Her eyebrows lifted.
Kelsey looked around. "Did she just say no?"
I put the notebook into my backpack and stood.
Madison stepped closer. "You think writing things down makes you brave?"
"No," I said. "I think it makes things harder to deny."
For half a second, neither of them spoke.
Then the bell rang.
Students began moving toward the building, and Madison stepped aside. She let me pass, but her shoulder slammed into mine as I walked by.
I did not turn around.
That night, I placed the notebook beneath my mattress and sat at the kitchen table while my mother folded laundry. Our apartment smelled like tomato soup and dryer sheets. A magnet shaped like a yellow school bus held my grocery list to the refrigerator.
My mother looked up from a towel.
"Bad day?"
I almost said no.
Instead, I said, "Madison took my notebook."
Her hands stopped moving.
"She gave it back?"
"I got it back."
"That wasn't what I asked."
I stared at the soup cooling in my bowl. "She keeps doing things. Her and Kelsey."
My mother pulled out the chair across from me. "What things?"
I told her about the lunchroom, the backpack, the picture, and the project. I told her about the comments in class. I left out the parts that made my throat tighten.
She listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she reached across the table and touched my hand.
"Did you tell a teacher?"
"Mr. Alvarez knows some of it."