Everything I Know About You Read online

  The truth was, Ava’s comment had me paralyzed. All this time, she’d been spying on me? I was horrified—although really, how was it worse than me spying on her?

  And what she’d said about me just now: that I was basically some kind of fake. I told myself she was wrong; she was just being mean; she didn’t even know me.

  Except Ava was Miss Perfection. She never made mistakes. About anything.

  “Hey, Tally.” Ava leaned toward me. “You finishing that muffin?”

  I blinked at the seven-eighths-eaten cinnamon muffin on my plate. “No. Why? You want it?”

  Without replying, she snatched the muffin eighth and set it on a napkin in front of her.

  “I thought you didn’t eat carbs,” I said.

  “Sometimes I do. Hi, Mom,” she said brightly, as Mrs. Seeley took a seat at our table.

  On her plate was what looked like a big squashed marshmallow. I guess she saw me staring at it, because she explained that it was scrambled egg whites.

  Then she pointed her chin in the direction of my bacon. “Tally, please don’t take this the wrong way, dear, but you might want to think a bit about your diet.”

  “My diet?” I repeated. “But I’m not on one.”

  “I mean diet as in ‘foods you eat.’ You’re putting a lot of junk into your body.”

  “Mom!” Ava scolded. “Don’t say that to her!”

  Mrs. Seeley kept on talking. “You have a very pretty face, Tally, and such gorgeous thick hair. But I’d love to see you take better care of yourself, maybe add a few nice outfits into your wardrobe. I could make some suggestions, if you like.”

  I almost choked. “That’s very generous of you, but I have tons of things.”

  “It’s not about quantity, dear.” Mrs. Seeley took a bite of squashed marshmallow. “I’m speaking from personal experience: Women need to look their best if they want to succeed.”

  “What if they don’t?”

  “Don’t want to succeed?” Her face looked like she’d swallowed a bug.

  “Yeah,” I said. “What if they just want to build hummingbird houses? Or play the drums all day? Or solve Sudoku puzzles? And what if they don’t care what people think about their bodies? Or their clothes?”

  “Then good luck to them. Because grown-ups need jobs, Tally, and it’s a tough world out there.” Mrs. Seeley raised her eyebrows at Ava. “Although a junk-food diet never stopped your father. He always ate whatever he wanted.”

  “Mom, don’t use the past tense,” Ava said. “Dad still eats food.”

  “I’m sure he does. Just not in my kitchen. But let’s not get me started on that subject.” Her phone made a noise. She read something, looked excited, typed something. Then she looked up. “Ava, darling, is that all you’re having for breakfast?”

  “No, I also had a huge muffin,” Ava said, showing her the muffin remains. “It was whole wheat. And it had nuts for protein. Anyway, it was so delicious I had to let Tally have a bite. Right, Tally?”

  She wanted me to lie about the muffin? Why? I searched her face for a clue. Ava was smiling, but now her eyes were pleading: Just do this for me. PLEASE?

  It was an expression I’d never seen on her before. At that moment, she wasn’t Miss Perfection, fearless leader of clonegirls. She looked desperate, really.

  And one thing she had wrong about me: I wasn’t just Miss Math, or a big obnoxious fake. I also took care of people. Even if sometimes maybe I shouldn’t.

  “Oh yes, you definitely did,” I said.

  Before Mrs. Seeley could challenge either one of us, her phone rang. She jumped up and ran from the table.

  I looked at Ava, expecting some sort of thank-you or acknowledgement that I’d lied for her, but she turned away and just started reading her phone.

  Great News

  AS SOON AS BREAKFAST WAS over, Ms. Jordan told us to gather in the Martha Washington conference room to go over the day’s schedule. By then Spider had shown up in the Thomas Jefferson to grab a doughnut for breakfast, and his mouth smelled stale, as if he’d forgotten to brush his teeth. I grinned at him as he ate his doughnut in the crowded conference room, careful not to spill any crumbs on the red carpeting, which had a Washington-crossing-the-Delaware pattern.

  “What?” he said.

  I grinned. “Nothing. I’m just watching you destroy that thing.”

