Laura
"--and so NOW Jared and *Jennifer* are going out! Can you BELIEVE it?! Poor Melinda! She must be crushed. But maybe not for long. *I* heard that Steve Herdenandez likes her. At least according to Sara Sawyer who heard it from Mark Peters. And then..."
I couldn't help smiling and shaking my head as Tammy Lucero plunged into another gossip story. Geez, it was only lunch period, and already she had enough gossip to last year. How in the world did she even HEAR all these things? I could see my other two best friends, Melissa McConnell and Funny Hawthorne, were also looking amused. Well, actually Melissa looked sort of annoyed. (She gets tired of Tammy's gossip the fastest. I think it's because she isn't easily impressed. Like, for her to be interested in one of Tammy's stories, it has to be something really out of the ordinary- not he likes her and she's dating him and all that stuff.) And Funny... well, Funny always looked amused.
I continued to tune Tammy out as I munched on my sandwich and glanced around the cafeteria. It was the usual lunch scene... noisy and packed. I actually knew almost all the kids, though. But then, I guess that's pretty normal when you're practically the most popular girl in school, I thought with a self-satisfied smile. The only real competition I had was from maybe Alexis Duvall or Shawnie Pendergast. I frowned. And of COURSE The Fabulous Five. They're the worst enemies of my clique, The Fantastic Foursome. They're ALWAYS on our case, trying to show The Fantastic Foursome up. I bristled, wondering what kind of schemes they'd be up to this year. I peered around the cafeteria, trying to get a glimpse of them so I could give them a dirty look, but I couldn't see them anywhere. I really hadn't seen much of them much during morning classes either. Christie was in my homeroom, Beth was in my science class, and I had briefly glimpsed Melanie in the hall, but that was about it... I really hadn 't seen Katie and Jana at all.
I turned back to my friends.
"Hey, what about the You-Know-Whos?" I said, interrupting Tammy midsentance.
"The You-Know-Whos?" Funny asked blankly, her wide blue eyes looking puzzled. Melissa shot her a disgusted look.
"The Fabulous Five, of course. Right?" She said glancing at me.
I nodded and looked back at Tammy. "So? What kind of rumors have you heard about them?"
She laughed. "Oh, just stuff. You know, like, for example, everyone's betting on how long it will take Christie and Chase to get together. And a bunch of kids think Katie will be back on Teen Court again. Then someone said that Beth had some cousins from the state penitentery out to visit over the summer and the cousins tried to bomb her house or something."
We all laughed. "Trust Beth to have juvenile delinquents for cousins," I giggled under my breath. Then louder, I said "What about Melanie and Shane? Do you know whether they're still going out?"
Shane Arrington was the boy I was madly crushing on, had been madly crushing on for YEARS. He was cool and athletic and sweet and totally HOT and unfortunately dating MELANIE EDWARDS of all people. How he could even WANT to associate himself with The Fabulous Five was beyond me.
Tammy gave me a sympathetic look. "I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings, but yeah. They're still dating. At least that's what everyone says and I even saw them together in the halls a couple times today. Holding hands and stuff. Sorry."
I rolled my eyes. "Well, it can't last much longer. I mean, Melanie just CAN'T stand to be tied down to one guy for too long. Especially with some new guys this year. *And* Melanie and Shane have been dating since *Valentine's Day*... sooo, I expect a breakup any day now."
"That's the spirit!" Melissa said in a ditzy voice (pretty out of character for her) and Tammy and I cracked up. Then I noticed Funny, who was sitting next to me, wasn't joining in. I scowled. Oh right, I'd forgotten she was pretty buddy-buddy with The Fabulous Five. Honestly, if didn't like her so much, I'd kick her out of the group for that. It was totally traitorish for her to be pals with THOSE girls. And the worst part was that she was closest with JANA MORGAN, who is the leader of The Fabulous Five, for pete's sake. Oh, which reminded me...
"So, what about Jana?" I asked Tammy. "You haven't said anything on her yet. Surely there must be SOME dirt about her you've heard."
Out of the corner of my eye I could see Funny frown as she took a sip of her milk.
Tammy giggled and shrugged. "Nothing, besides everyone saying she got plastic surgery over the summer."
I dropped my sandwich just as Funny spluttered to keep her milk in her mouth instead of all over the table.
"WHAT?!" We shrieked at the same time, causing a kids at the surrounding tables to give us puzzled looks. "What about plastic surgery?" I exclaimed lowering my voice. "I didn't hear about this."
"It's nothing but a lie," Funny said shakily, finding her voice. "So cut it out, Tammy. You KNOW that it's not true. She's like, what? Not even 14 yet! And everyone's saying she got plastic surgery?! Honestly! Get real! I wish you'd quit spreading stuff around that you know is totally false."
Tammy gave her a superior look. "Oh, really? How else do you explain all her curves?"
"Curves? Jana?" I snorted, trying to sound as if this news was totally trivial, when I could feel myself starting to pale. "In the same sentence? I don't believe it."
"You better believe it," Melissa rolled her eyes. "Haven't you seen her yet, Laura? She looks so different a barely recognized her."
"Would you guys just lay off?" Funny snapped, her eyes flashing. "There is nothing abnormal about Jana, okay? She developed over the summer! It happens, okay? Everyone's bodies change at different times and hers just... happened all at once." Then she turned to glare at Melissa. "And maybe she does look kind of different. She' s taller, curvier, tanner... a different haircut. Prettier. But she's still Jana and she's still my friend so I'd appreciate you all watching what you say about her."
"Whoa," Melissa said sarcastically, and I glared at Funny.
"Hey, who's clique are you in, anyway? The Fantastic Foursome or The Fabulous Five? Because it's kind of hard to tell."
Funny glared back. "Don't be ridiculous. You know you guys are my best friends. It's just that I like Jana, too, and I don't like people saying nasty stuff about her."
"Nasty stuff?" Tammy echoed. "What's so nasty about people making over her great figure?"
Great figure. The words stung me. *I* was the one with the great figure, not Jana. Well, I thought glancing down. I wasn't exactly really busty, but I wasn't flat either, and I was slim, so... well, Jana would have to look pretty terrific to pass me up, I thought firmly.
"Nothing wrong with THAT," Funny sighed. "But people need to accept the fact that she just changed. Not all these stupid rumors about her getting plastic surgery. Obviously everyone knows it's not true, and the only thing it'll do is get back to Jana and make her feel self concious."
"I think she must feel self concious already," Melissa snorted. "She walks down the hall and half the guys run into each other turning around to look after her."
This was getting worse by the minute. Okay, so there had been some cute guys last year who had liked her, like Parker Donovan and Keith Masterson, (and of course there was her boyfriend, Randy Kirwan), but she had never gotten attention from guys like, say, *I* did, for example.
"Well, she can't be that pretty," I remarked sourly, crumpling up my lunch bag. "She probably looks just different enough that people can't help but notice and make a few remarks."
"I don't know," Tammy frowned thoughtfully. "She has gotten a LOT prettier then last year." When she saw the look on my face, she quickly added, "But she's still not as pretty as you. Obviously."
I smiled at her, even though I was still worried. Not really worried that Jana was better looking then me, just upset that she was apparently getting so much more attention then she used to. Great, I thought, annoyed. That was all I needed. It had been a struggle enough keeping up with The Fabulous Five LAST year. Now this. Well, it didn't matter. It didn't matter even if Jana looked like a brunette Barbie doll. The Fantastic Foursome was going to be *the* top of the social ladder this year. And I would still be getting the most attention from guys. No matter what. I would see to that.