by Ann Braden
Bryce may be somewhere else, but he knows to shake his head “no” to that one. Knows that crying would be the worst thing in the world to admit to. But I’m pretty sure every single time he stops himself from crying, his nightmare factory just goes and creates another doozy for when he falls asleep.
“Well, don’t you touch me,” Lenny says. “I don’t want to get whatever gross eye thing you got going on. And be a man about it. No complaining, okay?”
When Lenny leaves the kitchen, Bryce gets the ketchup out of the fridge, and I don’t stop him when he brings the whole bottle back to the bedroom.
Bryce takes the two rocks to bed with him that night. At least when he wakes up from his nightmares, the rocks are right there for me to hand to him all over again. Lenny might be good for our family in general, but I’m not so sure he’s good for Bryce.
CHAPTER 8
I put the debate packet in my backpack the next morning and have it with me when I get onto the bus—in part to get back at Lenny’s friend for leaving those notes, but mostly because I want to.
Because I’m going to be top of my game today. I already managed to get Bryce and Aurora out the door on time, even though Bryce kept whacking things with his lightsaber every time I turned my back.
There’s even a spot on the bus right close to the driver so I don’t have to be anywhere near Kaylee and her nose. I sink into the seat and exhale.
When Matt Hubbard climbs up the stairs with his trumpet case, I peek to see if he looks at me. I can’t tell, though. He might have, but it also might have been a mistake, because usually someone else sits here.
Unfortunately, there are four hours between when I arrive at school and the Social Studies and Science Interdisciplinary Block. And even though I try to channel Silas’s impenetrable wall, stuff finds its way in anyway. Side-looks at my clothes. Extra-long sighs from my teachers when I haven’t done the homework.
And by the time I walk into social studies, I’m a mess. Just thinking about all those people looking at me while I’m up in front of the class has my hands doing their shaking thing.
Why? Why is this so scary? It’s not running out of food. It’s not losing our place to live. It’s definitely not Aurora trapped in the middle of Route 3.
I try to take a deep breath. Around me, kids are going back and forth between the social studies and the science room where the wall usually is, and they don’t seem nervous at all.
But I can’t stop my hands from shaking, and when I take my packet out to put it on my desk, it’s like a trembling white flag just trying to call attention to itself.
What if I do it without the packet? I know my octopus facts cold, right?
But as soon as I try to imagine what I would say, I can’t remember anything. Everything has cleared out. It’s like peering into an empty apartment the day after you’ve been evicted. The only thing there is a stray dirty sock that got left in the corner.
“All right, everyone,” Ms. Rochambeau announces, while Mr. Peck settles down some kids at the back of the science room. “Today will mostly be focused on the second part of the debate: the question and answer period. Your goal is to get your fellow classmates to realize that your animal is better than the one they selected. A debate is always about getting someone to look at things in a new way.”
Matt Hubbard raises his hand and asks something, but it’s like I’m underwater, and not in an octopus sort of way.
I’m going to need the packet and I’ll be worse than Calvin. I’m going to be a blubbering, shaking mess. Exactly who is going to change their mind about me based on that?
Exactly no one.
I stand up to sign out for the bathroom even though I was just there during English class. And on my way to the door, I do what I need to do.
I drop my packet in the trash can.
When I’ve finally gotten my hands to stop shaking and I come back to class, Ms. Rochambeau asks where it is.
But all it takes is a simple response.
“I forgot it.”
Ms. Rochambeau’s Raised Eyebrow of Disappointment only works if I’m looking at it.
I did the right thing, too, because when I take my seat again Holly Macnamore is trying to answer questions from Kaylee about giraffes, and it’s not going well. Holly is nice. She went to the other elementary school and she and her friends let Fuchsia and me sit at their lunch table. We sit at two separate ends of the table, but still.
“Aren’t they going to get neck issues when it’s so long and skinny?” points out Kaylee. “And how can they hide from lions? Also, I don’t see why—”
Ms. Rochambeau cuts her off before she can pile on any more.
