Read Online One Hundred Percent Lunar Boy by Stephen Tunney - Free Book Online Page B

nose as she told Paul how much the clouds at dawn resembled the veins in his hard-boiled, hungover dirty filthy bloodshot eyes, oh nuclear explosion, oh nuclear explosion, oh nuclear explosion, oh, spinning top, rop and mop!
How can you sit there and tell me that that is the same novel?”
    She barely had a moment to let that last sentence leave her open mouth, her teeth slightly horselike at that moment, the blue strands of hair waving on either side of her lips as she made her determined point, when there was another greeting from another male admirer.
    “Slue-Blue! Slue-Blue!”
    Both Slue and Hieronymus looked away from their work as another large class of students passed into the media-viewing rotunda. Again, there was a fellow, tall and athletic looking, who smiled in Slue’s direction as he walked with his classmates through the rotunda. Jim. A star second backer on the Lunar Public 777 tellball team, he thought every girl in the Sea of Tranquility found him irresistible. Indeed some did, but Slue was not among them. And yet, there he was, just like Bob, convinced she was somehow interested in him. She gave Jim the exact same fake smile she had given Bob, then turned back to the contested book.
    “As I was saying, Hieronymus, you are not studying the assigned text. Which, frankly, is your own problem. But being that we are working in groups and you and I are supposed to collaborate on this project, I guess you must think it’s very funny to pretend to be reading the same book as I just to get me upset.”
    What didn’t help matters much was the fact that Hieronymus had a big smile on his face. He was about to explain the game to her at last when, for a third time, a voice called out her name.
    “Slue! Slue! Slue!”
    Once more, a large group of students entered into the rotunda and, as usual, there was an athletic guy whose head jutted up slightly from the bustling crowd of teenagers. This young man had an ear-to-ear grin on his face — an expression seemingly cut from an identical mold as the other two. This was Pete. Pete was also on the tellball team. And not only was Pete on the tellball team, he was also the team’s captain. He was also on the track team. He was a young man who liked teams a lot. Everyone in school liked Pete, but at this moment, Slue did not even bother to smile at him — she just turned herself back to the text, utterly and totally and completely embarrassed.
    “Slue, why do those guys think you like them?”
    “Shut up, Hieronymus.”
    “No, seriously. It’s like you have a fan club here that only accepts barrelhead athletes.”
    “I don’t know why they think I like them.”
    “Well, you must have
something
to do with it.”
    “Those boys are just dumb. I don’t know why they look at me like that. I don’t even flirt with them or anything.”
    “Maybe you flirt with them by accident.”
    “Don’t be stupid.”
    “Maybe Bob or Jim or whoever dropped something like, I don’t know, a coin or a rubber band or something, and you just said something completely bland and neutral like, ’Excuse me, you dropped your rubber band,’ and to them, that was some kind of sexy flirtatious signal.” When Slue glanced sideways at Hieronymus, she saw by the curvature of his mouth, the tilt of his neck, and the tone of his voice that he was being as sarcastic as a bloody Pixie in Hades.
    “Your head,” she stated, articulating very slowly, “is somewhere… on the…far side…of the round…rock…stupid…”
    Hieronymus turned around to see Pete still trying to get Slue’s attention as the large group he was stuck with continued to shuffle through the media-viewing rotunda.
    “Slue! Hey, Slue!”
    Slue pretended to be deaf, but Hieronymus stared back at Pete. Then it occurred to him. This was the third huge group of students to pass through this normally quiet zone of research and study. Some kind of event must have been going on in the school, and they had no idea what.
    “Hey,