Boys Are Dogs (17 page)

“So can you come? Or do you need to check with your parents first?”

“It’s just my mom,” I said.

“Really?” asked Rachel. “So who’s the bald dude who’s always hanging around here?”

“Oh, that’s my mom’s boyfriend. He lives with us, too.”

“Your parents are divorced?” she asked.

“Not exactly.”

“So where’s your dad?”

No one had asked me that in a while, which was good since the real story is pretty complicated.

I don’t have a dad. Not one I’ve ever met, anyway. Twelve years ago, my mom went to graduate school at Oxford, in England, and came home pregnant with me. My biological father is named Sven Cooper. When he heard the news, he decided he wasn’t ready to be a dad. Mom said fine, she didn’t need him and neither did I. And we don’t.

She told me I shouldn’t take this personally because he decided all this before I was even born and he’s never met me. They never speak, but she said she’d help me contact him one day if I wanted. Also, if it was okay with him, she’d even take me there to visit. But it was also okay for me never to see him. It was my choice. And so far, I hadn’t made up my mind, which I guess meant I was choosing no thanks. At least for now.

But that’s a lot to explain to someone. Especially someone I’ve only known for a few weeks. Even if that person is as cool as Rachel.

“Um, I don’t really have a dad,” I said, hoping she’d leave it at that.

“Oh,” she said. “Hey, what are you doing now?”

I was about to say nothing, but stopped myself. It sounded like Rachel was about to invite me over. And what if Jackson was around? I didn’t want to see him on a weekend. Five days a week at school were bad enough. But I couldn’t exactly admit that.

“Um, I have a lot of homework,” I said, even though I didn’t.

“Oh, too bad,” said Rachel. “I’m heading over to Yumi’s and she told me to invite you, too.”

I wanted to tell Rachel I made a mistake, that most of my homework was done, but it was too late. I didn’t want her to get suspicious. She’d invited me over twice last week, and I’d had to make up excuses. Pretty soon she might figure out the truth.

“Tell Yumi I say hi,” I said glumly.

Rachel was already at the sidewalk. “Will do,” she called, before climbing onto her bike and pedaling off.

I watched her cruise down Clemson Court and then disappear around the corner.

It stunk that Rachel was allergic to Pepper. And it stunk even more that I was, well, if not allergic to, then at least extremely repelled by her brother.

chapter seventeen
house arrest

T
urned out, there really was a lake in Westlake. Mom finally fixed my squeaky bike and we rode to the lake on Sunday afternoon. We tried riding around it, but some lady in a pink warm-up suit waved us down and explained that the path was for running and walking only.

When we got home, I brushed up on my boy training, and it really paid off. Hardly anyone called me Spam or Spazabelle or any other variation of Annabelle on Monday. In science class, Oliver was nice to me and Tobias ignored me, which was the best I could hope for.

When some boy tried to trip me in the hallway before math, I stepped tall and easily cleared his foot.

A Corn Dog Boy threw popcorn at my head during lunch, but when I confronted him, he apologized, and insisted he’d been aiming for someone else.

Better yet, I’d successfully avoided Jackson all week. On Tuesday I saw him strut down the hall, and quickly ducked into the first open classroom. When he stopped by our table in the cafeteria to bum some money off Rachel on Wednesday, I hid behind a tree. Only Claire had noticed. In response to her quizzical glance, I’d crouched down and pawed at the ground. “I lost an earring,” I’d told her. And she’d believed me, even though my ears aren’t pierced. Sure, I felt kind of bad when she bent down to help me look for it, but not bad enough to tell her the truth.

I figured my problems were over.

But that was before Friday, when Mr. Beller passed back our book reports.

He waited until class was almost over before making the announcement. “I decided to be discreet, and write your grade on the last page, instead of the first,” he explained, like he was doing us a huge favor. “That way you’ll all have the opportunity to learn about your grade in private.”

As soon as the first kid, Marco, got his book report back, he flipped to the last page, whooped, and yelled, “A-minus. Yes!”

So much for privacy. The more papers Mr. Beller passed out, the louder the room got. Kids yelled their grades across the room if they were happy with them, or just groaned loudly if they weren’t. This happened despite our teacher’s repeated requests to settle down.

No one listened. The room was pure chaos. I must say—all the frenzy got me excited. When I got my report, I anxiously flipped to the last page. Instead of a grade, I found a note written in red pen:
Annabelle,
please see me after class. Mr. Beller.

No one else got a note, as far as I could tell. I sat there in silence, trying to figure out what it could mean. Obviously, nothing good.

As soon as the bell rang I hurried up to Mr. Beller’s desk.

“You wanted to see me,” I said.

“Ah, yes, Annabelle with the ketchup stains.” He chuckled to himself, like ketchup stains were extremely amusing. Then he folded his hands on his desk and sat back. “I’m concerned about the condition of your book report.”

“Um, that wasn’t really my fault.”

I tried to explain but he cut me off, raising his hand and frowning, like he’d already heard all the excuses in the universe.

“I don’t want to hear it. I just want a book report that doesn’t smell like the cafeteria.”

“Right, of course. I can get you a clean copy tomorrow. I was going to offer to do that last week, but—”

“It’s too late for that,” he said, shaking his head.

I looked from Mr. Beller to my book report, waiting for the obvious. But since he wasn’t saying anything, I had to ask, “So, what’s my grade?”

