Allie Finkle's Rules for Girls: Moving Day Page 6

  No. No, no, no. And also, no.

  And I couldn’t let nice, pretty teachers and fun new girls distract me from the fact that I still had a war to win.

  The war on my family moving.

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  RULE #10

  If You Get a New Best Friend, It’s Rude to Show Off About It

  Lady Serena Archibald came back Monday morning.

  I didn’t find that out because Brittany told me, though. I found out because Courtney Wilcox told me.

  And the only reason Courtney told me was because she carpools to school with Brittany, and she saw the whole thing.

  But Brittany told her not to tell me. Except that Courtney was mad at Brittany for telling her that she wasn’t her best friend anymore. Mary Kay is Brittany’s new best friend. Courtney is now Brittany’s second-best best friend.

  I guess the whole brownie thing should have been a sign that this was coming, but none of us recognized it then for what it was.

  “The truth is,” Courtney said, “the only reason Brittany gave that brownie to Mary Kay was because she was planning all along on making Mary Kay her new best friend. Your dance was really the best. Even if your singing wasn’t all that good.”

  I said thank you even though I wasn’t sure what Courtney had said was a compliment. Because that is the polite thing to do when someone compliments you. Even if you aren’t sure it’s a compliment.

  That’s a rule.

  Of course, neither Brittany nor Mary Kay was speaking to me—Brittany because I had told her mother about the suitcase game and Mrs. Hauser had taken away Brittany’s karaoke machine and her television privileges as well, and Mary Kay because…well, because I had told Scott Stamphley I was moving on her birthday, when I had promised I wouldn’t.

  “And Lady Serena Archibald is all right?” I asked Courtney.

  “Oh, yes,” Courtney said. “I mean, her fur is all matted and dirty, because she’d been in a field and gotten into some burrs. But she was sitting on the front porch this morning when Mr. Hauser went out to get the newspaper, and she was just fine—really hungry, but fine. Mrs. Hauser is taking her to a professional groomer to get the burrs out and says she should be good as new.”

  I was super relieved to hear that. I didn’t even care about the other thing—I mean about Brittany and Mary Kay not speaking to me. The truth was, after what happened at the Hausers’, I didn’t want to be friends with them anymore, anyway.

  “I’ll be your best friend, if you want, Allie,” Courtney said. “Until you move, anyway.”

  “Um,” I said. “Okay.” Because it’s rude to say no to someone who asks if you want to be best friends.

  What’s even more rude is to do what Mary Kay and Brittany did later that day, which was come up to me in the art room, where I was innocently gouging an outline of Marvin begging for a bone into my linoleum tile, and go, “What smells?”

  “Hmmm,” Brittany said. “I think it’s Allie. Allie Stinkle smells…like a rat!”

  I have to admit, that really hurt my feelings. But I wasn’t going to cry or anything. At least, in front of them. Because crying when people are trying to insult you just gives them what they want. Then they win, because they know they made you sad. So you have to pretend like you don’t care. Then you win.

  That’s a rule.

  Instead, I kept working on my art project and said very calmly, like what they’d said hadn’t bothered me at all, “Wow. That’s very mature, you guys.”

  “Oh, right,” Brittany said. “Like you’re so mature! I can’t believe you told my mother about lady business executive!”

  “I can’t believe you put an innocent cat in a suitcase,” I shot back.

  “I can’t believe you keep a book of rules,” Brittany said.

  I was so shocked that she said that, I forgot about pretending not to care. In fact, I nearly jammed my block cutter into my thumb.

  “What did you say?” I asked.

  “That’s right,” Brittany said, with a smile I can only call mean. “I know all about how you’re such a weirdo you have to write down rules to remind yourself how to act, Allie. That’s really pathetic. You know, I almost feel sorry for you.”

  I turned my hurt gaze toward Mary Kay, who was standing next to Brittany. At least Mary Kay looked kind of uncomfortable…if the way she was staring at her shoes were any indication, I mean.

