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didn’t need any extra-special-wecial attention from me. Hy’s short black hair is chopped in complicated chunks and streaked with spicy shades of red: ginger, cinnamon, chili. Add that to a deconstructed Run-DMC T-shirt that’s been cropped and covered with sequins, an ankle-length patchwork denim skirt with a generous front slit, and knee-high lace-up jack boots, and Hy was clearly a beauty and fashion force to be reckoned with. One the Clueless Crew, who are identical from their plastic mini-butterfly clips down to their platform Mary Janes, transparently wanted to tap into.
     
    "You’d better sit with us, since you don’t know like, the safe areas of the cafeteria," urged Bridget.
     
    "Whatsafe areas ?" asked Hy. An obvious question for the uninitiated.
     
    While we got on line for our food (she eats—good sign), I explained Pineville High’s social zoning laws and their origins:
     
    The Upper Crusters are at long tables by the windows because, well, it’s the best spot in the cafeteria and why the hell shouldn’t they be there? They’re surrounded on all sides by the Hangers-On, the popular juniors who will sit at the U.C. table when they rule the school as seniors. Jocks (separated by sport) sit front and center, symbolic of their importance in the minds of 99.9 percent of the student body, flanked by Groupies (the Jocks’ girlfriends or, more often, those who are dying to be). Dregs are way in the back by the emergency exit, so they can sneak out to get high. 404s (an ironic twist on the techie put-down for idiot users, derived from the Web error message "404 Not Found") are in the back on the opposite side, hovered over their laptops, hoping to avoid humiliation at the hands of the Jocks or the occasional mean-spirited Upper Cruster. IQs sit up front and close to the doors so they can make it to their next class on time. Over by the vending machines, Double As (ebony) and Wiggaz (ivory) live together in hip-hop harmony, the former outnumbered by the latter five to one. (Which isn’t bad, considering whites outnumber blacks thirty to one in the PHS population at large. Latino and Asian communities consist of a token representative or two in each grade. "Hey, Alice," I said to Hy, "welcome to Wonderbreadland.") Finally, because most of their counterparts leave PHS before lunch to take beauty culture or mechanics classes at the vocational school, Hoochies and Hicks are in small clusters throughout the cafeteria.
     
    "These are just the main categories," I said. "There are too many subdivisions to mention."
     
    "Where do you sit?"
     
    "We’re on the boundary between the Hangers-On and the IQs. It’s decent real estate for sophomores."
     
    "So what happens to border-jumpers?" Hy asked. Again, a good question.
     
    "Well, the IQs wouldn’t care. But if you had the nerve to take a Hangers-On table, you’d be pelted with the more aerodynamic components of the vegetable medley."
     
    "That would be ironic," she said.
     
    "What?"
     
    "Girl, I left the city to get away from real gangs," she said. "Then I come to New Jersey and get caught up in a turf war."
     
    I thought that was pretty funny.
     
    That was the high point of lunch. I had wanted to ask Hy if she was serious about the gangs, but when we got back to the table, the Clueless Crew hounded her with questions for the next sixteen minutes and I couldn’t get a word in edgewise. Here’s the gist:
     
    Q.Where did you get your T-shirt?(A. A friend attending the Fashion Institute of Technology made it for her.)
     
    Q.Where did you get your skirt?(A. At a vintage clothing store in the Village—that’sGreenwichVillage to you and me.)
     
    Q.Where did you get your boots?(A. From "the world’s best" Salvation Army.)
     
    By the end of the interrogation, Bridget, Manda, and Sara were swearing off the Ocean County Mall.
     
    Oh. There was one crucial non-wardrobe-related question:
     
    Q.Do you have a boyfriend?
     
    I must admit that I too breathed