Holly is all red and practically hyperventilating and both Nellie Abbott and Taylor Dixwell have their hands up like lions all ready for that giraffe.
“Remember to give the person you’re asking the chance to answer one question at a time,” says Ms. Rochambeau. “Holly, would you like to respond?”
Holly practically whispers. “Actually I think owls are better than giraffes anyway.” And she sits back down.
Kaylee smirks and I can see her moving the points from the giraffe column to the owl column in her head.
I cross my arms and in my head I tally up all the many points that belong in the octopus column. Maybe no one else knows it, but I do.
I glance at Matt. And at least I didn’t embarrass myself.
On the bus the next morning, Matt definitely doesn’t look at me as he gets on, and he definitely doesn’t look at me when he passes me in the hallway on his way to his locker. Maybe he caught sight of me once from his cozy spot on that tropical island of his, but he probably just decided it was the sun hitting a wave in a funny way. Or maybe a seagull.
Certainly not someone on the verge of drowning.
“What’s wrong with you?” Fuchsia says, appearing at the locker next to mine.
I try to rearrange my face. “I’m fine,” I say.
“Please,” she rolls her eyes. “Spill it. What’s up? Annoying grown-ups? Freaky nightmares? Boy drama?” She sucks in her breath. “You winced! That’s it, isn’t it?”
What is wrong with my face?
“There is no boy drama.” No winces. No twitches. Especially because Fuchsia is the I-heard-that-boy-laughing-at-your-hair-so-I-punched-him-in-the-stomach-and-you’re-welcome kind of friend. At least that’s what she did in first grade. Before that we’d hung out because no one else wanted to be friends with us, but we were actual friends after the punching. Now she’s less likely to actually punch someone since middle school punishments equal getting suspended and having to spend the day at home with her mom, but that’s probably for the best.
“Sure there isn’t.” She nods. “Who is it?”
“No one.”
“So, this no one likes you and you aren’t interested? Or this no one is older and gross and sending you perverted text messages?”
I stare at her. “I don’t even have a phone.”
She sighs. “So, it’s the other way around then: you like him, and he won’t give you the time of day.”
“We should be talking about you,” I say. “How’s Jane Kitty?”
“Don’t change the subject. Spill it. Who is it?”
She cocks her head, twirls a strand of pink hair, and stares me down. Like she’ll be completely and thoroughly insulted if I don’t tell her. But also like she might threaten to announce it to the world if I do.
I look away. When I had to move away during the spring of second grade, Fuchsia didn’t talk to me for the whole week before I left. It didn’t matter that she had moved plenty herself; her moves were always to somewhere else in town. What I was doing was unforgivable. When I moved back to town in fifth grade, she was cooler than before. Not actually cool, but more eye-roll-y and sigh-y and clothes-rip-y. She was still with one of her foster families then, and she claimed that she didn’t care what they did or said, but when I saw the fifteen-year-old sister at after-school picku
p one time, I realized that Fuchsia’s hair had been dyed just like hers.
“I’m waiting!” she says.
The wall’s bright white paint along the edges really helps the dark red brick stand out. If I were an octopus I’d be able to switch my skin to that exact brick pattern and blend right in.
“Fine,” Fuchsia huffs. “Be that way.” She walks away, and I’m left staring at a solid brick wall.
Matt isn’t in homeroom for some reason, which helps make the case for the lack of boy drama. Maybe he’s gone poof and suddenly stopped existing all together. That would solve a lot.
Unfortunately, Ms. Rochambeau hasn’t gone poof because Mr. Bontaff drops a note on my desk.
Zoey,
Mr. Peck gave me the okay to switch your Wednesday Ace Period schedule. You’ll no longer have extra help for science but instead will be required to attend the debate club I ’m running in the library during that time. Bring a pen or pencil and a notebook. Also, next time you’re throwing away your debate packet, you should use the paper recycling instead of the trash.
