Only the Lonely Read online

  I miss you! Did I say that already? You would love camp sooooo much, Maddie, I know you would. There are the coolest people here. Of course it is a dance camp of all kinds so there are not just ballet dancers but jazz and tap too. Everyone eats together and we do other stuff like swimming and arts and crafts and have camp nights where we sing songs and tell stories and roast marshmallows and sometimes go on skunk patrol which is this game we play and oh it is the best ever. Did I say I MISS YOU??? I do.

  I have made so many new friends too and I just know you would love them. This one girl Sasha is from Russia originally and she lives in New York City. She is so cool and I think we might see each other when I get back. Then there is this other girl Chelsea and she

  Aimee had only been gone a month and already she was making new best friends? Madison kept reading.

  is TOTALLY cool, she’s 15 and she has a tattoo! Can you believe that?

  So the funnest part of the whole camp for me is this one counselor named Josh. OK, he is to die! He is such a total hottie. He teaches modern dance and I think he looks like he should be a movie star or something. Seriously!

  Anyway, I decided for the last week of camp I am going to take his lessons as a dance elective and that way I get to see him like every single day. I know that he is like way, way older than me but I don’t even care he is so, so cute!!! Can you imagine going out with someone like that? I think about him all the time. Sometimes I wish I was 16 already. I am like in love with him. Is that possible???? Maybe something could happen, you never know.

  Well, I just wanted you to know that I miss you and all that. I will be back home a couple of days before school starts and I will call you like the very second I get home. Have you heard from Egg? I miss him too even if he is a total pain in the butt. I am so glad we are finally starting 7th grade. Now I can qualify to be in the Far Hills Junior High Dance Troupe and that is something I have wanted forever.

  How are your Mom and Dad and the snuggly puggly?

  Okay, I’m going now. I have Josh’s class this afternoon and I am so psyched!!! I want to look just right and act just right, right?

  Bye!!! I luv you more than ice cream!

  Luv, Aimee

  P.S. As soon as I get home I will call you I promise!

  While Madison couldn’t deal with the hives of change, Aimee was in a huge rush to change everything. How could she be crushing on a camp counselor? Madison hadn’t even given boys too much thought lately. They all seemed pretty stupid and dorky to her.

  “Camp must change the way you think about stuff,” Madison mused, and put the letter in her desk for safekeeping. She’d scan it into her Aimee file later.

  “Maaaaaadison,” Mom suddenly screeched from downstairs. “Are you still in the bathroom? Get moving, I need your help.”

  Mom always needed something. Ever since Dad moved out, Mom needed help cleaning, gardening, organizing, and all that. She needed help so she could get her own film work done. Whenever Mom went away on an overnight business trip she said, “I need your help holding down the fort, honey.” Whenever Mom was going to be gone for more than a few days, she said, “I need your help while I’m gone. I want you be good for the Gillespies,” or whomever Madison was staying with during that trip.

  The truth was, “help” was Madison’s real middle name.

  Madison Francesca Help Finn.

  “In a minute, Mom!” Madison screamed back. Of course, she should have said “In twenty-six minutes, Mom,” because that was how long it took Madison to actually get downstairs. But once they started cleaning up, the two of them accomplished a lot. She and Mom washed the kitchen floor and repotted some of Mom’s orchids.

  After the general house “summer cleaning” was done, Mom raised her eyebrows and in her best Wicked Witch from The Wizard of Oz voice, said, “Weeeell, my pretty … now it’s time to clean your ROOM!”

  Officially, she didn’t bug Madison about cleaning her bedroom until the laundry factor got out of control. Unfortunately, today was that day. Madison’s hamper was overflowing onto the floor and Mom had seen it. Mom had a mantra: Clean up your mess, say bye-bye to stress.

  “Madison, my pretty,” Mom whined like the Wicked Witch again. “Go pick up your room now before I lock you up in it forever!”

  Mom was such a weirdo sometimes. That’s where Madison got her weirdness—definitely.

  All joking aside, Madison was happy to straighten up the piles of clothes and books and magazine clippings in her bedroom. After an hour or two, she’d even finished a collage card for Aimee.

