“What?” snapped Olivia Alvarez from across the aisle.
“Are you serious?” said her seatmate, Kaitlynne Bronson.
“Only a monster wouldn’t like The Fault in Our Stars,” Peighton said loudly.
“Exactly,” said Olivia and Kaitlynne in unison.
Peighton folded her arms and smirked.
“Are we having this conversation?” Sivan said to Rachel and Gertie. “Is this actually happening?”
“No one asked you,” Rachel sweetly said to Peighton.
“Don’t talk to us,” Brooklynn snapped.
Rachel’s smile grew wider. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I couldn’t hear you over the sound of my hair growing.” She waved her middle finger in the air and then flipped her long blond hair with it.
“Is he the only boy you haven’t blown?” Brooklynn asked, pointing at Sivan. Sivan shrank into herself. Gertie put a protective hand on her arm.
“No, that’s Brock Chuddford,” Rachel said. “But don’t worry. I will.” Brock Chuddford was the handsomest boy in the sophomore class. He was sitting up front right behind Mr. Kenner, because he wasn’t allowed to sit with his friends in the back, because he always ended up “roughhousing,” as Mr. Kenner put it. Brock Chuddford had been Brooklynn’s boyfriend freshman year. He was incredibly good-looking and popular, and he had dumped Brooklynn at a school dance because she was taking time away from his focus on lacrosse. Everyone had seen it happen and had witnessed Brooklynn’s subsequent screaming rage fit, which had required faculty intervention in the form of Ms. Bump dragging her to the office and calling her parents to pick her up. And though nobody would dare bring it up, everybody knew Brooklynn’s parents had made her go to a psychiatrist for a good six months after her freakout, because the school had strongly recommended it. Brooklynn was so obsessed with Brock Chuddford to this day that the school always made sure they had no classes together. So basically, by even speaking Brock Chuddford’s name, Rachel was bringing up the very worst wound Brooklynn had ever suffered—and throwing salt in it. Plus, like, hot sauce and lemon juice. And piss. And acid.
“You fucking bitch!” Brooklynn hissed, starting to get up from her seat. Peighton, the athlete, pulled her down while Kaylee shot devil eyes at Gertie. Ms. Deats noticed the commotion and called out, “Is everything all right, girls?” Mr. Kenner’s head snapped around and he glared at them. Even Brock Chuddford’s head turned around, but when he saw it had to do with Brooklynn, he quickly looked away. He was a little scared of her. Everybody was.
“Everything’s fine,” Rachel called back. “We’re just so excited to get to D.C.!”
“You girls,” Ms. Deats said fondly. “I love the enthusiasm. But stay calm now. You’re going to need your energy for three days of active learning!”
Brooklynn, Peighton, Kaylee, Rachel, Sivan, and Gertie smiled tightly and nodded. Mr. Kenner stared suspiciously at each of them in turn before resuming his study of whatever was going on outside the window.
“This isn’t over,” Brooklynn mouthed to Rachel.
“I’m sorry, I can’t hear you,” Rachel said. “Can you speak into this microphone?” She raised her middle finger again and tapped it. “Testing, testing … is this thing on? Gertie, can you talk into it and check?” She held it under Gertie’s mouth.
“Just wait,” Kaylee hissed. “We’re gonna do something in D.C.”
“I love when that one speaks,” Rachel said loudly to Sivan. “Isn’t it adorable when it has thoughts?”
“Oh my God, Rachel,” Sivan muttered, staring out the window. “You are not helping to defuse the situation.”
Brooklynn, Peighton, and Kaylee put their heads together and whispered. Sivan looked over nervously and caught Peighton’s eye. Peighton smiled slowly, like the Grinch.
Well, this couldn’t be good.
“We should totally sneak out tonight and find Danny Bryan,” Rachel whispered to Sivan and Gertie. “It’ll be so fun!”
“That’s absurd,” Sivan said. “Right, Gertie? Tell her it’s absurd.”
Gertie thought for a moment.
“Of course it’s absurd,” she said, and grew very quiet. Sivan and Rachel could tell she was deep in thought.
When the bus entered D.C., Alicia looked at Brian. It was that time, and they both knew it.
