Bikini Body

Chapter twenty:

Today's the last day of school.

Everyone at school we buzzing with excitement. Yearbooks were passed out, phone numbers and social media were exchanged, and people were already counting down to the official hour of summer. I've been counting down since the beginning of the year! One more year of this hell and I am free. I couldn't believe it. Summer was a few hours away, I could just taste it!

Classes were only thirty minutes long. I thought it was a joke! Barely anybody in my first hour was present. Mrs. Hall let us do whatever we wanted until the bell rang. For Dance, we played on Just Dance on the Wii, and then we cleaned out our lockers. I figured that Dance was going to be much different now that Bree is gone. I wondered who was going to be the top dancer next year. To be honest, I was just glad that I had only one more year of Dance. I only signed up for the easy A-- and also because I didn't want to lift weights in Gym.

In Honor History, we returned our textbooks and signed each other's yearbooks. Luke was the first to sign mine. While he signed mine, I signed his. I wrote:

Have a nice summer, Luke! See you next year!

When I read what Luke wrote, I almost died!

Have a good summer! You're such a good friend! We should totally hang out over the summer together!

He even wrote me his number, too!

There was no lunch after third hour, so we had to go to our fifth hour right after our third. All the students were pretty anxious and wanted the day to be over already. I kept myself busy by checking the clock almost every minute. It was as if the clock was laughing at me, torturing me when it made its ticking sound. Finally, we were released to go to sixth hour. One more hour to go!

In Spanish, we had a fiesta. The teacher played Spanish music for us while we chowed down salsa and chips and Kool Aid. Instead of watching the clock, I joined in on the fun. Then, all of the sudden, a student started doing a countdown like in New Year's. I realized that we were seconds away from summer.

"... seven... six... five... four... three... two... ONE!" we chanted.

The bell rang. The class erupted into cheers as we scurried out the classroom door as our teacher hollered after us, "Have a great summer!" In the hallway, students were throwing papers, cheering, and some were even crying! I didn't want to stay in school any longer, so I ran to the bus. Good thing because the bus already had a ton of people inside and was getting ready to leave! I sat next to Grace.

"We're free! We're free!" she said as she squeezed the life out of me. "Summer is officially here!"

"I know!" I said. "It feels good! One more year, Grace, one more year!"

"Are we going to see each other over the summer?"

I nodded. "Of course!"

"Oh! And the new Bikini Body issue is coming out today!" Grace squealed.

I rolled my eyes. Of course Grace knew that.

When I got home, I half-expected Mom to hug me and congratulate me for getting one more year closer to graduation. But she wasn't at home. I found a note sitting on my bed saying that she went out to view some college courses that took place over the summer. I was proud of her. I then started to clean out my backpack. I planned to use the same backpack for senior year. It was still in good condition. I liked how it kept everything organized and how it didn't make my paper all crumbled up and wrinkled. After I was done, I threw them away to the recycling bin.

My family has a tradition. The tradition is that we throw away old papers, old clothes, and old appliances. It symbolizes throwing away the old year and welcoming the new year. We always do it whenever school was done. I saved my unused notebooks and pens and pencils for next year. I thought it would be silly to buy new ones when I already had some that I never used. When I was done with everything, I was about to go to the living room and watch T.V. when I realized that I had my old clothes mixed with the new ones Zarah and I bought when she was here.

"Hmm... " I said to myself, opening my closet. I had just the idea.

I cleaned out my entire closet. I laid all my old, worn-out clothing on my bed in a pile while leaving the clothes Zarah and I bought in the closet. Then I hurried to the garage and got one of those large bags Mom would always come home with from the store. I filled three bags worth of my clothes when I was done! Now what to do with them was the question.

I heard the front door open and close.

"Mom?" I called. But it wasn't her.

"Nope... Tony."

I tried to hide my disappointment. "Hey, Tony. You can come in."

My bedroom door opened.

"Goodness!" Tony exclaimed. "What a lot of clothes! They're all yours?"

"I decided to clean out my closet," I told him, proudly.

"Are you going to donate them?" he asked.

Donate?

Hey! I thought. Not a bad idea-- why didn't I think of it?!

I nodded. "That's exactly what I'll do."

"C'mon, I'll take you to Goodwill," said Tony. "You can donate them there."

"Really?" I was surprised that Tony offered to take me to Goodwill, even though he'd just came home.

Tony nodded. "Yeah! Let's go, come on."

We loaded the three bags onto Tony's car and drove to Goodwill. After we parked, an attendant came out and helped with the bags. The attendant gave us a receipt, at our request, afterwards.

"Thank you for donating to Goodwill," the attendant said, giving us a toothy smile.

"Thank you," Tony and I said in perfect unison.

While driving home, I felt really good inside. It felt like winning the lottery-- but better! I didn't want to smile and Tony notice, so I smiled out the window. People were looking at me weird, but I didn't care! I felt like I was free. Happy. Like, I could do anything. Like I answered the meaning of life. Of my life. It seemed like nothing else mattered. The legs, the clothes, the fact if you're stupid or not-- it didn't matter! I knew that now.

"Oh, look," said Tony as he was just pulling up at the house, "we have mail."

I looked, and just as Tony said, we indeed had mail. The mailbox's red stance was up. I got out of the car and opened the mailbox. I pulled out the new monthly issue of Bikini Body. On the cover was a beaming redhead smiling broadly wearing a bikini. The cover read:

Introducing Bikini Body's new Plus-size model: Christina Drew.

The heavens opened up to me.