You Are Here by Liz Fichera Read Free Book Online

do for everything she and her family had done for us.
    I was grateful that Jack had Ramon today, too. I hated to think of him walking through the front doors of his middle school all alone. Like me, he was quiet. Mom always said Jack had an “old soul.” Some of the boys in school had teased him. Wearing glasses and being smart didn’t help. Glasses usually didn’t help any kid in middle school. Before, when I had a cell phone, I used to text him after school every day just to make sure he was okay, especially after Dad died. Then one day, when he started sixth grade, he told me I had to stop treating him like a baby. And so I did.
    All in all, Jack and I had lots to be grateful for this morning. I put that mantra on repeat in my head all the way to the South High parking lot, already sizzling beneath the sun.

Chapter 12
    Twenty-Four Days and Twelve Hours Before
    E ven though my old school was only about twenty miles away, Valley High and South High were like different planets in different galaxies.
    South High had an enormous parking lot crammed with cars. Unlike Valley High, the cars in the South parking lot were from earlier decades. It was like watching an old sitcom, looking out among the parking spots. As we got closer, I could barely hear my own thoughts because of competing car stereos, which, in retrospect, was probably a good thing because my brain was performing self-sabotaging anxiety backflips. To make everything a gazillion times worse, I felt at least three dozen pairs of eyes on me—or imagined it. Then the whistles started. I’d never been whistled at before, at least not that I could remember.
    Marisela deserved every whistle, every lingering stare. She was so senior-girl chic in her low-rider jeans, layered tees, and cropped leather jacket. Her hair cascaded in shiny waves over her shoulders, looking, I swear, red-carpet ready. She told me that A New Start had a clothing closet and that I would be allowed to pick out a few outfits if I needed more clothes for school. She said the clothing options there were surprisingly awesome. “Sometimes the clothing gets donated with the price tags still on. Can you believe someone would actually do that?” she’d said, her eyes round with disbelief. “Buy new clothes and never wear them?”
    I nodded in agreement but only to hide my embarrassment. Unfortunately, I could imagine that extravagance. I’d lived it. Before. Before things got bad, Mom and I went shopping whenever we wanted just because it was fun. Because we could. Before, there were always new clothes and shoes and purses and book bags before the start of a school year. And whenever we went on vacation when Dad was still alive, like to Hawaii or Jamaica, Mom always treated me to new bathing suits, shorts, shoes—whatever I wanted. Always more than I needed. Who would have imagined that one day I’d be wearing donated clothes?
    “Hey, Marisela!” a guy called from inside the driver’s seat of his car.
    Marisela’s hand fluttered at him and her bracelets jingled.
    “Over here!” Three girls sitting cross-legged on the hood of a green car as big as a boat waved at us.
    “Who’s your friend?” yelled another guy leaning against a shiny silver bumper, and my cheeks flushed molten. He was all white teeth and rock-hard muscles beneath a tight T-shirt.
    The catcalls and greetings continued until we reached the three girls seated on the hood of the four-door. Marisela continued to wave and smile and even blew one guy a kiss with newly manicured blue fingernails, her favorite color and now mine, too. It was like walking with high school royalty, the closest I’d ever been. I had no idea that Marisela Santiago, my brand-new friend, knew every student at South High. And to think that when I first met her on the swing set, I thought she’d be shy like me.
    I was relieved to reach the green car. It was like a lifeboat in the middle of an ocean.
    The three girls lit up for Marisela the moment we