Peace, Love, and Baby Ducks Read online

  Whoopee, I think. I look marginally better than freakish, and he gets a refund.

  The next day is Monday, and I wake up as jittery as all get-out. At breakfast, I can’t even finish my Pop-Tart, that’s how jittery I am. It’s not all about me and my hair, either. Quite a few jitters are devoted to Anna, since she’s starting high school and high school is scary—especially at Holy Redeemer.

  Since Anna’s a freshman now, she’ll be moving to the upper-school section of Holy Redeemer’s campus. The lower school, where we spent our elementary years, is construction-paper adorable. The middle-school building is safe and contained; it was designed for “community building.”

  The high school, however, is its own intimidating thing: grander and stiffer than the middle school, and not even on the same planet as the elementary school.

  “We’ll see each other in PE, just remember that,” I tell Anna. Last year I didn’t sign up for PE on purpose so that this year Anna and I could take it together. Peyton’s in the same class as us, too. “Fourth period, ’kay? You just have to make it till fourth period.”

  “Carly, stop,” Anna says as she munches her own Pop-Tart. “You’re projecting.”

  “Sorry, sorry.” I exhale. “You, um, look cute. Nice outfit.”

  “You, too.”

  “Yeah, whatever.” Anna’s wearing capris and a white tank top with straps that just barely meet the two-fingers’-width requirement. She looks fantastic. I, on the other hand, opted for jeans and a T-shirt to show how little I care. Not my peace T-shirt, but a yellow one with the Tide laundry-detergent logo on the front. On the back, it says LOADS OF LOVE. It came down to either my Tide shirt or my brown Harajuku shirt, but my Harajuku shirt has a centimeter-long rip at the neck, and it would be just my luck to get written up for a dress-code violation on the very first day.

  Also, I’m trying to believe that the yellow color of my Tide shirt makes my hair look brighter.

  “If you’re worried about your hair, you shouldn’t be,” Anna says. “You look like an indie-rock chick.” She reaches over and snags the rest of my Pop-Tart.

  “I think you’ve had plenty, Anna,” Mom says from the sink, where she’s washing Dad’s breakfast dishes. He and Mom ate already—whole-grain toast, egg whites, coffee—and now Dad’s upstairs brushing his teeth and splashing on cologne. “Have a clem entine if you’re still hungry.”

  Anna blushes.

  “Mom, don’t make a big deal out of what we eat,” I say. “Don’t you know that’s how eating disorders start?”

  “Neither of you girls has an eating disorder, thank heavens,” Mom says.

  “Not yet,” I correct her. “But we might if you keep talking about it.”

  Dad power-walks into the kitchen, smelling of authority. He tells Anna and me to have a terrific first day of school and kisses each of us on the head. Well, in my case, above the head. Anna gets the real deal, because she’s his baby girl and always will be.

  “Now if anyone mentions your hair,” he says to me, “just give them Jerr’s number.”

  “Uh-huh, sure, Dad.”

  “Give them Frederic’s number,” Mom corrects. “Ted, stop teasing her.”

  “She can take it,” Dad says.

  “No, actually, I can’t,” I say, and he laughs. Anna’s his baby girl, and I’m his ballsy, no-need-for-kisses daughter who is far less ballsy than he thinks.

  “Well, I’m off,” he says, cruising by the sink and giving Mom a peck on her lips. “Somebody’s got to support your mother’s extravagant lifestyle, you know.”

  “Thank goodness,” Mom says. “Girls? We should get going, too.”

  It takes the three of us longer to gather up and leave than it takes Dad, but we’re on the road by 7:55. As we drive, I lean my forehead against the window and watch the houses go by. Every house in our neighborhood is a mansion—stately, gorgeous Southern homes that were built way before planned subdivisions came onto the scene.

  In Atlanta, where you live is a pretty big deal. There’s a saying about it that goes like this: “In Charleston, they ask, ‘Who are your people?’ In Macon, they ask, ‘Where do you go to church?’ In Savannah, they ask, ‘What do you drink?’ But in Atlanta, the only question that matters is, ‘Where do you live?’”

