Sasha Preston piece of advice: Compliment
someone at least once a day. It makes everyone happy.
"They're hot, right?" Molly asks. We're in the cafeteria finishing lunch and she's standing up with her back to us and her head turned over her shoulder, like a wannabe supermodel. "Three hundred. But they only made, like, fifty pairs, so they're kind of like a collectible."
"Yeah, I'm on the waiting list at Denim Spectator. They're trying to see if they can find me a pair. They've even called the manufacturer," Kendall adds.
The thing with Kendall is that she always has to have exactly what everyone else has. It started when she and I had the same baby fur coat in playgroup when we were two years old, and it's been that way ever since. Usually, I'm the one she tries to clone, but she's been acting more like Molly lately. I wonder if it's because she's noticed that I don't have the newest, coolest stuff before everyone else does anymore.
I should have those jeans. I'm the one who got everyone into the brand in the first place after I went to the trunk show with my dad and one of his colleagues. I hate that I get into a bad mood just because I don't have those jeans, and won't ever have those jeans.
"Are you getting them, Chels?" Kendall asks.
"Yeah, of course." I smile. "I just haven't been shopping so much because of the mono."
"Well, if Denim Spectator finds me a pair, I'll just pick them up for you and you can pay me back," she says. "No problem."
I nod and swallow hard. I pray they don't find them. It's weird Kendall cares about me having them. Usually, she's only concerned that she has what everyone else has.
"Sucks you have to hang out with that girl after school," Kendall says. "I'm so sorry we didn't get you into our science group. I totally thought buttering up Mr. Oliver with Dunkin' Donuts would work."
I guess I made them feel guilty, so they did end up fighting to work with me-for a few minutes, at least-so that was good.
"Yeah, I have to meet up with the new girl. How else am I gonna finish the stupid video?" I eat the last section of my clementine. "I shouldn't have laughed in front of Mr. Valakis. Apparently, he doesn't have a sense of humor."
They both shrug. "That girl is strange," Molly says. "The way she videos random stuff. She doesn't even have any friends here, so what's she videoing?" Molly stares at Dina as she talks about her. Molly doesn't even try to be slick when she's talking about people. It's like she wants them to know she's talking about them.
"I have no idea." I look over at Dina. She's sitting only one table away from us, and I wonder if she can hear what we're saying. I hope not; that would make the whole working together thing even more awkward.
She's sitting with the studying-obsessed girls who wanted to start a field hockey team last year. They never seem to really like each other, either. They sit quietly at lunch with books on their laps, studying and barely talking to each other. Dina has her camera out of course, and she's just randomly taping the cafeteria. Who does that?
We're all watching her, and then we see Ross walk over to her.
"Guys, Ross Grunner is walking over to that girl right now," Molly says, as if we can't all see it ourselves.
He kneels down next to Dina's seat and whispers something to her. She looks all confused, then she smiles and says something back, and then he gets up and walks away.
I can't look, and yet all I want to do is look. I keep looking away and then turning to look again. It could have been a bad clementine, but my stomach is doing flips right now.
"Aren't you going to stop that, Chels?" Kendall asks. "Ross is talking to the new girl more than he's talking to you."
I don't say anything. It's not really that big of a deal, but the way they're reacting is stressing me out. I'm ripping my clementine peel into a million little pieces.
"We should make a video of her!" Kendall yelps. "And, like, show it to people and stuff. Wouldn't that be hilarious?"
"Do you know how to even use a camera, Ken?" Molly elbows Kendall. "Come on."
"Yeah, there's one on my phone!"
Finally, the bell rings and we all leave the cafeteria. I block out the fact that Ross was just talking to Dina and I have absolutely no idea why. I block out the fact that it seems like Kendall wants to torment the new girl.
Have they really stooped that low? Have I stooped that low, too?
After school, I meet Dina in the library. She's sitting at one of the back tables, writing in a Curious George notebook. It's one of those thick, sturdy ones, with a red binding and a bright yellow cover, and I immediately want it. I have a soft spot for school supplies. I'm staring at it so I almost trip on one of the blue library carts that's sitting in the middle of the floor.
