Amy was the poor girl in my class. Everyone knew it, even if no one ever said it kindly. Her sweaters were always too thin for winter, her shoes cracked at the soles, and her backpack looked like it had lived several lives before it reached her shoulders. At lunch, she sat alone, pretending to read while the rest of us lined up for hot meals. Sometimes she didn’t even have a tray.
The whispers came easily to others. Did you see her clothes? She smells like old books. Why does she never eat? I hated how casually cruel it all sounded, like background noise no one bothered to turn off.So one day, without making a big deal of it, I sat next to her and slid half my lunch across the table.
