Free A Star is Born by Walter Dean Myers

shoots into a crowd, the bullets spreading destruction according to the rules of physics, not humanity.
    When I was hit by a fragment of a bomb it was not me who was the target. The pilot of the plane did not know who I was or who my family was. He didn’t know that I was only five and had just learned to read, or that I was the first girl in my family who had gone to school. Or that I cried all that night as my grandmother held me. Or that I was so frightened that I did not even look up into the air for the next week.
    I have nothing against the young woman who came to Da Vinci and told how she had been a soldier. I just wanted to say that there are other sides to the same story.

B y lunchtime I was feeling low. Nothing was really breaking me down, but nothing was looking too cool, either. I was drifting off into Self-Pity City when Caren Culpepper and Zhade Hopkins came to where I was sitting. Zhade sat next to me (she was actually touching me!). I was surprised because I had forgotten that Caren had asked me to meet her.
    â€œWhat’s up?” Me, being lame.
    â€œCaren said that you won’t go out with her because you don’t like her father and everybody’s saying that if the Cruisers are so cool why are you putting down people’s families?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œYou didn’t hear me?” Zhade asked.
    â€œYeah, I heard you.” I looked over to where Caren was staring dead at me with her head to one side like she was daring me to say the wrong thing. “We weren’t even talking about going out.”
    â€œSo, you going to go out with me or what ?” Caren asked.
    â€œYou want to go out?” I asked.
    â€œShe’s here, isn’t she?” Zhade said, looking at me all serious. “Or are you too macho to have a girl ask you out?”
    I felt like I was between the devil and the deep blue sea. On one hand I didn’t want to go out with Caren again because the last time I went out with her she put it out that I was sweating her big-time, which was a lie. On the other hand, what was Zhade’s play? I wasn’t sure if I was setting up a date with Caren or her. At any rate, I said I’d go out with Caren, hoping that it was going to lead to a date with Zhade.
    â€œFriday,” Caren said. “The day after you guys put on the play.”
    She was already standing up, and I looked at Zhade and she was standing, and she had this really satisfied look on her face.
    â€œZander, you’re a good dude,” she said.
    Then they were gone.
    I saw Kambui in Biology and told him what happened.
    â€œThe same thing happened to a paramecium I was raising,” Kambui said. “Two lady paramecia got him in the locker room and sexually molested him.”
    â€œYo, Kambui, that is so seriously stupid I don’t know how you can get it into your mouth to spit it out.”
    â€œI ain’t going out with the assistant principal’s daughter,” Kambui said. “You are.”
    I got home and Mom was shopping on the Home and Garden Network. In between her buying everything I told her what happened.
    â€œZhade was bringing in stuff about me being macho and getting up in my face like it was her that I was going out with or something. I was really confused.”
    â€œBoth of them like you,” Mom said. “They’re just going about letting you know in different ways.”
    â€œNeither one of them said anything about liking me,” I said.
    â€œThey didn’t have to,” Mom answered. “You’re easy. Hey, there’s nothing wrong with that, because you’re a guy. But, baby, you are easy. Right?”
    â€œNo!”

    THE CRUISER
    A LETTER
    By Demetrius Brown
    Please excuse me because my English is still not as good as it should be. But my friend Tyree Jackson was arrested this week and it looks as if nobody cares. He was caught shoplifting in a large store downtown. The police had pictures of