Read Online XGeneration 1: You Don't Know Me by Brad Magnarella - Free Book Online

reached for the quarter. “Better hol’ to her tight, or next time I’m liable to keep her.” His eyes squinted when he chuckled. “Course, maybe I already kept her.”
    Mr. Shine snapped the fingers holding the quarter—a fast, dry sound—and Scott watched the quarter disappear. Mr. Shine showed his large, calloused palm, then the knotted darkness of the back of his hand, also empty.
    “How did you—?”
    When Mr. Shine snapped his fingers again, the quarter reappeared right where it had been, except now with the heads-side showing. A laugh of disbelief escaped Scott’s throat. He pressed his glasses to his face and stooped toward the coin, still trying to figure out what Mr. Shine had done.
    “Don’t worry. I ain’t gonna make her jump again.”
    Mr. Shine handed the quarter to Scott, who took it between his own thumb and third finger. Scott began to execute a slow snap, watching the quarter rise between his first and middle fingers.
    “Now you don’t go makin’ her jump.” He nodded past Scott. “You need her lots worse than me, seems.”
    Heat scaled Scott’s cheeks. “Oh, I was just, um”—he turned his face toward the pay phones and then back to Mr. Shine—“just trying to call home.”
    “You forget the number?” Light twinkled from his eyes.
    Before Scott could come up with another half-truth, Mr. Shine leaned into the cart, setting the wheels into wobbling motion. “You have you’self a fine day, sir,” he called over his shoulder.
    “Thanks, Mr. Shine. You too.”
    “Oh, and ’round here they call me Geech. Ain’t my name, but just so’s you know.”
    Scott looked from Mr. Shine’s limping, receding figure down to the quarter. He turned it from heads to tails and back. All the years Mr. Shine had worked in their yard and that marked the first time they had really talked. Scott considered this as he pocketed the quarter and wandered off in search of lunch.
    * * *
    Janis reached fifth period typing between the warning bell and final bell, out of breath and with the first stabs of a stomach cramp. Eating off campus was liberating, sure, but she’d never had to sprint to get to her next class at Creekside Middle School.
    The desks sat in pairs, and the sight of twenty-odd sets of eyes peering over the enormous Smith Coronas unnerved Janis. She scanned the room for a place to park herself, thankful her hair had darkened a shade over the last years. She still harbored adrenaline-spiked memories of other kids, boys especially, taunting her on the first day of elementary school each year, calling her Strawberry Shortcake. Not that she hadn’t eventually straightened them out with her fists. Her temper had once been as storied as her bright hair.
    Now, a pair of sniggers made the nape of her neck bristle. Her gaze darted toward the source, a boy with a pug nose and shades parked on the top of his head of tight, blond curls. But his sniggers weren’t meant for her. He was leaning toward the punk-rock girl seated in front of him, poised to set a wad of gum atop one of her blade-like spikes of black hair.
    “Hey!” Janis called.
    The guy jerked his arm back. The girl, who had been oblivious, turned from the window, one knee hugged to her chest. Janis looked on her gaunt, pale face painted with black lipstick and funeral-dark eye shadow. It was a face Janis had seen once that day already, though she couldn’t remember where. She approached the empty desk beside her.
    “Seat taken?” Janis asked.
    The girl shrugged a shoulder. “Knock yourself out.”
    Janis thanked her and shot a warning look at Blondie, who had popped the gum back into his mouth and dropped his shades. Janis stowed her books under the desk and glanced around. When the final bell rang, the teacher’s desk remained empty.
    Janis cleared her throat. “I’m Janis.”
    The girl lifted her dark, hooded gaze. “Star,” she said.
    And then Janis remembered. “Right, you’re in my American history class. Second