Rotten Apple Read online

  “No, um, I just missed a call, that’s all. It’s not a big deal,” Apple answered, frantically starting to shove everything she had dumped out back into her bag. “I couldn’t find my freaking phone in this bag. It’s like an endless pit leading to nowhere.”

  “Was it an important call?” the cute guy asked, bending down to talk to Apple at eye level. Apple looked down. She wasn’t good at looking people directly in the eye. It made her uncomfortable. The cute guy started helping her pick up the contents of her bag, handing over a package of gum, which Apple grabbed and threw into her purse, along with a package of bobby pins, her wallet, and a lip gloss she had been trying to find for more than a month.

  “No. I doubt it. It was probably just one of my friends. I was supposed to meet them, like, twenty minutes ago, and I’m late. They were probably just wondering where I was. Well, I’d better go. I’m late,” Apple said, standing up.

  “So you’ve said,” the cute guy responded.

  It just figured, thought Apple—I get stopped by a super-cute guy when I’m wearing dirty, stretched-out jeans and on my way to get my eyebrows waxed. Why couldn’t I have run into him afterward, when I don’t look like Oscar the Grouch?

  “That’s it?” the cute guy asked. “That’s all I get?”

  What the heck was he talking about? Did he expect a tip or something? Apple realized she hadn’t even thanked him for helping her gather her things. She had been rude to her mother, and now she was being rude to a complete stranger who had just helped her and who was being very kind. She was just not herself today. She was in what her Crazy Aunt Hazel always annoyingly called her “Rotten Apple” mood.

  “Oh,” Apple said. “I’m sorry. Thank you for helping me.” She watched the cute guy stand up. He was at least a head taller than her.

  “No, seriously,” the cute guy continued. “Come on! Is that really all I get from you?”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “Apple! It’s me! Aren’t you even going to ask how the last six months of my life was?” the cute guy asked. “Have you lost your mind along with your cell phone and everything else in that deep and endless pit of a bag of yours? You should really think about cleaning that thing out. Apple, it’s me! Me!” he insisted. “Come on! You really don’t recognize me?”

  Apple turned her eyes up and took a proper look at the cute guy’s face, finally forcing herself to even look in his eyes.

  “Oh … my … God,” she said, blinking her eyes. How had she not noticed? But he looked so completely different. It couldn’t be. Could it?

  “Zen?” Apple asked, hesitantly.

  “Um, hello? Yes, it’s me, Zen,” he said with a laugh. “We’ve only been going to school together for ten years now. I know I was gone for half a year, but still …”

  Apple suddenly found herself feeling light-headed and slightly dizzy. All the shiny cars trying to find parking in the mall, and the people walking around them on the sidewalk eating ice cream cones suddenly seemed to go into slow motion. It was the same feeling she had always had when she walked by Zen in the hallways at school, or when she knew he was sitting near her on the spiral staircase before classes started.

  All she could think was, please, dear God, do not let me faint.

  “It’s only been six months,” protested Zen. “Am I that unforgettable? Do I really look that different?”

  How could I ever forget you? Apple thought. I’ve only thought about you every day for two years. I just spent months wondering if I was ever going to see you again. She cleared her throat and fanned her face. She suddenly felt very hot, as if she had just gone for a long jog.

  “I can’t believe it,” Apple said. “You look … well… you look so different. What happened to your glasses? And your hair! It looks so much longer and blonder. You look … you look … you look … you look so much taller,” she gushed. And she thought—this time only in her head—and you look like you’ve been working out! Where did those shoulders come from? Where did those washboard abs come from?

  Apple hated herself for stuttering. She hated herself for gushing. She was a stuttering, gushing moron.

  Breathe, Apple, just breathe.

  “‘Different’ meaning good? Or ‘different’ meaning bad?” Zen asked, smiling his dimpled smile.

  “‘Different’ meaning amazing!” Apple heard herself gush again. She knew the words coming out of her mouth made her sound idiotic. She had to tone it down a notch—or five hundred notches. “I mean, you know, you look healthy. Very healthy. That’s all I meant. You look really, really healthy. You look very different and really healthy.”

