Don't Kiss Him Good-Bye by Sandra Byrd Read Free Book Online Page A

neighborhood below.
    Lord, I want to play a song that will honor You. One that I really like and can play with feeling. Please help me pick a good one.
    My thoughts went from the April Fools show to the May Day Ball, which honestly was never far from my mind.
    It’s okay if I don’t go , I said to myself.
    But I really want to, and that’s okay too, I said back.
    But who could I go with? I replied.
    I felt like such a hypocrite for giving such a breezy, know-it-all answer to the girl who’d written in the paper. I watched as the lights shut off in each of the neighborhood houses till only one house was still lit. Only one choice left, as far as I can see.
    I sat on the floor and searched through the Taylor Swift music again. There was no escaping the fact that certain titles caught my eye more than others. “Love Story.” “Baby, Don’t Break My Heart.” “Sparks Fly.”
    One song called to me, and as I picked up the music, I knew two things for sure:
    1. The Lord had answered my prayer and showed me the song to play. Thank You, Lord.
    2. The song had a double entendre , one of the words in my French homework that night. It meant “a word or expression used in a given context so that it can be understood in two ways.”

Chapter 20

    Friday, glorious Friday, when I could wear whatever I wanted to school, when an entire weekend stretched ahead, with sleeping in on Saturday, followed by waffles and scrambled eggs whipped up by my dad. I had homework, of course. And I needed to practice my song for April Fools. Plus, I’d promised Natalie I’d do a bit more research for her. But it was still Friday!
    “Love the boots, Savvy,” Ashley said as I sat down at the lunch table. The entire table went quiet. Had Ashley just complimented me? I felt her crown of approval on my head. Others must have noticed because I felt a distinct thaw in the attitude toward me at the table. Penny beamed like a proud mum. I felt pretty glad too. I had been myself, had remained true to myself, and that was good enough to be noticed.
    “Thank you, Ashley. I love your new bag. Yellow patent leather is very in.” I returned her compliment in kind. It was true—she did have a great bag. Then Penny and I got down to business: nibbling the protein bars she’d brought and the bag of veggies I’d brought. I looked at the clock.
    Four more hours till I can get to the chippie for my real meal!
    “Hey, what are you doing after school?” I asked Penny. “Want to shop in the village with me? I was thinking of checking out Be@titude and then heading to Fishcoteque.”
    “Brilliant, Savvy, but tonight’s the night a bunch of us—” she nodded in the direction of the other Aristocats—“are taking the bus and the Tube to London to shop for dresses. I’m sorry.”
    “Is Chloe going with you?” I asked, trying to seem as if I didn’t really care. Casual. Chill. You know.
    “Yes . . . why?”
    I shook my head. “No reason; just wondering.”
    I could see her little-white-lie detector go off, but she was loyal enough not to ask me anything in front of the rest of the group. Instead, she squeezed my hand and then wrote Monday! on my hand in Sharpie. “We’re still getting together at my house on Monday, right? And my mum would like you to stay for supper.”
    “Okay. Have a good time,” I said, meaning it. I hadn’t told her this, but I was definitely, absolutely going to feature her and Oliver as one of the couples in the paper.
    After school I dropped off most of my gear at home and headed to the village square with only my purse and my WA Times notebook. The daffodils labored to push their heads through the ground, and some of them had successfully burst through in a ground-level shot of sunshine.
    I arrived at a tidy brick shop with wide, clean windows and the word Be@titude scrawled across the top. The clothes in the window ranged from chic and fresh to fairly modern—nothing stodgy here. I opened the shop door, and the chimes