I didn’t have the energy to give Kathleen a play-by-play of everything that happened over the weekend, so I gave her the condensed version.

B-E-A-U GIVE ME INFORMATION ABOUT CI FOR MY BIRTHDAY, I signed, my movements jerky. HE THINK I WANT ONE.

Kathleen’s eyebrows shot up, and her mouth got all tight like it did any time she disapproved of something.

HOW YOU FEEL? she signed after a moment.

SAD, I signed back immediately. ANGRY.

And a whole list of other emotions too, but Kathleen could get the picture without my going into detail.

I was sort of expecting Kathleen to come up with a solution, like she did when I told her about the situation with Cartwright and the interpreter, but she was still silent when we reached Mr. Wells’ history class.

I was prepared to go through another round of questioning when I took my seat next to Nina, but I figured by the tiny smile she gave me, and the understanding look in her eyes, that she already knew everything that had happened.

YOU OK? was all she signed right when Beau walked into class and sat down in the seat beside me.

I went with total honesty here.

“No, I’m not,” I said aloud.

Mr. Wells jumped right into class the second after the bell rang, but I was still far from being grounded in the lesson. I ended up doodling all over the page in my notebook instead of taking notes. I snapped back to reality when Nina started tapping on my desk to get my attention and noticed that I’d drawn a whole page of boxes and frowny faces.

GROUP DISCUSSION TIME, Nina signed to me when I glanced her way.

YAY, I signed with an eye roll.

I turned my back to Beau and faced Nina. I didn’t want to talk to him about history either.

Nina started signing and using her voice to talk about something to do with the Cuban Missile Crisis, but my attention wandered once I caught on to the looks Jackson kept shooting my way. He was sitting two rows back, leaning toward a guy I knew to be on the baseball team too. They were clearly not talking about anything related to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

It was a mixture of curiosity and determination that had me focusing on Jackson’s big mouth, lipreading what he was saying. His gaze kept darting back and forth between me and Beau, so he was apparently talking about us, and he was starting to smirk.

“Excuse me,” I blurted out loud enough to catch the attention of a few classmates. “You really didn’t just say that, did you?”

I’d made it a point to have as little interaction with Jackson as possible, but there was no chance I wasn’t going to call him out on what he’d just said.

Jackson shot upright in his seat, eyes going wide. “. . . heard me?”