Taffy Sinclair 004 - Taffy Sinclair and the Romance Machine Disaster (9 page)

"
Will all the boys who have no paper or pencil or both please raise your hands.
"

Slowly nine hands raised into the air.

Wiggins cocked an eyebrow.
"
All right. All nine of you may do your quizzes at the blackboard.
"

I was having a terrible time keeping a straight face. It was too good to be true. The boys were getting what they deserved.

Suddenly Taffy Sinclair
'
s hand shot into the air.
"
Excuse me, Miss Wiggins,
"
she said in her icky sweet voice.
"
I have lots of paper and pencils that the boys can borrow.
"
Without waiting for Wiggins to answer, she gave Randy a piece of paper and a pencil and then handed a whole stack of paper and some more pencils to Mark Peters to pass around.

"
Thanks a lot, Taffy. You
'
re a real friend,
"
said Mark.

"
Yeah, thanks, Taffy,
"
said Randy, and most of the other boys mumbled
thank-you'
s, too.

Taffy glanced over her shoulder at the rest of us. She had that nasty smile on her face that she always gets when she is feeling superior. We were all so mad that if poison-dart looks could kill, she
'
d have been a goner.

Wiggins tapped her foot impatiently as she waited for everyone to settle down. You could tell that she was disappointed, too. But leave it to Taffy Sinclair to mess things up. Anyway, when all the boys had their paper and pencils, she began calling out the spelling words.

"
The last word is
responsibility
,"
Wiggins said loudly, sounding out all the syllables.

Responsibility? I thought. That wasn
'
t on the list. Then I smiled to myself. Good old Wiggins.

After a couple of minutes we passed our spelling tests to the front, and Wiggins told us to get out our math books and begin working the problems on page 79. They were pretty easy. Multiplying decimals.

"
Psst. Jana.
"

It was Keith Masterson. He always bugged me to give him answers, and sometimes I did. I smiled to myself. There was no way I was going to do it this time, and Taffy Sinclair was sitting too far away to help him.

"
Jana,
"
he whispered louder.

I kept right on ignoring him, and I could see all around the room that other girls were ignoring boys who wanted help with answers. Maybe our strike was going to work after all.

I should have known better than to forget about Taffy Sinclair. The moment Wiggins turned her back someone pitched a note onto Taffy
'
s desk. I didn
'
t see who did it, but it must have been a boy because Taffy was looking around and smiling her nasty smile again. Very slowly she started running the fingers of her left hand through the back of her long curly hair, acting as if she were concentrating on her
problems. Then
when it was obvious that Wiggins wasn
'
t looking, she held out three fingers, then two fingers, then made a fist, then one finger, and then she made a circle with her thumb and first finger.

It only took an instant to figure out what she was doing. I looked down the answers on my paper. Number seven! The answer I had gotten for number seven was 32.10. Taffy was giving the boys answers to the math problems. She had made the numbers three and two with her fingers. Her fist must have been the decimal point. Next she held up one finger and then made a circle for the zero. That traitor, I thought. I hated her more than ever.

On the playground after lunch Taffy Sinclair was the center of attention. The boys were all milling around her, talking and showing off. Every once in a while one of them would look away from Taffy and frown or throw a dir
ty look at any girl who went by.
It was totally disgusting. Taffy Sinclair was batting her big blue eyes at them. I tried not to notice that the one she was batting her eyes at the most was Randy Kirwan.

My friends and I were standing with Alexis, Lisa, Sara, and Kim.

"
They think that they are such hot stuff!
"
said Alexis.
"
Just wait. They can
'
t get along without us forever.
"

I wasn
'
t so sure. The way Taffy Sinclair had taken over made me wonder if any of them would ever notice us again.

Things really got out of hand when we got back to the room after lunch. As we were heading for our seats, Kim Baxter accidentally brushed her hand against Clarence Marshall
'
s arm.

"
Yuk!
"
shrieked Kim.
"
I touched a boy! Yuk! Yuk!
"
Kim shrank away from Clarence and held out her hand as if it had poison on it. That was all it took.

