Bad Girls in Love Read Free Page B

have?” Tan asked Mikey.
    â€œWhat did I do to you? I just said his name, just Tiger. Tiger, Ti-ger.” Mikey ducked out of Tanisha’s reach. “I didn’t say anything about, That’s a weird name, or, How dumb is it to think you’re in love with some sports hero who never even heard of you and never will.”
    â€œNo different from a movie star or a rock star,” Tanisha maintained.
    But Margalo disagreed. “Tiger Woods is a whole different story from Tyrese.” Then she was diverted. “Denzel Washington. I could go for Denzel Washington.”
    â€œOr Will Smith,” Tanisha agreed.
    Mikey groaned. They ignored her.
    Margalo didn’t remember when it had become fun to make lists of handsome guys, fun just to think about who should be on the list; but she didn’t deny that she enjoyed it. It was more interesting than listing all the boys in your class, ranked in order of who you’d like to kiss, or go on a date with, or marry, which one you’d most want to be marooned on a desert island with, or—this was the currently popular list—dance with, or slow dance with or super slow dance with, which were all the same unspoken question: Who do you want to go to the dance with? If every boy was going to ask you, who would you choose?
    As some art-room kids passed by, Cassie Davis—front-runner for the title of eighth grader with the worst attitude—stopped to ask Mikey, “You coming to assembly? Or what?”
    â€œIs there an or what choice?” Mikey asked, then “I’m not joking,” she protested.
    â€œI know,” Cassie said. “That’s what makes you so funny.”
    â€œI’m not funny,” Mikey told her.
    â€œI’ll save you a seat,” Cassie said, passing on by.
    â€œWhy does she think because we’re in the same homeroom, she should save me a seat?” Mikey demanded.
    â€œShe doesn’t mean it,” Margalo explained. “She won’t do it.”
    â€œThen why does she say she’s going to? People,” Mikey said, disgusted.
    Being disgusted with people reminded her of something else. “What committee are you going to be on for the play?” she asked Tan.
    Tan was rising, and it really was time to start over to the auditorium. She said, “Promotion—you know, getting advertisers for the programs, finding stores that’ll let us put up posters. The committee only meets during lunches, and we can sign up the advertisers and ask at stores during the weekends. It’s Mrs. Sanabria’s committee so you know it’s not going to interfere with the basketball schedule,” she said as she joined up with Ronnie Caselli and others from the team.
    Watching the cafeteria get empty, Mikey looked at Margalo and smiled, a grim Let’s-look-for-a-bright-side smile. “The sooner it starts, the sooner it’ll be over.”
    Like someone about to step into the dentist’s office, Margalo tucked her straight, chin-length hair behind her ears and squared her shoulders. “If you say so.” She rose from her seat.
    Slowly, reluctantly, they got going, drifting out of the cafeteria, drifting down the hallways, drifting into the auditorium, just two jellyfish riding along on tidal waters.

2
LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT
    W ith the seventh and eighth grades both present, the auditorium aisles were clogged with students, especially the narrow passages separating the rows of seats. People yelled greetings to one another, yelled responses back, gathered together to talk. Groups lingered in the aisles and individuals moved back and forth along the rows. Seated students leaned forward across seats, leaned backward or sideways, whispering for private conversations, speaking loudly if they wanted to be overheard, shouting if they felt like it. Everybody looked around to see who everybody else was talking to, sitting with, looking at.
    As Margalo predicted, Cassie