What Every Girl (except me) Knows Read Online Free PDF Page B

still.” I thought that was a good one.
    “You mean the ones who wear so much makeup their own mothers wouldn’t recognize them without it?” Cleo said.
    I laughed and was thinking of something to add. It felt like we were friends or even something more. Right away I could feel my heart start thumping. I always say something dumb when I get like this.
    But Cleo had stopped smiling. And I hadn’t even said anything dumb yet.
    “I’m so sorry,” she said quietly. She had her hand over her mouth.
    “What? What?” I looked out the window and then back at Cleo.
    “I can’t believe I said that,” she said. “I’m sorry”
    In my mind I flashed over the last few words Cleo had said. Their own mothers, she had said, but it meant nothing to me. Their own mothers—these are words that just get tossed around and immediately evaporate in the air.
    “Why?” I asked. “Sorry for what?”
    “I guess everyone just assumes you have a mother, don’t they?” Cleo explained. “And I’m sorry for the other night at dinner. It’s just that I thought if I didn’t finish what I was going to say about your mother it would have been worse.”
    Cleo looked sad. “Oh, I always say something dumb.”
    “So do I!” I nearly shouted. I couldn’t believe I had just been thinking the same thing. She was like me. I was like Cleo.
    “I mean, you didn’t say anything dumb,” I said quickly. “It doesn’t bother me. People always say things like that, like ’Go tell your mother.’ Or ‘Wait till your mother finds out.’ Or ‘Your mother will be so proud’… Like teachers or strangers or nurses, stuff like that.” Once I had started, I couldn’t stop talking.
    Talking but not feeling anything. All words, information I was used to imparting, information that usually got people to feel sorry for me. Sometimes it got me out of trouble, sometimes it got me out of having to do stuff.
    “The only thing…,” I began.
    And if feeling sorry for me got Cleo to like me, I’d take that, too.
    “The only thing that kind of bothers me…is Mother’s Day,” I told Cleo. “I have this whole collection of dried-up marigolds in green plastic planters from school.”
    But that was true. Mother’s Day bothered me, if I thought about it. I used to give the Mother’s Day gifts to my Nana, but after she died I started hiding them in the back of my closet. I don’t know why I didn’t just throw them away. Anyway, they stopped having us make Mother’s Day projects by second grade. It was just cards now, and cards are easier to get rid of. Mother’s Day still came and went every year. Come to think about it, I hated Mother’s Day.
    Cleo was listening. She looked interested, but she looked sad. I was giving too much away, thinking too little and talking too much. I should have stopped, but Cleo looked like she wanted me to keep going. To keep talking. Once I realized this it all came out at once.
    “Cleo?” I blurted out. “Do you think I have big hips?” At first I couldn’t tell if Cleo had sneezed or laughed real loud. “Who told you that?” she asked.
    When I didn’t answer, Cleo said seriously, “Gabby, you are looking less like a little girl and more like a woman.”
    I couldn’t tell if that was good or bad. “Does that mean I do?”
    “No. You certainly don’t have big hips!” Cleo said firmly. “These are good changes. It means you’ll be a woman soon.” She paused.
    “Unless you already are?” Cleo asked deliberately. What did she mean? Did she mean what I thought she meant? Like in the movie from health class? Me?
    “Oh, no,” I said. “Not me.” The mall was just ahead, thank goodness.
    “Well now, here we are. Let’s go find you the perfect coat!” she said as she pulled the car into a parking space. “Something as beautiful as you are.”
    The first thing we saw when we walked through the big glass doors of Saks Fifth Avenue was two women poised like models—tall, wearing lots of lipstick