BFF Breakup Read Free

were spread out on our long kitchen table, along with order forms, the cordless phone, and the computer we kept at the end of the table. She sells this stuff to clients for Sense of Scent, which is kind of like Mary Kay cosmetics, meaning you can’t buy them in a store but only through a sales rep. I know she doesn’t make much money—thank goodness for Dad’s job—but it really makes her happy working so closely with clients and getting to know them and their families. She said the world had become too virtual and she likes interacting with people.
    â€œMadeline and I sort of got into a fight in class.”
    â€œYou got in a fight ?”
    â€œWe only broke a couple of chairs.” The veins in her forehead started to bulge. “Come on, Mom, I’m kidding. I mean, we did get in a fight, but just yelling. It was over something stupid. I don’t know what happened.”
    I felt it again. Oh, why hello there, tears. So nice to see you again after three whole hours of your absence.
    â€œI don’t even know what to say anymore,” Mom said, shaking her head. “Is everything okay?”
    â€œYes,” I totally and completely lied as I wiped away the tears that raced down my flushed cheeks.
    â€œYoung lady,” Mom began, reaching her hand out for mine and tugging me close to her. She stroked my arm and said, “When is this going to end?”
    â€œSh-sh-she started it!” I said like a big crybaby.
    â€œOh, Brooke,” Mom said. “Maybe you should end it, make things right with Madeline. You’ve been friends too long not to.”
    In my room later that night, I lay on my bed surrounded by all my stuffed animals, the ones I’d had since I was a tiny baby up to the hard, stuffed penguin I won at the state fair last year with Madeline. We named him Mr. Keating. I propped him up on my stomach and looked into his shiny, black plastic eyes. It’d been weeks since Madeline and I had been friends. I couldn’t believe it’d been so long. We used to brag that we’d never gone more than three days without talking to each other. I thought of the summer she called me from vacation with her parents in Fort Lauderdale, telling me that she’d kissed a boy in the hotel swimming pool while her parents were insidegetting food and her brother was off on Jet Skis. “He’s not even that cute,” she’d whispered. “But he’s funny and told me I’m pretty. Brooke, no one has ever said that before!”
    â€œI tell you,” I’d said.
    â€œIt’s not the same,” she’d said.
    She was right. I knew it wasn’t. The truth was, I had been a bit jealous. Madeline had her first kiss. It seemed even more exotic that it was out of state.
    â€œI bet by the end of seventh grade we’ll both have kissed a boy,” she’d said, and I was pretty sure she was just trying to make me feel better.
    â€œI hope it’s not the same boy,” I’d joked, and we both laughed.
    Now we couldn’t even look at each other. And even if we did manage to talk again, how could we trust each other enough to share our secrets? Would I ever trust her again? Worse, I thought, was Madeline even worth trying for?

4 BROOKE
    I N MY MIND, JUNIOR HIGH BEGAN WITH THE elementary school end-of-the-year dance.
    It was the first time we really got dressed up for a school event, and the first time I got to buy a dress that was fancier than anything I’d ever worn before. I only admitted it to Madeline, but I was excited about wearing a dress. It’s not that I was anti—I just preferred clothes that allowed me to spring across our back creek at a moment’s notice.
    Madeline and I decided to go together, just us. Some girls were meeting boys there—not exactly adate, but as close as they’d gotten so far. Mads and I didn’t care about that—we just wanted to have fun together.
    I carried my