Seeing Cinderella (16 page)

Super Freaky Glasses Rule #
₁₅

Not everyone has a pair of magic glasses. If you’re sorry for something, they won’t know unless you say so.

“W
ANT SOME CHOCOLATE
?” E
LLEN SAID A COUPLE WEEKS
later in drama class. “They’re from Scott.”

I looked at the gooey sweets she offered my way and tried not to gag. I was so
not
going to eat Scott’s latest love declaration. I didn’t care how good those truffles smelled.

“No thanks,” I said, staring at the truffle and the dreamy expression on Ellen’s face. “Too much sweetness makes me barf.”

Stacy stifled a giggle, but Ellen seemed unfazed.

“Your loss.” Ellen popped the truffle into her mouth.
“Anyway, then he said I was pretty, and then he said he had a crush on me in sixth grade, and then he said—”

“That he would’ve asked you out last year, but you never noticed him. Yes, Ellen, I
know
.”

I wasn’t wearing my glasses. That’s not how I knew what Ellen was going to say. I knew because Ellen told me this story twice already. Once before first period started. Then again after first period ended. And now in drama, when we were supposed to be running our lines.

“Come on,” I said, cutting off Ellen, who was still slobbering on and on about Scott. “The play is this weekend. We need to practice.”

“What’s to practice?” Ellen said. “It’s just memorizing a bunch of words—it’s like taking a test.”

“It’s not at all like taking a test,” I said. “You have to learn your character.”

“Sheesh, Callie, you sound just as bad as Mr. Angelo.” Scott came up behind Ellen, followed by a glum-looking Charlie. Scott struck a pose and said in his best Mr. Angelo impersonation, “You have to
learn
your character. You have to
feel
your character. You have to
respect
your character.”

Ellen giggled and Scott continued. “I think you’ve practiced with your understudy enough for one day, don’t you? Want to hang out with your Prince?”

“Sure.”

“Wait, Ellen, don’t you think . . .” I trailed off as Ellen and Scott floated away to the corner, where they sat down and started whispering.

“It’s no use,” Charlie said behind me. “They don’t take it seriously. And they’re both horrible actors.”

I laughed and turned around. “Don’t hold back, tell me how you really feel.”

Charlie grinned and shrugged. “It’s true. Every time I’ve practiced with her she hasn’t done much more than just recite her lines. To tell you the truth”—he lowered his voice—“I was surprised Ellen got the lead. I mean, I know she’s your best friend and all, but I really thought you’d be Cinderella.”

“You did?”

“Yeah, I thought your audition was hilarious.”

“I’m sure Mr. Angelo had a good reason for giving the part to Ellen,” I said, choosing my words carefully. “Besides, why do you care? You said you were just taking drama to get an easy A.”

I thought about the few times I’d spied on Charlie’s thoughts—he was usually reciting his lines in his head. “You were lying, weren’t you? You actually like drama.”

Charlie grinned. “Don’t tell Scott.”

I nodded and turned away and realized that I just had a whole conversation with a boy without getting nervous or using my glasses to talk to him.

Weird.

I sat down next to Stacy, who flipped a page in her script so hard it tore, making a loud ripping sound. She stared at Ellen and Scott with a strange expression on her face, so I slipped my glasses out of my backpack and waited until the screen appeared next to her:
What good is having a best friend if she’s never around? Ellen hasn’t called me all week.

I knew how Stacy felt—it had been weeks since Ellen called me regularly. And now that I thought about it, I never saw Stacy hang out with anyone else other than Ellen.

Kind of like me.

“Callie. Stacy.” Mr. Angelo stalked over to us, looking irritated. “What are you two doing?”

“Nothing,” we both answered.

“Precisely. If you can’t be bothered to practice your lines, then perhaps I could trouble you to run an errand instead.”

“Okay,” Stacy said. “We’ll do it.”
I have to get out of here,
her thoughts scrolled across the screen hovering next to her.

