Read an Excerpt

Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood

Simon Pulse

I planned my move back to Terrace with the same level
of care and detail employed by nations going to war. My parents, who never met a
self-help book they didn?t like, were huge fans of goal setting and
visualizing your perfect future. How would the universe send you your heart?s
desire if you weren?t clear about what you wanted? I forget which book my mom
had gotten it from, The Secret, or maybe Energy for Life, but she was big on writing down what you
wanted. Somehow this was supposed to help the universe bring it to you. The universe
apparently has short-term memory loss issues. It needs things written down. My mom
was always saying, ?The difference between wishing and goal setting is that
goal setters have a plan.? I wasn?t sure I bought into the whole theory,
but why take the chance? I thought about every facet of my plan very carefully. I
made lists and diagrams. I kept a three-ring binder with all of my notes separated
by color-coded tabs. On the first page of my binder I wrote my new mission statement in large
block letters so that the universe would be sure to see it, even if the universe had
bad eyesight:

Revenge is a tricky thing. I wanted Lauren to pay, but pay in a very
particular way. For example, it might be momentarily satisfying to do one of the
following:

1. Push Lauren out in
   front of a speeding dump truck

2. Slather her
   with BBQ sauce and set a herd of hungry pit bulls on
   her

3. Pour honey in her hair and then tie her
   down on an anthill

4. Dress her in a bathing
   suit made out of herring and then push her into shark-infested
   water

However, all of these
things would be over quickly. I?ll admit it doesn?t sound nice, but I
wanted her to suffer a bit longer. I wanted her to know what it felt like to have
everything taken away. Then there was the added factor that it would be difficult to
make a bathing suit out of tiny stinky fish, and I was pretty sure you could do some
heavy jail time for pushing people into shark-infested water or into the paths of
speeding dump trucks. I wanted Lauren to pay, but I wasn?t looking to spend
the next forty to life
wearing an orange jumpsuit. Orange is so not my color. No, my revenge plan was going
to have to be more creative. Plus, I wasn?t even sure where I could find a
pack of hungry pit bulls.

I made a list of the things that
were important to Lauren:

1. Being popular

2. Her
   boyfriend

3. Getting the lead in the school
   play

4. Her status as a
   cheerleader

Once I had the list,
the basics of the plan were already framed out. I had to become more popular than
she was. I had to steal her boyfriend out from under her, ensure someone else took
the lead in the play, and get her kicked off the cheerleading squad.

Now I just had to figure out how to make those things happen.

The popularity angle was going to be the easiest to tackle. High schools
have a social structure more strict than a Hindu caste system. By the time you get
to your senior year everyone knows exactly where he or she belongs compared to
everyone else. You could try to change your status?you could get a new
wardrobe or take up a new sport, for example?but it would only take a few days
before everyone would shove you back into the place where they felt you belonged.
There might be a few people who shifted ranks, but it was highly unusual. I would
have the advantage of being a new kid. No one would know exactly where to put me, but they
would be trying to sort it out from the first moment they met me. I had to stack the
deck. I couldn?t become popular at Lincoln
High. I had to be popular from the moment I walked
through the front door. I spent hours thinking about what made one person more
popular than another. When I was done I taped a list to the mirror in my bedroom so
I could study it. It was a thing of beauty.

Attractive: Assign
yourself up to 10 points, depending on your level of hotness, zero points being
seriously ugly and 10 points being supermodel hot. Bonus 2 points for being fit and
in shape versus merely thin. An additional 2 points for hair that looks like a
shampoo ad. Minus 1 point if you flip it around way too much. Bonus 3 points for big
boobs. Minus 5 points for being attractive but too slutty. Plus 1 point for good use
of makeup. Minus 2 points for mild disfigurement such as bad skin, crooked teeth, or
bad breath.

Sporty: Assign
yourself 5 points for general athletic ability as defined by ability to run without
falling over and catching a ball without getting smacked in the face. 5 bonus points
for being on key school teams such as football, cheerleading, basketball, or soccer.
Minus 2 points for being on dorky teams such as archery or fencing. Bonus 2 points if you have a
leadership position on a team. Minus 2 points if you never play and instead always
sit on the sidelines.

Rich:
Assign yourself 10 points for being filthy rich, 5 points for possessing mere
wealth, zero points for being middle class, and minus 5 points for being poor. Bonus
point for each item of designer clothing that you own or for accessories such as
handbags that cost more than a small used car. Minus 5 points for purchasing your
wardrobe at Wal-Mart. Give yourself 2 points if you shop at a funky vintage shop,
minus 2 points if you buy your underwear at a thrift store. Some things should never
be secondhand.

Cool: Award
yourself up to 10 points for exotic factors such as being from a cool place (large
city, anywhere in Europe or Hollywood), knowing famous people, having a good car,
being in a band (but not the band?wearing a
uniform that makes you look like a hotel bellman is never cool), or demonstrating
artistic ability.

I was going back to Lincoln High, but not as
Helen Worthington. I was going to be remade into the destined-to-be-popular Claire
Dantes.

I was named Helen after my mom?s great aunt.
Ever notice you don?t meet a lot of Helens these days? That?s because
it?s an old lady name. Thankfully, my middle name is Claire. My mom?s
maiden name was
Dantes, and since I would be living with my grandma it made some sense to borrow it.
My mom was ticked that I wanted to register for school under a different name. She
said she didn?t feel it was necessary for me to hide myself like I was
spending my senior year in the witness protection program, but I could tell she was
just hurt that I didn?t want to use the name she had given me.

In the end my mom backed down. Either my grandma talked her into it or,
more likely, the guilt of abandoning me kicked in. No matter the reason?I
didn?t care?Helen Worthington ceased to exist. Claire Dantes officially
registered at Lincoln High. Step one of the plan was in place.

? 2010 Eileen Cook

---

Excerpted from Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood by Eileen Cook Copyright © 2010 by Eileen Cook. Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

---