The Yearbook by Carol Masciola Page B

doorway right then to show off his stack of survivalist magazines, she might have been glad.
    Danielle took off the blouse and dropped it on Lola’s bed.
    “Okay. Then who’s your date?” Danielle asked, pulling her own shirt back on.
    Lola turned away and pretended to tidy her desk. “I don’t know yet. Anyway, you don’t have to have a date.”
    “So you’re wearing two olden-days outfits on the same night, or is this for two Halloweens, or two different Halloween parties?”
    Suddenly Danielle was the district attorney conducting a cross-examination. It was time for a clever change of subject.
    “What about you?” Lola asked. “You got a date?”
    Danielle turned away from the suitcase and smiled mysteriously. The tactic had worked.
    “You
do
have a date,” Lola said. “Who is it? That Jeff guy from pottery?”
    “No. Not the Jeff guy. Not even close.”
    “Who then?”
    “Brent Gaynor,” Danielle said.
    “Wow,” Lola said. “That’s front-page news.”
    “Are you being sarcastic about Brent Gaynor?”
    “No.”
    Danielle shrugged. “Well, he hasn’t asked me in so many words. But I know he’s going to. He’s obsessed with me. He talks to me all the time now. He’s always intercepting me at school, hanging around my locker, asking me all about this place.”
    Lola wondered who was intercepting whom. She didn’t think she could stand to hear any more just now. Her head felt hot. She took off the flapper hat and tossed it on the bed.
    “There’s another thing, Lola. I’ve seen him sitting outside in his truck, right outside, looking up at this window.”
    She’s getting worse,
Lola thought.
A basketball star wouldn’t be caught dead with a Wrigley girl. At least not in public, not in daylight.
    Danielle seemed to sense Lola’s skepticism and pulled out her phone, ready with photographic proof. The big oak tree that stood just outside the bedroom window jutted into the picture, partly hiding the truck, but it was Brent Gaynor in the driver’s seat all right, and just as Danielle had said, he was looking up at the building.
    “It
is
him,” Lola said.
    “Of course it is,” Danielle said. “You think I’m having hallucinations of Brent Gaynor?”
    Lola skipped the evening meal. It seemed best to avoid Graham, Danielle, and the rest of the Wrigley Group Home residents. Besides, the voice that had encouraged her to buy the clothes had grown louder, and she needed some peace and quiet to hear what else it might have to say. This wasn’t the kind of voice a crazy person hears, she assured herself, but a wisdom that seemed to come from deep inside her. It was a version of her own voice, and she trusted it.
    • • •
    On Monday morning, Lola was surprised to encounter Mrs. Dubois running the metal detector. The machine was beeping like mad while Dubois worked the sudoku.
    “How come you’re here?” Lola said as she passed through the machine.
    “Oh, they’re making me play cop today,” Mrs. Dubois said. “Where’ve you been? I’ve been waiting for you in the library.”
    Lola stepped to one side and let the stream of students beep past. “Waiting for me? Why?”
    “You signed on to clean up all that crap, but unless my eyes deceive me, the crap’s still right where it was.”
    “That was a one-day thing,” Lola said. She was about to add,
Go find yourself another slave
, but something stopped her. Suddenly she wanted more than anything to return to that stinky, cozy reserve room. “I’m free right now,” she said, although she had a midterm chemistry test.
    “All right,” Mrs. Dubois said. “Here’s the key. Have fun.”
    Lola took the heavy old key. It felt good in her hand. She was halfway to the library when a page from the principal’s office intercepted her.
    “You Lola Lundy?” He was one of those freshmen whose voices were still trying to change.
    “What of it?” Lola said. She couldn’t stand for interruptions. Not now. That voice was talking to her