  “It’s a good doughnut, but your dad’s are better. Tell him I said so, okay?” He leaned closer to me, so I got another whiff of his stinky breath. “Oh yeah, some spy updates: Marco’s feet smell really bad, and he spits in the sink. But he doesn’t even turn on the tap, so his spit blob just sits there.”

  “Gross,” I said, laughing.

  “Also, he’s constantly on the phone. In the bathroom.”

  No wonder Spider couldn’t brush his teeth. “That’s terrible! Do you tell him to get out?”

  “It’s not a problem, Tally.”

  “Well, sure it is, if you can’t use the bathroom, Spider!”

  “It’s fine. I’m not complaining; I’m just telling you because it’s interesting.”

  “What’s interesting about it?”

  “The fact that it’s so private. And that he keeps saying, ‘Don’t cry.’ ”

  “Yeah? Who’s he talking to?”

  “No idea. It’s hard to hear very much with the door closed.”

  I had to admit this was extremely interesting—even though ever since I’d watched Ava exercising, I’d been feeling a little off about the spy game. And after hearing she’d been spying on me . . . well, the whole thing had gotten weird. Still, I definitely wanted to hear more about Marco.

  But then Ms. Jordan held up a hand to quiet us.

  “Okay, folks, so there’s some good news and some great news,” she said. “The good news is that this afternoon, we’re doing the US Capitol, followed by a tour of the Mint. The great news . . .” She smiled, a bit nervously, I thought. “Ava’s mom, Mrs. Seeley, has just now arranged a very special backstage tour of the Kennedy Center.”

  Haley gasped. “Omigod. Omigod. Ms. Jordan, isn’t that where they’re doing—”

  “Yes, the national touring company of Hamilton is in town, and they’re doing some performances at the Kennedy Center this week. We tried to get tickets, but I’m afraid it’s just not possible—”

  Haley and all the other theater-and-music kids screamed. So did Sonnet, who was with them. Even though Ms. Jordan had just said she hadn’t gotten tickets. It was crazy.

  And Mrs. Seeley was beaming proudly. “Yes, I’m just delighted! The assistant stage manager at the Kennedy Center happens to be my old college roommate Sarah, and now she’s a client of mine. So when she heard about our trip, she graciously offered to meet us and take us around a bit, but she wasn’t sure until just this morning that it could be arranged. And during breakfast, she called to say we were on!”

  So that was the exciting phone call. I wondered if Ava knew what her mom had been busy arranging. She sure didn’t give very much away, did she?

  “Will we see actual performers rehearsing?” Haley squealed. “Or get to meet anyone backstage?”

  “No guarantees, but you never know,” Mrs. Seeley answered. She fluttered her eyelashes in a teasing way.

  More screams. Across the room, Sonnet was hopping, first on one foot, then the other, as if the floor were giving her small electric shocks.

  Then Ms. Jordan made settle down hands. “But here’s the catch: Only thirty of us are allowed. They’re very strict on the number of guests backstage, so we’re asking those of you who aren’t super interested, or who don’t do music and theater at school, to please raise your hands. We’d like to give dibs on the Kennedy Center to classmates with the strongest interest in the performing arts.”

  “That’s so unfair,” Sydney Brunner grumbled. “Just because I don’t play an an-stru-mant, I don’t see why I should be pun-ashed.”

  “No one’s being punished, Sydney,” Mr. G said cheerfully. �
��We’ll have an alternate activity for you guys, extremely cool, so no worries.”

  Sydney sniffed the air suspiciously. “What is it?”

  “Well, that’s the beauty of plan B: It’s entirely up to us.”

  At first nobody raised any hands. Then Spider raised his.

  “What are you doing?” I whispered at him.

  “Telling the truth,” he said, shrugging.

  “But you do music! You play trumpet!”

  “Yeah, but it’s not like I care about it.”

  My heart sank. Because who asked Spider to tell the truth? If he wasn’t going to the Kennedy Center, naturally I wasn’t going either.

  Reluctantly, I raised my hand.

  Other people raised theirs, too: Sydney, then Jamal, then Shanaya, then Marco. Plus a bunch of kids from Mr. G’s class.