“Do you want to tell them, or should I?” Alicia said.
“Better if it’s me,” Brian said. “You’d probably apologize to them.”
Alicia felt mildly insulted. “Excuse me,” she said. “I would not. I would simply explain to them that in the context of this particular trip, with the focus on learning, it makes sense for them to—”
“Hand over your cell phones!” Mr. Kenner said in his booming, this-means-business voice.
The students stared at him in abject shock.
“Wh-what?” Olivia said, her lower lip quivering.
“But I need mine!” Gertie said, her voice hitting a slightly hysterical pitch. “I need mine because—because—I just do.” Sivan and Rachel looked at her sympathetically.
“You can’t be serious, dawg,” Brock said.
“I can be incredibly serious, Brock, and calling me ‘dawg’ is your first strike,” Mr. Kenner said. “School trip protocol says that no cell phones may be used except in an emergency.”
“But nobody ever follows school trip protocol!” Kaitlynne whined. “Ms. Bump let us use our phones two weeks ago on our tour of the hospital!”
“I am not Ms. Bump,” said Mr. Kenner. “I am Mr. Kenner. And I follow school protocol exactly.”
“But what if we need to use Insta … I mean, what if our parents need to contact us?” Gertie asked with evident desperation.
“I just sent an email to all your parents reminding them of the rule,” Mr. Kenner said. “They signed off on this rule when they signed your permission slips for this trip.”
“No one actually reads the permission slips, though,” Peighton grumbled.
“That’s not my problem, Peighton,” Mr. Kenner said. “They have my cell phone number if they need to get in touch. I’ll have it on all day and all night. Now give me your phones.” He pulled out a backpack and walked slowly up and down the aisle, collecting the now-
contraband phones from the very, very, very unhappy students. Kaylee in particular looked as if she might burst into tears.
When Brian got back to the front of the bus, he handed over the backpack to Alicia.
“I assume I can trust you with this,” he said without a hint of emotion or good humor.
“Obviously,” she said testily, taking the backpack from him. She resented his flat tone, even if his eyes did twinkle in a really cute way. And those cheekbones …
“You know how this trip goes, but let’s go over it one more time,” Brian said, turning back to the students. “Today we’re at the Holocaust Museum, then dinner, then we’re at the hotel. Tomorrow we have breakfast at the hotel. Then we go to the National Museum of the American Indian, where we will eat lunch. This will be followed by the Air and Space Museum, and then dinner, and then the hotel. The next day is our last day. We will eat breakfast at the hotel, head to the White House, and then head home. Got it?”
“Got it,” everybody said.
When they pulled up beside the Holocaust Memorial Museum, Brian told all the students that their luggage would stay on the bus.
“Just bring some money for the gift shop,” Alicia said, loud and clear. She was tired of him taking the lead on this trip. “And any medication you may need. Carter, don’t forget your inhaler.” Carter Bump, Ms. Bump’s pudgy, awkward, deeply asthmatic nephew, nodded.
“Let’s go, team,” Brian said, and looked at Alicia. “You ready?”
“Of course,” she said, and followed him off the bus. She even believed it when she said it.
The students waited uncomfortably in the lobby of the museum as Mr. Kenner and Ms. Deats conferred with a staff member about their group reservation. Rachel gazed
around the space with wide eyes. There were signs for exhibits on the Holocaust, the German invasion of Poland, the camp at Auschwitz, films and literature inspired by the Holocaust, and more. One sign in particular caught her attention.
“Why is there an exhibit on Rwanda?” she whispered to Sivan.
“Part of the museum’s purpose is to educate people on other genocides that have happened since the Holocaust,” Sivan said. “That was one of my grandfather’s big things when he was on the planning commission.”
“Wow,” Rachel said quietly. “That’s pretty cool. I mean, it’s not cool. But you know what I mean.”
“I know what you mean,” Sivan said, smiling patiently.
“It’s a Jewish thing, right?” Carter Bump asked from behind Gertie. Gertie, Sivan, and Rachel turned to look at him.
