Elaine Orr - Jolie Gentil 00.5 - Jolie and Scoobie High School Misadventures Read Online Free PDF

them were kind of self-conscious about their outfits the first few days, which I probably would have been, too, if I’d been selected in Lakewood.
    One of my good friends did make the Lakewood squad. I knew this because I looked at the Lakewood paper’s sports section on Mondays. It was in the Ocean Alley High School library. That’s how I knew who won the football games the prior Saturday. Last week they had a picture of the new cheerleading squad, and noted which ones were returning members and which ones were new.
    I thought about spending a weekend in Lakewood to watch them cheer the football team. But it would seem really weird to be in my hometown and have to stay in someone else’s house. And what if I ran into my parents? Would they avoid me?  This is ridiculous.
    Scoobie had introduced me to the Army Surplus store that was two blocks from First Prez . I bought a pair of sort of khaki-style pants that were the tan camouflage colors that troops wore for service in desert countries. Scoobie bought the green color.
    These were useful pants for sitting on the sand under the boardwalk . It was very chilly, so all the people above were usually in pants. “If we were under here in summer, the cops would accuse me of looking up the girls’ skirts,” Scoobie said.
    “And would you be ?” I asked.
    He grinned . “Generally, no. I sit under here to read when it’s too noisy above.”
    By now I knew that Scoobie read about two books a week, not including any for classes . He had dragged me to the library with him a couple of times, and I knew he was disappointed that I mostly read the magazines. “My mother likes to read a lot,” I said, glancing up as someone with what sounded like high heels tromped overhead. Who wears heels on a boardwalk?
    “Ah,” he said.
    “What ah?” I asked.
    “Nothing . What does she read?”
    I shrugged . “Mostly Nora Roberts and Danielle Steele.” The month before my parents deserted me, all my mother had done was sit on the couch and read. A couple of times I thought she looked like she’d been crying and she’d assured me it was something in a book. Now I knew better.
    I could feel Scoobie looking at me, and turned to face him . “What”
    “Did your sister write again?” he asked.
    “Yeah. She said she was sorry she hadn’t written for two weeks. She has to teach two classes to freshmen. That’s how she gets her tuition paid,” I said.
    “Teaching,” he mused . “If you didn’t have to be with little kids all day I could do that.”
    This amused me . “College freshmen aren’t exactly little kids.”
    “Yeah well, from the way they party on the beach at the end of their freshmen year, they act like it a lot,” he said .
    I had figured out that Scoobie seemed to have a lot of disdain for people who had a lot of money, or at least acted like it. He never seemed to have much, and told me he didn’t like school lunches, but if I saved a banana or cookie for him, he ate it.
    “So,” I kidded, “what do you want to be when you grow up?”
    “Not sure. My dad travels a lot for his sales job. I know I don’t want to do that.”
    “But your mom’s home, right ?” I knew she worked nights, which was why he could roam pretty freely.
    “Oh, sure . Tide’s coming in,” Scoobie said.
    We were under the boardwalk right next to the fairly short pier that sat partially over the ocean. I looked toward the pier’s two pillars closest to the ocean. A few minutes ago they’d been dry. Now the water was between them, seeping toward the third pillar, which was only a few feet from the boardwalk. Even at high tide the ocean wouldn’t come all the way to the boardwalk, but it got pretty close.  “Yep. My butt’s getting cold, anyway.” I stood and brushed off my pants.
    Scoobie yawned widely as he stood . “Gotta quit staying up so late,” he said.
    “Don’t you go home when I do?” I asked.
    “Yep. Not always tired then.”
    I looked at my watch . It was ten