The Rule of Threes by Marcy Campbell (android e book reader txt) 📕

Tony looked taken aback. “Then, both of you. Get your things and get to that bus. Right now. Or so help me God, I will take you to school in tiny pieces.”

Great, I thought. I’ll be just like my shell.

When I heard my door open a minute later, I yelled, “I’m coming!” and spun around, still pulling a shirt over my head. But it wasn’t Tony, or Mom. It was Grandma.

“Are you okay, honey? I heard yelling.”

“Oh, Grandma, yes. I’m fine. I just . . . I was having a little argument with Tony. Sorry if it bothered you.”

Grandma had on her long flannel nightgown, but over it was her cream-colored silk robe, knotted at her waist. Her silver hair was out of its typical bun and hanging loose around her shoulders, and she looked beautiful, especially her bright green eyes, which, this morning, seemed completely clear.

“Tony?” she said. “The foreign exchange student?”

“Uh . . .” So this is how my parents were dealing with the Tony situation? Another lie?

“Go easy on him, Maggie,” she said. “It can be hard to get used to a new place.”

She took a few steps toward me and held out her arms for a hug, and I squeezed her tightly until she pulled back and held me by the shoulders. She brushed a strand of my hair out of my eyes.

“Don’t you look beautiful today,” she said.

I knew I looked a mess. It wasn’t like I didn’t have a mirror in my room. But leave it to Grandma to find the beauty in anyone or anything. Why couldn’t she always be this way? Why couldn’t Tony always be like he was when we had our picnic? Why did things ever have to change?

I sat on the bus, chewing the health-food Pop-Tart Mom had pressed into my hand as I’d run out the door.

A girl named Sarah leaned over the seat in front of me. “Do we have band today?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I’m not in band.”

She screwed up her face. “You’re not? I thought you played flute.”

She popped her gum, and I looked at her blankly for a moment. “I think I would know if I played the flute,” I told her.

“You don’t have to be mean.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled, but she’d already leaned across the aisle to ask someone else. You’d think she might have noticed all the instrument cases clogging the aisle, where they were not supposed to be. I’d tripped over a trumpet case myself.

I rested my head against the window and could see Tony’s head leaning the same way, three rows ahead of me. Talk about not noticing things. How could Tony not have noticed my shell? Especially after crunching it under his foot, or the chair wheels, or whatever happened?

The bus started pulling away from the curb, but Olive was still missing. She hadn’t shown up at the bus stop. And Rachel’s mom was driving her to school more and more lately, probably because she thought the bus wasn’t Rakell-cool enough.

Suddenly, I caught a glimpse of blue out the window. Olive’s coat. She was running alongside the bus, yelling, “Wait! Wait!”

The driver hit the brakes, and I jerked forward and bumped my head on the seat in front of me. I heard the screech of the heavy doors opening and looked up to see Olive coming down the aisle, wheezing and panting. She sank into the seat with me.

“Whew!” she said, “that was a close one. That would almost have been a catastrophe. The opposite of fantabulous! My mom had already left for work, so how would I have gotten to school? Plus, we have that quiz this morning, and if I don’t do well, I’m totally toast. Oh, and hey—” She caught her breath and looked at me. “What’s wrong with your brother?” she asked.

“Huh?” I said. It was still so weird to hear someone say that. “Tony?”

“Yeah, he’s crying, so something’s obviously wrong.”

I stood up and tried to crane my neck to look over the seats.

“Sit down, Miss Owens,” the bus driver called out.

I sat down and pressed my cheek against the window again. I could see Tony’s head leaning against his window, just as before. From my position, it looked like he was taking a nap.

“Are you sure he’s crying?” I asked Olive.

“Pretty sure,” Olive said. “His eyes are all wet, and he was rubbing them. Unless he has allergies. There’s a high pollen count today. I checked this morning. Does he have allergies?

“How would I know?”

“Well, he’s your brother,” Olive replied with a shrug. “Hey, are you going to eat that?” She pointed to the other half of my whole grain, no high-fructose-corn-syrup Pop-Tart, which was still in the package sitting on my lap. I handed it to her.

“Thanks,” Olive said. “You know, my baby brother is allergic to peas, which I think is totally lucky for him because he never has to eat even one bite of them. Pollen, though, that would suck. I mean, hello, it’s everywhere.”

Olive sniffed at the Pop-Tart and made a face. “What is this?” she asked.

“Um, could we, maybe, not talk right now?” I said. I was not in the mood this morning, for Olive or Tony or tripping over trumpet cases. “I’m just kind of tired,” I added. My head had started aching like crazy. I pressed my thumbs over my eyebrows to try and make it stop.

I decided to go to the nurse’s office before my first class. I couldn’t afford to spend another day at home sick, not with the outer office waiting to be finished, but if I could just get some Tylenol or something, I’d be fine.

“What’s up, hon? Not feeling well?” the nurse, Mrs. Sherman, asked.

I hadn’t personally talked to Mrs. Sherman before, but she was introduced during an assembly and seemed really nice. Plus, I knew all the students loved her. I’d heard some of them faked an illness just to get out of class and hang out with her, though maybe that