  But not Sonnet, of course. She was huddled in the corner with Haley, Nadia, and some other theater people. Her back was turned, so I couldn’t see her face or make eye contact. But I could see she was wearing her hair unponytailed and parted on the side, the clonegirl way. Rooming with Haley had given her a new hairstyle, apparently. Maybe hairstyles were contagious, like cold germs or pinkeye.

  “Thank you, volunteers,” Mr. G was saying. “But we still need a few more of you for plan B, or we’ll have to start picking names out of a hat. Come on, we’ll have a blast, and I know some great spots for lunch. Hey, that’s awesome.”

  He was smiling at Ava, who was now waving her arm over her head, like a flag.

  “Ava, what are you doing?” Nadia shrieked.

  “I’ve been to the Kennedy Center before,” Ava replied. “And backstage once. And I’ve already seen Hamilton. So I’m totally fine with plan B.”

  I glanced at Mrs. Seeley, who seemed to have something stuck in her throat. “Ava, darling,” she said, and she did a pretend chuckle. “That’s really generous of you, but since you’re my daughter, and this tour was arranged as a thank-you to me, I think we can make an exception—”

  “No, Mom, it’s fine,” Ava answered firmly. “It wouldn’t be fair if I went today. Other kids should get a chance.”

  “Are you sure?” Ms. Jordan asked. Her eyes flitted to Mrs. Seeley’s face, I saw.

  “Completely.” Ava was using her quiet voice, which was somehow more forceful than her loud one.

  And for the second time in the space of an hour, I wondered what the bleep was going on in her mind. She sure wasn’t staying off the tour for social reasons, because all her friends, except for Sydney and Shanaya, were going. And it wasn’t like she wanted to hang out with me; I had no illusions about that.

  I watched as Mrs. Seeley pushed herself over to where Ava was standing and begin to argue with her—quietly, but with a lot of gestures. They were too far away for me to hear anything, but I could tell that Mrs. Seeley was frustrated with how Ava just kept shaking her head. And then I had a strange thought: Whatever they were arguing about, it had nothing to do with the Kennedy Center.

  Superhero Dolphin

  “TALLY?” NOW SONNET WAS IN front of Spider and me, with Haley right behind her. “I feel terrible you guys aren’t going.”

  “It’s fine,” I said, chewing my lower lip.

  “Tally, you don’t have to stay behind because of me,” Spider said.

  “I’m not,” I lied.

  “So why are you doing it, then?”

  “Why? Because plan B sounds mysterious, and you know how I love mysteries.”

  Sonnet and Haley exchanged glances.

  “Tally, can I talk to you a sec?” Sonnet asked.

  Without waiting for me to answer, she dragged me over to the wall, next to a portrait of Martha Washington. “Spider doesn’t need a babysitter,” she announced.

  “What?” I stared at her. Not only was her hair different, she wasn’t wearing her small gold heart studs anymore, either. The earrings she had on were big silver hoops. “Sonnet, I’m not—”

  “Exactly. You aren’t his babysitter, but sometimes you act like you are, and that’s not being fair to him. Or to you.”

  “That’s crazy,” I sputtered. “Did Haley tell you that?”

  “You think I can’t see things for myself?” Sonnet raised her chin. “And as long as we’re on the subject, Tally, you do the same thing to me.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Well, it’s true. Sometimes you act like Spider and I can’t take care of ourselves. It’s like you think we’re these drowning swimmers, and you’re this superhero dolphin who can save us.”

  “Superhero dolphin?” I gaped at her. It definitely sounded like a line she’d heard from Haley, or maybe even Nadia. “Sonnet, what are you talking about?”

  “I mean, seriously, Tally, I’m really grateful for the way you stopped the teasing after my audition. And the way you made me feel better about the whole thing afterward. You helped me a lot back when I first moved here, you know? But I’m not the scared new kid anymore, so you can please stop now.”

  I was buzzing like a nearly dead lightbulb. “Well, I’m really sorry, okay? I never meant to—”

  “I’ve been thinking this for a while, actually,” Sonnet continued, her cheeks bright pink. “And you know what? I think Spider feels the same way. I think he’s getting tired of how you treat him.”

  Now my throat ached. Sonnet had been thinking this for a while? Since when? Probably before we got on the bus, or even before that. I tried to scroll back in time to a point when Sonnet had seemed happy that we were friends, but my brain had crashed.

