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fight.
I’m totally going to barf into the potted palm.
Principal Gupta is going on about how this is just a friendly debate so that Lana and I can let the voters know where we stand on the issues.
Friendly. Right. That’s why I’m still holding Lana’s braid in my hand.
And, hello, issues? There are ISSUES???? NOBODY TOLD ME THERE WERE GOING TO BE ISSUES!!!
I can see Lilly, her video camera pointed and ready, in the front row of bleachers—sitting with Tina and Boris and Shameeka and Ling Su and, oh, look, isn’t that sweet, Perin—signaling me. What is Lilly trying to tell me? She can’t be getting ready to pull out her secret weapon. Not yet, anyway. The debate hasn’t even started! What is she doing with her hands??? Why is she making that folding motion?
Oh, I get it. She wants me to sit up straight and stop writing in my journal. Yeah, fat chance, Lilly. I—
OH, MY GOD. That smell. I recognize that smell. Chanel Number Five. Only one person I know of wears Chanel Number Five—or at least slathers on so much of it that you can smell it for miles before she ever enters the room—
WHAT IS SHE DOING HERE????
Oh, God. Why ME? Seriously. They should NOT allow people’s families to just saunter onto school grounds whenever they feel like it. I would not have half the amount of problems I currently have if there was some kind of security at this school, keeping my parents and grandparents OUT of it—
Oh, no. Not my dad, too.
And Rommel.
Yes. My grandmother brought her DOG to my debate.
And a phalanx of reporters.
Good grief! Is that LARRY KING????
Great. All I need now is for my mom and Rocky to show up, and it’ll turn into a Thermopolis-Gianini-Renaldo family reunion—
Oh. And there she is. Waving Rocky’s little arm at me from the bleachers. Hi, Rocky! So glad you could come! So glad you could come watch your sister be totally and systematically annihilated by her mortal enemy—
Oh, no. It’s starting.
WHERE IS MICHAEL WHEN I NEED HIM????
Monday, September 14, ladies’ room
Well, here I am. In the ladies’ room. How unusual.
I don’t think I’ll be coming out for awhile. A long, long while. As in…maybe never.
The whole thing was so surreal. I mean, I saw Principal Gupta tap on the microphone. I heard the murmuring from the people in the bleachers suddenly stop. Every single eye in the place was on us.
And then Principal Gupta welcomed everyone to the debate—making a special effort to thank Larry King for coming, with his cameras—and explained the importance of the student council, and the vital role the president plays in its governance. Then she said, “We have two very different young ladies—each with her own uniquely, er, strong personality—running for office today. I hope you will give them all your attention while each of our candidates tells us why she is suited to the role of president, and what she intends to do to make Albert Einstein High School a better place.”
And then—I guess as punishment for the whole braid-ripping-out thing—Principal Gupta let Lana go first.
The applause that went up as Lana swished her way to her podium could only be called thunderous. The whoops and catcalls, the chants of “La-na, La-na,” were almost deafening, especially since it was the gym, after all, and the sound really carried, what with the metal rafters.
Then Lana—looking coolly unconcerned over the fact that she was addressing a thousand of her peers, and another seventy-five or so members of the AEHS faculty and staff (if you count the lunch ladies), my entire family, and a number of CNN correspondents—began to speak.
Suffice it to say that what those thousand peers of hers wanted to hear—well, most of them, anyway—Lana gave them. Not surprisingly, Lana turned out to be a strong supporter of better cafeteria food, a longer lunch hour, larger mirrors in the girls’ bathrooms, less homework, more sports, guaranteed admission from the guidance office to such Ivy League schools as AEHS graduates might want to attend, and more diet and low-carb options in the candy and soda machines. She was against the outdoor security cameras, and vowed to have them removed. She promised a cheering student populace that if they elected her as president, she would make all of these things happen….
…even though I happen to know that she can’t. Because those security cameras may infringe upon the rights of the people who like to smoke outside the school and litter the steps with their gross cigarette butts, but mostly they help keep the school safe from vandalism and break-ins.
And the food distributor for the cafeteria is the same one that services all the schools—and hospitals—in the area, and offers the lowest prices for the highest quality food that can be found in the tri-state area.
