“N-no. I was just wondering if you know Tiffany?”
“What’s her last name?”
“I’m not sure. Um, I think she’s a freshman.”
“Oh, I don’t know any freshmen.” Beverly turned to the rest of the Charm Club. “Do you guys?”
They all shook their heads.
“Sorry,” Marylin said.
“That’s alright. Thanks anyway.”
Beverly called, “Hey, wait! Do you have anyone to sit with?”
I shook my head.
“Come sit with us!”
I smiled. “Alright.”
I sat down and spent the lunch talking with everyone in the Charm Club. I actually liked them. They weren’t the stuck-up snobs that I thought they were going to be. In fact, they were really nice.
At the end of lunch, Marylin asked, “Brittany, are you sure you don’t want to be part of the Charm Club? Because if you do, you have the spot.”
I thought about it for a moment. I’d have a spot for lunch, I’d have built-in friends, and one of the girls had said that the Charm Club meets three times a week, including on the weekends. I’d have something to do after school!
I nodded. “I’ll join.”
Tiffany
“It’s settled.” I said. “The three of us will join the Charm Club. And Brittany, if she wants to be friends with us.”
“I don’t get why you’re being so nice to the new girl,” Betty said.
“I saw her.” Judy told me. “You only want her to be our friend because she’s pretty, don’t you?”
I shrugged. “She would help us get in with the popular girls. And she’s from California. I’ve never met anyone from California! She seems pretty cool.”
“Hey, isn’t that her?” Judy asked.
I turned around and looked in the direction Judy was pointing. Sure enough, Brittany was sitting at the Charm Club’s table.
“Looks like she thinks she’s better than you,” Betty laughed.
“If she thinks that then she obviously thinks that she’s better than you too,” I snapped.
“Gee, I was just kidding,” Betty held her hands up in defense.
I sighed through my nose. I was nice to Brittany and this was how she thanked me? “Judy!”
“What?”
“Go get Charm Club applications.” I demanded. “Three of them.”
“Ok. Gosh.” As Judy walked away she muttered, “No need to be so mean.”
I might have been being mean, but I didn’t care. This was not how the first day of high school was supposed to go.
When Judy came back with the applications I said, “Alright, fill them out. Lie if you need to. We are getting into that club.”
Meg
After school Lauren-Anne and I met at Penny’s Diner.
“Alright, tell me everything about this mystery boyfriend,” Lauren-Anne said.
“His name is Adam and we met on Independence Day.” I told her. “We danced under the fireworks and stars. It was dreamy. And we spent all of July and August together. Every night. He had a job, so he had money to take me out. Ready for the best part?”
“What? Tell me!”
“He had a car!”
“He’s an older guy?” Lauren-Anne asked loudly.
I nodded. “But be quiet. I don’t want anyone to hear us.”
“Alright, sorry. But wow, how scandalous!”
I shrugged. “He’s only sixteen.”
“Are you going to keep in touch?”
“Yeah. We’re going to write to each other. I write to him one Sunday and he writes to me the next. That way we should have received each other’s letters by the time it’s our turn to write.”
“Aw, that’s so cute! Meg, I’m so happy for you!”
Suddenly a girl said, “Lauren-Anne! There you are!” She grabbed Lauren-Anne’s arm and shouted, “Marylin! Beverly!”
“Oh, Margaret. Hi,” Lauren-Anne said.
Margaret turned to Beverly and Marylin, who came up behind her. “Ladies, this is Lauren-Anne. The girl from my homeroom. I told you she’d be here.”
“How’d you know that?” Lauren-Anne asked.
Margaret smiled. “You told me, silly.”
Lauren-Anne looked perplexed as she said, “No, I didn’t.”
“You must have, otherwise I wouldn’t have known where to find you.”
Lauren-Anne still looked confused, but she didn’t say anything.
“Here, let me look at you.” Marylin said, taking Lauren-Anne’s face in her hands. “Oh my, you are absolutely beautiful. Please say you’ll join our club!”
“I-I don’t-”
“Oh! And you!” Beverly grabbed my face. “You’re beautiful, too!”
“You are!” Marylin agreed.
“No one has ever told me that before,” I said.
“Oh, that’s because you aren’t showcasing your beauty. If you join the Charm Club, we can show you how to do your hair and makeup. We’ll also show you what to wear. Please say you’ll both join!”
As they stared at me I could feel something inside of me urging me to say yes. Even though I never thought I would have joined a beauty club in a thousand years, I still said yes. I think I shocked everyone there. I certainly shocked myself. And I was shocked again when Lauren-Anne said, “I’ll join too.”
Chapter 3
Lauren-Anne
On the Saturday after the first week of school, Meg and I attended our first Charm Club meeting at Marylin’s house. The other two new members were the new girl, Brittany, and Tiffany, who had been the most popular girl at our junior high school. I caught myself wondering why her two friends hadn’t been let into the club instead of Meg and me.
“Alright everyone,” Marylin began. “Let’s welcome our newest members. We have Lauren-Anne, Meg, Brittany, and Tiffany. Ladies, why don’t you introduce yourselves? Tell us something about you.”
“Wait, what about Evelyn?” One of the girls asked.
“She’s running late. She said to start the meeting without her. Don’t worry.”
“Lauren-Anne, go ahead. Tell us about yourself,” Beverly said.
I stood up. “Hi, I’m Lauren-Anne. I- I’m not really sure what to say. I wasn’t prepared for this. Um, well, I’m not usually into all this stuff. But Beverly and Marylin said that they could teach me to better myself. It’s what Jesus would want, so here I am.”
Everybody clapped politely as I sat back down.
“Meg, now it’s your turn,” Beverly said.
Meg stood up. “Hi everyone, I’m Meg. I have an older brother and a dog. I don’t know, that’s it, I guess.”
Everyone clapped again and Marylin told Brittany to stand up.
“Hey, I’m Brittany. I just moved here from Los Angeles and I’m really excited
