says.
“Chairperson,” Tally says.
“Who was the chair person ?” I ask.
“Mrs. Wharton.” Blake grins. “Turns out Charity doesn’t really have any talents.”
I look into the cafeteria. Charity is sitting right next to Marcus, and I mean right next to him. Like if she sat any closer, she’d be sitting in his lap. She laughs at something he says and puts her hand on his arm. She leans toward him a bit, and I can feel my face heating up. It’s then that she looks directly at me and smiles.
“She’s pretty good at being mean,” I say.
“She’d get crowned Hog Queen for sure if all she had to do was look pretty and be mean,” Tally says. She pulls the rest of the pemmican bar out and stares at it for a moment, as if she’s having an argument with it in her head. I guess the bar wins, because she puts it back down without taking a bite.
“So are you going to tell me?” I ask. I gesture toward the half-eaten bar on the table.
“I’ll give you a hint: read the ingredients.”
I pull one of the pemmican bars out of my pocket and read the wrapper. Dried fruit, organic flour, lard. What’s with Tally and lard? I can’t ask her, because now she’s helping two guys in backward baseball caps find the right size shirt.
Most of me says to forget about all of this. By the time the festival comes around and Charity is up onstage vying for the crown, I’ll have figured out a way to get my old life back. I’ll be back in the City and telling all my friends about this and they’ll be laughing and saying, “No way!” I’ll have to keep saying “Way!” because they’ll never believe a place like this exists. Unfortunately it’s only most of me and not all. There’s this tiny part of me that actually does care about all of this, and I need to get out of here before that part takes over.
I’m supposed to deliver the message about the apartment papers to my mom and I will, but only if she talks to me first. I know it’s stupid. I know it’s just a dumb game that I’m playing, but we’ve been in the house together, just the two of us, for almost three hours and she hasn’t said one word to me. Not one. Since we’ve moved here, she keeps drifting further and further away, drifting back just enough to make a comment about how what I’m wearing or what I’m doing is wrong before she floats away again. If she isn’t going to talk to me, then I’m not going to talk to her. I even put my shoes on the couch, but all she did was look at my feet and frown. She’s been going through pictures, putting some in a box marked ME and some in a box marked PETER. I notice that all of the photos of their wedding go in my dad’s box. I’m not an idiot. It’s not like I need a big flashing neon sign to tell me that things have gotten worse between them since we moved to Hog’s Hollow. But for once I’d like someone to just talk to me. I want to shout that at the back of my mother’s head: Just talk to me! But I don’t, because maybe if no one says anything out loud, it can still change.
Oscar walks through, holding his stuffed bear in his mouth, and my mother smiles over at him. The cat gets a smile. She doesn’t even look at me when I stand up. I walk into the library and sit down in front of the computer. I check my e-mail. Nothing. I e-mailed my two best friends in the City last night, mostly questions about what they’re doing, but also wanting to talk to someone about things. Normally I’d just call or text one of them, but it feels weird now. I feel the same disconnect that I have with my dad. Like everyone is pretending that everything is normal and nothing has changed, but the reality is that everything has changed and nothing feels normal at all.
The phone rings and my mother answers it. I brace myself, hoping it’s not my father.
“It’s Tally,” my mom says. So, officially I should tell her about the papers because she talked to me, but she had to talk to me, so it doesn’t
“Chairperson,” Tally says.
“Who was the chair person ?” I ask.
“Mrs. Wharton.” Blake grins. “Turns out Charity doesn’t really have any talents.”
I look into the cafeteria. Charity is sitting right next to Marcus, and I mean right next to him. Like if she sat any closer, she’d be sitting in his lap. She laughs at something he says and puts her hand on his arm. She leans toward him a bit, and I can feel my face heating up. It’s then that she looks directly at me and smiles.
“She’s pretty good at being mean,” I say.
“She’d get crowned Hog Queen for sure if all she had to do was look pretty and be mean,” Tally says. She pulls the rest of the pemmican bar out and stares at it for a moment, as if she’s having an argument with it in her head. I guess the bar wins, because she puts it back down without taking a bite.
“So are you going to tell me?” I ask. I gesture toward the half-eaten bar on the table.
“I’ll give you a hint: read the ingredients.”
I pull one of the pemmican bars out of my pocket and read the wrapper. Dried fruit, organic flour, lard. What’s with Tally and lard? I can’t ask her, because now she’s helping two guys in backward baseball caps find the right size shirt.
Most of me says to forget about all of this. By the time the festival comes around and Charity is up onstage vying for the crown, I’ll have figured out a way to get my old life back. I’ll be back in the City and telling all my friends about this and they’ll be laughing and saying, “No way!” I’ll have to keep saying “Way!” because they’ll never believe a place like this exists. Unfortunately it’s only most of me and not all. There’s this tiny part of me that actually does care about all of this, and I need to get out of here before that part takes over.
I’m supposed to deliver the message about the apartment papers to my mom and I will, but only if she talks to me first. I know it’s stupid. I know it’s just a dumb game that I’m playing, but we’ve been in the house together, just the two of us, for almost three hours and she hasn’t said one word to me. Not one. Since we’ve moved here, she keeps drifting further and further away, drifting back just enough to make a comment about how what I’m wearing or what I’m doing is wrong before she floats away again. If she isn’t going to talk to me, then I’m not going to talk to her. I even put my shoes on the couch, but all she did was look at my feet and frown. She’s been going through pictures, putting some in a box marked ME and some in a box marked PETER. I notice that all of the photos of their wedding go in my dad’s box. I’m not an idiot. It’s not like I need a big flashing neon sign to tell me that things have gotten worse between them since we moved to Hog’s Hollow. But for once I’d like someone to just talk to me. I want to shout that at the back of my mother’s head: Just talk to me! But I don’t, because maybe if no one says anything out loud, it can still change.
Oscar walks through, holding his stuffed bear in his mouth, and my mother smiles over at him. The cat gets a smile. She doesn’t even look at me when I stand up. I walk into the library and sit down in front of the computer. I check my e-mail. Nothing. I e-mailed my two best friends in the City last night, mostly questions about what they’re doing, but also wanting to talk to someone about things. Normally I’d just call or text one of them, but it feels weird now. I feel the same disconnect that I have with my dad. Like everyone is pretending that everything is normal and nothing has changed, but the reality is that everything has changed and nothing feels normal at all.
The phone rings and my mother answers it. I brace myself, hoping it’s not my father.
“It’s Tally,” my mom says. So, officially I should tell her about the papers because she talked to me, but she had to talk to me, so it doesn’t
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