DELICIOUS FOOD, LOUSY CONVERSATION
“I INVITED MARELI over to dinner,” my mom said, after I got home one night. We’d been shooting for around a month.
“You did?”
“Yup.” Mom grabbed my backpack and got out my crumpled up lunch bag, which was unopened. The banana was completely flattened. “Ew,” she said. “Why do I even bother?”
“I’ve told you a thousand times you don’t need to make me lunch anymore,” I said. “There’s tons of food at the studio.”
“But you don’t get there until 1:45,” said my mom. “Aren’t you starving by then?”
“No offense, Mom, but I’d rather not ruin my appetite with tuna fish when I know I’m going to get steak an hour later.”
“Fine,” she said, dropping the broken banana into the garbage as if it were covered with mold.
“Why did you invite Mareli over?” I asked. “I’m kind of busy, in case you haven’t noticed.”
My mom looked at me. “What’s going on with you? I remember when you found out she liked you—we couldn’t wipe the smile off your face for weeks. Now suddenly you’re too busy to have dinner with her?”
“It’s complicated,” I said, shrugging. I didn’t really feel like going into the whole my-friends-are-all-mad-at-me-because-I’m-always-too-busy and I’m-mad-at-them-because-they-just-want-to-be-my-friend-because-I’m-in-a-movie thing. I knew my mom would ask me a ton of questions, and I was too tired to answer them.
“Everything’s complicated,” said my mom. “But, to answer your question, I saw Mareli downtown, and she looked at me with those big brown eyes and said how she hadn’t really seen you around much lately, and then the next thing I knew, I was asking her over for dinner and she was saying yes.” She hugged me. “Don’t be mad. This is a good thing. You need to relax for just an hour or two and forget all the pressures of school and the movie and all that. You’re still a kid, remember? So have dinner like a kid!”
“Okay. But I have to study my lines before dinner. Tomorrow we’re shooting the scene where Sammy’s roommate asks Princess Clarissa out.”
“Oooh, sounds juicy,” said my mom.
“See you at dinner,” I said.
“Dinner’s now,” she said.
“What?”
“It’s 7:30.”
“No way.”
I checked my phone—Mom was right.
Sheeesh. Two months ago, I literally had nothing to do. These days, I blinked, and it was dinnertime.
Times had sure changed.
The doorbell rang.
“Why don’t you get it?” Mom asked me. But before I could, Sylvia came charging down the stairs and raced to the door.
“Mareli’s here!” she squealed. Sylvia loved Mareli. I think they bonded over the same color nail polish.
When Sylvia opened the door, the first thing I noticed was that Mareli had completely changed her hair color. I’d never seen anyone in middle school do that before.
“Hi,” I said.
“Hi,” she said.
We stood there for a second, and then I said, “What happened?”
“Huh?” Mareli touched her hair self-consciously. “Oh, you mean this? I don’t know, I just decided to try something different. So I went to the salon today, and the next thing I knew, I was a blonde.”
She looked interesting, that’s for sure, but there was something else. Something familiar. I tried to think where I’d seen that look before—dark skin and blond hair—and then it hit me.
Shana Fox.
“Are you trying to look like Shana?” I said, before I could stop myself.
Mareli’s face immediately turned bright red. “Of course not! What are you talking about?”
I tried to backtrack. “Nothing! I just meant, that you look really pretty, and you kind of reminded me of Shana, because of how pretty you are.”
But Mareli wasn’t buying it. “You think I’m trying to look like Shana? Why? Just because ever since you started being in that movie with her, you’ve been ignoring me? You think I’m jealous or something? Well, guess what? That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard!”
As she was saying it, I realized something: That’s exactly what I thought.
“No, of course that’s not what I think,” I said. “I just think it’s funny that you and Shana have the same hair style, that’s all.”
“Coming here probably wasn’t a great idea,” said Mareli.
“Dinner’s on the table!” called my mom.
We all sat down to eat, and I realized something else: We didn’t have that much to talk about. We had a lot to NOT talk about, though. It seemed like every possible topic—the movie, Shana, school, friends—was some sort of minefield where something could explode at any minute.
So instead, we just talked about how delicious Mom’s lasagna was, and Sylvia described every possible thing about the soccer game she’d played in that day.
“And I scored the winning goal!” she bragged, ending the description.
Mareli smiled. “That’s fantastic!” she said. “You must have gotten your soccer skills from your brother.”
Mareli was right—I was a pretty good soccer player. But I’d had to quit the team because of the movie—and of course, my teammates were mad at me about it.
Which is probably why Mareli mentioned it.
We sat there silent for another couple of minutes, until my mom brought up the one subject she knew would make everyone relax.
“Who wants dessert?” she said.
After we ate our peach cobbler, Mom asked Sylvia to help her do the dishes. That left Mareli and me sitting there, by ourselves.
“Peter,” Mareli began. Uh-oh. Whenever she called me “Peter,” she meant business.
“Yeah?”
“I’m really happy for you that you are in this movie,” she said. “You deserve it. I always knew you had something special in you.”
I waited, because I knew there was a but coming.
“But,” she went on, “when something this great happens, it can also mean some other things aren’t so great. And we aren’t so great. Because I feel like I’m getting in the way of your exciting new life.”
“You’re not,” I said, trying to mean it.
“It’s okay,” Mareli said. “I know how busy you are, and how many interesting new people you’re meeting. I can see how you have changed already—you’re more responsible, more mature, much less of a troublemaker in school. It’s great, seriously—and I’m sure it’s crazy to think that in the middle of it all, you would still be thinking of your boring old life.”
“You are not boring,” I said. “You’re the opposite of boring. And I’m not more mature. I don’t want to be more mature! It’s just that I’m really, really busy. And tired. But mostly busy.”
The doorbell rang, which meant Mareli’s mom was there to pick her up.
“Everybody’s busy,” Mareli said. “It’s just that you’re a different kind of busy.” She got up. “I should go thank your mom for dinner. See you tomorrow.”
As she walked into the kitchen, I wanted to tell her how wrong she was, but one thing stopped me.
She was right.