Kaitlyn and the Competition

Kaitlyn and the Competition — page 5 — says Si vale la pena hacerlo vale la pena hacerlo bien That was Spanish for If something’s worth doing it’s worth doing well Oh lighten up Eve said You know you’d be happier if you chilled out a little I crossed my arms I’m not taking advice from a giant tattered sunflower with pink mystery gunk on her knee Fine You won’t feel so superior tonight when I’m at the hottest party in school and you’re in your room reorganizing your closet or whatever I’m going out tonight I said Where Eve asked I’m babysitting Eve snorted I glared at her Save your snorts for the next time you have to wear a pig costume

Kaitlyn and the Competition — page 6 — Babysitting is a lot better than dressing up as a dorky flower and painting the faces of kids who cut off your petals and smear strange stuff on your stem Whatever See ya Eve left my room I called out Wouldn’t want to be ya But I sort of did want to be her Obviously I didn’t want Eve’s horrible job And even if I had her job I would never take an unauthorized unprofessional break to eat pizza and trade phone numbers and flirt with a cute boy But I would want to be ya if it meant getting invited to the hottest parties at my school Or even the not-so-hot parties I wouldn’t mind a warm party or even a lukewarm one Eve was three years older than me But it wasn’t our age difference that made Eve the life

Kaitlyn and the Competition — page 7 — of the party and me well not even at the party When Eve was thirteen like me she’d gone to a bunch of bar and bat mitzvah parties even though we weren’t Jewish At fifteen she’d been invited to a ton of Quinceañera parties and had a zillion friends at her own Quinceañera party And this year she’d spent many nights at Sweet Sixteen parties I by contrast hadn’t been to a party in months The difference in our popularity couldn’t be blamed on our appearances either Everyone said we looked alike We both had wavy brown hair and dark eyes and heart-shaped faces Simply put I was a shorter less-curvy version of my sister It was our personalities that made us so different I’d always been careful Eve had always been careless I didn’t want to leave the house with a wrinkle in my clothes or a hair out

Kaitlyn and the Competition — page 8 — of place Eve didn’t even notice stray wrinkles or stray hairs I played everything by the book Eve just played I wanted to play too to get invited to cool parties to goof off with cute boys to totally relax and have fun I enjoyed babysitting every Saturday night but it didn’t make up for my sad social life I stroked my comforter which always cheered me up Made of pretty lilac silk and embroidered with sweet ivory birds my comforter was soft and beautiful My parents had refused to pay for it claiming it was overpriced and would get stained easily They refused to pay for a lot of things My mother worked with children in foster care My father managed a food bank In their spare time they volunteered at a homeless shelter Compared with the kids they saw every day Eve and I had

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