Dreaming of Cheers (Standing Up to Life Book 3)

Chapter 3:

THE NEXT MORNING when Amy and I arrived at school I was feeling fairly self-conscious. I knew that footed pajamas are definitely something for little kids... but I thought I looked way more like I was five today wearing this outfit, than I did the day before! Since even Amy looked like she was about eight, I didn't stand a chance! As we walked inside the school, I was really glad to see another girl on the squad, Amanda, looked at least as young as I did. She and I actually spent a couple moments giggling about it in the hallway before Amy and I went inside.

As I sat down in first hour though, the day became fairly normal. Before I knew it, I was in choir and having a great time singing a piece for our Christmas concert. I knew we were pretty close to that concert already... but it still seemed like so long away! After we had sang through the new song Ms. Beecher told us we could sit and chat for the rest of the class.

Kristina, Amy, and I were chatting about a bunch of different things for a bit before she said, "Oh! Hold on a second – I have something for you Tiffany!"

She ran over to her bag and came back with a baby doll dressed in a cute dress and said, "Here, this is for you!" She said that with an evil little gleam in her eyes.

"Uh..."

"Ooh! Cute!" Amy exclaimed.

"You want me to look like a kindergartner?" I asked Kristina.

"Yep!" she said cutely.

I shook my head. What else could I do? I mean my friends were conspiring against me!

"You do remember I'm a captain, right?" I told her with mock-menace in my face.

"So?" She sneered.

I started laughing, "I can't win, can I?"

"No," she told me.

A few minutes later, just before the bell rang, she told me, "Actually Tiffany I mainly brought Cali," her doll, "as a joke against your sub. She's still going to be there today – it's so funny that she decided you must have been someone's little sister!"

"That actually makes me feel better. Thanks for telling me that," I told her. She grinned and gave me a hug just as the bell rang.

When I came into fourth hour with the doll, Nikki and Ashley just laughed non-stop. Mr. Martin, the algebra teacher, finally asked me towards the end of that hour, "Tiffany, why did you bring a doll to school today?"

"Well... actually I didn't bring it. Kristina Jones did." I told him. He still looked just as curious and clueless about everything so I decided to tell him the story. He was mostly cool about these kinds of things after all. "Yesterday I was wearing those footed pajamas, right?" I asked him.

"Yeah, I remember that," he told me.

"Well, when I went to English yesterday Ms. Damien was gone so we had a sub. Before class started, she asked me, 'who's your big sister?' or something like that. She thought I was a little five-year-old that had tagged along to school with her sister on Pajama Day." I told him.

He looked somewhat incredulous about it before starting to laugh. "That's pretty funny. I could see that happening on any other day, I guess. She should have known better on Pajama Day though," he told me.

"Yeah, she should have. Anyway, we'd already had these outfits picked out for the dance squad for today anyway, but since everyone decided to put pigtails in their hair, they all thought I'd look just as young today."

"Actually, I think you look younger," he teased me.

"Not fair! Teachers aren't allowed to pick on students!" I told him.