About this Book
Jessica...on a track team?
 
From the minute Bethel saw Jessica Wakefield she thought, no way. No way was that girl going to make it on the track team. Pretty Jessica wouldn't want to mess up her perfect hair, much less get all sweaty and smelly running every day. She was way wrong.
 
Excerpt
Jessica
 
Why did I come here? I wonder as I wandered around the Red Bird Mall. It isn't cheering me up.
 
I had come to the mall to participate in my favorite hobby--shopping. Usually nothing makes me happier. But not this time. First of all, I had no money. Second of all, I was by myself.
 
How loserish can you get?
 
As I walked the circle around the edge of the food court, I noticed a group of boys standing in front of Chip's Chocolate Chips, munching cookies. Two of the four guys were pretty cute. If I weren't by myself, I would have smiled at them.
 
But right now, I was just grateful those guys didn't know who I was. That's why I came to the Red Bird Mall instead of going to the Valley Mall, which is closer to my house. If I ran into anybody from my old school while I was pathetically window shopping by myself, I would positively die. The fact is, last year I used to rule the school. Sweet Valley Middle School was my domain, and I was, like, the queen of everything I looked at or whatever.
 
Anyway, so now I was at a new school, where I was not the queen. My twin, Elizabeth, and I transferred to Sweet Valley Junior High at the beginning of the year, and I am not exaggerating when I say that my new school is worse than a torture chamber filled with blood-sucking trolls.
 
I love it there, as you can tell.
 
I stared at my reflection in the shiny food court sign. Was I different this year or something? Was that why I wasn't popular? I didn't look any different. But maybe other people could see things I couldn't.
 
"What are you looking at?" I growled at myself, then spun around--and came face-to-face with Lacey Frells. I had to stop myself from groaning.
 
Lacey was the coolest girl at Sweet Valley Junior High--the coolest girl in the world, maybe. And she didn't like me. About a week ago I told her this little white lie that she totally blew out of proportion, and then she decided I was a dork. I won't go into what the lie was. That's a whole other story.
 
The important thing is that I never managed to impress her and thus never managed to make it into the cool crowd at SVJH. And thus I was now shopping alone and talking to myself like a lame loser freak.
 
"Hello, Jessica," Lacey said levelly, running one hand through her sleek sun-streaked brown hair. Her other hand stretched back behind her, anchored by a little girl with blond curls.
 
"Hi." I tried to smile. Why was she talking to me? I never thought she'd want to speak to me again after last week. "What are you doing here?" It was an idiotic question, but I couldn't think of anything better.
 
Lacey shrugged. "I'm baby-sitting my half sister, Penelope." She flicked her head back in the direction of the girl, who looked about three years old. "Lucky me."
 
Penelope's round blue eyes were swollen with tears, and her bottom lip stuck out in a pout. She clung to a white stuffed rabbit.
 
"Hi, Penelope," I said. "I'm Jessica." I pointed to the stuffed animal. "What's your rabbit's name?" I asked.
 
"Bunny."
 
"Bunny." I grinned. "Well, that's easy to remember."
 
Penelope smiled back at me. She seemed sweet.
 
I looked back at Lacey. So, was I, like, supposed to make conversation with her? I racked my brain to come up with something to say, but luckily I didn't have to.
 
"Hey--Lacey!" someone called. Lacey stiffened. I followed her gaze and saw two supercool girls walking toward us. They looked about three years older than us. I wondered who they were.
 
Lacey cast a nervous glance at Penelope, then seemed to recover. As the girls approached, Lacey casually dropped her sister's hand, then closed and opened her eyes slowly, her dark lashes sweeping down over her cheeks. I'd never met anyone who could blink as cool as her.
 
"Hi, Cameron," she said to one of the girls--the taller one with short, spiky black hair. "Hey, Dakota."
 
Dakota's head was covered in tiny dreads, and she wore wire-rimmed glasses. "Who's this?" she asked, eyeing me.
 
"This is Jessica," Lacey said finally, "a girl from school."
 
A girl from school? Well, at least she didn't say, "This is Jessica, the biggest loser I've ever met," I decided. Would Lacey ever say something like, "This is Jessica, my friend"? If only. Being friends with Lacey would solve a lot of my problems. "Hi," I said to Cameron and Dakota.
 
