She looked at Ken. He was staring out the window, daydreaming, maybe, or listening to dead people, but in any case, he obviously hadn't been paying attention to Tracey's story. What a relief.
Madame was still staring at her. "Amanda?"
"Oh, yeah. Uh, that's okay. I mean, you're welcome. Whatever."
Madame called on Martin next. The boy--who looked to be at least two years younger than anyone else--spoke in a very annoying, whiny voice, which made it hard to listen to his story.
"It was a couple of years ago. I was shooting baskets in my driveway."
The thought of undersized Martin playing basketball was almost too much for Amanda to deal with, but she knew better than to show it. But neither Jenna nor Charles had her self-control, and they started laughing. Martin clenched his fists.
Madame rapped on her desk. "Stop it at once! Martin, remember your exercise. Close your eyes and count backward from ten."
Amanda half hoped that the exercise wouldn't work. She'd never actually seen Martin demonstrate his gift. It would be interesting to see if he would attack a person in a wheelchair. As for Jenna, Amanda wouldn't mind seeing her get shaken up a little.
But Martin relaxed, and the animal or whatever was inside him calmed down.
"Anyway, a couple of guys came by and said they wanted to play with me. Only they kept the ball and wouldn't let me have it. I tried to get it back, but they were bigger than me. And they laughed."
He didn't have to say more. Everyone knew what happened when Martin thought people were making fun of him.
"Did you hurt them badly?" Madame asked.
"One of them got away. I broke the other one's arm, but that was all."
"So you were able to restrain yourself," Madame commented.
"Well, not exactly. It's just that he was screaming so hard that I lost the feeling."
Supposedly, it was this "feeling" that gave Martin the strength of a bear or some other type of strong animal. In any case, his power went beyond anything a normal human being could do--even a big bodybuilder.
"And that's the first time you remember getting the feeling?" Madame asked.
"Yeah, I think so. But my mother told me that when I was three, my father took a toy away from me and I pushed him across the room. My father says she dreamed this and it never happened." He grinned. "But he never tried to take anything away from me again, so I guess he learned his lesson. I must have done a pretty good job for a three-year-old."
"This is nothing to be proud of, Martin," Madame reprimanded. "You have to learn to channel your strength and direct it appropriately."
"Maybe you could go into demolition work someday," Jenna suggested. "I'll bet you'd be great at tearing down buildings."
Martin considered this. "I'd rather tear down people."
Sarah gasped. "Martin! That's not right!"
"It's their own fault," Martin complained. "People are always picking on me. I'm small, so they think they can push me around. If they didn't pick on me, I wouldn't get the feeling and I couldn't hurt them."
"Martin, you have to take responsibility for your gift," Madame said. "We'll hear from Jenna next."
Luckily, Jenna was saved by the bell--not the usual one, but the three special chimes that signified an announcement was about to be made over the intercom. This was followed by the disembodied voice of the principal's secretary.
"Would Jenna Kelley please come to the office?"
Everyone looked at Jenna, who immediately went all defensive. "I didn't do anything!"
"Just go to the office, Jenna," Madame said. "You can give your report another day."
Lucky dog, Amanda thought. It was very likely that Madame would forget that Jenna hadn't given her report and would never call on her again to do it. Jenna didn't deserve the good fortune.
On the other hand, Jenna was on her way to Mr. Jackson's office. Amanda brightened. Nobody ever got called to the principal's office for a good reason.
Chapter 6
JENNA RACKED HER BRAIN, trying to think of a reason for being called to the office so that she could come up with a story or an excuse to get out of it. She'd done plenty of bad things in her time at Meadowbrook, but she hadn't broken any major school rules recently. She hadn't been cutting classes--not for a while, anyway. She hadn't cheated on any tests lately. Come to think of it, she'd been unusually good the past couple of weeks, not even going to the mall and hanging out with Slug and Skank, the lowlife types she'd befriended on the street. She hadn't even seen them since they'd been picked up for shoplifting.
What could be so big that she'd be called out of class? Had they looked in her locker and found something bad? Okay, it was a mess, but there weren't any cigarettes or drugs or alcohol stashed away. Surely you didn't get called to the office for a couple of Kit Kat bars.
Then another possibility occurred to her, and she felt sick. Her mother . . . had something happened to her mother? Her legs turned to jelly and she stopped walking. That was definitely the kind of thing a person would be called out of class for--a family situation. Something really terrible, like an accident or … or worse.
Her mother. She was weak, she was an alcoholic, she'd never win any mother-of-the-year prizes, but jenna loved her. And the thought of losing her . . .
"Jenna? Are you all right?"
The concerned voice belonged to Mr. Gonzalez, the school counselor. Jenna had been forced to have sessions with him after her stint in the juvenile detention center. He was nice enough, but she'd put so much effort into lying to him during their sessions that she couldn't tell him the truth now.
"Sure, I'm fine. I'm just on my way to, um . . ."
"The principal's office?" He smiled. "It's okay. I know all about it. If you need to talk later, you know where I am." And he ambled off.
He left Jenna gaping. He knew why she'd been called to the office, and he was smiling. So she couldn't be in trouble and it couldn't be anything terrible, like her mother being hurt. It had to be something else.
Then she wanted to kick herself. Why hadn't she read his mind? Then she'd already know!
She moved quickly now, down the hall, around the corner, and up the half flight of stairs to the administration wing. When she walked into the main office, the secretary recognized her, but for once she wasn't wearing a reproving look. She beamed at Jenna and picked up the phone.
"Jenna Kelley is here, Mr. Jackson." She put down the phone. "You can go right in, Jenna."
Still feeling shaky, Jenna went to the door and rapped. A familiar booming voice rang out. "Come in, Jenna."
She opened the door. The heavyset principal was behind his desk, and for the first time ever, he looked pleased to see Jenna. There were two chairs facing the principal's desk, and a man was sitting in one of them.
He turned as Jenna approached, and she thought he looked vaguely familiar. "Hello, Jenna," he said.
It was his voice that put the memory in focus. This was the man who had come to the door yesterday looking for her mother.
"Hello," she said uncertainly.
"Sit down," the principal said, and as she did, once again she became nervous. Had this strange man come to give her bad news about her mother? No, that couldn't be it. He, too, was smiling. And Emily had been right about something--he was definitely handsome.
The principal spoke. "I'd like you to meet Mr. Stuart Kelley."
Jenna's eyes darted back and forth between the principal and the strange man. Kelley was a pretty common name, but she had to ask.
"Are you related to me?"
The man nodded and spoke gently. "I'm your father, Jenna."