  Inspired by Aimee’s letter, she pasted a picture of some cute guy on the front of the card and drew a big arrow with the words Josh & Aimee 4-Ever. She even found a clipping of some ballerina that made it look better and more Aimee-like, too.

  Madison wondered what Josh really looked like. She assumed he must be cute, because the cute boys always liked Aimee best.

  Finally, Madison signed the card, “I love you more than chocolate shakes, Maddie.” They always signed letters with stuff that way. One day back in fourth grade, when they were on the swing set in Aimee’s backyard, they had decided to be best friends forever and to love each other forever more than absolutely anything else. That “anything” included ice cream and chocolate shakes, of course. Once Aimee had even sent Madison a card that said, “I luv you like a sister.” That meant a lot.

  Later on, Madison went online. She’d cleaned, she’d organized, and now she figured it was a good time to check out TweenBlurt.com again.

  Madison scanned the list of names currently logged onto the chat pages. A moderator (also known as a Shark) led off the list. (The sites were required to have some Web police person who tried to keep people from cursing or saying nasty things to the other members.)

  Shark

  TimTrav

  Cuteguy87

  Mystake

  Wuzupgrl

  PC_cake

  Bethiscool

  AuroraLiv

  Peacefish

  HelPer

  Bigwheels

  Bigwheels?

  Madison couldn’t believe it. Her “only the lonely” chat buddy was somewhere on the site—right now. That meant Madison could IM her. IM stood for Insta-message. It was like having a live conversation on the computer.

  : hey bigwheels remember me only the

  : lonely?

  In less than ten seconds, a message back popped up.

  : Hello!!! Oh WOW its u! 2K4W!! HIG?

  : 2K4W? HIG?

  : 2 kool 4 words! Howz It Going? LOL

  : ya LOL

  : I thought about what u said B4 about being alone I am alone a lot too

  : when does your school start????

  : next week and my friend is comin home

  : I cantbelieve u looked me up sooo KOOL

  : ;>) I WANNA BE KEYPALS OR WHATEVER oops sorry I hit capslock

  : ok em me it’s just bigwheels@email

  : madfinn@email too

  : hey BRB

  : Hello??

  : Are you AFK?

  BRB meant “be right back.”

  AFK meant “away from keyboard.”

  Madison had learned how to text from Egg and she loved online lingo.

  But Bigwheels stayed away for longer than BRB. She was AFK for at least five minutes!

  Madison was forced to log off again.

  That night, after Mom’s takeout sushi supper, Madison returned to her file.

  Only the Lonely

  Alone once again. Big surprise. This will be the file that gets filled the fastest, no doubt.

  Dad called again. He thinks he might be coming home a lot later than he said in his e-mail and he was checking to make sure we were on for dinner as soon as he got back. He doesn’t want me to feel left out but he sure sounded so far away. Then again,
everyone feels far away to me these days. I guess Dad’s new Internet start-up is going well, though. He has his fingers in a lot of different pies; that’s what Mom always says. He calls himself an entrepreneur (that is a huge word, I had to look it up to spell it!).

  Maybe Dad can help me find Bigwheels online?

  I couldn’t believe that Mom and I had sushi tonight. It’s a little more interesting than pizza even though I think raw fish is maybe the grossest thing on the entire planet except headcheese and pig’s feet, which I saw at the butcher’s once. I must admit that I did like the California roll sushi a teeny bit. It was just vegetables and rice and a little bit of seaweed, which wasn’t so bad. But forget the tuna roll!!! That wasn’t anything like tuna from the cans (Mom lied) so I spit it right out right away. Not even Phin the animal garbage disposal would eat that!

  If I don’t like tuna rolls, does that mean I am not an adventurous person? If I’m not an adventurous person, does that mean that I am going to be snubbed in junior high as some kind of loser? If I am branded as a loser, does that mean I’ll be alone forever?

  For Madison, all over-thoughts led back to one place: the lonely, looming doom of seventh grade. It was less than two weeks away.

  Madison wished she could see Fiona again.

  She needed a real friend real fast.