Out of the comer of my eye I noticed that the four cute guys I had spotted before were staring at our group of girls. I wasn't surprised. Lacey and her two friends were totally gorgeous and way, way, cool. I slouched a little bit, trying to look like I belonged with this group.
 
One of the guys--I didn't see which--tossed a small foil ball over our heads, which landed just in front of our feet.
 
Penelope picked up the ball.
 
"Brat!" Lacey muttered to Penelope between her teeth.
 
Cameron grinned, and Dakota gave a little chuckle.
 
"It's no big deal," I said quietly to Lacey. I knew Penelope didn't mean to be a problem. As for the guys, they were just trying to get us to notice them.
 
Penelope tossed the ball back to the boys. They laughed, then threw two more balls of foil, which landed in front of us.
 
"I'm glad I'm past that stage," Dakota said.
 
"It's so junior high," Lacey agreed.
 
Well, you and I are in junior high, I thought, but I didn't say anything. Then one of the guys--a dark-haired boy in huge athletic shoes sprinted ahead--swooped by us, and snatched Penelope's stuffed rabbit.
 
Penelope let out an incredible howl. Everyone in the food court fumed around. The howl became heavy sobs.
 
"Give it back," I said without even thinking. "Give back her rabbit."
 
Cameron and Dakota looked at each other.
 
"Later, Lacey," Cameron said, and the two of them walked away quickly.
 
"Later," Lacey replied. She sounded furious. I guess she didn't want to look like a nerd in front of her cool friends any more than I wanted to look like a nerd in front of her.
 
The four guys grinned at one another. I couldn't believe they weren't giving back the rabbit--couldn't they see how upset Penelope was? Well, fine. I would just take it back. But as I reached for Bunny, the dark-haired boy who had grabbed the toy quickly tossed it to the boy wearing the Giants shirt. Lacey took Penelope's hand, walked over to a table, and sat down. Lacey was shaking her head and saying something under her breath. Why isn't she standing up to them? I wondered.
 
"Do you think stealing a little kid's rabbit is cool or something?" I asked the dark-haired guy.
 
In response, the blond boy held the toy out to me. My fingers were just closing around it when he snatched it away and took off. Penelope shrieked.
 
"Don't worry, I'll get it back," I called to Penelope. I ran after the guy.
 
He raced through the crowd, dodging left and right. So did I. People stepped out of his way, then out of mine. "Go get him, girl," some old lady yelled.
 
The boy took a sharp turn at the fountain. Closer still. I could hear his friends running after us.
 
This is so lame, I thought. I can't believe I'm doing this. Lacey's never going to speak to me again. At least Cameron and Dakota weren't around to see me chasing after Bunny--I would have been mortified. But I don't give up on something once I've started it. I hate to lose.
 
At the far side of the fountain I reached out--in one second that boy was dead meat. "Heads up!" he hollered, and tried to toss Bunny over the water to his friends. He missed.
 
Splash!
 
Bunny belly-flopped into the fountain. The four guys and I stared at it for a moment, floating facedown among the plastic lily pads. Then they all cracked up. Some other people standing around the fountain laughed with them. I was so mad that I couldn't even move. I saw a long arm reach in and fish Bunny out of the water.
 
I stared at the soggy rabbit, which was now Ty-D-Bol blue. Gross.
 
"Finders keepers, Damon," the dark-haired boy joked. "It's yours now."
 
I looked up--right into the eyes of Damon Ross.
 
My stomach flipped over.
 
Damon was possibly the cutest guy at school and my personal hero. He had recently rescued me from two jerks who were teasing me at my locker.
 
"I think you're going to have to get another rabbit," he said.
 
I could feel strands of my hair sticking to my face. My cheeks were hot and probably red. "It's not mine."
 
"Oh," was all he said as he wrung out the toy. I guessed he'd been sitting on the edge of the fountain, eating, because he picked up a napkin from beneath a plate of hamburger and gently blotted the rabbit.
 
Damon sure had a way of showing up in the middle of my uncoolest moments. The day he rescued me at my locker, he had thought he was standing up for Elizabeth. Did he think he was helping out my twin again?
 
He held the rabbit by its ears and handed it to me, smiling a little.
 
"Thanks. And just so you know, I'm Jessica," I said, "not Elizabeth."
 
