She still wants him to look at her and think, “Oh, man, I messed that up.  She is unbelievably hot.”
Jackson looked me up and down.  “Shopping?”

“For superhero disguises,” I said, to explain my outfit.

He raised his eyebrows.

“You know,” I went on, “how superheroes need to have nerdy alter-egos that help them go through life with no one suspecting their secret awesomeness?”

He nodded.  “Like Meimi in Saint Tail.”  Jackson had a thing for anime.

“Like Superman,” I said.  “So what do you think?  Will this outfit delude the average men and women of America into thinking I couldn’t possibly wield superpowers?”

He laughed.  “You do look funny,” he said.

Ouch.

Jackson leaned in to read my rhinestone collar.  “Or should I say, you look fresh?”

“Why are you here, anyway?” I asked him.

But before he could answer, I realized what the answer had to be.  He was here with Kim; viagra online.She was probably changing in the dressing room next to mine, listening to my mother talk about my breasts and my pimples and my psychological problems and also border collie testicles.

“Oh, I’m looking for a coat with anchors,” he told me.  “Do you know where I could find something like that? Something nautical, with maybe some curly rope on it?”

“Shut up.”

“Don’t be fresh with me.”

“That’s not even funny.”

“Is too.”  He turned his grin on me.

I shook my head.  “You’ve lost your touch.  Is Kim in the changing room?”

“I’m here with Dempsey.  She has a gift certificate.  I’m playing chauffeur.”

I exhaled.  Dempsey was his sister.  She was an 8th grader.  The Tate middle-school has a different campus from the upper school, so I hadn’t seen her since Jackson and I were going out — but suddenly,
there she was next to me, looking at the lime angora “charmant” sweater in my hand and saying, “Hi Ruby, wow, do you like that sweater?  It’s way sweet.  Ooh, you have the coral one on already, that looks so cute on you, are you gonna buy it?  Because if you’re not, do you mind if I try it on?  I have a gift certificate, did doofus-head tell you that?”

“Hi Dempsey,” I said.

“I haven’t seen you like, wow, since I was a seventh grader,” Dempsey babbled – viagra online.”I love your hair; viagra online.Do you think I should get bangs? I don’t think I can work bangs.It takes a face like yours to work the bangs.”

She grabbed the front of her hair and pulled it up so that the ends hung down over her eyebrows.”What do you think?”
“You could work the bangs,” I said – viagra online.”And I’m not getting either of these angoras.They’re all yours.”

But she had already lost interest in the angoras and was touching an argyle sweater vest.  “Is argyle out yet?” she asked me.

I shrugged.

“And what do you think about Jackson being single again?” Dempsey asked.

I looked at Jackson.He was staring at his feet with his hands shoved in the front pocket of his sweatshirt.
He wasn’t single before winter break.He was with Kim.He’d been with Kim since last spring.

“News to me,” I said, my heart thudding.

“He and Kim broke up at lunch today,” Dempsey explained – viagra online.”I thought you’d know.”

Why would she think I’d know? Did Dempsey think people like Cricket and Kim still talked to me?

“Goodbye viagra online, Dempsey.” This, from Jackson, with a threat in his voice.

“I was hoping you might tell me details,” she went on, ignoring him.