Tenth Grade Bleeds Read Online Free

pens, and other school supplies inside. His locker already looked messy. Vlad closed the door.
    Eddie was waiting for him. And he wasn’t smiling.
    Neither was Vlad. “What do you want, Eddie?”
    â€œJust to show you my new camera. You like it? I saved up all summer for it. Must have mowed every lawn in Bathory to afford this baby.” He patted the camera gently, his eyes never leaving Vlad’s.
    Vlad shrugged. “It’s nice, I guess. I don’t know much about cameras.”
    â€œI do. I know about lots of things.” Eddie’s normally quivering jaw set, a determined look in his eyes. Determined to expose Vlad’s secret. “Anyway . . . see ya around, I guess.”
    â€œYeah . . . and you can bet I’ll be seeing you.” Vlad watched Eddie walk away, his mood plummeting. He’d never be normal. He’d never fit in. And this kid was out to tell the world why.
    Henry walked past Eddie, glaring at him the entire time. Eddie shrank away, and Vlad felt just a little bit better about their encounter. Henry opened his locker. “So what did the National Enquirer want anyway?”
    Vlad shrugged. “The usual, I guess.”
    He glanced over at Eddie, who had stopped at the drinking fountain for a sip, and bit his bottom lip. “He’s not going to stop until he exposes me, Henry. He’s different this year. Last year he was just annoying. But now . . . it’s like he’s got something to prove, and that something is me.”
    Henry grabbed his English and science books and closed his locker. His forehead was creased, as if he was troubled. “Don’t worry about it, Vlad. We’ll figure something out. After all, it’s just Eddie Poe. He’s nothing. He’s empty space.”
    Vlad nodded, unsure if he agreed with Henry’s assessment of the situation. Eddie might be a nobody, but a determined nobody could find his way into being a somebody if the right opportunity presented itself. Trying to push those troubling thoughts from his mind, he frowned down at his schedule. He didn’t share any classes with Henry or Meredith this year, which didn’t exactly give him a lot to look forward to. After receiving a friendly slug in the shoulder from Henry, he grabbed the teal book with a picture of what looked like a brain holding hands with a piece of broccoli on the cover and headed down the hall to first period.
    Health class. Whoever had decided that forcing kids to sit in a room together while a teacher blushes and stumbles over the ins and outs of sex and drugs and puberty was a good idea should have realized that kids already know most of the stuff by the time they hit high school, and the stuff they don’t know, they really, really don’t want to hear from an old windbag like Mr. Cartel.
    Mr. Cartel was born before the beginning of time, and he seemed to look fondly on those pre-dinosaur years, as he couldn’t help but comment on how things had been when he was a kid. Vlad had heard the horror stories about health class with Mr. Cartel. He’d been warned about the weird wheezing noise he made when he breathed, and about the fact that every time he was forced to say the word gonads he would stutter. But Vlad hadn’t been prepared for the life-size posters of two naked people and all their naked bits. Nor had he been prepared for the desktop models of the human reproductive systems.
    Oh. My. God.
    Vlad’s face flushed as he did a quick head count on the way to his desk. Twelve girls, eight guys, one very old teacher, and way too many naked parts at the front of the class. It was like a scene out of his worst nightmare.
    Suddenly he was relieved that Meredith didn’t share first hour with him.
    He took a desk in the back, as far away from all the nakedness as he could possibly get. No one, of course, was sitting in the front row. Mr. Cartel waited quietly until the bell rang, then leaned back in his