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High school student Mary Elizabeth Cep, known to her friends as Lola (and to her family as the Drama Queen), recently moved with her mother and twin sisters from New York City to Dellwood, New Jersey. Lola, who aspires to be an actress, hates living in the suburbs, where she believes everyone looks and acts the same. She decides to try out for the lead role in the school play—a role that Carla Santini, the most popular girl in school, believes should be hers. When Lola wins the lead role, Carla persuades most of the student body to ignore Lola, and Lola decides to quit the play. In the following excerpt, Lola is confronted by her best friend Ella, who is disappointed by Lola’s decision.

from

Confessions of a Teenage

Drama Queen

by Dyan Sheldon

1 I heard my mother get up and go into the kitchen. I heard the twins erupt into consciousness. I heard the radio go on. The weather was going to be mild and sunny. I’d been hoping for rain. Rain’s always so comforting when you’re unhappy. And then I heard the front bell. I looked at my clock. It was too early for the mailman with a package, or even for the UPS man, come to take some boxes of dinnerware away.

2 Pam tripped over something and fell, so Paula reached the door first.

3 “She’s sick!” shouted Paula. “She isn’t going to school today. So now we don’t have to go to her boring play.”

4 “Now nobody has to go to the boring play,” said Ella.

5 This was not Ella-like behavior, this coming to the house at seven-thirty in the morning. She hadn’t been able to bring me my homework the afternoon before because she had to do something with her mother at the last minute, but I’d figured she’d wait till the weekend to come. I had the thought to jump up and lock the door, but before I could, it opened and Ella Marjorie Gerard, the girl once destined to be picked as Most Shy in our high school yearbook, marched in.

6 “I want to talk to you,” said Ella, and she slammed the door in Pam and Paula’s faces.

7 “Not now,” I said. I rubbed my eyes sleepily. “I just woke up.”

8 Ella threw her book bag on the foot of my bed. “Oh, sure you did,” said Ella.

9 “I really don’t feel well—” I began.

10 “You can cut the act,” said the most polite and well-mannered teenager in New Jersey. “I know what you’re doing.” She grabbed the blanket and yanked it off me. “And I’m not going to let you get away with it. Get up now and get dressed for school.”

11 I stared at her, agog. I’d never heard Ella talk to anyone like that. I didn’t think she was capable of it.

12 “I’m telling you I’m sick,” I said. I pulled the blanket back around me, shivering slightly. “I have a fever,” I told her. “Ask my mother.”

13 “What do you think I am, stupid?” asked Ella. “You’re not sick. You’re bailing out of the play.” She folded her arms in front of her and set her jaw. She looked like she was in a play herself. “You’re giving up,” said Ella.

14 Admitting defeat was getting easier and easier.

15 “All right,” I snapped. “So what if I am?” I glared at her. “I wish I’d done it when you wanted me to. I could have saved myself a lot of time and trouble.”

16 “Well, I don’t want you to now,” said Ella. She dropped her arms and sat down on the bed. “You can’t do this, Lola. Everybody’s depending on you.”

17 Sure they were. Depending on me to play the fool.

18 “Hah hah,” I said. “Nobody will even notice the difference.”

19 “Of course they will,” said Ella. “What about your parents? And your grandparents? And me? And Sam? Sam’s never been to a school function before in his life. He’s only going for you.”

20 “Maybe he can get a refund.” I fluffed up my pillow and leaned back. “Maybe all of you can.”

21 “I can’t believe I’m hearing this,” said Ella. “This isn’t like you at all. What happened to the person who never gives up? What happened to the person who told me her motto was ‘never say die’?”

22 “I don’t know,” I said. Which was true. “I guess she bailed out, too.” 23 Ella gazed at me in silence for several seconds.

24 “So that’s it?” she said at last. “All that stuff you told me about passion and art and putting your work before yourself, that was just more of your lies?”

25 “Of course not,” I said. “That’s what’s important. It’s just that I—”

26 “You’re just the same as Carla, aren’t you?” Ella stood up. “It’s all me, me, me, and I, I, I. Nobody else counts for anything, do they?”

27 I stood up, too.

28 “That’s not true and you know it!” I felt like I was falling apart inside.

29 “No, I don’t know it!” Ella screamed back. “You haven’t given one thought to anybody else in all this. It’s all been about you.” She flung her arms wide, appealing to the gods themselves. “What about me?” she demanded. “I was miserable until you came to Dellwood. Totally miserable. I thought that everybody’s life was like mine, just doing all the things you’re supposed to do when you’re supposed to do them, and never questioning anything. I thought that when I grew up, all I could expect was a life like my parents’.” She was trembling with rage. “And then I met you. You gave me courage, Lola. You taught me that you can make life what you want.”

30 I reached out to touch her shoulder. I’d never seen Ella cry before. “Ella, I—”

31 She jumped back as though I’d threatened her with a saber. “Don’t touch me!” She wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt. “You’re a sham, Lola Cep; that’s what you are. I thought being the best Eliza Doolittle you could be was what mattered to you. But it isn’t. Because if it was, you’d go on tonight and you’d be the best Eliza Doolittle, no matter what Carla Santini says or does.” Ella’s face was red and blotchy from crying. “Don’t you get it, Lola? That’s the one thing she can’t do anything about. The one thing nobody can do anything about! And you’re just going to hand it to her.”

32 By now, I was crying, too.

33 “What’s going on in there?” called my mother. She started banging on the door. “Mary? Ella?”

34 I snuffed back a few million tears. “Nothing,” I shouted back through my sobs. “I’ve had a miraculous recovery.”