Third Time Lucky pd-3 Read online

  She was only guessing, of course. She couldn't have seen me. Unless ...

  Unless Justin Baxendale did figure it out - you know, seeing me in the hallway like that just before the alarm went off - and mentioned it to Lana . . .

  No. Not possible. I am so far out of the sphere of Justin Baxendale's consciousness as to be non-existent to him. Lana, like

  Mr. G, obviously just thinks it's a little coincidental that on that fateful Wednesday the fire alarm went off about two minutes

  after I'd disappeared from class with the pass to the bathroom.

  But even so. Even though she could only have been guessing, it seemed to me like she knew and was going to make sure I never heard the end of it.

  I really don't know what came over me. I don't know if it was:

  A. The stress of Finals.

  B. My impending trip to Genovia.

  C. This thing with Kenny.

  D. The fact that I'm in love with this guy who is going out with a human fruit fly.

  E. The fact that my mother is going to give birth to my Algebra teacher's baby.

  F. The fact that Lana has been persecuting me practically my whole life and pretty much getting away with it, or All of the above.

  Whatever the reason was, I snapped. Just snapped. Suddenly, I found myself reaching for Lana's mobile, which was lying on her desktop beside her calculator.

  And then the next thing I knew, I had put the tiny little pink thing on the floor and crushed it into a lot of pieces beneath the

  heel of my size eight combat boot.

  I guess I can't really blame Mr. G for sending me to the principal's office.

  Still, you would expect a little sympathy from your own stepfather.

  Uh oh. Here comes Principal Gupta.

  Friday, Decemter 11, 5 p.m., the Loft

  Well, that's it, then. I'm suspended.

  Suspended. I can't believe it. ME! Mia Thermopolis! What is happening to me? I used to be such a good kid!

  And, OK, it's just for one day, but still. It's going on my permanent record! What are the Genovian cabinet ministers going to say?

  I am turning into Courtney Love.

  And, yeah, it's not like I'm not going to get into college because I was suspended for one day in the first semester of my freshman year, but how totally embarrassing! Principal Gupta treated me like I was some kind of criminal or something.

  And you know what they say: treat a person like a criminal and pretty soon she'll end up behaving like one. At least, I think that's what they say. The way things are going, I wouldn't be surprised if pretty soon I start wearing ripped-up fishnet stockings and dyeing my hair black. Maybe I'll even start smoking and get my ears double-pierced or something. And then they'll make

  a TV movie about me and call it Royal Scandal. It will show me going up to Prince William and saying, 'Who's the most popular young royal now, huh, punk?' and then headbutting him or something.

  Except I practically fainted the first time I got my ears pierced, and smoking is really bad for you, and I always thought it must hurt to headbutt someone.

  I guess I don't have the makings of a juvenile delinquent after all.

  My dad doesn't think so, either. He's all ready to set the royal Genovian lawyers on Principal Gupta. The only problem, of course, is that I won't tell him - or anybody else, for that matter - what Lana said to make me assault her mobile.

  It's kind of hard to prove the attack was provoked if the attacker won't say what the provocation was. My dad pleaded with me for a while when he came to pick me up from school, after having received The Call from Principal Gupta. But when I wouldn't tell him what he wanted, and Lars just looked carefully blank, my dad just went, 'Fine', and his mouth got all scrunchy like it does when Grandmere has one too many Sidecars and starts calling him Papa Cueball.

  But how can I tell him what Lana said? If I do that, then everyone will know I'm guilty of not just one crime, but two!

  Anyway, now I'm home, watching the Lifetime channel with my mother. She hasn't been doing much painting at her studio

  since she got pregnant. This is on account of her being exhausted. It's quite hard to paint lying down, she's discovered. So instead she has been doing a lot of sketching in bed - mostly line drawings of Fat Louie, who seems to enjoy having someone home all day with him. He sits for hours on her bed, watching the pigeons on the fire escape outside her window.

  But since I'm home today, Mom did some drawings of me. I think she is making my mouth too big, but I'm not saying anything as Mr. Gianini and I have discovered it's better not to upset my mother in her current hormonal state. Even the slightest

  criticism - like asking her why she left the phone bill in the vegetable crisper — can lead to hour-long crying jags.

  While she sketched me, I watched a very excellent movie called Mother, May I Sleep with Danger? starring Tori Spelling

  of Beverly Hills 90210 fame, as a girl who has an abusive boyfriend. I really don't get why any girl would stay with a guy who hits her, but my mom says it's all about self-esteem and your relationship with your father. Except that my mom doesn't have that great a relationship with Papaw, my grandfather, and if any guy ever tried to slug her, you can bet she'd put him in the hospital, so go figure.

  As my mom drew, she tried to get me to spill my guts to her — you know, about what Lana said that made me go on a mobile-stomping rampage. You could tell she was trying really hard to be all TV mom about it.

