Sticks & Stones (14 page)

“No, it did!” Mom said. “She performed wonderfully.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “I did.”

“Great to hear,” he said. “Then what's going on with all of this?”

I looked down at my shoes. I didn't really want to explain to my old guy doctor that this was all because of a boy and a bad friend. So embarrassing.

“There've been some social struggles,” Mom said like she was an expert on everything that was happening. I did my very best to be nice and not roll my eyes.

“Hmm,” Dr. Patel said again, looking me up and down. “And all of these negative words, have they been from the mouths of others? Or from up here?” He tapped on his forehead with his pen.

“Um … they might be from that area. Mostly.”

He and Mom both looked at me like they felt sorry for me, and I wished that I could disappear right then and there. Those looks weren't making anything better, that was for sure.

“Maybe if you focus on something else,” Dr. Patel suggested. “A project of some kind. Something to take your mind off whatever issues you're having with your friends.”

“You still don't know for sure about Explorer Leader,” Mom added. “It's a very special honor at her school,” she told Dr. Patel. “She finds out sometime this week. And if you don't get it, Elyse, you'll be on the committee. You'll still be an important helper. I really think you'll get the job, though, despite how you doubt yourself so much.”

“I don't know,” I mumbled. “I don't think Mr. Todd thinks I'm the best person for it.” It was true. He didn't think I could grab the horns on the bull or however that saying went. He told me himself.

But, I remembered, there was still the hope that my activity—or the note writer or both—could change Mr. Todd's mind. Yeah. And then I'd be the most popular person in sixth grade, and I'd feel amazing, too.

I smiled a little. That could really happen. It could all work out dandier than a dandelion.

“I guess I don't know for sure,” I added. “It could be me. And if it's not, being on the committee would be cool, too.”

They both nodded and smiled at me like I was such a good little girl for agreeing with them. But I had something else in mind, a slightly different, better kind of project that was slowly becoming an actual plan.

I was finally going to do something to figure out who wrote the notes, and get him or her to hurry the high heels up and talk to Mr. Todd. And I was going to do it soon.

“Great appointment, guys,” I said, pushing my sleeves and pant legs down. “Ready to go, Mom?”

“I guess so. Unless there's any additional information we need or any new developments you want to tell us about—creams, advances, anything…”

Dr. Patel shook his head. “Not today, I'm afraid.”

I looked him right in the eye. “But maybe another day?”

He patted my leg. “Maybe another day,” he said. “Maybe another day.”

 

23

CRAZY BOMBS

I walked into school the next day with a mission. Instead of grabbing my books from my locker and heading straight to class like normal, I made sure to keep an eye out for suspicious activity. I scoured the floor for blue papers and peered into every eyeball, looking for ones that seemed guilty. But this was only part one.

When I finally made it to class, I was quick to take my notebooks and pencils out and pull my sleeves down as far as humanly possible so that no one could see
WORTHLESS
and
TOTAL LOSER
on my wrists. Then I got down to business. Maybe the note writer was someone in this class—but no one was writing on blue paper. This was going to be harder than I thought.

“Elyse, Mr. Todd wants to see you,” Ms. Sigafiss said.

Everyone went “Oooooh” and turned around to look at me, and I knew my face had turned the color of a strawberry.

I gathered all my stuff, dropping like five hundred things in the process, and I didn't even have five hundred things with me.

“Oooooh,” everyone went again. Awesome.

KLUTZ
bumped onto my right elbow and pinched me like a bug bite. If only there was a special bug spray I could wear to protect me from these words.

I scurried out of the room, down the hall, and into Mr. Todd's office. I nearly collapsed on the blue couch, tired from being pinched and tired in general.

But also a little excited. Was this the moment I had been waiting for?

“Feeling blue?” he asked in a quiet voice.

“No,” I said.

LIAR.
Ugh.

He eyed me suspiciously, like he could see the word through my sleeve and knew how badly I wanted to scratch it. Didn't he have any important principal-ing things to tend to? There had to be some kid doing something bad somewhere in the building, but here he was, trying to get
me
to admit I felt blue.

