AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“You’re too young for caffeine.” The frown deepens. I’m losing her. “I can help you with your homework,” I offer, trying to revive her enthusiasm.
“I drink coffee all the time. And I’ve been doing my homework alone for years. If you haven’t noticed, I’m not nine anymore, Mal.” She rolls her eyes, and I know I’ve lost her. “I’ll just hang out outside school with the other derby girls so you don’t have to do two trips.” She slips out of the car without saying goodbye, and I seethe about the youths till I get to the credit union.
I’d love to deposit the check to the family account, but I can’tthink of a believable excuse that won’t involve me mentioning chess.Mom, I won the Powerball. I microwaved Darcy’s oatmeal for too long and it turned into a diamond. I have a secret writing career in furry erotica.Yeah. No.
I pay outstanding bills, deposit what’s left in my account, and run errands that would usually fall on Mom. And if in the grocery line, at the recycling center, by the library’s return desk, while I wait for Mom to finish working to have lunch with her— if whenever I have ten minutes to myself I spend them analyzing Koch’s games on my phone, well . . .
I shouldn’t. Boundaries and all that. Chess is just a job, and today I’m off. I made a promise to myself.
But it’s okay, a voice rebuts.You’re thinking of prize money. You’renotfalling in love with chess again. You’re firmly out of love.
Yeah. Exactly. Precisely. That.
I pick up my sisters midafternoon and I’m aggressively thrown into the Grade 7 Cinematic Universe, which is more riveting than a Brazilian soap opera.
“. . . so Jimmy was like, ‘Pepto pink makes me throw up,’ and Tina was like, ‘My shirt is Pepto pink,’ and Jimmy was like, ‘No, your shirt’s agoodpink,’ and Tina googled Pepto pink and it was the same color as her shirt, and Jimmy was like, ‘What do you want me to say?’ and Tina was like, ‘Admit that you hate my shirt.’ ”
“And what did Jimmy say?” I ask, pulling up our driveway, genuinely entertained.
“He was all, like— ”
“There’s a guy on the porch,” Sabrina interrupts us.
“Probably the mailman,” I say distractedly. “What did Jimmy do?”
“That’snotthe mailman,” Sabrina says. “I mean, Iwish.”
I look at where she’s pointing. Then immediately flatten myself as deep into the driver’s seat as I can go. “Shit.”
“Should you be sayingshitin front of us?” Darcy asks.
“Yeah— what happened to the pedagogical modeling of appropriate behaviors?”
Impossible. He’snothere. He can’t be. I’m hallucinating. Paranoid delusions. Yes. From the chemicals in the Twizzlers. All that dye.
“ Mal. Mal?”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“A stroke, maybe? She’s starting to be of a certain age.”
“Call nine- one- one!”
“On it.”
“No— Sabrina,don’tcall nine- one- one. I’m fine. I just thought I saw . . .” I glance to the porch again. He is still there.
Nolan.
Sawyer.
Is.
On.
My.
Porch.
