You’re Invited Too Read Free

need to excuse myself because that is just plain disgusting and I won’t hear of it.”
    Okayyyyyyyy, then. I guess we’re hired.
    Which is a good thing, right?
    Right?

Lauren
    optimism noun -
    to be full of hope and confident about the future or about something in particular
    Use in a sentence:
    I am full of optimism that this school year will be the best ever!
    Z ach’s car wheezes and shudders as he hits the squealing brakes at the bottom of the circular drive that winds in front of Sandpiper Beach Middle School, home of the Pirate Pelicans. I grip the dashboard so I don’t end up kissing it instead. He inherited this pile of rust when our oldest brother, Josh, went off to college. I secretly hope the car will collapse before it’s time for me to get stuck with it.
    â€œA little closer, maybe?” I point to the doors, which are way up the drive.
    Zach slams the gas and then screeches to a stop in front of the doors. I still haven’t figured out why Mom and Dad think that riding with Zach is even remotely safe. I’d be much better off riding the smelly school bus with Sadie and Becca, or cruising across the bridge to the mainland and down the main highway in one of my dad’s golf carts from the marina. Somehow statistics on golf-cart crashes worry Mom more than statistics on crashes involving teenage-boy drivers.
    â€œOut,” Zach says.
    â€œThank you for the ride, brother dearest.” I flash him a smile as I grab my backpack and heave the door open.
    He rolls his eyes. Back-to-school might be the worst day of the year for him, but it’s like Christmas to me. The tailpipe pushes out a cloud of smoke as Zach takes off toward the high school (which is all of right next door to the middle school, so he really can’t complain about driving me), and I turn and head inside. By some miracle, Zach actually got me here half an hour early.
    I stop just inside the doors and inhale that freshly-scrubbed-no-vomit-on-the-floors-or-anything-gross-yet school smell. And I feel like I could run up and down the halls cheering and laughing. Not only is it the first day of school, but all my extracurriculars start this week. I’m playing Bunco with my grandmother, Bubby, and her friends at Sandpiper Active Senior Living this afternoon, and RSVP just landed that amazing job with Miss Worthington.
    Okay, so maybe she’s a little on the scary side, but still—it’s a wedding , and we’re going to plan it. And maybe we barely have three months to do so, but hey, we wouldn’t be the most amazing new party-planning company in the Cape Fear region if we couldn’t pull off a simple wedding on short notice.
    Besides, Sadie’s mom already handled most of the major stuff, like the venue and the dress and the caterer, a long time ago. All that’s left to do is pull all the small details together. Although that’s really the most important job—they’re the things that’ll make the wedding extra memorable, and they’re the most fun. The favors, the cake, the music. And I can’t wait to get started breaking down the budget Miss Worthington gave us. Best of all? Vi, Becca, Sadie, and I get to plan this wedding together!
    Life could not be any more perfect.
    I salute the giant Pirate Pelican painted on the lobby wall. (It’s a pelican with an eye patch and a skull-and-crossbones hat and its wings are crooked like it’s holding its nonexistent hands on its nonexistent hips. Seriously.) Then I find my new locker in the empty second-floor hallway. It’s squeaky clean—probably thanks to Vi’s dad, who’s the new janitor this year—and full of possibility. I hang up the seashells I threaded with yarn last night, and stick a new dry-erase calendar on the inside door. Sadie probably has one exactly like it. Once I’ve gathered everything I need for my first three classes, I find my new homeroom—super-conveniently