Inside Girl

By J. Minter

Flan Flood is determined to be more than just Patch Flood's little sister when she begins her freshman year at Stuyvesant High, a huge public school downtown. When she meets a new group of friends that could help her become a new person, Flan has to convince them that she's just an ordinary girl, like they are. This becomes nearly impossible when her very not-normal friends Liesel, Philippa, and Sara-Beth Benny move in!

Can Flan keep the Inside Girls hidden, find a new high school boy to date, and get her new friends to accept her? Flan Flood, a favorite character from the original Insiders series, offers a fresh, young, and girlcentric perspective that is perfect for early teen readers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Dec 26, 2012
• ISBN: 9781619630161

J. Minter

J. Minter grew up in New York City and attended Columbia University. He is the author of The Insiders series, and lives in TriBeCa, in New York City.

Book preview

CKS

Chapter 1

Back in the City Again

Our yellow Mercedes convertible turned a corner onto Perry Street, and I breathed a sigh of relief. I’d spent the whole long summer in boring Connecticut, but now, thank God, I was back in the city again.

And, more important, I was free.

My brother, Patch, was driving, and our sister, Feb, was supposedly in the city somewhere, but our parents were staying in Connecticut for a couple more weeks, to go to a horse show and go yachting and stuff while the weather was still nice. After that they might go on to Marrakech, to see some sultan’s palace or something. It used to make me nervous when they went traveling for weeks without us, but I was used to it by now. This time, I was even glad they were going to be away for a little while. As much as I love them, they’re so scatterbrained and wrapped up in their own lives that they drive me kind of nuts sometimes. Besides, I was fourteen years old and about to start my first year of high school. I figured I was old enough to take care of myself. After all, Patch and Feb had started taking care of themselves as freshmen, and look how they turned out.

Looks like some of your friends are here to welcome you home, Flan, Patch said as he turned off the engine and double-parked in front of our town house.

The three girls I’d been hoping to avoid most were standing right there on the sidewalk staring at us: Angelica, Camille, and Beverly. They weren’t in school uniforms, but they might as well have been. Beverly and Camille were both wearing those footless leggings that just came back in style, and all three of them had on these gauzy, faux-vintage tank tops in pastel colors. We’d all gone to this private girls’ school on the East Side together from the time we were little kids—until now. I wasn’t going back to Miss Mallard’s Day this year. But of course they didn’t know that yet.

Flan! It’s so good to see you! they cried, rushing over to me. After a tornado of air-kisses, I stepped back, leaned against the car, and counted the milliseconds before the questions started.

So, said Camille, sneaking a look at Patch, who was unloading our bags from the trunk. "We’re dying to know how your summer has been! Where did you go? What did you do? Who did you meet?"

I shrugged. I dunno. Like I said in May, I was just out at our place in Old Greenwich all summer.

But what about your brother and sister? What parties did they take you to? pressed Angelica. She sat down on the steps to our house, like she was settling in for a long conversation.

I didn’t really go to any parties. Mostly I just rode my bike and went swimming and stuff. On the Fourth, I watched the fireworks from my parents’ sailboat. Seriously. Actually, I had gone to a few parties out on the beach with Feb—there was this one really wild one where some guys from the house next to ours roasted a goat—but I wasn’t about to tell them that. One little story and they’d be pumping me for details for the next fifteen minutes. And I wasn’t in the mood to recap my entire summer just then.

Well, what about Patch? Beverly whispered. An air conditioner dripped onto her head, but she didn’t seem to notice. Did he have a good summer? Is he … seeing anyone?

I don’t know, I said in a normal tone of voice, right as Patch walked by us carrying a couple of suitcases. Why don’t you just ask him yourself?

Angelica, Camille, and Beverly all just stared at me like I’d killed Santa Claus. And that right there is exactly the reason I wasn’t going back to Miss Mallard’s Day.

