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steps at a time, running from teachers, the guidance counselor, andthe principal. Ralphy Sherman had deserved what Lourdes had done to him, and so she fought back her tears, and fought the remorse that was trying to take hold of her.
    Ralphy had been whispering lies about Lourdes in science lab, as if he himself believed they were true. Did you hear that Lourdes was offered ten grand to join the circus? Did you hear that Lourdes donates fat to the Southampton Candle Factory? Did you hear they found some loose change and a TV remote in Lourdes’s belly button? Lourdes tried to control herself. She bit her tongue and gritted her teeth, but there’s only so much abuse a person can take. She wanted to hurt him as much as he hurt her—as much as they all hurt her, and so she pushed Ralphy up against the wall, held her hand firmly on his chest, and felt his chest begin to crush inward. Ralphy tried to scream, but couldn’t. His face turned red, purple, then blue. By then the teacher had taken notice and come running, so Lourdes stepped away from the limp blue kid, and he fell to the floor. Lourdes ran.
    Now, as she lumbered down the stairs, she cursed the steps and the way they rang out every time her bursting orthopedic shoes hit them.
    It was at the first floor landing that Lourdes encountered Mrs. Conroy, the principal of Hampton Bays High.
    â€œHold it right there, Lourdes.” She stood ten steps beneath Lourdes, and her voice was well trained to wield power—power enough to stop the grossly obese girl in her tracks. Lourdes swayed just a bit, and the steps creaked like the hinges of a rusty door. There wasn’t any sympathy from anyone in school this year—not even the principal. It was as if sympathy and understanding were limited to a certain waist size, and if a person grew beyond that limit, they were fair game for all forms of cruelty.
    â€œYou are coming to the office,” said Mrs. Conroy, “and we’re calling your parents. What you’ve done is very serious, do you understand?”
    â€œOf course I understand,” said Lourdes. “I’m fat, not stupid.” Her voice was thick and seemed to be wrapped within heavy, wet layers of cotton. When Lourdes spoke, it sounded as if she was shouting from inside the belly of a whale.
    â€œI didn’t kill him, did I?” asked Lourdes.
    â€œNo,” said Mrs. Conroy, “but you could have.”
    Lourdes was relieved and disappointed at the same time.
    â€œThis school has had about enough of you,” growled Conroy.
    â€œDoes that mean I’m expelled?”
    â€œWe’ll talk about it in my office.”
    â€œFat chance,” said Lourdes. She took one step at a time as she descended slowly toward her principal.
    Boom! The steps rang out as Lourdes planted her swollen feet on them.
    Boom!
    In a moment she eclipsed the stairway lights, and Conroy’s face was lost in shadow.
    â€œI’m warning you, Lourdes . . .”
    Boom!
    As Lourdes approached, Mrs. Conroy seemed smaller and less powerful. Why, she was just a wisp of a woman after all, thought Lourdes.
    Boom!
    â€œLourdes, I won’t let you past me.”
    â€œSo try and stop me.”
    Boom!
    As Lourdes continued her descent toward the frail principal, Conroy unconsciously gripped the rail, already feelingLourdes’s pull—her gravity , for Lourdes did have a gravity about her. When she was in a room, it was difficult not to find oneself leaning in her direction. If a breeze blew in through the window and scattered papers, they would all stick to Lourdes until she peeled them off. If you threw a paper airplane at her, it would curve around her and come back to you like a boomerang—and if you threw it just right, that airplane would continue to circle in orbit around her until it fell to the ground. Her classmates called her the Planetoid, and she hated them all.
    â€œIf you so much as touch me,