Dirty Secret Read Online Free

Dirty Secret
Book: Dirty Secret Read Online Free
Author: Jessie Sholl
Pages:
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that that’s not true! I’m still an atheist!”
    â€œGood for you, Mom. Now what about that tree? What tree are you talking about?” Good Lord, I’m a humorless bitch. But someone has to take care of business and it certainly isn’t going to be her.
    â€œIt’s just this branch that’s been growing against the house. It’s not a problem.” She waves it off. How does a “branch” grow against a house? I walk past her, toward the back door, which is blocked by empty paper grocery bags, more plastic bins,dirty dish rags, rolls of paper towels, the skeletons of shelving units she never got around to properly installing, giant metal pots still in boxes, and full bags of garbage I don’t even want to guess the ages of. She stands behind me, watching as I try to get through it all.
    â€œOh, Jessie, the lock on the back door is broken. Do you think your dad and Sandy know a good locksmith?”
    â€œI’ll ask them tonight. Although I can’t see why anyone would want to break in,” I add, rudely. I can’t help it. Most people, I imagine anyway, whose mothers are about to undergo surgery for cancer have visits where they get to know each other better or discuss fond memories or whatever it is that normal families do. I, on the eve of my mother’s surgery, get to begin cleaning out her junk-filled house because she can’t. The one bright side to this is that I’m too busy to worry about the cancer.
    She’s not offended by my rudeness, anyway. “I know, you can think of all this stuff as a burglar deterrent! It’s my own free version of home security!”
    As she laughs hysterically, I finally make it through the pantry and open the back door. She follows me out.
    It is indeed a tree and it’s growing right against the house. To my untrained eye it looks big enough to crack the foundation if left untended. The whole yard looks like something out of
Wild Kingdom
: There should be lions and tigers prowling the lawn, hunting prey. It was once a beautiful backyard, with neatly cut emerald-green grass, two lilac trees that every spring and summer filled the air with their purple scent, and a long garden running the length of it. Someone has put planks of wood down where the garden once was, which is odd because it’s right up against the metal fence that divides my mother’s lawn from the neighbor’s. What is the purpose of the wood? It’s like a shabby catwalk to nowhere. And the two lilac trees look like somethingyou’d see in a movie involving a haunted forest with evil foliage that comes to life and strangles passersby. At the back of it all, the rickety, paint-flaking garage looks about to tip over.
    â€œAnd there’re those, too,” my mom says, pointing at the rain gutters running up the side of the house to the roof. “Could he do those?”
    They’re totally rusted through in places, hanging off the house like a trapeze artist flailing in the wind. Then I notice the trim around the windows: The wood is coming apart from the house—it’s as if nothing wants to be part of this decaying landscape. And I don’t blame any of it. I don’t want to be here either.
    â€œJesus Christ,” I say.
    â€œOh, Jessie—” my mom says. “I just remembered something. The dryer guy is coming tomorrow.”
    â€œWhat dryer guy? What’s wrong with your dryer?”
    â€œIt hasn’t worked in over a year.”
    â€œHow have you been drying your clothes?”
    â€œI’ve been going to the Laundromat,” she says, shrugging. “But I don’t think I’ll be able to get there with my clothes while I’m recovering from the surgery. . . .”
    â€œWhat’s your basement like right now?” I doubt a stranger should go down there.
    â€œIt’s fine,” she says, a nervous smile on her face.
    She’s lying. She brought it up for a
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