Free Here's Lily by Nancy Rue

loudly. Ms. Gooch looked hard at him, but she didn’t say anything.
    â€œI put, like, horse trainer,” Reni went on as she continued to point to the collage. “Veterarian—”
    â€œVeter- in- arian,” Marcie called out.
    Ms. Gooch cocked an eyebrow.
    â€œUm, dog breeder, dolphin trainer, like the person that uses dolphins to help, like, crippled kids and stuff—”
    Shad snored loudly. When Lily looked up, he was dropping his head onto Ashley’s shoulder. Ashley pulled away, but she was laughing.
    â€œAll right, people,” Ms. Gooch said. “That’s enough.”
    It sure is , Lily thought. She looked anxiously at Reni, who was now just jabbing her finger at pictures and shrugging a lot.
    â€œGo ahead, Reni,” Ms. Gooch told her. “We’re listening.”
    No, they’re not . Lily shifted in her seat and tried to catch Reni’s eye to nod at her. Reni turned from her collage and looked right at Lily. And then she seemed to remember something. She straightened her shoulders and let her arms fall to her sides, and she looked Ms. Gooch right in the eye.
    â€œI’m done,” she said. And then she went to her desk.
    â€œLet’s give Reni a round of applause!” Ms. Gooch said.
    Lily, bursting with pride for Reni, clapped enthusiastically. The rest of the class offered a halfhearted spattering of applause.
    That’s all right, Reni , Lily wanted to whisper to her.
    But Zooey evidently didn’t agree. Her hand shot up into the air, and before Ms. Gooch could call on her, she said, “I think you should have a rule.”
    Ms. Gooch lifted an eyebrow. “I have lots of rules, Zooey. You want me to add another one?”
    â€œNo, dude!” Shad said.
    Now he wakes up , Lily thought. She rolled her eyes at Reni.
    â€œYes.” Zooey lifted up her chin. “You oughta have a rule that people in here aren’t allowed to say things that make other people feel . . . um . . .” She stopped, her face going red, and turned around in her chair. “How does that one rule go, Lily?”
    Lily stared at her. She saw Reni give Zooey a poke and out of the corner of her eye watched Suzy park her face firmly into her folded arms on the desk.
    Ms. Gooch laughed. “Do you have your own set of rules, Lily?”
    â€œNo!” Lily shook her head and looked hard at Zooey. Something dawned in Zooey’s eyes, and she clapped her hand over her mouth.
    â€œWhat was that all about?” Ashley asked.
    â€œShe’s so weird,” Chelsea said.
    â€œYou see what I mean?” Zooey’s face was red all the way up to her new bangs. “People get to say whatever they want, and that’s not right. It—” She turned again to Lily, the right answer glowing in her eyes. “It hurts people’s feelings. That’s it!”
    â€œ ‘It hurts people’s feelings,’” Shad said in a whiny, mocking voice that came out through his nose. “Poor baby!”
    Ms. Gooch snapped her fingers at him, and then she looked at the class.
    â€œWhat do you think, people? Should we make a rule that we can’t say things to hurt people’s feelings? Let’s discuss this.”
    Hands shot up all over the room. Everybody had a comment.
    â€œI don’t think that many people are being mean,” Marcie said without being called on. “I just think it’s that some other people get their feelings hurt too easy.”
    â€œAnd some people just blurt out whatever they want, whenever they want,” Ashley said. She looked right at Marcie. Marcie stuck out her tongue. Ms. Gooch gave them a finger-snapping and an eyebrow.
    Lily pulled a piece of paper out of her notebook and grabbed her favorite purple-inked pen.
    Reni, Zooey, and Suzy , she wrote . Even if she makes it a rule, Shad will never follow it. Let’s stick to our plan. P.T.O .
    P.T.O. meant Pass This On, and Reni did, first