Anna Banana and the Sleepover Secret Page 2

  Isabel sat on the couch beside him, and Sadie and I plopped down next to her. Isabel tucked her feet up under her body as she turned to face Sadie. “Truth or dare?” she asked.

  “Dare,” Sadie said immediately, and Isabel and I grinned. Sadie always chooses dare.

  “I dare you . . .” Isabel said the words slowly while she thought about what dare to give. Her eyes sparkled with inspiration. “I dare you to go up to Maria and ask if the refrigerator is still running. And when she says yes, you say, ‘Then you’d better catch it!’ ”

  I giggled and Sadie groaned. “That’s so corny!” she said, falling back against the couch cushions. “You couldn’t give me something less embarrassing?”

  “That’s what makes it a good dare!” Isabel said. She looked as gleeful as Banana does when she finds a forgotten tennis ball. Mewsic stretched a paw across Isabel’s lap and leaned his weight against her leg. He looked pretty pleased too.

  Sadie jumped to her feet. She never turns down a dare. I almost always choose truth when we play this game, and Isabel usually goes back and forth between the two. I wanted to be as brave as Sadie always was, but the idea of agreeing to do a dare before I’d even heard what it would be made me nervous, even though I trusted my friends not to give me a horrible one. I was glad this dare had gone to Sadie, not to me.

  Sadie smoothed her skirt and looked up the stairs. “Is Maria in her room?”

  “I think so,” Isabel said. We stood up too. Mewsic narrowed his eyes, like he was annoyed that Isabel was no longer being his pillow. He curled himself around one of the real couch pillows instead.

  Sadie crept up the stairs like she was a spy on a secret mission. She hunched her shoulders to make herself smaller and moved with slow, light steps, like Banana does when she’s trying to sneak up on a squirrel. Isabel and I followed behind her, covering our mouths with our hands to keep the giggles inside. Already this was the most fun game of Truth or Dare ever.

  Sadie paused at the top of the stairs. She turned and put her fingers to her lips as if to say Shhhhhh! and motioned for us to hide. Isabel and I flattened ourselves against the wall to stay out of sight as Sadie raised her fist and knocked twice on Emma and Maria’s bedroom door.

  “Come in!” Maria called, and Isabel let out a tiny snort that made me want to laugh out loud too. I tried not to look at her, but I could feel her shaking with silent giggles beside me.

  Sadie kept her cool, though. She turned the doorknob, pushed open the door, and stepped inside their room.

  “I was just wondering . . . do you think the refrigerator is still running?” we heard her say. Isabel bit her fist and nudged me with her shoulder. I nudged back. Sadie was so bold.

  “Huh? Why wouldn’t it be?” Maria said. “Wait, is this some kind of—”

  “Oh no!” Sadie shouted, playing her part to the fullest. “We have to catch it! Run!” She bolted out of the bedroom, shrieking at a high pitch. Isabel grabbed my hand, and we ran down the stairs after her, gasping with laughter and scaring Mewsic, who leaped off the couch and quickly disappeared.

  All three of us collapsed on the couch on top of one another.

  A voice cut through our giggles. “What’s going on in there?”

  Chapter Six

  Party Crashers

  I looked up and saw Isabel’s mother standing in the doorway, her hands on her hips. “Nothing!” Isabel gasped out as she tried to catch her breath from laughing. “Just having fun.”

  “Hmmm,” her mother said. “Maybe the fun could be had a little more softly.”

  Sadie, Isabel, and I scrambled to sit up and look innocent. “Sorry. We’ll keep it down,” Isabel said. Her mom smiled and left the room.

  “I hope we didn’t get you in trouble,” Sadie said, echoing my thoughts.

  “No, it’s okay. She’s not mad at us,” Isabel said.

  “Good,” Sadie said. I nodded in agreement. I hate making parents upset—mine or anyone else’s.

  “We’ll just have to dare each other a little more quietly,” Isabel said. “But, oh my gosh, I can’t believe how well you pulled that off.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “That was epic.” “Epic” was a word I had learned from Chuck. He used it to mean “super impressive” or “huge.” Sadie’s face filled with pride.

