Rotten Apple Read Online Free PDF Page A

meddling in other people’s lives. Anyway, back to my promise to Happy in order for Happy to give me the details of her fling. Happy is so addicted to
Queen of Hearts with Dr. Bee Bee Berg
(even more addicted than I am to
Minors in Malibu!)
, so not only does Happy want me to find out what my mother’s upcoming shows are, so she can be in the know before everyone else—which is painful enough—but she also wants to know how she can get on the show! Happy wants to be a guest on my mother’s show! I mean, I know Happy has always wanted to be an actress and she thinks that getting on my mother’s show as a guest will be the place she gets “discovered.” I told her just to go to my mother’s website, where people write in for advice, but Happy actually wants to be on the show, in front of the audience and everything! What could I do? I mean, she is my best friend and I promised. I wasn’t thinking clearly! But she also promised me this fabulous pair of jeans that she has that I’ve always adored. So I guess I have to do it—at least for the jeans! (Once I get my Plan Z into action, and he sees me in them, they’ll be an added bonus!) I really, really need those jeans. And now I have to get downstairs for “family dinner.” Which is such a joke. I mean, my parents don’t really seem to spend any time together at all. And to top it off, Crazy Aunt Hazel is here. All I’ll say about her is that she is a walking, talking memo reminding me how I DO NOT want my life to end up. Once again, welcome to my life, ED.
    “I just can’t believe he broke up with me,” Apple heard her aunt Hazel moan loudly as she walked into the large open kitchen. “Everything seemed to be going fine. And then, poof, out of the blue he decides he needs ‘space.’ Space! Can you believe that? Why would he want space from me? I was the ideal girlfriend. I did everything for him! I was always there for him. Always. I worked my entire schedule around him!”
    Apple knew that Crazy Aunt Hazel was grousing about her latest dating disaster. She was always having a major crisis about a man, and Apple’s mother was always giving her advice, which Aunt Hazel always ignored.
    “Maybe that was the problem,” her mother responded, in full Dr. Bee Bee Berg mode.
    Apple sat down at the kitchen table, across from her aunt, resting her feet on another chair. Her mother was putting out dinner plates on the table, which was already full of cartons of takeout Chinese food. Dr. Bee Bee Berg could solve all matters of the heart, but she couldn’t even manage to make scrambled eggs or to microwave frozen peas.
    “So Rupert broke up with you?” Apple asked her aunt, who had started, literally, to pound her head on the table. Her hair was a disaster, as if she had just been caught in a tornado. Her shirt was even on inside out.
    “His name was Roger,” Crazy Aunt Hazel huffed, hiding her face in her hands. It looked like she still had on her makeup from the night before.
    Roger, that’s it! Apple thought. I knew it started with an R.
    It was hard for Apple to keep track of all the men who moved in and out of Aunt Hazel’s life like it had a revolving door. The taste in a piece of chewing gum lasted longer than Aunt Hazel’s relationships. And all Aunt Hazel wanted was to fall in love, get married, and have babies.
    “I didn’t even hear you come in, sweetie,” Apple’s mother said. “So did you have fun with the girls?”
    “Yes,” Apple answered, crossing her legs on the chair.
    “What’s up with your friends?”
    “Not much,” Apple answered, trying to sound friendly but not so friendly as to invite more questions.
    “Come on. What did you guys talk about?” her mother pressed.
    There was no way Apple was going to tell her mother about Happy’s lifeguard. That was Happy’s life and Happy’s business. And Apple didn’t think Crazy Aunt Hazel would want to hear about the fling either, given that a fifteen-year-old was probably getting