Two Cool for School (4 page)

They heard Coach heading down the front stairs. He walked in, freshly showered and smelling of shaving cream, and kissed Mrs. Sackett gently on the forehead.

“Long day, hon?”

“Yes, I'm exhausted,” said Mrs. Sackett. “I've forgotten what it's like to do this full-time!” She sank into a chair and smiled gratefully as Ava handed her a large glass of iced tea. Moxy sidled over and put her head on Mrs. Sackett's lap, hoping to be petted.

“I was firing all afternoon,” said Mrs. Sackett, her hand now stroking Moxy's glossy head. “And I just found out there's a PTA meeting this Wednesday and I am very much expected to be there. Plus, a reporter from the paper called and asked me for quotes about our family life.” She took a long gulp of tea. “Did you remember to stop by the vet for Moxy's medicine, sweetie?”

Coach grimaced. “I'm sorry, hon,” he said. “Practice ran late and . . .” He shook his head.
“I just forgot all about it,” he admitted.

Mrs. Sackett sighed wearily. “It's okay. I'll go in the morning, before I go to the studio.”

Coach hung his head. Ava and Alex exchanged a look.

Later that evening, after Ava had finally finished her social studies reading, she climbed into bed with
White Fang,
her dictionary, and her writer's notebook. She opened to the first page of the book.

Dark spruce forest frowned on either side the frozen waterway. The trees had been stripped by a recent wind of their white covering of frost, and they seemed to lean toward each other, black and ominous, in the fading light. A vast silence reigned over the land. The land itself was a desolation, lifeless . . .

Ava's mind wandered. She thought about her mom and dad, and how stressed they both seemed. She thought about Tommy, and his feelings about football. Would he ever consider
quitting the team? How would Coach respond?

. . . desolation, lifeless, without movement, so lone and cold that the spirit of it was not even that of sadness. . . .

Her eyes drooped. Why was it so hard to concentrate? The text was small, the language was flowery, and the sentences were so long. Plus, who cared about the landscape? Why couldn't the author get to the fun part, which presumably was a dog or a wolf named White Fang? Was she the only person with this concentration problem? She thought about Jack. Had he breezed through the chapters? Then she thought about Alex. She wished she had Alex's powers of concentration.

“Stop,” she said out loud, shaking her head quickly back and forth to wake herself up. “Concentrate.”

But the next thing she knew, it was morning. She'd fallen asleep with her light on. Her book had slipped to the floor, and she hadn't read the first page, let alone started the writing assignment.

Alex loved Ms. Torres, her English teacher, for her sense of style. She was young and pretty, with full lips and large dark eyes. And two days in a row she'd worn very fashionable outfits. Today she had on a red shift dress and matching red patent leather flats. She also had a lovely, lilting laugh. The downside of English class with Ms. Torres was that it looked like it was going to be a little slow moving. They only had to read one chapter of
Johnny Tremain
per night, and it was not a complex book.

At the start of today's class, Ms. Torres gave them a pop quiz on the reading. Then they passed their quiz to the person behind them and graded their partner's quiz during a guided
discussion. As it happened, Corey was sitting behind Alex.

That was the upside to the class. A very good-looking, very twinkly-eyed upside. Not only was Corey in this class, but so was Emily. By some miracle, Alex, Corey, and Emily also shared the same math class. But the difference was Lindsey was also in math with Ms. Kerry. And Alex had found that Emily acted differently when Lindsey was around.

“You got a hundred and five with the extra credit,” said Corey as he passed Alex back her quiz. “Impressive.”

Alex could feel herself blushing. Was he making fun of her? Did he think she was a big nerd? Alex knew what her mom would say if she knew what Alex was thinking. Mrs. Sackett had always emphasized the importance of being proud of her intelligence and told her never to hide or mask it for the sake of a boy. That was easy for her to say. The fact was, Alex was a nerd. How many other seventh graders were spending their free time studying SAT vocab words?

“That's so great, Alex!” said Emily, who seemed genuinely impressed. Then she leaned in a little
closer. “A few of us are going to the mall on Saturday,” she whispered. “Want to come? Like around eleven?”

Alex beamed. Her first social invitation of the school year! “I'd love to!” she said.

Ms. Torres cleared her throat.

“I'll text you with the plan once I find out what it is,” said Emily quickly.

Alex felt giddy with happiness. She was on her way to being accepted by the popular crowd. And once she was in, she'd help guide Ava into it as well, just as she'd done back in Massachusetts.

But Emily wasn't quite so friendly in math class the next period. She chatted away with Alex as they walked between classrooms together, but once they got there, Emily sat in the only seat next to Lindsey. The day before, there'd been two free seats, but today the second one was occupied by a new kid—probably a transfer from another math section. That left Alex no choice but to sit halfway across the room, next to a kid with his head down on the desk, evidently asleep. Corey leaned over from a few desks away in the same row and grinned at her.

Ms. Kerry wrote a complex equation on the board:

343 − 49 ÷ 7 x 6
²
+ 12

“Alex,” said Ms. Kerry. “Can you help us to demonstrate order of operations? How would you work this out?” She beckoned Alex up to the board.

Alex glanced at Corey, who gave her an encouraging nod.

