The Pretty One(43)

I bend over and pick up the couch. While I’m down there, I catch sight of my ugly-looking toenails. Yuck. Lucy and I both got pedicures and manicures for our first day of school, and even though I took the polish off my fingernails a million years ago, I haven’t touched my toes. My cuticles are overgrown and the bright pink polish is faded and chipped.

“Anyway,” Lucy says. “I wanted to tell you that after you left I was talking to Liz Hopkins, and she said she’s never seen George so into anyone before.”

“George?” I pick up the dental pick that I use as a tool on my dioramas and begin gently pushing back the cuticle on my big toe. “She must be kidding. He was so busy performing he barely noticed me.”

“You sound upset,” Lucy says with a knowing smile.

“What?” I stop pushing back my cuticle. “No! I’m just saying the whole idea of him really liking me is ridiculous. He doesn’t even know me.”

My sister shrugs. “Apparently he likes what he sees.”

“Eech,” I say, making a face as I go back to my toe cuticle.

“What?”

“What he sees. What you’re saying is that he likes my new face and body. That’s so, well, superficial. By the way, do you have any nail polish remover? I have to take this polish off. It’s gross.”

“It’s under the bathroom sink,” Lucy says, in her annoyed voice. “Look, Megan. You have to accept that you look different now. You better adjust. You can’t keep acting like you used to otherwise people are going to start to hate you.”

“What do you mean acting like I used to?”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but I just don’t understand why you still seem to feel so sorry for yourself. I know that before the accident things weren’t all that easy for you. But now you have a whole new you, and all these guys think you’re hot, and you got a part that a lot of people wanted and here you are, still eating a million bowls of Cap’n Crunch, sucking your thumb, working on your dioramas, and picking your toes.”

Picking my toes? “For one,” I reply, sitting up straight as I set down the pick. “I’m taking care of my cuticles. For two, this is only my second bowl of Cap’n Crunch. For three, I don’t feel sorry for myself. And for four, I don’t suck my thumb!” How dare Lucy even insinuate such things? After all, she’s the one who feels sorry for herself. She just can’t seem to get over the fact that I, her lowly little sister, beat her out of a part.

But I don’t say that. I really don’t want to argue with Lucy anymore, and besides, I suspect she might have a small point. I am feeling a little sorry for myself. But I have a right to. After all, my sister and my best friend have recently gone loco. Anyone in my shoes would be upset.

In fact, I’m so certain I’m in the right, I pour myself some more Cap’n Crunch to soak up the leftover milk in my bowl and call the one person I know will agree, my mother. Even though it’s Saturday, she left for work before I woke up.

“Hey, honey,” Mom says, answering her phone. “I’m about to go into a meeting. What’s up?”

Lucy walks back in the room, eyeing me suspiciously as if she thinks I’m going to tattle on her or something. “I just…I wanted to know what movie you wanted to see tonight,” I say loudly into the phone. “I can order tickets online.”

“For when?” she asks.

“Tonight.” I have been looking forward to my date with my mom. I have everything all planned out including where we will eat (Blue Agave) and what I will order (house salad followed by carnitas).

“Oh Megan, I’m sorry. For some reason I thought you had plans. I’m going out with Carol tonight. We’re going to the Baltimore Symphony. They’re playing Mozart’s Requiem.”

My mom made plans that didn’t include me? “But I’ve hardly seen you all week,” I say, sounding more like a five-year-old than a sixteen-year-old. “I have a lot to tell you.”

“Hah!” Lucy murmurs, just loud enough for me to hear her. I roll my eyes at her and she shoots a smirk in my direction before leaving the room again.

“Sounds like we got our connections crossed,” my mom says.

I honestly can’t believe my mom, the one person who is supposed to be there for me in my time of need, is blowing me off. After a moment of silence she says, “Maybe I should call Carol and tell her I can’t make it.”

As much as I’m tempted to tell her what a fabulous idea that is, I keep my mouth shut while I think about it for a minute. Can I really ask my mom to cancel her plans just to hang out with me?

“It’s okay,” I say finally, forcing a smile even though she’s not there to appreciate my effort. “I’m supposed to read Moby-Dick this weekend, anyway.”

If she preferred listening to a funeral procession to going out to dinner with me, fine. I’m not going to feel sorry for myself. No way. I will stay home with Moby and read. And I will like it. But before I begin to read, I find Lucy’s nail polish remover and use it to take off my toenail polish. Then I clip off all my fingernails and paint them with the rancid No More Nail Biting stuff she bought me last year.



After an hour of alone time with Moby, my nails are dry and I’m so desperate for company that I call Simon. I know it’s a risky proposition because he was so angry with me for blowing him off, but he did respond immediately to my e-mail last night, so I’m kind of hoping that things have calmed down between us. I call him up and act like nothing weird has transpired between us whatsoever and ask him if he wants to do something. Even though I’m kind of expecting Simon to be busy (even though he’s not), he acts totally normal and suggests we meet at the coffee shop at six.