  They had swapped phone numbers, but who would be the first to call?

  Chapter 4

  THE NEXT DAY, WHILE Madison was taking a predictable walk around the block, something quite unpredictable happened.

  Phin took a sharp corner, got loose, and ran full speed ahead, tongue wagging along with his curlicue tail.

  Naturally, he was chasing a C-A-T.

  “Stop! Phin!” Madison shouted, almost catching up with him. That’s when she saw the car. Phin was on a one-way collision course with—

  “STOOOOP! Phiiiiiiiiiin!”

  Someone in the car must have seen Madison darting down the street like a cartoon character, hands waving in the air. The car screeched to a stop. Phin stopped too, collapsing at the curb.

  “Are you okay? Phinnie?” Madison rushed over. He sputtered and sneezed, stunned by all the activity. He was probably mad that he’d missed the cat, too. Madison wrapped her arms around his furry body and guided him onto the sidewalk. He licked her hand.

  The girl who had jumped out of the car rushed over, talking too fast. “Oh, Madison! Is he okay? Oh, my dad didn’t see him. He just came out of nowhere—”

  Madison looked up. “Fiona?”

  “Is your doggy okay?”

  “Phin’s fine.” Madison smiled.

  By now Mr. Waters had pulled his car to the side of the street so the rest of the traffic could pass.

  “Young lady, you have one lucky dog there,” Mr. Waters said, as he also got out of the car. “I turned my head for a moment and—whammo—we almost hit the little guy. You just can’t be too careful these days, can you? Hey there, little fella.”

  Phin wagged his tail, shaking his whole butt. He got excited around strangers. No one could have guessed that Phin just missed crashing into a car. He was loving all this attention.

  “Dad, this is Madison. We just met the other day, actually. We’re going to be in the same grade at Far Hills this fall.”

  Madison couldn’t believe she was sitting on the pavement, holding Phin and talking to Fiona and Mr. Waters. Now she definitely believed that some kind of cosmic forces were pulling her together with this new girl.

  And now no one had to worry about who called whom first.

  “Well, Miss Madison,” Mr. Waters continued, “how about we give you and that pooch a lift back home? He’s shaking like a leaf.”

  Fiona’s Dad helped lift the dog into the back seat of the car.

  Madison showed him the way home.

  It took thirty seconds.

  “What a pretty house,” Fiona said as the car tires crunched up the gravel driveway.

  “Thanks,” Madison shrugged from the backseat.

  “It was very nice meeting you, Miss Madison,” said Mr. Waters in a very low voice. He sounded like Darth Vader’s brother. “And you too, little doggy.”

  “Rowrooo!” Phin howled back.

  Fiona called out cheerily from the car window as they pulled away, “Maybe we can hang out later? I don’t really have any—well—it would be fun, do you think?”

  “Do I think?” Madison laughed and then quickly added, “Way too much. Wanna hang tomorrow maybe?”

  “Yeah! Come to my house around twelve,” Fiona cried. “You know where I live! Bye!”

  As the car made a turn onto the street, Mr. Waters honked his horn good-bye.

  Madison hardly ate any dinner that night. Suddenly life had gotten interesting, or at least she hoped so. It was better than TV or TweenBlurt.com, and Phin even deserved some of the credit.

  “What a good dog,” Madison cooed at him that night when she went to bed. “I am sorry you almost got run over, Phinnie, but thanks to you I get to hang out with Fiona again.”

  The next day, Madison knocked on her new friend’s door around lunchtime. She got there at twelve noon exactly because she didn’t want to risk being late, early, or in between. It was twelve on the dot.

  A boy answered the bell. He was at least a foot taller than Madison.

  “Hey!” he grunted. “You here for Fiona?”

  Madison guessed he was Fiona’s twin brother, Chet, since they looked exactly the same. The only difference was that he had fuzz on his face, and was a lot taller.

  Chet was just back from band camp and he was in a bad mood. He yelled upstairs for his sister and then flopped back onto the sofa in front of a giant TV set until Fiona came down the stairs a minute later.

  “How was camp?” Madison asked.

