"Someday, I'm going to give you a big old hug. Teddy bearastyle."

"Maybe when you graduate," he says just as Ty and Jared start moaning again. "Undefeated Halo 3 champs! Our streak is still alive, brother!"

From his wheelchair, Chad says, "Who's your poppa?"

Chad and Franks slap hands and then touch elbows before slapping hands again. Man stuff.

Just as I finish the last line of the MC ad, the five-minute warning bell sounds, so I stand by the door and, as they exit, I hand each one of my boys a piece of paper folded into a swan-origami style. Inside all of the swans are coded instructions regarding where to meet and at what time, plus their individual speeches for tonight, written by yours truly. Jared made up our code two years back and we all have it memorized. (It's just each letter plus 1, so that As are written as Bs and Bs are written as Cs and so forth. Not overly secure, but it stumps most of the morons in our school. True.) And as they walk through Franks' door, I give each of my boys a pat on the b.u.t.t too, like I am a football coach or something. The pat on the b.u.t.t makes my boys blush and smile. I have to pinch Chad on the cheek because he's in a motorized wheelchair and all, but I get him blushing too.

"Ricky Roberts wants a paper swanacoded message like everyone else in the-"

"How does Ricky Roberts receive information?" I ask him.

"On a need-to-know basis. Yes."

"You only have five minutes to get to homeroom," I say, and then Ricky is off.

Back inside of his lair, I hand Franks the Marketing Club ad and say, "Read that over the loudspeaker-if you dare."

"Cool," Franks says with a smile.

"Hug?"

"Homeroom," Franks says, raising his chubby hand.

I slap his red palm, and then I'm on my way to homeroom.

"Rub-a-dub-dub, it's Marketing Club! What's the rub, bub? Nada. MC for real, with plenty of zeal-and that's the appeal! Do you have what it takes-to slake-the growing desire for marketing and advertising fo' hire? We meet in the bas.e.m.e.nt every day, hey, so what do you say? Drop on down, give Franks a pound. Become a Marketing Club man or woman today. Peace out, homies! And keep hope alive!"

Sitting in homeroom, I smile to myself. Franks read my announcement verbatim, just like he promised. He's an honorable man, a man of his word, which is rare in this world, or at least that's what I've observed after seventeen trips around the flaming ball in the sky. (That's the sun, sucka!) Everyone around me is talking and totally not paying any attention to the announcements; not even my homeroom teacher, Mrs. Lindsay, listens or gives a c.r.a.p, but I know that there are at least four teenage boys sitting in homerooms hysterically laughing at my advertis.e.m.e.nt and Franks' awesome delivery-and I know that it might be the only laugh they get today. Franks Freak Force Federation will get a little fuel from this, and maybe that will be enough for them to make it through the school day. "Keep hope alive." I'm pretty sure Jesse Jackson said that when he was running for president back in the 80s. Yeah, we learned that hip catchphrase in my U.S. History II cla.s.s a few months ago.

The day pa.s.ses uneventfully-boring Spanish III, lame-a.s.s gym, boring pre-calc, boring chemistry-and since Mondays and Tuesdays are Ricky's socialization days, we don't eat our lunch in Franks' room, but in the cafeteria, because the special education department thinks that Ricky should interact with the student body more. Great idea, special education people who have no idea how evil the student body can be to special people like Ricky Roberts.

When I'm in the lunch line, watching over Ricky, protecting my boy, Lex Pinkston elbows me in the back and coughs out a disgusting single syllable word for a woman, which I'm not even going to repeat. He pretends to cover his mouth and cough, because he is a moron, but it is clear that he is calling me this worst of all words, so I say, "Like you'd even know what one was."

"I've seen your mom's," Lex says, five moronic football players standing behind him. "Everyone in this town has."

I slap his face hard enough to turn his head-SLAP!-and it makes me smile, even though I'm a Catholic and JC is not down with violence.

And then Lex's hand is on his face. He cannot believe that I frickin' slapped him.

The football morons are shocked as hooey-their pieholes wide open, like their eyes.

Ricky is screaming, "Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi!"