  Maria came into the living room with Emma and Luisa close behind her. “What was that all about?” she asked.

  Sadie shrugged and smiled sheepishly. “Sorry. It was a dare. I had to do it.”

  “Oooh, are you playing Truth or Dare?” Luisa asked, stepping toward us. We nodded. “I want to play!” She squeezed into the space on the couch between Isabel and me. I moved over, practically onto the armrest, to make room.

  Maria dropped cross-legged onto the floor, and Emma settled beside her. “We’ll all play,” Maria announced. Isabel, Sadie, and I looked at one another in surprise. Sometimes Luisa hung out with us if she didn’t have anything better to do, but Emma and Maria almost never did. It was kind of exciting that they wanted to join our game. Isabel’s older sisters were all pretty cool. “Whose turn is it?” Maria asked.

  “Uh, Sadie’s the only one who’s gone so far,” Isabel said. “So I guess it’s—”

  “I’ll ask,” Emma interrupted. “Isabel, truth or dare?”

  I glanced at Isabel. Usually the person who’d just done a dare or truth got to ask next, but Emma was way older than us—she was already in seventh grade, and Maria was in eighth—so even Sadie didn’t correct her. Apparently, we were playing by their rules now.

  “Truth,” Isabel said.

  Emma leaned forward. “Okay, truth: Who do you like better, Anna or Sadie?”

  Chapter Seven

  The Terrible Truth

  My whole body froze when I heard Emma’s question, except I could feel how quickly my heart was still beating. I both did and didn’t want to hear Isabel’s answer. Who would she choose?

  But Isabel just rolled her eyes. “Both!” she said. I let out my breath. Of course that was true.

  Emma shook her head. “Sure, but if you had to choose between them, who would you choose?”

  Now I knew for sure that Emma was trying to stir up trouble. I glanced at Sadie. She looked as uneasy as I felt. But Isabel didn’t hesitate at all.

  “I would choose Sadie for making up rules to new games and taking charge and laughing loudest and being super brave about doing silly dares. And I would choose Anna for sharing books with and knowing cool words and inventing recipes and having the best dog ever,” she said.

  I felt a smile growing inside me, and saw one spread across Sadie’s face. “But my favorite is being best friends with both of them and all three of us hanging out together,” Isabel finished. She winked at me, and I winked back. I felt the same way, and I knew Sadie did too.

  Emma leaned back onto her elbows and sighed. I could see she was giving up. “Fine,” she said.

  Isabel grinned. “My turn to ask,” she said, returning the game to its original rules. Sadie nodded her approval.

  Isabel turned to her oldest sister. “Maria. Truth or dare?”

  “Hmmm. Truth,” Maria said.

  “Okay, tell the truth: Did you really stay late after school for extra cello practice last Wednesday?” Isabel’s voice was barely louder than a whisper. I guessed she wanted to make sure no parents overheard.

  Maria blushed dark red. Emma giggled, and Luisa’s eyes grew wide. “No,” Maria said. “I wanted to watch the girls’ basketball tryouts to cheer on my friends, but I didn’t think Mom would say yes to my sticking around for that.”

  “I knew it!” Isabel cried. She pumped her fist into the air.

  “But I did practice extra on my own that day, before tryouts started,” Maria added. “And Tawana and Kaye both made the team, so it was worth it.”

  “Liar, liar, pants on fire,” Emma teased, and Maria stuck out her tongue in response. I wondered what would have happened if she’d told her parents the truth. It seemed
like a weird thing to lie about.

  “Your turn to ask someone,” Sadie said to Maria, sounding a little impatient. I could tell she didn’t love how Isabel’s sisters were taking over our game. I didn’t like it either, but it felt like we had no choice but to let them. After all, we were playing in their living room. But I hoped that after this we’d go back to doing something with just the three of us.

  “Okay, let’s see . . .” Maria moved her finger through the air, pointing it at each of us, as she decided who to choose. The finger stopped on me, and my heart skipped a beat. “Anna,” she said. “Truth or dare?”

