Promises, Promises Read online

  Maeve hung the feather boa back on the mannequin. “Bye for now. I should be able to afford it in a couple of weeks.”

  “Toodles! Stop by any time,” Ms. Magenta called after her. “And don’t forget! Think Pink!”

  As Maeve rushed off toward the dance studio, she reread the contest flyer. This is perfect, she thought. The BSG could use something fun and frivolous to distract them right now. Marty would look so cute in pink! This was something they could all do together! Even Avery would be excited. She was crazy about animal shelters.

  Crossing the Line

  “It will all work out. It will all work out,” Charlotte said to herself as she plopped down at her desk. Oddly she felt like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz when she clicked her heels together in order to get home. She half expected to open her eyes and find herself on a farm in Kansas.

  “Kansas might not be a bad idea,” Charlotte said as Marty jumped from the floor to her lap.

  Right after lunch, within minutes of each other, both Katani and Avery had asked Charlotte if she would be home today because they wanted to use the Tower as their campaign headquarters. She had promised both of them that they could.

  “How could I not say yes?” Charlotte asked Marty as she scratched him behind his ear, setting off a rapid twitch of his back leg. “The Tower doesn’t belong to me! It belongs to the BSG. It’s our special place. It would be against the BSG Oath to exclude anyone. What do you think, Marty?” she asked the little dog. Marty looked up and snorted at Charlotte. “Marty, I swear you understand everything we say,” Charlotte giggled as she gave Marty another little tickle on his stomach.

  She hadn’t asked either girl when they planned to come over. Then had realized with horror, as she walked home from school, that they might show up at the same time. Well, thought Charlotte, maybe they could divide the Tower into two rooms to separate the dueling candidates. So as soon as she had gotten home, she had found a hammer and nails, clothesline, and a large flat sheet. She had pounded in the nails and had the clothesline and sheet waiting just in case.

  “I even put little loops in the ends of the clothesline, so I can hang it up quickly. Just in case,” she told Marty, and he cocked his little head to one side as if to say he wasn’t sure that would work.

  “Well, I’m as prepared as I can be,” Charlotte told him.

  The doorbell rang. Charlotte left Marty in her room, shut the door, and ran down the stairs to answer it. It was Avery. Just moments after Charlotte helped carry all Avery’s things up to the Tower, the doorbell rang again.

  Oh, no! Charlotte thought. But she didn’t say anything as she went downstairs, hoping it was UPS or FedEx, or even a traveling salesman.

  But, of course, it wasn’t. There on the other side of the door was Katani with her campaign file box, three-ring binder, stereo, easel, and bulletin board. Katani was in a great mood.

  “You’re a lifesaver, Charlotte,” she said as she handed the last of her campaign supplies up the ladder. She climbed up and froze the minute she saw Avery. She turned to Charlotte. “What’s she doing here?”

  “What am I doing here? What are YOU doing here?” Avery asked.

  “I’m using the Tower as my campaign headquarters,” Katani said.

  “The Tower is my headquarters.”

  They both turned to Charlotte. “Who asked first?” they asked at the same time.

  “You promised me, Charlotte, that I could use the Tower!” Avery exclaimed.

  “What?! You promised ME! How could you promise us both?” Katani was furious with Charlotte.

  Charlotte was stuck. She did technically promise both Avery and Katani.

  Charlotte tried to sidestep the issue by saying, “I don’t see why you both can’t use the Tower as your headquarters.” Even as she said it, she had the sinking feeling that this could never work, but there was no way they were going to make her choose between the two of them.

  “How’s that going to work?” Katani asked.

  “Maybe if we set up a schedule,” Charlotte said. “We could alternate even and odd days.”

  “Nope. Won’t work for me,” Avery said, crossing her arms in front of her. “Not with basketball and indoor soccer practice to work around.”

  “Look,” Katani said, stepping forward and coming toe-to-toe with Avery. “I NEED the Tower. I share my bedroom with Kelley and can’t spread out stuff. Why can’t you use your huge bedroom, or your carriage house?”

  “Katani!” Charlotte gasped.

