Populazzi Read Free Page A

had felt really good about my mop of brown curls tucked behind a funky headband, my cute new jeans, my ballet flats, and a fun textured vest over a basic tank. But watching this girl, I felt ridiculous, like I was trying way too hard and looked dorky anyway.
    I wasn't the only one looking at her. All the other Populazzi girls kept darting their eyes her way, as if checking in to make sure she approved of what they were saying, doing, and thinking. That settled it: the girl was the Supreme Populazzi. The others were Penultimates. And if she was the female Supreme Populazzi, it stood to reason that the guy next to her with his arm slung over her shoulders was her boyfriend, the male Supreme Populazzi. He wore preppy-cool clothes, and his hair was short, dark, and wavy, brushed back from his face, and ... Uh-oh...
    He was looking right at me.
    The guy's face scrunched up. He tapped his girlfriend on the shoulder and pointed to me. She turned and squinched her face like she smelled something nasty.
    Why was I still staring at them???
    I dropped to my knees so I was below their sight line and crawled away from the picture window. My phone chirped. Claudia had cropped my earlier picture so it showed just the male Supreme Populazzi. "
Say hello 2 your prom date!!!
" her text read.
    "Yeah, right," I muttered, and kept crawling as the bell rang. I was almost clear of the window, when—
    "Ow!"
    I had crawled right into a pair of khaki-clad shins. And they were hard.
    "Oh—sorry," a confused male voice said. I looked up. The khakis were attached to one of the Theater Geeks. I recognized him because he wore a gray 1920s Gatsby hat. He frowned and cocked his head as he studied me for a second, then asked, "I'm sorry, are you ... crawling to class?"
    "No, I..." I went for the obvious. "I lost a contact lens."
    "Oooh." Gatsby Hat winced. "Been there. Let me help you." He dropped to his knees and started poring over the floor. The halls had already emptied out. We were both going to be late, but he was clearly a true Samaritan and was not going to give up until he helped me find my lens ... which didn't exist.
    I sat back on my knees. "I don't wear contacts."
    Gatsby Hat peeked up at me from his position on all fours. "You don't?"
    I shook my head. "I ... I'm new here."
    "I see," he said. "And at your old school you crawled everywhere?"
    I sighed. How exactly was I going to explain this to him? Then I saw his sly half smile and realized I didn't need to.
    "Yes," I said, "we did. It was an underground school. Literally underground. Tunnels everywhere. Very low ceilings. They said it was once part of the Underground Railroad."
    "Ah," Gatsby Hat said. "Sounds very edifying."
    "Very. 'Experiential Education,' they called it."
    "'Experimental Experiential Education,' no doubt," he said.
    "Exactly."
    Gatsby Hat and I smiled, taking goofy delight in our mutual powers of alliteration. Then he sat up and held out his hand to help me.
    "My name's Archer," he said, "and we're both very late for class. What do you have first period?"
    "Cara." I of course responded to the question he
didn't
ask. Oops. "My
name's
Cara. First period I have..." I rummaged through my funkadelic brown and orange paisley messenger bag until I found my schedule. "English. Mr. Woodward. Room ten."
    "Me too. We're lucky; he's the best in the school. I'll walk you there. Or we could crawl, if it makes you feel more comfortable."
    "That's okay. I think I'm getting used to the standing-erect thing." Like an idiot I blushed. I waited for Archer to pounce on it.
    He didn't, though he did raise an eyebrow and smirk almost imperceptibly before leading me down the hall.
    Claudia had
way
too much faith in me. I could already imagine my next journal entry. "I really thought this would be the year everything changed, but even though the place is new, Cara Leonard is exactly the same."

Chapter Three
    "My reputation precedes me," Mr. Woodward boomed as Archer and I tried to sneak in.