“Is what a Jewish thing?” Sivan asked suspiciously. She got a lot of weird and, to be honest, sometimes offensive questions from kids about her Judaism whenever a Jewish holiday rolled around. Flemington wasn’t exactly a Jewish stronghold. Most of the kids were Catholic or Presbyterian. And dumb, not that their religion had anything to do with that. They just didn’t seem to care about anything that happened outside the mall and the school hallways.
“Social justice,” Carter said. “A commitment to social justice.” He looked at Rachel when he said it, and he blushed bright red. She smiled at him. It was pretty clear he’d always liked her, but Rachel was used to boys liking her. And there was something different about Carter, anyway. Something kind of special—in a friendly way, not a romantic way. Rachel was no snob, but she’d never go for Carter Bump. She had certain standards of sexiness to adhere to.
“I’m probably saying it wrong,” Carter said. “I don’t mean to sound offensive.”
“You don’t sound offensive,” Sivan said kindly. Carter was a nice kid. Nobody would call him “cool,” but Sivan generally didn’t have anything in common with the cool kids (primary example: the cuntriad of Peighton, Kaylee, and Brooklynn). “What do you mean?”
Carter hesitated, and then spoke in a rush. “I mean, like, whenever Ms. Deats teaches us about civil rights movements and things like that, it seems like there’s this Jewish presence. Like Jewish people are involved. Remember when she showed us video of that protest in New York in Harlem and those rabbis marched and they got arrested? I mean that’s just one example, so, I’m probably wrong.”
“Wow, Carter,” Rachel said sweetly. “I think that’s the most I’ve ever heard you speak at once.” She patted him on the back like you might a little kid.
“Sorry,” Carter said. He blushed harder.
“Don’t be sorry,” Sivan said. “You’re not wrong. American Jews have actually been an integral part of social justice movements in the United States for centuries. For example …” Sivan launched into an explanation that wouldn’t have been out of place during one of her mother’s Jewish studies lectures at Rutgers. Gertie watched her with admiration, just as she always did whenever Sivan spoke at length on a topic. Gertie got nervous before school presentations, but not Sivan. Sivan was a natural. She knew facts and figures, but she also knew how to talk to people so they didn’t feel like idiots, even though she might obviously have superior knowledge of the subject. Gertie and Rachel always told Sivan that she would make a great teacher, and Sivan said that even though she fully intended to study political science at Harvard and become a community organizer, she could probably see herself getting a teaching certificate too. But only for high school teaching. She wanted mature students. Middle school kids were a nightmare.
Gertie noticed something as Sivan talked to Carter. It was something shitty, and naturally, it involved the cuntriad. Brooklynn, Peighton, and Kaylee stood behind Sivan. Peighton was doing that thing with her hand where you mimic someone talking on and on and on. Brooklynn squatted down, pretending to be Carter, and nodded vigorously. Kaylee snickered and snorted with laughter. Gertie sent them a death stare of her own, which wasn’t something she usually (or ever) did. Kaylee noticed, and scowled at her. Then Sivan looked to see what Gertie was looking at, and so did Carter, and Gertie felt super bad because you could just see Carter deflate and Sivan withdraw into herself.
“Anyway,” Sivan said lamely. “That’s all I had to say.”
“No, you had more,” Rachel said, glaring at the cuntriad. “Keep going. It was interesting. And Carter probably had more questions, right?”
“It’s okay,” Carter said quietly.
“We can talk later,” Sivan said. “Look, there’s the tour guide.”
The cuntriad smiled as one unit, and Gertie thought to herself that she’d never met a shittier trio of human beings.
The sophomore class obediently flocked to Mr. Kenner and Ms. Deats when signaled. Their tour guide, a pretty young woman, introduced herself as Rhonda and said that she’d recently graduated from Rutgers so she was especially excited to lead a tour of kids from New Jersey.
“What was your major?” Ms. Deats asked brightly.
“Jewish studies,” Rhonda said.
“Oh my God, I bet you had Sivan’s mom!” Rachel said. “Did you know Babs Finkelstein?”
Rhonda’s face lit up. “She was my adviser!” she said excitedly. “I love Babs. And you’re Sivan! Oh, I’ve heard so much about you.”
