Spying on Miss Muller by Eve Bunting Page B

hurry.”
    I ran my tongue over my chalky teeth and nodded. I tried not to worry, but to tell the truth I thought what Bryan was doing was exciting. I never thought of anything happening to him.
    â€œGet yourself a glass of water before you go, Jess,” Nursie said. She touched my sleeve. “Is your blouse wet?”
    â€œJust a wee bit.”
    â€œWhy on earth were you outside? Get down to your room this instant and change it, Jessie Drumm. You’ll catch your death of cold.”
    â€œBut Nursie...”
    â€œRush along, Jessie. Rush now.”
    I rushed, muttering to myself. Honestly, this morning of all mornings. I bounded down the stairs, not like a lady the way we’re supposed to. Usually I wouldn’t have minded being late for assembly, but today was different.
    The dorm was empty. I unbuttoned my sleeves as I ran, unknotted my tie. As soon as I got into my room I pulled off my tunic, threw my wet blouse into my bottom dresser drawer, and found a clean one in my laundry pack. The dorm was strange without noise, without voices, without the sound of somebody playing the piano in the common room or the click click of Ping-Pong balls on the table in Long Parlor. Creepy, in a way.
    We were never allowed back in our rooms between breakfast and assembly. “The maids must be free to do their jobs without interruption from you girls,” Old Rose said.
    I didn’t think I’d ever been in the dorm alone before.
    We’re not like those maids, I thought, making a face at myself in the mirror. They were free. My diary. I got down on my knees and felt for it under my dresser. There was no private place in the dorm. Boarders weren’t supposed to have secrets, that’s why.
    My fingers touched the small leather book and pulled it out. Hard to tell if anyone else had done this, even checked on me every day because I wrote every day. How awful. I opened the diary, flipped through the pages. Ian McManus’s code letters jumped out at me: I’M, written like that. Those smart, horrible maids had probably decoded it by now. “I’M walked behind Ada and me to French class. He’s had his hair cut short and he looks adorable.” How embarrassing. Why had I written such a dopey thing?
    I didn’t have a code name for Daddy. There he was on almost every page, my thoughts about him, my rage. Last weekend I’d written in my diary, sitting here on my bed the night I got back to Alveara. “Went to Swatragh with Daddy. We were supposed to be going to see the Curragh bands. He left me in the car while he went into the pub to meet Jamie Ruck. I waited and waited. I read two stories from the new
Girls’ Crystal,
my favorite magazine. Good thing I brought it. He didn’t come back for more than an hour. ‘Sorry, darlin’,’ he said. ‘Jamie and I had important business to conduct.’
    â€œHe always gets so highfalutin when he’s like that. I started to cry because I was so mad at him and nothing I say to him does any good. It’s hopeless. ‘What’s the matter, darlin’? Sure there’s no need to cry.’
    â€œ ‘We’ve missed the bands,’ I said, though I didn’t care that much about hearing them. I was crying over him. But he’s right. Crying is hopeless, too. Sometimes I don’t love Daddy at all. I hate him.”
    I closed the diary and ran my fingers over the gold-leaf lettering of my name on the outside. My mother had given the book to me for Christmas. Maybe she thought writing things down in it would help. But it didn’t if the maids were reading it. Tears stung my eyes. “What’s the matter, darlin’? Sure there’s no need to cry.” I pushed the diary under my pillow. It wasn’t safe there, either. It wasn’t safe anywhere.
    I took my brush off the dresser and tugged it through my hair, watching the blur of myself in the mirror, tugging and tugging. And