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ski club would be fun and a good way to meet boys. Her mother thought Latin sounded too brainy and she should join something more sociable, in order to make friends. They were both aware that Victoria had had very few friends in middle school. But in high school she could meet people, and by junior year she'd be driving and wouldn't need them to chauffeur her at all. They could hardly wait, and Victoria liked the idea too. She didn't want her father making sarcastic remarks about her to her friends, as he did whenever he gave them a ride somewhere, even if he thought his comments were funny. She never did.
    She signed up for the three clubs that interested her the next day, but none of the sports teams. She decided to fulfill her athletic requirement with just Phys Ed, although she could have taken ballet too, which would have been her worst nightmare come true, leaping across the gym in a leotard and a tutu. She shuddered at the thought when the assistant PE teacher suggested it to her.
    It took her a while, but in time Victoria made friends. She dropped out of the film club eventually because she didn't like the movies they picked to watch. She went on one of the ski club trips to Bear Valley, but the kids that went were stuck-up and never talked to her. She signed up for the travel club instead. And she loved the Latin club, although it was all girls, and she took Latin all of freshman year. She met people, but it wasn't easy making friends in high school either. A lot of the girls seemed to be in airtight little groups and looked like beauty queens, and that wasn't her style. The academic girls were as shy as she was and hard to meet. Connie proved to be a good friend for two years until she got a scholarship to Duke, and left when she graduated. But by then, Victoria was comfortable at the school. She heard from Jake at Cait once in a while too, but they never got together again. They always said they would and never did.
    She had her first date during sophomore year when a boy from her Spanish class invited her to the junior prom, which was a big deal. Connie said he was a great guy, and he was until he got drunk in the bathroom with some other boys and got kicked out of the prom, and she had to call her father for a ride home.
    She got her first car the summer before junior year, and had taken driver's ed the year before, and had her learner's permit so she was all set. From then on, she drove herself to school. It was an old Honda her father had bought for her, and she was excited about it.
    It wasn't something she talked about to anyone, but by junior year her body had gotten bigger than it was before. She had gained ten pounds over the summer. She had a summer job at an ice cream store, and ate ice cream on all her breaks. Her mother was upset about it and said it was the wrong job for her. It was too much temptation for Victoria, as proved by the weight she gained.
    "You look more like your great-grandmother every day" was all her father said, but it made the point. She brought home ice cream cakes shaped like clowns for Gracie every day. She loved them and no matter how many she ate, she never gained a pound. She was nine by then, and Victoria was sixteen.
    But the main benefit of her summer job was that she earned enough money for a trip to New York with the travel club during Christmas break, and it changed her life. She had never been to such an exciting city and liked it much better than L.A. They stayed at a Marriott hotel near Times Square, and they walked for miles. They went to the theater, opera, and ballet, rode the subway, went to the top of the Empire State Building, visited the Metropolitan Museum, the Museum of Modern Art, and the United Nations, and Victoria had never had so much fun in her life. They even had a snowstorm while she was there, and when she got back to L.A., she was dazed. New York was the best place she'd ever been, and she wanted to live there one day. She said she might even go to