Bad News/Good News Read online

  Every time Charlotte thought about that first sleepover she felt a rush of emotion. She could still remember how much she’d dreaded the event, and how awkward it had been at the beginning…her dad all excited that she finally had “friends” coming over and refusing to listen when Charlotte kept telling him they were only coming because they had to. And how weird it felt sitting around, sipping hot chocolate and waiting for someone to say something. Finally, when the four girls were getting ready for bed, this whole huge fight had erupted, with everyone yelling at everyone…Katani furious with Charlotte for wrecking her favorite outfit, and Maeve exploding at Katani for accusing her of being spoiled rotten, and Avery mad at Katani for sounding like she was dissing adoption…which she wasn’t, and the next thing the girls knew, they were all pouring their hearts out to each other. Really talking about who they were, what they feared and worried about, and how they really felt.

  When Charlotte looked at the other girls now, it was hard to believe that four such different girls could become so close. But in many ways, the differences between them were the best part of their friendship. Together they were…How did Mr. Sherman in pre-algebra put it? Together they were more than the sum of their parts!

  “Hey—you still haven’t let me tell you my news,” Maeve reminded Charlotte. She twirled around dramatically, pulling a printed invitation out of her velvet book bag. “Look what my mom gave me last night. She got hers early because she’s on the Arts Committee. You guys should be getting one any day.”

  * * *

  Seventh-Grade Social Dancing

  Learn classical dance steps!

  Practice manners and social graces!

  Free dancing too!

  Sponsored by the PTO

  Brookline Neighborhood Club

  Wednesday evenings, 7-9 P.M.

  Attire: Dressy

  * * *

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” Avery said, scowling. “You call this good news?”

  “It’s not every Wednesday,” Maeve said quickly, “just once a month. It sounds amazing. There’s going to be refreshments…and they’re going to teach us how to do cool new dances, and the classics.” She bounced a little, her eyes shining with excitement. “And at the end of every class, there’s a chance for the guys to ask the girls to dance—and then the other way around. Girls’ choice!”

  “Let’s guess,” Avery said dryly. “Who do you think Maeve might pick? Hold on,” she added. “The suspense is killing me.”

  “Hmm,” Katani said, eyeing the card. “I like the sound of ‘dressy attire.’ Sounds like a perfect opportunity for someone with a designer’s eye…moi, for instance.”

  “My mom says everyone on the PTO is completely behind this. They’re all going to make their kids do it. Even all the guys!” Maeve sang out happily. She hugged herself. “She’s pretty sure Dillon’s mom is going to send him. Same for Pete Wexler. And Nick! And the Trentini twins.” She was practically spinning with joy. “I can just see it now. It’ll be like the big waltz at the end of My Fair Lady, when Audrey Hepburn dances with everyone and her neck is so long and graceful that no one can tell she isn’t a princess!”

  “Give me a break,” Avery snorted. “This is so not like that, Maeve. Can’t you see this is just a grown-up plot to shove us all into a room and make us civilized?”

  Charlotte peered anxiously at the announcement. She had a completely different worry. If a person can’t even manage to get through a school cafeteria without humiliating herself publicly, how on earth could that same person be expected to survive a dance class? Dancing was not exactly Charlotte’s thing—not even the kind of dancing where you just got up and moved around to the music, let alone something like this, where you had to get the steps right! As a self-professed klutz, Charlotte had to admit she was on Avery’s side on this one. Katani and Maeve, however, gave each other a high-five, looking like they’d just won the lottery.

  “I think off-the-shoulder,” Katani advised, her arm around Maeve’s shoulder. “And colors—we have to think of something very this year.” She thought for a minute. “Mulberry,” she added. “Or maybe aubergine.” Katani so loved exotic names for colors. Yellow, her favorite, she liked to refer to as “Tuscan gold.”

  “Dillon,” Maeve breathed rapturously. “Just think, I’m going to have at least one Wednesday evening a month where I can get Dillon to ask me to dance!” She paused. “And a chance to ask him, too. It’s going to be heaven!”