The lunchroom monitors show up, get between us, and the next thing I know I'm in Prince Tony's office, waiting for him to finish some stupid phone conversation. When he finishes, he looks at me from across his battleship-size desk and says, "What now?"

"Your quarterback called me a disgusting single-syllable word for a woman-which I'm not even going to repeat-and then implied that he had s.e.x with my mother, so I slapped his kisser," I say, and then add, "Prince Tony."

"It's Princ.i.p.al Fiorilli to you, young lady."

"Come on, Prince, we're behind closed doors. Just us here," I say to the tiny man, because he is weak and can be swayed if you flirt with him the right way-not in a s.e.xy way, but in a father-daughter sorta way.

He turns red, and I know I have him.

"I heard you kicked him in the shin yesterday. His father called to complain and-"

"Lex Pinkston is an evil boy who-"

"I know exactly who Lex Pinkston is and his father-"

"I prayed for you last night, Prince Tony."

"You did?" He doesn't know how to react to this one. Church and state and all. This is a public school. "Why did you pray for me?"

"I pray for you every night. True."

"Thank you," he says, blushing again.

"When are you going to start protecting the good people of Childress Public High School?"

"What would you have me do?"

"Expel Lex Pinkston."

"For what?"

"For being evil."

"It's not that easy."

"So you are admitting Lex Pinkston is evil?"

"I said it's not that easy."

"Yeah, it is."

"First, Mr. Pinkston is a school board member and we have to be delicate when-why am I explaining myself to a seventeen-year-old girl?"

"I'm going to say one thing to you, Prince Tony, and then I'm going to walk out that door."

I stare into his eyes, and I see him swallow once. He digs me, and he knows that Lex Pinkston needs to be kicked in the shin and slapped every so often, if only to maintain the balance of power within the student body so that evil doesn't get out of control; the boss man sees this because deep down, Prince Tony is a good man-even if he is a wimp who plays both sides of the political fence-and like Billy Budd, Prince Tony needs a Captain Vere to protect him from the evil people in the world. I fancy myself a more adroit and less dreamy, less starry Captain Vere. Captainess Appleton, at your service. Word, all you lime-suckers.

"You're a good man, Prince Tony," I say, "and I believe that you will eventually clean up this school and protect the common students from the selfish interests of school board members like Mr. Pinkston. My money's on you, Prince Tony. My money is on you."

I get up and start walking out of his office.

"You simply cannot a.s.sault students in my building, Ms. Appleton. I will not endure your vigilante approach to-"

"Search your heart, Prince Tony. You know what's the right thing to do. I believe in you. And I'm praying for you. Every night."

I walk out of his office, and his ancient wrinkly secretary Mrs. Baxter-who wears the reddest lipstick I have ever seen on any woman, and looks like a patriot with blue hair and white skin-asks me, "How'd it go in there?"

Mrs. Baxter is pretty nice, and I think it's safe to say she's an Amber Appleton fan.

"I'm praying for your boss," I tell her. "He has the ability to turn this school around."

"If he only had the chutzpah," she whispers, with her hand shielding her ancient lips so that only I can see.

"Viva la revolution, Mrs. Baxter," I say as she writes me a pa.s.s, and then I jog up two flights of stairs so I can check out Doolin's Accelerated American Lit cla.s.s, where I learn all about civil disobedience and that cool cat Henry David Th.o.r.eau, whom I admire a whole bunch, because he represented hard-core and even went to jail for his beliefs, which is saying something. True? True.

CHAPTER 5.

Practical Life Skills cla.s.s, where I work on my prom dress.

Semi-boring history, and then I'm at Ricky's locker.

"Amber Appleton slapped Lex Pinkston in THE FACE. Bad girl! Bad girl! Bad girl!"

"If you don't stop saying bad girl, I'm going to tickle you."

"No! Ricky Roberts does NOT like to be tickled. No tickle-tickle."

This is as close as Ricky gets to making a joke, because tickling is his favorite. I get him good under his armpits, and he doubles over and yells "Hi! Hi! Hi!" until some bearded teacher I don't know comes out of his cla.s.sroom and asks if everything is okay.

"Beautiful," I say to the beard.

