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falls out of my head. I don’t know if this will really do much good, since if I freeze with terror, mere prompting will not be of much use. On the other hand, knowing Mikey will be there calms me down a little. It’s like having a life jacket.
    Hah! Little do I know what kind of life jacket he will turn out to be.
    To my dismay, I have not been able to parlay my time working on the skit with Tiffany into anything bigger. This is partly because she is the busiest person in the eighth grade, with more clubs and committees and activities than any normal person could ever be involved with. It is also because I am stupid about this kind of thing and don’t have the slightest clue how to do it. So I treasure my memory of the two rehearsals and, more than anything else, the sound of her laughing at some of what I have done.
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    Despite my prayers, Friday arrives. I don’t suppose I really expected God to cancel it, though I would have been deeply appreciative if he had. I go through the day in a state of cold terror. The drama club meeting is after school. Members of the club have invited their friends, their families, and some teachers to come see the skits. There are going to be four skits in all. Tiffany, Laurel, and I are scheduled to go last, which gives me more time to sweat and worry.
    Mikey is backstage with us, but Tiffany does not know why. I tell her he came because he is my pal. Getting him aside, I check to make sure he has the script.
    At 2:45, Mrs. Whitcomb, the drama club coach, comes back to wish us luck. She makes a little speech, which she ends with, “Okay, kids, break a leg!”
    This, of course, is how people wish each other luck in the theater. According to my mother, the idea is that you’re not going to get your wish anyway, so you wish for the thing you don’t want, and you may get the thing you do want instead.
    I suddenly wonder if this is what I have been doing wrong all my life.
    On the other hand, Tiffany is standing next to me, so that is one wish that is continuing to come true.
    â€œAre you excited?” she asks.
    â€œYou have no idea,” I answer, with complete honesty.
    Laurel, who is standing on the other side of me, whispers, “I’m scared.”
    â€œDon’t worry, you’ll be fine,” I reply.
    I am fairly confident this is true, since I expect to make such an ass of myself that no one will notice anything else, anyway. Inside me, a small voice is screaming,
What were you thinking of, you moron? You are going to humiliate yourself in front of all these people, including the girl you would cut out your heart for, who will be even more humiliated than you are, because it’s her skit that you are messing up! Run away! Run away!
    If I could get my hands on this small voice I would gladly beat it to a bloody pulp. Instead I keep taking deep breaths and reminding myself how funny I was during the second rehearsal.
    The first skit goes up. I think it’s funny, but at first people don’t laugh. This terrifies me all over again. Then someone snickers. A moment later someone else lets out a snort. Pretty soon people are enjoying themselves. Clearly it takes people a while to get warmed up when they are trying to have fun.
    At first the sound of that laughter is soothing. People are ready to have a good time. But it takes only a few minutes for me to get terrified by it. What if they don’t laugh at our skit? Even worse, what if they laugh for the wrong reasons? What if Tiffany is totally humiliated and it’s all my fault?
    I go back to wanting to die.
    The second skit goes up, and dies in my place. It just lies onstage, stinking the place up like a week-old fish. It’s as boring as last month’s news. In fact, it’s almost as boring as Mr. Fessenden, which I would not have thought possible. I feel a surge of hope. We can’t possibly look worse than this. In fact, next to it we’ll seem like geniuses. Too