  I did not just use the word “healthy” four times in one sentence, Apple moaned inwardly. Please tell me I did not.

  “I decided to get contact lenses,” Zen said, “so maybe that’s the ‘different.’ You can’t exactly surf with glasses. And my hair, I know it’s a little long, but six months’ surfing in the Australia sun does make it lighter, and I guess grow faster or something.” He touched his hair. “I guess hanging out with all those surfers got to me or something, because I kind of like it like this.”

  “Well, you look incredible,” Apple told him. What was wrong with her? “I mean, you look incredibly healthy.”

  “Well, I’ll take ‘healthy’ as a compliment. So how are yow?” Zen asked. “How was your semester?”

  “Fine. Uneventful. Boring. The usual,” Apple answered nervously.

  Apple found it hard to speak in full sentences to this new Zen. Not that she had ever had an easy time talking to the old Zen, before he became Hot Zen.

  Apple could not get over how much he had changed.

  She forced herself to turn her eyes away from his face, and stared at the ground, with the same concentration she usually saved for exams or watching Minors in Malibu. God forbid Zen could read in her eyes that her Zen crush had, in the last few seconds, just turned into a super-sized Zen Crush. Apple had always thought Zen was sweet-looking and cute. But now? She had to get a grip!

  “What are you doing here?” Apple asked, finally. Market Mall was a fun place to hang out with friends at night, but not necessarily on a Sunday afternoon, unless you had an appointment at Gossip.

  “I’m just waiting for my mother. She’s grabbing some vitamin E oil or something,” he said, nodding toward Health Nut.

  “Oh,” Apple responded.

  “Yup,” Zen said.

  “Well, I guess I better go. I’m late,” Apple told him. “You know, to meet Brooklyn and Happy. I’m late. We’re meeting at Gossip.”

  Okay, Apple thought, how pathetic am I? I’ve used the words “late” and “healthy” way too many times in the last three minutes. Zen will for sure think I’m a nutbar. How could he not?

  “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow at school then. I’m dreading going back,” Zen told her. “Being home schooled in Australia was so laid back. There wasn’t any schedule—I just had to get my work done and send it in. I’m dreading having to go back to a regular schedule.”

  “Yeah, me too,” Apple answered, thinking, I’m so not dreading going back—especially now that you look the way you do. This was going to make school so much more interesting.

  “Well, it was nice to see you,” Zen said, “even if you totally didn’t know who I was.” Zen laughed.

  “I knew! I knew! My mind was just somewhere else,” Apple said. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

  Apple turned her back to Zen and headed down the sidewalk toward Gossip, fighting the urge to start running.

  I’m an idiot, Apple thought. I’m a stuttering idiot, with a mono-brow. I’m a stuttering mono-browed idiot.

  “Hey, Apple! Wait up a sec!” Apple heard Zen call out. He ran and caught up to her, two storefronts away from Gossip.

  Please do not notice my mono-brow, Apple thought, turning around to face her super-sized Zen Crush once again. Was it possible Zen wanted to talk to her longer? Or to ask her something important, like if she w
anted to hook up sometime?

  “Yeah?” she asked. She could literally hear the gulp in her throat as she swallowed, and wondered if Zen could hear it too.

  “You forgot this. It’s not exactly what I’m into—I have no use for it,” Zen said, holding his arm out toward her, smiling broadly. Oh, that dimple!

  Apple swore that she could actually feel her heart melting.

  “Oh. Thanks very much,” she said, taking the Teen Vogue from Zen’s outreached hand, all the while wishing the ground would open and swallow her up.

  “I’m late,” she said again, and raced off past the last couple of doors to Gossip. Why was it always so hard to breathe when Zen was around?

  here you are!” screeched Happy the moment Apple raced into Gossip Spa. Happy had been standing near the tower of nail polishes by the nail bar just inside the door. “Where have you been? You’re, like, a month late! I tried calling you, but you didn’t pick up. We had to move our appointments back half an hour! Now come here and give me a hug.”

  “Me too! I want a hug too!” said Brooklyn. “We missed you!”

  “I missed you more than Brooklyn did,” Happy said.

  “Did not,” Brooklyn said.

  “Did too!”

