Daria sat in her room with a book on her lap, deep in thought. As much as she would have liked to have let the matter drop, letting what Jane and Trent had told her be the end of it, something told her there was more.
But who else to talk to? Penny would certainly be further removed than Trent, plus Helen and Jake were still touchy about the topic of long-distance phone bills. A couple of all-night gab-fests Quinn had indulged in with some ex-croney of hers from Highland had sent them through the roof, so an overseas call to San Salvador would certainly be beyond the pale.
Or was it Tegucigalpa now?
Amanda would probably be worse than useless. Jesse, too.
That left the Fashion Club itself. The problem being, who would be the most informative?
Fortunately, Quinn and Tiffany were at the mall, doing research for a club report (Sh'yeah, right).
Sandi would be too close, so she decided to try Stacy.
Now all she had to do was figure out which button on Quinn's speed dial was Stacy's. She tried one.
"Griffen residence, Sandi speaking."
Daria hung up without a word. She felt sure that the Griffens had caller ID. That would certainly give her and Quinn a topic for conversation tomorrow. They should thank me, she thought.
Second time was the charm. "Hello?"
"May I speak with Stacy, please?"
"It's me, Roger," she replied with a giggle.
O-kay, this is not getting off to a great start, thought Daria. "No, I'm not Roger, I'm Daria."
"Daria? Daria who?"
"*Sigh*, Morgendorffer."
"Quinn's cousin?!?"
She groaned inwardly. "That is the name by which I am known, yes."
"Omigod, it's Quinn isn't it? What happened? Is she alright?"
"She's fine, she's out with Tiffany."
"Oh, no! It's Tiffany, isn't it?"
"Tiffany is fine. Look, I just wanted to talk to you about something."
"Eap!"
So much for putting the interview subject at ease, she thought. What was Quinn telling them about me? "It's alright Stacy, it's just about an incident in the past, something that happened before we moved here. I'm just curious, that's all."
"Yes, ma'am?"
Daria paused, counted to ten and resisted the temptation. "Please... don't call me 'ma'am.'"
"Yes, m... um... okay..."
It's just about what happened between Jane and Tiffany, back in grade school."
"Oh, geez, she isn't still sore about that, is she?"
"No, she seems to have gotten over it. It's just that I've gotten two different versions of the story, and I just wanted another side of it."
"'Kay."
There was a pause. Daria sighed inwardly. "So, when did you and Sandi meet Tiffany?"
"Mmmmm, that would be way back in the first grade. me and Sandi had been best friends since nursery school, but she was immediately drawn to Tiffany. Don't know why, *giggle*. I have to admit I was a little jealous for awhile."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, but she liked me, so she kinda won me over. then Sandi had this idea, like that we should become like blood brothers, like people did in the movies, but since we were girls, it would be like sisters instead. But like me and Tiffany didn't want to do anything with knives and besides, Sandi couldn't get one anyway, so we just settled with pricking our finger tips and joining 'em together."
"Brave."
"Well, actually Sandi did all the pricking, *giggle*."
Probably still does, thought Daria.
"But we never did anything like that with Quinn, we'd like outgrown it by the time she got here."
"Well, that's a load off my mind," she lied. "So when did Jane enter the picture?"
"Who? Oh, okay, ummm, Tiffany was going to have a birthday party, see, and wanted to invite Jane, so Sandi and the Blum-Decklers didn't like that, cause the Lanes were like... oh..."
"I know," said Daria gently, "not everyone understands or appreciates the eccentricities of the Lanes. Go on..."
"Um, so Tiffany didn't invite Jane. Then Jane caught us after school one day, and we found out that Tiffany had performed the secret blood-sister ceremony thing with Jane, and Sandi got like real upset about it, so she jumped all over the two of them for it. Of course, she always said that Jane hit first, but... promise not to tell?"
Daria rolled her eyes. "Cross my heart, etc."
"I think Sandi may be remembering it wrong, *giggle*."
"So, are you saying she hit Tiffany, too?"
"Oh, yeah, she even took a poke at me, but I got out of the way and all. Tiffany was crying, and Jane was screaming, and Sandi and Jane ended up in the sand-box beating the stew out of each other. Mrs. Pierce had to pull them apart and Sandi knocked her glasses off. Mrs. King suspended both of them, um, that was the principal, but Mrs. Griffen threw a fit and got Sandi reinstated after a couple of days. I don't know what happened to Jane."
"According to Trent, she served out her sentence."
"Oh, okay, well, anyway, it took Sandi years to get over it. She wouldn't even speak to Tiffany for three whole years!"
"What? She stayed mad at Tiffany?"
"Mmm-hmm. She was madder at Tiffany than she was at Jane. They eventually made up, but Sandi can sure hold a grudge."
Three different stories, three different views of the same event. And from that muddle of memories, somewhere was the truth.
Daria stared at her ceiling. One thing she could glean was that it had taken Jane a long time before she was comfortable trusting other people again, but long enough that the memory of the event was not important to her anymore.
She had had no trouble trusting Daria and Tom. No fallout left over for them.
But, and this bothered her, what if Jane hadn't lost Tiffany as a friend, or what if she had made up with her before Sandi had? Would she be the same? Would Tiffany be less superficial or would Jane be more shallow? Would Jane be more tolerant of yes-men?
Would Jane even have still needed Daria's friendship, or even wanted it? Would she still have had to attend the self-esteem class where they'd first met?
But even that did not bother her as much as the realization that, if Tiffany had been a stumbling block to their friendship, it would have been Daria that would have tripped, not Jane.
I know myself too well, she thought sourly.