****
Fern showed up for fifth period, her right hand in a brace. “Early onset RSI,” she explained to her cluster of friends. “I’ll be fine, but I’m not allowed to use my hand to write or anything for a while. I’ve got a mini-voice recorder, so I can take notes that way, but I guess I’ll be relying on you for a while.”
“Actually, my pen ran out during history, so I can’t lend you my notes…” Maria looked apologetic and Victoria nodded.
“I had the same problem in Chemistry.”
“You can borrow my notes,” Emily offered.
“And mine,” Alexis said quickly. Regretting her comments that morning? I smirked, but my smile faded as I remembered what else Fern had missed that morning. I made my way to the newspaper meeting room feeling like I dragged myself through concrete.
Candice was in her element. “We’ve never had so many submissions. The hard part is going to be narrowing these down. I think we can fit ten each on the inside pages, but the cover will depend on Milo’s article.”
I swallowed. “About that. Can we talk a moment?”
Candice followed me to the door. “What’s up? Don’t tell me you haven’t written it. You’ve never missed a deadline.”
The pages that Taylor had torn up weren’t my only copy. I had the article on USB in my pocket, but I could not forget Taylor’s words as he’d ripped it up. You’re very good at manipulating public opinion. “I’m quitting the paper.”
“You can’t quit,” Candice said. “You’re deputy editor. If you need more time or the article’s a problem—”
“I wrote the article. The problem’s me.” I took a deep breath. “I’m not a real reporter. I’m not brave or dedicated or any of the things that people think I am. I don’t write the truth. I write what I want people to think the truth is— I’m a fake.”
Candice put her hand on my shoulder. “Everyone has doubts sometimes, Milo. They question their motivations, if they’re really writing for the right motives. But you don’t improve by quitting.”
I looked at my feet. “I’m never going to be a good reporter. I don’t even know if I’m a good writer. The best thing I ever wrote is an article that no one read the way I wanted.”
“And so you’re just walking out?” Candice stiffened.
It was even worse than I thought it would be. “I am.”
Candice followed me down the hall to yell at me. “You can forget ever coming back! I am never, never forgiving you for this, Milo!”
“Then don’t forgive me! I don’t care!” Distracted by my rejoinder, I was too slow to avoid collision with someone coming down the hall.
Taylor put his hands out to steady me. “What’s going on?”
My face burned, and I jerked myself away from him. “Nothing,” I replied at the same moment that Candice spoke.
“Newspaper business.”
Taylor looked between us. “I was hoping to talk to both of you about the newspaper representative for the formal.”
“You can relax,” I told him. “It’s not me anymore.”
Candice folded her arms over her chest and glared at Taylor. “Are you behind this?”
“No, he’s not! It’s my decision, Candice! I know you don’t like it, but tough!”
“You’ve never talked about quitting before! Even when no one in the entire school cared about the paper but us, even when we were ostracized by our entire peer group, you never let it get to you, but he shows up, and suddenly we’re not good enough for you anymore? Is that it?”
“Milo’s quitting?”
“Quit.” I stepped past Taylor and walked down the hall. “So you can relax. I won’t be writing any more articles.”
“You’re not quitting!” Candice yelled after me. “I’m firing you!”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her it didn’t work that way.
I reached my locker and leaned against it face-first. I’d thought high school life had been getting better.
I was still trying to summon motivation to open my locker when Fern found me.
“Milo! Taylor just told us you’d resigned! Is everything okay?”
“You’re asking me? I’m not the one wearing a cast!”
“It’s just a wrist brace,” Fern assured me. “I overdid it with the tickets Friday and then catching up on homework over the weekend. Speaking of the tickets—”
“I heard.”
“We’re having an emergency meeting to cut them out now. You’re welcome to join us.”
And see Taylor? I shook my head. “I should get going.”
“Did something happen? Taylor wouldn’t say anything about why you’d decided to quit.”