I know exactly how you feel
, I wanted to tell her.

“Here’s a hall pass. Take these receipts to Principal
Reynolds’s office.” Mr. Angelo handed Stacy a stack of slips.

We left, and I read the thoughts scrolling across the screen bobbing along next to Stacy:
I sooooo cannot stand another minute of Scott and Ellen. They make me sick. She missed the Key Club meeting because she couldn’t bear to be away from him. I only joined that lame club because she did.

We continued to walk, and the silence became uncomfortable until Stacy said, “What are you doing tomorrow after school?”

“My dad is taking my sister and me out to dinner.” Finally Dad said he could come down early for the weekend. Mom had gone out of her way to be nice to him all week whenever they talked on the phone.

“Oh.” Stacy looked away, and the words scrolling across the screen changed:
Great. So I have to go out for pizza with
The Scott and Ellen Show
by myself tomorrow. Fun.

I looked away, grateful Stacy hadn’t said anything out loud. I didn’t want to tell her Ellen hadn’t mentioned anything to me about going out for pizza.

After we dropped the receipts off at Principal Reynolds’s office and headed back to drama, we heard a stern voice echoing down the hall.

“Hey, you!” A boy as skinny as a lima bean, and clad
in the blue and gold vest all hall monitors were required to wear, flagged us down.

“What are you doing out of class?” The air shimmered, and the blue screen appeared next to him.
They are so busted
, his thoughts said.

“We’re running errands for our teacher.” Stacy fished the hall pass out of her pocket and showed it to him.

He glanced at it suspiciously. “This doesn’t look like a teacher’s handwriting.”

“Would you like to walk us back to class and talk to Mr. Angelo?” Stacy asked in her sweetest voice.

He thrust the pass back at Stacy. “Just don’t dawdle.”

Stacy and I waited until he’d turned the corner to burst into giggles. “What a creep,” she said.

“I know,” I said. “Hey—did you know at the beginning of the year Ellen wanted to be a hall monitor?”

“No. Did you, too?”

“No. I told her people would run away from us.”

“And what did Ellen say to that?”

“That only the slackers would run away.”

Stacy laughed. “That sounds like Ellen.”

We continued down the hall, and Stacy’s thoughts changed: An image formed, of me and Ellen and Stacy eating lunch one day in the cafeteria. Ellen and Stacy were
giggling over a joke or something. And when I looked at myself, I realized I was glaring. Right at Stacy. Then another image—of me and Stacy and Ana sitting together in drama class, the day I asked Ana to go to the movies. While I whispered to Ana, Stacy looked at us hopefully. But when I went back to my script, her smile vanished.

Had Stacy been hoping I would invite her, too?

The screen changed again, and Stacy’s thoughts scrolled across:
I wish Callie didn’t hate me so much.

I almost smacked into a row of lockers. I didn’t hate Stacy. I just didn’t like her a whole lot. Weren’t you supposed to dislike the girl who stole your best friend? Then again, how did I know I didn’t like Stacy? I barely knew her. And that was my fault, I realized. Stacy had tried to be friends with me at the beginning of the year—she even offered to help me paint my room. I’d always found a way to ignore her. But I could change that, I decided. Starting now.

“So, what was it like in Oregon?” I asked.

Stacy shrugged and said nothing. But in the screen hovering next to her I saw something unexpected. A picture of Green Braces Girl. But this time, I really,
really
looked at her.

And I realized that girl was Stacy.

She was about twenty pounds heavier, wore no makeup, and had dull hair instead of her current golden locks. But it was Stacy, no doubt about it. The picture kept changing: first Green Braces Girl, Stacy, sat alone in a school cafeteria. Then alone in a classroom while groups of students around her talked and laughed. The images continued, showing Stacy exercising, dying her hair, and finally getting her braces removed, all while she counted the weeks off on a calendar to a day with the note “Moving” written in thick red marker. The last image showed Stacy—the way she looked now—smiling widely as Ellen sat down next to her in science class and started chatting.

