I ran around (and up and down) the wobbly porch to the front of the house. Juliette’s mom, Jackie, was the first to get out of the car. She had on a bright pink-and-orange sundress, and her blond hair was held back with a matching scarf. She looked just like a mom from a TV show—the kind where everyone lives in a neat, perfect house and eats big weekend breakfasts, like pancakes, even on school days. After my mom’s reunion a few years back, I remembered thinking how great it would be to live with her and really be sisters with Juliette. Sure, I’d miss my parents and my friends—but besides that, it would be awesome!
Of course, then my parents would be stuck alone with just Josh, and that would be totally unfair to them.
I stood on the steps and watched Jackie lift her sunglasses to her forehead. “Sam? Is that you?” she said.
Oh, brother. Not again.
“It’s Samantha now…but yes. Hi!” I said, waving.
Just then, my mom and Karen came running around, and the next thing I knew they were all hugging one another and squealing and jumping and even, yes, crying. OMG!
Jay came up behind me. “Girls will be girls.” He chuckled. “Am I right, Lady Samantha?”
Lady Samantha? “Uh, yeah…” I said, nodding—agreeing, and at the same time marveling how anyone could be so weird.
Then he loped down the steps and joined the meet and greet in the driveway. Jay will be Jay, I thought, along with Moms are really weird and embarrassing sometimes. I knew they hadn’t all been together like this in years. But still. And besides, all this “I’ve missed you so much!” and “It’s so good to see you!” and “We’re going to have so much fun!” was making me miss my own BFFs. A lot.
Get out here already, Juliette! I thought. I looked down at my skirt and my tights and my bright pink combat boots and my hoodie…which was now covered with watermelon juice. (Oops.) Was it too much? Should I have worn my black boots instead? Or maybe my plaid leggings and that supercute purple vest?
My mom looked up and waved at me. “Come down and say hi, Sam…”
I waited.
“…antha!” she added.
I waved back and very coolly (in case Juliette was watching) walked down from the porch.
Juliette still hadn’t come out of the car, but Jackie greeted me with open arms.
“Samantha! I love your hair!” she exclaimed. “And you’ve gotten so tall! You look just like your mom!” She hugged me tight, and I couldn’t help smiling.
“Uh…thanks,” I said.
I had to remind myself that my mom’s old friends knew her back when she was young and surprisingly pretty. So when they said that I looked like her, it really wasn’t so bad.
“Don’t tell me you’re just eleven,” Jackie said.
“No, actually, I’m twelve,” I said. “My birthday was last week.”
“Speaking of birthdays,” Jay piped up, “if I remember correctly, Dave must have just had his. Where art thy better half, anyway?” he asked Jackie.
I didn’t listen to the response, because I was too busy watching the passenger-side door of Jackie’s car slowly open, instead. And out stepped not Juliette’s dad, Dave, but Juliette herself!
Or maybe I should say she glided out—like a movie star arriving at the red carpet, or an American Idol at their hometown parade. Only way cooler.
Juliette had her blond hair up in a high ponytail, but it was soft and loose in front. And she was wearing three layered tank tops, plus these cute, longish surf shorts and awesome green-checkered Vans. (Too bad Vans weren’t Goth.) Plus, I could tell that she had on makeup—but in a way I knew even my mom would think looked good.
Instantly, any worries I’d had about the summer—about missing my friends or losing out on my shot at true love with Jeremy Ryan—all melted away. (Kind of like me in that beach house.) With Juliette around, my summer was going to be awesome!
I watched as Juliette walked around to the trunk, pulled out a bag, and slung it over her shoulder. She marched right past me, up to her mother. “I need to go to my room and make some calls,” she announced stiffly. She looked at Karen. “Hi. Thanks for having us. Where should I go?”
“Oh, go right inside, darlin’, and up the stairs,” Karen replied. She gave Juliette a little hug. “And then just pick any old room you like. There are plenty.”
“Nuestro casa es su casa,” said Jay.
(I take Mandarin, not Spanish, but I think that means something like “make yourself at home.”)
“Thanks,” Juliette said softly.
I grinned, raised my hand, and began to say, “Hi! I’ll go with you!” But before I could even open my mouth, Juliette had walked up the steps and into the house. Alone.
As the screen door slammed shut, I stood there speechless. And yes, embarrassed. Ouch.
I guess I should have worn the leggings, I immediately thought. Or done something cuter with my hair? Then it hit me like a lightning bolt—my hair. Of course!
I felt it with my hands. Juliette hadn’t recognized me!
The last time Juliette had seen me, I was a little girl with long hair. She’d probably looked around when she got out of the car, and assumed that I was someone she didn’t know!
I was about to follow her and tell her, when Kiki ran up and tugged at my sleeve. Emery crawled along behind her.
“Are you ready to play now?” Kiki asked me.
“Arf, arf, arf!” Emery sat up on her haunches and pawed at my leg.