  Chapter Eight

  Someone Else’s Secret

  I swallowed hard. Why was I so nervous? Maybe because of the way Maria was looking at me, like she was a cat and I was a mouse, and she thought I might taste delicious. I tried to puff myself up bigger as I prepared for her to pounce. “Truth,” I said. No way would I risk a dare with Maria as the one choosing it.

  Maria licked her lips. “All right, truth,” she said. “How about . . . what’s something you know about Sadie that she wouldn’t want you to tell us?”

  My jaw fell open. That was the meanest Truth or Dare question I’d ever heard in my life. Isabel, Sadie, and Luisa looked shocked by it too.

  “No,” I said, without even worrying about what Maria might think. “I’m not doing that.”

  “You have to!” Emma said. “You chose truth!” Maria nodded.

  I shook my head, feeling much braver on Sadie’s behalf than I ever would have been on my own. I knew lots of Sadie’s secrets—small ones, big ones, good ones, embarrassing ones—and Isabel did too. But they were called “secrets” for a reason, and Sadie was one of my two best friends. No way was I going to spill her secrets and break her trust. This “truth” was completely unfair. “I won’t answer that. You can ask anything you want about me, but I won’t share secrets that belong to someone else,” I said. My voice was as firm as Mom’s when she tells Banana “No chewing!” if Banana sniffs Mom’s shoes.

  Sadie shot me a grateful look, but I knew she would have done the same thing for me.

  “When you choose truth, you have to answer with the truth. Those are the rules,” Maria said. But I could tell Isabel and Luisa were on our side. That made four against two. Maria and Emma were not going to win this, even if it meant ending the game and letting them think I was chicken.

  Sadie spoke up. “Actually, she doesn’t have to. There’s a rule in Truth or Dare that once per game, each player can turn down a dare and take a truth instead, or turn down a truth to do a dare. So, Anna’s not breaking the rules if she switches to dare now. It’s her choice.”

  I had never heard that rule before. I was pretty sure Sadie had made it up right then to save me, but Luisa said, “Yeah,” and Isabel added, “Everyone knows that,” so I pretended I’d known about it all along too.

  Emma looked like she wanted to keep fighting, but Maria shrugged her shoulders and said, “Okay, fine. We’ll let you do a dare instead, if that’s what you really want.”

  Normally, choosing dare made me super-duper nervous, but this time it felt like a giant relief. “Yes, please. Dare,” I said, and waited to hear my fate.

  Chapter Nine

  The Challenge

  Maria looked around the room for inspiration. She pointed to the wall behind me, which was lined with shelves holding picture frames, knickknacks, and lots and lots of books. Isabel’s grandmother is a librarian, and the entire family loves to read. Their house has so many books, it would take a whole lifetime to read them all.

  “See that vase?” Maria asked.

  I swiveled to look and spotted it on a middle shelf. “Yeah,” I said.

  “I dare you to balance it on your head for ten seconds,” she said.

  A small rush of panic shot through me, like always happens when I’m challenged with a dare. But just as quickly as it had zinged into my chest, the panic disappeared. That wasn’t such a terrible dare. I could do it.

  I jumped up from the couch and took the vase off the shelf. It was lighter than I’d expected, given how big it was. It was sculpted from thin clay and hand-painted with delicate flowers up the sides. It was beautiful. I wondered who had made it.

  “Wait,” Luisa said. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  Isabel’s eyebrows were pushed close together. “Yeah, isn’t that the vase Abuelita’s mother gave our parents on their wedding day? I think it’s really old and special,” she said.

  I gripped the vase a little tighter, suddenly worried I might drop it. “It’s fine,” Maria said. “She can stand on the carpet while she does the dare, and the carpet will cushion the fall. If it falls,” she added. She crossed her arms and raised both eyebrows. “Or she can always go back to choosing truth if she’d rather just answer the question.”

  I looked to Sadie for help. Sadie bit her bottom lip like she does when she’s worried, but she didn’t say what she thought I should do.

  Isabel was also looking at Sadie. “Well . . .” Isabel said. “Anna does have really good balance.” She turned to me. “And you’d be super careful, right?”

