My First Love Read Online Free PDF Page B

give up the opportunity to watch the eclipse with Chris.
    After class, I caught up with Blythe. “You should pair up with Rick,” I advised her in a whisper. “It’s the perfect time for you two to be alone.”
    Blythe was shaking her head. “My parents are dragging me up to our cabin in Payson this weekend,” she said, sighing. “So I’ll be gazing at the heavens alone. And unless you can come with us, I guess you’ll just have to pair up with Chris.”
    There was hardly anything I liked more than driving with the Carlsons to Payson, wedged into the backseat with Blythe and her brother and grocery bags full of junk food. We sang stupid road songs, and sometimes we did crossword puzzles together or played word games. I loved being with a real family, one where there was a mother and a father and a brother. Mr. and Mrs. Carlson seemed to really love each other, and Blythe and her little brother Bill actually got along. The cabin itself was beautiful—tucked away in the mountains northwest of Phoenix, surrounded on three sides by a fragrant forest of pines. But to me, getting up there was at least half the fun.
    Blythe knew as well as I did that my mom would let me go. She welcomed any opportunity to get me out of the city to breathe some fresh air. But just then, I would have given up a trip to Paris to spend Saturday night with Chris.
    “I have to stay home this weekend and finish my Englishpaper,” I said. “Not to mention those two books for our report that I have to start reading.”
    Blythe looked hurt for a moment, but then she winked at me. “Okay, Amy,” she said. “By Monday, I’m sure you’ll be something of an expert on the subject of intimacy.”

chapter five
    As I’d explained to Mr. Tayerle, it was a tradition for some of the Dolphins to go for a premeet carbo load. That’s when we piled into someone’s car at lunch period and cruised Central Avenue’s mile-long stretch of restaurants, a virtual buffet of fast food. Though I’d always liked our ritual of pizza and french fries and camaraderie, that day I’d secretly been hoping that Chris and I could carbo-load alone.
    But when I got to my locker at lunchtime, there was Shannon O’Malley, one of the Dolphins. “So who’s driving today?” she asked.
    Before I could even answer, Chris came up behind me. “We’re going in Zipperman’s car,” he said, meaning Mark Zimmerman. He had gotten the nickname Zipperman because he zipped along in the water, the fastest swimmer on our team after Chris. “John Horvath’s driving too, but I think he already left. Zipperman’s out in the parking lot, waiting for us in his Blazer.”
    “Sorry, Amy,” Chris whispered, as if he’d been thinking the very same thing I had. “Zipperman caught me between classes and wouldn’t let me say no.”
    “That’s okay,” I said, but I had to admit I felt disappointed. When Zipperman turned the car around and pulled up at the curb beside us, I was doubly disappointed to see who was sitting next to him in the front seat. It was Jill Renfrew, another junior who was always competing with me for the chance to swim the 100 free. I’d recognize her linebacker shoulders and hairless arms (she shaved them so she’d slide like a snake through the water) anywhere.
    “Oh, no, it’s Cutthroat,” I said under my breath. That was the secret nickname Shannon had given her after she’d overheard Jill telling one of our teammates that she thought I should be benched for skipping practice one day last week. “What if this carbo load is just a ploy for Jill to slip poison into my food, so that I can’t swim in the meet?” I asked Chris jokingly.
    Chris had noticed that Jill and I didn’t get along, but he didn’t know she had stolen (or as she put it, “misplaced”)my bathing cap before divisionals last season. And though I couldn’t prove it, I suspected she’d once cut the straps on my suit. He wrapped his arm around me conspiratorially as Shannon opened