“Oh, it’s just that Traudt’s brought it up twice already in English,” explains Emily. “Most of us have her, right?” She looks around at everyone to confirm. “And Brynn and I were telling Nik and Lili on the way here about how Mangin is super easy to sidetrack. We talked about the McAllisters practically the whole period yesterday in AP US, instead of the Federalist Papers.”

Nik and Lili. She’s using nicknames, like real friends. “I get the joke,” I say irritably, even though I hadn’t quite, “but it’s not funny. We’re talking about my great-grandfather’s life. And other people’s lives.”

“Oh,” Brynn says, “I didn’t mean that was funny. I was joking about how easy it is to distract teachers with social issues.”

“Okay,” I say. “So, they’re just a good excuse to get out of doing work?”

Brynn blushes. She glances at Aviana, Zach, and Owen, who avoid her gaze. “That’s not how I meant it.”

“Whatever. It’s fine.”

“Are you sure?” asks Em. “Do you want to talk—?”

“I said it’s fine, Em,” I say, maybe a shade more harshly than I need to. Em and Brynn exchange looks, like they’re a team, and I feel the hot, sharp scrape of betrayal on my heart.

“Don’t worry about it,” says Owen. “We all want the same thing, so let’s focus on that for now.” He beckons me over to look at his Chromebook screen and says, “Help me out with this part, Ceej. Will and Sam say they like it, but I’m not sure if it works.”

I lean over to check what he’s written. That faker. On the screen, he’s typed, Let it go, CJ. We need to work together.

“What do you think?” he asks out loud, and nudges me. “Does that work?”

He’s staring at the screen with that cute little Roman numeral three between his brows, like he’s thinking really hard, and then he breaks his stare to grin at me for just a moment—How clever is this?—before he looks back at the screen all serious again.

“Clever,” I answer. I nudge him back. Doofus.

“I thought so.” And he nudges me back, harder, and we engage in a brief but intense battle for shoulder space until I’m actually laughing, and I realize that Owen’s literally nudged me back into a good mood. So good that I remember that I’ve told myself to trust Emily to take care of herself. So good that when I notice her giving me a sly little wink-wink-nudge-nudge-isn’t-he-cute smile, I don’t even care that she’s got it all wrong, and I just smile back.

Script for: Weekly History Minute, page 3

Submitted by: Owen Takasugi

Approved: R. Adams

(cont. from page 2)