"
Yuk!
"
girls all over the room began to shout.
"
Yuk! Don
'
t touch boys!
"

With a big grin, Clarence lunged for Kim and slapped at her back, pretending to wipe something on her. Some of the other boys started doing the same thing, chasing girls around the room and trying to touch them while the girls were screaming
"
Yuk! Yuk!
"
at the top of their lungs.

Keith Masterson took out after me. He was making monster noises, and he grabbed my arm, nearly pulling it out of the socket.

"
YUK!
"
I screamed and tried to wrench out of his grip.

Just then Wiggins walked into the room. We all froze as if we were playing statues and waited to see what she would do.

Wiggins drew herself up to her full height and strode to the center of the room. Sunlight streaming in the windows glinted off her glasses, making her eyes look like circles of fire.
"
Get into your seats immediately,
"
she commanded, and we did.

"
Will someone please explain to me what this little episode was all about?
"

Of course nobody did. Nobody wanted to rat on their classmates. Not even Taffy Sinclair. Inside my chest my heart was pounding as if it were trying to get out.

"
I
'
m waiting,
"
Wiggins warned.

Still nobody said anything.

"
If no one volunteers, I will pick one of you,
"
she said. Then she began tapping her foot.

The room was so quiet that I could hear the electric clock humming. I had never heard that clock hum before. I tried to imagine what kind of punishment
Wiggins would come up with if nobody would tell. Just then I heard a voice.

"
I
'
ll explain what happened.
"
It was nerd of the world, Curtis Trowbridge. Leave it to him to fink, I thought. He was beaming as if he was about to do the most noble thing in the world.
"
The girls started it.
"

Clarence Marshall scrambled to his feet.
"
That
'
s right, Miss Wiggins. I just walked into the room minding my own business when Kim Baxter ran up to me and punched me and then started shouting
'
Yuk! I touched a boy! Yuk!
'"

"
That
'
s a lie!
"
shrieked Kim.
"
I didn
'
t punch him. I just accidentally brushed against him. And then he punched ME in the back—really HARD—and it HURT.
"
Kim started fake crying, and she doubled over as if she were in pain.

"
The girls think they
'
re so smart,
"
said Mark Peters.
"
They walk around with their noses in the air and act like it
'
s a really big crime if one of us wants to borrow a sheet of paper or something.
"

"
They
'
re the ones who think they
'
re smart,
"
shouted Alexis.
"
They don
'
t even bother to bring their own paper and pencils to school or even do their homework. They expect us to take care of them. They
'
re just a bunch of conceited babies!
"

"
I think I know what the matter really is,
"
offered Randy. Then he looked straight at Wiggins and said,
"
They
'
re mad because none of us will tell them who our girl matchup is. You said we didn
'
t have to. You said we could keep it a secret if we wanted to.
"

"
Sooooo,
"
said Wiggins, glancing around the room with a sly expression.
"
Just as I expected. This entire episode has something to do with the computer matchup.
"
She paused a moment. There was a gleam in her eye.
"
Yes, Randy. I did tell you that you could keep your matchups a secret if you wanted to. But there is something else about the computer that I did not mention.
"

Wiggins paused again, and I began to squirm in my seat. What on earth could she be talking about? Could the computer tell if you were lying? Or if you put down an answer because you thought it would make you match up with someone special? Or worst of all, since the boys were being so mysterious, did that mean the computer knew our secrets, and did it tell all our secrets to the boys
?

W
hat Wiggins said next was just about the strangest thing I had ever heard.

"
In some ways, the computer is only human.
"

I wasn
'
t the only one who thought it was strange. All over the room kids were shuffling their feet and shrugging and making weird faces at each other. Wiggins let us do that for a moment before she went on.

