8 All My Fault

CHAPTER 8 All My Fault And then I woke up. It was Friday. The day of Joshua's birthday party. Mrs. Benson was driving to school. She pulled up outside our house. Mom walked us to the front door. "Have a good day, girls," she said. But I knew having a good day would be impossible. "I'll be here when you get home," she said. "Can Evie come over?" I asked.

第八章 都是我的错 然后我醒了过来。 那天是周五。 是约书亚开生日派对的日子。 本森太太正开车往学校去。 她把车停在了我们家门外。 妈妈送我们走到前门。 “姑娘们，祝你们今天过得愉快呀。”她说。 可我知道，今天我根本不可能过得开心。 “你们放学回家的时候我会在这儿等着的。”她说。 “伊薇能来咱们家玩吗？” 我问道。

"Evie's going to Joshua's party," she reminded me. "Actually I don't think she'll want to go without me," I said. "She's new, after all." "I'm sorry, Stel," Mom said. "Mrs. King called me last night. She said Daddy doesn't have to pick Evie up from school today, because Evie is going home with Lucy. They're going to head over to Joshua's party together." "Does that mean you'll play with me after school?" Penny asked hopefully. "Zoey has to go to the dentist, so it'll just be you and me. Hooray!" "You see," Mom said, bending to kiss the top of my head. "Someone thinks you're very special." It was just Penny who thought so, but I didn't point that out. "Go on now," Mom told us. "The Bensons

“伊薇要去参加约书亚的派对呀。”她提醒我。 “其实我觉得，我不去的话她也不会想去的。”我说。 “毕竟她才刚来这儿嘛。” “我很抱歉，斯特尔。”妈妈说。 “金太太昨晚给我打电话了。 她说爸爸今天不用去学校接伊薇，因为伊薇要跟露西一起回家。 她们俩打算一起去约书亚的派对。” “那是不是说你放学之后会陪我玩呀？ 佩妮满怀期待地问。 “佐伊得去看牙医，所以就只有你和我啦。 太棒啦！” “你看呀，”妈妈说着，弯下腰亲了亲我的头顶， “有人觉得你特别特别棒呢。” 只有佩妮会这么想，可我没把这话讲出来。 “现在快走吧，”妈妈对我们说， “本森一家

are waiting." When we got to school, Mrs. Finkel collected our stories first thing. "I'm very excited to read all these," she said. "It will be like reading an anthology. Does anyone know what "anthology" means?" Anthology is the kind of big word that I like, and I did know what it meant. There's a section at the new bookstore, Scheherazade, labeled "ANTHOLOGIES" and I asked Dad about it. He told me an anthology is a group of stories that are connected in some way, like they could be all about the same thing. But I didn't raise my hand. I just let Mrs. Finkel explain. She said our stories were connected because we're all in the same class, even though the subjects were all different. Then Joshua waved his hand around. Mrs. Finkel called on him. "But there are

还在等着呢。” 我们到学校之后，芬克尔太太第一件事就是收我们写的故事。 “我可太期待读这些故事了。”她说。 “这感觉就像在读一本故事选集。 有人知道‘故事选集’是什么意思吗？” 这种复杂的大词我最喜欢了，我还真知道它的意思。 新开的那家叫“山鲁佐德”的书店里有个区域，标签就写着“故事选集”，我还问过爸爸那是什么意思。 他告诉我，故事选集就是一组有某种关联的故事，比如它们可能讲的都是同一个主题。 可我没举手。 我就等着芬克尔太太自己解释。 她说我们的故事是有关联的，因为我们都在同一个班里，哪怕大家写的主题都不一样。 这时候约书亚使劲挥着手。 芬克尔太太点了他回答。 “可是有

two dragon stories, so not everything is different. Maybe Asher should've written about something else." "Now, Joshua," Mrs. Finkel said. "I've had enough of that. The stories will be different because they have different authors—or you could have picked another subject to write about. You don't want to go to Mr. O'Neil today, on your actual birthday, do you?" "That would be against the rules," Joshua told her. Mrs. Finkel MAKES the Ground Rules—I think she knows what's for or against them. "We can certainly have two stories about dragons," is all she said.

两篇写龙的故事，所以也不是全都不一样呀。 阿舍说不定应该写点别的才对。” “够了啊，约书亚。”芬克尔太太说。 “这种话我听够了。 这些故事本来就会不一样，因为写故事的人不一样——不然你也可以选别的主题来写啊。 今天可是你正儿八经的生日，你不想闹到要去见奥尼尔先生那儿吧？” “那可是违反规定的呀。”约书亚跟她说。 班级基本规则都是芬克尔太太定的——我觉得她肯定比谁都清楚什么符合规定，什么不符合。 “我们当然可以有两篇写龙的故事。”她只说了这么一句。

See how mean Joshua is to Asher! But he still invited Asher to his party, and Asher was probably going. I wish I would stop thinking about Joshua's stupid party, I thought to myself. I clicked my heels three times under my desk. It didn't work. Kids were talking about the party at snack time and again at lunch. Everyone was going, except for Clark and Maddie, and not because they didn't want to. Clark had to go visit his great-aunt, and Maddie has jazz dance on Fridays. "It's too bad that you have to miss a party at Batts Confections," Lucy told her. All the other kids nodded in agreement. That's the problem with having the coolest store in all of Somers, California—everyone wants to go to parties there.

你们看约书亚对阿舍多过分啊！ 可他还是邀请了阿舍去他的派对，而且阿舍多半也会去。 我真希望自己别再想约书亚那个蠢派对了，我心里默默想着。 我在桌子底下偷偷踮着脚碰了三次脚后跟。 一点用都没有。 零食时间大家在聊派对，午饭的时候又在聊。 所有人都要去，只有克拉克和麦迪不去，而且也不是他们不想去。 克拉克得去看望他的姑婆，麦迪周五有爵士舞课。 “你没法去巴茨糖果店的派对，也太可惜了吧。”露西跟她说。 其他小朋友都点头赞同。 在加利福尼亚州萨默斯镇有个最酷的店，麻烦就在这儿——所有人都想去那儿参加派对。