Cat Read Online Free PDF Page B

Her nostrils twitch
like a rabbit's when she suspects someone.
"Anyway, later I was in the cafeteria waiting to
get my lunch. I wasn't even thinking about having
been in the bathroom with the smokers when suddenly
I felt her hand squeeze down on my left shoulder, her
fingers pinching me hard and puffing me out of the
line.
"'Come with me,' she demanded, and marched
me to the office where she accused me of smoking
just because she could smell it in my hair and clothes.
I swore I hadn't been smoking and I started to cry,
which was enough for Sister Louise, the principal, to
judge me innocent, but Sister Margaret was relentless. "'All right, if you didn't smoke, you were right
in it and certainly close enough to see what was going
on. Who was smoking?' she demanded.
"The thought of telling on girls I had just gotten
to know was terrifying, almost as terrifying as being
caught myself. I shook my head and she grabbed my
shoulders and shook me so hard, I thought my eyes
would roll out. The sisters could hit you, too," I told
them.
In anticipation of what I was about to describe,
Star's eyes widened with anger.
"She made me put out my hands and slapped
them with a ruler until the tears were streaming down
my cheeks and my palms were nearly cherry red and I
couldn't close my fingers."
"I'd have kicked her into her precious heaven,"
Star said.
"What did you do?" Misty asked.
"I told her again and again I didn't know who
was smoking. 'I don't know everyone,' I lied. I closed
my eyes expecting lightning to strike me or something
because I was lying to a nun.
"'Then you'll point them out,' she decided and
marched me back to the cafeteria.
"The moment we entered, all the girls knew why I had been brought back. They stopped talking and looked up at me. You could almost hear them breathe. The two girls who had been smoking were very frightened. They looked down quickly, probably
reciting Hail Marys at the table.
"'They're not here,' I said.
"'What do you mean? They have to be here.
Everyone's here,' Sister Margaret snapped. She still
had her hand on my shoulder and squeezed so hard, it
sent pain down my spine and through my legs. "I pretended to look around the cafeteria and
then I shook my head.
"'They're not here!' I cried. Tears were dripping
off my chin by now.
"She was fuming. I thought I could see the
smoke she hated so much coming out of her ears. "'Very well,' she said. 'Until your memory
improves, you'll eat lunch by yourself in my office
facing the blank wall every day.' She kept me there
for a week before telling me to return to the cafeteria.
The good thing was they never told my mother," I
said.
"How old were you when this all happened?"
Jade asked.
"I had just turned eleven. I was still in the fifth
grade."
"Girls were smoking in the fifth grade?" she
muttered.
"That's nothing. Kids in my school have been
smoking forever," Star added.
"Terrific. Maybe Cathy's mother is right.
Maybe the country is going to hell," Jade said. "You don't know anything about hell," Star told
her. "Your idea of hell is a bad hairdo"
"Is that so?"
"Girls. Aren't we getting a little off course?"
Doctor Marlowe softly suggested.
Jade threw a look at Star that could stop a
charging bull, but Star waved it off with a smug turn
of her head and a small grunt.
"It sounds so horrible. What did your father say
about your changing to a parochial school?" Misty
asked. "Was he for it, too?"
"Like I said, when it came to most things
concerning me, my mother was in charge. She told
him what she wanted me to do, of course. It was an
expense, but he just nodded as usual, glanced at me
for a moment, snapped his paper and continued to
read."
"Didn't he care about what you thought and
wanted?" Misty followed.
I shook my head.
"Another absentee parent," Jade quipped. "Why
do they bother to have children in the first place?
What are we, some kind of status symbol, something
to collect like a car or a big-screen television set? I'm
not going to have any children unless my