Gemini Read Online Free Page A

second, then started talking rapidly,with forced cheerfulness. “You know what I was actually thinking? This whole Sadie Hawkins concept is pretty sexist and backward. Girls can ask guys out anytime they want, so why do we need a special occasion for it? Maybe we should all boycott this event on feminist grounds.”
    Juanita stared at Clara, her eyes alight. “I’m not saying you’re wrong, but you seem to feel very strongly about this all of a sudden. What’s up?”
    â€œNothing. Could we just please change the subject? Please?”
    Juanita squealed. “Oh, look at you! You’re nervous because you want to ask him out! Otherwise you would just be ignoring us.”
    Clara shook her head, and her voice rose to an unnaturally high pitch. “I don’t even know him! I haven’t even spoken to him!”
    â€œYeah, I know,” Juanita said. “But you think he’s cute, don’t you? Cute plus telescopes—what more do you need? So it seems that Bridget has once again accidentally hit the nail on the head. You are definitely asking Max to the dance.”
    â€œCan anyone hear me?” Clara asked. “Am I not speaking out loud? That is not going to happen, I promise you.”
    â€œSure it is,” I answered, brushing the crumbs from my fingers. “Because if you don’t ask him, then I’m going to ask him for you.”

5
Clara
    My main priority for the rest of that day was to avoid Max at all costs, which was a little tricky, since I didn’t even know which classes he was in. I wasn’t sure if Hailey was serious about asking him to the dance on my behalf, but I wouldn’t have put it past her. This was the girl who had convinced our fifth-grade teacher to make me go first for every class presentation, in order to help me get over my stomach-churning stage fright. Which didn’t even work.
    I had spent the last seventeen years trying to camouflage my shocking self with all the bits and pieces of normal life I could grab. My wardrobe was bland but never out of style; my musical tastes were borrowed from my classmates. My opinions, often sharp inside my head, were normally softened before being spoken out loud. When people talked about doing things that, because of my situation, I couldn’t possibly do—driving a car, riding a bike, skiing, kissing a guy—I tried not to point it out to them. I tried not to make anyone uncomfortable.
    And this, of course, included never attending a school dance, let alone asking a boy to one. I wasn’t sure what it would look like if Hailey and I tried to dance, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t a sight that anybody needed to see.
    Hailey, on the other hand, followed none of my rules. And she adored making people uncomfortable.
    So when I saw Max walking in the hallway up ahead of us, grinning and chuckling at something that Lindsey Baker was saying to him, my fear was instantaneous and instinctive. Before I even had time to think about it, I was babbling something to Hailey about needing to go back to our locker, and yanking her bodily away from Max and Lindsey.
    Later, when I saw him crossing by a few yards away, I was more prepared, and managed to distract Hailey with some questions about a recent scandal in the art world.
    The closest call came when he turned up in our fourth-period physics class. He arrived just as the teacher started to lecture, so Hailey couldn’t accost him, but all through class I didn’t hear a word that anyone said. Luckily, as soon as class ended, some guys got him involved in a discussion about sports. Hailey didn’t try to break in.
    Finally we arrived at our last and most pointless class of the day—art.
    Yeah, yeah, yeah, art is probably the most unique contribution of the human species, now that we know that chimpanzees can create tools and dolphins have a type oflanguage. Art may, in fact, be the one thing that elevates us above our