AN: No more Kitchen Witches :P Wasn’t feeling it. This is a story that’s been floating in my mind for a while…it’s kind of close to my heart, because it is a half-hearted true story. I like this format, too. It’s refreshing. School’s busy, so it’s getting harder for me to write. Please tell me what you think. – D.g.

Zoey Mills

It wasn’t my fault.

Things just changed—people change, and I changed. I had been feeling it for a while, like she just kept annoying me, and I didn’t know why. Whenever we would hang out, I would just keep thinking why is she here? Why am I here? Then, one afternoon we were tanning on my trampoline, it hit me. I was wearing my new sunglasses, staring up at the cloudy sky. The radio was playing the top twenty over the sound of someone cutting their grass. I could feel the heat on my stomach—my newly exposed stomach saying HELLO! to the world. It was the first bikini Mom let me get. I had worn two pieces before, but this one had a top that actually tied in the back. That made it a real bikini—no clasp, just a pretty little bow. We were eighth graders, so we already knew that the big Ryder Junior High pool party was going to happen the first weekend after school started. We had to be tan and wearing new suits. Julia had already been tanning; her family spent a week in Florida. She bought a new swim suit at the big surf store in Orlando just for the party. I was wearing mine…pink with brown flowers…and then there was Bailey.

She had worn that same old faded one piece suit since we were in the sixth grade. It was so stretched, and I couldn’t believe she still had it. I just kept hearing her breathing next to me like she was trying to run a marathon. She was wearing shorts over her round, pasty legs, and I was thinking, Why is she even here? We’re supposed to be tanning, and she can’t even take off her shorts. She was just lying there. Sweating. I just knew what the party would be like with her, too. She would want to sit on one of those old blue benches next to the wall, watching everyone else have fun in the water. I would sit there with her, secretly wishing that I could actually be a part of the party. Last year I don’t think she even wore a suit. She had on a tank top and running shorts, and she didn’t take them off. She kept popping quarters into the soda machine, drinking cans of pop and watching everyone stretched out on their towels or splashing in the water.

Not this year.

I sighed and sat up, reaching for the bottle of water I had brought out. Alisha Linner doesn’t even drink soda. Sometimes she has a Diet Coke, but all of her friends are on a diet, and they don’t touch any of it. I wasn’t exactly Alisha’s friend, but everyone knew about that. Someone said she was a scarf and barf, and she just said that she’s been on a diet since the fifth grade. No soda, no potato chips, and no red meat. Anyone who watches what she eats at lunch knows it’s true.

Even Bailey knew. She would watch what Alisha got every day, convinced it was a lie.

“She totally scarfs and barfs,” Bailey said to me every day. “I’m just waiting for the day she pulls out a cupcake and sneaks off to the bathroom.” It never happened.

“So, are you going to take off the shorts?” I asked her. Bailey sighed and shook her head, still lying there with her eyes closed like…a beached whale.

“No…” she moaned. “I’m going to wear them to the party.” Big surprise. I take a drink and lie back down.

“Well, just so you know,” I decide to share up front, “if they start up a chicken game, I’m going to play.” There’s a long pause, and I know she’s shocked. There’s always a chicken game, usually started up by Alisha and Nick or Matt or whoever she wants, but everyone can join in. You have to have a boy, though, although sometimes girls will do it together. Not very much. Of course, in the past Bailey, Julia, and I would be sitting on the bench watching. Julia had been dating Keath since July, so they’d be together to play. I would not sit on that bench with Bailey and her fat, white legs.

“You have to have a guy,” she argued quietly.

“I was talking to Dev online, and he’s going to do it with me.”

“Well…” She didn’t see that one coming. Dev and I weren’t dating, but we didn’t have to be. He just broke up with Lois (cheater, skank) and didn’t want to be moping at the party. I was to make sure Lois knew he was over her. “I’m not going to,” she said even more quietly, like she didn’t even want me to hear. “I’m going to just watch.”

“Fine.” I turned up the music and pretended she wasn’t there. Mom didn’t let me go to the tanning salon, but I wouldn’t invite Bailey over anymore. It was a waste of her time. She wasn’t even going to tan.

A few weeks later at the party, everyone was there and acting crazy. There had never been so many kids from our class at the party before, but we were finally eighth graders. It was our last Ryder pool party before high school. I walked in with my new suit and matching towel and immediately found Julia and Keath. She looked really dark from Florida; she had gotten streaks in her hair, too. Keath couldn’t keep his hands off of her; she’s so skinny. She said my suit was really cute, and Allen (cheerleader, total Alisha A-crowd) said she thought my hair was cute. Everyone was in the pool, Dev was the first to dunk me, and I got to play in the biggest, funnest chicken game ever at RJHS.

Bailey sat on her bench, drinking sodas and watching everything from the wall.

After that, we still talked, but she didn’t come over anymore. I mean, she never wanted to do anything. Shopping with her was pointless—all she bought was CDs and baggy T-shirts. Plus, she couldn’t really try on anything at the cool stores because they don’t carry anything above size ten. I mean, I was a size eight, but I was already trying to fix that. I wanted to have a decent wardrobe for high school. High school is supposed to be the best years of your life, and I didn’t want to spend them on the outside like I did in junior high. Julia was already dating someone, and now I felt like I was missing out more than ever. I didn’t have to be “popular” to have fun, but I had to fit in a little more. I wanted to change, and Bailey didn’t. So it wasn’t my fault that I kind of grew up, and she just wanted to keep…sitting on the wall.