You Go First by Erin Entrada Kelly

Author:Erin Entrada Kelly
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2018-02-05T05:00:00+00:00

Life According to Ben

Part XI

Millions of tons of debris were floating around in the earth’s seas, threatening and killing marine life. Ben had nightmares about this sometimes. Manatees smothered by grocery bags. Dolphins muzzled by plastic six-pack rings. Whales swallowing take-out containers.

Ben had planned to spend his lunch period working on his speech, but he’d become too distracted by items going in the wrong bins and it occurred to him that he could do something about it and meet people at the same time. So he decided to stand between the trash and recyclable receptacles wearing his friendliest smile.

It bewildered Ben that no one at Lanester seemed remotely interested in the “ocean of garbage,” as he liked to call it, but he figured it was because they weren’t fully educated on the issues. He was going to take care of that and woo potential voters at the same time. Multitasking. He refused to let Theo, Sherry, Derrick Whatshisname, or anyone else deter him. Adversity built character. It was all part of politics.

“Focus on the greater good,” he whispered, under his breath.

As far as Ben could tell, the biggest problem with the cafeteria bins was that the students threw their plastics into the bin for trash, rather than the other way around.

“This one is for recyclables,” said Ben to the first person who walked up—a girl with a T-shirt that said FUTURE DIVA, who was about to drop an empty Coke can into the trash.

She gave him a quizzical look, but beelined to the right bin.

“Thank you,” said Ben. “My name is Ben Boxer and I’m running for student council.”

He continued this routine as more students walked up, but added statistics for good measure.

“Excuse me,” he said. “I’m Ben Boxer and I’m running for student council. Did you know that millions of milk jugs are introduced into our oceans each year?”

He varied the stats as more students streamed through.

“Twenty billion plastic bottles are tossed into the trash annually.”

“At least one hundred thousand marine creatures died from plastic entanglement last year.”

For the most part he got bewildered looks and some laughter, but he felt a sense of accomplishment anyway because so far his strategy was working—sixth graders watched him curiously as he gestured frantically toward the appropriate bin, but they would realize their error and discard properly.

There were so many people he didn’t know. Like there were two schools: one with Ben and another with every else.

Which universe? Pluto?

When Theo and his friends walked up, Ben absently touched the back of his head and watched them throw all their paper and plastic into the trash. He clamped his mouth shut and made no eye contact, but no matter.

“How’s it going, prawn?” said Theo. The other boys snickered. “Do you know what a prawn is?”

Ben shifted his eyes toward Mrs. Fausto, the English teacher, who was on lunch duty. She stood near the windows and glanced around the room like an attentive cat, ready to pounce. But she wasn’t watching Ben. Not at that moment, anyway.

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