“It’s nothing.” I opened my locker. Something red fell toward me. I stepped back and it spilled everywhere, separating out into individual papers that fluttered to the ground. “What on earth?”
“The tickets! In your locker—” Fern gasped. “Milo, you took them?”
“What? No!”
“I can’t believe this!” Fern had tears in her eyes. “We worked so hard— I really thought the shelter meant something to you!”
“You’ve got it all wrong! Someone must have put them here—”
But Fern was backing away. “Just don’t. This is— I never want to talk to you again!” She turned, running down the hall, leaving staring students, craning their necks to see what the cause of the disturbance was.
Belatedly, I became aware of a presence behind me. “Littering in the halls?” Coach Burns crouched to pick up one of the tickets from the hall. “Or are these the tickets reported missing this morning? Theft of student property’s a serious offense. I think it’s time you had a little chat with the principal, Markopoulos.”
****
Chapter Eight
Every step in the direction of school Tuesday was an effort. “You can do this,” I told myself. “You’ve done it before. Just remember. Today cannot possibly be any worse than Monday.”
It was worse.
The paper was out, the stands half-empty. Knowing that the paper had been a success even without my contribution was a mixed relief. I glanced at the lead article and swallowed. WHY QUITTING NEVER WORKS. It was safe to say that Candice was still angry.
But as I made my way down the hall, it became apparent that I had bigger problems.
“Is that even real?”
“It looks like Milo’s handwriting. I sit next to him in Spanish, so—”
“But who would—” Stacey caught sight of me and nudged her friends. They melted away down the hall, leaving me with a clear view of what they’d been looking at.
It was an A3 poster, and written in the font the newspaper used for headlines was “EXTRA EXTRA: MILO REJECTED!” Pasted beneath that, enlarged so that the lines where it had been ripped up were clearly visible was my formal invite.
I tugged the page off the wall, crumpling it up. Behind me, I could hear snickers and furious whispers.
“Serves him right. Did you hear about the tickets—”
They were still talking about the tickets in AP English.
“I think it’s disgusting,” Alexis said. “Taking advantage of Taylor’s newness to the school and making friends with him, just to use him as stories! And pretending to work for the formal, just to sabotage it. I suppose that would have been a story too!”
“Milo quit the paper before the tickets were found,” Lily said. “He wouldn’t have done that if he was just in it for the story.”
“Because he already had what he wanted! In with the popular kids, Logan in trouble. He was probably trying to get Logan kicked off the team! You know Milo’s always had it in for the football team. Carson and Blake—”
“Maybe,” Taylor said, “before we get too carried away, we should hear what Milo has to say.”
There was a long pause.
“He’s not going to say anything. He’s been face down on his desk since he got to class—” Sarah Choi stopped suddenly.
I f
elt someone standing over me, a slight pressure on my arm and Taylor’s voice. “Milo?”
I was going to be sick again. “I didn’t take the tickets.”
“Then how did they end up out of my bag and in your locker?” Fern demanded. “They didn’t move themselves!”
“When the tickets were in your bag, were they loose?” Lily asked suddenly.
“What?”
“Did you have them loose or were they inside something?”
“I had them in a bag, of course. So nothing would happen to them.” Fern sounded puzzled.
“And was that bag in Milo’s locker, too?” Lily folded her arms. “Why would Milo go to the effort of removing all the tickets from the bag and putting them in his locker where they would fall out the first time he opened it, when they were right there in a bag that would have kept them secure and contained?”
“Maybe he wasn’t thinking?”
“Somewhere along the line when he was taking all the tickets out of the bag and trying to keep them from falling out of his locker, he must have thought ‘there has to be a better way.’” Lily’s voice was heaped with scorn. “Milo’s not stupid. The rest of you on the other hand…”
“What are you implying, Lily?”
“I find it weird that with all the drama in your life, Fern, you’re always the victim.”
“How can you say that? You took my history textbook the week before our exam—”
“I did not.”
“It was found in your bag!”
