40
I cleared my throat. "Doesn't he, um, like, go out with Kathryn Ford?"
Jessica made a face as if I'd suggested Connor went out with Dave. "They're just friends," she
said.
"Yeah," said Madison, waving my idea away like so much annoying cigarette smoke. "They're
just friends."
We all sat there for a second, digesting this piece of information. Then Jessica touched my hand
again and nodded enthusiastically. "So I say you should come to the game with us."
Madison's head bobbed up and down. "Yeah, Lucy. Come to the game tonight."
My brain was continuing to malfunction; I could see their lips move, but I could barely make out
what they were saying. "Um, sorry, did you say tonight?" My mouth was so dry I had to peel my
lips apart between words.
Jessica's smile turned to a grimace. "Whatever other plans you have, you have to cancel them."
Other plans? I almost laughed. When was the last time I'd had other plans?
Was this actually happening? Was I actually being invited to a basketball game by the hottest
guy at Glen Lake? It was almost as if--
"Oh my god," I said out loud. Because all of a sudden, staring across the table at Madison, the
truth hit me so hard I practically felt it smack me right between the eyes.
41
Prince Charming was requesting my presence tonight.
Jessica, misunderstanding my epiphany, shrieked, "I know!" Then she stretched her hands out, one toward Madison, the other toward me. "So are you coming?" she asked.
For a second I just sat there, staring across the table. With their matching suede jackets, artfully
highlighted hair, and coordinated lipstick and eye liner, Madison and Jessica looked more like
teen models than fairy godmothers. But there was no doubt that fairy godmothers were exactly
what they were. Because you didn't have to be Walt Disney to see that my life was a fairy tale.
And finally, after all this time, I'd arrived at the part where I got to live happily ever after.
I waited a minute, giving myself time to let the significance of what was happening sink in. Then
I took a deep breath, laid my hand in Jessica's, and accepted my destiny.
"Definitely," I said.
42
Chapter Six
At five-thirty, just as I was finishing a second nervous breakdown and starting on my third, there
was a knock on the basement door.
"Lucy, may I come down?" It was Mara.
"Yeah, sure." She came down the stairs holding a sample square of carpet in her hand, something
I might have gotten excited about if she hadn't been coming downstairs with identical squares for
the past six months. Who knew there were so many shades of beige on the planet?
"How's it going?" she asked.
"Okay," I said. It was a good thing she hadn't shown up five minutes before, when I was trying to stop my head from spinning by putting it between my knees and taking deep breaths.
She surveyed the floor, which was covered in clothes and books. "This room's a bit of a mess,"
she said.
43
"Yeah, sorry about that," I said.
Mara leaned against the wall, folding her arms across her chest. "I'd like to see you pick up after
yourself a little more, Lucy."
I was tempted to ask the point of picking up after myself if I had no place to put down whatever I picked up. But that would have meant a whole discussion about how hard Mara was working to
find just the right dresser and how much she wanted me to like my room and feel at home there
once it was decorated. With less than an hour to shower, decide what to wear, get dressed, and
have several more nervous breakdowns, this wasn't the time to explain to my stepmother that she
didn't have to worry about my room feeling like home. We all know that after she meets the
prince, Cinderella moves into the master bedroom suite of the royal palace. Once that happened,
Mara could douse my dungeon with kerosene and strike a match.
Rather than try and explain my new circumstances, I decided to keep things simple. "I'll
definitely clean up when I have a minute," I said. "I just can't do it right now."
"Do you have plans tonight?" Was it my imagination or did Mara sound shocked?
"Kind of," I said. Thinking about my plans, I started to get light-headed again; I hoped I wouldn't need to pant into a paper bag in front of my stepmother.
44
"Oh?"
"I kind of got invited to the game," I said. "By these girls I know."
"Who are the girls?" she asked, like she has the Glen Lake yearbook memorized and would
immediately be able to recognize any one of the hundreds of girls I might have named.
"Um, they're just these girls I know," I said. Why is it I can spend a dozen Friday nights staring at the peeling walls of my "room" without anyone in the family so much as poking a head down
to see if I'm still alive, while the one time I actually have plans (major plans, plans that
necessitate extraordinary focus and massive preparation), my stepmother suddenly suggests we
sing a duet of "Getting to Know You"?
I really wanted to ask Mara to give me some privacy, but I had to be careful about rejecting her
motherly advances. If I do that, she gets all hurt, then she complains to my dad, and he gets mad
at me for not giving her a chance. The most I could risk was turning my back to her ever so
slightly as I started digging through a pile of clothes.
"How are you getting to the game?" Clearly Mara wasn't hip to the subtleties of body language.
"They're picking me up," I said, still not turning around.
There was a sharp intake of breath. "They drive? How old are they?"
45
"They're sophomores," I said, giving up and facing her. "They're picking me up in a cab."
Mara thought about what I'd said for a minute. "What time will you be home?"
I did a double take. What time would I be home? In San Francisco I'd never had an official
curfew, I just had to call and let my dad know what time to expect me.
"I don't know," I said. "But I'll call if I'm going to be late."
"Excuse me?" said Mara. She said it like I'd just told her I'd call her from Charles de Gaulle if the evening went continental.
"I said I'll call if it gets late."
"Lucy, your father is not going to be happy when I tell him I have no idea what time to expect
you home."
I clenched my teeth. Like I needed her to tell me under what circumstances my father would or
would not be happy.
"Look, Mara, I don't know what to tell you. I won't be home too late." Remembering something
Jessica had said to me at lunch, I added, "I think the guys have a curfew during the season or
something."
Mara's eyes practically popped out of her head. Too late, I realized what I'd done. "The guys? "
she said.
"What guys?"
I forced myself to walk over to Mara and put my hand on her arm. We were in very, very
delicate territory.
46
"I'm going to a basketball game with Jessica Johnson. You know, Jennifer's older sister?" Who
would have guessed I'd be grateful to my stepsisters for their intimate knowledge of the J-J-J-