Leap Day Read Online Free PDF Page A

themselves. She gives them extra homework because she wants them to suck the marrow out of life and learn all they can from this world. They are the only children she has ever wanted.

8:20 A.M. – 9:35 A.M.
    Chapter 2A: Josie
    These are the things I’m afraid of: an airplane falling on my house, the dark, being in small places, failing my driver’s test, spiders, drowning, snakes, never growing taller, never getting out of this town, alligators, war, anyone in my family dying, having my friends turn against me, eels, getting old, ghosts (including the ones that get in your car at the Haunted Mansion), letting everyone down, and never falling in love. Oh, and I’m also petrified of tornadoes. We get them sometimes here in central Florida and it scares me to death. When my mother was growing up on the outskirts of town, her younger brother was plucked from his very own bed as if the hand of God came down and took him. He was found on the front porch with nearly every bone in his body broken. He didn’t make it through the night. My mother said that next to his body was a whole pile of fish — even though they didn’t live anywhere near a lake — and some smashed tomatoes, which aren’t even native to Florida. Now I’m older than my own uncle ever got to be. It’s weird.
    But on the positive side, I’m not afraid of heights, clowns, or public speaking. The only day of the year when I’m not afraid of dying is my birthday. I mean, the odds of both being born
and
dying on Leap Day are practically astronomical. Sometimes when I get up in the morning I wonder if I’ll die before I get back in my bed. Today I breathe a little easier. I know I will sleep in my bed tonight. Or at worst, on my floor.
    I wish Katy hadn’t given me her note until after first period. Besides Mrs. Greenspan’s love of homework, she has a nasty habit of confiscating notes and posting them on the bulletin board. I decide not to even take it out of my pocket so I’m not tempted to read it. Last month Katy and I were on this kick where we’d exchange notes with dirty limericks about
The Brady Bunch.
It’s a good thing no one saw those. They’d have us committed. Katy is a pretty good poet, though. I think she has a future in it.
    Jeff Grand runs in just as the late bell rings and I hand him last night’s physics homework as he passes my desk. He takes it without a word. It’s an unspoken understanding that he didn’t do the assignment and will need to copy mine. I don’t mind. I feel I owe him something. When we were all eight years old, me, him, Megan, and Katy played doctor once, but the three of us refused to show him ours after he had been so gracious as to show us his. We ran back through the woods while he stood there with a red face hurrying to button up his shorts. To this day I can still picture those green-and-blue-striped shorts. Anyway, he’s taking a chance copying from me because I’m what is known as the Typical “B” Student. Do my homework, but not extra credit. Study for tests, but not a second longer than I have to. Every report card says the same thing, “Josie could get A’s if she applied herself.” Let Rob be the smart one in the family. I don’t even think I want to go to college. I’d rather go to acting school. The one class I get A’s in is drama.
    Mrs. G takes attendance differently than any other teacher. “Jared Adams?” she asks, knowing very well he’s sitting right there in the first seat.
    “Ubiquitous,” Jared responds. “Existing everywhere at the same time.”
    “Very good, sweetie,” she replies. “Tara Bantok?”
    Tara pauses for a second and then says, “Reciprocate. A mutual or equivalent exchange or a paying back of what one has received.”
    It goes on like this, all around the room. Every Monday we have to respond with a different SAT word and definition from this huge list Mrs. G gave us in the beginning of the year. If she especially likes your word, she’ll call you