  Happy and Brooklyn embraced Apple into a bear hug, and Apple instantly felt better about life. She inhaled the scent of Happy’s long, straight blond hair, which smelled like peach. Hugging Happy was like coming home to a house full of fresh baking.

  “You have no idea how much I missed you guys! I can’t believe you both left me alone for two weeks. How could you guys do that to me?” Apple asked her friends as they pulled apart. “Take a guess how many times the Queen of Hearts asked me if I wanted her advice. Come on, take a guess!”

  “Fifty!” Brooklyn said.

  “Nope. Guess again,” Apple said.

  “Two hundred and fifty,” Happy said, as if they were at an auction.

  “No, I stopped paying attention after the 285th time,” Apple told them.

  “I promise we will never do it again,” Happy said, “right, Brooklyn? We will never leave sweet Apple alone with her mother for two weeks ever again. Next time, you go on vacation with my family, and I’ll stay at home with Dr. Bee Bee Berg.”

  “Thank you!” Apple said. “That would be fantastic.”

  “Right. You try spending two weeks with Sailor, and you might think twice about just how painful it is to spend it with your mother,” Happy said. “I’ll take your mother over my sister any day.”

  Happy had a real love/hate relationship with her older sister. Sometimes their fights got so out of control that they turned physical. But just as often they hung out together, being only two years apart in age, and they always shared the same clothes.

  “Well, I had a relaxing holiday,” Brooklyn said. “I did sunrise yoga classes on the beach every morning at 6 a.m., and they were truly inspirational.”

  Happy and Apple exchanged doubtful looks. How could anything be inspirational at that ungodly hour?

  “So what do you think?” Happy asked. “Should I get the slut-red nail polish today, or go for candy-floss pink?” She held two different nail-polish bottles out for Apple to look at.

  “I don’t know. They’re both nice,” Apple said. As Happy contemplated the two colors, Apple couldn’t help but stare at her.

  “Happy,” she finally said, “what are you wearing? You do realize it’s just Sunday afternoon, right? Do you ever not look good?” Happy had the kind of thick, blond hair that celebrities paid a small fortune to fly their hair stylists in to maintain, along with big blue eyes, a perfect ski-slope nose, and high cheekbones. Now, thanks to two weeks in Mexico, she was perfectly bronzed too. And, as always, she was dressed as if she was heading to the MTV Music Awards. Today it was skin-tight black jeans under knee-high black leather boots, and a lacy, almost see-through top.

  “No, it’s impossible for Happy to ever look bad,” Brooklyn said. “You should know that by now. Even Happy’s worst-looking days are better than my best-looking ones,” she moaned. Brooklyn was wearing her usual sort of getup—low-waisted yoga pants and a long-sleeved yoga shirt with the words “hugs make the world go round” written across the chest.

  “You guys are too nice!” Happy said. “I don’t know why I need therapy when I have you guys to make me feel so good all the time.”

  “Yeah, well there’s a reason they call you ‘the Onion’ at school,” Brooklyn said.

  “Oh, God, stop it!” Happy moaned, shaking her head. “I hate that.”

  It was true that all their classmates called Happy “the Onion” behind her back, and sometimes even to her face. It was because she was so beautiful that, when you looked at her, you wanted to cry. “Mind you, at least I’m not called the Noodle,” Happy said, looking at Brooklyn, who could bend her body like a boiled noodle. Brooklyn was tall, lean, limber, and willowy, like a ballerina. “I’d rather be called the Onion than the Noodle, wouldn’t you, Apple?”

  “Um, I’d rather be called neither,” Apple said.

  “Apple? Your skin looks amazing! You look like you just had an oxygen facial recently or something. Did you?” Happy asked.

  “No! I just got here,” said Apple. “Plus I’d never come to Gossip without you guys. It’s our thing, right?”

  Apple, Happy, and Brooklyn came to Gossip Spa on a pretty regular basis. They came to celebrate special occasions, like their birthdays or Valentine’s Day, and always on the last day of school break, before school started up again. They called it “back-to-school” pampering.

  “I don’t know, Apple,” Happy said. “Your skin looks all flushed. You’re glowing! You’re not pregnant, are you?”