  Charlotte shook her head as the four girls crowded together into homeroom, just as the last bell rang. This didn’t sound like such good news to her. She hoped whatever Ms. Rodriguez had in store for them was going to be better than this!

  CHAPTER 2

  Changing the Rules

  Ms. Rodriguez had her “even though it’s Monday morning, I’m still in a good mood” look on her face. There was the usual mad scramble to get into homeroom before the P.A. system blared morning announcements. Today there was more confusion than usual, since all the students had new places—which meant extra time was not only needed for wandering around to find their seats, but for commenting on the new arrangement. The announcements began before they were all settled, and Maeve groaned. “We definitely need music,” she muttered. “Don’t you know they’ve done studies on this? Kids our age are much more responsive if they hear something with a good beat before getting down to work.” She’d found her new desk and was trying to cram her bag into it without much luck. She finally gave up and pulled out her laptop; it was a special privilege because of her trouble with spelling and writing; but not much of a pleasure as far as Maeve was concerned.

  Ms. Rodriguez kept a seating chart. She had used it the first few weeks of class so she could get to know everyone and everyone could get to know each other. Now she rotated seats every few weeks so nobody would “get in a rut.” Today’s assignment landed Charlotte between Dillon Johnson and Betsy Fitzgerald. “Omigod,” Maeve hissed when she saw Charlotte slide into her seat next to Dillon. “Charlotte Ramsey, this is the most unfair thing ever!” Maeve was way over on the other side of the room, next to Riley Lee, who wore his dark, unruly hair long and played bass guitar. There weren’t that many guys who Maeve didn’t think had crush potential, but Riley was definitely off her list. “Way too into the grunge thing, which is so over,” she’d described him to Charlotte. “And what’s with the all-black clothing thing? Gross!”

  Charlotte would’ve been willing to trade seats with Maeve if she could—she could tell her friend was absolutely dying to be next to Dillon. But they all had to respect Ms. Rodriguez’s new assignments.

  TYPE A+

  Betsy Fitzgerald had her “Student Planner” out and was thumbing through it. She had every day organized with three different color pens—assignments in blue, tests in green, and long-term projects in red. “Big math test this week,” she announced, to nobody in particular. “I hope everybody’s planning for it.” She frowned a little, squinting at the planner. “Oh, and we have our first major paper due in social studies on Friday, too!”

  “Please,” Dillon groaned. “Betsy, is there such a thing as a type A+? Or are you just obsessive-compulsive? It’s too early in the morning to worry about things like tests and papers.”

  Betsy blinked at him. “You know, Dillon, I happen to like a little organization in my life, OK?” She sat up straight and smoothed her hair back. Not that there was anything to smooth back—she had every hair in place under her tidy headband. She folded her hands and gave Dillon a prim, disapproving look. Everything about Betsy always looked like it had just come from the dry cleaner. Perfect.

  Ms. Rodriguez cleared her throat. “Did everyone have a good weekend?”

  Anna McMasters and Joline Kaminsky, Abigail Adams Junior High’s resident “Queens of Mean,” gave each other significant looks. Joline leaned over to whisper something to Anna and they both giggled.

  “Something you’d like to share with the rest of us, Joline?” Ms. Rodriguez aske
d pleasantly.

  Joline kept a deadpan cool look on her face without flinching. Charlotte glanced at her wonderingly. How did Joline do that—manage to look so scornful without even rolling her eyes? It was pretty amazing if you didn’t let it get to you personally. At every school Charlotte had ever attended, there’d been someone like Joline. Someone with superior written all over her face, and a way of cutting you down without saying a single word. How did you even get to be that way? Charlotte wondered. Was it hard-wired? Or was it somehow contagious? “The Whisperers,” she and Sophie had called them in Paris. Even before Charlotte’s French was good enough to understand, she could pick them out. It was that certain combination of snobbery and power…a universal language.

