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the seventeenth

Things are getting really weird.

Greg Mahoney was shot at a kegger last night. Greg is a Dreg–Hick hybrid, a burnout who blasts country music and decorates his pickup truck with a Confederate flag and an I’m A Piney, From My Head Down To My Heiniebumper sticker. (Translation: I’m proud to live off a dirt road in the middle of the woods.) Anyway, this wasn’t another tragic teenage rampage. No one had a gun. Greg found some loose bullets in his truck that, for reasons that remain unclear, he drunkenly decided to throw into the bonfire. The bullets exploded and shot up Greg’s ass.

I heard about it in homeroom from Sara, who just loves sharing gossip like this.

"Omigod! Only a total idiot would try to, quote make fuckin’ fireworks unquote."

"That’s why he did it?"

"That’s what I heard."

"I bet there wasn’t any thinking involved at all," I said. "Greg did it because that’s what Dregs do. It’s his contribution to society."

Then I heard a voice say, "Excuse me, Miss Don’t-Get-High-and-Mighty …"

I didn’t have to look up to know who it was. And when I did look up and saw him zooming in on me from two rows over, I was proven right.

"What’s your contribution to society?" Marcus asked.

I giggled. Jesus Christ, that’s annoying.

"Omigod! Ugh. Mind your own fucking business," Sara said.

"Why don’t you mind your own fucking business?" Marcus countered. "You weren’t at the party, were you?"

And that’s when our homeroom teacher, Rico Suave, got involved.

"What’s my rule about foul language in this room?"

"Well, if you’re going to bust me, bust her, too," he said, pointing at Sara. "She said ’fucking’ before I did."

Before Sara even had a chance to protest, Rico Suave said, "I didn’t hear her. I only heard you. Out."

"You’ve got to be kidding me," laughed Marcus.

"Out!"

It wasn’t fair. It really wasn’t fair.

Marcus didn’t take his eyes off me as he gathered his stuff to go down to the principal’s office. That’s when I realized that Sara and I hadn’t been talking that loud. Marcus had been listening to our conversation on purpose. And he wanted me to know it.

Why? He had pretty much ignored me since the office incident. And I had done my best to ignore him, too. I don’t know what he’s doing with me, but he definitely did it again. Now I can’t stop thinking about it.

the nineteenth

Sara and Manda undoubtedly killed time on their flight to Mexico today by (a) analyzing Marcus’s outburst and (b) hypothesizing about my role in it. I’m telling myself that there’s nothing I can do to stop this, so there’s no point in getting all hung up on it. I’m doing an okay-to-sucky job.

Only two thirds of the Clueless Crew are spending spring break in Cancún. (All expenses paid for by Wally D.) Sara and Manda tried to keep it a secret from me via a half-assed hush-hush that I can only compare to a stage whisper. DON’T LET JESS FIND OUT ABOUT OUR TRIP. They thought I’d be crushed when I found out they were bonding without me.

Uh, no.

Ironically, once they found out that I had found out, they had no problem dishing about their trip in front of Bridget. Bridget masked her pain for thirty seconds before she lost it.

"How come I didn’t get invited?!"

"We assumed you wanted to spend all of your time with Burke," said Manda.

"Yeah!" said Sara.

"We can’t help it if you’re lucky enough to have a great boyfriend to spend spring break with and we don’t," said Manda, who conveniently dumped Bernie as soon as Sara offered her the trip.

"Yeah!" said Sara.

I guess Bridget decided that she was indeed the lucky one. So she forgave them and there were hugs all around. Typical Clueless Crew conflict resolution.

Spring break is stressful. All that freedom freaks me out. It’s like I’m expected to do something cool with all this free time. Maybe that’s why I slept in until 3:37 P.M., throwing my sleeping schedule even more out of whack. But no matter how bored I get, it’s better than being in school.

the twentieth

My mom came home from work last