chapter one.
In the movies, Halloween season—or what boring people call October—is depicted by howling wind, skeletal tree branches, and creeping shadows. But in Poplar Creek, California, where wind is more of a lazy sigh, palm fronds sway like a fresh blowout, and the sun is too bright for shadows, Halloween season ushers in a different type of terror, one that Fonda Miller named the Seventh- Grade Slopover.
“The Ferdink Farms field trip is pure hell,” Fonda said as she, Drew, and Ruthie walked home from Poplar Middle School. It was Friday, and the next-door besties, or nesties, as they called themselves, were spending the night at Fonda’s. Her stride should have had spring, her steps pep. But the feet in her leopard-print high-tops were heavy with dread because this year’s Seventh-Grade Slopover would be no different than last year’s Sixth-Grade Slopover. And no different was no bueno.
“How bad can it be?” Ruthie asked, her wide blue eyes beaming optimism. And who could blame her? The students in the Talented and Gifted program were also invited. Which meant that for three days and two nights, Ruthie and her TAG friends would have the same schedule as Fonda and Drew. It was something Ruthie had always wanted. It was something they had all wanted. But not like this.
“Two nights, three days, and seven meals of nothing but pig slop. That’s how bad.” Fonda removed the mirrored heart-shaped sunglasses she’d “borrowed” from her sister Amelia so they could see the panic in her eyes. “We shovel horse poo, milk cows, and sleep on mattresses that smell like oily grandfather scalp.”
“My grandfather is bald, so his scalp doesn’t smell oily,” Ruthie said. “His has more of a minty smell. Hey, maybe my mattress will smell minty!”
“Then mine will smell like sticky notes,” Drew said, because her Grandpa Lou tacked Post-it reminders all over the house so her Grandma Mae wouldn’t forget anything.
“I bet Weird-O’s mattress is gonna smell like money,” Fonda said, pointing at the boy who lived at the top of their street. He was ambling up his driveway, shoulders rounded and neck arched, as he thumbed the screen of his phone. His rich, preppy, private-school look—button-down shirt, white sneakers, and corn-tortilla-colored slacks—might be on point in Connecticut or, say, Boston—but it completely missed the point in California. Everything about Weird-O missed the point.
“His name is Owen Lowell-Kline,” Ruthie said, defending him as usual. Not because she liked Owen, or even really knew him. But because two years earlier, he bought her entire supply of Girl Scout cookies, which freed her up to go to the beach with Fonda and Drew. “I feel bad for him.”
“Why?” Drew asked. “Because he ate fifty boxes of Do-si-dos?”
“They weren’t all Do-si-dos. There were Samoas and Tagalongs too. And, no. I feel bad for Owen because he doesn’t have any friends.”
“Because he’s a pick-me,” Fonda said. If Ruthie had ever had the misfortune of being in class with Owen and witnessed him waving his hand at the teacher while shouting, “Pick me, pick me,” she would have felt bad for herself, not Owen.
“Just because he’s a pick-me doesn’t mean you have to be a pick-on-him,” Ruthie said. Then she laughed. Everyone did. Because it was one of the clunkiest comebacks of all time.
The laughter stopped the moment Fonda’s mother greeted them in the kitchen and asked how her day was. “Tell me everything,” Joan said, her russet-brown eyes wide and eager.
She was a feminist studies professor at UC Irvine and didn’t teach on Fridays, which freed her up to serve snacks and pry at the end of every week. “Kitchen time” was something Fonda looked forward to. But not today. Today, Fonda didn’t want to relive the details; she wanted to forget them and get right to the snacks.
She opened the pantry and grabbed three bags of cheese popcorn. “They announced the Slopover today.”
“What’s a slopover?” Joan asked. She set out three glasses on the table for the girls and filled them with chocolate almond milk. “And why do you seem so miserable about it?”
“We have to scoop horse poo,” Ruthie said.
“And sleep on mattresses that smell like oily grandfather scalp,” Drew added.
“Ew, are you talking about Ferdink Farms?” Winfrey asked as she padded barefoot into the kitchen. She was wearing a wet suit, unzipped to reveal her midriff, and a red bikini top. Knowing her, she probably wore that to school. And if she did, it wouldn’t be long before every junior at Poplar Creek High began wearing it too. Because Fonda’s sixteen-year-old sister, with her butterscotch-colored highlights, cactus-green eyes, and three first-place surf trophies, was major like that.
“Ferdink Farms is still a thing?” said Amelia, the middle Miller sister, who was also wearing a bikini, but no wet suit. She entered behind Winfrey, piling a mess of fiery auburn waves on top of her head. A freshman in high school, she was a star volleyball player with a statement sunglass collection that could fill a swimming pool. So yeah, she was pretty major too. “I thought that dump burned in last year’s wildfire.”
“Nope,” Fonda sighed. “The fire didn’t want it either.”
“Smart fire,” Winfrey said. Then to her mother, “Joan, can I borrow the car? Amelia and I are going to the beach.”
“Really?” Joan took a seat at the table. “This isn’t like you.”
“Um, Mother, have we met? Amelia and I surf every Friday after school.”
