SPEAK Pg 71- 137

Summary:

            Melinda is a very good artist. From the beginning of the school year, her art teacher has assigned a project that is due by the end of the year. Melinda has to create a tree, she has to work on it, to improve it and to tell a story with it. She has to work on it every single day but she can’t do it at home its way to distracting. In school she found a unused room. It’s more like a closet for the genitor that seemed like it has not been used for years. She managed to fix it, to clean it up and turn it into a room for her, filled with artwork and her tree project. Every time she feels alone and when she doesn’t want to go to class or home after school, she ends up in the small room working on her project. Heather hangs out with the “Marthas” now, the popular girls in the school. Melinda has come to understand that they only want Heather to do their homework and that’s the only reason that they allow her to sit with them in the lunch table.

            
         In the end of these pages, Melinda is laying down in her bed looking outside the window at the moon. She remembers how the moon used to be closer in the summertime. She reflects back to the night that changed her life. She remembers how Rachel got them into the end-of-the-summer party because of her older brother. That was the day that Melinda tasted beer for the first time. She also met a really cute guy. He was very handsome and he was a senior. She felt so happy that he asked her to dance and kissed her. But then, the moment that changed her life came. She was on the ground staring at the moon with his hand over her mouth. She couldn’t talk she couldn’t tell him to stop. She remembers her short being down and him getting up zipping his pants and walking away. The next thing she knows is the phone dialing 911 and the police sirens outside.  

Quote:

            “He tilted my face up to his. He kissed me. Nearly knocked me off my feet, that kiss. And I thought for just a minute there that I had a boyfriend, I would start high school with a boyfriend, older and stronger and ready to watch out for me. He kissed me again.” (Anderson 135)

Reflection:

            I like this quote because it shows how Melinda was fooled. She believed that this guy really cared about him. That he actually wanted to start a relationship with her but instead he hurt her in the worst possible way. After what happened every one blames Melinda for ruining the party because no one ever bothered to listen or even ask Melinda for what really happened to her. Not even her best friend Rachel.