“Bad dog, Emery. Down!” Kiki said.
I stepped back toward the house. “Sorry, guys,” I said, trying to make it clear that I was much too old for playing. “I have calls to make, too.”
“You do?” my mom asked.
I nodded. I hadn’t talked to Mina or Liza, and I wondered how their trips were going so far. Even more than that, though, I wanted to head inside and find Juliette.
“Oh, Samantha, why don’t you go up and pick out a room, too?” said Karen.
“Can’t she sleep with me?” asked Kiki.
“No, sugar pie.” Karen smiled at me. “Samantha gets her own room.” She walked up and picked Kiki up and kissed her on the cheek. “Besides, you have a roommate already. Remember? Emery.”
“But Emery howls at night.” Kiki frowned at her sister, then turned to me. “And she’s not really a dog either,” she whispered.
I tried not to giggle. “I had a feeling,” I said, pulling my bag out of our car and heading up the porch steps.
Inside the house, I tried to hold my breath. But I gave up on that before long, and concentrated on dragging my bag up the creaky, old stairs instead. (Do they really have to make combat boots so heavy?)
Upstairs, I discovered a seemingly endless hallway of bedrooms, numbered 1 to 16. Most of the doors were open, and the rooms sat musty and empty. There was one littered with Polly Pockets and other random toys that I figured was Emery and Kiki’s. And I could tell which room was Brian’s without even looking—because it smelled exactly like dirty boy feet.
Only one door was closed: number 11. Bingo! That had to be Juliette’s.
I raised my hand and was just about to knock, when I heard her talking. She was on the phone, and as an almost-teenager I knew that interrupting phone calls was not cool. I’d wait, I decided. And in the meantime, I’d claim my own room.
It was a tough call. I wanted to be right next to Juliette, but the way the rooms were numbered, that meant room number 9 or number 13. I wasn’t crazy about either one. 9 was so three years ago. (And besides, the room had a GIANT spider on the ceiling, right above the bed.) But 13 was so…well, jinxed, cursed, doomed. It didn’t seem very conducive to sleeping, or even staying alive. But it did have this awesome green wallpaper with starfish all over it—and a matching bedspread, too. And it did have a big, sagging bookshelf filled with paperbacks with great titles like, And Then There Were None and Death on the Nile and Murder on the Orient Express. Plus, on the table by the bed was a lamp made out of a conch shell with a hula girl attached. Her grass skirt actually wiggled if you pushed it.
And no spiders! (At least none that I could spot.)
Of course, there was always room number 10, right across the hall from Juliette’s room. But ten was Olivia Miner’s soccer number, so in a way, that was even more cursed than thirteen.
Room 13 it was. The more I thought about it, the more fitting it seemed—teen and Goth!
So I went in and dropped my bag on the floor, then sat on the bed and pulled out my phone. Should I call Mina and Liza? I wondered. Or just text them?
Only then did I realize that I wasn’t going to do either. My phone was completely dead.
Great. I searched through my bag, tossing my clothes around the room. I dug through every pocket, pulled out every article of clothing, even turned my bag upside down and shook it out. But there was no denying it—I’d forgotten my charger. Argh.
I sighed and picked up the framed photo that had fallen out on the bed with the rest of my stuff. My mom had taken it of me, Mina, and Liza at the “See Ya Soon” party we had at my house, on my birthday, before we all left. There was Mina, looking all artsy and cool, and Liza making a face, and me with a smile that said plainly: “Help! I ate too much cake!”
Oh! I was dying to know what they were doing right now! I propped the photo up next to the hula girl lamp, then I tried to think. Could I use my mom’s charger? Or could Juliette, maybe, have the same phone as me? I could ask her! And even if she didn’t have a charger for me to use, it was a way to politely interrupt and tell her who I was!
I walked out of my room and up to her door, and knocked very softly.
Nobody answered. I guessed she was done talking. So I took a deep breath and knocked again.
After another minute, the door swung open. Juliette stood there with the same look on her face that my mom gets when she answers “junk-mail phone calls” (as she calls them) during dinner.
“Hi! It’s me,” I said. “Samantha!”
Juliette looked at me with a blank expression that still didn’t seem to know me—and didn’t seem to want to either.
“Sam,” I went on, trying to light a spark of recognition. “You know, Suzanne’s daughter? I don’t go by that name anymore, though. Of course, my mom keeps forgetting and still calls me Sam all the time, which is totally weird, since she’s the one that gave me the name Samantha in the first place. So, how do you like your room? I’m right next door, in room thirteen. You don’t think that’s unlucky, do you? I mean, spending the summer cooped up here with all these younger kids is unlucky enough, right? Plus, Karen says there’s no air-conditioning. Can you believe it? She gave us a whole tour. If you want, I can show you around whenever…”
I finally paused to take a breath. (Sometimes I can get a little rambly.)
And that was when Juliette slammed the door.