"Tim LaHaye - Left Behind Kids 01 - Vanishings" - читать интересную книгу автора (LaHaye Tim)

_________________________




CHAPTER TWO
 Vicki

The Rebel




VICKIByrne was fourteen and looked eigh-teen. Tall and slender, she had fiery red hair and had
recently learned to dress in a way that drew attention, from girls and guys. She liked leather. Low cut
black boots, short skirts, flashy tops, lots of jewelry, and a dif-ferent hairstyle almost every day.

She was tough. She had to be. Other kids at school considered kids who lived in trailer parks lower
class. Vicki's friends were her "own kind," as her enemies liked to say. When she and her trailer park
neighbors boarded the bus on Vicki's first day of high school, they quickly realized how it was going to
be.

The bus was full. It was obvious the trailer park was the last stop on the route. Only the first two kids of
the twelve boarding from the trailer park found a seat even to share. Every morning they jostled for
position to be one of the lucky first ones aboard. Vicki had given up trying. Two senior boys, smelling of
tobacco and bad breath and never, ever, car-rying schoolbooks, muscled their way to the front of the
line.

No one on the bus looked at the trailer park kids. They seemed to be afraid that if they made eye
contact, they might have to slide over and make room for a third person in their seat. And, of course, no
one wanted to sit next to "trailer trash." Vicki had seen them hold their noses when she and her neighbors
boarded, and she had heard the whispers.

How was a freshman girl supposed to feel when people pretended not to see her, pre-tended she didn't
exist, acted as if she were scum?

The bus driver refused to pull away from the trailer park until everyone was seated, so the two senior
trailer boys---who had already found seats---rose and scowled and insisted that people make room.
Some "rich kids," which they all seemed to be if they didn't live near Vicki, begrudgingly made room.

The first day, Vicki had found herself the last to find a seat. She looked in the front, where most of the
black kids sat. They had to be among the first on the bus, because no one seemed to want to sit with
them either---espe-cially the trailer park kids. In fact, Vicki's friends called the black kids horrible names
and wouldn't sit with them even if they offered a seat.

Vicki had been raised to believe black kids were beneath her too. No black people lived in the trailer