LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

racks over the chairs. I’d had a cup of coffee, at least I think it was coffee, from the vending machine down the hall.

      I was horrified at what had happened and bored out of my mind at the same time. And I was incredibly uncomfortable. The orange molded plastic chairs ranged around the florescent-lit waiting area had not been designed for long-term occupancy. In fact, since I had so much time to think about it, I realized they were designed to discourage occupancy.

      My entire torso was starting to take on the same molded shape as the chairs before Tom returned. He’d come out earlier to tell me about the clinical diagnosis. The skin of his face was almost translucent with fatigue and drawn so tight over his cheekbones it looked like it might tear.

      I knew. We hadn’t saved her life. We’d just saved her body.

      We left the ER and walked slowly across the shadowed campus, the stone shapes of the buildings rising stone upon stone, lit by the blue moonlight and the halogen floodlights installed to deter crime, though crime still regularly occurred. Gargoyles regarded us passively from the edges of the turrets above, not caring one way or the other if we were mugged.

      But we walked safely on. My feet still hurt, but I was not wearing my badly scuffed spangled heels. I carried them in one hand, the remaining sequins hanging by barely a thread. I thought they were probably damaged beyond repair. Instead I was wearing the soft hospital socks and slippers they’d given me.

      Tom’s hands were bandaged, as were mine. He must have allowed someone to treat his hands, or more likely, he’d done it himself. There’s nothing doctors seem to hate more than letting other doctors touch them. I’d been afraid he’d ignore his injured hands, but then, as we gingerly touched bandage to bandage at the tips of our fingers, I realized his hands were his livelihood and he would not have neglected them.

      We walked on, saying nothing. What was there to say?

      Finally, we arrived at my darkened house.

      I had wondered, as I’d been sitting and waiting, whether Kelly might have talked to Carol, opened up a little about the tragedy of her mother’s death, the sudden move to Chicago, having to change schools and then live with her Dad. When I got away from Kelly’s smoldering presence, I could sympathize with her hurt, even identify with it a little. I hadn’t lost my parents, it’s true, they’d lost me, but the loss of Marco was something I’d never get over and I still alternated between grief and rage about it.

      I unlocked our front door and disengaged the security system before it started wailing and waking everybody. The scene in the front hall earlier with Kelly, the boys and Molly seemed to have happened years and not just hours before. I shut the door behind Tom and me and he put his arms around me. I rested my head on his chest for one moment of peace before we had to face waking Kelly.

      The overhead light snapping on made us both jump. I turned and saw Kelly’s accusing face regarding her father and me. I felt Tom start and move quickly away from me.

      Too late.

      Kelly had seen us embracing.

      Kelly’s Online Journal

      Thursday, May 18, 8:30 a.m.

      Spanish is so dumb this morning and the asshole teacher thinks I’m actually taking notes on my computer. Nah. She’s just too lazy to care what any of us are doing. Well, like I’d care about Spanish verbs with the night I had last night. I can’t even function this morning.

      Well, first, the Amazon struck again. She and Daddy were supposed to be at some hospital thing and then I find out she jumped down a hole—she’s the hole—yeah, and she saved this woman only she didn’t save her anyway. She died. Well too bad. Dad, Daddy, my darling Daddy. You suck. You couldn’t keep your hands off her.

      I don’t care. Nothing here is right for me. I called Alison again last night. At midnight! I texted so her idiot parents wouldn’t hear her cell. Alison never goes to bed. She always says she sleeps all day in school, that’s what it’s for. Ha. That’s right. We talked for an hour!!!

      Alison said she’s going to go out with Scott, but I think she’s lying. He never even talks to her. I so don’t think so.

      Anyway, screw them. Besides, he’s only a kid. Fifteen. No big deal.

      I told Alison all about this guy at the idiot Amazon’s house. His name is Giles—is that cool or what? He’s from a French place in Africa and he has the most darling accent. He’s married. Doesn’t it just figure? To this American named Carol. She’s okay, but she seems so way older than he is. Alison wanted to know everything. Well, Giles is this sweet mild chocolate color with these killer brown eyes. He’s not real tall, but he has muscles where it counts.

      Dad totally forced me to go to the Amazon’s house while they went to the hospital thing, and I was so pissed I showed up late and then went in their den and locked the door. Her kids are fiends.

      So Giles comes and knocks on the door and says so softly, ‘Kel-ly?’ Oh, it’s to die for the French way he says it. Anyway, I opened the door and he has espresso coffee for me and him. Decaf, but hey, espresso! He must think I’m much older than 14. Well, girls mature much faster than boys, everybody knows that.

      So I talked to him, really talked, and he listened and didn’t say I shouldn’t swear or that I should try to see Daddy’s side or anything. He just listened and nodded and once he called me “la pauvre.” It means poor thing. I looked it up. I wish I was taking French. It’s way cooler than Spanish.

      And he cooks. After a while we went in the kitchen and he gave me some black bean and rice dish he’d made and it smelled so good and I realized I was starved. Usually I hate that kind of vegetarian bean crap, but this was really good. I ate a ton of it and had a coke. The espresso was great, but maybe it was a little strong.

      Giles was so sweet I wanted to figure out a way to let him know that I’m not a kid and I can tell when a guy is interested. So when we were putting the dishes in the dishwasher I accidentally on purpose brushed against him twice. When he didn’t seem to get it, I pretended to trip and fell toward him so he’d have to catch me.

      Well, can you fucking believe it??? He catches me by the arms and holds me at arms length. His face looks like a mask and he says, “No, Kel-ly, no. Be a child. It is okay.”

      I was so humiliated I wanted to die. A child! What does he think these breasts are, balloons under my shirt? I ran back to the den and locked the door again.

      Well, of course I didn’t tell Alison that part. I let her think things got a little heavy in the kitchen. Whatever. I could tell she was just so jealous.

      But then I heard the front door open. I went out and the Amazon and Dad were in the dark in the front hall groping each other for crap’s sake. Oh, who gives a shit? Everybody’s got somebody but me. I wish I was the one who’d fallen into the hole and the hole had no bottom and I could go on falling.

      Forever.

      5

      Good morning street!

      The street wakes up.

      I wake up the street.

      Don’t run Alisha!

      I wave at the bus to wait;

      She makes it.

      Alisha’s grandpa waves at me,

      Taps his cane twice,

      And makes his way back home.

      “A Good Morning”

      Charlie Bruin, #876

      StreetWise

      Thursday, May 18, 8:00 a.m.

      He shivered in the cold, damp morning air.

      StreetWise!

      It was an okay day. The sun was creeping up the street like it hoped it could sneak up behind him and yell, “Gotcha!” Fat chance of that. Just hurry up sun. Warm

Скачать книгу