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giving her a giddy thumbs--up before walking along as if nothing had happened.
Ariana waited while Mr. Chen shut the lights in his classroom and closed the door, then followed him out down the hallway, admirably keeping her head held high. It wasn't until the heavy door slammed behind her that Ariana allowed herself one small, triumphant laugh, which was drowned out by the twittering gossip and speculation that filled the hallway around them.
It was almost too easy.
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RETALIATION
"I'm so glad you came to the meeting tonight, Ana," April Corrigan said in her slight Irish accent as she turned out the lights in the multimedia room that evening and ushered Ariana out. "I liked your idea about theming each issue of The Ash after the season in which it's published.""Well, nothing too on the nose," Ariana said, tilting her chin. Up ahead, the dozen other members of the literary magazine's staff pushed through the double doors of the building. "I'm thinking maybe coming--of--age for fall, death for winter . . . celebration for spring. Just brainstorming here."
April nodded enthusiastically, checking messages on her iPhone while she adjusted the stack of notebooks and back issues of The Ash in her arms.
"We should definitely do it," April said, shoving her square glasses up into her hair to hold her curls back from her face. "Remind me
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at the next meeting and we can all ruminate on the exact themes together." She fished out a few copies of The Ash and handed them to Ariana as they walked out. "In the meantime, why don't you look these over? I'd love to hear your thoughts."
Ariana beamed. April was very accomplished and she had run the meeting like a professional--organized, to the point, succinct but welcoming. Everyone on the staff had hung on her every word. She wasn't going to be wasting anyone's time with a whole lot of flowery debates over whether a piece was worthy for publication or not. Although, as a senior, April was actually two years younger than Ariana, Ariana found herself looking up to the girl as a real junior transfer would have, honored that April was asking for her input.
"That's great. I'll make some notes and bring them next Monday," Ariana replied, tucking the issues into her arms in a neat pile.
"Perfect. Lexa and Soomie were right about you," April said with a smile.
Ariana's heart skipped a beat. "Why? What did they say?"
"Just that you were my kind of girl," April replied, sending a quick text.
Ariana smiled. So maybe the whole "rigid" thing wasn't a curse after all. Maybe it just meant that Ariana was an April kind of girl. And if Lexa and the others were friends with April, then clearly they could accept Ariana the way she was as well.
But she was still going to show them that she wasn't rigid all the time.
"Interesting," April said, pausing and pushing her glasses up again.
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She looked across the circle, where a bunch of people were jogging past the class building toward the boys' dorms beyond. "Wonder what that's all about."
Ariana and April exchanged an intrigued look and followed the crowd. Standing behind Ferrin Hall, the upperclassman dorm, was a huge crowd of students that was growing larger by the second. A few people pointed up at one of the windows on the top floor and Ariana squinted in the waning light of evening to see what had caught everyone's attention.
Finally, her eyes lit on a window that looked different from the others. As she squinted at it, she realized that something was stuffed up against the windowpane.
"Is that what I think it is?" April asked, narrowing her eyes.
Just then, Landon glanced over his shoulder and spotted Ariana. He whacked Adam on the back of the head to get his attention, and the two boys joined them.
"What's going on?" Ariana asked.
"Some genius filled Martin Tsang's room with coconuts," Landon said, laughing. "Literally filled it! There must be a thousand coconuts in there."
"More, actually," Adam said, twisting his lips in thought. "You'd need at least two thousand to fill a standard ten--by--ten dorm room."
"The genius of it is, Tsang hates coconuts," Landon said, still laughing.
"It's true," April confirmed with a nod. "He doesn't just hate them. He's afraid of them."
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