Jean and Johnny Read Online Free PDF

she could get along without them between classes. If one boy had noticed her, perhaps another boy might come along….
    Elaine gave Jean little time for daydreaming. “Now the first thing you have to do,” she said, as she stood with a fork poised over the sizzling pork chops, “is to learn to dance. After dinner we can play some records and I’ll show you what I have learned. We can practice all during Christmas vacation. After all, if the boy asked you once, he might ask you again and”—Elaine paused significantly—“he might have a friend.”
    So that was why Elaine was taking such an interest in Jean’s future. Jean carefully slipped the skin from the avocado, leaving the fruit as smooth as green velvet. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to practice,” she said, “not that anything will ever come of it.”
    And so Jean practiced dancing under Elaine’s direction during the rest of Christmas vacation. Step, step, slide, slide, step, step. “This is the basic step,” Elaine explained, “but it is more fun with a boy.” Step, step, slide, slide, step, step. When Mr. Mundy saw what the girls were doing, he took an interest and insisted on dancing them around theliving room a few times. The girls were polite about this, but they did not feel he was much help. His dancing was so old-fashioned.
    Jean began to half wish that when school started the boy would recognize her, seek her out, and say something to let her know he had not minded those few minutes spent with her. She wouldn’t even expect him to ask her for a date. She would just like to know that a good-looking boy felt friendly toward her and would pay her a little attention beyond saying, “Hi,” in the halls. That was the trouble with her and Elaine and a lot of other girls—nobody paid any attention to them. Jean and Elaine had both had a left-out feeling since they had transferred from junior to senior high school. Northgate High School, the only high school in the city, seemed so big, so full of strange faces, that they felt lost in the crowds that swarmed the corridors.
    One evening when the practice session ended, Elaine sat down with her long legs over the arm of a chair, helped herself to a handful of peanuts, and began to eat them one at a time. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we got to be popular?” she asked. “Dates, committees, getting elected to offices, more dates…”
    â€œIt’s funny,” said Jean thoughtfully, “but I don’t think I even want to be popular.”
    â€œEvery girl wants to be popular.” Elaine was positive about this.
    â€œI don’t.” This time Jean was positive too. “I’m too—too quiet. I wouldn’t want to call a meeting to order or even read the minutes. And I would be miserable if I had to be a rally girl. Not that there is any danger of that.”
    â€œNot me,” said Elaine. “I would simply adore swishing a couple of pompoms around in front of the whole student body.” She added, with a note of regret, “Except that I am taller than all the yell leaders.”
    â€œI would rather be part of the crowd cheering for the team,” said Jean, nibbling a peanut.
    â€œAnd when the school puts on the variety show I would like to be right out in the middle of the stage, with everybody applauding madly,” said Elaine, “although I don’t know exactly what they would applaud me for. I can’t do anything special.”
    Jean giggled. “You could do that Captain Jinks of the Horse Marines tap dance we learned in gym. The one where we had to paw the ground with our feet.”
    Elaine leaned back against the arm of her chair and laughed. “I want people to applaud, not dielaughing,” she said. Then she sighed gustily. “I guess I don’t have a thing to worry about. Nobody is going to ask me to swish a pompom in front of the