You’ve probably heard of the Floods: February and Patch, my older sister and brother. Their parties, their celebrity friends, their VIP passes. Both of them are gorgeous (not to brag, but good looks run in our family), and by the time they were my age, they were both as popular as any Manhattan private school teenager can possibly be—which, believe me, is pretty popular.

You might think that having them as siblings would be the coolest thing ever, and in some ways you’d be right: there’s a reason everybody likes them so much. But let me tell you firsthand, there’s nothing as uncool as having your friends more interested in your siblings than in you. Sure, I could have a party at a cool club like Lotus, like I had for my birthday at the beginning of the summer. It hadn’t made any difference: by July the only friend who even bothered to call me was my old pal Liv, and she just wanted to grill me on what was going on with Patch, who she—like most all the girls I know—is so totally obsessed with that she’s fooled herself into thinking it’s love.

So, said Camille, to fill up the shocked silence still hanging in the air. Did you hear about the new uniform rule? Ramona Wood’s mother is on the committee, and she said they voted to make the skirt two inches shorter.

Finally, said Angelica. Thank God we don’t have to start high school looking like nuns.

Listen, guys, I said, because now seemed as good a time as any. I’ve got something to tell you. I’m not going to Miss Mallard’s this year.

"What?!" all three of them cried at once.

I got into Stuyvesant. I would have told you in the spring, but I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, and Stuyvesant held a place for me. So I’m doing it. I’m going to public school.

The girls all looked confused and almost scared, like I’d just told them I was committing myself to a mental institution.

But Flan, you’re a Flood, Camille breathed. I could tell she was upset, because even though a cute guy in Diesel jeans came out of a town house right across the street from us, she didn’t take her eyes off me for a second.

So?

"Your sister’s a legend at Miss Mallard’s. Your brother was voted hottest private school boy. You’re legacy cool. Why would you give that up? For a public school?"

I shook my head. Listen, if you guys don’t understand it already, I don’t think I can explain it to you.

And with that, I walked into the house. The truth is, I’d been prepping for that moment for the past two months and now that it had happened, I was deliriously happy and almost kind of in shock. I’d done it! The first true speech uttered by the new Flan!

So I was glad to get away from those three. But once I was inside the town house, it seemed awfully big and empty all of a sudden.

Feb? I yelled, dropping my bags in the foyer. I stepped out into the living room. Anybody home?

My older sister, February, had supposedly been living in the attic for most of the summer, but except for a lipstick-stained wineglass on the coffee table that looked like it had been there for weeks, I didn’t see signs of her anywhere. Patch tossed his duffel down next to mine, then glanced around aimlessly.

I think I’ll go out for a sandwich, he said, trying to stifle a yawn. You gonna be all right here by yourself?

Sure, I said—I kind of didn’t want to be by myself, but it wasn’t like I’d never been home alone before. I’ll be fine.

Okay, well, call me if you need anything. I’ll be back.

When Patch left, he didn’t even bother closing the door all the way behind him. And the thing about Patch is that going out for a sandwich could equal being gone for an hour or a day or a week. He could go out for a sandwich and end up on a mountaintop in Nepal or surfing off the coast of Australia. Which is why I didn’t bother to ask him to bring me back a coffee yogurt.

After I locked the door and put the chain on for good measure, I glanced around. Our house is really nice—three floors if you count the attic, four if you count the basement—and the living room is one of the best places in it. It always cheers me up to sit in there. Mom and Dad aren’t huge art collectors, but a few years ago they went to Florence and found this great Italian artist who does all these sort-of-Cubist-but-not-really ink-on-paper drawings. They bought the whole show and shipped it home and now his pictures are all over our walls: colorful little shapes and noodly lines. Then they have this great supermodern sofa, made of soft leather and sort of shaped like a Nike swoosh, but unlike a lot of designer furniture it’s really comfortable, and it’s got all these llama-fur afghans on it that they found in Peru a few years ago. There’s a glass coffee table, usually covered with remotes for the TV and all the different VCRs and CD and DVD players, not to mention some video game controllers. Across from that is our entertainment system. Through the door at the far end of the room is our kitchen, which is usually bright and sparkly clean. Right now, though, the whole house looked dark and unused and somehow a lot less friendly than I remembered.

