The Girls Read Online Free PDF

the rhino, the purple lanyard keychain that Darcy had made for me. Out of my drawer and straight onto the pile went the stack of Renée’s homesick letters from summer camp. Next was the autographed program from the play Brianna was in last year. I didn’t have to look at it to remember what she’d written. “Maya, dahhhhhling, there’s no business like it! Forever, B!”
    Candace, Darcy, Renée, and I had given Brianna a bouquet of four roses, one from each of us. We’d gone wild, applauding and cheering at the curtain call. Then we’d run backstage screaming like rock fans, begging for Brianna’s autograph. I’d felt a little silly doing that. After all, Brianna was only in the chorus, and she had the smallest part in the whole play. She didn’t even say any actual lines. But Candace was never embarrassed about making scenes, and she got us all going.
    I sat down on the edge of my bed thinking there was no saving my room—every inch was infested. I tried to remember it before the girls. When I’d just moved here.
    I’d loved this room from the first second. In my old neighborhood some kids were rough. The big sister of a kid in my class went to jail for shooting another girl in the thigh with her dad’s gun. We’d moved here right after that.
    Life was easier here and I hadn’t been a bit homesick. My folks were calmer and didn’t watch me like hawks anymore. They let me walk to school alone, which I’d never been allowed to do in the old neighborhood. My sister, Lena, met Ann right away and stopped following me everywhere, which was great. The kids at school were friendly and I’d made friends. Nothing tight like Salt and Pepper, but good enough.
    Everything was nice, and then it got even better when Candace swooped down from the sky and scooped me up. My gut shrank, remembering how thrilled I’d been that day when she’d asked me if I wanted to “do lunch” with her. I thought I’d gone to heaven. She was popular and she’d picked me. Suddenly that made me popular too.
    Renée, Darcy, and Brianna were part of the package. Once Candace had shone her light on me, they all took me in as their pal.
    And now? Now that Candace had decided I was no longer worthy, did any of them give me another thought? I knew Darcy would do anything that Candace even hinted she wanted her to. But what about the others? Brianna wasn’t the type to do anything drastic, like defend me on her own. But I couldn’t believe that even Renée didn’t care about me at least a little.
    My eyes landed on my little cactus plant. We’d each bought one at the Earth Day fair. Candace had called them the Earth Sisters and said one day we’d all share a house and reunite the sisters in our big backyard. I threw the cactus into my trash can. It made a dull thunk sound in the otherwise silent house. It landed on its side and a clod of dirt tipped out. I shoved the can deep under my desk.
    But I could almost hear the cactus say, “What did I do to deserve this? ” I snatched out the trash can, stood the plant up on the bottom, poked the dirt back in, then slid it back under the desk. Maybe I’d give the cactus to Lena tomorrow, but I’d make her promise to keep it out of my sight.
    Then there were the photo stickers of the five of us, making faces, cracking up as if life was just one big party. They were plastered everywhere, all over my school notebooks. School. The word made my insides wither.
    I scraped and clawed at the two stickers I’d stuck on my light switch. It felt good, peeling off the girls’ faces in little shreds, mine included. But the white stickum stayed stuck, a reminder of what had been there.
    And what about the old-fashioned hand mirror Candace gave me for my birthday? Could I keep it? I wondered if I’d ever be able to look into it and not feel this gray cloud shrivel my guts.
    I added