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something. Although it wouldn’t hurt you to miss lunch for once.” She left the room, then came back in. “I’ve got an appointment. We’re going to make the videotape for my television ads.” She paused. “Want to come along?”
    “No, thanks.” Tessa was always surprised how bad it made her feel to disappoint her mother, even though her mother had just been totally unfair.
    Anne waited. “You know it’s Carmen’s day off.”
    “Duh, yes .”
    “You’ll be fine here alone.”
    “I know.”
    “The taping might be fun.” The silence stretched. “Very well, then.” Anne went away.
    Grubbing through the junk on her desk, Tessa found her Discman, clapped the headphones on, and threw herself onto her bed.
    Tessa hated her mother for being so mean. She hated herself for hating her mother. She hated herself for becoming such a retard.
    Sometimes she consoled herself with a fantasy: she’d boot up one of her friend’s computers, click on to her mother’s Website, and send a letter to the world: The truth about Anne Madison, candidate for the State Legislature, Arlington and Medford Districts, Massachusetts.
    But her mother really wanted to win that campaign, and as much as she hated her mother,Tessa loved her, too. And winning that position might make her mother happy in a way she’d never been before.
    And then maybe her mother would let her have a cat. Cats weren’t as bad as dogs. Andrea’s Siamese had kittens, tiny chocolate creatures with eyes like huge blue jewels. But her mother didn’t want pets in the house—they were too much work. How could they be too much work when her mother had a housekeeper? Tessa had asked, but her mother had snapped, “Don’t get fresh with me, Tessa.”
    If she had a kitten, she’d treat it so gently. She’d give it lots of cream and salmon and scrambled eggs. She’d let it sleep in bed with her. When Tessa was an adult, she’d have lots of cats and let them all sleep in bed with her.
    When she was an adult, she’d have to have cats sleep in bed with her; she was too ugly ever to get a man.
    Although Chad had said hey to her when he saw her at the orientation for Camp Moxie on Friday. Chad’s parents were as wealthy as Tessa’s, and totally as bizarre.
    Tessa’s stomach rumbled. She was hungry again. She was always hungry. It was so easy, her mother said, to gain weight, weight crept up on women like a kind of fog, you didn’t even see it coming and the next thing you knew, it had glommed onto your body, lying just beneath your skin like slabs of yellow cheese. Her mother was already worried about how fat Tessa’s thighs were.
    For breakfast, Anne had green tea, a small glass of orange juice, and one Ry-Krisp cracker. She let Tessa have a bowl of Cheerios, but only a small one, and watched her eat it with a look of disgust on her face, as if Tessa were spooning mud into her mouth. Since her father had left, her mother was even more vigilant about the food she allowed in the house.
    Tessa curled on her bed, staring at the wall. She didn’t really mind being grounded. She was too tired, really, to go anywhere. And here in her bed was really the best place. She could close her eyes and be in a world of her own.

    Kelly slammed her Subaru to a shuddering halt, threw herself from the car, and raced up the stairs to her apartment on the second floor of the handsome stone building on Memorial Drive.
    Donna was waiting in the hall, leaning against Kelly’s door, reading. “You’re late,”Donna said.
    “Sorry. I’ll hurry.” Kelly unzipped her dress as she walked into her bedroom, dropped it on the floor, yanked on a severely cut blue linen sheath, fastened her grandmother’s pearls around her neck, stabbed pearl studs into her ears, dabbed her skin with perfume, and grabbed her purse. “Ta-da,” she sang out, returning to the living room. “Ready.”
    Donna shook her head. “A miracle.” She squinted her eyes. “But maybe your hair …”
    “It’s