What was I going to do for the rest of the afternoon? I could curl up on the couch and watch my new DVD of Some Like It Hot, but I’d already binged on old movies back in Connecticut, and it seemed pretty dumb to keep on doing that now that I was back in New York. I should be doing something fun, something wild and independent, something grownup. Or at least I shouldn’t just be standing around. Maybe I should have gone out for a sandwich with Patch and seen where that led me.

Before I could even step away from the door, though, the bell rang urgently, three times in a row. I figured it was Patch, just having forgotten his money or what his mission was or whatever, and so I opened it without even looking through the peephole. Now that he was back, maybe he’d take me with him. Sure, I’d be tagging along, but so what? I didn’t feel like being alone in this big dark house. When I opened the door, though, I saw it wasn’t my brother at all.

Her tiny face was almost hidden behind a huge pair of sunglasses with black, round frames that reminded me of Mickey Mouse ears, and even though it was sweltering outside, she was bundled up in a gray mink coat that was about ten sizes too big for her. She’d put on a weird old lady wig, all white and puffy. Underneath it, strands of her short dark hair were sticking out, all hot and squashed looking. And before I could say anything, she’d shoved me back inside and locked the door behind her.

Chapter 2

She’s a Star … From Outer Space

Sara-Beth Benny, I gasped. What are you doing here?

Sara-Beth threw her mink coat on the floor and kicked it away from her. Beneath it she had on a vintage flapper dress that looked like it was made entirely of spangles and ostrich feathers, like something Catherine Zeta-Jones would wear in Chicago. That’s Sara-Beth for you: even when she’s wearing her own clothes, she looks like she’s in costume.

Oh, Flan, I knew you’d see through my disguise. That’s why you’re such a true friend. You know the real me even better than I know the real me.

I shook my head. I doubted I was the only one who’d recognized her. Tourists had probably been following her around the West Village and snapping pictures of her all afternoon. In case you don’t know, Sara-Beth Benny is one of the most famous seventeen-year-olds around. After she grew up on national television as the most adorable star of Mike’s Princesses, she started getting parts in all kinds of really cool movies—like this really creepy thriller called Blennophobia, and a remake of this French New Wave movie. She even tried her hand at comedy in The Seventeen-Year-Old Virgin. I’ve always preferred old movies, myself, but I think Sara-Beth Benny’s a really good actress, and I’d say that even if we weren’t friends. When her eyes get all big and her lower lip starts quivering, she can make you believe whatever she wants.

But wait. I still don’t know what you’re doing here. Aren’t you supposed to be filming a movie in Gdansk or something? Sara-Beth definitely had a decent excuse for not calling me all summer, since she’d been halfway around the world for the last couple months.

Oh, Ric Roderickson, that idiotic director—he makes me so furious, I can’t even talk about it. The catering people couldn’t get my uva-ursi, so of course my face starts swelling up like a balloon. So what does he do? Does he find me an acupuncturist? No. He cut two of my scenes. And I had to come home early to a very toxic apartment.

But wait, how would an acupuncturist—

Well, that was a separate thing. She threw herself down onto the couch with a sigh. Oh, Flan, I just can’t talk about it anymore. It’s just so good to be home, with my real friends. I couldn’t talk to those people on the set anyway. The guys were all so strange and hyper, and the girls were all prima donnas. Do you have any clothespins? Well, do you?

Sara-Beth tossed the old lady wig behind the couch and raked her fingers through her short hair. She’s so tiny and nervous

Reviews for Inside Girl

[jaggirl53 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I am just so glad that everything worked out for Flan. She is cool! Poor thing had to go thru so much drama. SBB living with her and beinf a wacko. Then not to mention Liesel and Phil staying there too. Too many female hormones under 1 roof is never any good. Flan is lucky to have 2 totally different sets of friends, her normal and then not so normal. And I can't wait to see what flourishes with Bennett.