Losing Faith by Denise Jaden

died. Maybe I do think about my own needs too much.
    The other students work feverishly on this week’s test that I don’t have to take.
    Not today, I decide in a flash. I don’t want special treatment. I’m fine. It’s everyone else who thinks that I’m not. Marching to the front of the class, I’m about to snatch up the sheet of test questions and head back to my seat, when I notice Clancy already holds a copy outstretched toward me. He looks at me but doesn’t say a word.
    I scan the quiz twice and quickly realize this was not my best decision. Without much choice, I fill in the only historical figures I can drum up in my mind. Napoleon, Christopher Columbus, Thomas Jefferson. It’s been weeks since I’ve opened my textbook.
    By the time I finish scribbling in answers that don’t make any sense, I’ve decided I’ll back off for a while with Amy and everything will be fine.
    After the lunch bell sounds, I stand at my locker feeling very alone. If I go to the cafeteria, who will I sit with? I won’t want to approach Amy’s table—my table—and the rest of the student population can barely look at me. While I rearrange my books, then rearrange them again, trying to appear busy for the hall monitors, I mull over the possibility of finding somewhere outside to eat.
    A bang on the locker next to mine startles me. But I don’t look over. That’s Tessa Lockbaum’s side.
    The binder I’m fiddling with falls to the ground and I scramble to pick it up.
    “Hey,” she says, talking to someone she knows behind me. Even though I can’t remember her ever talking to anyone so casually, I don’t bother to check who it is. Keeping my eyes straight ahead, I shove my binder into a space that suddenly seems too small for it.
    “Hey, Jenkins,” she says.
    My heart stops. During middle school it was obvious why she never spoke to me. My churchy reputation didn’t exactly fit with her death metal, extra-black-eyeliner image. “Rockin’ Lockbaum”was the nickname she had for herself. Terrifying Tessa, Troublesome Tessa, Tormenting Tessa—those are what we actually called her.
    “Hey, Jenkins,” she says again.
    “Me?” I ask, which is over-the-top stupid, since I’m now the only one in the school with that last name. I turn toward her, but keep my eyes on her black leather boots.
    “Pretty screwed up what happened to your sister, huh?”
    What’s even more screwed up is that you’re talking to me about it. “Yeah,” I whisper. And when the word comes out of my mouth, something changes. It feels good to have someone talk to me. To talk about it . Even if it is Tessa Lockbaum.
    “Meet me in the bathroom on the second floor after last class,” she says. “We’ve got something to discuss.”
    Her tone makes my throat go dry. What would she have to discuss with me? And why can’t we just discuss it right here and now? But I’m not sure how to challenge Tessa Lockbaum and by the time I look up to respond, she’s gone.
    I feel sick all through lunch, and even though I head out to a stoop at the back of the school with my brown bag, I don’t bother to open it.
    Plan G: Talk to Tessa.
    After last class, I’m on my way to face her when I practically barrel into Dustin, still sweaty from P.E. A strand of his sandy hair sticks to the side of his face.
    “Hey, babe.” He tries to hug me, but I put a hand to his chest as a knee-jerk reaction. When I realize what I’m doing, I pull my hand away and move in close to him.
    “Hi.” I feel a bit better with the proximity today and take quick, shallow breaths.
    He ignores my jilt and whispers in my ear. “We should do something tonight, just us.” He plants a sloppy kiss at the base of my neck.
    It seems like all he wants to do lately is grope me, and I try to remember if he’s always been like this. After all that preparation of how to answer him, he hasn’t even asked how I am.
    I realize a second later that I’m probably overreacting. Any girl at Sharon