Status: Active. (Based on the novel by Laurie Halse Anderson.)
Twisted
Thirty-Four
The concussion turned out to be minor. The only damage was that Aaron’s team lost and he had to sit out the next four games. He sat them out on Hardy’s lap. She claimed that his black eye was cute. If aliens had crawled out of my brother’s forehead and nested in his nose hair, she would have called it cute.
The day after Aaron’s incident, Dad had to leave for some mysterious meeting in Omaha or Topeka or God Knows Where. He and Mom had a screaming match in the kitchen before he left. The postal look on his face when he stalked out to the taxi made me think I should steal the gun hidden in his bottom drawer and toss it in the river.
Mom kept busy photographing dogs in Santa hats and antlers for other people’s Christmas cards. I helped her by combing the real-estate listings for better studio space. She said it was impossible to find a landlord who wouldn’t mind that most of her clients had four legs and unpredictable bathroom needs. I suggested again that she should take pictures of people who were generally better at using a toilet. That made her laugh.
We didn’t talk about Dad or Omaha.
---
Sean was able to ditch his crutches a couple days after Aaron got creamed. I was afraid this meant the end of our relationship. Not that it was exactly a relationship, not quite. But he would sit next to me at lunch a couple times a week and he grabbed or squeezed my arm and average of 1.2 times a day and he waved to me in the halls and he hadn’t blocked my screen name, so there was hope. I did push-ups every night until my arms shook.
Kelsey and I had a standoff. She didn’t like me talking to Sean, standing near Sean, or kissing the ground that Sean walked on- that much was obvious- but she just stared at me like a gorilla and cracked her knuckles whenever I was around. The knuckle-cracking was supposed to intimidate me. Maybe if I was a walnut or a pecan. And the staring? She had miles to go before she came close to competing with my father.
Dad came home after four days spent in God Knows Where. He didn’t say anything when he walked in, just set his suitcase in the laundry room and went straight downstairs.
---
Two weeks into October, I finally figured out how to get Michael through the boiler room. All he had to do was avoid the steam and turn the wheels that were attached to the pipes to turn it off. Duh. I then made it to the next room, which held three large barrels and pig corpses. The time I dedicated to unlocking the man from the bottom of the vat with ground up dead pig juice contributed to the failed Calc quiz and the plunging of my Government grade from a solid C to a whiny D, but you have to make sacrifices if you’re going to get anywhere in Jigsaw’s World.
The day after Aaron’s incident, Dad had to leave for some mysterious meeting in Omaha or Topeka or God Knows Where. He and Mom had a screaming match in the kitchen before he left. The postal look on his face when he stalked out to the taxi made me think I should steal the gun hidden in his bottom drawer and toss it in the river.
Mom kept busy photographing dogs in Santa hats and antlers for other people’s Christmas cards. I helped her by combing the real-estate listings for better studio space. She said it was impossible to find a landlord who wouldn’t mind that most of her clients had four legs and unpredictable bathroom needs. I suggested again that she should take pictures of people who were generally better at using a toilet. That made her laugh.
We didn’t talk about Dad or Omaha.
---
Sean was able to ditch his crutches a couple days after Aaron got creamed. I was afraid this meant the end of our relationship. Not that it was exactly a relationship, not quite. But he would sit next to me at lunch a couple times a week and he grabbed or squeezed my arm and average of 1.2 times a day and he waved to me in the halls and he hadn’t blocked my screen name, so there was hope. I did push-ups every night until my arms shook.
Kelsey and I had a standoff. She didn’t like me talking to Sean, standing near Sean, or kissing the ground that Sean walked on- that much was obvious- but she just stared at me like a gorilla and cracked her knuckles whenever I was around. The knuckle-cracking was supposed to intimidate me. Maybe if I was a walnut or a pecan. And the staring? She had miles to go before she came close to competing with my father.
Dad came home after four days spent in God Knows Where. He didn’t say anything when he walked in, just set his suitcase in the laundry room and went straight downstairs.
---
Two weeks into October, I finally figured out how to get Michael through the boiler room. All he had to do was avoid the steam and turn the wheels that were attached to the pipes to turn it off. Duh. I then made it to the next room, which held three large barrels and pig corpses. The time I dedicated to unlocking the man from the bottom of the vat with ground up dead pig juice contributed to the failed Calc quiz and the plunging of my Government grade from a solid C to a whiny D, but you have to make sacrifices if you’re going to get anywhere in Jigsaw’s World.
♠ ♠ ♠
Subscribe please?