Tales from a Not-So-Fabulous Life (13 page)

And I plan to do everything within my power to STOP them!

WHY?!

Because Chloe and Zoey are my BEST friends at this school!

And my ONLY friends at this school! But that’s beside the point.

Unfortunately, I only have TWO options:

1. Rat them out to their ’rents and risk losing their friendship forever

OR

2. Figure out a way to get girlfriends some tattoos for National Library Week PDQ (which, BTW, means “pretty darn quick”)!!

I hardly got any sleep last night! I kept having horrible nightmares about Chloe and Zoey living in the secret underground tunnels beneath the NYC public library.

In one of my dreams, they were having a dinner party with some of their neighbors.

And in the scariest one, I got married to Brandon Roberts and Chloe and Zoey were bridesmaids. But they brought a few uninvited guests to my wedding
!

OUR WEDDING

I actually woke up SCREAMING my head off until I realized it was all just a very bad dream!

This morning at breakfast my little sister, Brianna, got on my last nerve.

I was just sitting there, eating my Cinnamon Life, reading the back of the cereal box, and trying to figure out what I was going to do about the Chloe and Zoey situation.

They were planning to leave in less than twenty-four hours.

Brianna was eating Fruity Pebbles and drawing a face on her hand with an ink pen. She said she was naming the face “Miss Penelope” because she was “borned from a pen.”

BRIANNA’S HAND

“Got milk?!”

Even though I was trying to concentrate on my personal problems, Miss Penelope asked me to watch her perform “Itsy-Bitsy Spider,” the Rihanna remix version.

Apparently, the itsy-bitsy spider went up the water spout but got washed out by the rain because he had no umbrella, ella ella, eh, eh, eh!

The whole thing annoyed me to no end, because I wasn’t that into puppet shows.

Anyway, I warned both Brianna and Miss Penelope to quit bothering me, mainly because I was in a really

HORRIBLE MOOD.

And it was not helping matters that Miss Penelope’s awful singing sounded like a humpback whale in labor.

She must have been highly insulted by my unbiased critique of her singing abilities, because she hauled off and socked me on my arm.

So I grabbed Miss Penelope and tried to drown her in my cereal bowl.

I was like,

Brianna started screaming, “Stop it! Miss Penelope can’t swim! Let her go! You’re smushing her face!”

But I wouldn’t let go. That is, until my mom walked into the kitchen.

“Why on Earth are you shoving your sister’s hand in your cereal?! LET GO OF HER THIS INSTANT!!”

So I released Miss Penelope only because I didn’t have a choice.

Brianna stuck her tongue out at me. “Miss Penelope says she’s not inviting you to her birthday party! Na, na, na, na, na!!”

Then I stuck my tongue out at
her
and said, “I’ve
already
not been invited to a birthday party. SO THERE!” I could thank MacKenzie for that one.

Anyway, I think I taught Miss Penelope a good lesson. I bet she won’t be interrupting my breakfast again anytime soon (EVIL GRIN).

Since my cereal had been contaminated by Miss Penelope’s germs, I dumped it into the sink and ran upstairs to my bedroom.

I sat on my bed and stared at my wall as a million thoughts bounced around in my head.

I had to admit, the Chloe and Zoey situation seemed hopeless, and there was nothing I could do to fix it
.

To make matters worse, Miss Penelope was still in
the kitchen singing so off-key, I thought my ears were going to bleed. I felt like taking my favorite pen—a water-based, nontoxic, dark purple gel ink pen by Hot Writer, Inc.—and drawing a big fat zipper across her mouth to shut her up. But I was pretty sure my mom would have just YELLED at me again.

I mainly just use it to write in my diary and to bring me good luck. But lately, the good luck part hasn’t been working so well.

MY LUCKY PEN

I was twirling my pen in my fingers when, suddenly, the CRAZIEST idea popped into my head! I was like, OMG! This might work! I quickly scribbled out two notes and then rushed off to school fifteen minutes early to tape them on Chloe’s and Zoey’s lockers.

I waited in the janitor’s closet for five long minutes and was starting to worry they were not going to show up. But finally they did.

“I hope you didn’t ask us to come here to try and change our minds about running away,” Chloe said, real seriouslike.

“Yeah! This is something we just gotta do,” Zoey said, staring at the floor.

It got so sad and quiet, I thought I was going to cry.

“Um…I asked you both to come here to tell you about a special present I wanted to give you on Monday. But since you’re leaving tomorrow…”

Of course, this made Chloe and Zoey really curious, and they started begging me to tell them what it was.

“Well, you may not know this, but I’m a pretty decent artist. Not that I’m bragging or anything. And since you guys are my BFFs, I’ve decided to personally give you each a tattoo! Temporary ones. In honor of National Library Week!”

At first Chloe and Zoey just stared at me like they couldn’t believe it.

Then they started screaming and jumping up and down and hugging me.

ME, CHLOE, AND ZOEY DOING A GROUP HUG!

“Just decide what kind you want,” I said, “and I’ll design it over the weekend and draw it during lunch on Monday. But you both have to make me one promise…”

“Anything!!” Zoey gushed. “Let me guess! We have to ditch our plans to run away and live at the NYC library?”

“Okay, then it’s officially CANCELED!” Chloe announced, and did jazz hands, like the show was over.

“Actually, that’s not what I meant,” I said, hiding my smile and trying to look all scary-serious. “I want you both to promise me you won’t bring RATS to my wedding!”

“HUH?!” They both looked at me like I was crazy.

“Never mind!” I giggled. “It’s a long story.”