Even after Dad moved out, Adrian kept doing the spell for years. She said it worked on keeping all sorts of bad things away, and I admit I did it periodically for insurance that he wouldn't come back.

You would think the courts wouldn't have given my father joint custody of us, but they did. So we're all just glad he lives far away and never visits. Once in a while he calls, mostly to complain how my mother has ruined his life, and how he can't pay child support, but we can live with that.

If I came into any money before I turned eighteen though, could he get a hold of it?

This caused me actual anxiety until I realized my father wasn't likely to even call before I turned eighteen let alone find out my financial status, so I had nothing to worry about. I let myself return to the daydream of being discovered, of hearing myself on the radio, of Mr. Metzerol just once nodding proudly and telling me my potential was officially shaped.

In real life, Mr. Metzerol continued to prod and poke me through my voice lessons. He told me that Molly and Polly still refused to sing solo. He said this like I could change their minds. Right. I couldn't even get them to agree to come to the movies with a few people from school, and believe me, I tried.

Samantha and I invited Aubrie, Rachel, and half the football team—including Joe—to go to the movies with us on Friday. Molly and Polly wouldn't come though, because in English class Polly heard Joe say he was going bowling. Yes, bowling. I was trying to play Cupid and the boy would rather flatten a bunch of bowling pins.

Mike and Naomi, of course, showed up. This hardly bothered me though, because while we stood in line to buy tickets, Tanner text messaged me twice from work. He complained that the weekends were the busiest time for restaurants and tried to entice me to stop in by telling me the specials. The lobster is fresh, he wrote. Like I needed lobster to persuade me to see him. If I hadn't been stuck in line, he could have lured me in with dry toast and pretzels.

I must have been smiling a lot because while I texted him back, a couple of the guys commented on what a good mood I was in.

"It's the new boyfriend," Rachel told them. "Chelsea's seeing a college man."

They both went "Ohhhh," like it explained everything.

"It's not that," I said. "It's just that life is a wonderful, precious gift so we should be happy."

Both of the guys laughed and one said, "Yeah, she's got it bad."

The other imitated my voice and said, "Life is a precious gift. Well, my life, anyway. Your life ain't worth squat because you ain't got my boyfriend."

And they laughed some more. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Mike. He wasn't laughing. In fact he glared over at us, but I didn't care.

On Saturday and Sunday I doubled my singing practice, but I still couldn't get notes to properly come out of my forehead. I followed Mr. Metzerol's instructions. I went around for an hour doing diaphragm exercises and practicing scales. Once when I got to the point where I sang, "Mi-mi-mi-mimi-mi-mi-ii" Adrian strolled by and shook her head. "Isn't that the truth?"

Instead of getting Adrian in trouble for this kind of commentary, Mom bent over backward to be nice to her. On Sunday when Adrian skipped out on helping with the dinner dishes and disappeared into her room—an impenetrable fortress of screeching guitar music—instead of calling her to come out and help, Mom just did Adrian's j ob for her.

"She's having a hard time right now," Mom told me as she cleared off the table. "We can be sensitive about that."

"No one was sensitive to me when Mike dumped me."

"But you've dated lots of boys," Mom said. "We knew you'd find someone else quickly. And you have. Don't you have a date tomorrow?"

Well yes, but there had still been several weeks that I had sworn off men altogether and no one had done the dishes for me.

"Adrian dumped Rick, not the other way around," I said. "I don't see why she's so upset about it."

Mom poured uneaten green beans into a container and put them on a shelf in the fridge, where we would undoubtedly ignore them until they went bad. "Why don't you try to talk to her about it?"

After I finished loading the dishwasher, I went up to Adrian's room. She was sprawled out on her bed painting her toenails black, intent on ignoring me. I walked over to her CD player, turned down the music so she could hear me, and in my most sensitive voice, I asked her how she was doing. Then I gave her the "There-are-other-fish-in-the sea" pep talk, followed by the "I'11-help-you-go-fishing" pep talk.

She looked at me in stony silence for a moment then said, "First of all, you don't understand anything about Rick. Second, you don't understand how I feel. You've never lost anyone you've cared about because you don't really care about guys. They're all just one more picture to make your my space look like you've got an online hot-guy fan club. Mike, by the way, was a total flake."

And Rick wasn't? This was a little like the Corn Flakes insulting the Wheaties.

"Third," Adrian said, "I wouldn't trust you where guys are concerned, anyway. You'd set me up with someone and then decide you wanted him yourself."

That stung, but I should have expected it. It was the one card Adrian pulled out any time she wanted to trump whatever I said and show me what a horrible person I was.

You see, there was this thing about a year ago. . . . No, it's been longer than that. It happened during the end of my sophomore year; it just seems more recent because the memory hasn't faded.

When had Adrian started to like Travis Woods? I couldn't remember. Sometime in elementary school. She used to watch out our living room window for him every morning so we could time our walk to school with his. I thought it was cute, sweet, even if I didn't know what she saw in him. To me, Travis was just another slightly annoying boy in my class.

It wasn't like Adrian sat around pining for him when he didn't notice her. By seventh grade she had rotating crushes. But even then Travis was always in the background of her thoughts. He grew six inches and filled out into a good-looking guy, which goes to show you that Adrian has an eye for potential. I didn't blame her anymore for liking him. A lot of girls liked him.

When she came to see all of the freshman football games, I knew it wasn't to watch me cheer. Her eyes were glued on number 96. When we ran into each other in the neighborhood, she always complimented him on whatever pass, tackle, or interception he'd made. He thanked her with this quirky smile, like he didn't deserve the hero worship, but appreciated it anyway.

The next year when I put together that sophomore biology study group, I did it with Adrian in mind. Travis would be there. Granted, I knew nothing would happen between them. I mean, let's face it, no self-respecting sophomore guy hits on an eighth-grade girl, but we were laying the groundwork for her freshman year, just a few short months away.

During every study group, Adrian hung around, finding ways to linger near Travis. Often she lingered too long and said stupid things. I tried to coach her on the delicate balance between letting a guy know you're interested and trapping him on the couch with stories of your PE flag football adventures, but she wouldn't listen to me. Apparently I no longer knew what I was talking about. In her mind she had already made the jump to high school, and she didn't need me to navigate her course.

I could see Travis mentally labeling her as an annoyance, a groupie. He pulled away from her, cut her out of the conversation. The harder I tried to convince Adrian to ease up, the harder she tried to get his attention. She actually asked him about his summer schedule and then tried to invite herself to some of his activities.