  Buckhead, where we live, is the best response. The only response, Dad would say. Chastain is good, but the public schools have a “diverse” population. Ansley Park is code for “a little on the artsy side”—not a desirable characteristic because the residents of Ansley Park are into recycling and painting their houses fun colors and hanging flags from their porches. Flags decorated with peaches or magnolias, not Gay Pride rainbows, heaven forbid. The rainbow flags fly from the porches in Little Five Points.

  Madison Miller, a girl in my grade who supposedly tried pot, lives in Little Five Points. In fifth grade, Peyton and I went to Madison’s birthday party, and we saw that Madison’s mom had a tattoo of a ladybug on her wrist. That was it for Peyton. She wanted out of there. “There’s no place like home,” she’d whispered to me, clicking the heels of her pretend ruby slippers.

  We pull into Holy Redeemer’s gated drive. My stomach tightens.

  “Okay, I am nervous,” Anna says from the backseat. I look over my shoulder. She smiles twitchily.

  “You can do it,” I say. “Just be confident, you know? Walk into a room like you own it, and everyone’ll assume you do.”

  “Oh my God, you just quoted Dad,” she says.

  “Oh my God, I did.” I take a moment to process this. “That is so extremely horrifying.”

  Mom winds past the gymnasium and eases to a stop in front of the high school. “What are you two worried about?” she asks. “Are you worried about boys?”

  Oh, Mother, must you? I think. Of course we’re worried about boys, but that’s not at the top of the list. Not at the top of my list, anyway. Not this very second.

  “No, Mom. I’m not worried about boys,” I say. “And honestly, it would be best if you never talked about that with us again.”

  “If not boys, then what? Is it your hair, Carly?”

  “No!” Yes.

  “Well, there’s nothing left. You’re an excellent student, you enjoy your teachers . . . and you certainly can’t be worrying about the Holy Redeemer girls.”

  Uh, yeah. Sure, Mom. The girls at Holy Redeemer all tend to be a certain way: as in rich, Republican, and Christian. And what Mom doesn’t get is that that’s a bad mix, because it means the halls are filled with super privileged girls who think people deserve what they get in life. According to that logic, they themselves are obviously blessed by Christ Himself, because just look at them. They’re perfect.

  The fact that they attend Holy Redeemer is bonus proof that they’ve been handpicked for glory, as Holy Redeemer is the most prestigious prep school in the South. That’s why Anna and I go there, not for religion (opiate for the masses, according to Dad) but for the status. Holy Redeemer grads go to Harvard. Princeton. Yale. One day Anna and I are expected to go to Harvard. Princeton. Yale. Except not all three, of course. Unless it’s for grad school later down the road.

  As a side note: Anna will never go to Harvard, Princeton, or Yale. Anna is not Harvard, Princeton, or Yale material. Neither am I if I can help it, but I could conceivably get in. Anna will end up at a lovely Southern school with a fine-if-not-Ivy-League reputation, like Wake Forest.

  As another side note, regarding Holy Redeemer’s Christian-ness: I don’t know what I think about religion. I am religiously tangled. But while I may not know what I think, I do know what I feel. Or rather, that I do feel.

  What, exactly, do I feel? Um . . . something. Something that has a bigness to it, and that involves being authentic instead of stupid and shallow. Like when I’m listening to a totally rock-out gorgeous song, and my soul expands, and I love the whole world and ache to be my very best self—that’s the feeling I mean. And, well, I call that feeling God, though hardly ever out loud.


  It’s not the same God the other Holy Roller girls believe in. The other Holy Roller girls believe in a God created in their own image.

  Mom fails to grasp this distinction; hence, she finds it inconceivable that I’m not jumping with joy at the prospect of reuniting with my (alleged) Holy Roller gal pals.

  “Carly, you’ve known every girl in your class since first grade,” she says.

  “Exactly.”

  Her eyes drop to my jeans, then move up the rest of me, taking in my Tide shirt, the necklace I made myself from a piece of twine and a shell, and my earrings, which are dangly miniature doughnuts, complete with strawberry frosting and sprinkles. Her gaze goes a notch higher to my choppy beige bangs before she recalls what she was saying.

  “The other Holy Redeemer girls may not be going through such a rebellious phase—”

  “Mom, please. Laundry detergent is rebellious? Doughnuts are rebellious?”

  “—but believe me, you have much more in common with these girls than you realize. You’re creating a network that will last your entire life.”