  “Camp is what it is,” Chet said in a monotone.

  Madison was certain this conversation was going nowhere. Thankfully, Fiona appeared.

  “Madison! I am so glad you came! Do you wanna go for a walk and maybe get an ice-cream cone or something?”

  They spent the next hour walking into the old town part of Far Hills, near the train station, past the ice cream Freeze Palace, of course; a discount shoe-repair place; a bakery; Wink’s Pet Store; and some other places. Madison gave Fiona a neighborhood tour.

  “I go to Wink’s when I’m feeling bummed out,” Madison admitted. “They have cool tropical fish and actually it’s where I got Phin when he was just a baby. He’s almost four now.”

  “I don’t have any pets,” said Fiona. “I’m so jealous of you. Phin is a total cutie. I love those snorty noses.”

  It was the beginning of a great week.

  On the second day, Madison and Fiona went to Freeze Palace for two scoops of Raspberry Bliss, a new homemade flavor.

  On the third day, they skipped the cones and bought an entire pint of Cherry Garcia at the store and sat on the Waterses’ porch to eat it spoonful by yummy spoonful right out of the container. These days, for Madison and Fiona, life was just a bowl of Cherry Garcia.

  Of course, day three wasn’t all cherry ice cream. That was the day when Madison saw a very different side of Chet. Waters. He threw a fit at his sister. “You’re such a mega-loser, Fi-moan-a!” he screeched. Madison thought at first he was a major crybaby, but then she realized that maybe he was just jealous because his sister had a new friend and he didn’t. Maybe he was only the lonely, too?

  Fiona was not as sympathetic. “My brother Chet is not lonely—he’s just a load. Ever since he got home from camp, all he can do is play Minecraft and pick on me. He won’t even let me online when he’s home.”

  “You go online?” asked Madison.

  “Of course! I totally love computers. I gave you my e-mail, right?”

  Madison made a mental note: send Fiona an e-mail soon. She didn’t want Fiona to think she’d lost her address.

  On the fourth day, Madison and Fiona went clog shopping, because clogs were comfortable and Madison loved th
em.

  On the fifth day, they sat on Fiona’s porch and made friendship bracelets from string.

  On the sixth day, they went for a long bike ride and Madison met Fiona’s mother.

  Mrs. Waters kept insisting how thrilled Madison must be to be starting those junior high school years.

  “Aren’t you just overjoyed?” Mrs. Waters gushed.

  Madison didn’t really know how to answer that. She didn’t want to admit that she was “run for the hills and don’t look back” terrified. She was afraid of getting lost on the first day of school. She was afraid of getting swallowed up by all the popular people and trapped in study hall with all the geeks.

  “Overjoyed.” Madison finally answered Mrs. Waters question with middle-of-the-road enthusiasm. “Totally OJ.”

  “OJ is short for overjoyed, Mom,” Fiona blurted.

  Mrs. Waters smiled.

  On the seventh and final day of the week, Madison Finn and Fiona Waters had their best afternoon ever together. That was the day when Madison spent the entire day hanging out in Fiona’s bedroom. She’d seen it before, of course, but not for such a long time.

  Madison was learning a few of Fiona’s secrets. That was the surest sign that their friendship was the real deal.

  Fiona was a collector, too. Up on a top shelf in Fiona’s room, Madison saw a far-out, enormous collection of ponies. They came in all shapes and sizes. Some were plush and others were plastic.

  “I’m really over the whole pony thing,” Fiona admitted. “Except … I’m sort of not. I still play with them sometimes. Not a lot, but …”

  “You must have like a thousand animals here,” Madison said.

  “Yeah, I know it’s babyish, right?” Fiona said. “I have one hundred and fourteen and Mom says I should put them in the attic …”

  “No, they’re cool. I like ponies a lot.”

  Fiona grinned. “Really?”

  Elsewhere in her room, Fiona had tacked up all sorts of postcards and pictures on a piece of flowered fabric that hung over her bed. Madison leaned in to read some of the cartoons. She pointed to one photo in the center. It showed Fiona and a redheaded girl. They were standing by the ocean.