“Anyone could have put it there.” I heard a metallic thud as Lily kicked her booted feet up onto the desk.
“Are you seriously suggesting that the same person who took my history textbook took the tickets and planted them on other students? That’s insane.”
“Yeah,” Lily said. “I am. And I think she’s in this class.”
The classroom was so silent that even with my face against the desk, I could hear Fern inhale. “I am not going to stand for this. If you’re serious about what you’re saying, then I want to take this to the principal.”
There was a clatter as Lily stood. “Ready when you are.”
“Me, too.” Declan had been uncharacteristically silent until now. “If you remember, I gave you the same suggestion last week.”
“Fine!” I’d never heard Fern so angry. “At least I know who my real friends are—”
“Good morning, class— good-bye.” Mr. Perry’s voice sounded confused. “I didn’t think Wuthering Heights was bad enough to cause a general exodus. Perhaps it’s just as well we’re not starting Great Expectations until next semester.”
There was a general clatter as students returned to their seats and started opening books and getting out pens. I felt Taylor’s presence beside me shift away. It sucked. Even knowing how little he thought of me, some part of me was still desperate for his attention.
“As I should not have to remind you, your project for Wuthering Heights consists of a take-home essay written on a subject of your own choosing. Your homework assignment was to come up with the topic for your essay. I’ll be using this class to check that everyone has a suitable topic. Please have your assignment sheet ready on your desk, and you can use your spare time to start working on your essays.” Mr. Perry walked from desk to desk until he got to me. “Milo, you’ve been laying on your desk all class. This won’t do.”
I made a halfhearted attempt at agreement.
Mr. Perry shook his head. “Do you want a detention?”
I sat up. “Sure.”
Mr. Perry stared at me. “That— was not the reply I was expecting.” He paused. “You really want to go to detention?”
Ignoring the looks I was getting from my classmates, I nodded.
Mr. Perry pursed his lips but wrote me the misdemeanor slip. “That’s settled it. I don’t care what the Board says, we’re doing The Grapes of Wrath next year, and that’s final.”
****
Biology was tolerable only because we had a test and no one was allowed to talk. Taylor was waiting for me outside drawing, however. My heart sank as I saw what he held. A copy of the poster.
“Milo, we need to talk.”
I tried to step around him. “I don’t think we do.”
He blocked my way into the classroom. “I mean it. I wanted to say that I had nothing to do with this. I never saw the invite—”
“That was beyond obvious.”
“And if I had—” Taylor trailed off.
At a loss? I couldn’t even enjoy the strangeness of seeing him flustered. “You’ve got nothing to apologize for. Something like this isn’t your style. I know that.”
“I hate seeing you this upset. Is there anything I can do?”
“You can get out of my way.”
“I mean it. Milo, I—”
“Aw, a lover’s quarrel?” There was a snicker behind us.
Wearily, I turned.
Logan stood in the hall, Jordan and Boomer behind him. There was a gloating note in his voice. “Going to kiss and make up?”
A thought flashed through my head. I had three and a half more days of this ahead of me this week.
“That’s none of your business—” Taylor trailed off as I snatched the poster from his hand and turned. “Milo, what—”
Logan smirked at his friends as I walked up to him. “This will be good. What, do you think you can—”
Nobody was expecting me to punch Logan, not even me. Which was quite possibly the only reason I succeeded. I’m not really sure. All I remembered was that the crunch as my fist connected with Logan’s jaw was really satisfying, and then we were on the floor, Jordan’s arm around me as I tried to feed Logan the poster and Jordan tried to pull me off.
“He’s gone mental! Someone get a teacher!”
****
Principal Kim shook his head. “I don’t think I heard that right. You said that Logan was minding his own business and Milo punched him?”
“I’m not lying,” Logan croaked. He was holding an ice pack to his jaw. “I wasn’t doing anything!”
“I find that highly unlikely. You’re on the wrestling team, and Milo—” The principal paused.
“Milo has the physique of string cheese,” I supplied helpfully.