  “You told her?” I croaked. “About my book of rules?”

  Mary Kay rubbed her nose with her shoulder, avoiding looking at me. Before she had a chance to say anything, Brittany went, “Of course she told me about your stupid book of rules. Never eat anything red? Please. Who do you think you are, anyway, the food police? You know what rule I think you need to add to your little book, Allie Stinkle? The rule of not being a rat. I’m so glad you’re moving, so you won’t continue to stink up our class with your hideous rat odor! Aren’t you glad she’s moving, Mary Kay?”

  “Oh, yes,” Mary Kay said, perking up suddenly. “I’m really glad you’re my best friend now, Brittany.”

  “Me, too,” Brittany said, throwing an arm around Mary Kay’s neck.

  It was at this moment that I realized that other people were listening to our conversation and finding it very interesting. By “other people,” I mean other people at the table I was sitting at, people who were still only at the cutting stage of their block-printing project.

  One of them, unfortunately, was Scott Stamphley.

  “You keep a book of rules?” he asked me.

  “Shut up,” I said to him. Because I might have to put up with Brittany and Mary Kay. But I do not have to put up with him.

  “Are there any rules in there about me?” Scott wanted to know.

  “Yeah,” I said. “To stay as far away as possible from you.”

  “How about this?” Scott asked. “Is there a rule about this?”

  Then he burped very loudly.

  “EW!” shrieked Brittany and Mary Kay…which is of course exactly the kind of reaction boys like Scott Stamphley hope to get when they do things like that. Because Brittany and Mary Kay do not know the rule about ignoring people.

  “No,” I said. “But there’s a rule against this.”

  Then I burped even louder than he had.

  This caused Brittany and Mary Kay to shriek again—and also caused all the people sitting at my table to groan disgustedly, including Scott Stamphley.

  That was when Ms. Myers came over to see what was going on.

  “Excuse me, girls,” Ms. Myers said to Brittany and Mary Kay, who were the only ones who weren’t at their own table. “Is there a problem here?”

  “Oh, no problem, Ms. Myers,” Brittany said, in the sugary-sweet voice she only uses when grown-ups are around. “We were just telling Allie how much we’re going to miss her when she moves away.”

  “Well, that’s very nice of you,” Ms. Myers said. “But I think you should go back to your seats now.”

  “Of course, Ms. Myers,” Brittany said.

  And the two of them flounced off, squealing things like, “Ew, she’s so disgusting” and “I told you! She’s practically a boy!”

  Ms. Myers looked down at me as I held my linoleum tile and asked, “Allie? Are you all right?”

  I must have looked as if I were about to start crying or something. I did feel as if I were about to, a little.

  “Oh, yes,” I said, trying to smile. “I’m fine, thanks.”

  “Your tile is lovely,” Ms. Myers said, about my lino tile. “Is that Marvin?”

  “Yes,” I said. I could feel the tears swimming inside my eyes, fighting to come out. But I was fighting just as hard to hold them back. “Practically a boy?” How could they say that? They’d seen me do grand jetés. No boy could do that. At least, in our class.

  “Well, keep up the good work,” Ms. Myers said, some of her long hair brushing my hand. Then she moved on to see what Scott Stamphley was m
aking (a king snake eating a smaller snake eating a smaller snake, all the while almost being run over by a Corvette, Scott’s favorite kind of car).

  Over on the other side of the room, I could see Brittany and Mary Kay giggling together. I could also see Courtney Wilcox staring at them all jealously, wishing she were over there giggling with them.

  They were probably giggling about my book of rules. Was it really that weird that I kept a book of rules? Rules are important. If it weren’t for rules, no one would know how to act at all.

  And then the world would just be full of Brittany Hausers. And who would want that?

  I wasn’t going to give up writing in my book of rules just because Brittany and Mary Kay thought it was weird. I was going to keep on writing in it.

  Maybe I just wouldn’t tell any more people about it. Like my new best friend, whoever she was going to be. Sometimes it’s better just to keep things to yourself.

