Read Secrets for Free Online Page A

parts of himself covered. Now all he had to do was get himself back to the locker room. The only thing was, he’d have to go by the girls again. Yeah, a bunch of scary, scary girls, he thought.
    “I. Have. Bagged. The. Tiger!” he yelled, then leaped from the stage and strutted toward the door. He was going to at least have a little dignity this time, no scurrying and blushing. The girls whooped their approval, and a grin broke across Anthony’s face. He planted a big lipstick kiss on the cheerleader closest to the doors, earning himself a round of applause.
    Anthony held the tiger over his head as he strode out of the cafeteria. As soon as the doors swung closed behind him, he bolted and didn’t stop until he was safely back in the locker room. “You’re a true Sabertooth now,” Marcus called.
    “So what do the girls do with those pictures they took?” Anthony asked, trying to sound casual.
    “They’ll be showing them to everyone at McHugh’s party,” Sanders told him.
    Anthony nodded as if he knew all about the party. But he hadn’t heard anything. Clearly he was good enough to be considered part of the team. Good enough to sit with the guys at lunch. But outside of school it seemed like it was a different story. Anthony was supposed to go back to his crappy little house and-
    “You’re coming, aren’t you?” McHugh asked. “My parents are out of town for the week. It’s going to be the most massive party of the year.”
    “Sure. Yeah,” Anthony answered, feeling a ridiculously big smile trying to take over his face. “But I’m warning you guys, once the rest of the girls see those pictures, you’re all going to be very lonely.”
    “Anthony’s here,” Rae’s dad called up the stairs. Rae froze, remembering the scene in the cafeteria at lunch today.
    Then she shook her head, tellingherself she was being silly. She needed to talk to Anthony, and now she had the chance.
    She got up and started walking toward her bedroom door, then stopped abruptly. She flipped her head down to her knees, then came back up fast so her hair went all full and curly around her face. What are you doing? she asked herself as she headed out of the room and down the hall. It’s just Anthony. He probably couldn’t even say
    what color your hair is if he wasn’t looking right at you.
    “Hey, did you see the game?” Anthony blurted out the second Rae stepped into the living room.
    Rae blinked. “Obviously you didn’t rush over here to see how I was feeling,” she answered. She sat down in the chair across from him.
    “What?” Anthony rubbed the bruise that was forming on his forehead.
    “I was out sick,” Rae said. “I thought you might have, you know, noticed.” Actually she’d only been out sick yesterday. But she hadn’t eaten in the caf today, so for all he knew, she could have been out two days running.
    “Sorry,” he muttered. “Are you okay?”
    “I have strep,” Rae told him. “But there’s this-”
    “It sucks that you missed the game,” Anthony interrupted. “It was really close. I mean, it could have gone either way right up to the end, and I saw anopening and went for it. Pretty much won us the game.”
    “That’s great,” Rae answered, trying to force herself to sound enthusiastic. She wasn’t the only one with a life here. This was a huge deal for Anthony. She could tell him all her garbage in a minute-about the numbness and the meter man who wasn’t a meter man. But Anthony deserved to brag a little first. “I knew you’d be amazing,” she told him.
    “The guys actually carried me off the field,” Anthony said. “Then they made me put on this ballet costume-”
    “You bagged the tiger? After your first game?” Rae exclaimed. “Some guys aren’t allowed to get near the tiger for a whole season. You must have blown the guys away.”
    “Nobody even cares that I used to go to Fillmore,” Anthony rushed on.
    “I knew they wouldn’t,” Rae answered. “So when I called