  “Because I get the best ideas here!” Avery said, not backing down, even though Katani was towering over her.

  “Then you’ll just have to share,” Charlotte said.

  “Share?” they both said at the same time, in a way that made it seem like a totally ridiculous idea. It seemed to be the only thing they could agree on.

  “I’ll divide the room in half.” Charlotte was glad she had thought ahead and put the nails up and tied the loops in the clothesline already, or the moment would have been even longer and more awkward. If that was possible.

  Charlotte mobilized into action. In an instant, she had the clothesline up and was tossing the sheet over the line. It would take two sheets to completely divide the room, but one sheet was enough of a divider between the two candidates. Charlotte pulled the sheet almost totally over where the Tower steps came up through the floor.

  Katani and Avery stood in the opposite corner—Maeve and Charlotte’s corner—watching in amazement as Charlotte straightened the sheet and created two distinct working spaces.

  “Well, what do you think?” Charlotte asked.

  “But Avery can still see my stuff when she comes up,” Katani said.

  “I’m not a spy! Besides…what’s worth seeing except a bunch of feathers and sequins?”

  “I think you should both get to work,” Charlotte said before anyone could say anything else.

  Reluctantly, each girl moved to her side of the sheet. Charlotte sat at the end of her window seat closest to the corner so she had a view of each girl’s side of the sheet. She grabbed a pen and notebook and paged open her library book. She was reading a great book called Lyddie by Katherine Paterson and couldn’t wait to get back to it. It was about a girl who lived in 1843 and moved from Vermont to Lowell, Massachusetts, to work in a textile mill. Charlotte couldn’t believe that girls as young as sixteen worked ten to twelve hours a day, six days a week, in cold, smelly, dimly lit rooms.

  Katani got out her portable stereo, popped in a CD, and cranked it up.

  Avery marched to the sheet divider. “Hey! Isn’t that a little loud?”

  Katani kept her back to the sheet and shrugged. “Deal with it,” was all she said.

  Charlotte choked back a laugh when Avery leaned toward the sheet and stuck out her tongue.

  Her friends were acting so childish that Charlotte felt like she was babysitting a pair of kindergarteners. On the other side of the sheet, Katani set up a portable easel and put a bulletin board on it that was neatly divided into cate-gories with jewel-toned yarn and labeled with matching construction paper. Katani sat primly on the edge of the Lime Swivel chair, pulled her file box toward her, and started sorting through papers as music blared around her.

  Across the room, Avery pulled out a dry erase board, set it on the floor, and propped it up against her window seat. She pulled a folder of papers out of her duffle bag and started sorting them out. Suddenly, Avery grabbed her duffle and dumped the contents on the floor. Different sized and shaped Nerf ball equipment rolled in every direction.

  Avery had hung a Nerf basketball hoop weeks ago, so Charlotte was used to seeing her bounce and toss the Nerf basketball around, but this was over the top. Charlotte couldn’t hide the surprised look on her face. It was Nerf City on Avery’s side of the room.

  “I don’t get ideas by sitting,” Avery said when she saw the look on Charlotte’s face. “I get ideas by moving around.” She dribbled away from the basket, turned, and shot a fade-away jumper. �
��Avery Madden for two!” Avery shouted when it went through the hoop.

  “Hey, Charlotte,” Avery asked, dribbling around her side of the room. “Where’s Marty?”

  Charlotte held up one finger. She’d intended to bring Marty up to the Tower right away, but had been sidetracked by hanging the sheet. Charlotte tiptoed across Katani’s side of the room and down the ladder. When she returned to the ladder with Marty in her arms, Katani’s music poured through the opening. The base beat of the music shook the floorboards, punctuated by loud thumps and thuds. It sounded like someone was performing a hippo ballet up there.

  Avery’d switched to Nerf baseball by the time Charlotte settled into her seat with Marty in her arms. Charlotte noticed there were a few things written on her dry erase board. Ironically, Avery, “the green candidate,” was using an orange-colored marker to write with.

  Marty usually loved greeting visitors, especially Avery, but even he seem stunned by the loud music and the frantic activity on Avery’s side of the Tower. He was very content to stay on Charlotte’s lap.