"
Some of you have been acting like big shots, enjoying all the attention you got from keeping your matchups a secret and playing hard to get. Some of the rest of you have been making nuisances of yourselves by trying every trick you can think of to find out who those matchups are.
"

How did Wiggins know a thing like that? I wondered. Had she been spying? Did she know about how I had my friends talk me up to Randy Kirwan? Did she think I had made a nuisance of myself? I felt my ears start to get hot.

"
Some of you have even been acting as if the computer were some sort of magic box that could tell you who your true love was meant to be. The truth, as I said, is that the computer is only human because it can only evaluate the information you give it. It doesn
'
t know anything you don
'
t tell it. So,
"
s
he paused, sticking up a finger
like an exclamation point,
"
the matchup each one of you got is exactly who you wanted.
"

I shot up straight in my seat and frowned at Wiggins. How could she say a thing like that? Randy Kirwan is the most conceited boy in the world. I certainly don
'
t want anything to do with him, I thought. Then another voice in my mind spoke up.
"
You did when you filled out that questionnaire. Besides, what if he was just enjoying the attention he was getting from all the girls who got his name?
"
"
Isn
'
t that what
conceited
means?
"
reasoned the first voice.
"
Well, maybe he was just playing hard to get,
"
said the second voice.

No! I insisted, almost saying the word out loud. Randy wasn
'
t
playing
anything. He had changed. Maybe he wasn
'
t conceited before, but he certainly was now.

My four best friends felt the same way I did about what Wiggins had said about the computer matchup.

"
Wiggins must be crazy to think we
'
d believe that we all got who we wanted on the boy-girl matchup,
"
said Christie on the way home from school.
"
If I had gotten who I wanted, I would have gotten Mr. Scott instead of Gregory Harper.
"

"
I
'
d rather have Gregory Harper than who I got,
"
I said.
"
Anybody is better than Randy Kirwan.
"

"
I think she was just saying that to calm everybody down,
"
said Katie. I tried not to laugh, remembering that Katie had gotten
"
Computer error #14.
"

I was still fuming about it when Mom got home from work. This time she stormed into the apartment, slamming the door so hard that the dishes rattled.

"
You
'
ll be happy to know that I broke my date with Pink for dinner at Ricardo
'
s Saturday night,
"
she said.

I couldn
'
t for the life of me think why I would be happy with news like that, but when I said so, it set Mom off ranting and raving about Pink.

"
I
'
ve really had it with that man,
"
she said.
"
I don
'
t know why I
'
ve wasted so much of my life on him. And to think, I was actually considering marrying him.
"

"
What did he do this time?
"
I asked.

"
He ignored me again today. That
'
s what. You
'
d think that I was poison or something. I don
'
t know why he
'
s suddenly changed, but I
'
ve had it!
"

"
But how can you forget what a super guy Pink is?
"
I asked.
"
Don
'
t you remember how concerned he was when you were sick? He sent you flowers and called all the time to see if you needed anything.
"

"
Oh, I remember, all right,
"
she said, nodding her head and frowning as if I had just reminded her of something terrible.
"
First he made a nuisance of himself by trying every trick he could think of to get my attention. And
now
—now he
'
s playing hard to get!
"

I didn
'
t answer right away. Mom
'
s words had hit me like a bucket of cold water. They were almost the same words Wiggins had used when she was talking about the way our class was acting ever since the computer matchup.
Nuisance. Trying every trick he could think of. Playing hard to get.
I didn
'
t know when I had been more confused. I was certain that Pink hadn
'
t changed. He was just desperate. I couldn
'
t blame him for trying all those things on Mom. She certainly could be stubborn sometimes. I wanted to believe that Randy hadn
'
t changed either, but I couldn
'
t. There was just too much evidence convincing me that he had.

"
If you think Pink is bad, you should see Randy Kirwan,
"
I said.
"
Ever since I told him off, he
'
s been hanging around Taffy Sinclair. If you ask me, they deserve each other.
"

"
Believe me, men are all alike,
"
Mom said in that warning tone she gets sometimes.
"
To make matters worse, I got a call from your father today.
"

My heart fluttered.
"
You did?
"
I whispered.
"
What did he want?
"
I tried not to hope that he had wanted to talk to me, and of course he hadn
'
t.