  And I guess it must have worked because all of a sudden I found myself telling her all of it, every last thing: the stuff about Kenny and about my not liking to kiss him, and about him telling everybody that, and about how I plan to break up with him

  as soon as Finals are over.

  And along the way I mentioned Michael, and Judith Gershner, and Tina and the greeting cards, and the Winter Carnival, and Lilly and her protest and how I'm secretary of it, and just about everything else, except the part about pulling the fire alarm.

  And after a while my mom stopped drawing and just looked at me.

  Finally, when I was done, she said, 'You know what I think you need?'

  And I said, 'What?'

  And she said, 'A vacation.'

  So then we had a sort of vacation, right there on her bed. I mean, she wouldn't let me go and study. Instead, she made me order a pizza and together we watched the satisfying but completely unbelievable end of Mother, May I Sleep with Danger?, which was followed, much to our joy, by the dishiest made-for-TV movie ever, Midwest Obsession, in which Courtney Thorne Smith plays the local Dairy Princess who goes around in a pink Cadillac wearing cow earrings, killing people like Tracey Gold (deep in the throes of her post Growing Pains anorexia) for messing with her boyfriend.

  And the best part was, it was all based on a true story.

  For a while, there on my mom's bed, it was almost like old times. You know, before my mom met Mr Gianini and I found out

  I was a princess.

  Except, of course, not really, because she's pregnant and I'm suspended.

  But why quibble?

  Friday; December 11, 8 p.m., the Loft

  Oh my God, I just checked my e-mail. I am being inundated with supportive messages from my friends!

  They all want to congratulate me on my decisive handling of Lana Weinberger. They sympathize with my suspension and encourage me to stay firm in my refusal to back down from my stand against the administration (what stand against the administration? All I did was destroy a mobile phone. It has nothing to do with the administration). Lilly went so far as to compare me to Mary Queen of Scots, who was imprisoned and then beheaded by Elizabeth the First.

  I wonder if Lilly would still think that if she knew that the reason I smashed Lana's mobile was because she was threatening

  to spill the beans about my having pulled the fire alarm that ruined Lilly's walkout.

  Lilly says it's all a matter of principle - that I was banished from the school for refusing to
back down from my beliefs. But actually, I was banished from school for destroying someone else's private property - and I only did it to cover up for another crime that I committed.

  No one knows that but me, though. Well, me and Lana. And even she doesn't know for sure why I did it. I mean, it could

  have been just one of those random acts of violence that are going around.

  Everyone else, however, is seeing it as this great political act. Tomorrow, at the first meeting of the Students Against the Corporatization of Albert Einstein High School, my case is going to be held up as an example of one of the many unjust decisions of the Gupta administration.

  I think tomorrow I might develop a case of weekend strep throat.

  Anyway, I wrote back to everyone, telling them how much I appreciate their support but not to make a bigger deal out of this than it actually is. I mean, I'm not proud of what I did. I would much rather have NOT done it and stayed in school.

  One bright note: Michael is definitely getting the cards I've been sending him. Tina walked by his locker today after PE and

  saw him take the latest one out and put it in his backpack! Unfortunately, according to Tina, he did not wear an expression of dazed passion as he slipped the card into his bag, nor did he gaze at it tenderly. He did not even put it away very carefully. Tina regretted to inform me that he slipped his Imac laptop into his backpack next, undoubtedly squashing the card.

  But he wouldn't, Tina hastened to assure me, have done that if he'd known it was from you, Mia! Maybe if you'd signed it...

  But if I signed it, he'd know I like him! More than that, he'd know I love him, since I do believe the L word was mentioned in

  at least one card. And what if he doesn't feel the same way about me? How embarrassing! Way worse than being suspended.

  Oh, no! As I was writing this, I got Instant Messaged by, of all people, Michael himself! I freaked out so bad that I shrieked and scared Fat Louie, who was sleeping on my lap as I wrote. He sank all of his claws into me, and now I have little puncture marks all over my thighs.

  Michael wrote:

  CracKing: Hey, Thermopolis, what's this I hear about you getting suspended?

  I wrote back:

  FtLouie: Just for one day.

  CracKing: What'd you do?

  FtLouie: crushed a cheerleader's mobile phone.

  CracKing: Your parents must be so proud.

  FtLouie: If so, they've done a pretty good job of disguising it so far.

  CracKing: So, are you grounded?

  FtLouie: Surprisingly, no. I told them the attack on the phone was provoked.

  CracKing: So you'll still be going to the Carnival next week?

  FtLouie: AS secretary to the Students Against the Corporatization of Albert Einstein High. I believe my attendance is required. Your sister is planning for us to have a booth.

  CracKing: That Lilly. She's always looking out for the good of mankind.

  FtLouie: That's one way of putting it.

  Winter Carnival. What is up with that?

  Friday, December 11, 9 p.m., the Loft

  Now we know why Mr. G was'so late getting home:

  He stopped along the way to buy a Christmas tree.

