Please, Please, Please by Rachel Vail Page A

pick me up, after.”
    “She what? What do you mean, forgot to pick you up? What did you do?”
    “I just sat there, waiting,” Zoe said matter-of-factly. “I mean, I knew they’d realize eventually, so I didn’t care or anything. She felt bad when she finally came.”
    I sat up. “How long were you sitting there?”
    “I don’t know,” she said. “It got dark. But Roxanne waited with me, since she had her bike, so it was fine.”
    “Oh, Zoe.”
    “It was pretty funny, actually.”
    “Funny?” It didn’t sound the slightest bit funny to me.
    “Yeah,” she insisted. “My family was all sitting down to dinner, and everybody was like, where’s Zoe, where’s Zoe, and I guess then my mother was like, oops!”
    I didn’t know what to say to her. My mother would never forget me. When soccer started last year, my mother shadowed me up and down the field on the sidelines yelling, Don’t run, CJ!
    “Do you want me to come over?” I asked Zoe. It was dark out already, and I was supposed to be rinsing my new maroon leotard, doing my homework, and getting ready for bed, but I felt like Zoe might really need me, after something like that. Mom would understand and drive me over, if I explained to her what happened to Zoe today. I wandered over to my desk and sat down in my desk chair to put on socks and my sneakers.
    “You want to come over now?” Zoe asked.
    “My mom will drive me over, I’m sure,” I said, but right away slapped myself on the head—what am I, an idiot? What, like it will make Zoe feel better for me to tell her how understanding my mother is? “If . . .” I tried to think quick what to say, but I really am not a very quick thinker. “Are you, I mean, depressed?” I rolled my eyes at myself in the mirror.
    “No,” Zoe said. “You mean about my mom?”
    “Yeah.” I shook my head. All I want to do is be nice, and I end up such a jerk.
    “It was funny,” Zoe said again, sounding less sure. “I don’t care.”
    “OK.” How would I feel, I wondered, if Mom ever really did leave me alone? I tried to think what in the world to say. “Anyway.”
    “Anyway,” she repeated. “Has Tommy called you?”
    “No.” I flopped back onto my bed. “Hey, did you think about Lou?”
    “Lou?” she asked.
    “If you like him.”
    “Are you serious?” I couldn’t tell if she was laughing or angry.
    “Don’t you think it would be fun?” I asked, taking my time with the words. “He’s good friends with Tommy and . . .”
    “I like him,” Zoe protested. “He’s my buddy, he draws funny comics even if they’re all about battles in World War Two. I have nothing against the guy, but he’s a, sort of, a doof, don’t you think?”
    I pulled the big blue sweatshirt Zoe had given me last week out of the closet and held it in front of myself, in the mirror. “He’s nice. I think he likes you. I saw him looking at you, today.”
    “Ew. No. Really? When?”
    I smiled. She sounded a little interested. “At lunch.”
    “I bring big sandwiches,” she said. “He probably just thinks I’m fat.”
    “He does not!” She tries to seem like she doesn’t care, but I know she does. I pulled the sweatshirt over my head and dropped the phone. “Sorry,” I said when I got it back up to my ear. “I was putting on your sweatshirt. Bluie.”
    “Big Blue,” she said softly, so I couldn’t really hear her.
    “What?”
    “Big Blue,” she repeated, loud.
    “Oh, yeah. Big Blue. It’s so soft.”
    “I know,” she said.
    I decided to change the subject again. “Anyway, what were you saying?”
    “Nothing,” she mumbled. “Just, you know. Boys don’t like me that way.”
    “That’s not true.” She heard Morgan say that about her last week. Morgan has said that a lot. Maybe it is true, maybe not—but Lou might. He seems more mature than the rest of the boys. I couldn’t think what else to say to make Zoe feel better. Everything I was trying seemed to backfire. I decided not to