Similes
They look at me like I’m a time bomb about to go off in their faces.
They are worried I am going to get really mad
When Mom gets home from work that day, I'm there at the front door to throw it in her face. She looks totally bewildered.
confused
My fingers freeze over my phone screen. My brother is depressed enough.
pause or stop
I’m hyperventilating to the point where I can’t get any air in. Just when I’m about to pass out and topple off the trike, the water stops.
having trouble breathing
All the anger that's been building inside me since Joel left for Melton rises to the surface like magma
The anger she feels is now showing
Funny-she was sympathetic when I told her about that, but she didn’t seem very surprised.
caring
Right when Hugo is telling me about his life-and-death struggle with a pup tent, I spot...him.
The tent was really difficult to put up.
We get a rolling cart laden with juice boxes, cookies, crackers, and free newspapers.
loaded up
I’m like a computer with its hard drive wiped clean.
I have no memory.
While my questions sent murmers of shock around my hospital bed, this line is greeted with silent resignation.
acceptance that things will not change
He looks right through me at first, which is insulting enough.
Ignoes me, pretends I'm not there.
That’s the edited version of the truth. What Chase doesn’t remember is he basically starred in that bullying.
A story from one person's perspective
The longer we sit, the darker his mood gets, blackening and lowering until it hangs over him like a line of thunderheads.
His mood is getting worse and worse
My friends are mugging at me behind her back the whole time, trying to make me laugh.
making faces
I start to tell him I’m only here to cover the team for the video yearbook, but something makes me swallow the words before they hit the air.
not say anything
I have a giddy vision of my phone screen- the three of us brandishing the baseball bat with the ruined jack-o’-lantern.
holding up
Recruiting him is like inviting a shark over for sushi
not a good idea
I speak the craziest, most foolhardy words that have ever come out of my mouth: “You need help with that?”
ridiculous
I have a sickening vision of faces turning away from me, of kids shrinking back at my approach, fear in their body language.
moving away from me
Chase looks almost small, dwarfed by all those players in pads and cleats.
made to look smaller in comparison to something else