My light, goofy friendship with Ben has transformed into an odd, uncomfortable acquaintance. I don’t blame him for not knowing how to act. I’m the one who keeps acting like he’s some highly contagious leper. Every day, if I haven’t received my wish yet, I go out of my way to avoid him. Sometimes he’ll be heading my way down the hall, and I’ll abruptly veer out a side door.

Maybe it’s stupid and I won’t be able to avoid kissing him, but I keep doing it anyway.

He’d have to be a complete idiot not to notice. On top of all that, I keep yammering on and on about Ken, hoping somehow that’s going to be enough to keep him at arm’s length. I’m still thinking it’s possible Ben will use his own common sense and choose not to kiss me. So if he remembers I have a boyfriend, well, that’s a good thing.

My mom is still out of town, and she’ll be away until Friday. We haven’t talked since our blowout.

My back hurts all of the time because of my huge chest, the gumballs are everywhere, the pony is getting crankier every day, and I’m still talking in Italian.

I’m absolutely dying for a long, hot shower to relax, but for the last couple days I’ve had to settle for a sponge bath and washing my hair in the sink, because there’s no way I want to find out what happens if I submerge my legs for more than two-point-five seconds.

By the time I’m walking up the stairs to my room, I’m muttering Italian curses under my breath.

When I walk into my room, Ann looks suspiciously happy, the polar opposite of my mood. She’s spinning around and around in my rolly computer chair, the very chair I once foisted between us to keep her away from me on the day she appeared.

Too bad I didn’t succeed.

I glare at her and throw myself onto my bed, resting my cheek against the cool lime-and-orange-plaid quilt.

If I can’t be happy, she shouldn’t be either.

She stops spinning and nearly falls out of the chair. Her eyes look sort of loopy and crossed, so I know she’s dizzy and hasn’t noticed my scowl.

“What’s got you all hyped up?” I say, not even attempting to cover my hostility.

“I’m going to a party!” she says, her voice so chipper it’s practically filled with rainbows and ponies. If, you know, that were possible.

I want to throw things at her. Rocks, maybe.

I sit up on my elbows and give her a closer look. “Who invited you to a party?”

“I don’t know! Some girl named Janae. I wrote down the address,” she says, waving it around in the air.

I leap off the bed like a puma on attack and snatch the paper out of her hand.

Janae’s house.

Unbelievable.

“Where did you get this?”

“From your notebook,” she says, pointing to where she ripped out the sheet of paper.

“Not the paper! The address!”

“From Janae. Duh.”

“Ann!” I screech, totally exasperated. “How do you know Janae?”

“I don’t.”

My eyes flare and I want to throttle Ann. Instead I take a deep, calming breath, unclenching my fists.

“Start at the beginning. How do you know about this party and why did she give you her address?”

Ann shrugs and gives me a look like, Sheesh, why are you so annoyed? “She called. A half hour ago.”

Ann points across the room to where my cell phone is still sitting on my nightstand, where I put it last night to charge and forgot it when I went to school.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I say, rushing over to my phone. I flip it open and find the call log. Sure enough, Ann answered a call thirty-six minutes ago. I punch the call button and listen as it rings.

“Hello?”

I blink and yank the phone away and slap it shut.

That was definitely Janae.

“That was rude!” Ann says. “She’s very nice.”

“Janae is not nice. Far from it.”

“She said it wouldn’t be a party without me.”

I’m gripping the phone so tightly in my hand that it makes my fingers hurt. “Did she know it was you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Did you say, ‘I’m not Kayla,’ or maybe, ‘Hello, this is Ann’?”

Ann blinks a few times and tips her head to the side as she stares up at the ceiling. “I guess not.”

“So now Janae thinks I’m coming to her party?”

Ann twists a frizzy strand of hair around her finger. “Yeah. I suppose. But I can still go, right?”

“No, you cannot go!”

Ann pouts and crosses her arms. “You sure are grumpy a lot. What’d I ever do to you?”

I so don’t have time for this.

“Don’t you get it? These stupid wishes are destroying my life!”

The playful pout turns into a real one. “Everything is always about you.”

I fall onto my bed, exasperated. “What do you want me to say, Ann? Everything is a wreck.”

Ann spins the chair toward the wall. “I heard that lady at the bakery, you know.”

“What?”

“I’m not stupid. I have a few days left, tops. So whether you like it or not, I’m going to this party.”

There’s a strange pressure inside me, like an elephant is perched on my chest. I don’t know if I feel guilty about Ann or panicked about my life, but it’s like the whole world is sitting on me.

“Why would Janae invite me to a party?” I ask, though I don’t expect Ann to have the answers.

“I don’t know. Maybe she secretly wishes you two were best friends.”

I snort and give her a skeptical look, but the look melts away as Ann’s statement rings in my ears. Realization dawns, slow and clear.

“She didn’t,” I say quietly. “I did.”

I stare at the ceiling in my bedroom, trying to find shapes in the popcorn texture. It’s so quiet except for the rain pounding outside. “Not to be best friends. But that she’d invite me to her birthdays and pool parties.”

I sigh, long and drawn out. At least it’s another wish down, right? I pinch the bridge of my nose and close my eyes, trying to figure out what I should do next.

“If I rent movies and we make sundaes and stuff, will you skip the party and hang with me?”

“No,” Ann says. “I’m not wasting any more time sitting inside these four walls. I’m going insane.”

Fair enough, I think, but I don’t say it aloud. I feel myself slowly resigning to the idea of showing up at Janae’s, being completely humiliated, and going home. It’s not like my life can get any worse, and at least Ann has tried to be a good sport.

Can I really deny her any more? And would it matter if I did? It’s not like I can wrestle her to the ground and tie her up and put her in the closet. She’s probably got the address memorized and she’ll go whether or not I go with her. If I accompany her, at least I can do damage control.

“Whatever. If we’re back by ten, when Chase gets home, my mom will never know the difference.”

Ann’s whole face transforms into a glowing smile, and despite the nagging worries in the pit of my stomach, I find myself unable to resist smiling back at her.

She better be worth it.

Because if my instincts prove correct, tonight will be an utter disaster.