Mr. Henderson said he’ll call Kentucky Fried Chicken on Cumberland Road tomorrow to get in chicken and chips for any of us who wanted to eat lunch at school, and we'd pay $1.50 apiece. Me and Jennifer couldn’t decide if we wanted to stay with the other kids, because they keep picking on us, or else ignoring us most of the time, and we’re kind of left out of things. But I told Mom about it and she said we should go, we’d probably enjoy it. So we did.
Mr. Henderson stayed and ate with us, and we had cokes and individual boxes with portions of chicken and chips, and everyone seemed nicer than usual. There was one box of chicken and chips left over, and Mr. Henderson thought we should have a quiz for the chicken, and a spelling bee for the chips. So he asked geography questions and Marc LaPointe - he’s really good in geography - he won the chicken. And Kerry was really mad, and threw his empty box in the aisle, and I’m sure he tried to hit Marc.
I won the spelling quiz, but I didn’t really feel like eating any more chips, so I gave mine to Kerry and he was very nice about accepting them. Mark didn’t eat all his chicken either, he divided a big piece up between his best friend and Kerry, so everything turned out okay, after all.
Funny about that. It’s not any of the guys really who’re giving me and Jennifer a hard time. Like, they don’t seem to care about any of that stuff. It’s just the girls. We don’t really have anything much to do with the guys. Like, we know they’re there, and they know we’re there, but neither of us seem to care too much.
Except for one bunch of guys and they’re stuck-up, like Pearl’s group of pasty-faces, and they get together all the time. We think that’s fine, as long as they leave us alone, but they kind of like to put us down all the time. Big thrill.
We had a home-room period last thing that day, and Mr. Henderson was out of the room for a minute, before the bell rang. Pearl and Michelline and Sally started talking about me and Jennifer, real loud. And they were saying really stupid things, like how cheap we are, and how we think we’re better than anyone else.
And it’s not true, and they know it. We don’t think we should have to do any more explaining, and we won’t. Most of the other kids just ignored them, and started to get their stuff together for the bell, and to go home. It was a really nice and warm day, and everyone wanted to get outside.
For the first time I can remember, Laura spoke up for us and said we’ve got a right to do what we want to, but they just ignored her. I guess they know she’s still Sally’s friend, and they don’t want to pick on her, or anything. But they sure went at us with a fury, and my face was red and so was Jennifer’s, but we didn’t say anything, except I said “stuff it!”. And me and Jennifer left before the bell rang, for our lockers. Even before the day’s announcements, and you’re not supposed to.
As soon as we left the room, both of us started to feel so bad, like we couldn’t show it in the classroom. But we were both crying a little, and we got our stuff all together, and were just about to go, when Mr. Henderson came back in in a big hurry and asked where we thought we were going.
“I just leave the room for a minute, and when I get back, two of you are gone. Do you call that being responsible, girls of your age?” I guess he finally noticed we weren’t saying anything much, just looking glum. Then he said, “what’s wrong?”
“Nothing, Sir”, Jennifer said. Then she burst out crying real loud, and he looked anxious.
“What’s the matter, Jennifer?” he said, turning to me. “What’s happened to Jennifer? Oh, you know what I mean.”
“Nothing, Sir” I said. And then I started bawling. “We’d like to go home, please”, I said, through my snotty tears. “Before any of the other kids come out. Please.”
He looked like he didn’t know what to do. But he said, “all right, girls. I’d like to have a talk with you both. But I can see now is not the time.”
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