  Charlotte couldn’t blame him. It was all a little overwhelming. Charlotte had been trying to think of ways to make a special space for Isabel, but the Tower had never seemed smaller. The election had overshadowed everything in their BSG world.

  Avery threw the Nerf ball up in the air and smacked it hard with the Nerf bat. She dropped the bat just before the ball hit the sheet divider and dove for the rebound, miraculously catching the ball as it bounced off of the sheet divider. She landed on the floor with a monstrous thud, but quickly jumped to her feet. She raised the Nerf ball above her head as if showing the ball to an imaginary crowd. “And the crowd goes wild!” she said.

  She dropped to her knees in front of the dry erase board and scribbled out a few more ideas before she popped to her feet to repeat the whole process. This time she hit the floor extra hard. Charlotte was sure even Miss Pierce had heard the crash from her first-floor apartment.

  “What are you doing over there?” Katani asked, looking back over her shoulder at the sheet divider. “It sounds like a herd of rampaging elephants.”

  “I am creating, if you want to know, Miss Perfection!” Avery shouted back.

  Katani popped out of the Lime Swivel, tiptoed to the sheet, and peered around the edge to see what Avery was up to.

  “You are being rude, Avery,” said Katani in her most haughty Kgirl voice.

  “Hey! Stop peeking!”

  “At what? You’re not doing anything!”

  “Yes I am! I’m thinking, and you’re disrupting the process.”

  Charlotte cleared her throat. Both girls took the hint and went back to their separate headquarters.

  When Katani cranked up the tunes even louder, Marty began whining.

  “I can’t think with that noise, and you are hurting Marty’s ears!” Avery shouted.

  “Listen! I can’t play music loudly in my room because of Kelley. That’s why I came here. If you don’t like it, leave!”

  “What about Marty?!” Avery retorted

  “Put him downstairs.”

  “That’s not fair!”

  “Candidates, in your corners, please!” Charlotte said as if she were reffing a boxing match. “I think you should just concentrate on your campaigns—and not talk to each other…you both are upsetting Marty.”

  Katani reluctantly turned back to her bulletin board with a big sigh.

  Avery switched back to Nerf basketball. After a few perfect baskets that hit nothing but net, one shot hit the rim. Avery dove for the rebound. She caught it, but she ran into the sheet before she hit the floor. The sheet pulled off the line and wrapped around Avery as she rolled across the floor. She rolled right into the legs of Katani’s easel. Katani’s poster board catapulted off the easel and knocked the cord of the stereo loose as it fell. The Tower was plunged into instant temporary silence. The falling bulletin board hit Katani’s equipment box, which slid off her portable file box. The corner of the equipment box hit the floor and sent the contents—multicolored paper clips, markers, push pins, and rolls of tape—skidding across the wooden floor.

  A large roll of masking tape rolled across the floor with such force that when it hit Avery’s dry-erase board it fell over and smacked the floor.

  “What was that?” Avery asked in a muffled voice. She was rolled up like a mummy in the divider sheet.

  Katani rose up from the Lime Swivel and looked at her wrecked side of the room. Before she could say anything, Marty jumped from Charlotte’s lap. He seemed to think this whole thing was for his benefit and started yapping and jumping on Avery, who was wrapped in the sheet. As he jumped and danced about, he scattered the markers and paper clips further across the room.

  “Help! Get me out of here,” Avery called.

  Hearing Avery’s voice, Marty jumped right on top of her. His puppy feet must have tickled because the sheet—wrapped Avery started laughing and wiggling about like a giant silkworm.

  Just as Avery wiggled enough to get her head out, they heard a car horn from the street below. Charlotte went to the window to see Mrs. Madden’s car in the driveway.

  “Your mom’s here, Avery. I’ll run down and tell her you’re…wrapped up in your work, but will be along in a minute.”

  That did it. Katani had been wavering between laughter and outrage and Charlotte’s comment pushed her over the edge. She laughed so hard she couldn’t stand any more. She sank down into the Lime Swivel as Charlotte disappeared down the ladder.

