Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell

anyway. Maybe when he
    stopped
    caring
    about
    her
    altogether, he’d stopped caring
    about that, too.
    Eleanor put on an old striped
    men’s shirt and had her mom tie
    one of her ties – like knot it, for
    real – around her neck.
    Her mom actually kissed
    Eleanor goodbye at the door and
    told her to have fun, and to call
    the neighbors if things got weird
    with her dad.
    Right, Eleanor thought, I’ll be
    sure to call you if Dad’s fiancée
    calls me a bitch and then makes
    me use a bathroom without a
    door. Oh wait …
    She was a little nervous. It had
    been a year, at least, since she’d
    seen her dad, and a while before
    that. He hadn’t called at all when
    she lived with the Hickmans.
    Maybe he didn’t know she was
    there. She never told him.
    When Richie first started
    coming around, Ben used to get
    really angry and say he was going
    to move in with their dad – which
    was an empty effing promise, and
    everyone knew it. Even Mouse,
    who was just a toddler.
    Their dad couldn’t stand
    having them even for a few days.
    He used to pick them up from
    their mom’s house, then drop
    them off at his mom’s house while
    he went off and did whatever it
    was that he did on the weekend.
    (Presumably, lots and lots of
    marijuana.) Park cracked up when
    he saw Eleanor’s tie. That was
    even better than making him
    smile.
    ‘I didn’t know we were getting
    dressed up,’ he said when she sat
    down next to him.
    ‘I’m expecting you to take me
    someplace nice,’ she said softly.
    ‘I will …’ he said. He took the
    tie in both hands and straightened
    it. ‘Someday.’
    He was a lot more likely to say
    stuff like that on the way to school
    than he was on the way home.
    Sometimes she wondered if he
    was fully awake.
    He turned practically sideways
    in his seat. ‘So you’re leaving
    right after school?’
    ‘Yeah.’
    ‘And you’ll call me as soon as
    you get there …’
    ‘No, I’ll call you as soon as the
    kid settles down. I really do have
    to babysit.’
    ‘I’m going to ask you a lot of
    personal questions,’ he said,
    leaning forward. ‘I have a list.’
    ‘I’m not afraid of your list.’
    ‘It’s extremely long,’ he said,
    ‘and extremely personal.’
    ‘I hope you’re not expecting
    answers …’
    He sat back in the seat and
    looked over at her. ‘I wish you’d
    go away,’ he whispered, ‘so that
    we could finally talk.’
    Eleanor stood on the front steps
    after school. She’d hoped to catch
    Park before he got on the bus, but
    she must have missed him.
    She wasn’t sure what kind of
    car to watch for; her dad was
    always buying classic cars, then
    selling them when money got
    tight.
    She was starting to worry that
    he wasn’t coming at all – he
    could’ve gone to the wrong high
    school or changed his mind –
    when he honked for her.
    He pulled up in an old
    Karmann Ghia convertible. It
    looked like the car James Dean
    died in. Her dad’s arm was
    hanging over the door, holding a
    cigarette. ‘Eleanor!’ he shouted.
    She walked to the car and got
    in. There weren’t any seat belts.
    ‘Is that all you brought?’ he
    asked, looking at her school bag.
    ‘It’s just one night.’ She
    shrugged.
    ‘All right,’ he said, backing out
    of the parking space too fast.
    She’d forgotten what a crappy
    driver he was. He did everything
    too fast and one-handed.
    Eleanor braced herself on the
    dashboard. It was cold out, and
    once they were driving, it got
    colder. ‘Can we put the top up?’
    she shouted.
    ‘Haven’t fixed it yet,’ her dad
    said, and laughed.
    He still lived in the same
    duplex he’d lived in since her
    parents split up. It was solid and
    brick, and about a ten-minute
    drive from Eleanor’s school.
    When they got inside, he took
    a better look at her.
    ‘Is that what all the cool kids
    are wearing these days?’ he asked.
    She looked down at her giant
    white shirt, her fat paisley tie and
    her half-dead purple corduroys.
    ‘Yup,’ she said flatly.