See you soon,
Ms. Rochambeau
Honestly? She went through the trash? Maybe she is more like me than I thought. But in what alternate universe do I belong in the debate club? I couldn’t even handle standing up for two minutes to talk in class.
When Mr. Bontaff calls everyone to attention and announces that it’s time for the student council election speeches, I stuff the note in my pocket. Maybe I’ll be forced to go to her stupid debate club, but there’s no way I’m participating. At least I have a say in that.
Our homeroom shuffles down to the multipurpose room, and as soon as I get there, I realize why Matt wasn’t in homeroom: because he’s running for seventh grade class president.
Up at the front of the room, the kids around Matt are fidgeting, but he’s completely still, as though preparing to give a speech in front of a hundred-something kids is no big deal. If I had to stand up there at that podium, I’d probably blurt out “octopus” and pee myself.
Ms. Rochambeau is bustling about up in front, in charge of the whole thing. Of course. I wonder if she ever got married. I might not like her, but I hope she did just to show that friend of Lenny’s.
As our homeroom sits down in its row, I see Amanda Dubois and Nicole Rochefort from Ace Period science extra help sitting together two rows in front of me. Even though I mostly spent the periods cleaning Mr. Peck’s hermit crab tanks, I liked the time with them. After they’ve finished doing their work, Amanda and Nicole can draw the best poodles, and they didn’t mind that I’d peek over their shoulder. I wish there were kids like them on my bus or in my homeroom, kids that aren’t all fancy-pants like Matt and aren’t grimy like me and Fuchsia.
Meanwhile, in our homeroom row, fancy-pants Kaylee Vine and Nellie Abbott are making eyes at my shirt like it once mugged them in a dark alley. In my head, I spin my octopus funnel to point directly at them and dose them with a generous helping of freezing cold salt water.
I look around for Fuchsia, but she’s in the alternative classroom, and they don’t always come for grade level assemblies.
The speeches are boring. One girl talks for a long time about what kind of vending machine we should have in the cafeteria, but since you can’t stick your free lunch ticket into a vending machine, I could care less about that.
When Matt stands up and walks to the podium I lean forward to see better. He has to be nervous. Are his hands shaking? How can they not be? How can he look so calm? There are so many people watching him. It’s like he’s not even human.
“Principal Fitzgerald, teachers, staff, my fellow classmates,” he begins. “Thank you for this opportunity to speak. I’ll keep it short, since I know there are more people that need to give speeches after me, and there’s only so long you can listen to people talk about themselves.”
He looks up from his piece of paper and smiles. A few people around me giggle at his joke, and someone yells out, “Hubbard!” before a teacher hushes them—but all I can see is that smile. A real smile. Even when he was making a joke about himself. Like he knew everyone would get the joke because who doesn’t think he should be standing up there? Like he couldn’t even imagine someone calling him grimy or stupid or lazy or a troublemaker.
He goes on about how hard he works and how he’ll work for the seventh grade so that we’re represented in the way that we deserve. He says more stuff. And then he sits back down.
Other people stand up and talk, but I can’t take my eyes off of Matt.
Because, suddenly, I know: This isn’t some crush on a boy. This is me wanting to feel the way he does. Strong. Confident. Like no one would even think about messing with me.
Too bad that’s even more impossible.
And just in case I needed the impossibleness of that to wave its giant hands in my face more directly, when I show up at the library for Ace Period debate club, guess who’s sitting smack in the middle of one of the circular library tables like he owns the place?
Matt Hubbard.
CHAPTER 9
This would be a good time to turn around. I can still hide out in the bathroom all period if I need to.
“Zoey!”
I turn to see Mr. Herd, the librarian, standing on a chair next to a bulletin board for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, an open stapler in his hand. “Are you going to be doing debate for Ace Period? That’s fabulous.”
Right. Fabulous.
Ms. Rochambeau is coming toward me. “It’s good to see you here. Do you have a pen and notebook with you?”
I nod. I don’t say that I have no plans to actually use them.