“I was talking to Fonda,” Joan said, hands serious and clasped.
“Ew, why would you do that?”
Fonda ignored her sister’s jab. “What isn’t like me?”
“Civic laziness,” Joan said.
Fonda had no clue what “civic laziness” meant, but she did know that she was about to get lectured on feminism or activism or both. Every conversation with her mother went there eventually. “If you don’t agree with your leader’s choices, speak up. The world is only going to change if you change it.”
Fonda nearly choked on her chocolate almond milk. “How am I supposed to do that?”
“Real change, enduring change, happens one step at a time.”
Ruthie smacked the table like a game-show buzzer. “Ruth Bader Ginsburg!”
“That’s right.” Joan beamed. “Very good, Ruthie.”
“I’m a huge fan.”
Joan beamed even brighter. “Who isn’t?”
“Um, I’m not,” Winfrey said. “Unless Ruth Bader Ginsburg is the name of your car.”
“You have a voice, Fonda. Don’t use it to complain. Use it to campaign!”
Ruthie hit the table again. “Gloria Steinem!”
“No,” Joan said.
“Tarana Burke?”
“Nope.”
“Malala?”
“No, Ruthie. That one was Joan Miller.”
“You?”
Joan nodded proudly.
Ruthie got out of her chair, sat on Joan’s lap like a toddler visiting Santa, and hugged her. “JM, you are my everything.”
“This popcorn is my everything,” Drew said, crumpling her bag. “Can we have seconds?”
“Check the pantry,” Fonda said impatiently. Because now what? Her mother didn’t give her a plan; she gave her words. The type of words that end up on bumper stickers, tea bags, and motivational Instagram posts. A wildfire couldn’t quash Ferdink Farms, and Joan thought some Ruth Bader Ginsburg quote was the answer? “Mom, what am I supposed to do? Stand outside the principal’s office with a sign that says Hell no, we won’t go?”
“I don’t think we should say hell,” Drew called from inside the pantry. “Heck might be better.”
“Mom!” Winfrey said with a stomp of her bare foot. “The keys!”
“Slogans don’t work because they don’t offer a solution,” Joan said. “Instead of shouting about what you don’t want, try shouting about what you do want.”
What do I want? Fonda asked herself. It was a good question. One that she didn’t know how to answer. She definitely wanted an overnight field trip, especially now that Drew and Ruthie were going too. But what kind of field trip? And where?
“I don’t want a place that smells like horse poo,” she began.
Drew returned to the table with three new bags of popcorn. “Isn’t that more of what you don’t want?”
“Exactly!” Joan smacked the table. “What do you want?”
Fonda stood. She thought better on her feet. “I want a place that smells like fresh air. I want a place with fun activities. I want a place with good food and candy. I want—”
“What about Catalina Island?” Amelia said. Then she grabbed the chocolate almond milk off the table and began chugging it from the carton.
“Great call!” Winfrey said. “Catalina’s all those things. How rad was the Fourth?” she asked Amelia, who, unlike Fonda, was “cool enough” to party with Winfrey’s friends.
“So rad.”
“Right?”
“Right.”
“And the ferry ride is super rad too.”
“So super rad.”
“Right?”
“Right.”
“Girls, details please,” Joan insisted. “Use your words.”
Winfrey lifted herself onto the countertop and began swinging her legs. “They have snorkeling, zip lines, an ice cream shop—”
“And wild bison,” Amelia added.
“Wild is good,” Ruthie said. “No poop to scoop!”
Fonda stopped pacing. They were right. Catalina Island would be perfect. And to think it was right there in front of her the whole time. Literally. Less than forty miles off the coast, it rose up from the Pacific Ocean like a sleeping sea monster’s spine.
If Fonda upgraded the class trip, not only would the entire seventh grade worship her, she’d have Catalina stories to swap with her sisters. She’d be known as a civically unlazy game changer who single-handedly put an end to the Slopover. Fonda Miller would matter. The nesties would matter. Her social life would finally be worth living.
“I’m going to do it!” she announced.
“Great,” Winfrey said. “Now, Joan, can I please have the car keys?”
Fonda spotted them by the banana basket and quietly swiped them. Then she dangled them in front of Winfrey’s face like a hypnotist’s watch. “Only if you drop us at Fresh & Fruity. Fro-yo helps me think.”
“Seriously?” Winfrey screeched. She turned to her mother, hoping for backup. As always, Joan looked away, refusing to get involved.
“Come on,” Fonda said. “Please—”
Before she could finish her request, or even begin it, Amelia snatched the keys from Fonda’s hand and tossed them to Winfrey. “Let’s ride!”
As her sisters ran out of the house, cackling victoriously, Fonda, who would have normally felt like a stage-five loser in that moment, kept her head held high. Drew and Ruthie were looking at her with chocolate almond milk mustaches, ready for their marching orders. They were going to dismantle a tradition and overthrow the status quo. If they did their jobs right, the real stage-five loser would be Ferdink Farms. And if they didn’t? Fonda would be doomed to inhale the stench of her Ferdink failure with every scoop of horse poop those farmers made her shovel.
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