  She seemed to realize that she’d hurt my feelings. “Tally, look, you’re a really good person . . . ,” she began.

  I knew what word came next: But. Well, I didn’t want to hear it.

  “Sonnet,” I said loudly, “for your information, I just want to be with Spider, not babysit for him. Maybe you don’t believe it; maybe Haley doesn’t either. But it’s the truth. Okay?”

  She shrugged. “Okay.”

  “And I don’t think I’m some kind of rescue dolphin, or whatever you said. I’m really glad you’re doing better now. Oh, and I like your hair. And those earrings.”

  Sonnet fingered the silver hoops. “Thank you, Tally. Haley let me borrow them, so.”

  “I figured. Well, that was extremely nice of her.”

  At that point I knew she wanted me to tell her, Have fun backstage; take a selfie with the Schuyler sisters; get some autographs—but I refused. I was being a loyal friend to Spider. If Sonnet wanted to spend the afternoon with clonegirls, that was her business.

  And as I watched her walk back over to Haley, I wondered if this was the last conversation we’d ever have. It kind of felt that way, like if this were a movie, the camera would be pulling away, and pretty soon all you’d see would be a big empty highway.

  • • •

  “Okay,” Mr. G was saying in a fun-counselor sort of voice. “All you non-theatrical types, follow Mrs. Packer, Mr. Melton and me.”

  They led us to the lobby, where Roy took off his three-cornered hat and bowed at us. I took off my green glasses and bowed back, but apparently he didn’t notice.

  “So what’s plan B?” Marco asked skeptically. Trey had deserted him for the Kennedy Center, and it was obvious he was disappointed. Some people were just sucky friends, when it came down to it, and I almost told Marco I knew how he felt.

  “Plan B,” Mr. G said, “will be decided by popular vote. We have several great possibilities. We could do the Museum of Natural History—”

  “Bor-ang,” said Sydney.

  “—or the National Gallery of Art—”

  “Nah,” Marco said.

  Then it hit me.

  “Wait, what about the Air and Space Museum?” I cried.

  Spider’s eyes lit up and he started bouncing on the balls of his feet. “Yeah, Mr. G, could we?”

  “They have a museum for space?” Marco asked, laughing. “So you mean it’s completely empty? Except for the black holes?”

/>   “Marco, it’s actually incredible,” I said, catching Spider’s eye. “Just look it up online!”

  While everyone read their phones, I told myself that if we were doing Air and Space, I didn’t mind missing plan A. I mean, just to see the look on Spider’s face right then, like it was Christmas morning on the moon, was worth everything about this trip, even having to room with Ava.

  “Okay,” Marco said after a minute. “I agree with Tally—it does look amazing. Let’s do it, Mr. G!”

  Spider grinned at me.

  Mr. G held up his hand. “First we need to take a vote: How many in favor of checking out Air and Space?”

  Everyone raised their hands, including Ava.

  “The popular vote is unanimous,” Mr. G said, rubbing his hands together. “And may I commend you on an awesome choice. All right, people, vámanos.”

  Popcorn

  WAY, WAY BACK IN THE olden days before the bakery opened and Dad was just messing around in the kitchen, he tried to get me interested in baking. Specifically, he tried to teach me how to bake bread. But I thought bread baking was boring: all that kneading, and then just sitting around watching a blob of dough for hours and hours. The only type of cooking I enjoyed was making popcorn, because it was exciting—like a food explosion, I told him. One minute you had a corn kernel, and then suddenly, pop. It was something different.

  Although Dad said, “Yes, Tally, you’re right, making popcorn is like an explosion. But it’s also a whole process. First you add oil to the pan, and heat. The kernels turn from brown to yellow, and get fatter and rounder. Then they start sputtering and hopping in the pan. And when they get so hot they can’t stand it anymore, they pop. So really, if you think about it, it’s no different from making bread.”

  “No, Daddy, it’s the opposite of bread,” I insisted. “Popcorn is fast.” I clapped my hands once, to show him how fast it seemed to me.

  Dad smiled. “What I’m saying is, if you know how to look at it, you’ll see that popcorn doesn’t happen all at once. It’s faster than baking bread, sure, but it still happens step by step.”