What She Saw... by Lucinda Rosenfeld Page A

who used to play the bass clarinet but now booked flights to Aruba because the music money wasn’t coming in the way it should have been. If only Leonard had been a little more like Rachel’s father, Mr. Plotz, who wore Italian suits and made pots of money doing things no one understood at a company called Technotron Incorporated. But he wasn’t like Mr. Plotz at all; he was a freelance oboist. Which meant that Phoebe was a freelance oboist’s daughter. Which meant she didn’t stand a chance at real popularity, built as it was not just on cup size and charisma but on the ability to afford ski vacations in Park City, Utah.
    At Whitehead Middle, Phoebe had been safely middle-class; at Pringle, where she was one of the so-called financial aid students, she found herself well below the poverty line—a point of fact made clear on her first day of school, for which she made the mistake of arriving not just by car pool but in a zip-up sweatshirt and white painter pants. In their elaborately patterned Benetton sweaters and snakeskin cowboy boots, her new classmates showed their contempt through their colored contact lenses. That’s why Phoebe started shopping at Suburban Sophisticates, a designer-seconds emporium in shouting distance of Teterboro Airport, just off Route 46. The place reeked of overbuttered popcorn and ammonia-rich floor cleaner. Every other garment seemed to feature a fuchsia lipstick stain. The carpet that lined the ladies’ changing room never seemed hygienic enough for bare feet. There was an abandoned day-rate motel (MIDNIGHT SPECIAL $27!) at the edge of the parking lot. But Roberta told Phoebe that if she wanted the same things rich kids had, this was the only way she was going to get them— with pulled threads, mangled insignias, and two different-length sleeves no one was supposed to notice.
    Except they did—especially Jennifer Weinfelt, who would fix her eyes on Phoebe’s paraplegic polo players and ask, “Is there something, like, wrong with your shirt?”
    Another time Jennifer pointed at the plastic flower ring on Phoebe’s middle finger, and asked her, “Is that, like, a flower?”
    â€œBy the way, Jennifer, in case you haven’t noticed, your skin’s falling off,” Phoebe was tempted to say, was going to say, because Jennifer’s acne-blemished skin had turned red and flaky on account of her Retin-A prescription. But she never would have. She didn’t have the nerve for scenes. She was still thinking she could make people like her. She hadn’t yet learned that it’s a waste of time to try—that they either do or they don’t, and usually they don’t. But even if they do, they still say nasty things about you—just not to your face. So she answered, “It’s just, like, a ring,” because it
was
a ring—just not one of the silver and gold Tiffany’s bands that Jennifer sported on her short, tan fingers.
    â€œOh—right,” Jennifer responded, as if Phoebe had just shown off her termite collection.
    RACHEL RETURNED FROM the rest room with a new coat of Silver City Pink anchored to her thin, downturned lips. “Like, what was
that
about?” she demanded to know.
    â€œI have no idea,” Phoebe told her.
    â€œWell, you sure weren’t acting like you didn’t know . . .”
    â€œDidn’t know what?”
    â€œDidn’t know what Jason was, like, doing here.”
    â€œDid
I
invite him to sit down?”
    Rachel lifted one overplucked eyebrow to the heavens. “I don’t know who invited who, but you certainly weren’t acting like you minded sitting next to him.”
    â€œYou were the one who started talking to him!”
    â€œI was just trying to make a point, whereas
you,
” she said, pausing for effect, “were flirting your ass off.”
    Phoebe grimaced and turned away. At times like this, she really hated her best