"I figured," he replied, then sat down to finish his burger.
 
What did that mean? I wondered as I headed back to the food court to find Lacey.
 
For a moment I was afraid she had cleared out of there, not wanting to be seen with the kind of loser who would chase a rabbit through the mall. But I found her sitting at the table, Penelope across from her. The little girl held up her arms when she saw me with the rabbit. Her eyes got wider. "He's blue!"
 
"It's the newest shade for fall," I told her, sitting down.
 
Lacey smirked.
 
"Careful, Bunny is a little drippy," I added, handing the toy to Penelope. "He's been for a swim."
 
"I just saw those guys go by," Lacey said, her smirk becoming more of a smile. "The blond one looked wiped out. But you don't look tired at all."
 
"Spare me--I look awful," I replied, opening my purse to get out a mirror. "In case you're interested, Damon Ross rescued Bunny from the fountain."
 
"Damon? He's cool," Lacey said, "for a ninth-grader." I hoped he was cool enough to make up for the fact that I had just made an idiot out of myself. Lacey did that blinking thing again. "Do you like to run, Jessica?"
 
"Run?" Was this a trick question? "Uh, it's all right, I guess. I ran with my brother early this summer when things got boring."
 
"So why don't you join the cross-country team?" she suggested.
 
Join the track team? Did she have, like, a brain transplant while I was chasing the rabbit? Or was she making fun of me?
 
"I'm going to," she added.
 
"You are?" I blurted out. "At Sweet Valley Middle, that kind of sport is nerdy." As soon as I'd said it, I wished I hadn't. I had to learn to keep my mouth shut till I found out what was in at my new school.
 
Lacey gazed at me steadily. "I don't let anybody tell me what I should or shouldn't do."
 
That's what made Lacey so cool and even a little scary. She really didn't care what anybody else thought of her. I used to be more like that, but as much as I hated to admit it, I did care what Lacey thought of me. Was she starting to think I was less of a nerd? I could hardly believe we were sitting there, having a somewhat normal conversation.
 
I tapped my fingers on the table, thinking. Should I run track? Joining the team would give me a chance to know Lacey better. And then maybe I could hang with her cool friends instead of by myself at the mall. Joining the cross-country team would mean not trying out for the cheer squad--but maybe cheerleading wasn't cool at SVJH. I remembered Lacey saying something about cheerleading being lame one time. Forget it, then, I decided.
 
"Miss Scarlett tried to coach a girls' team last year," Lacey went on, "but everyone hates her, so not enough kids joined."
 
"Yeah?"
 
"Mrs. Krebs, the bio teacher, offered to do it this year. She's nice. She'll probably let anybody--like the off-season guy jocks--run with us."
 
This was sounding better and better.
 
"It would be cool if you went out for the team with me," Lacey added. She studied her nails. "Those girls I was talking to before--Cameron and Dakota," she said, seemingly out of the blue, "you know who they are?"
 
I shook my head.
 
"They used to be in Splendora."
 
My jaw dropped to the floor. "They did? Really?" I asked. Splendora was the most popular local band in Sweet Valley. Lots of kids said they were going to go national one day. "How do you know them?" I asked.
 
"I hang out with Splendora sometimes." She shrugged as if it were no big deal.
 
"Wow," I said, because it was a big deal. An enormous deal. Lacey was even cooler than I had ever realized.
 
"Wow," Penelope echoed, like she knew what we were talking about. I laughed. Lacey ignored her.
 
"Those two have broken off to form their own band," she added. "I think they re going to be sorry, but who knows?"
 
I was hoping Lacey would tell me more, like what the band members were like for real, but she didn't. She looked at me sideways. "Maybe you could meet the band sometime," she said. She shrugged again. "If you're interested. They rehearse every day around four. We could watch them after track practice one day."
 
"I'd love to," I said. I was trying not to sound too eager, but I couldn't really help it. How could Lacey act so cool all the time without even trying?
 
I'm going to meet Splendora--with Lacey! All I had to do was join cross-country. I was still amazed that Lacey was interested in the sport. I knew Lacey had a boyfriend in high school. Why didn't she want to spend time with him? Maybe she and Gel broke up, I thought, and she's looking for something to do. Well, once Lacey and I got to know each other better, she'd tell me things like that.
 
"So," I said, "when's sign-up?"