Judging Covers

Backfires

I plan everything on my own. It'll be fine, my friends don't need to be dragged into this mess anymore, they deserve they're freedom and I don't want to pressure them into doing this.

So I steal some posters and markers and sneak into the gym in the middle of the next night.

I'm all alone in the dark with a tiny flash light in my mouth. This has to be done efficiently and quickly

So I settle on the stage and prepaid my timer just in case I fall asleep or forget what time it is. There's a five o'clock time check in the morning. Gotta be back in my room before then.

"What're you doing?"

I nearly pee my pants and just barely clamp a hand over my mouth to keep from screaming bloody murder.

A curly dark head and large eyes blink rapidly against my onslaught of flashlight on his face.

"Carlos! You freakin' jerk!"

He flinches. "Sorry Maree."

He's the only one that calls me that.

"God, give a girl a warning next time, what are you doing here?' I breath out, so, so glad it's him and not a monster come to punish me for my upcoming sins

"I was just sitting here."

I give him a hard look. He only ever sits here alone in the dark when he's worried about something, or -

"They kick you out of the room again?" I say, anger sweeping into my face.

He nods slowly.

Mustards.

Due to the unfortunately uneven amount of boys in our school, my poor Carlos is stuck in a room with Milton and Daniel. Pricks always pull crap like this at random times. Nobody really understands Carlos except me, but that's because we've been friends since first grade.

He's super awkward, shy, antisocial, weird, but plenty smart. Guy has a real knack for movement and an incredible ear for music and rhythm. But nobody cares about that. Because he's literally at the bottom of the schools ranking system.

I'm five ranks above him.

"Sorry Carlos. Here, you can help me with this." I hand him a blue marker.

He smiles at me and takes it while scooching closer to me.

"What are we writing?" He asks and I give him a devil's grin.

"Guilt trips my friends. We are guilt tripping everyone at this dump."

At least . . . I hope we are.

---------

I overslept.

So instead of hanging the posters up to be anonymous I hung them up after math class.

Mr. Joel thought that was hilarious. He even corrected some of my grammar mistakes on the poster, even though he is my math teacher. Everyone else just ignored me and walked by like I wasn't standing on a chair in the middle of the hall way clogging up the bulletin board.

By now my crew knew about this and Jerry called me an idiot. Maybe I am but at least I know what I want.

Freedom of expression and freedom from ranks controlling our society!

That's what it says on my poster. Neat huh.

"Maybe I should have made it more colorful?" I say to Carlos who standing there in his huge hoodie sucking on a juice box.