Eleanor & Park Read Online Free PDF Page A

Park had thought at
    the time, don’t wear fishing lures
    in your hair. Her jewelry box must
    look like a junk drawer. Not that
    everything she wore was stupid …
    She had a pair of Vans he
    liked, with strawberries on them.
    And she had a green sharkskin
    blazer that Park would wear
    himself if he thought he could get
    away with it.
    Did she think she was getting
    away with it?
    Park braced himself every
    morning before she got on the
    bus, but you couldn’t brace
    yourself enough for the sight of
    her.
    ‘Do you know her?’ Cal
    asked.
    ‘No,’ Park said quickly. ‘She’s
    on my bus. She’s weird.’
    ‘Jungle fever is a thing,’ Cal
    said.
    ‘For black people. If you like
    black people. And it’s not a
    compliment, I don’t think.’
    ‘Your people come from the
    jungle,’ Cal said, pointing at Park.
    ‘ Apocalypse Now , anyone?’
    ‘You should ask Kim out,’
    Park said. ‘That’s a really good
    idea.’
    Eleanor
    Eleanor wasn’t going to fight over
    an e.e. cummings book like it was
    the last Cabbage Patch Kid. She
    found an empty table in the
    African
    American
    literature
    section.
    That was another fucked-up
    thing about this school – effed-up,
    she corrected herself.
    Most of the kids here were
    black, but most of the kids in her
    honors classes were white. They
    got bussed in from west Omaha.
    And the white kids from the Flats,
    dishonor students, got bussed in
    from the other direction.
    Eleanor wished she had more
    honors classes. She wished there
    was honors gym …
    Like they’d ever let her into
    honors gym. Eleanor would get
    put in remedial gym first. With all
    the other fat girls who couldn’t do
    sit-ups.
    Anyway. Honor students –
    black, white or Asia Minor –
    tended to be nicer. Maybe they
    were just as mean on the inside,
    but they were scared of getting in
    trouble. Or maybe they were just
    as mean on the inside, but they’d
    been trained to be polite – to give
    up their seats for old people and
    girls.
    Eleanor had honors English,
    history and geography, but she
    spent the rest of her day in
    Crazytown. Seriously, Blackboard
    Jungle . She should probably try
    harder in her smart classes so that
    she wouldn’t get kicked out of
    them.
    She started copying a poem
    called ‘Caged Bird’ into her
    notebook … Sweet. It rhymed.
    CHAPTER 8
    Park
    She was reading his comics.
    At first Park thought he was
    imagining it. He kept getting this
    feeling that she was looking at
    him, but whenever he looked over
    at her, her face was down.
    He finally realized that she was
    staring at his lap. Not in a gross
    way. She was looking at his
    comics – he could see her eyes
    moving.
    Park didn’t know that anyone
    with red hair could have brown
    eyes. (He didn’t know that anyone
    could have hair that red. Or skin
    that white.) The new girl’s eyes
    were darker than his mom’s, really
    dark, almost like holes in her face.
    That made it sound bad, but it
    wasn’t. It might even be the best
    thing about her. It kind of
    reminded Park of the way artists
    draw Jean Grey sometimes when
    she’s using her telepathy, with her
    eyes all blacked out and alien.
    Today the girl was wearing a
    giant men’s shirt with seashells all
    over it. The collar must have been
    really big, like disco-big, because
    she’d cut it, and it was fraying.
    She had a man’s necktie wrapped
    around her ponytail like a big
    polyester ribbon. She looked
    ridiculous.
    And she was looking at his
    comics.
    Park felt like he should say
    something to her. He always felt
    like he should say something to
    her, even if it was just ‘hello’ or
    ‘excuse me.’ But he’d gone too
    long without saying anything since
    the first time he’d cursed at her,
    and now it was all just irrevocably
    weird. For an hour a day. Thirty
    minutes on the way to school,
    thirty minutes back.
    Park didn’t say anything. He
    just held his comics open wider
    and turned the pages more slowly.
    Eleanor
    Her mom looked tired