Jersey Tomatoes are the Best Read Online Free Page B

feel good?” I say.
    “Yes!” she exclaims. “
We
don’t have cancer! What are the odds of that, living in New Jersey? If we haven’t gotten cancer by now, we probably never will.”
    “Eva, we’re sixteen. Well, at least I am. We’ve got, like, another seventy years to get cancer,” I say. Eva shakes her head as she presses the plastic lid onto the top of the blender. She’s loaded it with fresh strawberries, vanilla yogurt, lemonade and chopped ice. She pushes a button and the whole thing spins and shakes. When it all turns a uniform shade of pink, she shuts it off.
    “My point is that if you can emerge from the heap in Jersey, you can make it anywhere.”
    “Uh, no offense, but I think that comes from the song about New
York
.”
    Eva smiles and fills two tall glasses with the creamy liquid,then pushes one across the counter to me. She raises hers in a toast.
    “Today New Jersey, tomorrow … the world!” she declares. “Congratulations, Hen.” We clink, then drink. Yum. Total Pink Decadence, but Eva insists it only has 180 calories per serving. Not that it makes much difference to me. I’m a pretty mindless eater, devouring whatever is on my plate until the growling stops. Ballerina Eva, on the other hand, never seems to eat a morsel without whipping out her calculator.
    When she lowers her glass, she’s wearing a pink mustache.
    “Your dad must be happy,” Eva says. I reach over and wipe her upper lip with my napkin.
    Eva knows Dad.
    “Something did happen,” I say.
    “Of course,” she says matter-of-factly. “Spill, girlfriend. You’ll feel better.”
    Ages ago, Eva and I figured out that we’re good friends because we never compete with each other. Except about one thing: who has the most obnoxious parent. She insists her mother takes the prize. Once, when Eva didn’t get the lead in a local production of the ballet
Coppelia
, her mother let all the air out of the casting director’s tires. Eva claims my dad’s outbursts are nothing compared to her mom’s terrorist attacks.
    “This girl I beat, in the final? Dad accused her, right in front of everyone, of talking to her coach between games.” Eva’s never so much as even picked up a tennis racket, but years of hanging out with me have made her a tennis rules expert. She knows: no coaching during tournament play.
    “And … was she?” Eva asks.
    “I don’t think so. She told me she’s diabetic and
her
dad was just asking how she felt.”
    Eva rolls her eyes.
    “Let me guess: Mark learned the truth and apologized to the diabetic girl?”
    “Guess again,” I say.
    “Hmm. He continued to press his point? Even after his little darling triumphed?”
    “Try: he rubbed it in her face that she’d lost, accused her of cheating and pissed off her dad so much that I thought the guy was going to deck him.” Eva lets out a long, low whistle of admiration.
    “Ten points, Mark!” she exclaims. “Watch out, Rhonda. If he keeps this up, we’ll have to transfer the Obnoxious Parent of the Year trophy from the Smiths’ house to the Lloyds’.”
    The Obnoxious Parent of the Year trophy was Eva’s idea. She bought it a couple of years ago from this online trophy and plaque place and got them to engrave OPY on the brass plate at the base. Depending on Mark’s and Rhonda’s latest escapades, we swap the trophy between us.
    I know I should be laughing, but the Attitude Deficit has a real hold on me today. The bubbles at the top of my smoothie are suddenly fascinating.
    Eva puts her hand over mine.
    “You know I’m kidding,” she says. “Honestly, Henry, was it really that bad?”
    My throat closes at this point. Even to Eva, this is hard tosay. Because it’s not just Dad’s behavior that has left me feeling bad about this match. I’m used to Dad. The whole Jersey junior circuit is used to Dad.
    “I don’t know,” I finally say. “It’s like … the crowd is never with me. They’re always pulling for my opponent. And I