  That’s a rule.

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  RULE #12

  When You Are Setting a Turtle Free and People Are Chasing You, the Best Thing to Do Is Hide

  I knew the hostess lady wouldn’t catch me, since she was wearing high heels and a dress. The dress was really tight, too.

  So I figured she couldn’t run very far.

  Still, I knew she’d probably go get my dad. And my dad can run far. He plays basketball every Saturday at the Y.

  So I knew the best thing to do was hide.

  And I knew from playing hide-and-seek with my brothers that the best place to hide is the most obvious—the one place no one would ever think to look. If you were running around downtown with a turtle, where would most people look for you? The park, right?

  By the pond. Because that’s where you’d most likely take a turtle to set it free.

  That’s why I didn’t go there.

  Instead, I decided to wait everybody out in Uncle Jay’s car. He never locks it (he says there’s nothing in it worth stealing). Also, it was parked right in front of the restaurant. So it was really easy just to dive inside.

  I was sitting on the floor with all his CDs, listening to everybody yelling outside about me, when I heard the driver’s door open, and Uncle Jay slid behind the wheel.

  “Allie?” he whispered, like he’d known I was in there all along. Which he probably had. Uncle Jay and I get along pretty well, he says, because we’re both independent thinkers.

  “Don’t tell them I’m here,” I whispered.

  Uncle Jay looked down and saw me. The turtle was still snapping in midair and kind of making swimming motions with his feet. You could hear him rustling, even though I myself was being excellently silent.

  “I won’t,” Uncle Jay said, with a kind of smile. “But you’re going to have to come out sometime.”

  “I’m not giving them back the turtle,” I said. “They’re just going to make soup out of it.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You know,” I said. “Like it says on the menu. Just because no one has ordered turtle soup yet doesn’t mean someone won’t someday.”

  Uncle Jay looked like he was about to laugh. Instead, he said, “Right. That’s totally true.”

  “It’s not fair,” I said. “This turtle should have a say in what happens to him. He should be allowed to be free. I’m going to let him go in the park, where he can be with his own kind.”

  “Well,” Uncle Jay said, “that’s a nice idea. But you know, that turtle has lived in captivity its whole life. I doubt it knows how to look for its own food. And it’s starting to get pretty cold out. Soon it will be winter. It might starve. Or freeze to death.”

  I hadn’t thought about that. Suddenly, I realized that my plan of letting the Lung Chung turtle go in the park might not be such a good plan after all.

  Actually, I hadn’t put a whole lot of thought into it. It had been a kind of spur-of-the-moment plan, really.

  Still.

  “But if I give him back,” I said, “he’ll get eaten! I can’t stand thinking about him here, knowing at any minute someone could come along, and just…order him for dinner.”

  Outside the car, I heard my dad yell, “Jay! What are you doing? Are you going to help us look for her, or what?”

  Uncle Jay yelled back, “Just getting my gloves!” Then, to me, he said, “Okay, Allie. I’ll make you a deal.”

  “What kind of deal?” I asked. I hate to admit it, but I was crying a little. Mostly because the turtle really did stink, and that was making my eyes water.

  But also because I knew I was in trouble.

  And I hated being in trouble. Which I knew was surprising, considering how much trouble I’d been in lately.

  But still.

  “I thought we already had a deal,” I said. “About what really happened to the scuba watch. I never told, you know.”

  “This is a different deal,” Uncle Jay said quickly. “The thing is, I really shouldn’t have let you watch that zombie-hand movie. So I kind of owe you one. So the new deal is, I’ll keep the turtle. You can leave him here, in the car, and I’ll take him home with me tonight to my apartment. We won’t tell anyone. It’ll be our secret. And in return, you’ll stop giving your parents such a hard time about moving into the new house and pretend to be okay with the whole thing. The thing about pretending to be okay with things is that sometimes you actually start to be okay with them. So…you never know. Maybe you’ll actually start to be okay with the moving thing. What do you think about that?”

