Salvation
Authors: Anne Osterlund
Tags: #Young Adult Fiction, #Social Themes, #General, #Dating & Sex, #Peer Pressure, #Juvenile Fiction, #Social Issues, #Adolescence
The night was insane. He must be high on adrenaline. The game had been incredible. The car was—face it, the car was unlike anything he’d ever planned on riding in during his life. And as designated driver, he was going to get to drive it home.
But really, he wasn’t even thinking about that drive.
Because he couldn’t get rid of the realization that had rocked and cracked his world like a broken windshield. Just before the car had pulled up.
She might be crazy—wearing that thin dress on a night that was maybe twenty-nine degrees. And she might be a nerd—because, really, who from Liberty High School ever applied to go to Stanford? And she was most definitely a walking disaster area.
But she was also
beautiful
.
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ANNE OSTERLUND
speak
An
I
mprint of Penguin Group (USA)
I
nc.
SPEAK
Published by the Penguin Group
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Published by Speak, an imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2013
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ISBN: 978-1-101-59543-5
Copyright © Anne Osterlund, 2013
All rights reserved
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| ALWAYS LEARNING | PEARSON |
For all the cast members of
The Tempest,
Hamlet, Julius Caesar, Macbeth,
and
The Taming of the Shrew.
Burn spectacular.
Salvation
6: My Life Had Stood—A Loaded Gun
18: Such Stuff as Dreams are Made on
SACRILEGE
“So you gonna ask her out?” came the inevitable question.
Salva groaned, though it was hard not to let his gaze linger a little too long on Char’s bare shoulders, gleaming in the late August sun. She knew how to look sexy even at church. “Are you kidding me, man? I’ve known her since I was eight. We were practically raised together.”
“Must have been rough chasin’
her
through your sprinkler.” Pepe grinned, then leaned back against the outer brick wall and rolled a wrapper off a
limón
candy. “You want one?” he offered.
Salva shook his head. His father would blow a gasket if he caught him with it at mass. “Look, you want to date Char, she’s all yours.”
“Right. We both know she ain’t lustin’ after my rep,” Pepe said.
Salva elbowed him, though jabbing his best friend in the chest was a lot like elbowing the statue of
El Pípila,
hard as
stone. “You break a few more sacking records this fall, and she might start.”
“Everybody knows you’re gonna be the prime merchandise at school this year,” said Pepe. “She didn’t wear that outfit for me.”
Once again Salva found himself staring at the teal-green top with the off-the-shoulder sleeves. There was no denying the fact that Charla looked
fine
.
His best friend might be right that she’d dressed on Salva’s behalf, but that didn’t mean Salva could ask her out. It wasn’t just that he’d known her forever or that their parents were always pushing their children together; he’d dated Char back in their freshman year for two months, and despite the fact that they shared the same culture, their parents worked the same shift at the onion-processing plant, and he and Char had been in the same class since second-grade migrant summer school, they really didn’t have much to say to each other.
“We have nothing in common,” he tried to explain to Pepe.
That went over like a flat football. “Have you lost it, man? She’s hot, and you’re a friggin’ god at our school. What more do you want?”
Salva shrugged. “Someone who wants the same things I do, I guess.” He’d never heard Charla mention any grander ambition than making head cheerleader, which hadn’t worked out, since her mom had refused to let Char join the squad.
“Like a state football title?” Pepe mocked. “Not a whole lotta girls lookin’ for that.”
Salva grinned. His best friend had pretty much a two-track mind: girls and football, in the reverse order. “Like college…and a future.”
“Yeah, well, we can’t all be gods and brainiacs, can we?” The linebacker reached out as though to slug him.
“Knock it off.” Salva blocked Pepe’s fist. “If my father thinks I’m being blasphemous in church, he just might yank me off the team. He already says it’s too much time off from my studies.”
“Has he seen your GPA?”
“Yes, but I have to get a scholarship. I can’t just coast in on football.”