"Oh, sorry," this kid says, running over to move it.
"Don't worry about it," I say. I can't think of his name. He was new last year, but he hasn't been in any of my classes. I think something happened to him over the summer-he's turned cute out of nowhere. He has ultrashort brown hair and very blue eyes. You don't see that combination very often.
As I get closer to Dina, I notice how neat her handwriting is and spot the pretty turquoise ring on her middle finger.
There are cool things about her when you take the time to pay attention. Maybe Ross realized that.
"Hey," I say. I want to compliment her on her notebook and her ring, but I don't. The words don't come out.
"Oh, hi!" Dina's way too cheery for three fifteen, and it bugs me when people are too cheery for no reason at all. I want to tell her to cheer down. "I was just jotting down notes. I have a million ideas, but here's the best one: I can tape and you can be the star of the video! Like how Mr. Valakis said 'a day in the life' of a student here. Well, this can be a day in your life!"
"Um." At first, I think that sounds like an amazing idea. Who doesn't want to be a star? It could be like my own reality show, a camera following me around. Then I could be discovered and become the next Sasha Preston. But after I think about it for a few minutes, I change my mind. "That would be cool, but I don't think so."
"Why not?" she asks. "You know everyone at school, you've lived here awhile, you're perfect for 'a day in the life of a Rockwood Hills student.' I'll do all the shooting and editing and putting it all together. You'd just have to be you!"
"I said no." Dina doesn't even know me. How does she know I'd be a good star for the video? I can't look at her, so I look at my phone instead. Kendall sent a text about how they're all going to Ross's house to order in sushi and play video games and I should meet up with them. I don't want to be here, but I'm not sure I want to be there, either. I'm sure everyone is already talking about their plans for winter break and if they're flying first-class. And I'm a little sick of Kendall and Molly trying to convince me that I like Ross. I'm not sure I do. "Okay?"
"Okay," Dina says under her breath, like she knows she's been defeated, and she stays quiet for a few minutes.
"It just wouldn't be good to focus on one person in the video," I say as an excuse because I feel bad but also because I can't stand the awkward silence anymore. "I know it's a day in the life, but we should focus on more than one person."
There. That's a good explanation, if I do say so myself, and I bet she'll be into that idea because she probably wants to meet people around here. Yeah, she's only been here two days, but she barely talks to anyone, not even to the girls she eats lunch with.
"Oh!" she yells suddenly. "I have an idea! I can just get random shots of the school and kids in the hallways and we can put upbeat, fun music over it, and it can show all kids in their natural school environment. It'll be all B-roll."
"B-roll?" Right when I start to feel bad about being rude to her, she gets way too excited about something and starts using weird video terms and I feel myself getting annoyed with her all over again.
"Yeah, it means, like, background shots, shots of the surroundings, and people walking around and stuff. But I think it would be neat for this," she says.
I text Kendall that I'm stuck at school working on the video and can't come to Ross's house, but that she has to tell me everything that happens as soon as she's home. "That could be okay, I guess."
Dina huffs. I guess she senses my lack of enthusiasm. "Well, you've lived here a long time, haven't you? Don't you have any ideas?"
My phone vibrates again, a text from Molly this time.
"Um." I crack my knuckles, praying something will come to me. Molly thinks I'm lame, and she knows something's up, but she hasn't figured out what it is yet. Even though I'm not sure I like Ross, it still feels good to know he likes me, or at least that's what Kendall thinks. I wonder if he told them anything about what he said to Dina at lunch. "Nope. No ideas."
Dina sighs, and twirls a pen around her fingers like a miniature baton. "Well, we should do a good job, right? Aren't there going to be a ton of people there? Like, the whole school and parents and everyone?"
I nod. "Yeah, I think so."
"So think about my idea of background footage and candid shots," she says. "The parents will be excited to see glimpses of their kids' lives at school, and the kids will be excited to see their friends."