  I hesitated. The dare made me nervous, especially knowing how special the vase was. But Sadie’s eyes were filled with so much hope, I couldn’t back out now. Going back to “truth” just wasn’t an option. “Right,” I said with way more confidence than I felt. Sadie looked relieved.

  I took a deep breath and nodded at my friends. “Okay. I’ll do the dare,” I said. They nodded back grimly. I walked slowly to the center of the carpet, taking my time to get there, even though I also just wanted to get this whole thing over with.

  “No hands,” Emma said, as if I didn’t know that. I resisted the urge to glare at her.

  I faced Sadie and Isabel for good luck, lifted the vase up high with both hands, and placed it on my head. I moved its base to the flattest spot on my skull that I could find, the spot just above my forehead. Then I steadied my breathing and let go.

  Chapter Ten

  Dare, Dare, Don’t!

  “One! . . . Two! . . .” Luisa said, counting off the seconds. I held my arms out to my sides to help keep my balance and tried not to move my head. So far the vase was holding steady.

  “Three! . . . Four! . . .” she said, and the other girls joined in, counting together in unison. It felt like they were cheering me on, even Emma and Maria.

  “Five! . . . Six! . . .” they all said, and I could hear Sadie’s and Isabel’s voices climbing higher with excitement. I felt hope and excitement building inside me, too. Six seconds! Only four more to go! I was doing it! I was pulling off the dare!

  “Seven! . . . Eight! . . .” the girls called, and for a second I thought I felt the vase almost tip, but I moved my head just slightly to steady it, and somehow it stayed in place.

  My heart was pounding harder than if I’d just run full speed around the bases in kickball. Only two more seconds! I was almost, almost there.

  “Nine!” they practically shouted, and out of the corner of my eye I saw a streak of orange fur as Mewsic ran out from his hiding place underneath the couch and dashed right in front of me, hurrying out of the room. I blinked with surprise and jerked my arms up to make sure the vase held steady.

  “Ten!” Isabel, Sadie, Maria, Emma, and Luisa cried, at the same time I shouted, “No!” and felt the vase toppling off my head.

  My hands moved faster than they’d ever moved before, reaching to grab the vase as it fell. I caught it in one hand, then the other, but I was falling forward too, and it slipped through my grip as I stumbled. Isabel dove to catch it, like Banana leaping to fetch a Frisbee. She flew through the air, and it fell through her hands right before she hit the ground.

  The vase struck the carpet with a thud and broke in two.

  Chapter Eleven

  Too Many Secrets

  “Oh no,” Isabel said. She knelt beside the pieces.

  “Oh no, oh no, oh no,” her sister Luisa
echoed, running to her side.

  I couldn’t say anything. I was frozen in place, staring at the broken vase in shock. What had I done? I was going to be in so much trouble.

  I wished I could rewind those fifteen seconds, back to before I balanced the vase on my head, back to before I took on that stupid dare. Back to the moment where I could have said no.

  What had I been thinking, agreeing to do a thing like that?

  I looked up and met Sadie’s eyes. She looked as guilty and horrified as I felt inside. What were we going to do?

  “I’m sorry,” I said, the words rushing out of me like Mewsic had rushed across the room. “I’m so sorry. I’m really sorry.”

  Sadie grabbed my hand and squeezed it, and I knew she wished as badly as I did that we could fix this.

  Isabel shook her head. “It’s my fault too. I knew the vase was fragile. I shouldn’t have let you take the dare. I just didn’t think this would happen.” Hearing Isabel take the blame made me feel even worse. She wasn’t the one who’d dared me. She looked up at her sisters, who hovered around us, looking upset. “What are we going to tell our parents?”

  Maria blinked slowly. “Nothing,” she said. “We’ll tell them nothing.”

  Isabel looked startled. “What do you mean?” she asked.

  Emma stepped forward. “That’s right. None of you are going to say one word about this to Mom and Dad.”

  “But—” Luisa said, before Maria cut her off with a look.

  “Do you want them to ground us forever?” she asked.

  “No, but—” Isabel started to say.