“Well, even if you
are
feeling blue, or even blue-ish”—he eyed me again—“I think I have some news that's going to brighten your day.”

Now I was interested. Very interested. I sat up straight, showing him just how non-blue I was. Blue people were usually slouchy people, after all.

“I've noticed that lately you've been a little more…” He paused, leaning back in his big black chair and scratching his hairy chin. “Proactive than usual. I was really impressed with your performance in the fund-raising show, and it seems that since then, you've been extremely engaged socially with your peers and with the greater community.”

“Yeah,” I said. “It's nice that someone noticed!”

“I was also extremely impressed by the activity idea you turned in. It was thorough, well-researched, and relevant to the type of trip we're trying to plan. With all of this in mind, I can tell that you want to be Explorer Leader, and I think you'd be a very good one.”

I could hardly believe what I was hearing.

“Wait.” I leaned forward, almost falling off the blue couch. Such a klutz. My face felt red, but in a super-duper, crazy-happy-excited kind of way. “Are you serious? You want to make
me
the Explorer Leader? Me, Elyse Everett.
Really?
”

He smiled. “Is that a problem?”

“No! No!” Now I
had
fallen off the couch.
KLUTZ
got bigger and itchier, but I was more focused on the amazing sensation of
WINNER
growing on my left knee. “That is so not a problem. I can do that. I can definitely do that.”

“Glad to hear it.” He got up. “I'll be in touch about your responsibilities, but know that it's going to be a lot of work. I'm going to depend on you to plan activities and meals, but there's plenty of time for you and the committee to work together before February. Here are some things you might find helpful—a basic outline of the schedule, some articles on leadership, and useful e-mail addresses and phone numbers.” He handed me a ginormous stack of papers. “Oh—and one more thing before you go. Look, I want you to know that I have a lot more hair than most people.” He motioned to the furry arms that stuck out of his short-sleeved shirt. The Loud Crowd could make thousands of little French braids out of all that hair.

“Uh, that's nice.”

What is a person supposed to say to that?

He looked at me like he was trying to tell me something really important, but it's hard to concentrate on important things when you want to squeal your brains out.

“It's not particularly nice, Elyse. It's often embarrassing. I
could
do something to remove it, but that would require a lot of time and energy. So instead, I'm okay with it. This is who I am. I'm a man who has more hair than most. So be it.”

“Um, yes,” I said, my heart racing because I really wanted to get out of there and go tell everyone my news. “So be it.” I tapped my foot and bounced up and down in my seat.
Set me free, you hairy, hairy man!

“Well,” he said, staring at me with his teeny eyeballs. “I suppose that's it. We'll talk soon. Have a nice rest of your day.”

I skipped out of his office all the way down the hall. I was going to be Explorer Leader! This was happening! It didn't even seem real, but it was. It really, really was. This was
my life
. My fabulous, wonderful life.

With each step I took, I felt happier and lighter as my awful words disappeared, then even more amazing as they were replaced with words like
COOL
and
AWESOME
and
BEST
. Only the coolest and most awesome and best person was picked for something like this. And I was that person! It was already having the effect I wanted, and no one else even knew about it yet, which meant it could only get better from here.

I walked slowly down the hall where the Explorer Leader posters had been placed after the show. The one with the giant question mark in the face wasn't a question anymore. It had an answer, and that answer was me. Me!

I opened Ms. Sigafiss's door slowly and tried to sneak back in without distracting people too much. But it was hard. I was about to burst. This was the kind of thing that needed to be shouted from the rooftops, or at least announced to the whole class.

“Do you want to tell us why Mr. Todd wanted to see you, Ms. Everett?”

Ms. Sigafiss's voice made me jump. I wasn't sure if it was because she was talking to me or if it was because she was actually using a nice, friendly voice when there weren't any parents in the room. It was almost too nice of a voice. Was this a trap? And how did she know I'd want to share what Mr. Todd told me?

Maybe he told the teachers before he told me. That must be it. But it didn't really matter, because here was my chance to shout it from the back of the classroom, and I was certainly not going to waste it.

