Found Things Read Online Free Page B

the milk.”
    â€œForgot? Get upstairs and stay there till I call you down,” she say, unhooking her pocketbook from the rack by the door. “Think about what it means to be dependable.”
    â€œWhere’s Daddy?” I asked. It was dusk and he wasn’t home yet from Boston.
    â€œDon’t change the subject.”
    I went upstairs, like Mama say, and tried to think about being dependable, but instead I fell asleep. Sometime later their voices woke me up, and then I heard Daddy’s footsteps coming up the stairs and a soft knock on my door.
    â€œRiver?”
    I slid my bedspread halfway over my nose and I closed my eyes. The door opened slowly. Daddy come and sat on the bed and put his hand on the bedspread, where my ankle was, and jiggled it.
    â€œWake up, River. It’s past eight. You have to eat.”
    I fluttered my eyelids, pretending to wake up, and mumbled, “Is it morning already?”
    â€œNo, it’s already nighttime.”
    I rubbed my eyes and brushed the hair off my face. “I told Mama I was sorry about the milk, but she send me up here anyway.”
    â€œYou have to be gentle with her. You know she’s like a piece of glass these days,” Daddy say. “And,” he say with a little squeeze on my ankle, “remember to correct yourself when you talk.”
    â€œ Sent. I’m trying, but I forget.”
    â€œI understand,” he say, and smiled gently.
    I yawned and then say, “I wish I knew how to make Mama happy again.”
    Daddy looked down at his hand on my ankle, and I noticed for the first time since Theron left how the skin of his cheeks folded like draperies beside his mouth. “Me too, honey.”
    Then a thought come to me, as if it walked in the door and sat on the bed with us. “Maybe what make—makes—her happy now is being sad. And being sad is the way she’ll always be from now on.”
    Daddy squeezed my ankle again. “I sure hope that’s not true.”
    He sat there on my bed while the wind-up clock they gave me last birthday ticked. I counted forty-three ticks. When my stomach growled, I realized the only thing I’d eaten since breakfast was half an apple—and none of Meadow Lark’s pretzel sticks.
    â€œAre you sure it’s safe to go downstairs?” I asked.
    â€œMmm-hmm,” Daddy say, and raised one eyebrow. “But if she starts to hum, let her sing.”
    At that moment I’d have given anything—even my emerald ring—to hear Mama hum again.

Chapter 4
    That Sunday, as Mama and I sat in church—holy hot dogs!—my stomach started growling again.
    â€œShh!” Mama say, keeping her eyes on the altar. This was her sacred time.
    My stomach felt stuck to the back of the pew, I was so hungry, and all I could think about was the stack of blueberry pancakes waiting at Doby’s and the little bottles of syrup all lined up at each table. So I pressed my hands over my stomach and hunched over to muffle the noise, wondering if that little cube of bread about to come around on the silver tray could keep it quiet until lunchtime.
    Mama flickered her eyes at me as a warning. She never let me go to Sunday school. She say Sunday school was a waste of good time for a girl like me, so ever since I was old enough to remember, I come into church with her and Daddy and Theron. These days Daddy stayed until the offering plates started passing across the pews, and then he slipped to the side and out the back door. He say the Cathedral of Nature was the only church he cared to attend anymore.
    â€œPay attention,” Mama say. It was what she always say to me whenever communion began and a hush as heavy as whipped cream filled the sanctuary. While other kids had doodle pads to keep them quiet, I wasn’t allowed. I had to sit up straight with my ears perked and eyes wide open. If ever there was a time to pay attention, Mama say, it was during communion.