  I chewed my lip. The turtle living with Uncle Jay was actually an excellent idea. He didn’t have any pets, and his apartment was very messy, anyway. So it wasn’t like he’d even notice the turtle was there.

  And I wouldn’t have to worry about anyone eating it. So that would be one worry, out of many, off my mind, anyway.

  I wasn’t so sure about the pretending to like the new house thing, though.

  “What about the thing that boy said?” I asked.

  “What boy?” Uncle Jay asked. Across the street in the park, I could hear my dad calling my name. “Allie! Allie, where are you? Allie, come here right now. This isn’t funny.”

  “The boy next door,” I said. “At the new house. He said the people who used to live there did something bad in the attic.”

  “I will use all my investigative powers to determine whether or not this is so,” Uncle Jay said. “But I’m thinking this guy might have been teasing you. Besides, I’m actually very sensitive to psychic phenomena, and when I was at your new house, I sensed only the most harmonious vibrations.”

  I didn’t see how Uncle Jay could even say this, considering the dark gray walls and brown floors and all of that.

  But I was willing to let that slide since he was being so nice about the turtle.

  “Now, what do you say?” he asked. “Will you come back to dinner?”

  The truth was, I didn’t really have any other choice. I couldn’t sit in Uncle Jay’s car holding the Lung Chung turtle for the rest of the night.

  So I agreed to his deal.

  Uncle Jay got out of the car and went to pretend-look for me in the park with my dad so it wouldn’t seem suspicious when I suddenly appeared right after he did. I counted to twenty, and then I put the turtle down on the floor of Uncle Jay’s car. It stopped snapping at me and kind of looked around, like, Where am I? What’s going on?

  “You’re going to a better place,” I told him. “One where no one is going to order you for dinner. I promise.” Then I told him I’d come to visit real soon.

  Then I got out of the car and went back inside the restaurant.

  Everyone was really mad at me. Everyone except Mom. She was glad to see me.

  At first.

  Then she got mad.

  “Don’t you ever do anything like that again, young lady,” she said when she was done hugging me. “Do you know how scared I was? Your father and Uncle Jay are still out there looking for you!”

  “Yeah,” Mark
said. “And all the restaurant people are really mad at you, because you stole their turtle. They said we have to pay for it. And we didn’t even get to eat it!”

  “Never mind that,” Mom said, giving her credit card to the waitress, who was giving me dirty looks. I wasn’t just imagining it, either. She was really giving me dirty looks. “Let’s just settle our bill. I must say, Allie, I might have expected behavior like this from one of the boys, but I never expected it from you! What in heaven’s name came over you?”

  “I just can’t stand the idea of someone eating that turtle,” I said.

  “Eating that—?” Mom gave me a strange look. “Oh, Allie! No one—”

  “See,” Uncle Jay said as he and Dad walked in suddenly. “She’s right here, safe and sound. I told you.”

  “Allie.” My dad looked mad. “There you are. We were looking everywhere. Where’s the turtle?”

  “Never mind,” Mom said, getting up. “Come on. We’re going.”

  “What do you mean, never mind?” Dad asked. “Allie, just tell us. What did you do with the turtle?”

  But I wouldn’t tell. Even when the restaurant manager came up and pleaded with me and then told me I was a very bad little girl and that I was going to be in big trouble and that I was lucky they hadn’t called the police. That’s when Dad stepped in and said, “Look, we paid for the turtle; cut it out—you’re scaring her, okay?”

  But the restaurant manager wasn’t scaring me at all. I was just thinking how funny it was going to be the next time Dad went over to Uncle Jay’s apartment to watch a ball game, and he saw the turtle there. Would he even know it was the same turtle?

  “Come on,” Mom said after she signed the bill. “We’ve had enough celebrating for one night. Let’s go home.”

  And so we did.

  But not before Mark and Kevin made sure they jammed a chopstick into the change release slot of the pay phone right outside the men’s room, so no one could ever get change from it again. I high-fived them in the car.

  But not so Mom and Dad could see.