She hands me a laptop. “Then, you’ve got everything you’ll need.”
I eye the other kids. They’re all looking at Ms. Rochambeau like eager beavers. I mean, there’s no way I could ever be like them.
“Okay, everyone, find a seat,” Ms. Rochambeau says. “Let’s get started. And Mr. Hubbard, get off that table.”
I slip into a chair at the table farthest away, but Ms. Rochambeau is having none of it. “Zoey, come sit up here.” She motions to a chair next to a girl who must have gone to the other elementary school and who I think is in my English class.
All the kids go blurry when I make the switch from one chair to the other, but once I sit down they start to come back into focus. The girl does seem to be the same one who’s in my English class, unless there are two brown-haired girls with a long braid and a habit of drawing cats all over their notebooks.
But more importantly, the other person at the table is Matt Hubbard.
Octopuses are supposed to smell like geraniums when they get stressed, and I’m pretty sure this whole library now smells like a bunch of geraniums exploded.
Ms. Rochambeau has dragged a rolling whiteboard over and holds a dry-erase marker over her head. “Now, you must always remember that the purpose of debate is to convince someone to see something in a new way.”
I take a deep breath. I just have to stay calm. I’ve had plenty of practice blending in and doing nothing in all of my regular classes. And Ace Period only happens on Wednesdays. What’s forty minutes once a week? I open my notebook, uncap my pen, rest my chin in my hand, and stare at a spot on the whiteboard just a bit to the side of Ms. Rochambeau’s head. I’ve got this. I just have to keep my leg from going all jittery.
Ms. Rochambeau goes on about how a “resolution” is the statement in the debate that you’re either arguing for or against, and other stuff, too, like about how if you’re confident in what you say, people will take you more seriously. She says the word confident sixteen times in the space of five minutes.
I counted.
But one great thing about Ace Period debate is that everyone else likes to talk a whole lot, and none of the kids seem to care when I sit here totally mute. I manage to make it through the period unscathed. No embarrassment. No jittery leg. No total reveal of the mess I’d be if I had to stand up at a podium. And nothing for Ms. R
ochambeau either. Because she might want me to jump through some silly hoop, but too bad.
Dolphins might jump through hoops, but I’m an octopus.
My mom doesn’t have any hours at the restaurant today, and I find her at home sorting through the mountain of laundry while Hector takes clothes out of the pile and flings them around. Frank is watching one of his news programs and flossing his teeth.
“I’m going to walk to the laundromat,” my mom says. “Lenny never has time to drive me, and this washing machine isn’t about to start working again.” She sighs and looks at the clothes still outside of the laundry basket. “But I can only take the important stuff. I can’t carry it all.”
I look at what’s in the laundry basket. “Why is it just Lenny’s stuff?”
She looks down like she hadn’t noticed. “Well, you know how important it is to him to look put-together for work, and last night he was saying that he didn’t have any clean pants to wear.”
The pile of laundry already in the basket is pretty big, but I dig around in the leftover clothes until I find Aurora’s pink sparkly leggings that desperately need to be washed. I hold them up for my mom to see. “Can these go in, too?”
My mom’s eyes widen. “What happened to those knees?”
“Aurora was crawling around on the sidewalk, pretending to be Bryce’s cat, and that’s from the rock salt.”
She laughs and deposits the leggings into the laundry basket. “She does make a good cat, doesn’t she?”
I nod. “Her meow is so good I keep thinking there’s an actual cat around.”
“Maybe Bryce will stop asking for a real one,” my mom jokes. “Because that sure isn’t happening.”
“Well, he hasn’t brought it up in a while, so maybe.” There’s something about Bryce that’s not-exactly-Bryce recently. He’s stopped asking about a cat, and there was all that extra lightsaber whacking this morning.
I eye the rest of the laundry. I want to add some of my clothes, but then I see Bryce’s favorite Star Wars shirt that he spilled ketchup down the front of, and I grab that instead.