  “No thanks, Ms. Rodriguez,” Joline murmured silkily. But the look she shot back to Anna said it all. They’d probably gone together to some exclusive high school party Charlotte thought. Or more likely, they sneaked into an “R” movie with some of the eighth and ninth graders they liked hanging out with. Sometimes she thought Anna and Joline didn’t even need actual language, since they had the body language thing down so well.

  One shoulder turned in meant: Don’t you dare sit with us.

  One lifted eyebrow meant: You are so juvenile.

  Direct eye contact with each other meant: The two of us are the coolest things that walk the earth. Other mortals—stay away!

  One derisive snort of laughter means: That was an inside joke. And you are so on the outside!

  Anna and Joline intimidated just about everybody with their super-cool, “we’re so in and you’re so not” kind of attitude. It was funny, though—Anna and Joline didn’t seem to have as much fun together as Charlotte and her friends did.

  Ms. Rodriguez was still interested in hearing about people’s weekends.

  Pete Wexler’s hand went up. The J.V. football team won their game, he announced, 24 to 7.

  Other people mentioned things. Nick Montoya had gone hiking in the Blue Hills in Milton. Avery had everyone laughing when she described doing double ollies over some chairs in her driveway and almost breaking her arm. Samantha Simmons, who loved dropping hints to remind everyone that her family was incredibly wealthy, described driving down to Cape Cod to their second home. “We had to take our new ski boat out of the water for the winter,” she announced, which prompted some serious eye rolling from Anna and Joline.

  Dillon, who was obsessed with action movies, took almost five minutes telling everyone the plot of the latest fantasy movie he’d seen—until Ms. Rodriguez cut him short. “That sounds very exciting, Dillon,” she said with a smile, “but I think we need to give others a chance—”

  Betsy’s hand shot up. “My weekend was excellent. I signed up at a test-prep center to get coaching on the PSATs.” She glanced around the room, waiting for a reaction, and when none came, she added, “You know, you can raise your scores by quite a few points if you just take the time to prepare.”

  Dillon coughed and Ms. Rodriguez shot him a look. “Well. That certainly sounds like you’re thinking ahead, Betsy,” she said. Trust Ms. Rodriguez to find something encouraging to say—even to Betsy.

  Anna and Joline exchanged a superior smirk. Betsy drove them up a wall and they didn’t exactly hide it. They were still dumfounded by the fact that Betsy actually argued with Mr. Sherman when she got a 98 on her most recent math test. She wanted 100 percent, and she kept trying to prove to him that the one error she’d made wasn’t an error after all.

  Betsy wasn’t done yet. “I liked the prep class. It’s really important to think ahead. It’s not too soon to start thinking about applying to college. My brother, who goes to Harvard, always says…”

  Anna snorted, and then tried to cover it with a sneeze. A bunch of people giggled.

  Ms. Rodriguez’s eyebrows shot up. Betsy was very fond of quoting her older brother, who was a sophomore at Harvard. The class had already heard quite a few of his views on getting into the best colleges.

  “College!” Dillon shrieked. “We’re in seventh grade! Give me a break.”

  Fortunately Ms. Rodriguez was already calling on someone else. Abby Ross, a friendly, round-faced girl who sat in the back row, talked about the walk she’d gone on to raise money for Project Bread, an organization that brought in money to buy food for people who needed it.

  Betsy’s hand shot back up. “That’s so great, Abby, “she said. “That sort of thing looks really good when you apply to schools. My brother says—”

  “Betsy,” Ms. Rodriguez cut in. “I think Abby was trying to tell us about her experience. Please, let’s listen—and give her a chance.”

  “Anyway,” Abby Ross added, “it’s not exactly a good thing if you help people and use it to your own advantage.”

  Betsy frowned. “I don’t see why not,” she objected. “People can still get their food. And you can get credit for it. So everyone wins.” Betsy always saw the pragmatic side. But, as Avery put it, Betsy’s favorite subject was always really “How Can Betsy Get Ahead?”

  “You raise an interesting point,” Ms. Rodriguez said. “Doing something helpful, and wanting credit for it…” She looked thoughtful. “I think Abby’s raised something worth thinking about. You know, adults struggle with these issues, too. When we do something to help someone, shouldn’t that be the primary goal?”

