Anything but Normal - Melody Carlson [11]
Of their group of Christian friends, Jenny was the only one who had refused to take the pledge a few years ago—to promise to abstain from sex until marriage. Jenny had claimed the pledge was hypocritical. Although Sophie hadn’t got that back then. She’d figured it was simply Jenny’s excuse to blow it. Not that she had. At least not that Sophie had ever heard about.
“For your information,” Carrie Anne said, “there are certain guys—the kind of guys who are worth waiting for—who appreciate the kind of girls who’ve made that pledge.”
“Yeah, whatever.” Jenny just shrugged.
“And Dylan Morris happens to be one of them,” Kelsey finished for her.
“Right, Sophie?” Carrie Anne looked at her.
Sophie just nodded, but suddenly she wasn’t hungry anymore. In fact, she felt all hot and prickly, and kind of like she’d just stepped off a Tilt-a-Whirl ride, only worse. She stood up and grabbed her bag.
“What’s wrong?” Hannah looked up with a frown.
“I’m done.” Sophie stepped back.
“Are you okay?” Carrie Anne asked.
“Yeah, you look like—”
But Sophie was already leaving—heading straight to the girls’ restroom. She barely made it to the first stall, and suddenly she was hurling into the toilet. She barfed so hard it felt like her brains were coming out. Finally she stopped and slowly stood up. Her head was throbbing, her heart was pounding, and all she wanted was to just lie down . . . and die.
“I told you those fries are lethal.” Carrie Anne pushed open the door behind her. “Gross!”
Without looking at her, Sophie flushed the toilet. Then she pulled off some toilet paper and used it to wipe her mouth and wipe the sweat off her face.
“Are you going to be okay?” Carrie Anne called from the sink area. “Ya want me to call for the school nurse or something?”
Sophie stepped out of the stall and slowly walked over to the sink. But she just stood there staring into the mirror. A scrap of white toilet paper was hanging from the ugly scab on her chin. “I’m a mess.”
“I’ll say.” Carrie Anne gently peeled the toilet paper from Sophie’s chin.
Sophie stepped onto the foot pedal that turned on the water, then dipped her hands into the spray, tossing some of it onto her face.
“Do you think it’s the flu?” Carrie Anne asked as she handed Sophie a couple of paper towels then quickly stepped back. “Excuse me if I don’t get too close.”
Sophie blotted her face with the paper towels. Tears were threatening again. She pushed the cool, damp paper on her closed eyes, telling herself not to start crying. She’d already made a spectacle of herself. Enough was enough already.
“I think you should go see the school nurse,” Carrie Anne said with conviction. “You might be really sick. Maybe it’s from falling down yesterday.”
“Like falling-down sickness?” Sophie crumpled the towels, tossed them into the trash, and forced a smile.
Carrie Anne snickered as she handed Sophie her purse. “At least you’re still funny.”
Sophie put the strap of her bag over her shoulder and sighed.
“But I still think you should see the school nurse. I’ll walk you there, okay?”
Sophie just shook her head. “No, go back to your lunch.”
“What about you? And your lunch?”
Sophie nodded toward the stall. “I left it in there.”
“But what if you’re contagious?”
Sophie considered this. “Fine, if it makes you feel better, I’ll go see the nurse. Just go back and finish your lunch, okay?” “Okay . . .”
“And don’t tell Jenny and Kelsey and Hannah.”
“What?”
“That I just lost my cookies in here.”
Carrie Anne smiled impishly. “And I so wanted to tell Jenny that she’d made you sick.”
Sophie walked slowly toward the school office. She really had no desire to see the school nurse today. The last time she’d seen a school nurse was in fourth grade, right after she’d fallen from the monkey bars and split open her chin. Sophie had been bleeding so profusely that the nurse had looked like she was about to faint before she had the good sense to place a towel on Sophie’s chin and tell her to “apply pressure.”
Sophie reached up to see if she could feel where