My Miserable Life by F. L. Block Page B

me,” he said. “Our moms are best friends. So are our dads. Since we were born.”
    â€œWe were born in the same hospital on the same day,” Rocko added, slamming the pink rubber ball against the wall with his little grimy pipsqueak hands. “Kind of like twins.”
    I, on the other hand, was born in a bathtub at a birthing center. I didn’t have a best friend being born at the same time. I don’t even have a dad, since my mom used a donor to have Angelina and me.
    When I got home from school, my mom noticed that something was wrong. I know this because she kept asking, “What’s wrong, Ben? What’s wrong, sweetie?” I wouldn’t tell her. How are you supposed to explain to your worried-looking mom that your life is irrevocably miserable? (Even my correct use of the word irrevocably would not comfort her.) But when I started throwing my favorite baseball cards, my mom put her arms around me and made me tell her what was going on.
    â€œRocko Hoggen is in my class,” I said.

    â€œThat kid from 4 Kids Only?”
    â€œThat pipsqueak from One Zillion Kids Only, who broke my clavicle,” I said.
    â€œIt was an accident, sweetie.” I could tell by my mom’s squeaky-sounding voice that if I insisted that it wasn’t an accident, she would call Rocko’s house and make him apologize.
    So I just said, “Yeah, but I hate him. And now he’s trying to steal Leif Zuniga.” I hadn’t meant to say that about Leif Zuniga, but it just came out.
    Angelina walked in not wearing her headphones, for once. She had on shiny white leather high-top sneakers, cut-off shorts things that she rolled up when she left the house in the morning and rolled down when she got home, a football jersey with shiny gold numbers, and a gold chain around her neck. She has millions of different outfits with lots of what she calls “bling” on them; I pretty much would wear the same Darters baseball jersey and shorts every day if I could.
    â€œIs that the kid you’ve been hanging out with?” she asked.
    I nodded. I told them the whole story about the handball game and how Rocko and Leif had been best friends since they were newborns in the hospital, spitting up on each other while their moms, who were also best friends, envisioned their sons’ futures together.
    â€œMaybe you could find another friend in your class to play with?” Mom said.
    â€œIt’s ‘hang out with,’ Mom, not play. He’s in fifth grade now,” said Angelina. She went over to the refrigerator and pointed to the paper whale I had made in second grade that said FRIENDSHIP MEANS TRUSTING EACH OTHER . It bugs me that my mom still keeps that up.
    I appreciated that Angelina had corrected my mom about not using the word play , but there was no one else I wanted to hang out with. Simon Heller picks his nose and sticks it under his desk. Joe Knapp is only eight and a half and just reads all day. Nicholas Gonzalez never sits still or stops talking. Darby Levine has a Mohawk and hangs out with eighth graders. And for some inexplicable reason, EVERY SINGLE OTHER KID IN MY CLASS OF TWENTY-FIVE IS A GIRL!
    â€œPeople usually don’t realize they’re being rude. They’re just thinking about themselves. You need to go where the love is, Ben Hunter. Like with Serena Perl, maybe?” Since Angelina got her braces off, she always flashes her perfect teeth at me. I still have some baby teeth and two front chompers that you can see a mile away. “Come here, Monkeylad,” she called, putting on some fresh lip gloss.
    Monkeylad trotted in, and she picked him up. His tail was sticking through the hole in the back of the cheerleader outfit he was wearing. The costume belonged to a bear Angelina had made herself at Stuff-It, and she liked to put it on Monkeylad since she was a cheerleader, too.
    Our dog is obsessed with lip gloss and tried to lick it off