Kill Switch by Penelope Douglas

That’s why I do it. They give the girls white ones and the
boys wooden ones for first communions. Father Behr was
really mad when some of us put them around our necks. When
I found out how wrong it was, I started wearing it like that all
the time.
There isn’t much I can do to fight back—at home anyway—
so I pick dumb things I can get away with.
I pull it off over my head and hold it over hers, slipping it
on.
“Now you’re bad, too,” I tell her.
She looks down at it, rubbing the cross between her
fingers, the silver over the wood.
“You can have it,” I say.
She can remember me, then.
“Are you mad I’m here?” she asks all of a sudden.
Do I seem mad?
When I don’t answer, she looks up at me.
I shake my head.
“Can I come back again, then?” she presses hopefully.
And I nod.
“Let’s do this,” she says, taking off the rosary and then
unclipping the silver jeweled barrette from her hair.
She takes both and sets them up on the little alcove under
the upper bowl, hiding them in the niche there.
“Since it’s our secret hiding place,” she tells me with an
excited look in her eyes. “It’s like part of us is always here. In
our spot.”
I tip my head back against the fountain, looking up at the
items that claim our nook, and I smile. She’s nice. I like how
she talks to me.
And she likes it here, too.