"Amber Appleton is my best friend. She makes omelets with tequila and takes me on missions and I am taking her to prom in a limousine! Yes," Ricky says.

The beard nods once, real serious-as if Ricky told the beard that he needed to donate a kidney to the president because it was the beard's civic duty or something-and then the beard walks back into his cla.s.sroom.

Truth be told, there are a lot of teachers who are scared of Ricky, because he flips out sometimes and punches himself in the head, which can get a little intense.

As we walk to Donna's house together, Ricky counts aloud, and I enjoy the afternoon winter sun on my face.

Bobby Big Boy always p.i.s.ses himself whenever we are reunited, so I pull a few paper towels from the roll, and then let him out of his room. In the tiled hallway, he circles me seven times, like he has been snorting cocaine all day, and then he pees on the floor, so I wipe up the yellow puddle and give Thrice B a kiss. He tries to slip me the tongue, but he doesn't make it into my mouth or anything.

I give Ricky a sleeve of Fig Newtons and a blue Gatorade.

He's already doing his math homework, because he frickin' loves math.

"I have to go see The KDFCs," I tell him, but he doesn't look up from his math. "I'll be back to cook dinner. Okay?"

"Ricky Roberts is doing math. Do not talk to Ricky Roberts when Ricky Roberts is doing math!"

"Cool," I say, and then lock the door behind BBB and me. Ricky will do math problems forever if you let him, so no worries leaving him alone.

I take Donna's ten-speed bike from the garage and put B3 in the little basket Donna bought for him that is attached to the handlebars. He fits perfect so that just his head sticks out. It's pretty frickin' adorable.

We are flying through the cold January air, out of town, across the tracks, and into the ghetto. There are a lot of down-and-out people in this town, and they usually stare at me when I ride my bike through.

The first time this happened, it scared me a lot, because it sorta looked like these people wanted to kill me, but I have since learned a trick.

Whenever someone looks at me like they want to stomp my face in, I now look the person in the eyes, smile really huge, wave, and say, "Hope you're havin' a great day!" It's pretty wild, because doing this really works. If you don't believe me, try it yourself. Even the meanest-looking people will get this really stunned look on their faces, but then the smile blooms, and they usually wave back and say something nice like "G.o.d bless you!" or "Same to you!" It's a pretty cool trick, and maybe even a pretty killer way of life, if you are a crazy spiritual ho like me. True? True.

Today I yell, "Hope you're havin' a great day!" eight times, and I get two "Thanks!" one "Jesus loves you!" two "You go girl!"s two "Same to you!"s and one "You a s.e.xy bike girl! Ride on, girl, ride on," which made me laugh, because the man who yelled this had to be at least ninety-seven.

And then I'm at the Korean Catholic Church, which is an old shoe store turned house of G.o.d, and sits nestled between a McDonald's and a liquor store. In his penguin suit, Father Chee is waiting outside for me, because the men in front of the liquor store sometimes say bad things to me, and the "Hope you're havin' a great day!" trick doesn't always work on them so well.

Technically, I got hooked up with Father Chee through my high school guidance counselor, who says I have to do a load of community service if I want to get into Bryn Mawr College, which is where I want to study English, because you can go to law school if you major in English and do really well at Bryn Mawr College. That's what Donna did anyway. But to tell you the truth, I don't really give a c.r.a.p anymore about fulfilling the community service requirements, which are of this world, as Franks like to say. I still want to go to Bryn Mawr and all, but doing what I do with Father Chee has become part of my religious practice, which I realize might sound truly whack to some, but I believe in what FC and I do, like-for real. Word. And I had been praying for a chance to make a difference in the lives of people who needed it most, because that's really all I want to do with my life-help people who need it, just like JC told us to do.

About a year back, Father Chee contacted the high school looking for someone to teach English to the women in his church who wanted to learn. At first, I tried to simply straight-up teach them vocab and grammar and whatnot, but it was so boring and depressing for the women that I had to think up a killer alternative or quit. Lucky for FC's church members, I'm pretty good at thinking up killer hooey. Also, Father Chee and I work well together-we're an awesome team-and ever since I implemented my new teaching technique, my enrollment has more than doubled.