"
He called to tell me that he lost his job. It
'
s his drinking again. Not only that, he asked me for money. He knows that we can barely get along as it is.
"

"
What are you going to do?
"

"
I have a little saved. I guess I
'
ll have to send it to him. He hinted that without money he
'
d lose his apartment, and knowing him, that
'
s the same as saying that he
'
d come here and try to live off us. That
'
s all I need on top of my troubles with Pink. Men!
"
mumbled Mom.

"
Men!
"
I echoed, but I was tingling all over. I knew Mom was right. My father is an alcoholic, and it would be wrong for him to try to live off us. But something inside me was secretly wishing that he would come, just for a little while, so that we could get better acquainted. Besides, Mom said that men were all alike. If that was true, maybe I could tell him about how Randy has been acting, and he would understand and know what I should do.

On the way to school the next morning I was still thinking about my father
'
s call and about what a jerk Randy had become when I heard someone running up behind me.

"
Jana,
"
called Melanie.
"
Wait up.
"

She was out of breath when she caught up with me, but that didn
'
t stop her from talking excitedly between gulps of air.
"
Scott called me last night
. . . and . . . oh, Jana, he told me that he got my name. He said he was tired of keeping his matchup a secret.
"
She paused to take a deep breath.
"
And guess what? You did start something when you had a date with Randy! Scott asked me to meet him at Mama Mia
'
s after the game.
"

I smiled weakly and tried to think of something to say, but I had a queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach.

"
And guess what else?
"
Melanie burst out.
"
I almost forgot. Oh, wow! You
'
d kill me if I forgot this.
"
Then she lowered her voice to a confidential tone.
"
I asked Scott about Randy. Scott said that at first Randy didn
'
t tell because he just didn
'
t like all the attention. You know, the boys teasing him and all the girls saying they had his name and everything. He thought that he
'
d wait a while until things quieted down to tell who he got. But instead of quieting down, things got worse.
"

"
You mean, he got conceited,
"
I grumbled.
"
Did you ask him whose name Randy got?
"

Melanie nodded.
"
He wouldn
'
t tell me. He said that Randy would
tell himself when he got ready.
"

We walked the rest of the way to school in silence. I didn
'
t want to talk about Randy anymore. I felt so confused and hurt and angry that I didn
'
t want to talk about anybody or anything.

All day long I kept hearing about boys who were telling girls that they got their name. Of course Clarence Marshall was going around saying he had Taffy. I also kept noticing that Randy was looking at me a lot, and once in the cafeteria he even tried to get my attention. I just looked the other way. I certainly didn
'
t want to talk to him.

At home that evening I bragged to Mom about how I had snubbed Randy.
"
I wouldn
'
t look at him once all day long,
"
I said.
"
Not even when he tried to get my attention. I guess I showed him a thing or two.
"

"
Don
'
t you think you
'
re being a little hard on him?
"
she asked.
"
It wasn
'
t so long ago that you thought he was just about perfect, and I
'
ve always liked him. Maybe if you gave in and talked to him, all this trouble would be over with. Did you ever stop to think that maybe he
'
s waiting for you to make the first move?
"

I couldn
'
t believe what I was hearing. How could she say a thing like that? After all, she had been having as much trouble with Pink as I had been having with Randy.

I looked at her suspiciously.
"
Did you pay attention to Pink today?
"

Mom seemed embarrassed.
"
Not much,
"
she said.

"
What do you mean, not much?
"

"
Um . . . well, I said hello a couple of times, but that
'
s all.
"

I was feeling confused again. Why did she keep changing her mind? I was certain that Pink really was a super person and that Mom had been mean to him the last couple of days. But now that she seemed to be giving in and talking to him again, I suddenly felt alone and betrayed. Just then the phone rang. It
'
s probably Pink, I thought, feeling lonelier than ever. It wasn
'
t. It was Melanie, and she wanted me to go to the boys
'
football game with her Saturday.