It's Not Easy Being Bad Read Online Free PDF Page A

there,” Mikey pointed out.
    â€œI’m not complaining,” Frannie said.
    â€œOkay,” Mikey said. “You’re not. So what do you want from us?”
    â€œ Zut , Mikey, alors! ” Margalo protested.
    But Frannie didn’t take offense. “You’re both in Mrs. Brannigan’s seminar, and that’s the one I want to sit in on. The school is giving me a two-week trial period, to see if I’m a good enough student to take seminar. Can you believe it took all this time for my parents to persuade Mr. Saunders just to let me try? And that’s after we finally got an appointment, so we could argue our own case.”
    â€œWhy us?” Mikey asked.
    â€œI want to know what you think of her.”
    â€œBut why us?” Mikey repeated.
    â€œBecause you think for yourselves,” Frannie explained. “Everybody else gossips about her, but if youtwo like her, she’s probably a good teacher. Do you like her seminar?”
    â€œIt’s okay,” Mikey said. “For school.” Her attention returned to the chasing of kernels, which skidded around the plate trying to escape her Terminator fork. “We’re about to start the Renaissance.”
    â€œI know. I wish I’d been there for Greece. Did you read the myths?”
    â€œLiterature’s not until next year,” Margalo said. “But we heard about Schliemann’s excavations. Even Mikey liked Schliemann. You can admit that, just to us, Mikey.”
    â€œEverybody told him he was wrong,” Mikey explained, “and he wasn’t.”
    Frannie went along with this conversation as if they were friends, the three of them, and knew each other. “So, can I go to class with you for the trial period? What are you reading, or are you doing art now?”
    â€œArt this week,” Margalo said. “Next week we’re talking about The Prince.”
    â€œMachiavelli,” Mikey announced. “I’m looking forward to Machiavelli.”
    Frannie shook her head. She’d never heard of him. “I just don’t want to go in alone. I know it wouldn’tbother you, Mikey, but it does me. It’s okay, isn’t it, Margalo? If I stick with you two?”
    â€œAs long as you don’t stick too close,” Mikey answered, and that set Frannie off again. “You laugh a lot,” Mikey observed.
    â€œPeople are pretty funny,” Frannie explained.
    â€œYou mean they’re ridiculous,” Mikey corrected.
    â€œYeah, sometimes that’s what I mean,” Frannie agreed.

3
One (bad) Egg, Scrambled
    T he Monday morning after Halloween, Margalo waited outside for Mikey’s bus, so she could hear about the party, who talked to who about what, how they liked the food, and if—against all probabilities—Mikey had been transformed into a popular person. The day was sunny and crisp, a clear blue sky over the flat roof of the school, people standing around in their down vests and Polartec vests, or their heavy knit sweaters and hooded sweatshirts. Margalo waited for Mikey, and a few people greeted her as they got off buses, “Great sweater.”
    It was an old Irish knit, an Aran sweater someone had discarded because of a couple of big holes. Margalo had paid fifty cents for it and sewed up the holes;now she looked like someone out of a PBS special about Ireland. Or Scotland, maybe, somewhere overseas where people were exotic and more interesting.
    Finally, Mikey came down the steps of the bus, in her cargo jeans and a green and white jacket, looking a lot like a brussels sprout.
    A brussels sprout having a serious attack of bad temper, Margalo realized. Mikey emanated a force field of fury so strong that everybody was giving her a lot of room, and looking back at her over their shoulders. Mikey smiled a Don’t-even-think-of-it smile, more warning than friendliness, more threat than warning.
    Margalo considered going somewhere else, maybe