Father Chee holds open the front door and I ride Donna's bike right into the church.

My Man of G.o.d locks the door behind us, which is sorta weird since it's a church and all.

"h.e.l.lo, Bobby Big Boy," Father Chee says, patting 3B on the head. Triple B licks Father's hand, because they are boys, and then FC is pulling BBB out of the basket so that they can get a man hug in, which is cool, because B Thrice loves to hug Men of G.o.d.

My dog is Catholic. And if you say dogs don't have a soul and therefore don't go to heaven, I will slap your face silly. Word.

Maybe-before I get into the story of The Korean Divas for Christ and Father Chee-you might want to know how I became a Catholic and a crazy-serious religious person?

Well, the only thing my father, Bob, left behind for me when he took off was this series of children's books called Jesus Was a Rock Star. They were these big picture books for kids-twelve in the series-and each was about one of the killer adventures Jesus had on earth, how Jesus rocked the world and then got crucified for being so cool. These books were pretty awesome because Jesus was always doing miracles like turning water to wine and walking on water and even bringing people back from the dead, which is definitely a pretty killer thing to do. Also, in the pictures, Jesus was very handsome (sorta like Jack White of the White Stripes) with His long rock-star hair. JC always had an entourage around Him, He never freaked out when people let Him down or things went wrong-JC was always so very cool-and He loved everyone and went around saving people like Mom and me, people everyone else had already given up on.

My favorite Jesus adventure was when He stopped the crowd from stoning a hooker. You probably know that one already, but all these mean men were actually going to throw rocks at the woman's head until her skull caved in and she was dead, but Jesus did this Jedi-mind-trick thing and just wrote words in the sand until the mean men noticed and asked what the h.e.l.l JC was doing. Then-so cool, like a rock star-Jesus says that the person without any sin can throw the first rock at the woman. And then the men start to feel guilty and freak out and leave-which is the best part. Jesus didn't even have to raise His voice, let alone throw any fists. Who would have thought that writing words in the sand would work? And then JC doesn't even yell at the woman for having too much s.e.x. He just saves her and tells her to live a good life, which is pretty cool of Jesus. No guilt trip or anything.

I still have my Jesus Was a Rock Star books, and the pages are all worn out from my reading them so many times. True.

My mom never really dug Jesus too much, maybe because my dad was big on JC and he broke Mom's heart-shattered it-leaving her all alone with newborn me and an endless train of loser boyfriends.

So Mom never took me to church or anything like that.

But when I was in eighth grade, Ty was always complaining about his mom making him attend these religious cla.s.ses about Jesus so that he could join the Catholic Church and avoid getting sent to h.e.l.l. I asked if I could go with him, and this excited Mrs. Hendrix very much. So I started attending Jesus cla.s.s with Ty at St. Dymphna's, which is this big old church with killer stained-gla.s.s windows, ancient wooden pews full of comfy red cushions, and a ma.s.sive organ that can blast your eardrums until you go deaf-St. Dymphna's pretty much has the works.

Only the priest there-Father Johns-told the Jesus stories all wrong. Father Johns was always going on and on about how Jesus was going to be disappointed in us if we sinned or didn't do enough charity, and the way he talked about JC made the Son of G.o.d seem more like a mean, p.i.s.sy old lady than a rock star. But the one thing that really hit home with me was Father Johns telling us that we would go to h.e.l.l if we didn't join the Catholic Church, do enough charity work, and live a good life. That bit sorta scared me and made me want to join for real.

Needless to say, I was baptized, did the confession thing, had my First Communion with all of these little kids whose parents were good Catholics and therefore didn't let their sons and daughters get to middle school before they have their First Communion, and then Ty and I joined the church as his parents watched all proud. Mrs. Hendrix was my sponsor-and she even bought me a white dress and white shoes for the big day. I took Mary for my confirmation name-not too original, I admit-and then I went to a big party at the Hendrix house, where Ty's relatives actually gave me presents simply because I was an official Catholic now.

Mom didn't come to see me baptized, nor when I became a member of the church-probably because of my religious dad leaving her.