“Hey!” Pepe argued. “I
am
taking geometry.”
“Enjoy that. Lundell’s mind-numbing.”
“I’d rather be numb than dead. I heard AP calc is like an execution.”
“I’ll handle it.”
The church bell started to ring, and Char chose that moment to stroll past both Pepe and Salva, her brown shoulders glimmering in the sunlight before disappearing into the vestibule. “Don’t know what good all that brainpower is doing you, man,” Pepe whispered, “if you can’t even recognize a God-given gift like her.”
COLLISION
“Salvador Resendez.” The sharp tone came from inside the Pen—aka the school’s ominous square front office with its bulletproof windows, legal-form wallpaper, and particleboard cubicles for dividing kids in trouble. Principal Markham appeared. His flabby arms crossed over his paunch as he leaned up against the wraparound counter that separated the office staff from the reality of Liberty High School. “It’s about time. The welcome ceremony starts in five minutes.”
Salva shrugged his shoulders. “Yeah, the girls are taking care of that. I’m doing activity sign-ups on Friday.” He figured he ought to be able to relax and enjoy the first day of the school year.
Markham’s uneven mustache dipped down at the corners. “You are the president of the Associated Student Body.”
It’s not my fault Julie Tri-Ang transferred to some fancy prep school. VP would have looked plenty good on a college application.
Salva started toward the gym, braving the last-minute traffic of sprinting achievers and dawdling slackers, but Markham called after him. “I need you back here before you go to class.”
“Why?”
“Later, Resendez. Now move.”
The assembly lasted twenty minutes. Nalani Villetti, who’d been elected secretary and was now vice president, at least did her job introducing the teachers and staff members, but Kaitlyn, who had left her speech at home, panicked in front of the crowd. Salva ended up having to vamp and do the whole “Welcome back, everybody. We’re going to have an awesome year” bit. Not that giving the speech was a big deal. It just wasn’t the low-key start he’d intended for his senior year.
Neither was visiting the principal’s office.
“Come in, Salvador,” Markham said, dropping his thick body into the padded chair behind his desk. “Seems we have a problem with your current class schedule.”
Do I have to go through this again?
Salva braced his hands against the doorframe. Just because he had taken a few classes ahead of the curve didn’t mean he should have to fight for the advanced courses every year. Why did they always try to schedule students into a box?
“You aren’t signed up for an English class,” Markham said, the joints on his chair squealing as he leaned back his torso.
Salva let out a breath. Was that all? “I took senior English last year, remember? I started freshman lit as an eighth grader.
You’re the one who made me do that.” Well, technically, it had been Mrs. Lukowski, his middle-school English teacher, who had strong-armed the high school into accepting him and four other top students. Back then, Salva had been a bit afraid of Mrs. Lukowski.
“You still need four years of English in high school. It’s state law.”
Salva just stared. This was stupid, far too stupid for him to waste his breath explaining why. “You’re saying I need to retake freshman English in high school to get it to count?”
“Don’t be obtuse.” Markham wrapped his thick fingers around an insulated coffee mug. “You need to take AP English.”
Salva’s grip on the doorframe faltered. “With the Mercenary?”
Markham grimaced, looked as though he might rebut the use of the school-wide moniker, then disdained the effort and took a swig from his mug. Coffee drizzled around the edge of his mouth and dripped down onto the mountain of papers piled on his cheap metal desk. “You’re more than capable of taking her course.”
Capable. Not stupid.
“I have advanced physics and AP calc. You can’t expect me to take on the Mercenary, too.”
The principal gave him a look of false pity, then lifted a coffee-stained printout from the top of his pile. “Your new schedule. I removed you from phys ed II. A waste of your time, Mr. Resendez.”
Salva fumed. He knew better than Markham what was a waste of his own time.
“That’s all.” The principal tossed the printout across the desk and gulped another swig of coffee. “Hurry, or you’ll be tardy for second period.”
That would be AP English. Great.