She's trying so hard to convince me, but I just don't really care that much. I want to get it done as quickly as possible. Lately, all I want to do is get through things and have them be over with so I can move on to the next thing.
It can be kind of nice to have someone try really hard to get you to agree, or try really hard to get you to like them. Sometimes it's really pathetic, but other times it's pretty flattering.
Right now it's one of the flattering times.
"Okay…" I smile slowly. "Let's do it."
The thing about this Dina girl is that you want to hate her but something about her makes you not totally hate her. There's a shred of likeability in her. And she doesn't even feel weird about being new. It's like she's from some alternate universe where people don't worry about what others think of them. I'm not going to lie-I'm a little jealous. I want to go to that universe sometimes. A lot of times, actually. Especially now.
"I know how we can get started." She caps her pen and closes her Curious George notebook. "Ready?"
I nod.
"Let's look at yearbooks. Since you know everyone here, you can tell me about them, and maybe there are some people better than others to sort of focus on. Maybe I can even pan the yearbooks in the shots. That'd be so cool-looking, and it would help highlight the history of the school! It'll help show the transformation from the school of the past to the school today. And who doesn't like looking at yearbooks?" She jumps up. "It'll be fun!"
"Okay…"
"And if we look at really old yearbooks, it'll be fun to see people's crazy hair. People always had the weirdest hairstyles back in the day. Didn't they?"
"Totally. But I don't know how far back the yearbooks go. I'll go find Mr. Singer." I wonder if I'll see that kid again, and if I do, I hope I remember his name.
"Who?"
"Oh, the librarian. He's actually kind of cool."
When I get back from looking for Mr. Singer, I realize what I've done-something totally careless and stupid. Like an absolute total idiot, I left my cell phone on the table, just sitting there, not even with the keypad locked. The screen on my BlackBerry is bright, and on it there's another text from Molly.
Dina looks at the phone and then up at me and back at the phone again.
Things just went from bad to worse. Why did she have to see that?
Yeah, I don't want to be working with her, but I'm not like Molly, someone who's totally fine with insulting other people. But in all fairness, even Molly didn't expect that Dina would see it.
I'm the moron who let that happen.
"Sorry," I mumble. "It's just Molly. She doesn't realize what she says half the time."
"I get that you guys don't know me, and I'm new and that automatically makes me uncool, even though I sort of thought that would make me stand out kind of in a cool way," Dina says all in a rush, "but what I don't get is why you're all so weirded out with the video thing. You have a video camera on your BlackBerry right there, the one that just vibrated and insulted me."
She's pointing at my phone, and I cover my mouth because I'm about to crack up. Dina's actually kind of funny sometimes. "It's just-I don't know-unusual, I guess."
She nods like she's trying to understand what I'm saying. She doesn't say anything for a few seconds, and then she asks, "Did you find the librarian or the yearbooks? I have to go soon, and we've accomplished nothing."
"I'm sorry you saw that, okay?" I say again because I don't know what else to do. And then I hear Mr. Singer's unmistakable whistling. "I'll make it up to you, I swear. Right now, actually. I'll get the yearbooks."
I head over to the circulation desk, but before I can ask Mr. Singer for anything, Dina yells from across the library.
"I actually have to go," she says. "My mom forgot my brother has a dentist appointment, so she needs to pick me up now. I'll meet you here after school tomorrow."
At least she says she'll meet me here tomorrow. That's kind of a good thing because now that I think about it, talking about the project for a few minutes was actually kind of fun. It was a little chunk of time when I wasn't thinking about things at home or worrying about my friends finding out about everything.
And I got to see that cute kid with the libary cart.
Dina doesn't wait for me to say anything back, she just leaves, her oversized mom-looking tote bag slung over her right shoulder. That's what I get for offering to make it up to her, even though I didn't really say the mean thing-Molly did.
Maybe I should text Molly and tell her she shouldn't have said that, but the truth is, the only reason I'm mad is because Dina saw it. If she hadn't seen it, it wouldn't have even fazed me.
But that's how I feel about everything lately-once it's out in the open, it's much, much worse.