Sloth by Robin Wasserman

Author:Robin Wasserman [Wasserman, Robin]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Juvenile Fiction, Social Issues, Dating & Sex, Friendship, Love & Romance, General
ISBN: 9781442408128
Google: lVvAEBX0bWEC
Amazon: 1416907181
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 2009-12-14T16:00:00+00:00

chapter

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7

The newspaper staff was at the hospital, reading picture books to sick children.

The cast of the school musical was performing excerpts from Oklahoma! at the Grace Retirement Village.

The French club was distributing meals—with a side of croissants, but no wine—to invalids and shut-ins.

Community Service Day was a success, and any senior with a conscience or a guilt complex was devoting the morning to helping others. The only seniors left in class were the ones too lazy to make the effort and too dim to realize that even cleaning bedpans or trimming nose hairs would be preferable to spending the morning in school.

And then there was Beth.

She’d organized the event, worked with the hospital administrators and the town hall community liaison, shined with pride at adding a socially responsible activity to the spirit week agenda, and planned to lead the charge with a quick visit to the Grace animal shelter and a stop at the hospital children’s wing, culminating in a triumphant hour of reading to the blind. But instead, she was hiding in an empty classroom, folded over her desk with her head buried in her arms, like she was playing Heads Up, 7 Up all by herself. She’d told her history teacher that she had a headache, but instead of going to the nurse’s office, she’d slipped in here and was wiling away her time by listening to her breathing and wondering if Berkeley admitted felons.

She looked up at the sound of a knock on the door. Before she had a chance to come up with a cover story or consider hiding, the door swung open, and Beth was momentarily relieved to realize that it wasn’t a teacher who might demand an explanation for Beth’s presence. But her relief was short-lived, as a dour-looking woman with a squarish build, coffee-colored skin, and a pinched, vaguely familiar face stepped into the room—followed by a reluctant Harper Grace.

“I was told this room would be empty,” the woman said, her words clipped and precise. “You’ll have to go.”

The woman sat down on one of the desks and, without bothering to check that Beth would follow her command, focused her attention on Harper.

“I should get back to class,” Harper mumbled, still standing in the doorway. Beth had to push past her to get out of the room, a maneuver made more difficult by the fact that Harper didn’t edge out of the way, but instead just stood planted in the middle of the doorway.

“Come in, sit down,” the woman said, and though her voice was soft, it was far from kind. “You said you needed to talk to me—here I am.”

Harper glanced toward Beth for the first time, and Beth recoiled from the look in her eyes, a confusing mixture of Get out and, more disturbingly, Stay. Beth quickened her step. She shut the door behind her, just slowly enough to hear the woman’s final words.

“So, what did you remember about the accident?”

She just had to come to school today. She couldn’t be

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