Read Online Tell by Carrie Secor - Free Book Online

space as she considered the question.  “I remember when I was in ninth grade, they tried to have tacos once, but then like half the school got sick.”
    Elliot stared at her.  “Are you joking?”
    Felicia shook her head.  “It turned out to be just a stomach bug, because people were getting sick that hadn’t even eaten the tacos, but we still called it the Taco Epidemic.  I’m pretty sure they haven’t had tacos since.”
    Elliot raised an eyebrow as she speared a chicken nugget with her fork.  “I may never eat tacos again.”
    As they continued talking, Felicia started feeling less anxious about the new addition to their lunch table.  She was fairly convinced that melding Elliot and Cadie was not going to be a problem.  However, when she saw Cadie appear with her tray of chicken nuggets, she felt her nerves kick in again.
    Cadie sat down next to Elliot, which Felicia chose to take as a good sign, and she introduced herself immediately.  “Hi,” she said.  “I’m Cadie.”
    “I’m Elliot.  It’s nice to meet you.”
    “Nice to meet you too.  You’re in my gym class, right?  Rosenberg, second period?”
    “Oh, yeah.”
    “I was just telling Elliot about the Taco Epidemic,” Felicia said.
    “Yeah.  Sorry you missed that,” Cadie said to Elliot, who laughed.  Felicia’s jitters calmed down considerably.  It looked like lunch was going to go smoothly.
    “Cadie, I hope this isn’t too personal, but I really need to ask you something,” Elliot said.  Felicia tensed up again.
    Cadie looked alarmed.  “Yes?”
    “Was it really hard to stop swearing around Felicia?  Because, I have to tell you, I’ve been here for five minutes and it’s driving me fucking crazy.”
     
    Shane walked into his last period calculus class.  He wondered how long it was going to take before people figured out that he was actually supposed to be in this class; they kept looking at him like he had wandered in here by mistake.  Thankfully, today, Cadie only glanced up, saw him, and looked back down at her opened textbook on her desk.  He made his way to the back of the class and sat down beside her again.
    Neither one of them said anything for a few minutes, and finally he looked over at her.  She looked like she was having an internal dialogue with herself.  She glanced at him, looked away, and then glanced back.
    “Chicken nuggets?” he guessed.
    “What?” she said.
    “Yesterday you looked weird and you blamed it on the chicken patties,” he reminded her.  “I thought it might have been the chicken nuggets.”
    Cadie waved a hand dismissively.  “No, it’s—”  She paused, then plunged ahead.  “I ate lunch with a random girl today.”
    “Don’t you and Felicia have lunch together?” he asked.
    “Yeah… She brought the random girl.”
    Shane stared at her.  “Felicia brought another human being to eat lunch with you?”
    Cadie sighed.  “Thank God that I am not the only one who thinks this is bizarre.”
    Shane thought hard.  “She brought a girl and it wasn’t you?”
    “I think I would have noticed if it was me,” Cadie said flatly.
    He sat back in his seat, considering this new information carefully.  “But you’re the only person she talks to,” he said finally.
    “I know, right?  I know!  And you know what was really weird?  She just met her yesterday.”
    “And she’s already spoken to her?”
    “I think she was expecting me to say something,” Cadie said slowly, ignoring his last comment.  “Like, I think she was expecting me to react because she was bringing someone else to lunch, but I couldn’t really do that.  I mean, I didn’t want to act surprised that she was hanging out with someone else.”
    “I’m surprised, and I have no problem telling her that,” Shane answered.
    “I just thought it was really weird.  The girl just moved here and Felicia said she felt bad for her because she didn’t know anybody.”
    Shane stared at her.  “Felicia