He sighed. “Clearly you read and understood the book. I can tell that you worked hard on this, which leaves me in a quandary. Had you turned in clean pages, you’d have gotten a B-plus. But since this is such a mess, well, I’m going to have to dock you a grade.”

“A whole grade?” I cried. “You’re giving me a C-plus?”

“I’m not giving you a C-plus. You’ve earned a C-plus.”

I hated how he kept saying C-plus. And to get technical, I
earned
a B-plus. It’s not like I asked Tobias and Erik to steal my report. None of this was my fault. “But that’s not—”

“I don’t want to hear it, Annabelle. Just don’t let this happen again.”

I stood there for a moment, my stomach in knots, trying to figure out a way to make him understand. But Mr. Beller had already slammed his grade book closed. He got up from his desk and began erasing the white board, like I wasn’t even there. Clearly there was no reasoning with him.

I left the room in a daze. Anger burned inside of me. Confusion, too, because I didn’t even know who to blame. Tobias? Mr. Beller? My mother for making me move to Westlake? Dweeble for dating my mom in the first place?

By the time I walked into social studies I was a few minutes late. My teacher, Ms. Winters, didn’t say anything, but she did frown when I walked in, which was almost as bad.

We won our third basketball game in a row in PE, thanks to the free throws I made after Tommy fouled me. But it didn’t help. I still felt lousy.

I couldn’t even walk Pepper after school that day. When I peeked out the window, I saw Jackson dragging his skateboard ramp to the bottom of the cul-de-sac. I waited him out, hoping he’d get bored and go home. But five minutes later, four more boys I didn’t recognize showed up. Each dressed almost identically in a ski cap, T-shirt, baggy shorts and Vans, like a uniform.

They stood around the ramp for a while, talking, shaking it, kicking the bottom, checking to make sure it was sturdy, I guess. Then they proceeded to skate off it, one by one.

Jackson alone was intimidating enough. But Jackson with four other guys? No way could I go near them. I didn’t think so, anyway. And I certainly wasn’t going to try.

Soon they moved on to more elaborate jumps. One kid did a three hundred and sixty degree turn in midair. The next one tried to do the same, but fell. As he rolled around on the street, cradling his knee in pain, his friends cheered and laughed.

Yup. You heard me right. He hurt himself and the other boys laughed!

I turned away from the window. This served as just one more example of how Jackson was like no dog I’d ever known or read about. In fact, putting Jackson in the same category as a dog insulted my dog in a major way. I loved Pepper. He was so much sweeter than Jackson, or any boy. It wasn’t his fault he was out of control. It was just his natural puppy energy.

I think Pepper woke up every morning wondering, “What kind of fun am I going to have today? Where will I get to go? Who will I jump all over? And which cool stuff will I chew up?”

Meanwhile, Jackson probably woke up asking, “Who am I going to torture today? And how?”

If my time at Birchwood taught me anything, it was this: Jackson was completely immune to training.

That got me thinking. What if only the sixth grade boys could be trained like dogs? In two years, they’d grow up to be eighth grade boys. And what would I do then?

Did it matter? Because even when my boy-training lessons worked, they didn’t
really
work. Yes, I’d gotten my book report back after I stopped chasing Erik and Tobias. But they’d still managed to mess up my grade.

Maybe I just didn’t belong at Birchwood. Maybe the universe was sending me a message.

I picked up the dog-training book, since there were still a few pages I hadn’t yet read. But before I opened it, Pepper ran into my room, carrying one of Mom’s sandals.

“Drop it, Pepper.”

He ignored me, and stretched out on the floor so he could chew in a more comfortable position. I tried distracting him with Buttons but he wasn’t interested.

“Drop it.” I spoke sharply, which got him to stop, but only for two seconds. When I reached for the shoe, he pounced on it.

Great. That’s just perfect. I’d been trying to get Pepper to drop things for weeks, and I wasn’t getting anywhere. So if I can’t even train my dog, what made me think I could ever train boys?

“Come on, Pepper.” This time I waved Buttons in front of his face. “Mom got her fixed, so she’s all in one piece.”

He dropped the shoe and went for Buttons, but I put her on my highest bookshelf.

“Let’s go, Pepper.”

At least he followed me downstairs like I wanted him to.

Pepper went for the front door, but I had to take him out back, instead.

“Here, Pep.”

I picked up an old tennis ball so we could play fetch. He’d finally gotten it down.

It would’ve been fun, had I not felt like we were under house arrest. Forced to stay in the backyard because I was too wimpy to go out front.

chapter eighteen
birthday bashing

I
peeked out my bedroom window a few hours later to find the street empty. As happy as I was to see Jackson and the other skater guys gone, it didn’t do me much good because it was already too late to take Pepper on a real walk.

At least I could go to Rachel’s birthday party without stressing. She told me Jackson would be bowling all day, so I had nothing to worry about. I even found some real beach towels. Dweeble had a bunch left over from his first marriage. I took one with faded rainbow stripes. At first I was happy because it was cool and colorful, but as I walked across the street to Rachel’s on Saturday, I worried that it looked too worn out. Hopefully, no one would care.

An older woman with short, curly dark hair and small glasses answered the door as soon as I rang the bell, like she’d been waiting in the entryway. “Oh, hi. You must be Annabelle. I’m Rachel’s mom. Please call me Jenny. I’m so glad you’re finally here. Isn’t that always the way? The people who live closest are always the last to arrive.” She spoke so quickly, it took me a few moments to take it all in.