“Um,” I said, probably blushing as everyone's eyes turned toward me. “He told me that … that … I'm the Explorer Leader.”

For a second the whole room went silent. I realized after I said it that some people might be mad. Snotty Ami, for one. And maybe even Nice Andy. They had both wanted it bad, too.

I was wrong about Nice Andy, of course. After the silence ended, he and Olivia leaped out of their chairs and gave me great big tackle hugs.

“Explorer Leader Elyse!” Kevin yelled, jumping out of his chair and clapping like crazy. Soon a bunch of other people joined in, too. I laughed a little. People cared a lot more about making a scene than celebrating me, but it was still pretty cool. Really cool.

I glanced over at Jeg and Liam, and they were looking at each other—gross—but they were clapping, too. A big I-love-everybody feeling came over me, and I wanted to give everyone a huge hug, except for those two. Okay, and except for Snotty Ami and Paige and Lindsey and the rest of the Loud Crowd, and except for Ms. Sigafiss. But otherwise, everybody.

“Stop it!” Ms. Sigafiss shouted. The room was getting really loud and rowdy. “Stop it right now. This level of noise is unacceptable.”

“Yeah, stop it,” Snotty Ami echoed as the room quieted down a little. “It's totes not a big deal.”

“Jealous, much?” Nice Andy retorted.

“No.” Snotty Ami stood up. “But just because Elyse has CA—”

“Cavities,” I quickly jumped in. I knew I couldn't hide CAV forever, and most people probably knew anyway, but did she have to try to bring it up now? She couldn't get away with it. I wouldn't let her. “I have cavities,” I continued. “I admit it. But I'm not going to let them stop me from doing a great job.”

I got some funny looks, but it shut up Snotty Ami for a second. Then Ms. Sigafiss said, “Congratulations, Elyse,” and actually smiled at me a little bit, but then she started talking about who knows what so fast that it was like the smile didn't even happen. But it did. I think.
She might not be all bad,
I decided.

I sat down at my desk and traced the letters through my sleeves with my fingers.
A-W-E-S-O-M-E. C-O-O-L. B-E-S-T. S-P-E-C-I-A-L. I-M-P-O-R-T-A-N-T.
Not too shabby. Not too shabby at all.

I bent down to get my notebook out of my backpack (Elyse the Explorer Leader didn't care about whatever Ms. Sigafiss was babbling about, but she was still going to take notes and get good grades) and noticed a crumpled blue paper (the real paper kind, not the Post-it kind) on the floor. My jaw dropped and I felt a surge of dread and excitement both. Was it from the mystery writer? Would it be something cool to do, like being in the fund-raiser show, or something awful, like breaking up Jeg and Kevin? (Maybe this time I'd have to break up Jeg and Liam. Hmm—that might not be so bad.) And what was in it for me, anyway? I had gotten what I wanted. Maybe the note writer just wanted to say hi and congrats or offer some advice for Explorer Leader-ing. That would be cool. Maybe they would tell me who they were so I could stop wondering! Then I wouldn't even need to do my plan.

Breaking up Jeg and Kevin seemed like such a long time ago. I wished so bad that I had never done it.
But,
I reminded myself,
you didn't do it.
Kevin was going to do it anyway. You just helped speed things up.

Then I noticed a sinking feeling in my stomach, and some awful thoughts popped into my mind. The thing was, what if I had ignored the note writer and skipped that one? What if, without my anonymous motivation, Kevin had decided not to break up with Jeg after all? What if she was still with him today and not with Liam, freeing him up to go out with me again? And also, what the high heels did any of this have to do with me becoming Explorer Leader?

This was what I was (briefly) thinking about as I scooped up the piece of paper and opened it. To my surprise, it was totally, completely blank.

I flipped it over to the other side. Nothing. The one time I had been kinda ready for it, the note was a false alarm. I wasn't sure if I was disappointed or relieved, but when
WORRYWART
crept onto my upper arm, I knew something wasn't completely right with the world.