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actual battle. As always, Lily looked the most original. She wore a slouchy knit beanie that went halfway down her back and breezy, beachy, striped pants rolled up to the knee.
    â€œYou look
muy bonita
,” Eddie said to her. “Which in my language means—”
    â€œI know what it means.” Lily smiled at him. “I’ve been taking Spanish since sixth grade. I can even sing a song in Spanish.”
    She burst into a little chorus of “La Bamba,” and Eddie joined in. If you ask me, this was turning into a major flirt fest.
    The last one out was my sister, Charlie, whose smile was so big I thought her face was going to crack. She was wearing a totally glammed-up version of a tennis outfit with platform tennis shoes, white shorts, and a white tube top. She carried her racket in one hand and a wide-brimmed straw hat in the other. It was clear that whoever put that outfit together had never touched a tennis racket in her life. I could tell Lauren had picked out those clothes. After a couple of serves, a tube top like that would be around your ankles, particularly if you were small on the boob front, like Charlie.
    Okay, I admit it. Mine are a little bigger. I’m not bragging, just saying that things like that are bound to happen when you weigh twenty pounds more than your twin.
    â€œYou guys all look great,” Alicia, who is the sweetest person in the world, said when they were all lined up in front of us. “Can we see the pictures?”
    â€œWe won’t have them until tomorrow.” Jillian could barely get the words out because she was so occupied trying to adjust one of her false eyelashes that seemed to be crawling like a caterpillar down the side of her face.
    â€œTyler is photoshopping them,” Brooke went on. “Just to clean up any little imperfections. That’s what they do with all cover girls, you know.”
    â€œThey don’t always do that,” Lily commented, and she should know because she’s actually been a model for the Gap catalog.
    â€œYou are so wrong, Lily,” Jillian responded in a huffy voice. “I read that in
Popstar Daily
so I know it’s true.”
    Jillian is obsessed with reality television stars. When the rest of us are doing algebra problems, she’s poring over celebrity gossip magazines. Just the other day, I heard her telling Charlie that gossip magazines are a lot more relevant to her life than knowing the value of
x
—which is a stupid letter, anyway.
    â€œGirls, focus,” Lauren said. “The important thing is that Tyler said he thinks some of us have real model potential.” I noticed that she directed her remark to Ryan. “Just think, Ry. This could be the start of my career.”
    â€œI’m more interested in the start of dinner,” my always-starving brother answered. “Hey, Dad,” he bellowed, “how long before we eat?”
    â€œThe fire’s not hot enough yet,” he called back. “Why don’t you kids play some volleyball until the burgers are ready?”
    â€œOh, I just love beach volleyball,” Lauren said.
    Okay, I happen to know that she not only doesn’t
love
beach volleyball, she doesn’t even
like
it. She never ever plays when Ryan’s not there—she just lies there in the sun, rotating herself like a chicken on a spit. But everyone knows that the fastest way to my brother’s heart is either through food or sports . . . and since my dad was in charge of the burgers, Lauren picked sports.
    â€œI have an idea,” Lily said. “What if Eddie stays for dinner and volleyball? It could be all of us versus Ryan and Eddie. Girls against guys. That’d be fun.”
    I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. She was inviting Eddie right in front of Oscar, without even thinking about how that would make Oscar feel. I knew how he must have felt—left out. The SF2s are experts at making you feel that