Jewels
- Corinna's going through her mom's jewelry box when her dad calls her downstairs and tells her Aunt Jennifer's not coming—her whole family is sick with the stomach flu. Bummer. Big time.
- Speaking of bummers, school's become slightly less of one because Corinna has a cool new teacher. Ms. Carey teaches sewing elective, and she makes her own artsy clothes and has a spiky, artsy haircut.
- Corinna considers telling Ms. Carey about her mom, but she doesn't want Ms. Carey to feel sorry for her; plus, she's not sure if her principal told all her teachers, or just Miss Beatty.
- One day, the week before school lets out for Thanksgiving break, Corinna's in the bathroom checking to see if she's gotten her period yet (nope), and as she's washing her hands, Joci walks in and says they need to talk.
- Joci wants to know why Corinna tried to keep it from her that her mom was dying, then got mad at her for telling other people.
- Corinna says she didn't want anyone to know. She needed part of her life to still be normal.
- Joci says it must have been awful, and she hugs Corinna, and they both cry.
- When other kids come into the bathroom, they wash their faces and go their separate ways.
- Corinna still needs to talk to Joci about that "If my mom died, I'd kill myself," comment, though. On the first night of Thanksgiving break, she works up the nerve to call Joci and confront her about it.
- Joci says she said it as a way of telling Corinna she understood how hard things must be for her; she didn't mean for it to sound mean.
- Corinna says there's no way Joci could understand, and by the way, it really hurt when Joci disappeared for the weeks between the funeral and the start of school.
- Joci apologizes. Yay.
- Corinna says she wants things to be normal again, and Joci say she does, too.
- After they make plans to hang out over Thanksgiving break—still no sleepovers, though—Corinna calls her mom's voice mail just to hear her voice.