Things Go Flying by Shari Lapena

that was what he needed—to teach him some responsibility. And when Dylan turned sixteen, maybe he should work too. He and Audrey had both had part-time jobs in high school, and they’d turned out all right. But Audrey had been too concerned about their marks—it’s so much harder for kids today, she’d said—and what was the result? Neither one of them was going into rocket science.
    â€œI can take you over here,” the girl said, opening up an empty cash register when she saw the lineups at the others. Harold read the name on the girl’s name tag and asked her, as she rang up his purchase, “Nula—if you don’t mind my asking—how are your marks in school?”
    â€œStraight As,” she said matter-of-factly.
    Harold had to wonder if he and Audrey had done anything right raising their kids.
    â€¢ • •
    E VER SINCE HE’D been grounded, John’s waking hours were spent falling behind on his homework, catching up on his TV programs, and thinking about Nicole. And now all he could think about was how he was going to sneak out of the house to meet her.
    One thing he knew, he’d have to bribe Dylan to keep quiet. That wouldn’t be much of a problem because Dylan—John knew this from experience—was totally willing to be bribed. John would simply have to meet his price. So it was imperative that Dylan not see how important this was to him.
    John slouched into his brother’s bedroom after school, where Dylan was lying on the bed with his hand in a bag of potato chips, reading a movie magazine. “I need a favour,” John said, leaning against Dylan’s desk, which had nothing on it but a basketball. Dylan didn’t do homework.
    â€œWhat kind of a favour?”
    â€œI need to go out tonight.” Dylan didn’t need to be reminded that John was grounded; he’d been making the most of it all week.
    â€œWhat for?”
    â€œGot a date.”
    â€œWho with?”
    â€œSomeone hot, you don’t know her.”
    â€œHow’re you going to pull that off?” Dylan was eating his chips and leafing through his movie magazine, pretending he wasn’t interested.
    â€œLike you don’t know.”
    Dylan’s room had the only window on the second floor that you could climb out of to make the break for freedom. If it weren’t for this little detail, and if his parents didn’t usually sit in the living room as if guarding the front door every night till eleven—if he didn’t have to pay what amounted to a heavy toll to pass through Dylan’s room and out his window—John could actually have a life. His mother had probably thought she was doing him a favour by giving him, the eldest, the bigger room, but both boys knew which room was the prime real estate.
    â€œFifty,” Dylan stipulated at last.
    â€œYou’re out of your fucking mind,” John scoffed. Dylan said nothing. “I don’t have that kind of money,” John insisted.
    â€œYou have your birthday money,” Dylan said.
    â€œI spent it,” John lied.
    â€œNo you didn’t.”
    How did Dylan know he hadn’t spent his birthday money? Why did Dylan always know everything? John weighed things in his mind very carefully and finally gave in, just as Dylan probably knew he would. “Just don’t ever ask me for anything,” he said with heat.
    John left, returned and tossed two twenties and a ten on the bed, and went off in a huff.
    Dylan threw himself back on his bed, his hands locked behind his head, and pondered his situation. He couldn’t understand why his parents were so against him being an actor. Their reasons seemed stupid to him. They wanted him to get an education—for what? So he could sweat in an office for thirty years like his dad? His mother was the real problem—all of her ideas about actors obviously came from the front pages of the tabloids at the