12.
Mink was right.
Every history class was the same pattern: five minutes of actual history lessons followed by distracting questions that led to the rest of the class being wasted. On Tuesday we discussed which singer had the most impact on history, Lizzo or Selena Gomez. Wednesday we debated whether or not Zendaya was too hot to play Underground Railroad organizer Harriet Tubman. Thursday: Who would make a better dictator in fascist Italy, Miley Cyrus or Kanye West. On Friday we were given a test about World War II but, because Mr. Cromwell felt we hadn’t spent enough class time going over the material, he let us use our books. And told us what pages the answers were on.
“Gotta keep the bureaucrats in Washington happy with our test scores,” he laughed. “No chucklehead left behind.”
Though each class made me want to scream as if I’d had an ear yanked from my head, I kept my mouth shut because I’d promised Marvella that I wouldn’t call attention to myself. And because of my motto: Stay out of it. So, when the rest of the class laughed at his lame jokes, I laughed. When they pretended to be interested in his stories about his college dorm life, I pretended. I was as invisible as a raindrop in a thunderstorm.
At home, Marvella did her best to bring some normalcy to our crazy lives. She bought me a new computer and at night we played Scrabble (which I sucked at), chess (which I also sucked at), and poker (which I was pretty good at). During the day, she was busy setting up escape routes and new identities for when we’d have to leave this place. We couldn’t afford to stay in one place too long or those killers were bound to find us.
“When we leave,” she said, placing all seven of her Scrabble tiles on the board for a gazillion points, “it’ll be suddenly and we can’t take anything with us. So, if you have something important, keep it with you at all times.”