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[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] expensive restaurant or get all dressed up for a dance. None of that mattered to her. All she wanted was to spend some time with him, be near him, and maybe even talk to him. But all of that was impossible now. David and Heather were going to the dance together and there was nothing she could do about it. Leah left school feeling miserable. As she walked home, she thought about the past two weeks and tried to remember if there had been even one moment when David had given her any indication that he liked her better than Heather. Nothing came to mind. Leah only talked to him when he asked her a question first. Occasionally, he looked at her, but she was sitting across from him in a circle of desks, so it made sense that he would look in her direction from time to time. The glances that he gave her didn't mean anything. He also talked to Heather more than he talked to anyone else, and he never resisted when Heather flirted with him. The difference was clear: David definitely liked Heather more, and today's revelation that they were going to the Homecoming Dance together would only strengthen their bond. These gloomy thoughts followed Leah home, and later that J.M. Reep | 113 afternoon, when Mrs. Nells came home from work, she found her daughter in an even more pensive mood than usual. Leah was upstairs in her bedroom, but instead of reading, Mrs. Nells found her daughter just sitting on the bed and staring into space. Something important was on her mind, and Mrs. Nells hoped that maybe her daughter would want to talk about it. She came into the bedroom and asked, "How was school today?" Leah hesitated, not because she was assessing her day in order to give an honest answer, but because she didn't know if she should be honest. Part of her wanted to tell her mother everything about David and the last couple of weeks, but what could she say? That she had a crush on a boy in her history class who wasn't interested in her? When she thought about it that way, the whole situation just seemed embarrassing. And if she did mention David, she knew she would only get her mother's hopes up. Leah answered the question with a simple, "OK." "You don't look well. Are you feeling all right? Are you getting sick?" Mrs. Nells asked, searching for some explanation for her daughter's behavior. She tried to place her hand on Leah's forehead to check for a fever, but Leah shook her head no in response to her mother's questions. There was nothing wrong with her health. Mrs. Nells then got straight to the point. "So how come you're just sitting here, not reading? You almost look strange without a book in your lap," she teased. Leah didn't reply to her mother's questions. Instead, she sat still and stiff and stared at her feet. A moment passed as Mrs. Nells hoped Leah would confide in her, but Leah remained as silent and immovable as the earth itself. Finally, Mrs. Nells decided upon a less intrusive means of breathing some life into her daughter. "Well," Mrs. Nells said, standing up, "your father will be home soon, so I'd better start fixing dinner. If you're feeling all right, why don't you come help me?" Leah knew from past experience that her mother's question was less of an invitation than an order, so she lifted herself off the bed and followed her mother downstairs to the kitchen. For once, Leah didn't 114 | Leah mind helping her mother cook. It was something to do, and it was sure to help her take her mind off David and all the depressing feelings that the thought of him inspired. _________________________ Leah didn't want to go to school Friday morning. For the last two weeks, the only class that she had been interested in was world history, but now it offered nothing for her but heartache. She didn't want to sit in class and listen to David and Heather discuss their plans for Homecoming. The last thing she needed was to hear them talk about how happy they were going to be at the dance. Before she rose from her bed Friday morning, she considered faking an illness so that she could stay home from school, but then she remembered that her mother had asked her yesterday if she felt sick, and Leah had insisted that she was well. She had no choice but to pull herself out of bed and face the day, no matter how miserable it might be. School was boring, and it felt like a meaningless chore. Without history to look forward to, she simply went through the motions of attending class and pretending to be interested in the lessons. She sat through most of her classes with her head propped up lazily by her hand; she read during lunch, although she didn't care about what she was reading; and she wandered through the halls between classes as though in a daze. As she walked, she kept an eye out for either David or Heather. She decided that if she saw either of them she would turn around and go in the other direction, but she never saw them. When the final period of the day arrived, Leah sat down at her desk in history class and waited for the happy couple. One by one, her classmates entered and took their seats, but when the bell rang and Mr. Simmons began taking roll, neither David nor Heather had arrived. As Mr. Simmons began his lecture, Leah waited for David and Heather to come in late, but they never did. Eventually, Leah gave up waiting for them and concentrated on listening to the lesson and J.M. Reep | 115 taking notes. In a way, she was glad they were gone, but in the back of her mind, she wondered where David was. Mr. Simmons, aware that it was Friday and that the Homecoming game was later that evening, knew that his class was only barely paying attention to him, so he cut his lecture short. Leah turned around in her desk and watched to see what Alex and Melanie, who had shown up for class, were going to do. But since David and Heather, the nucleus of their team, was gone, they didn't sit together, either. Instead, they talked to their other friends in the class as they waited for the hour to end. Leah took out a book and spent the remainder of the school day reading. Even though nothing particularly depressing happened during school that day, Leah was in another melancholy mood when she came home. She read for a little while, but mostly she just moped around the house. When her mother came home, Leah volunteered to help fix dinner, which her mother appreciated, but she wasn't in much of a mood to eat. After Leah's father came home and the family sat down to dinner, Mr. Nells turned on the small TV in the kitchen and tuned to the local news. He always did this during dinner. The news sometimes served as a conversation starter between himself and his wife, or if no one had anything they wanted to talk about, it was something to fill the awkward moments of silence. Mr. Nells and his family had already missed the news portion of the program, and the weather segment was just starting. Mrs. Nells remarked to no one in particular how it was very warm for this time of the year. Leah silently agreed, but she didn't mind because it meant that she could sit outside for lunch more often. As the newscast went to a commercial, the sports anchor appeared on the screen and teased the audience: "And after the break, [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ] |