I Hope Ashley Still Likes Me
The girls were in a bedroom again, but this time it was a girl’s room. They were sitting on the floor surrounded by piles of paper and colored pencils—they were drawing. I knew they wouldn’t hear me, but I tested them anyway. I picked a color and an animal.
“Pink hippo!” I shouted and waved my arms. It was silly, it made me smile. And just as I expected, there was no response.
Ashley was smiling. “Almost done.” She looked over at the other girl and quickly covered her drawing with her arm so the other girl couldn’t see it. I moved closer to look, but it was hidden.
“Me too!” said the other girl.
I wished I knew her name. I looked around the room for hints, but there was nothing. Maybe this was Ashley’s room.
“We can show each other together, when we’re done,” said Ashley. She was excited.
The other girl wasn’t so sure—maybe she wasn’t as good at drawing. I knew how that felt. Sometimes people who were good at stuff liked to show off by tricking you.
There was a girl at school like that, Melissa. She was always asking everyone to draw with her. She’d say, “When we’re finished, let’s count to three and show each other our drawings.” And then on three Melissa would hold up an amazing picture that made yours look like it was drawn by a third-grader. Of course you’d have to say, Oh, Melissa, yours is so much better. You’re such a good artist. This next part was Melissa’s favorite. She’d make her face look all sweet and say, Oh, really? Thank you, like she was surprised or something—which she wasn’t, because she’d totally planned the whole thing. She’d tricked a lot of people, and once even me—but I learned my lesson. I never drew with her again.
I was lucky. Lucy wasn’t like that. Neither of us was a good artist, but still, she was good at other stuff that I wasn’t, and she never made me feel bad about it—not once.
Now it was harder to watch the girls. I wanted to keep liking them, but if Ashley was a show-off, that was going to change. Show-offs weren’t my kind of people.
Finally the girls were done.
“I’ll go first,” said Ashley. “On three.”
“Okay,” said the blond girl. She seemed a little more hopeful; maybe her drawing had turned out. Ashley counted out the numbers, and on three she held out her paper.
“Here.” She handed it to the blond girl. “It’s for you. It’s my phone number. You can keep it in your room, in case you want to call me. And I put kittens and stars on it, because I know that you like those things. And some other stuff too.”
I leaned over to look. It was cute, but not a masterpiece. Under her name she had written “Ashley plus Shue equals ASHUE-MAZING!” Shue? Was that the blond girl’s name? What a weird name. The blond girl was frozen, just staring at the paper. It made me wish I had more powers than just being invisible—I wanted to know what she was thinking. I wanted to read her mind.
I guess I wasn’t the only one, because Ashley finally said, “Well? What do you think? Do you like it?”
“I do! I really do. Thank you,” said the blond girl. Her voice was quivery like she was trying not to cry. She got up, found some tape, and taped the paper to the mirror.
Now I knew whose room this was.
The blond girl looked over at Ashley. “It looks good, right?” She forced a smile.
“Sure,” said Ashley. “What did you draw?”
The blond girl looked down. Her smile disappeared, and she looked embarrassed.
“Uh, nothing—just a horse for my uncle. It’s his birthday on Saturday, and he really likes horses.”
“Oh,” said Ashley.
Both girls looked at the floor without saying anything.
The silence was painful. A couple of times the blond girl looked like she might be about to say something, but each time, she changed her mind and kept quiet.
Finally Ashley handed her a piece of paper and said, “Here, write down your number for me.”
I was glad about that. It gave the blond girl something to do. She wrote out the name “Shue” and a phone number. Under that she drew a little heart with feet, and a smiling flower. So Shue was her name. She handed the paper back to Ashley, and they both stood up.
“Let’s go to Anderson’s,” said Ashley.
Instantly Shue brightened. “I’ll put on my old sweatshirt.”
While Shue got ready, Ashley folded up the paper and put it in her pocket.
What’s Anderson’s? I wondered. And why change into something old?
But I never found out, because suddenly I was back home and Mom was calling my name.
“Ash! Ash! Are you okay?” Mom was halfway down the stairs. I shook my head and blinked fast to clear it. It wasn’t easy to be suddenly back in normal life. Luckily the basement was kind of dark; I didn’t want Mom to see the wish jar, or me just sitting in the chair.
“I’m okay,” I answered. “I was going to fold the clothes before I brought them back up.” I pointed to the laundry basket halfway across the floor. It was a terrible lie—I never fold clothes, plus the basket wasn’t even close to me. Mom took a few more steps down. I jumped up and stood in front of the jar.
Mom shook her head. “Listen Ash, I know this is hard, but you can’t hide out here in the basement. I think you’re going to be great for Claire, and if you give it a chance, it’ll be fun for you too. She needs someone like you.”
Mom looked me up and down, to emphasize her point, or to check out if it was true—I couldn’t tell which. I didn’t say anything. She continued.
“Maybe I pushed too hard for the first day. If you come upstairs and watch her fashion show for ten minutes, you can have the rest of the afternoon off. I’ll take her out somewhere.”
I nodded. It was a fair deal. Now I just needed Mom to leave first, so I could put everything away. “I’ll be right up.” I pointed to the workbench. “I knocked a few nails on the ground, and I want to pick them up, so no one steps on them and gets hurt.”
Mom started up the stairs, but before she got to the top, she stopped and turned back to look at me.
“Only two more minutes. Okay?”
“Promise.” I held up my hand. I had a feeling she didn’t believe me about the nails.
After she left, I picked up the wish jar and stuffed the wishes inside. I pulled a box out from under the workbench and hid the jar behind it. It wasn’t the best hiding place, but it was fast, and my two minutes were up. I grabbed the laundry basket and forced myself upstairs. I didn’t want to go.