please. Sebastian’s going to be here in thirty minutes.”
“So? He can wait.”
No, he can’t, I think. Or rather, I can’t. I can’t wait to get out of the house. I can’t wait to get out of here.
I’ve been telling myself this all week. The “getting out of here” part is unspecified, though. Maybe I simply want to get away from my life.
For the past two weeks, ever since the library incident, the two Jens have been stalking me. They poke their heads into swim practice and make mooing noises when I dive. They’ve followed me to the mall, the supermarket, and even the drugstore, where they had the exciting experience of watching me buy tampons. And yesterday, I found a card in my locker. On the front was a cartoon drawing of a basset hound with a thermometer in his mouth and a hot-water bottle on his head. Inside, someone had written “Don’t” before “Get Well Soon,” followed by, “Wish you were dead.”
“Donna would never do something like that,” Peter protested.
Maggie, The Mouse, and I glared at him.
Peter held up his hands. “You wanted my opinion, that’s my opinion.”
“Who else would do it?” Maggie asked. “She’s the one who has the biggest reason.”
“Not necessarily,” Peter said. “Look, Carrie. I don’t want to hurt your feelings, but I can promise you, Donna LaDonna doesn’t even know who you are.”
“She does now,” The Mouse countered.
Maggie was aghast. “Why wouldn’t she know Carrie?”
“I’m not saying she doesn’t literally know who Carrie Bradshaw is. But Carrie Bradshaw is definitely not high on her list of concerns.”
“Thanks a lot,” I said to Peter. I was really beginning to hate him.
And then I was furious at Maggie for going out with him. And then I was furious at The Mouse for being friends with him. And now I’m furious at my sister Missy for hogging the bathroom.
“I’m coming in,” I say threateningly. I try the door. It’s unlocked. Inside, Missy is standing in the tub with Nair on her legs.
“Do you mind?” she says, yanking the shower curtain closed.
“Do you mind?” I ask, going to the mirror. “You’ve been in here for twenty minutes. I need to get ready.”
“What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing,” I snarl.
“You’d better get out of that mood or Sebastian isn’t going to want to be with you either.”
I storm out of the bathroom. Back in my room, I pick up The Consensus, open it to the title page, and glare at Mary Gordon Howard’s tiny signature. It’s like the writing of a witch. I kick the book under the bed. I lie down and put my hands over my face.
I wouldn’t have even remembered the damn book and that damn Mary Gordon Howard if I hadn’t spent the last hour searching for my special handbag—the one from France that my mother left me. She felt guilty buying it because it was so expensive. Even though she paid for it with her own money and she always said every woman ought to have one really good handbag and one really good pair of shoes.
The handbag is one of my most treasured possessions. I treat it like a jewel, only taking it out on special occasions, and always returning it to its cloth pouch and then to its original box. I keep the box in the back of my closet. Except this time, when I went to get it out, it wasn’t there. Instead, I found The Consensus, which I’d also hidden in the back of my closet. The last time I used the bag was six months ago, when Lali and I took a trip to Boston. She kept eyeing the bag and asking if she could borrow it sometime, and I said “yes,” even though the thought of Lali with my mother’s bag gave me the creeps. You would think it would have given her the creeps too—enough for her to know better than to ask. After the trip, I specifically remember putting the bag away properly, because I decided I wouldn’t use it again until I went to New York. But then Sebastian suggested dinner at this fancy French restaurant in Hartford called The Brownstone, and if that isn’t a special occasion, I don’t know what is.
And now the bag is missing. My whole world is falling apart.
Dorrit, I think suddenly. She’s gone from pilfering earrings to stealing my handbag.
I tear into her room.
Dorrit’s been awfully quiet this week. She hasn’t been causing her usual amount of turmoil, which is in itself suspicious. Now she’s lying on her bed, talking on the phone. On the wall above her is a poster of a cat, swinging from a tree branch. Hang in there, reads the caption.
Dorrit puts her hand over the receiver. “Yes?”
“Have you seen my bag?”
She looks away, which makes me guess she is, indeed, guilty. “What handbag? Your leather saddlebag? I think I saw it in the kitchen.”
“Mom’s bag.”
“I haven’t seen it,” she says, with exaggerated innocence. “Don’t you keep it locked up in your closet?”
“It’s not there.”
Dorrit shrugs and tries to go back to her conversation.
“Mind if I search your room?” I ask casually.
“Go ahead,” she says. She’s crafty. If she were guilty, she’d say, yes, she did mind.
I search her closets, her drawers, and under the bed. Nothing. “See?” Dorrit says in an I-told-you-so tone. But in her second of triumph, her eyes go to the giant stuffed panda bear seated on the rocking chair in the corner of her room. The panda bear that I supposedly gave her as a present when she was born.
“Oh no, Dorrit,” I say, shaking my head. “Not Mr. Panda.”
“Don’t touch him!” she screams, leaping off the bed and dropping the phone. I grab Mr. Panda and run out.
Dorrit follows me. Mr. Panda is suspiciously heavy, I note, as I bear him away to my room.
“Leave him alone,” Dorrit demands.
“Why?” I ask. “Has Mr. Panda been up to something naughty?”
“No!”
“I think he has.” I feel around the back of the stuffed bear and find a large opening that’s been carefully fastened closed with safety pins.
“What’s going on?” Missy comes running in, her legs dripping with foam.
“This,” I say, unfastening the safety pins.
“Carrie, don’t,” Dorrit cries as I slip my hand into the opening. The first thing I pull out is a silver bracelet I haven’t seen for months. The bracelet is followed by a small pipe, the type used to smoke marijuana. “It’s not