“I wouldn’t go that far.”
“Logan’s telling the truth. I was having a really bad morning, he was being a jerk, and I’d had enough.” My knee throbbed where I’d grazed it on the floor, my hand still tingled with antiseptic where the nurse had bandaged me up, and as if that wasn’t bad enough, I had a headache coming.
“A really bad morning,” the principal repeated. “Something to do with this?” He patted the poster on his desk. “Do you have reason for thinking Logan was involved in this?”
I hesitated, but shook my head. “He’s used the ‘extra, extra’ line to tease me before, but I’m not sure someone who thought ‘nostalgia’ was an insult has the mental capacity to paste sixteen pieces of paper back together or link it to me.”
“You see? Milo’s harassing me!” Logan whined. “He needs to be punished!”
I stared at him. It was really hard to believe that I’d ever been intimidated by Logan. In the presence of a greater authority, he caved embarrassingly.
“I’m still not entirely sure the incident wasn’t provoked,” the principal said. “But violence toward another student is not tolerated at Bernhardt, under any circumstances. You’ll not be joining any cross-country practices for the remainder of the semester, Milo.”
“He doesn’t even like cross-country! Make him give up the newspaper club!”
I stood. “Too late. I already quit.” I faced the principal. “Nothing you can do to punish me can possibly make me feel worse than I already do, so I’m going home.” I picked up my bag and walked out of the office.
Taylor was waiting in the corridor outside. “Is everything okay? I wanted to tell the principal what happened, but they wouldn’t let me in.”
“Everything is
fine.” I walked past him.
He jogged after me. “Everything is not fine! Milo, you need to talk to someone—”
I increased my pace. “Why? So you can tell me what a gross human being I am?” We had the attention of the kids in the hall now, people openly staring. “I have had it with talking to you!” I flung my way out of the school doors and toward the gate, my heart still thumping with adrenaline. I’d punched Logan, and I’d walked out of school.
My angry momentum gave out abruptly ten minutes later. I groaned, dropping to my knees in the middle of the sidewalk and putting my head in my hands. I’d punched Logan and I had walked out of school!
Immediately, someone collided with me. There was a pain as a knee dug into my back, a startled exclamation and then a weight on my shoulders. I pitched forward onto the concrete as the person hit the sidewalk ahead of me and ended up tangled in his limbs. He groaned, and I hastily uncurled.
“I’m so sorry, I had no idea— Taylor?”
He spat out blood and gravel, heaving himself onto an elbow. “Bloody hell! Why did you stop?”
“I didn’t know anyone was there!” I brushed the gravel off my own palms, holding out a hand to Taylor. “You followed me?”
Taylor shifted cautiously, sitting up. “You should come with a warning sign, seriously!” He looked at his hand, noticing the blood on it for the first time. “Milo Markopoulos, hazard.”
“Here.” I always had a packet of tissues in my bag. Taylor let me dab at his mouth. “It doesn’t look like a bad cut— look, we’re near the park; we can clean this up there.”
Taylor grunted, getting to his feet.
I let out a sigh of relief as he stood. If he’d broken anything tripping over me… “It’s this way. Come on.”
****
“A big flashing neon light. Maybe even a siren—”
I rolled my eyes, using my water bottle to dampen a tissue. “Stop being such a baby. You’re not that hurt!” I’d chosen the sunniest bench I could find, but it was still cold in Patriot’s Park.
“No thanks to you! Who stops dead in the middle of a footpath like that?” I had to duck out of the way of Taylor’s hand to keep ministering to his scraped chin. “Only you! You’re a— a menace! A danger to life and limb and peace of mind—”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“Am I really?” A snatch of laughter caught our attention, and we looked across the park. At the base of Captor’s Monument, a couple of tourists were taking selfies. Taylor lowered his voice as he turned back to me. “All I’m saying is that if Washington Irving was alive now, it wouldn’t be a Headless Horseman haunting this town.”
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