Free Circle of Secrets by Kimberley Griffiths Little Page B

she talks about bad things and warnings. “What’ll they do? And what’s your name anyway?”
    Her eyes go big like I just asked the worst thing in the world. I can’t help wondering why my questions seem to make her so scared.
    “I’m not tellin’ you. You’ll tell them.”
    Before I can say another word, she turns and flees, her skinny spider legs stuttering across the floor.
    I brush my damp hair out of my eyes. She sure is odd. Or is she right about those other girls? I don’t know what to think. Maybe she’s just jealous of Tara and Alyson, wants them to be her friends, and they ignore her instead. It is a sad but true fact that when it comes to school popularity, the prettiest girls never hang around the plain girls, or girls with unusual characteristics — like strange and ugly scars.
    I dig out the school map from my pocket, wondering which is the fastest direction to the playground. Wondering if I just want to go back inside the classroom and read the history book.
    Two seconds later, the school fire alarm goes off.

C HAPTER S EVEN
    T HE FIRE ALARM SEEMS TO GET LOUDER THE LONGER IT GOES on, seeping into my brain so I can’t think in a straight line. I need to get back to my homeroom, but I stand there in the middle of the corridor covering up my ears and feeling like I’ve just gone stupid.
    Classroom doors bang against the walls and the kids who’d made it back to class before recess ended start emerging again in long, snaky lines.
    My stomach is seesawing when I realize that I have no class to walk with, no buddy partner. I’m one of those lone fish, swimming in the wrong direction, looking for any familiar face.
    Suddenly, someone grabs my arms on either side of me — Alyson and Tara — and my feet start walking with them.
    “We won’t let you burn up,” Alyson says with a giggle, and then gasps as someone bumps into her and all three of us almost fall over.
    “Hey, watch it,” Tara mutters, holding out her arms so the crowd has to walk around her, like she’s the queen of the corridor.
    Maybe she really is.
    A teacher blows shrilly into a whistle behind us, and a bunch of boys start yelling up ahead just to hear their voices echo.
    “Boys are so silly,” Tara says, sighing like she’s a teacher. “They think they can get away with it because it’s so crowded and nobody will know who’s yelling.”
    Me, I just want to get out of the crush. “You mean there really is a fire?”
    “Nope, just a drill. Happens every month like an alarm clock.” Tara laughs as she flings her long, silky black hair over her shoulder and gives us a smirk. “Get it? Alarm clock?”
    “Oh,” I say, trying to smile back. “Right.”
    “Never saw a fire alarm on the very first day of school,” Alyson says. She leans in close. I can smell Tabasco sauce on her breath, like she pours it on her eggs for breakfast. “Hey, after school, our group is going down to the piers along the bayou. We play games and stuff. Want to come?”
    The voice of the scarred girl rings in my head. Her warnings about the piers. Almost like she knew this was going to happen.
    Finally, we get past the heavy doors and break through the mob.
    I can breathe again. Alyson and Tara drop their arms from mine and start whispering together, leaving me out of their conversation. I hear something about Jett and some other boys, but at the moment I’m just glad we don’t have class.
    It’s still cloudy, but there are breaks of hazy blue peeking through. Maybe it’ll stop raining finally.
    Since I don’t know anybody else, I follow Tara and Alyson out to the field where students are standing in clusters, talking or kicking at the grass. I see that Jett Dupuis kid running in circles yelling, “I’m free, I’m free!”
    Tara watches him from under her eyelashes.
    Alyson gives a happy sigh. “I love getting out of class.”
    I stare at the main road in front of the school. “Look at that!”
    There are sirens and fire trucks in the