Lola McAffrey's Great Disappearing Act

Sour Little Lollipop

My legs were cramping when Cori found me. I had also had a half-eaten plate of noodles and some root beer dumped on me. And then there were the tweens shooting straw wrappers at my butt. All I could muster for Cori was a grumbling, "Help me up."

"Have you been here the whole time?" Her eyes were wide. And if I wasn't mistaken, a bit of color was spreading over Cori's cheeks. She hadn't wanted me to see her with Tolliver.

"Where else would I go? We have to look for your sister and get out of here." I flicked a stray noodle off of my sleeve.

"So you..."

"Saw you drooling over Tolliver? Sure did." I started walking toward the nearest sunglasses kiosk, hoping Cori was following behind me.

"Oh God," she moaned. I picked up a sweet pair of silver framed sunglasses and tried them on. "Oh no."

"What's the big deal? You've got a crush." I traded the silver in for a sleek turquoise. "Happens to everyone at some point."

"But, it's not like that. Not really."

I took off the blue ones and turned around. "Is this why you were being weird?"

"I wasn't being weird." Cori crossed her arms. I was touching a nerve. "And I don't have a crush on Brent."

"That's not what it looked like to me."

"Then you're blind!" Cori stormed away. Corianna Charles, the politest person in the world, screamed at me and stormed away. This was beginning to become a bad habit with this girl.

I chased after her. When I caught up to her, I knew that what she needed was not me picking at her about this. Clearly her brain was being scrambled by love, and I couldn't access good old Cori again until the static cleared.

I walked next to her, staying silent. I scanned the crowds for her sister, and finally I spotted her near the entrance. As soon as she spotted us, she started yelling, "Don't you babies wear watches?" I looked at the time. It was nearly eight. I hadn't checked my phone all afternoon or evening. I pulled it out of my pocket and sure enough, there were a few texts from Aunt Liv wondering why I had been gone so long. I shot off a quick text telling her I was heading home.

"You sour little Lollipop," Babs spat at me as I got closer.

"What the hell did I do?"

And then I saw it—Cori fell into Babs' warm embrace. She wasn't crying, but she did seem more upset than I would have imagined her being considering something like a routine crush.

"You know, you can really be a bitch sometimes." Babs nearly ran into the automatic door before it had the chance to part for her. She turned around and stared at me. "Find your own ride home." They disappeared into the dark parking lot. I didn't run after them—Cori didn't want me around. I texted Aunt Liv to see if she could come and pick me up. She agreed, so I sat on the bench near the door and waited. I felt awful that Cori was in such a state, but why was it only me that seemed to set her off all the time? I couldn't figure it out. Barbara was her worst enemy for so long—why was she running to her now instead of her best friend?

*

Aunt Liv picked me up, but she was intuitive enough to know that something bad happened, and I wasn't in the mood to talk about it. She turned up the radio and started to sing along. It soothed my nerves just a little, so that by the time we got back to her apartment, I forgot I hadn't spilled my guts just yet. When we stepped inside the apartment, Liv pounced.

"Are you going to tell me why I had to pick you up?" I held up my bag of undies, but that didn't work. "You know what I mean." She crossed her arms just like Mom. It was scary.

I sighed, sitting on the edge of the couch. "Cori went nuts again. I don't know what's up with her."

Aunt Liv sat down next to me. "What do you mean she went nuts? What happened?"

"She just wanted sushi. I had to hide because the food court was crawling with high school kids—from both schools. I was stuck crouching behind the trash while she enjoyed her California rolls with a boy from our school."

"The one she could possibly be in love with?" Her eyebrow raised. She was easily going to make me spill my guts, but as long as we stayed on the topic of Cori, I was in the clear.

"I think so. I teased her about it." Aunt Liv nodded like it was the key to all the answers. "Just mild teasing, I promise. I was just asking her why she didn't tell me about it. That's all, I swear."

"What I'm hearing is that Cori's trying to keep this from you. Do you like the boy?"

"Tolliver? Uh, that's a hard no." I fiddled with the handle of my bag. Just a few hours ago, getting this underwear had been the biggest thing in my entire life. Now, it wasn't even funny anymore. "I guess the thing that bothers me the most is that she ran into her sister's arms. They don't really get along, but she wanted her over me."

"The bond of sisters is a strong thing."

"Yeah," I mumbled. "I wouldn't know about that."

Aunt Liv sat down next to me. "Trust me, you do. You and Cori have a bond that won't break. It's just bending an awful lot right now. Your mom and I went through this. We got over our differences."

"Okay." I didn't know what else to say. Cori wasn't my real sister. She didn't have to keep bending. She could break it at any time. And that's exactly what I was worried about it.