The next day was a Friday.
It was bad from the moment I got up. Getting ready to go, I realized I’d bent Nick’s Choc-o-rama when I stuffed Bitsie into my knapsack the night before. I tried to be mature about it. It was only a chocolate bar after all, and it’s not like I’d lost it or anything, but it was still really upsetting.
Then Kathleen got mad at me for keeping her waiting, even though I was the one who’d been waiting for her. (I mean, who absolutely had to find her Mulberry Gash Lip Stain that day despite having twenty-six other lipsticks to choose from? Me or her? ) I kept my mouth shut though.
I knew she’d been talking money with her accountant the night before so I was sort of prepared for her to be cranky.
Not that cranky, of course, but cranky.
Even Zola wasn’t herself. Her boyfriend’s band—“The Tofu Weiners”50—had a big concert in Ottawa that weekend and the bus was leaving right at six. Zola was worried that if things didn’t go smoothly on set that day, she’d miss it. She was still nice of course, but I could tell she was anxious. And that made me anxious. When I saw Zola, a.k.a.
Granola Girl, woof down that chocolate jelly donut, I really started to worry for her.
And it only got worse as the day went on—because of Bitsie. Of course.
He was acting like a complete jerk. He kept “breaking down.” He must have done it ten times by noon. We were way, way behind and bound to go into overtime. That was bad for Zola—and for Kathleen. Kathleen had to pay everyone extra when things ran late. She wasn’t going to be very happy about it.
I knew why Bitsie was breaking down of course. It was his way of getting back at me for not taking him to the mall.
It worked.
It was the perfect revenge. He could hurt me by hurting my friends. I didn’t know what to do. Make us all suffer or just give in and promise to take Bitsie shopping again? It was the type of thing I would have liked to talk over with the family counselor.
I was agonizing about what to do when Nick came by.
Bitsie’s behavior suddenly didn’t seem so important. After all, I was wearing the lime green T-shirt Nick always raved about (“Matches your eyes”). That day, though, he didn’t even notice. He just rattled off a bunch of orders to Zola from Kathleen, and then, like it was just another message, said, “Oh, and Tally, there’s an e-mail for you from your sister. It’s marked urgent.”
I told you the day stunk.
50 The name suited them perfectly.