The Graduation by Christopher Pike Page B

them.”
    “Come on. Mom,” Michael said. “Give her a break.”
    “I know,” Jessica said. The lady wiped them on her green dress and then carefully fixed them back on Jessica’s nose, momentarily staring into her eyes.
    She’s checking me out.
    “I hope we get to meet another time, Jessie.”
    “So do I,” Jessica replied, a bit confused. Michael’s mother turned back to him.
    “Daniel and I are sitting near the bottom on the far right,” she said. “In case you wanted to know. Be sure to thank your mother in your speech for being so wonderful.”
    “I’ll mention it several times,” he promised. She hugged him briefly, and then—to Jessica’s surprise—gave her a hug, too. When she left, Michael tugged gently on Jessica’s tassel.
    “Would you like to trade caps?” he asked. “I know you would have gotten an A in chemistry if I’d done a better job structuring the universe.”
    “Yeah, it’s all your fault.” She added softly, “No thanks.”
    “I didn’t mean—”
    “No, it’s fine.” She shrugged. “I really messed up this year. It was my own fault.” She smiled quickly. “Your mom’s neat.”
    “I’m glad you like her. I’ll have to meet your parents.”
    “That’s right. You didn’t see them when we went out.”
    Hint. Hint. Hint. Ask me out again.
    Of course he hadn’t asked her out in the first place. He never had in all the time they had spent together. She must be crazy to think he liked her.
    In the hospital, however, the morning after Maria’s accident, he had begun to say something that had since given her cause to wonder.
    “ I know how you feel. You’re not a bad person. If you were, I wouldn’t care about you the way… ”
    She had been crying because Maria had been so bitter toward her. He had probably been trying to cheer her up. She would never know. She had run away from him. She would run away again. She didn’t deserve him. She was going to seduce the football quarterback tonight. It was all she was good for.
    She suddenly felt as if she were going to cry. Here it was her last day of school, a beautiful summer day. She had everything: rich and understanding parents, perfect health, a bright future. Yet she had nothing. She had no love. Alice was gone. Michael was going. And Maria hated her.
    It was at that precise moment that she saw Maria. Had that not happened, she might have been able to push aside her self-recriminations long enough to invite Michael and his parents to have dinner with her and her family after the ceremony. It was an idea, a good idea. But Nick guiding Maria across the track and onto the football field was bitter reality. She froze in midstride. Michael glanced at her face, then followed her eyes.
    “I was going to tell you,” he said.
    “I haven’t spoken to her since that morning.” Jessica swallowed thickly. “She’s in a wheelchair.”
    “It was a terrible accident.” He lay emphasis on the last word. She found that strange. He had always given her the impression that he didn’t believe in accidents. He was trying to dispel her guilt. He might as well have tried to convince her she would gladly have traded places with Maria. But she wouldn’t have, not for the world, and so her guilt remained.
    “I’ll talk to you later, OK?” she mumbled. “I have to get in line.”
    She walked off the field and hid in the crowd. Maria had asked Jessica never to make her see her again. It was the least she could do for her crippled friend, Jessica thought.
    The ceremony began shortly afterward. The huge audience had been seated when the chatty senior class marched in and took their seats. Mr. Smith, Tabb’s elderly principal, was the first speaker. Dressed in the same blue robe as the rest of them, he thanked the many parents, relatives, and friends for coming, and then proceeded to praise the group of graduates as the most dynamic in his long academic career. Jessica found his choice of the word “dynamic” appropriately