Strange Girl Read Online Free PDF Page B

free will right out of my hands.
    I slept that night with my phone beside my pillow.
    It never rang.

CHAPTER THREE
    THE NEXT DAY I looked forward to Mrs. Billard’s class and another chance to see Aja. I arrived early but Aja didn’t come in until a few seconds before the bell, sitting in the same chair as the previous day, on the far side of the room. She had on a simple red dress and looked fantastic. Only she didn’t look at me. Oh well . . .
    Billard started fast, handing out a quiz on yesterday’s discussion, the thirteen colonies’ difficulties with the king of England, chapter three in our textbook. Billard was known for her pop quizzes, but from the groans that surrounded me, I could tell the majority of the class hadn’t read the chapter. I was lucky, I’d awakened early and studied it thoroughly. I knew I’d ace the quiz. I never considered myself particularly smart but I had a knack for taking tests.
    As Billard had promised, she gave Aja her own special quiz. “This is on the first two chapters, all forty-eight pages. You did read them, didn’t you?” she asked as she handed Aja three sheets of paper.
    “Yes,” Aja said.
    “Good,” Billard said. “If you have time, you can take today’s quiz as well.”
    “Thank you,” Aja said.
    “Don’t thank me,” Billard replied. “All my tests are closed book. Put your textbook under your seat and leave it there. If I catch you cheating I’ll flunk you before you begin. Understand?”
    Aja nodded but said nothing. I wondered at Billard’s harshness. Aja had just arrived in town; there was no reason for Billard to snap at her. To even be in an AP class, Aja must have scored high on the placement tests that were given to all foreign students. For all Billard knew, Aja might have been Ivy League material.
    Yet I wondered if Aja had Billard flustered. The teacher was used to intimidating students and it was as if Aja’s calm demeanor, her penetrating gaze, made Billard feel like she was somehow no longer in control . . .
    It was just a thought.
    The quiz turned out to be harder than I’d anticipated. First off it was not all multiple choice; there were essay questions. Billard not only wanted to know who had started the Boston Tea Party, she wanted to know why they had started it. I was lucky I’d read a biography on Benjamin Franklin over the summer—a tome my mother had insisted I digest—and was up on my Revolutionary history. While taking the test, I was able to expand upon what was in the textbook, which I had a feeling would please Billard.
    I finished the test early but didn’t immediately hand it in. The last thing I wanted to do was show up my classmates. Yet, a half hour into the period, I was surprised to see Aja stand and hand in the test sheets Billard had given her. Billard, who was engrossed in a book about the Civil War, looked up in surprise.
    “What’s the problem?” she demanded.
    “No problem,” Aja said, giving her the tests. She returned to her seat, leaving Billard with a frown on her face. Ordinarily Billard graded her quizzes after class but today she quickly scanned Aja’s work. I don’t know why that disturbed me but it did; and it didn’t take long before her frown changed into an expression of outright anger. Clenching Aja’s quizzes in her hand, Billard stood from behind her desk.
    “Class, put down your tests and listen for a moment,” she said. “I want to read something that I think you’ll find enlightening. As a few of you might remember from two weeks ago, on the fourth question of your first quiz, I asked how the town of Raleigh and subsequent colony of Carolina was founded. Now Aja Smith answered this question by writing, and I quote, ‘During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, Walter Raleigh, a pirate well known for raiding Spanish ships crossing the Atlantic to and from the New World, came to the attention of the queen when he introduced the English court to tobacco, which he had discovered