  “Should I kill myself now?” I say. “Should I curl into a fetal position in the freezer compartment of our Sub-Zero and never come out?”

  Mom leans over and opens my door. “Go on. You, too, Anna. I have a manicure appointment with Kim-Hue, and I don’t want to be late.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  SCHOOL OF HARD KNOCKS

  The homerooms at Holy Redeemer are segregated by sex so that we don’t go wild and crazy first thing in the morning. Only we do, anyway. At least the other eleven girls in Ms. MacLean’s homeroom do. I just kind of stand there.

  “Wow,” Lydia says, checking out my hair. “You look like you’re from New York.”

  “That’s not a compliment, is it?” I say.

  “Your earrings are adorable, though. Omigod. Little doughnuts.”

  “Little doughnuts,” I agree.

  “Do you know how many calories are in a single doughnut?”

  “Um . . . a hundred?”

  “Two hundred and ninety nine,” she says accusingly. “Sixteen grams of fat. A single doughnut hole has fifty-nine calories and three-point-two grams of fat.”

  “Yes!” I say, thrusting my fist into the air. “Go, doughnut holes!”

  She pulls her eyebrows together. “You’re so weird, Carly.”

  “I’m weird? You’re the one who just said ‘three-point-two,’ Lydia.”

  “Why is that weird?”

  I pause. “Oka-a-ay.”

  “It’s not weird.”

  When Peyton arrives, she squeals, rushes over, and gives me a hug. She looks awesome with her shiny hair and perfectly white teeth that look like Chiclets. And unlike me, she knows her way around an eyeliner, so her brown eyes look doelike and enormous. She smells good, too. She wears a perfume called Hard Candy that’s really yummy.

  “Come on, let’s sit down,” she says, and we drop into adjoining desks. “Did you hear that Madison Miller tried crack cocaine with her cousin in Seattle?”

  Madison, as in Little Five Points Madison.

  “She did not,” I say.

  “He bought it on eBay,” Peyton says. “Her cousin got sent to rehab, but Madison told her mom she didn’t actually snort it or whatever.”

  “You can buy drugs on eBay?” I ask. Peyton is saving me from being “odd” in front of Lydia and the other girls, and I’m grateful. I’m a little amazed, even. Peyton’s so . . . preppy, or peppy, or both these things in her argyle vest, pleated black skirt, and jouncy ponytail. And I’m so incredibly not.

  Sometimes I wonder why we’re friends. Sometimes I get the itchy feeling of wondering how much longer our relationship will last, because Peyton and I aren’t the same girls we were when Mrs. Hopkins assigned us to be homework buddies back in the second grade. Not that I want us to go our own ways. Sometimes I just wonder if—or when—we will.

  “So how’s Anna?” Peyton asks, after exhausting the subject of Madison and her crack-cocaine addiction. “Price Jensen already told me how hot she is. Isn’t that hilarious?”

  I’m startled. “Why did Price Jensen tell you how hot my sister is?”

  “I don’t know, because she is?”

  “Price Jensen’s a tool,” I say.

  “He drives a BMW convertible,” Peyton says back.

  “Half the boys in the junior class drive BMW convertibles.”

  “But his is black.” The bell rings, and she jumps up. “Bye, babe. See you in PE!”

  She dashes off, and I’m left feeling like I’ve just gone through the spin cycle in Mom’s front-loading washing machine.

  “I don’t want guys talking about how hot Anna is,” I say to no one. “She’s my little sister.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  WHEN I GROW UP, I’M MOVING TO SEATTLE

  All day long, I get comments on: (a) how awful my hair looks, and, (b) how hot my sister is. I don’t get it. Do people not consider the possibility that maybe they’re being the tiniest bit insensitive, saying things like, “Omigod, you must have wanted to kill your stylist,” and then informing me how incredibly gorgeous Anna is?

  “Yes, thanks for that,” I say to Chelsea, who’s the third person to make the you-must-have-wanted-to-kill-your-stylist remark. “And my stylist has a degenerative nerve disease. It’s very sad.”

  “Oh,” Chelsea says, flustered. “God, I’m so sorry.” She blinks. “For real, your sister could be a model, though. Did she get a boob job?”

