Casey Barnes Eponymous Read Online Free PDF

class, “Dropped my…pen-o.”
    Senor Griffin frowned.   “Pluma, Casey, pluma.”  
    “Sí.   Yo drop-o mi pluma.”  
    Senor Griffin walked back to the board.
    “You mean your magic copying pen?” Ben said voluminously enough
for her to be scared Señor Griffin heard but not so loud that he had.  
    “How’d you know about that Cat Power song?” she hissed in his
ear.
    “Por favor!” Senor Griffin snapped from the front of the
room.  
    She dashed off a note in her notebook.   How’d you know?   HOW?   Senor Griffin turned to write
on the board and she slipped the note under Ben’s elbow.   He languidly picked the note up, read
it, and put it down.   Senor Griffin posed
a question to the class.   Ben raised
his hand and answered it perfectly.   Then, as Senor Griffin focused on another student, he wrote a
response.   Catherine’s
my lab partner.   She showed me the
playlist the period after you gave it to her.   When she described you I knew who she
was talking about.  
    He passed the note back to her.   She read and put pen to paper
again.   Why’s
that?   His response:   Because you were wearing a
Runaways T-shirt the day you passed her the note.   Not many people running around this
school in Runaways T-shirts.   She
scribbled another.   Are you a drummer?  
    He waited an evil six minutes to reply, in which time he
volunteered to put an answer on the board.   When the reply finally came back it said Yes .   She made a face.   She started to write something about
playing guitar.   But then she
crumpled the paper up, stuck it back in her bag, and started again.
    Congratulations. P.S. I suggest you hold your elbow closer to your rib cage during class
hours.   They’ve done studies and realized
that holding elbows at odd angles for prolonged periods of time can be a
pre-cursor to strokes.   She
passed it.   He shook his head, but
did get his next response back more quickly.   Nice try.   Have fun doing your Spanish homework for
the first time tonight.
    She held out her middle finger and tapped it on the desk.   Before he could turn around and see, the
bell rang and class ended.   Just
like that, he was up and out of his seat in a flash.   There was not much time to think about
it, however, because two periods later, it happened.
    The Return of Alex Deal.

7

 
    She was in the library, her back to the door, observing a set
of twins. They were freshman and wearing the same polo shirt in different
colors.   Their hairstyles were even
the same: straightened and parted in the middle.   She was thinking a recommendation of
Elliott Smith and The Helio Sequence would be a nice start. Perhaps a little PJ
Harvey too.   But which twin would
she slip the list to?   Both?   As she pondered these questions, she
heard it.   Alex Deal’s voice.  
    She turned.   He was
standing in front of Mr. Cole, pointedly avoiding making eye contact with her.   He had on a TV On the Radio T-shirt.
Casey pounded a fist against her thigh.  
    “Where are the books on World War II?” he asked.
    Do something, she commanded herself.   Mr. Cole pointed Alex Deal towards the
far side of the library.   He walked
away.   She let out a stressed
exhale.  
    Mr. Cole turned and gave her a strange look .   “What’s eatin’ you?”  
    She grabbed her bag and prayed she had not thrown it out.   A moment later she breathed a sigh of
relief.   It was there, under her math
workbook and the note she exchanged with Ben earlier in the day.  
    It was stained from coffee and crumpled from having been at the
bottom of her backpack, but the playlist she came up with for Alex Deal the
night before was still intact.   On
the other side of the library he took a book down from a shelf, walked to a
table, and opened it.   One of the
twins approached the counter and asked Casey where the books on art history
were.   She motioned towards Mr. Cole
with her head.
    She spread the list on the counter and