Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen - Dyan Sheldon [3]
Carla Santini (of whom more later…) was the centre of all meaningful homeroom conversation among the girls. Sophisticated, beautiful and radiating confidence the way a towering inferno radiates heat, she swept into the room in black trousers and a short black sweater as though she’d just stepped from the pages of Vogue. Although she’d checked me out the second her foot was through the door, it was a good five minutes before she finally deigned to talk to me.
“Aren’t you the girl who just moved into the old Swenska house?” she asked. She was using the sickeningly charming voice I’ve come to know so well, but she still managed to emphasize the word “old” and make it sound as though it meant more than “no longer young”.
Taking their cue from Carla Santini, her entourage all looked at me too. They were barely breathing.
“Maybe,” I said, returning her sugar-overdose smile with one of my own. I’d checked her out, too, without even seeming to look her way. I’d known girls like Carla Santini before – there are lots of girls in New York who think the world wasn’t complete until they were born – and I’d never liked one of them. “I didn’t realize our house had a name.”
The boy behind me, Sam Creek (more on him later, as well…), snorted. I saw Ella’s mouth tremble.
Carla Santini’s laughter rang through the classroom like an alarm.
“Is that supposed to be the famous New York sense of humour?” she asked. Loudly.
That caught the attention of the few people who weren’t already riveted by the spectacle of Carla Santini putting me through my paces.
“Are you from the city?” asked Carla Santini’s sidekick, Alma Vitters (more of her later, too…). She made it sound like she was saying, “You mean, you’re from Alpha Centauri?”
Before I could say, proudly, that I certainly was from the City, Carla answered for me.
“That’s right,” she said. “A real city slicker.” She gave me a phoney look of sympathy. “You must find it pretty dull in Dellwood, after New York,” purred Carla.
“You won’t for long with her around,” whispered a voice in my ear. I glanced right. Sam Creek was leaning forward on his arms as though falling asleep.
By then I’d figured out who Carla Santini was. Her mother was the real estate agent who sold my mother the old Swenska house. It was obvious that, despite Carla’s show of innocent curiosity, she already knew a lot about me and my family. Everything her mother knew: our income, our lack of a male parent, probably even the fact that I hadn’t wanted to move.
“I don’t know yet.” I smiled that famous New York “choke-yourself” smile. “I only just got here.”
Carla rang a few more alarms.
“Seriously,” she said when she was finished being incredibly amused, “Dellwood must be a big change. I mean, New York…”
It was at this point that other people began to join the conversation. Someone told a story about her aunt being mugged not five minutes after she got off the train at Penn Station. One of the boys claimed to know the statistics of violent deaths in the City for the last five years. One of the girls told a story about her friend’s friend who was abducted off the street in New York in broad daylight, in front of dozens of people, and no one tried to help her. Someone else said he’d seen a documentary about gangs that made him turn down free tickets to Madison Square Garden.
“Well, my parents took me to New York for my birthday last year,” said Ella, “and I thought it was beautiful.” She smiled. It wasn’t a big smile, but it was a sincere one. Which made a nice change. “You know,” she continued, “the lights at night and everything? I felt like I was visiting Oz.”
That was when I knew that despite her straight and rather uninspired appearance, inside Ella Gerard was a free spirit waiting – no, begging – to be released. I recognized her as the sister of my soul, who, unlike Pam and Paula, the sisters of my flesh, had everything important in common with me.
“You should see it at Christmas,” I said. “Fifth Avenue