Page 9 - My FlipBook

Christine Hurley Deriso

wal , which forces her to sto as well, since I’m bloc ing
her ath.
o roblem.
I study her face. eally, I can s i the wor out today

if
It’s not a roblem, she re eats, glancing over my
shoulder at the e ui ment she needs to clean.
till, I hover there another second or two. ou’re sure
I ersist.
e .
he says it in a fast, cli ed voice.

hat’s the thing about this girl she can be so intim-
idating. he loo she’s giving me now I used to get the
same loo in English it last year any time I’d get the nerve
to s ea u . i e cloc wor , ade would turn around and
glance at me for ust a fraction of a second, li e she couldn’t
uite wra her head around what a doofus I was. Es ecially
that first day of class, when rs. le ander as ed what our
favorite boo was and my answer was the ible. orry my
answer wasn’t hi ster enough for ade. ut it was the truth.

Hey, I ran into alvin today at the grocery store, I tell
her, eager to find some common ground.
he stares at me for an e cruciatingly long moment,
then gives the slowest of nods.
It’s only now that it stri es me how lame my comment
was. he and alvin dated for a while, but I heard recently
that it fizzled.

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