  “Happy!” Apple said, laughing. The things that came out of her mouth, Apple thought. It was one of the reasons she loved Happy so much: she always kept Apple on her toes. Happy didn’t know how to edit her own words.

  “You’re not in love, are you?” asked Brooklyn, clapping her hands like a little child who had just been handed a balloon. “You look like you’re in love! Are you in love?”

  “God, you guys. No, I’m not in love. No, I’m not pregnant. I’ve never even had a boyfriend, as you two know perfectly well,” Apple said. But maybe I will this semester, she thought. Zen smiled at me, after all.

  “Not that she’d tell you anyway, Happy. She’s the Sponge,” said Brooklyn, trying out a purple hue on her big toe.

  “Oh, the Sponge would tell us big news,” Happy said to Brooklyn, pretending Apple wasn’t standing right beside them. “One day, the Sponge is going to explode, and we’re going to know all her secrets. No one can keep everything inside for that long without blowing up.”

  “Guys, I’m not pregnant. I’m not in love. I just raced over here,” Apple insisted. “I was practically running. My face is flushed because my mother made me late with her stream of never-ending questions on the way out the door. That’s why. I swear!”

  “Okay, moving on,” said Happy. “So you’re getting the ‘Hello Gorgeous’ today?” she asked Apple.

  The Hello Gorgeous was one of the most popular treatments at Gossip. It promised to shape your eyebrows so perfectly that you’d be ready for the pages of a magazine.

  “Hey, Apple! You have to hear all about Happy’s new man,” Brooklyn suddenly said, looking up from her feet.

  “He was just a fling, Brooklyn,” said Happy, adding, “a super-hot fling. That’s what my parents get for forcing me to go to Mexico with them and Sailor. I swear, my parents never want to spend any time with us, and then when we have two weeks off, that’s the time they decide they want to ‘get to know’ us. Not that they really even did that. Sailor and I barely saw them the entire vacation. They had their own room and we had ours. Sailor and I fought the entire time. One night, Sailor—”

  “Happy!” Apple said. “Enough about Sailor! Tell me about the fling!”

  “He was a lifeguard,” Happy said, beaming. “Sailor was so jealous! It was tota
lly worth it, just to see the envy dripping from Sailor that I had found a guy and she hadn’t. It was, like, the happiest days of my life.”

  “Okay, you had a fling with a lifeguard and all I did was watch reruns of Minors in Malibu for two weeks and stare at my split ends,” Apple moaned.

  “Well, there’s not much to tell, though. Let’s just say I have a whole new appreciation for lifeguards.” Happy laughed.

  Apple had a million questions for Happy, but before she could ask any of them, Natalie, the owner of Gossip, sauntered over to them.

  Natalie was twenty-five and was the coolest adult Apple had ever met. She was always dressed like she was about to walk down a red carpet at a movie premiere. She had had features written about her in all the local newspapers and magazines. And, unlike Apple’s mother, she never shelled out unwanted advice—she only shelled it out when asked. But she always treated her clients like friends, and you could tell her anything. Not that Apple ever did.

  “Hey, you guys! It’s so nice to see you. It’s been way too long! And you all look phenomenal!” Natalie said, giving them each a hug.

  That was the other thing about Natalie. She was always so free with compliments. “Are you all ready for your treatments?” Natalie asked. “Brooklyn, you’re getting your legs waxed, right? Kendra is waiting for you in the back.”

  “In the torture room, right?” Brooklyn asked with a shudder.

  “You got it,” said Natalie.

  “See you guys soon,” Brooklyn said, “I may be a while. My leg hair is so long you could practically braid it. And I hate when people in my yoga classes stare at my hairy legs. I’m not that much of a tree-hugger.”

  “Nice, Brooklyn,” Happy said, and they all laughed. Brooklyn gave them a peace sign and headed to the back.

  “And Apple, you’re getting the Hello Gorgeous, right?” said Natalie. “Michele is waiting for you at the eyebrow bar. And Happy, you can head over to the nail bar with Jessica,” she directed.

  “Do you think maybe Jessica can do my nails at the eyebrow bar? I need to catch up with Apple,” Happy asked Natalie.