"Miranda?!" Jennifer screamed loudly.
Kylie was right. This surely made Jennifer's blood boil. Miranda Kirkson was also on the cheering squad. In fact, along with Trish, she was Assistant Co-Captain under Jennifer. Jennifer had always despised that fact. When she was made Captain, the instructor, Mrs. Morell, insisted on an assistant as well. She let Jennifer decide, so naturally Jennifer picked Trish. Mrs. Morell had then decided to add Miranda to that title as well for two reasons. The first was that she knew Jennifer and Trish were so close and had their own little clique. She didn't want them to be overly bossy of the other 8 girls on the squad. Second Miranda had bitched to high heaven about the whole thing. She had her own following of 3 friends like Jennifer had with Trish, Liz, and Jamie. Miranda and her friends, Alexis Martel, Lori Stradford, and Kaite Billings, all threatened to quit the squad. The reason they gave was because Jennifer picked her best friend to be Assistant. The real reason was because they all felt that Miranda should have been picked Captain. Mrs. Morell, caved in, knowing she couldn't let a third of her team quit. Of course with Kylie now being on the squad, she had 13 instead of 12. That didn't really matter though.
"I told you that you'd be upset," Kylie said. Just then Kylie's mother called from downstairs, "Is everything OK up there?" Kylie responded, "Yea, Mom. We just found out that we might have a problem at cheering tomorrow is all." "OK," her mother called back.
Kylie turned back to Jennifer and said, "Maybe we should leave so that we can discuss this somewhere else." Jennifer agreed. She was so mad that she didn't really want to blow her top and get Kylie in trouble. You see, Kylie's addition now helped her in power struggles with cheering. She had 5 people including herself, Miranda had 4. The other 4 girls usually split 50-50 on important decisions, but none of them aligned themselves with either group. So, Jennifer didn't want to anger Kylie's parents, just to make sure that they wouldn't restrict their daughter from cheering.
They left the room and climbed down the stairs. Kylie checked in with her parents before leaving. "We're going out now," she said to them. Her father asked, "What time will you be back?" Kylie said, "No later than 10." It was now 7:30. "OK, that's good," he said. Jamie then stepped up and said, "Mr. and Mrs. Perkins, Kylie asked if I could stay over tonight so we can help each other with math. If that's alright with you, of course." Kylie's mother asked, "Are your parents OK with that?" She replied, "Yea they don't mind it's a school night." Kylie's mother said, "OK then. See you later." They said goodbye and walked out the front door.
Climbing back into Jennifer's car, which she had moved in front of Kylie's house when she went outside to get her clothes, Jennifer asked, "Why are you going to stay over?" Kylie said, "I was wondering that myself, Jamie." Once again, Jamie used her skill for rationale to explain herself. "Somebody's going to have to help Kylie get her morning routine down. Were you guys going to volunteer?" They all admitted that Jamie was right. Kylie gave a Jamie a smile of appreciation. Now both of them wondered what was going on between them.
As soon as they started to drive, Jennifer started to rant. "I should have known that bitch was behind this! She's been after me for the last 2 years!" That much was true. There had always been tension between the two girls. Mainly, it was Jennifer's fault. She stole Miranda's boyfriend during their sophomore years. Miranda never realized that she was going to be dumped by that guy anyway. She chose to blame it on Jennifer. In that sense, Miranda and Jennifer were eerily similar to each other, kind of like Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia: Very close in spirit to one another, but too much to be anything but enemies.
Trish tried to calm Jennifer down. After all, she was driving and her being agitated was not good for anyone. "Alright, Jenn, let's just calm down. Keep focused on the road until we stop. Then we'll discuss this more." Trish had a knack for keeping Jennifer level headed. She did calm down. She talked at Kylie, sitting in the backseat. "You know, I decided that Kyle hadn't done anything to embarrass me, really. So I took it easy on you. And before you ask, 'This was easy?' what I mean is that I decided you should be my friend, and that way I could make up for what I did to you. You agree right?" Kylie said, "Yea, I don't really mind having my sex changed now. I do feel pretty good this way, and you guys have been great."
Jennifer smiled and said, "Good. I feel better now." Then her smile turned to a scowl. "Oh, but Miranda will not get off easily. Girls, we're going to have to come up with another plan." They all smiled at once. Deep down, Kylie didn't know how to feel about this. Miranda had not done anything to Kyle, only threatened. Would it be fair for her to help punish Miranda now? She decided that it would because while Miranda threatened Kyle to be cursed if he didn't call Jennifer, Jennifer didn't not threaten when she and the other girls came to Kyle's house. And Jennifer did let Kyle lose his virginity, something he didn't tell them. Looking back, Jennifer had been a million times nicer to Kyle then Miranda.
10 minutes later, Jennifer pulled the car into McDonald's. "Alright," she said. "We're going to eat. And start plotting."