Still shaken from being mocked by the cuntriad for what felt like the umpteenth time that week, Sivan could only muster a weak smile. She rubbed the back of her head and wished Rachel hadn’t felt the need to bring it up.
“You probably know, like, everything we’re going to learn today,” Rhonda said to Sivan. “Your granddad was on the planning committee for the museum, right?”
“Yeah,” Sivan said. “Yeah, he was.”
“Oh, Sivan knows everything Jewish,” Brooklynn said loudly. “She’s like, an expert Jewish person. Just ask her.” Rachel stared at her archnemesis. Kaylee and Peighton tittered, and Mr. Kenner gave them a piercing look. They shut up immediately. Rachel’s gaze didn’t waver.
“What are you looking at?” Brooklynn hissed.
Rachel just smiled and turned away. If you didn’t know her, you’d think it was just an innocent smile. But Gertie could tell Rachel was pissed. If there was one thing Rachel hated, it was a bully. Rachel had always stood up for the kids who got picked on, and it made her furious to see her best friends the victims of insults.
Rhonda explained the rules of the museum: no flash photography; no video or audio recording permitted; no loud voices; no cell phone use inside the museum.
“Well that won’t be an issue,” Brooklynn said resentfully, too quietly for any of the adults to hear.
The students followed Rhonda quietly as they entered the first exhibit, which defined genocide in general and the Holocaust in particular. There were photographs and a few video installations and many artifacts, like precious things the Nazis had stolen from synagogues, plus examples of the yellow stars Jews wore to mark their lower status. Gertie found it all fascinating and deeply sad, and she was actually surprised to see how her classmates behaved. Ever the worrywart, Gertie had been concerned that some of the kids would act like assholes. But even the rowdy kids, like Brock Chuddford, got quiet and somber as they moved through the museum, especially when they came upon photographs of teens and little kids who’d been forced into the camps.
At one point, Gertie heard sniffling behind her. She turned and saw Kaylee wipe away tears while Brooklynn put her arm around the cheerleader.
“I thought I was sad when they took away our cell phones,” Kaylee whispered. “But this is like, way worse. I hate this trip.”
“It’ll get better,” Brooklynn cooed sympathetically. “Maybe there’s a pool at our hotel.”
“There better be.” Kaylee pouted. “I am like seriously depressed right now.”
They watched a video with survivor stories, and a short film about Anne Frank. There were interactive exhibits and sobering moments, like when they came upon a pile of
shoes that had been discarded when victims were sent to the gas chambers. Gertie couldn’t believe the shoes were just there, close enough to touch (though of course she would never touch them).
“I always heard about this stuff in school,” Rachel said to Sivan and Gertie in a low voice. “Like remember in fifth grade when we read Number the Stars? But this place makes it feel real. I think this is the most important museum I’ve ever visited.” Gertie nodded her agreement.
“I’ve been here a bunch,” Sivan said. “But every time I come, I see something new.”
Rhonda told them they were almost at the end of their journey, where they could go into the museum shop. But first, they watched another short film, this one about a Lithuanian survivor who had been a little boy in one of the concentration camps and had grown up to be a professor and historian who helped Jewish families trace their roots. Photos of him as a nine-year-old boy flashed onscreen. And behind Sivan, Gertie, and Rachel, there was a little bit of giggling. It wasn’t so loud that the teachers could hear, but it was loud enough that the girls could hear. And then came the next part, which was definitely loud enough for Gertie to hear.
“Oh my God,” Brooklynn whispered. “That little boy looks exactly like Sivan.” At this, Sivan’s back stiffened, though she gave no other indication she’d heard.
“Right?” Kaylee said. “That’s totally what I was thinking.”
“Two little Jewish boys,” Brooklynn snickered.
Sivan’s shoulders slumped. Rachel got very still the way she did when she was truly enraged. Gertie whipped her head around, ready to tell the cuntriad to shut the fuck up, when something highly unusual occurred.
“Shh,” Peighton said. “Don’t say that.” Sivan looked confused.
“It’s not cool,” Peighton said quietly.
“Oh, whatever,” Brooklynn said. “It was just a joke. Lighten up.”
“It wasn’t funny,” Peighton said.
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