“It was okay,” Stacy said finally. “But I like it better here.”

I nodded. I wasn’t mad at Stacy for stealing Ellen away anymore, I realized. After seeing her thoughts, I could understand why she’d want a best friend.

I wanted to tell Stacy I was sorry for ever being a jerk to her—but the words just wouldn’t come. Maybe though, I could do something else. “Did I hear Ellen say something about going out for pizza after school tomorrow?”

Stacy nodded, and I continued, “I’m not seeing my dad until later—so maybe I could meet you there. We could watch an episode of
The Scott and Ellen Show
together.”

Stacy smiled. “That would be great, Callie. Really, really great.”

We walked the rest of the way back to class, and I read more of Stacy’s thoughts:
Maybe Callie and I can become friends after all.

Maybe,
I thought back at her.
Stranger things have happened.

Chapter 17

Super Freaky Glasses Rule #
₁₆

Don’t expect your magic glasses to figure out your own thoughts. That’s your job.

T
HE
S
COTT AND
E
LLEN
S
HOW GOT REALLY OLD, REALLY
fast the next afternoon at the pizza place. So Stacy, Ana, and I finally moved to another booth. When I invited Ana the night before, I figured she would just say no, so I was surprised when she agreed to come.

“No,” Ana said to Stacy. “No, it’s ‘
Es major que no llores.
’ Try it again.” While we waited for our pizza, Ana was trying to teach Stacy to sing “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” in Spanish. Stacy kept getting the words wrong, and would laugh so hard soda snorted from her nose, which would cause Ana to laugh so hard soda snorted from
her
nose.

I didn’t feel like singing so I just watched them quietly, and wound a paper napkin around my thumb until my skin turned white.

“Are you okay?” Stacy asked.

“Yeah, my stomach just hurts,” I said, loosening the napkin. “I’m hungry.” That was partly a lie, though. My stomach
did
hurt—but not because I was hungry.

“I’ll find out what’s taking the pizza so long,” Stacy said. “Want to come?” she asked Ana, who nodded.

After they left I glanced over at Scott and Ellen, who were sitting next to each other and playing a game on Scott’s cell phone. Then I leaned my head against the glass window. Outside, cars splashed through puddles of rain and the streetlights looked fuzzy, like angels with colorful halos. It was warm and steamy inside the pizza place, but I felt something icy gripping my stomach.

I always figured if I never told Ellen—or anyone else—about Mom and Dad’s problems, then in a way, they didn’t exist. I could pretend that Dad really
was
away working somewhere, and there was no one to tell me any different. Tonight though I would see him for the first time in months, and I wasn’t so sure I could pretend anymore.

Stacy slid into the booth and placed our pepperoni pizza on the table. Ana slid in next to me.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Stacy asked, handing me a slice of pizza.

“You look upset,” Ana added.

I thought about giving them my usual answer, and telling them I was fine. But I felt words bubbling up inside me. Words I wanted to say out loud.

“My parents don’t always get along,” I said hesitantly. Stacy and Ana waited while I took a bite of pizza. I swallowed. “So my mom kicked my dad out of the house. He’s been living in northern California. I’m actually seeing him tonight.”

“Hey, are you guys all right over there?” came Ellen’s voice. She had detached herself from Scott, and was looking over at our table with a frown.

Stacy glanced at me, and I shook my head. “Yeah, we’re fine,” she called back.

Ana squeezed my shoulder and asked, “How long has he been gone?”

“Since August.”

“Since August?” Stacy repeated. “That’s a long time.”

“Yeah,” I said, leaning my head back against the window. “It
is
a long time.”

When I got home from the pizza place, I decided to write a story about my dad. It would be the best one
I’d ever written. A story so great it would show him how much I missed him these last several months. He would be the star of my story, in one of the roles I usually gave him: a prince, a noble knight sworn to protect an ancient treasure, or a martial arts master fighting off a sea of enemies with his bare hands.