Crush Control by Jennifer Jabaley Page B

of my hair. “Quinton Dillinger is gorgeous. Gorgeous! THE QUARTERBACK ! If not the god at the top of the ancient Egyptian pyramid scheme, definitely whatever comes next—a pharaoh? A noble? A priest?”
    â€œI highly doubt he’s a priest,” I mumbled back as Mrs. Stabile stood up to start the lesson.
    â€œIf this is your first day here, how do you know Quinton?” Georgia was hyperventilating.
    I waited until the teacher looked down at her book, then turned and talked out of the side of my mouth like a ventriloquist. “My dog humped his leg at the park on Saturday.”
    â€œAh!” Georgia gasped. “Memorable! Just like on Rhapsody in Rio when Eva met Juan for the first time because she caused his toilet to overflow. Awkward at first, sure, but eventually, in season six, it became the focal point of the speech at their wedding!”
    We both turned and looked back at Quinton, who was running his fingers through his golden brown hair.
    I smiled and nudged Georgia. “Did he just sing Cher to me? I didn’t, like, hallucinate that, did I?”
    Georgia shook her head. “One microphone away from karaoke.”
    I turned back toward the front of the room and tried to calm my racing heart. Quinton just sang to me. And not in a mocking way, but rather in a we’ve got a private joke kind of a way. A warm heat coursed through me. Hot Guy Quinton, Grand Pharaoh of the Pyramid of Greatness at this school, not only remembered me but maybe—just maybe—was a little bit amused by me. Maybe I wasn’t a tennis player or a student government officer, and I didn’t have perfectly glossy hair, but maybe without even realizing it, I’d already started the reinvention.
    â€œThis could be the perfect way to get your mind off Max,” Georgia whispered as class began.
    Hmm , I wondered. Get my mind off him . . . or make him realize exactly what he’s missing?

5
    I walked the two miles home from school in the sizzling heat, with each step my hair levitating upward with frizz until I looked like a puffy dandelion. I climbed the front porch steps and entered the house, so quiet, still so empty. It was much bigger than our apartment in Vegas, and my mom thought this was fantastic— you can get so much more for your money here! But Mom failed to realize that extra space meant we would need more furniture to fill in the gaps, more rugs to stop the echoes, and since Mom wasn’t the best with budgeting, I suspected we’d be hearing echoes for quite a while. Since Mom had now officially taken over the checkbook, we were probably late on the mortgage the minute we crossed the threshold.
    No , I reprimanded myself. If I was capable of transformation, so was she.
    I tossed my canvas bag onto the kitchen counter, grabbed a Twinkie from the wicker basket of snacks, and plopped on the couch. Oompa waddled out from my bedroom, shook his head as if to say, This place is so quiet, with only the rustle and tap of the maple tree branches against the window, and that, my dear, does not compare to Cher.
    â€œI know,” I agreed and patted the cushion next to me. Oompa backed up, giving himself an ample runway, then heaved himself up onto the couch with a thud. I scratched his ear, thinking how for so many years I’d assumed Max’s feeling for me were deeper than friendship. He gave me his dog, after all. “When you saw Max yesterday, could you smell that girl on his clothes?” I asked Oompa. “Did you know he had a girlfriend?” Oompa snorted and buried his nose behind a pillow, looking guilty. “You could have warned me.” I sighed and propped my feet up on the old, scratched coffee table.
    I flipped on the TV and quickly got frustrated that I couldn’t find my favorite stations on the never-ending list of channels on the menu guide. Everything felt so weird. Mom was supposed to be here, eating Twinkies with me, asking me how my day