Beauty tip: Lip-gloss is the perfect finishing
touch to any clothing ensemble.
usually take the bus to school, but Mrs. Ramal's driving us today. She has to drive Yamir anyway, because he's bringing in a huge sculpture of the earth showing the effects of global warming, and there's no way he could take that on the bus. It's probably some extra-credit thing for Science. Yamir always does everything extra that he possibly can. He's one of those kids who make everyone else look bad.
Mom and Grandma are already at the pharmacy, and it feels weird to think that I could just stay home today, play hooky, and they'd never know. By the time they usually get home, around six, I'll be home from school anyway. Or I could just go over to the pharmacy around three thirty, when I'd normally be out of school. Either way, I could spend the whole day on the couch watching daytime television shows that I only get to see when I'm sick. I could order in pizza or Chinese food. I could do anything, really.
Knowing this kind of makes me feel powerful, and knowing I'd never do it makes me feel like a wimp. But since they're not here, I decide I can wear a little more makeup than I'd normally wear to school. Usually, I wear colorless lip-gloss and a little blush. But today I put on green glitter eye shadow and my favorite new product: my Pink Lollipop Extra Glossy lip-gloss. Just these little touches make me feel more dressed up.
Mrs. Ramal honks to let me know they're here. I lock the front door and sling my heavy backpack over one shoulder. Walking over to the car, I see that Sunny's in the front seat and Yamir's in the back, with the huge model of the earth next to him.
He pushes the model over to the other seat and hops out of the car. "You're smaller than the earth, so you get to sit in the middle," he says.
So I slide in, and I'm smooshed between the earth and Yamir. I have to fiddle around for my seat belt, and Yamir doesn't even try to help me find it. I'm touching his thigh, and I don't want to be. God. Why do car companies make the middle seat belt so impossible to find? Sitting in the middle is bad enough, yet they found a way to make it even worse.
"Ooh, Lu-Lu, we're so close right now." Yamir laughs. He's right-we are close. I can smell onion bagel on his breath, and I try as hard as I can not to gag.
"Mah-ahm!" Sunny yells. "Tell Yamir to stop being disgusting."
"Yamir," Mrs. Ramal warns. "Please behave like a gentleman."
Sunny says, "Yamir, only you would make this huge, annoying project for a stupid club." She looks back at us. "Lucy, it's not even for Science. It's for Earth Club."
"Really?" I turn to look at Yamir.
"It will also be entered in the county science fair, which I only get to enter because of Earth Club. There's a five-thousand-dollar prize if I win," Yamir tells us. "And that's not all. There's a trip to-"
Mrs. Ramal interrupts him and says, "Sunita, it wouldn't be such a bad thing if you joined some after-school club. I'd like to see you take an interest in something meaningful."
Sunny turns to look back at me again, and she bursts out laughing.
"It's not funny," Mrs. Ramal says. "I have been thinking this for a while, and now is the time I've chosen to say something. I would like you to join some activity."
Now both Sunny and I are laughing, but I'm not even sure why.
"Lucy, you could do it too," Mrs. Ramal adds. "If your mother says it's okay."
Until recently, I took art lessons. That was my extracurricular. And Sunny does Indian dance. But I guess Mrs. Ramal thinks we should do a school thing.
"Yeah," Yamir says, sticking his tongue out at the back of Sunny's seat. Then he smiles all good-boy-like at me.
Yamir Ramal really knows how to start the day off wrong.
On our way into school I tap Sunny on the shoulder, right in front of the Juicy Juice machine. "Sun, I have to tell you something," I mutter.
Her shoulders perk up. "What? And are you wearing perfume today?"
"No, it's my Pink Lollipop lip-gloss. Doesn't it smell delicious?"
Sunny nods.
I let out a long breath. "Okay, I have to make this quick-first period starts soon. I think the pharmacy might be going out of business." It hurts to say that out loud. I love Old Mill Pharmacy. I love the memories I have from all the time I've spent in the store-like when I was little and Grandpa used to push me around in the shopping carts after the store closed. And when Grandma would make Claudia and me root beer floats at the counter, even though Mom really didn't want us to have soda.
Sunny's response is slow, almost like a delayed chemical reaction. First her eyes bulge and her mouth opens, but no words come out. And then she gives me a look. "Really?" She looks around and then whispers, "Why?"
"Business isn't good anymore. People just go to, like, big stores where they can buy groceries and clothes and their prescriptions all at the same time."
"But those stores don't usually give the personal touch," Sunny insists. "And my dad says a lot of those stores are bad to their workers."
I shrug. I know she's trying to make me feel better, but I don't know what else to say. Sunny and I walk through the hall silently. After a few minutes she asks, "How can you be so calm about this?"
"I'm not calm. I'm just tired, so it seems like I'm calm," I tell her. It's a relief to tell Sunny this, but it does make me tired talking about it.
"Well, I'm going to tell my mom to shop at the pharmacy every single day from now on. She already gets prescriptions there, but I'm gonna tell her that she has to buy at least one thing there a day. Even if it's just gum."
"Thanks, Sunny," I say. "Oh, but guess what? I do have some cool news!"
"What?" Sunny's shoulders perk up again.
"So this girl Courtney Adner," I start. "She's in high school, you probably don't know her. I only know her because of Claudia. But anyway, she came into the pharmacy after she had this really bad hair situation at a salon on the night of homecoming, and-"
"Lucy! Get to the point!" Sunny says.
"And I fixed her hair. Right there in the pharmacy! I knew these two products would work, and they did!"
"You gave her a makeover?"
I throw my hands up. "Yeah! I guess so!"
"That's awesome, Luce," Sunny says, putting her arm around me.
It's good to hear that from Sunny, because I do feel really awesome about how I was able to help Courtney.
We get to our lockers, and I'm taking some books off my top shelf when someone bumps into me, really hard. "Move out of the way," I hear Erica Crane say. "You're blocking my locker."
Very unluckily for me, Erica Crane's locker is next to mine this year. Erica's been mean to me for as long as I've known her, since we were five, but there's never been a real reason for it. She's just always hated me. She never shared the toys in kindergarten, and she threw my lunch in the garbage for four days in a row in third grade. And in fifth grade, when her mom forced her to invite the whole class to her birthday party, she handed out the invitations in school but "accidentally" lost mine and never found it.
It's just a fact of life: Erica Crane hates me. Always has, always will.
"I'm not in your way," I say. "I'm in front of my locker."
"Shut up, Lucy," Erica says. "And by the way, lay off the scallion cream cheese. Your breath stinks, and you have scallion pieces in your teeth."
I turn away from her and clamp my lips shut. I grab Sunny by the arm and lead her into the bathroom so I can check my teeth.