Read Online Tell Me If the Lovers Are Losers by Cynthia Voigt - Free Book Online Page B

say?”
    â€œThe truth,” Hildy said quietly.
    That stopped Niki. “Oh,” she said. “OK,” she said, “I won’t.”
    Ann thought the argument would continue, but it didn’t. Each girl retired to her bureau to brush her hair.
    Niki spoke first. “Did you mean that about the team?”
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œI can play anyway.”
    â€œI hope so.”
    â€œI’m better than you are, you know that.”
    â€œNo, I do not know that. You are not, now, better than I; although you probably could be. You are much more agile, and your reflexes are quicker. But your emotion interferes with your play and with the play of your team. I am not confident that you are the better.”
    Niki fell silent. Ann did not speak. She sat on her bed, waiting for Hildy to be ready, thinking that her vocal cords felt entangled. She might never speak again.
    But this is bizarre, Ann said to herself, mindful of the future weeks and months they had to spend together. Somebody had to speak. Somebody had to say something. She cleared her throat experimentally and then hurled herself into the conversational breech, firing off the first thought that came to her mouth. “I think I’ll play volleyball too.”
    Hildy smiled, as at a child’s foolishness, but Niki said, “Why?”
    â€œWhy not?” Ann answered, with a rhetorical waving of hands. “I don’t particularly like field hockey and I don’t enjoy playing it. It’s time I tried something new. And besides, you two just blew up at each other and if I hadn’t seen that game I wouldn’t know why. So I have to take volleyball, to be able to keep up with your quarrels. And know when to steer clear of the room.”
    Niki grinned. Hildy protested: “But we were not quarreling about the game.”
    â€œYou think not?” Niki asked.
    â€œAnd we have understood one another, Niki and I,” Hildy continued. “We have seen, each, what the other is.”
    â€œSpeak for yourself,” Niki muttered. “But there’s more to me than meets the eye.”
    â€œOf course,” Hildy said, surprised.
    Ann’s head turned from one to the other. “Yes, I think I’d better take volleyball. With you.”
    â€œIf it is what you want, then that is fine,” Hildy said earnestly. “But we have made peace with one another, if it is not what you want.”
    â€œNot what she wants? Peace?” Niki asked.
    â€œWhat, volleyball?” Ann asked.
    Hildy shook her head and her eyes peered at them. “You can’t confuse me,” she said.
    â€œPeace is what I want,” Ann babbled. “Serenity, security, balance— So, I’ll take volleyball, whatever you say. How did that decision become so serious?”
    â€œAsk Hildy,” Niki advised, grinning and holding the door for them.

chapter 3
    The first weeks at Stanton passed both quickly and slowly, as Ann tried to settle in and feel at home. They lived together, Ann and Niki and Hildy, and grew to know one another There were classes to attend, professors whose methods had to be assessed, learning to accomplish. Ann worked at the ancient Greek declensions, neglecting science as much as possible, and finding the other courses rather easy. Hildy sat for hours at her desk, hunched over notebooks and textbooks; or she lay on the bed with a book up against her nose. Niki was frequently out.
    They would get no grades until the results of the first set of tests, which were usually given three to four weeks after a course began. Ann studied regularly, as she had been trained to do, three or four hours a day given to preparation and review. Hildy rose with the sun, to sit over the books at her desk. Ann woke to see Hildy silhouetted against the desk light, her head low over papers, her fingers buried in her short hair. Hildy’s hair looked ragged and unruly in the mornings, like a head just