  My third-period class is Algebra II. Mr. Jones is putting some fancy formula on the Smart Board when Kylie Ranger leans forward, nods her chin toward the door, and whispers singsong-ily, “Looks like someone has an admirer.”

  An admirer? Me? I turn my head and see Derek Green. He gives me a “’sup” nod and grins.

  No, no, no, I think, getting busy with my notebook. Do not come over here, Derek Green. Do not sit in the empty chair which is right beside me and which does not need to be filled with—

  “You!” Derek says, sliding into the chair. He points at me to ensure that we both know who he’s talking about. “It is you, Carly Lauderdale!”

  “Hi, Derek,” I say. Go away now, Derek.

  “Love the new look,” he drawls.

  “Uh-huh, thanks, Derek.” I keep our eye contact short and sweet, because Derek is the kind of guy who can take one little eye-to-eye and turn it into a sticky, gooey slime pit. Derek is also the kind of guy who drives home the realization that Patrick Dempsey, say, can carry off the name Derek on Grey’s Anatomy and make it work, when in reality Derek is and always will be a redneck name for someone who likes guns.

  Derek’s not technically a redneck, as he lives in Buckhead like the rest of us. (Except for crack-cocaine addict Madison Miller, who’s hip enough to live in Little Five Points.) Derek is a good ol’ boy, though. He’ll graduate from Holy Redeemer, go to UGA, live in a frat house with a Confederate flag out front, and then move back to Atlanta to work at his daddy’s real estate business. He’ll be thirty-five and have a MySpace page that says Git R Done! under his profile picture, in which he’ll be wearing a Braves baseball cap perched high on his head. Under “favorite activities,” he’ll list hunting, drinking, and muddin’. That’s just my guess.

  “So,” Derek says. He grins. “Let’s talk about your sister.”

  Ew. “Let’s not,” I say.

  He outlines a female form with his hands. He arches his eyebrows and nods.

  I catch sight of a familiar and very welcome form ducking in through the door. “Roger!” I call.

  Roger’s face lights up, waaaay up high on top of his six-foot-three-inch-tall body. I know his exact height, because we’ve talked about it. Those three inches mean he can’t join the air force, which was his dream ever since he was a little boy and his mom told him they’d be moving to America one day. He has twenty-twenty vision, but his body betrayed him by growing too tall.

  “Come sit by me,” I say, scooting out of my sea
t and taking the one next to it.

  Roger lumbers over and drops down between me and Derek, who appears confused.

  Sorry, Charlie, I tell Derek in my head. To Roger, I say happily, “Hi.”

  “Hiya, Carly,” he says in his deep, oatmeal-y way. Roger’s a sophomore like me. He moved here last year from Holland, and his accent makes his words come out gloopy. His last name is Goelt zenleuchter, which I can pronounce perfectly, thanks very much. Gultz-en-loych-ter. Most people get it wrong. Actually, most people don’t even try.

  Roger holds out his hand for a high five. “You’re looking good,” he says. “Your hair is very colorful.”

  I touch my palm to his. “Why, thank you.”

  He gives a slight nod, and I think, not for the first time, that he’s like a courtly knight from the olden days . . . an extremely tall, courtly knight who happens to ride a motorcycle (somewhat illegally, but his mom doesn’t care) and who has a thing for Japanese samurai movies. I also think, not for the first time, how easy it would be—how great it would be—if I liked him the way he likes me. As in, more than a friend.

  Sometimes I even wonder if I should, like, try to like him that way. If it’s possible to open yourself up to someone by just saying yes.

  But there’s something scary about that . . . so I pull my hand away before the touching goes on too long.

  “All right, class,” Mr. Jones says. “Let’s see what you remember from Algebra I.”

  I turn toward the Smart Board, but my thoughts go elsewhere. Roger is the one person—for real, the one, single person I’ve talked to today—who didn’t say anything about Anna’s new hotness. How sad is that that he’s the only one? I’m the older sister. I’m the one people are supposed to admire, not Anna.

  Although is admire the right word? Do people admire someone’s hotness, or desire it? I’m not sure I want to be desired for something as superficial as my bra size—although, fine, in Anna’s case, it’s her plain and undeniable gorgeousness, too. At any rate, I’m busy feeling sorry for myself when a student aide enters the room and delivers a note to Mr. Jones.