  Charlotte felt she could leave Marty as referee between the two and climbed down the ladder stairs and then down to the first floor. She was surprised to find Mrs. Fields climbing up the porch steps. She welcomed her inside.

  “Would you tell Katani to get her things ready? I’m going to stick my head in the door and say hello to Sapphire—Miss Pierce—while I wait.”

  Charlotte said that she would, wondering what it was like for two best friends from middle school to suddenly rediscover each other almost fifty years later. And to think that the BSG had gotten the two together. It was a pretty cool thing, she thought.

  She bounced out the front door and down the porch steps to the waiting car to tell Mrs. Madden that Avery would be along in a few minutes.

  Avery had her dry erase board and papers packed up by the time Charlotte returned.

  “Don’t worry about the Nerf mess. I’ll pick all that up for you,” Charlotte said.

  Avery glanced back at Katani. “Sorry,” she said before she disappeared through the Tower opening.

  Katani waved her off.

  “Your grandmother stopped to say hello to Miss Pierce while you pack up,” Charlotte told Katani. “I’ll help you. I’ll start with the paperclips.”

  “Charlotte…”

  “What?”

  “Avery is so…”

  “I know…”

  And they both started to giggle.

  Avery’s Blog

  The campaign is going pretty well. My slogan is: Vote Avery! For the Best Junior High Ever! When I become class president, I want our school to be more environmentally friendly. We have to learn “green habits” when we are young. I like to think of my generation as the one that will really save the planet.

  Campaigning is a little more work than I thought it would be. And the whole poster thing…what a royal pain in the you know what!!!!

  Survey:

  What is your favorite way to help the environment?

  a) Pick up litter

  b) Recycle cans and bottles

  c) Buy environmentally friendly products

  Results from the last poll:

  What is your favorite way to compete with friends?

  a) Trivia games (11%)

  b) One-on-one games (38%)

  c) Cards/board games (22%)

  d) Team sports (29%)

  CHAPTER 9

  Missing in Action

  After days of going to school early, Katani felt like it was a real treat to arri
ve later than normal. Her mother had offered to drop Katani off later so she could put the finishing touches on her new campaign headquarters location in her own bedroom.

  Katani still couldn’t believe what happened in the Tower yesterday. She thought sharing a room with Kelley was bad, but after an afternoon with Avery, she’d have to rethink that. She would have been really upset if it hadn’t been so funny. No, from now on, she’d keep her campaign headquarters at home. Besides, carting everything back and forth had been a real pain.

  The first bell rang, and Katani walked quickly up the steps to the seventh-grade entrance and made her way to her locker.

  “Did you hear?” Maeve asked as soon as she got her locker open. “There are more posters missing. Are any of yours gone?”

  “I don’t know, I just got here,” Katani said quickly, retrieving the things she needed for her morning classes from her locker. “Will you help me look?”

  Katani and Maeve made their way up and down the seventh-grade hall. They could see where a few of Betsy’s, Dillon’s, and one of the vice-presidential candidate’s posters were missing. Katani could tell they had been quickly ripped away. Nothing remained but balled-up masking tape and sometimes a thin piece of the poster board that had peeled away when the poster was ripped off the wall.

  “Are any of your posters missing?” Isabel asked when Katani and Maeve joined Isabel and Charlotte outside of Ms. Rodriguez’s classroom.

  Katani shook her head.

  “Wow, that’s surprising! Especially since you have so many. You probably have more posters than any of the candidates, and none of them are missing?” Charlotte said.

  “What’s going on?” Avery asked.

  “Did you hear? There are more posters missing,” Maeve said.

  “Yeah, I heard! Henry Yurt got hit the hardest. All of his banners are missing, and he only has one poster left,” Avery said.

  “How ‘bout you, Avery? Were any of yours taken down?” Isabel asked.

  Avery shook her head. “No, and good thing. I don’t have that many. But my posters are up pretty high. By the time I got them done, the only space left to hang them was above the lockers. I had to borrow a stepladder from the janitor to put them up. Whoever’s taking the posters would have to have a chair to reach them. Katani? Are you missing any?”