Read Online Surviving High School by M. Doty - Free Book Online

swimmers around here!”
    “I’ve actually been meaning to say hi,” said Phil. “I knew your sister.”
    “Oh, huh,” said Emily. “She, uh, never mentioned you.”
    Phil laughed. “Yeah, I bet she didn’t. I was sort of a geek back then. Plus I was in my reggae phase. Not that Sara was a music snob or anything.…”
    As Phil spoke, Emily felt her shoulders clenching involuntarily. She hated how anything to do with Sara—even a kind word from a relative stranger—seemed to trigger an immediate flood of stress and involuntary muscle spasms.
    “I only talked to her a handful of times,” Phil continued, “but she seemed like a genuinely nice person. Honestly, I wish I’d known her better. Only a few people really got to. Samantha and Cam—”
    “Knew who?” asked Cameron Clark as he sat between his sister and Emily. She had never seen him so up close. Like most swimmers, he smelled deeply of chlorine, and the roots of his blond hair looked wet, as if he’d recently gotten out of the pool. He seemed oddly out of place at the table; his layers of ropey muscles gave him the look of an older guy, a college student, maybe, a man among boys. Kimi couldn’t stop looking at him, and even Emily had to make a conscious effort not to stare.
    “Sara,” said Phil. “You guys hung out all the time, right?”
    “We trained together,” said Cameron. “But knowing someone? That’s entirely different.”
    “Sure,” said Phil. He seemed almost scared of Cameron. “That’s all I meant.”
    Cameron turned to Emily. “Sara was—exceptional. I hope you know that.” He stared at her intensely for a moment, as if he could read her every thought with his eyes. Then he looked away.
    All Emily could respond with was a muffled “Yeah.”
    Luckily for her, Phil seemed more socially aware than most. Reading the discomfort on Emily’s face, he quickly segued to a new topic. “Uh, so has anyone heard that new mashup of Lady Gaga and Mozart? Totally sick.” Maybe he was smarter than Kimi’s spreadsheet gave him credit for.
    Gradually, Emily’s shoulders relaxed, and she started breathing normally. Still, as lunch continued and more people started to sit down, she wondered how many had known Sara, and throughout the rest of the meal, she noticed Cameron alternately studying her face and avoiding eye contact.
    Phil stayed off the subject of Sara for the rest of lunch as he introduced Emily and Kimi to other members of the popular crowd. Many of them had heard about the article already, and the ones who hadn’t were impressed by Emily’s “future Olympian” credentials. A couple of guys even said they’d try to make it out to her next swim meet.
    A few minutes later, Spencer showed up, and Phil introduced him to Emily. Spencer smiled and shook her hand. Without trying, he almost crushed her fingers with his grip. Up close, he was even more muscled than she’d realized before, like a high school version of the Incredible Hulk, minus the green skin.
    “I know who you are,” he said. “Yogurt, right?”
    Emily couldn’t believe it. Ben must have talked to Spencer about her.
    “It’s too bad Ben’s not here,” said Spencer. “I’m sure he’d want to invite you to his party this Friday.”
    “Where is he, anyway?” asked Lindsay, who had just taken a seat at the far end of the table.
    “Home,” said Spencer, shaking his head. “Didn’t you see today’s paper?”
    Spencer dug into his bag and pulled out a wrinkled copy of the day’s school paper. Its headline read: SCHOOL CANCELED FOR REMAINDER OF YEAR AMID FEARS OF IMMINENT ZOMBIE ATTACK .
    “He totally hacked the journalism class’s computers last night,” said Spencer, smiling proudly. “What I do to linemen out on the football field, he does to the school’s firewalls. Anyway, he’s suspended for the week. Normally, I think Principal McCormick would have sent him home for longer, but I guess she actually thought it was pretty