Sometimes Never, Sometimes Always Read Online Free PDF Page A

My voice is still stuck in whisper mode, but my lungs at least seem to have regained normal functionality.
    To my horror, he reaches out his bony English-teacher hand and pats my shoulder, and then he withdraws his hand and shifts his weight on his heels, searching for a better view of my eyes. Even in the noisy classroom, I can hear his knees popping as he crouches there.
    “Cassandra. There’s something inside of you that’s worth celebrating, that’s worth singing about. If you think about it long enough, you’ll find it.”
    “If I think about it too long, I’ll fail this assignment,” I mutter. The due date looms from the white board. Two weeks from tomorrow, also midterms.
    “It’s not about the assignment,” he says, hauling himself to his feet. “It’s about life.” He turns toward the group of kids who are waving him down from across the room.
    “But … ” Life . The panic returns. “What if there’s nothing? What if there’s nothing to write about?” He can’t leave me. I can’t write this poem.
    “Well, I guess you’ll have to make something up then,” he says, in a tone that implies he’s done all he can do for me.
    Make something up? “Something for my poem?” I persist, half-rising out of my chair, as if to follow him.
    He shrugs. “Or something for life,” he says.
    I sit. Make something up.
    Darin pauses in his doodling and looks at me through his shaggy bangs. “It’s okay,” he says. He looks like he’s about to elaborate, but then he tosses his hair back. “I mean, I would read a poem about mutilating kittens.” And then he laughs, but it’s a nice laugh—not a mocking laugh and not the creepy kind of laugh that would make me suspect there was some truth in the statement.
    “Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.” My voice is shaky, but his eyes are a steady gray, and he smiles at me.
    “Relax, Cassandra. It’s a stupid assignment.” He hands me his paper, which I can see now has a few lines scribbled in among the sketches: I celebrate myself, and sing myself, but I won’t let you watch while I play with myself.
    “You’re disgusting,” I say, sliding the paper back across the desk. My cheeks tingle a little. I hope I’m not blushing.
    “It’s what makes me special,” he says, and then he does the weirdest thing. He reaches across the table and takes my hand, but before I can pull it away, he draws this stupid little smiley face on my index finger with his pen. And then he holds up his hand—each finger has a little face like mine—and he waves at me.
    All I have to do is smile, lift that one finger, and wave back. The bell rings, and my hands are still clutched into fists in my lap as he tosses his hair back and stands. “Lighten up,” he says. And then he’s gone.

8. The biggest risk
you’ve taken …
    I’m not sure I’ve ever gone to the mall alone. Eric’s twenty is in my pocket and it makes me mad. I can’t believe he couldn’t pick something out for me, for his own sister. I want to walk directly over to my favorite things and say, “Look, this is what I like, this is the kind of gift you should get me.” But as I stand here in the crowded food court in the middle of the Sterling Creek Shopping Center, I can’t even decide which direction to go, which store to walk into, much less what I want. I’m not sure I know how to even walk without Kayla leading the way.
    Make something up . I can do this. Out of habit, I turn left, toward the music store and the store where the skater kids hang out, but I can’t get myself to go all the way into the skater shop. I flip my hand listlessly through the rack of black T-shirts near the door and pretend like I’m checking out the orange suede sneakers on display. I feel so dumb. I don’t know these people. A boy with a pink-and-blond faux hawk and black eyeliner nods, but he doesn’t smile. I can feel him judging me. I tug the sleeves of my sweatshirt over my fingers and wish for Kayla, for her