Frenemies(16)

“Okay,” I said, fake smile in place. “Well, you know, it’s kind of cold out here and I really—”

“I have the journal right here,” Irwin said, whipping out a black-and-white notebook and flipping it open. From where I stood, I could see incredibly small, shockingly tiny letters stretched to fill the entire page.

He had to be kidding.

“June 25. Laughter in hallway at 11:56 p.m. June 26. Coughing in bedroom at 2:33 a.m. June 29—”

He wasn’t kidding.

I turned my attention back to my window, rattling the damned thing with increased desperation. Irwin had one of those nasal voices that was really more like a whine, and for the love of all that was holy, he was still droning on about the first week of July.

I gave the stubborn window one last, mighty shove and—thank the heavens!—it fell open.

“Freezing cold!” I singsonged at Irwin. “Hypothermia, must run!”

I heaved the window open and hurled myself through it, more or less belly flopping on my pile of clothes and bodysurfing my way to an undignified heap on my bedroom floor.

Moments after this, my ace watchdog, Linus, skittered into the room and barked a combined alarm and greeting.

Behind me, I could hear Irwin’s nasal whine. I had the horrifying thought that he might just stand there at the window all night, regaling the entire building with a minute-by-minute re-creation of my every movement during the past few months.

Out in the living room, I heard my old-school answering machine click on.

“Hi, you’ve reached Gus. Please leave a message.” My disembodied, oddly robotic voice floated through the room, sounding far more cheerful than I felt. I shoved Linus off of me and began struggling to my feet.

“Hi, Gus,” came Helen’s sad, sad voice. “It’s me again. I guess … I guess I’m going to give up now. Um. I still think we should, you know, talk.”

Click.

What does she mean, “again”? I wondered.

I staggered over to the machine as it blinked and reset, and had to take a moment to believe what I was seeing.

Ten new messages.

Ten.

I stood there for a moment, feeling almost dizzy. I wasn’t Miss Popular, but neither was I a troll beneath a bridge. Telemarketers didn’t leave messages, of course. But even if Georgia, Amy Lee, my mother, and my sister all called me in the same evening (which was highly unlikely) that still left six. Six messages that would be quite enough to frighten me, and that was without the personal appearance at the front door.

It was official. Helen was stalking me.





chapter six





When Georgia sauntered into the glitzy, primarily gold lobby of the Park Plaza Hotel two weeks later, she was looking particularly fabulous. We had an engagement party to attend and she had her glorious hair swept up into one of those impossible hair creations that I was eternally baffled by. She was showcasing the entire length of her ridiculously long legs beneath the simple and elegant shift dress she wore, which looked to rival the cost of the shoes on her feet. Christian Louboutin, if I wasn’t mistaken. (And I was never mistaken about shoes.)

Why was I so interested in Georgia’s outfit? A valid question.

While she was dressed for an elegant affair, I was dressed for the prom. The prom circa 1985, that was. I was sporting a royal blue taffeta gown complete with puffy cap sleeves and matching royal blue pumps—which, attention shoe manufacturers, was there an uglier word?—as well as a matching royal blue clutch. It was one of the least attractive ensembles I owned. In it, I looked like a royal blueberry.

The engagement party invitation had specified formalwear. And what, Georgia and I had asked each other, was more formal than an old bridemaid’s dress?

“You know perfectly well that you’re supposed to be in this dress,” I snapped at Georgia when she came to a stop in front of me. “I don’t think I’m speaking to you. Maybe not ever again.”

“This is the thing,” Georgia said, settling herself beside me on the plush settee. If she was impressed by my threat, she failed to show it. “When I wear that dress, people flip out and start calling me a giant Smurfette—”

“Exactly one person called you a giant Smurfette, and he was wasted the single time you ever wore this dress,” I interrupted. “And how is that any worse than rolling around looking like a royal blueberry?”

“I feel bad,” Georgia confessed, meeting my eyes. “But not bad enough to change.”

“This was your idea!” I shrieked at her, completely forgetting where we were.

My own voice, in a screech like a fishwife (as my mother used to say, not that she had ever explained—to my satisfaction—what a fishwife was, other than loud) at top volume, reminded me.

Georgia and I assumed meek smiles and fell quiet, as, all around us, the opulence of the Park Plaza registered its disapproval. The Park Plaza Hotel was not the sort of place where screeching was tolerated. It was swanky, historic, and filled with impressive flower arrangements. Tourists clumped together and gazed about in awe, while businessmen oozed expense-account nonchalance and headed for the bar.

“Did you just make that noise?” Amy Lee demanded, striding up to stand in front of us. “My ears are still ringing.”

“It was some girl,” Georgia lied vaguely, waving her hand in the approximate direction of the elevators.