Stranger Things by A. R. Capetta

Author:A. R. Capetta [Capetta, A. R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2021-06-29T00:00:00+00:00

NOVEMBER 21, 1983

Living in an unexpected state of suburban parental lockdown, losing the friend they wanted to go to Europe with (along with their other ones into the bargain), and having exactly zero dollars in the bank because they were focusing on said friendships and getting through the remainder of marching band season, some people would let go of their plans.

I’m doubling down.

Marching band is over in one week. By then, I’m going to have a job where I can make enough money for not one but two people to get to Europe next summer. Something about the way Dash (creepily) offered to pay for the whole trip made me extra determined to raise the funds all on my own. By the time my friendship with Milton is officially reinstated, he won’t have time to fund his own plane ticket, though my hope is that he’ll be able to contribute to the “trains and hostels and moules frites” fund. I’ve called and priced out every airline while my parents were asleep. If we leave from Chicago, round-trip tickets for Charles de Gaulle Airport near Paris will cost eight hundred dollars each.

If I work for the rest of the school year and combine that money with the saved-up funds I get from my rogue relatives who send birthday and Christmas cards stuffed with twenty-dollar bills, I might just have enough.

In the meantime, I’ll wait for Milton to fight his battle with the high school monster. Maybe I should be mad at him for bailing on me, but I understand his choice better than I want to. There are things the people around us just don’t understand or accept. Girls like Sheena Rollins, who won’t talk to anyone, refusing all forms of social connection, even though they’re the constant target of bullies. Girls like me, who won’t cave to the pressure to date a boy—any boy—even though it means losing longtime friends. And boys like Milton, who can manage to be friends with girls like me.

I trust Milton, though. He’ll ask out Wendy, go to prom with her (okay, I judge him a little for caring so much about prom), and then we’ll be back on for Europe. It would be weird to tell him about it now, when we’re in friendship purgatory, so I’ll just keep planning in his absence.

And in the meantime, I’ll look for a backup candidate—just in case.

My brain is clicking away with all of this as Mr. Hauser starts into the topic of Shirley Jackson. We finished Lord of the Flies back in September, slogged through The Catcher in the Rye in October, and for November are on to short stories by a bevy of assorted writers. Last week was Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants.” (Even Mr. Hauser looks bored when we talk about Hemingway. When I wondered aloud why he keeps it on the syllabus, he revealed that he isn’t allowed to set the readings. They’re based on school board approvals and whatever copies

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