Free Too Much Drama by Laurie Friedman Page B

true.
    I also could have gotten over the fact that yesterday Vanessa came up to me after dance and said that she’s really sad for Brynn that I wasn’t there for her when she was obviously going through a hard time, and that it just makes her wonder how committed I am to being part of the dance team. Seriously?
    But now I’m truly mad.
    I just found out Brynn is having a spa day at her house on Saturday afternoon and invited all the freshman girls on the dance team . . . EXCEPT ME!
    When Kate Walls texted me saying how much fun it’s going to be that we’ll all be together at Brynn’s for manis and pedis, I felt like I was going to throw up. I don’t want to be excluded from something all the ninth graders on the team are doing. My first reaction was to call Brynn and say something, but what’s the point?
    Even if she had invited me, the last place I want to be is with her.
    Thursday, January 8, 10:17 p.m.
Annoyed
    Leo texted me when he got to school, but tonight was our first live conversation since he left for college. He was so upbeat about his classes and the unlimited cereal bar in the morning and the fact that his dorm is only 163 to 165 steps from the library. He said he counted twice and got a slightly different number both times and that by his estimation some dorms are more than 600 steps from the library.
    Then he asked me what’s going on with me. I started to tell him about the girl drama going on in dance, but I stopped myself. It seemed trivial in comparison, and it was a little unsettling that a.) I don’t even want to talk about my own life, and b.) Leo has only been gone four days, and I already feel like there’s stuff I can’t tell him.
    Then I heard talking and laughter in the background, and Leo said he had to go because he had a floor meeting and it was starting. I don’t even know what a floor meeting is, but I know it includes other people because I heard them. I pictured Leo surrounded by those people. College people.
    Annoying.
    Saturday, January 10, 4:10 p.m.
Surprised (not in a good way)
    Today was the day the dance team went to Brynn’s house.
    I told Sophie what they were doing without me, and she suggested we have our own spa day, so I went over to Gaga’s, and we sat on the floor of Sophie’s room and painted our fingernails and toenails.
    While we were waiting for them to dry, I noticed something I didn’t remember seeing the last time I was there— a bright-colored, carved wooden fish on her bookshelf. “Is that new?” I asked motioning to the fish.
    Sophie smiled. She got up and got the fish from the bookshelf and brought it over so I could get a better look. “Billy brought it back to me from his trip to Mexico. Cool, huh?”
    I told her I thought it was, but what I was really thinking was that if Billy brought Sophie a gift back from Mexico, he must like her. I already had a feeling he did, especially when I saw them kiss on New Year’s Eve. But Billy was in Mexico over Christmas, which means he got her the fish before they kissed. It was proof that Sophie and Billy are going to get together.
    It used to be an
if
. Now it’s a
when
.
    I don’t know why that surprised me. Or upset me. But as I waited for my toes to dry, I pictured Sophie and Billy as a couple, Brynn with the dance team, and Leo off with a bunch of college people. Then I pictured myself. Alone. I felt stupid for picturing myself like that. Sophie and I were supposed to be having a spa day.
    Not a pity party.

Hold fast to dreams For if dreams die Life is a broken-winged bird That cannot fly.
    â€”Langston Hughes,
Dreams
    Monday, January 12, 5:59 p.m.
Home from dance
    Things aren’t better with Brynn, not that I thought they would be. But I hadn’t anticipated that she would use her spa day on Saturday to try to turn all the other freshman on the dance against me.
    I think it’s a pretty safe assumption that she