Don't Vote for Me Read Free Page B

shut.

Three
    By the time I got home, I was as worn out as an old shoelace. Faking stupidity was tougher than it looked.
    Mom could tell something was wrong as soon as I trudged through the door. She was halfway through her Sudoku—they only took her a few minutes—but after taking one look at my face, she set it on the couch. “All right,” she said. “Let’s hear it.”
    Mom was lots of things—a former litigator, a Sudoku champion, and a not-so-awesome cook—but most of all, she was Mom. Dad said she could roast any witness in three questions or less, but she said her real talent lay in raising six boys (or at least five and a half, since she wasn’t finished raising me).
    When I didn’t answer, she made a face. “Did Garth empty his spit valve on your shoe again?”
    I shook my head. “I think Garth was home sick. He was coughing all over the place yesterday. He probably has pneumonia, which means I’ll probably have pneumonia within the next day or two.”
    Mom half smiled, half sighed. “Is that what’s eating you?”
    I shook my head again. “I guess I was just…thinking.” Under my breath, I added, “I probably don’t do that enough.”
    Mom made a strange noise. It sounded like a laugh, but that couldn’t have been what it was. Something must have gotten stuck at the back of her throat.
    â€œWill you at least give me a hint?” she asked when I just stood there thinking.
    I pressed my lips into a line, determined not to let it out, but the pressure slowly built until I couldn’t keep it in: “I told Riley that Veronica doesn’t represent our opinions and that we should, you know, fight, and a few kids overheard me, and now everyone knows.”
    â€œEven Veronica?” she asked.
    I nodded slowly.
    â€œOh, David, you know how powerful words can be.” She glanced down at her lap. “They can hurt people, you know.”
    â€œNot the Pritchard-Pratt,” I replied. “She’s, like, the queen of ice. I doubt a heat-seeking missile could penetrate her permafrost.”
    â€œMost people would seem different if you could see them from the inside.”
    The truth of her words hit me like a thousand-pound gorilla—I’d always been of the opinion that I was cooler than I looked—but I pretended that they hadn’t. “She didn’t seem upset. In fact, she challenged me to run against her.”
    Mom picked up her Sudoku. “Well, then, I think you should.”
    I shook my head. “No way.”
    â€œWhy not?” she replied.
    â€œBecause that’s not the way it works! Don’t you remember middle school? The populars win the elections and score the winning baskets, and the BGs play the fight songs and grovel at their feet.”
    Mom considered that, then shrugged. “Why couldn’t someone do both?”
    For a second, maybe less, I saw two flashes of Veronica. In the first flash, she was sitting behind the piano, and in the second, she was standing on the populars’ table, freezing us with one look.
    But Veronica didn’t count. She was the exception to every rule.
    â€œBecause you can’t,” I said emphatically, then said it once more for good measure: “You just can’t do both.”
    â€œWhatever you say,” Mom replied, but I could tell she didn’t mean it.
    * * *
    I had to shuffle past the office to get to my locker the next morning, which meant I had to shuffle past the dreaded sign-up sheet. It fluttered daringly in the air-conditioned breeze, and I got the impression that it wanted to be seen.
    But the sign-up sheet didn’t pose even the slightest threat. I wasn’t going to give in, so it wasn’t an issue. Mom might have been right about most things, but she wasn’t right about this.
    Instead of waiting for Riley, I headed straight to the band room. It was usually deserted before