  Betsy looked a little miffed, but Charlotte thought Ms. Rodriguez was right. She thought of her favorite character of all times, Charlotte in the book Charlotte’s Web. Charlotte didn’t ask for credit when she saved Wilbur’s life, did she? In fact, she refused to be considered a hero. She worked her magic selflessly—out of love. If I ever do anything to help someone, that’s how I would want to do it, Charlotte thought to herself.

  That was the best thing about Ms. Rodriguez’s homeroom. The students really had a chance to talk about things that mattered. But today, discussion got cut short.

  ANNOUNCING…THE SENTINEL!

  “This gives us a lot to think about, but today, we have some important business to discuss—as I mentioned in class on Friday,” Ms. Rodriguez said. She smiled. “You may remember that for the past few weeks I’ve been asking you to write letters to me suggesting school rules that you’d like to see changed. I have been trying my best to see what we can do about acting on some of them.”

  “Yay! More school dances!” Dillon called out. It was no mystery that Dillon had asked for more seventh-grade dances. Across the room, Maeve beamed, taking Dillon’s suggestion as a personal compliment.

  Ms. Rodriguez shook her head at him. “I said, SOME of the rules,” she emphasized. “In fact, I’m happy to be able to report this morning that one school rule has been changed—thanks to a suggestion from Charlotte Ramsey.” She smiled in Charlotte’s direction. Charlotte sat up a little straighter. She couldn’t believe her ears.

  “You all know that for years, The Sentinel—our school newspaper—has been staffed by eighth and ninth graders. Charlotte wondered in her Change a School Rule Letter why seventh graders couldn’t write for the paper as well. I did some investigating, and it turns out that this particular rule was something that had been put in place ages ago. And since nobody really questioned it, it just stayed in place. That sometimes happens, which is one reason why it’s so important to keep questioning rules—and to work on changing the ones that don’t make sense. So, this morning, Jennifer Robinson, the editor-in-chief of The Sentinel, has handed me an announcement to share with all of you. In fact, the whole seventh grade is learning about this today.”

  Ms. Rodriguez read the announcement from an e-mail she’d printed out. “Any seventh grader who would like to write for The Sentinel should submit a brief writing sample by next Friday. We’d love your involvement, so please submit your best work!”

  Charlotte’s heart started to beat a little faster. She couldn’t imagine anything she’d like better than the chance to write for The Sentinel. She’d always wanted to be a writer for as long as she could remember. She c
ouldn’t believe her “change a rule” letter had actually made a difference! She felt so pleased and excited. She was hoping Ms. Rodriguez would go on and say a bit more about the writing sample that the editorial staff had asked for, but just then the homeroom door opened and Mrs. Fields slipped her head in. “Ms. Rodriguez? I hate to interrupt, but I wanted to let you know that your new student, Isabel Martinez, is here.”

  Ms. Rodriguez nodded. Everyone craned heads. Mrs. Fields came into the room, followed by a pretty girl with soft caramel-colored eyes and beautiful, raven black hair cascading down her back. She was wearing fashionably tight jeans and a white V-neck T-shirt which looked great on her curvy figure. There was a sparkle in her eyes, but she looked slightly shy, too.

  “Class,” Mrs. Fields said, “this is Isabel Martinez. She’s just moved here from Michigan. I hope you’ll all really make her feel at home.”

  Charlotte’s heart went out to Isabel. All the memories of being new came flooding back. At least she’d never had to start school after it already started! She was so glad that it wasn’t her standing in front of the room, looking awkwardly around at the rows of curious faces. But she couldn’t help noticing how poised and calm and graceful Isabel seemed. If she was suffering from any first-day pangs, she sure didn’t show it. Charlotte guessed that this girl was unlikely to have a first-day disaster. She didn’t look at all likely to zip a tablecloth into her jeans and walk off with everyone’s lunch trays!

  “Isabel, why don’t you take a seat behind Charlotte?” Ms. Rodriguez said, pointing to the one empty desk in the room.