Becoming Me Read Free

that in the first place. But I’m supposed to be honest here. And the truth is, I would hang with them if only they would let me. But, I ask you, is that so terribly wrong?

TWO
Thursday, January 4 (a beginning)
    Today, Jenny Lambert talked to me. Now, that might not seem like much to you. But Jenny is one of the most popular girls in the whole school. I know, here I go sounding all shallow again. You know, Jenny is a person too—and I shouldn’t hate her just because she’s popular, should I? Besides, for a popular person, Jenny is actually pretty nice. She’s friendly and even though she’s a cheerleader, she doesn’t seem all that full of herself the way most of them do. And she’s probably the prettiest one of the bunch too. She has brown eyes and long, dark hair that’s shiny and thick. Also, she’s really smart.
    She actually spoke to me at the honor society meeting this afternoon (Beanie refuses to join honor society, even though she’s smarter than most of the kids in there). Honor society is in charge of the Valentine’s Day Dance, and Jenny and I are on the decorating committee. And while we were compiling our list of what we’ll need (like red and pink crepe paper and stuff) Jenny toldme she didn’t even want to go to the dance because she had just broken up with her boyfriend, Josh Miller.
    Now, if I made a list of all the boys that I’d like to have for my boyfriend, Josh would definitely make the top three. Honestly, he looks just like Matt Damon—same smile, same teeth, everything! But when Jenny ragged on and on about what a total jerk Josh is, I just nodded and agreed with her. I mean, what do I know, just because he’s good looking doesn’t mean he has any character to speak of.
    But the best part was how Jenny even confided in me about him in the first place. And she also told me that she liked my outfit. I got the jeans and top at The Gap last week (with a gift certificate from my other grandma who lives in Pasadena), but my dad thought they were way too expensive—well, I’d say they were well worth it! Then Jenny asked me where I got my hair cut! And she said she wanted to get hers cut like that too. To be honest, at that point, I thought maybe she was just teasing me. You know how kids do that sometimes, saying things like, “Hey, where’d you get those cool shoes?” to some poor kid who’s got on a pair of ratty, old Air Jordans or something equally uncool. Anyway, I could tell Jenny wasn’t kidding when she actually wrote down the name of the hair salon on her notebook. And the whole time, I just acted really cool and laid back about everything. I never once revealed how totally excited I was just to be talking with her. And then we even walked down to our lockers together!
    But now, here comes the embarrassing part. It’s somethingI wouldn’t want to tell anyone, but diaries are good for this kind of confession. You see, Beanie spotted me walking with Jenny. One thing I haven’t said too much about is how much Beanie just loves to just blurt out all kinds of crazy stuff. She totally gets off on being loud and shocking—mainly to get attention, I think.
    Anyway, I was freaking that Beanie was going to say something really stupid about me walking with Jenny, so I tried to avoid making eye contact with her. But as soon as she saw me she said hey just like usual and started coming my way, but then I just turned and looked away from her, pretending like I didn’t even know her. I basically just ignored her! I couldn’t even believe I did it. For sure, it was totally stupid not to mention risky—I mean, talk about an open invitation for Beanie to really let me have it. But the really weird thing is, she didn’t. She just kept on walking by. And now I feel absolutely lousy about the whole thing, and I know I’ll have to tell her I’m sorry. I know she will never, in a million years, understand why I’d ever want to be friends with someone like Jenny Lambert. But the truth