Crash by Jerry Spinelli

Author:Jerry Spinelli
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780307555397
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 1996-06-16T07:00:00+00:00

24

He was wearing his usual thrift-shop rags except for the shirt.

It was a T-shirt that had been printed up to read:

STALL

THE

MALL

You believe it? And as usual he didn’t have a clue about what was going on. He just barged in from his own little universe, all perky: “Greetings, fellow students.”

“Hi, Penn,” said Jane. I would have given my left nostril for the smile she shot him. “Did you get it?”

Webb held up a plastic bag. “Yep.” He took something from it, a T-shirt. He shook it open, displayed it. It said the same thing as his.

Jane squealed and snatched it, and right there she pulled it on over her other shirt. She modeled it. Webb and her girlfriends clapped.

“That’s really stupid,” I said. “What makes you think you can stop a mall with a couple of T-shirts?”

“Not just a couple,” said Webb. “We’re going to try to get everybody in school to wear one. Everybody in town.”

I laughed. “You’re crazier than I thought if you think all these kids are gonna wear that thing. Whoever heard of trying to stop a mall? Anybody who doesn’t want a mall is”—I wasn’t sure what the word meant, but Jane had used it on me and it felt right— “obnoxious.”

“Well,” he said, “somebody in your own family is joining in. Abby has one.”

I poked him in his skinny, sunken chest. I kept poking him backward till he was against the wall. “You let my family outta this. If I ever catch you doing this stuff around my house, I’ll have your butt for breakfast. And stay away from my sister, y’hear? She’s little, so she doesn’t know any better.” I gave him a final poke. “Understand?”

I had him nailed to the wall with one finger. Behind me I could hear kids rushing over. Whispers of “Fight!” mixed with the music. I was waiting for an answer when Jane reached in and pulled my finger away. Anybody else, I would have clubbed them.

“Want to dance, Penn?” she said. She took his hand and pulled him away through the mob.

Mike came over. We just stood there, watching them dance. When the song was over, I said, “Come on, let’s get outta this dump.”

As we left, I made sure we passed Webb and Jane coming off the dance floor. I took a quick half step to the left, set my legs, and rammed into him with my shoulder. He went flying on his rear about ten feet across the floor.

“Oh,” I said, really sorry-like, “excuse me.” And we were out the door.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.