Raven (Orphans 4)

There were many fewer students at the school I now attended and only about a dozen or so boys I would consider as good-looking as Ronnie Clark. I agreed with Jennifer that I could never expect any of them to take any interest in me, but to my surprise that very afternoon after Jennifer and her friends had teased me about Clarence Dunsen, a chubby boy named Gary Carson bumped into me

deliberately between classes, and when I turned to complain, he smiled and said, "Jimmy Freer likes you."

He hurried on, leaving me confused. I knew who Jimmy Freer was. He was captain of the junior varsity basketball team, tall for his age, and very, very good-looking. He was right at the top of Jennifer's wish list, and I never even dreamed he would be looking at me, but at lunch he was suddenly right behind me when I went to buy some milk.

"That's the healthy choice," he quipped. I turned and, for a moment, was too surprised to speak. "Most everyone else is buying soda."

"I don't drink much soda," I told him. "Milk's okay." I paid for my milk and headed for the table where Terri and some of the other girls I liked were sitting, but he caught up with me.

"How about sitting with me?" he asked, and nodded toward an empty table on our right.

I gazed at the girls, who were all looking my way with interest, and then I turned and saw Jennifer and her friends staring at me, too. It warmed my heart to see the jealousy in their faces and made me smile.

"Okay," I said. He led the way and set his tray down across from me.

"How do you like the school here?" he asked, dipping his spoon into his bowl of chicken rice soup. "It's okay."

"Is that your favorite word?" he joked.

"No. Sometimes I say it's not okay."

He laughed, and I noticed what a nice smile he had and what a perfectly straight nose. I liked the way a small dimple in his right cheek appeared when he talked. His dark brown hair was cut closely on the sides, but he let a wave sweep back from the front. He had beautiful hazel eyes, bejeweled with flecks of blue, green, and gold on soft brown. No wonder he was everyone's heartthrob, I thought, and tried to look cool and sophisticated under his gaze. I could feel the way everyone was looking at us in the cafeteria. It made me think I was on a big television screen and every little move I made was magnified. I brushed my lips quickly with my napkin, afraid a crumb might be on my mouth or chin.

"So you're living with Jennifer, huh?" he asked.

"Sort of," I said.

"Sort of?"

"I don't call it living," I told him, and he laughed again. Then he smiled, his eyes drinking me in so intently I felt as if I were sitting there naked.

"I had a feeling you were smarter than most of the girls in junior high school here."

"I'm hardly smarter."

"You know what I mean," he said with that impish gleam in his eyes.

"No, I don't."

He laughed and grew serious. "Have you been to any school basketball games yet?"

"There's a big one coming up tomorrow night with Roscoe. We beat them once, and they beat us once this year. Why don't you come?" he asked.

"I don't know if I can."

"Why can't you? Don't you believe in having school spirit?" he asked with that teasing smile returning.

"It's not that. I don't know if my uncle will let me out," I said.

He grew serious-looking and ate as he thought.

"Why?" He leaned toward me to whisper. "Did you have a bad record at the last school you attended or something?"

"Sure. I'm on the post office walls everywhere," I said. He stared a moment and then roared so hard that kids who were sitting nearby stopped talking to look at us.

"You really are something. Come on, come to the game. Afterward, Missy Taylor is having a small house party. We'll have a good time, especially if we beat Roscoe. Can I hear you say okay again?"

"I can't make any promises," I said, but I really wanted to go.