Prom
Chapter Seventeen: Story of a High School Cheerleader
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gordo pulled into the high school parking lot, and he and Lizzie noticed a large group of people surrounded under a tree on the front lawn of the school. They quickly got out of the car and got to the tree to see what was going on. Gordo pushed through the crowd, and came back out with what looked like a newspaper.

"What is that?" Lizzie asked.

"It's the school newspaper," he replied.

"What's the big deal then?" Gordo showed the front page to Lizzie. It said: STORY OF A HIGH SCHOOL SENIOR - SECRETS REVEALED. "That can't be in the newspaper," Lizzie said. "Remember that girl Maria? The one I got the Prom King and Queen percentages from?"

"Yeah," Gordo said.

"Well she's the editor of the newspaper. She told me the whole theme would be Graduation," Lizzie said. "And that's obviously not what this is. Look at them." She waved her hand at the blob of people under the tree.

"Well, let's find out what it is," Gordo said, reading the article aloud to Lizzie. "The Seniors of our high school have always seemed nice, but is that really the whole story? No way. All of these people that the underclassmen look up to have their secrets. The most popular students do; Kate Sanders, Ethan Craft, Claire Miller, Danny Kesslar, Emily Richardson, Thomas Meeker, Janelle Edwards... the list goes on. In total, the secrets of thirteen of our very own Seniors have been revealed in this episode of 'The Paper.' Turn to page 3 for the rest of the details." Gordo looked up at Lizzie, but before he could say anything to her, he noticed the stares. The students scattered all around were staring at them.

"Why are they looking at us like that?" Lizzie said.

"I don't know. Let's go," he said, and he and Lizzie jogged to Gordo's car. They got inside it and Gordo turned to page three. He began reading it again.

"The Seniors we will reveal the secrets of are: Kate Sanders, Heather James, Claire Miller, Maria Flores, Danny Kesslar, Emily Richardson, Thomas Meeker, Ethan Craft, Janelle Edwards..." Gordo stopped reading and looked Lizzie in the eye.

"What's wrong? That's only nine. Who are the other four?" she asked. Gordo handed her the newspaper and pointed to the other four names. She read them to herself. Jason Davis, David Gordon, Miranda Sanchez, and Lizzie McGuire.

- - -

"Matthew McGuire," the substitute called.

"Here," Matt said.

"Felicia Murphy," the old lady called off, her face buried in the attendance book. "Felicia Murphy?" she called again.

"Yeah...yeah, I'm here," a voice said. The substitute looked up from her book.

"Why does everyone keep taking so long to answer me?" she asked. She got her answer. Most of the class was staring at Matt and his new look. "You can look at your friend later, now look up here." No one responded to the teacher. She slapped a ruler hard onto the desk. Everyone faced front. "Now everyone be quiet and pay attention while I finish roll," she said angrily. "Lanny Onassis." She paused, waiting for an answer. "Don't tell me..."

She looked up again. "Lanny Onasis?" she repeated. A hand was waving furiously in the air. "Lanny?" she asked, and the owner of the hand nodded vigorously.

The sub finished roll and started talking. "Obviously your normal teacher, Mrs. Hannigan, is not here today. And I'm sorry to say, but we're still going to work, because I did take Spanish in college, and since this is Spanish Class, we'll learn Spanish," she said dully.

"First off... Lanny," she said, finding a random name off the attendance sheet. "Please say 'The big coat is yellow,' in Spanish, of course.

Lanny stood up, and opened his mouth as if to answer, when the intercom interupted.

"Can you please send Lanny Onasis to the office?"

- - -

The bell rang, but Lizzie and Gordo did not move from Gordo's car.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In the next chapter:
-Find out the Seniors' secrets.
-Find out what the title of this chapter means.
-Find out who printed this article.