Also, he should know by now we’re not allowed to talk during Homeroom.
Wednesday, December 10, Algebra, 9:30 a.m.
I just saw Lilly in the hallway. She whispered, “Don’t forget! Ten o’clock! Don’t let me down!”
Well, the truth is, I did forget. The walkout! The stupid walkout!
And poor Mr. Gianini, standing up there going over Chapter Five, not suspecting a thing. It’s not his fault Mrs. Spears didn’t like Lilly’s term paper topic. Lilly can’t just arbitrarily punish all the teachers in school for something one teacher did.
It’s already nine thirty-five. What am I going to do?
Wednesday, December 10, Algebra, 9:45 a.m.
Lana just leaned back and hissed, “You gonna walk out with your fat friend?”
I take real objection to this. Only in a culture as screwed up as ours, where girls like Christina Aguilera are held up as models of beauty when clearly they are in fact suffering from some sort of malnutrition (scurvy?), would Lilly ever be considered fat. Because Lilly isn’t fat. She is just round, like a puppy.
I hate it here.
Wednesday, December 10, Algebra, 9:50 a.m.
Ten minutes until the walkout. I can’t take this. I’m getting out.
Wednesday, December 10, 9:55 a.m.
Okay. I’m standing in the hallway next to the fire alarm by the second-floor drinking fountain. I got a hall pass from Mr. G. I told him I had to go to the bathroom.
Lars is with me, of course. I wish he’d stop laughing. He does not seem to realize the seriousness of the situation. Plus Justin Baxendale just walked by with a hall pass of his own, and he gave us this really weird look.
And yeah, I probably do look a little strange, hanging out in the hallway with my bodyguard, who is currently experiencing a fit of the giggles, but still—I do not need to be looked at weirdly by Justin Baxendale.
His eyelashes are really long and dark and they make his eyes look sort of smoky. . . .
OH, MY GOD! I CAN’T BELIEVE I AM WRITING ABOUT JUSTIN BAXENDALE’S EYELASHES AT A TIME LIKE THIS!
I mean, I am in a real bind here:
If I do not walk out with Lilly, I’ll lose my best friend.
But if I do walk out with everyone, I will be totally dissing my stepfather.
So I really only have one choice.
Lars just offered to do it for me. But I can’t let him. I can’t let him take the fall for me if we get caught. I am the princess. I have to do it myself.
I just told him to get ready to run. This is one time being so tall comes in handy. I have a pretty long stride.
Well, here goes.
Wednesday, December 10, 10 a.m., East 75th Street, beneath some scaffolding
I don’t get why she’s so mad. I mean, yeah, if everyone evacuates the building due to a fire alarm going off, it’s not the same thing as everyone leaving in protest against the repressive teaching techniques of some of the teachers.
But we’re still all standing in the middle of the street in the rain, and nobody has coats on because they wouldn’t let us stop at our lockers for fear we’d all be consumed in a fiery conflagration, so we’re probably going to get hypothermia from the cold and die.
That’s what she wanted, right?
But no. She can’t even be happy about that.