I Was a Non-Blonde Cheerleader Read Online Free

nowhere, Mr. Loreng shouted my name.
    “Miss Gobrowski!”
    It was like a light spring rain.
    “Yes?” I said, fighting back cardiac arrest.
    “Is that
gum
you’re munching on, or do you fancy yourself a cow?”
    Omigod, he did not just call me a cow on my first day of school in front of everyone. He was evil. My geometry teacher was pure evil. There was a round of twittering behind me. And did I mention that both the Britney-clone
and
Daniel Healy were in my class? I thought I was going to dissolve into a pool of Annisa goo on the floor.
    “No . . . it’s gum,” I said.
    “Well, we don’t allow gum chewing in this class,” he told me. “Kindly spit it out into your hand.”
    Shaking, I lifted my hand to my mouth and dropped the wad of grape Bubble Yum into my palm. The girl diagonally behind me let out a disgusted groan.
    “Now please come up here and deposit your gum in the garbage can.”
    How about I dump you in there right on your squirrelly little head?
I thought.
    I stood up slowly, glaring at the teacher, and tried to do what he said with as much dignity as possible—which wasdifficult, considering the badly stifled laughter that followed me. The gum wad hit the bottom of the pail with a nice, resounding thud. I had never been so embarrassed in my life. Or at least in the last hour or so.
    Mr. Loreng smiled condescendingly as I returned to my seat. “Thank you, Sport.” Spittle, spittle. And they wonder why kids today don’t like math.

    In English class I decided to be as invisible as possible. I took a nice, innocuous seat right in the middle of the room behind some guy who was so tall, he
had
to be the center of the basketball team. With any luck, no one would notice I was there.
    The class was reading
Romeo and Juliet
, which we had covered in English last year. Sweet relief! Something I knew! As two students read through the classic balcony scene, my eyes flicked to the clock. My first day was almost over. Of course, I could only imagine the shiny new brands of torture they had devised for me in gym.
    When the readers got to the point where Juliet starts talking about a rose by any other name smelling as sweet, Mrs. O’Donaghue stopped them.
    “Now, what does Juliet mean by this? What is she trying to say?” the teacher asked the class.
    Total silence. Five minutes to go, then gym, then I was outta here.
    “Come on, people. What does Juliet mean when she says ‘’Tis but thy name that is my enemy’?” Mrs. O’Donaghue was starting to grow frustrated. “I know you know this.”
    Students around me shifted in their seats and stared down at their books, avoiding eye contact. The teacher was clearly exasperated.
    Someone answer and put her out of her misery
, I thought.
    “Anyone?”
    Finally I couldn’t take it anymore. I raised my hand.
    “Yes? Annisa?”
    “Well, she’s saying that she loves Romeo for who he is and she would love him no matter what his name was. But she’s required to hate him because his last name is Montague—because the Capulets and the Montagues have been feuding for so long,” I explained. “Basically she doesn’t care about their feud, but she knows it’s going to cause problems between her and Romeo.”
    Mrs. O’Donaghue smiled. “You’ve read this play before.”
    “Yeah.”
    “Well, class. Annisa has made some very astute observations,” Mrs. O’Donaghue said, walking behind her desk. “I’d love it if some of you would take your cues from her and participate. I think it would make our time together a lot easier on all of us.”
    Suddenly I realized that everyone in the class was glaring at me.
    Gulp.
    I’d just broken another of Gabe’s rules: Never show up an entire class on your first day.
    The bell rang and I was out of my seat like a shot. I was blocked by a little crowd of girls near the door, one of whom was the Britney double. Up close I noticed she had the longest eyelashes I’d ever seen on a human being. In a normal time and