  Not just any Christmas tree, either, but a twelve-footer that must be at least six feet wide at the base.

  I didn't say anything negative, of course, because my mom was so happy and excited about it and immediately lugged out all

  of her Dead Celebrity Christmas ornaments (my mom doesn't use pretty glass balls or tinsel on her Christmas tree, like normal people. Instead, she paints pieces of tin with the likenesses of celebrities that have died that year and hangs those on the tree. (Which is why we probably have the only tree in North America with ornaments commemorating Richard and Pat Nixon, Elvis, Audrey Hepburn, Kurt Cobain, Jim Henson, John Belushi, Rock Hudson, Alec Guiness, Divine, John Lennon and many, many more.)

  Mr. Gianini kept looking over at me, to see if I was happy too. He got the tree, he said, because he knew what a bad day I'd had and he didn't want it to be a total loss.

  Mr. G, of course, has no idea what my English term paper topic is.

  What was I supposed to say? I mean, he'd already gone out and bought it, and you know a tree that size had to have cost a

  lot of money. And he'd meant to do a nice thing. He really had.

  Still, I wish the people around here would consult me about things before just going out and doing them. Like the whole pregnancy thing, and now this tree. If Mr G had asked me, I would have been like, Let's go to the Big K Mart on Astor Place and get a nice fake tree so we don't contribute to the destruction of the polar bear's natural habitat, OK?

  Only he didn't ask me.

  And the truth is, even if he did, my mom would never have gone for it. Her favourite part of Christmas is lying on the floor with her head under the tree, gazing up through the branches and inhaling the sweet tangy smell of pine sap. She says it's the only memory of her Indiana childhood she actually likes.

  It's hard to think about the polar bears when your mom says something like that.

  Saturday, December 12, 2 p.m., Lilly's Apartment

  Well, the first meeting of the Students Against the Corporatization of Albert Einstein High School is a complete bust.

  That's because nobody showed up but me and Boris Pelkowski. I am a little miffed that Kenny didn't come. You would think that if he really loves me as much as he says he does, he would take any opportunity whatsoever to be near me, even a boring meeting of the Students Against the Corporatization of Albert Einstein High School.

  But I guess even Kenny's love is not that great. As should be obvious to me by now, considering the fact that there are exactly six days until the Non-Denominational Winter Dance, and Kenny STILL HASN'T ASKED ME IF I WANT TO GO WITH HIM.

  Not that I'm worried, or anything. I mean, does a girl who set off a fire alarm AND smashed Lana Weinberger's mobile worry about not having a date to a stupid dance? All right. I'm worried.

  But not worried enough to completely humiliate myself and ask him to the dance.

  Lilly is pretty much inconsolable over the fact that no one but Boris and me showed up to her meeting. I tried to tell her that everybody is too busy studying for Finals to worry about privatization at the moment, but she doesn't seem to care. Right now she is sitting on the couch with Boris speaking to her in a soothing voice. Boris is pretty gross and all -with his sweaters that he always tucks into his trousers, and that weird brace his orthodontist makes him wear - but you can tell he genuinely loves Lilly.

  I mean, look at the tender way he is gazing at her as she sobs about how she is going to call her congressperson.

  It makes my heart hurt, looking at Boris look at Lilly.

  I guess I must be jealous. I want a boy to look at me like that. And I don't mean Kenny, either. I mean a boy who I actually

  like back, as more than a friend.

  I can't take it anymore. I am going into the kitchen to see what Maya, the Moscovitzes' housekeeper, is doing. Even helping

  to wash things has to be better than this.

  Saturday, December 12, 2:30 p.m., Lilly's Apartment

  Maya wasn't in the kitchen. She was here, in Michael's room, putting away his school uniform which she just finished ironing. Maya is going around picking up Michael's things and telling me about her son Manuel. Thanks to the help of the Drs. Moscovitz, Manuel was recently released from the prison in the Dominican Republic where he'd been wrongfully held on suspicion of having committed crimes against the state. Now Manuel is starting his own political party and Maya is just as proud as can be, except she is worried he might end up back in prison if he doesn't tone down the anti-government stuff a little.

  Manuel and Lilly have a lot in common, I guess. Maya's stories about Manuel are always interesting, but it is much more interesting to be in Michael's room. I have been in it before, of course, but never while he was gone (he is at school even

  though
it is Saturday, working in the computer lab on his project for the carnival; apparently, the school's modem is faster than his. Also, I suppose, though I hate to admit it, he and Judith Gershner can freely practice their downloading there, without fear of parental interruption).

  So I am lying on Michael's bed while Maya putters around, folding shirts and muttering about sugar, one of her native land's main exports and, apparently, a source of some consternation to her son's political platform, while Michael's dog, Pavlov, sits next to me, panting on my face. I can't help thinking, This is what it would be like to be Michael. This is what Michael