Perfect Escape Read Online Free Page A

all the time?
That made me wish I’d gotten out the ruler and helped him with his coins last night.
    But I had only a second to feel it before panic set in completely: Chub Hartley, his wide face pale and quivering, was standing between Mrs. Reading and Mr. Floodsay in the attendance-office vestibule.
    Mr. Floodsay was talking, animatedly waving a sheaf of papers in his hand, frowning so hard his glasses weren’t even touching the bridge of his nose. I wanted to keep walking. Willed my feet to move. But I was rooted to my spot, barely even registering it when Artie Morris hit me in the back with the door and shoved past me, saying, “Get out of the doorway, ’tard.”
    All I could do was watch. And suppose. And worry. And watch and suppose and worry some more. And then some more. A loop of awful.
    And when Mr. Floodsay put his hand on Chub’s back and turned, guiding Chub into Mrs. Reading’s office, I knew it was only a matter of time before all the horrible stuff I had worried about would come true.

CHAPTER
FIVE
    Here are the things I thought about during what would probably be the longest day of my life:
I really hated Chub Hartley for how stupid he was. But I hated myself for being even more stupid than Chub Hartley.
If God somehow got me out of this, I would do something huge, like… I don’t know… like put out one of those statues of the Virgin Mary on my front lawn and garden around it, like my friend Lia’s family does. Or build a wing on a church someday. Or maybe even both.
If Chub somehow kept me from getting in trouble, I would hang out at his house a few times, like he was always asking me to do, regardless of how stupid he was and how much he smelled likemildew. But I wouldn’t go to prom with him, no matter how many times he asked. There was a limit to grace.
    I sat through my classes, feeling jumpy and like my palms were vibrating and my eyeballs sweating. My knee pumped up and down nervously under my desk, and I bit my nails. Every time a classroom door opened or a teacher said my name, things got gray and grainy, and I had to remind myself to take a breath.
    In calc, everyone was eyeing me. Darian poked me in the back with his pencil eraser when Mr. Floodsay turned his back to us, but I refused to turn around to see what he wanted. I had a pretty good feeling I knew what it was anyway. He wanted what three-fourths of the students in that class (and half of the students in the third-period class, and all but one student in the seventh-period class) wanted: for me to tell them everything was going to be all right, which I, at the moment, could definitely not do.
    By the time I got to lunch, I was adding nausea and ringing ears to my list of stress maladies.
    Things were only made worse when Bryn stopped by my table, setting her tray down on top of my hand. Her face was set in hard lines.
    “Chub got sent home,” she said. “Word is he’s expelled.”
    I pulled my hand out from under her tray and used my forefinger to push it toward the edge of the table. “I’m eating,” I said by way of response. (I wasn’t. I was moving myorange chicken and rice around on the tray and trying to keep from hurling under the table.)
    Bryn’s eyes went slitty, and she cocked her head to one side. “Well, while you eat, think about this: If they sent Chub home, it’s probably because he gave them all the information they wanted.”
    I picked up my fork and stabbed a piece of chicken nonchalantly, hoping Bryn would just go away… like a dissipating fart. Which, now that I thought about it, was the best possible way a person could describe Bryn Mallom. “Or he gave them none,” I said, shoving the chicken into my mouth and chewing, despite the protests of my stomach. I offered her a confident smile, even though on the inside I was thinking,
Oh, God! He told them everything!
    Fortunately, Shani and Lia showed up then, carrying fruit plates and biscuits—an odd combination, even for Shani, who liked