Dear Cassie Read Online Free

one like a sandwich toothpick. I didn’t want to grab an ax. I’d never grabbed an ax before. I’d never even seen one in real life.
    “Company coming?” Nez asked.
    “The boy’s camp is going to help,” Rawe said.
    Great, so that would probably include Ben. I wondered if he would turn chopping wood into some kind of drum solo or, even worse, a way to make me start thinking about Aaron again.
    “Rawrrrr,” Nez growled, clutching her chest like a black-and-white-movie star. She was like Lila on steroids—steroids laced with Ecstasy.
    Troyer walked over to one of the stumps, pulled out an ax, and held it. I wasn’t sure if she’d left her pad in the cabin or if she just had nothing to say.
    “You guys ever cut wood before?” Rawe asked. I felt like she probably should have asked that question before she ordered us to grab an ax .
    “Yeah, all the time back at the ranch,” I said, and then I wondered why. There was no one here I wanted to make laugh. No one like Amy who laughed at everything or Lila who laughed as long as the joke wasn’t about her; no one like my brother, who I could make laugh with a look.
    “Excellent, Wick,” Rawe said, clapping her hands together like cymbals. “You can start.”
    I stood there and stared at my ax, speared diagonally out of the stump like a penguin butt sticking out of the water, and realized words were probably going to mean little in a place where you had to live up to them.
    “Any time,” Rawe said, her shiny left boot tapping.
    “I’ve used an ax,” Nez said, saving me. “Lots.”
    “Good,” Rawe said. “Teach them.”
    Nez’s face melted into a smile. “Can I teach the guys?”
    “Nez,” Rawe said, in the kind of voice it seemed that Nez had heard already, because she walked toward the stumps without protest. “All of you,” Rawe said, looking at me.
    I followed Nez and waited.
    “Put a log in the center of the stump,” Nez said, picking one up and balancing it like a baby block. Her eyes shot to something across the field.
    The boys’ camp was marching out in a line. They walked with high knees behind Square Head, wearing the same paper-bag-brown uniforms we wore. It was Ben, a skinny kid with braces, a heavy-set kid with curly hair, and a guy with tattoo sleeves down his arms.
    “Sweet odds,” Nez said, whistling under her breath.
    “They’re all yours,” I said. “Just watch your lips on the one with the chain-link fence on his face.”
    Troyer seemed to pull her neck into her chest like a turtle.
    “Nez, more teaching,” Rawe said, standing behind us. She sounded angry enough for fire to be coming out of her nose.
    Nez held the ax high and wiggled her butt.
    “Nez,” Rawe spat. “One more and it’s three-hundred push-ups.”
    “What? It’s my technique,” Nez said, rearing the ax back and splitting in two the wood in front of her. It sounded like the crack of a bat at a baseball game.
    I waited while Troyer lifted her ax. She closed her eyes when she swung, but she hit. When the log cracked down the middle, she opened her eyes with the surprise of a little kid seeing her birthday cake all lit up in front of her.
    “Wick,” Rawe shouted, “your wood is going to start growing again. Let’s go.”
    I heard the boys march up behind us. I heard Square Head tell them to halt . He seemed a lot more army-like than Rawe did. I hated to think it, but he kind of reminded me of my father.
    I lifted the ax; it was heavier than I thought it would be. I reared back like you might at one of those carnival games with a bell and smacked. The ax bounced off the wood and forced me back, splaying me right on my ass.
    I could hear the guys laughing, could hear Ben laughing. The skin on my face seared.
    “Silent,” Square Head bellowed. But they were still snickering.
    “Again, Wick,” Rawe yelled.
    I sat there for a moment, my tailbone throbbing. What was I doing? I didn’t belong here. This seriously sucked. Even Troyer could chop wood, and