She moved to the whiteboard and quickly did the calculations. “You'd first square the six to give you thirty-six. Then you'd divide the forty-nine by seven, and that would give you seven. Then you'd need to multiply the seven by the thirty-six, which would give you two hundred fifty-two, so then it's three hundred forty-three minus two hundred fifty-two plus twelve. And then you'd do the subtraction and the addition to give you”—she calculated quickly—“an answer of one hundred three.”

“Very nice! And what if I inserted parentheses around the first two numbers?” Ms. Kerry added parentheses to the equation and then stepped back again. “Would that change your answer?”

“Well, sure,” said Alex eagerly. “Because you'd have to do the operation within the parentheses
first, rather than dividing the forty-nine by the seven, so the answer would be”—her marker flew—“fifteen hundred twenty-four.”

“Excellent!” Ms. Kerry beamed. “And if you group the forty-nine and the seven, would that change the answer?”

“No, because you would do the division first anyway, regardless of whether there were parentheses or not. So the answer would still be one hundred three.”

Ms. Kerry's smile broadened. “Lovely work, Alex. You may sit down.”

As Alex turned toward her desk, proud of herself and basking in Ms. Kerry's praise, she caught sight of Corey's furrowed brow, staring through half-closed eyes at the calculations Alex had just done in her neat, pretty handwriting. And she saw Lindsey and Emily exchange a look. What did that look mean? Did they think she was showing off?

Alex felt an uneasy awareness bubble to the surface. Emily had seemed so much nicer in English than in math class. It had to be because Lindsey was present. But what had she done wrong? At her last school, it had definitely been cool to be smart. There were a lot of smart kids
who were popular. Was it different here? She vowed not to raise her hand for the rest of class.

When the bell rang, she felt a tap on her shoulder. It was Corey.

“Hey. You were awesome up there,” he said. “I don't think I could have answered Ms. Kerry's questions like you did if my life depended on it.”

Alex glowed. “It was no big deal,” she said. “We studied order of operations at the end of last year, and I brushed up a little on them over the summer.” She picked up her backpack, which was now quite heavy, and Corey helped her hike it up onto her shoulder.
Not just gorgeous, but also thoughtful!
Alex mused.

“Hey, you know, you should totally sign up for the math team at the Activities Fair on Friday,” he said, moving in step with her toward the door of the classroom. “I'm sure they could really use you.”

“Thanks,” she said, feeling her cheeks flush. “I was planning to sign up for a whole bunch of stuff, actually. What I really want, though, is to be in the student government.”

“That makes a lot of sense,” said Corey, nodding. “You could totally be the class president even.”

“Really?” she asked breathlessly. “You think I could win?”

“Definitely. You're smart. You're organized. You're nice. You're pre—” He stopped himself and blushed to the roots of his hair.

Alex blushed too. Then she looked over his shoulder and saw Lindsey glaring at the two of them. Her elation deflated like a popped balloon. She muttered good-bye to Corey and hurried from the classroom, her face burning hot. She'd need to keep her distance from Corey when Lindsey was around. It was just too risky to flirt with a guy before she'd established herself socially with the girls.

Ava sat at her desk and stared down at the pop quiz she'd gotten back from Ms. Palmer in English that day. A big red “59” was written across the top. She folded the quiz in half and shoved it into the back of the bottom drawer of her desk. Of course she'd failed. She hadn't done the reading. She'd tried, but this book was just too hard for her, with its old-fashioned writing and long sentences. The one class she had
with Jack, and she looked like a total idiot.

She needed to get herself to concentrate before she fell further behind. With a sigh, she pulled out
White Fang
and opened it to where she'd left off the night before.

She'd made it about halfway down the page when she heard a gentle tap, and Coach walked in.

“How's it going, champ?” he asked, pulling up her cushy chair and sinking into it.

“Okay, I guess,” she said. “I'm having some trouble concentrating on this book for English.”

“I thought I noticed your light on late last night when I passed your room,” he said. He held out a hand for the book and peered at the title. “
White Fang
, huh? That's a good book. What do you think?”

“It seems like it could be an exciting story, but I haven't really gotten past the first few pages. The author keeps describing every little thing.”

He nodded, flipping through the pages. “I seem to recall we read that in high school, not seventh grade.”

Ava shrugged. “My teacher keeps talking about ‘students of your caliber,' like we're a classroom full of geniuses. If she has expectations
like this in our class, what must they be reading in Alex's accelerated English class?
War and Peace,
probably. I'm sure Al's already read it.”

Coach chuckled.

“Middle school seems a lot harder than elementary school, Coach.”

He nodded and put a strong hand on her shoulder. “But you're tough, Ave,” he said. “I know how fierce a competitor you can be on the playing field, and you're smart as a whip. You'll do okay. Every good athlete knows the value of hard work.”

Ava swallowed and nodded, although secretly she didn't feel so confident. “Well, on the bright side,” she said, changing the subject, “I think I've made a new friend. Her name's Kylie—she rides horses and she's really cool.”

“That's great.”

“And she invited me to her house on Saturday. She lives on a ranch outside of town.”

Alex appeared in the doorway. “Hey, Ave, can I talk to you about—Oh! Hey, Daddy!” she said. “I didn't know you were in here.”