Frannie and Tru Read Online Free Page B

then sent an embarrassed, apologetic, totally charming smile in my mother’s direction.
    To my amazement she’d smiled back and said nothing.
    Over the course of the next few minutes, everyone talked a little more, Jimmy’s face relaxing a bit and Kieran’s growing almost warm. They actually asked Tru if he wanted to come with them to the basketball courts down the street for a pickup game. He seemed to consider before declining by saying he was “kind of beat.” With that, the two of them were out the door, and Dad disappeared after them, saying he needed a beer, would be home soon.
    Then it was just the three of us. Mom had been scrubbing the bathrooms and picking up the basement, and she was still wearing her cleaning getup: an old pair of the twins’ gym shorts and an Orioles jersey. One of those dumb pink ones they make for ladies. Her hair was swept into a wild mess of a bun that leaned awkwardly to the side. I was afraid she was going to say something corny about how happy we were to have him and how much family means, blah blah blah. But she didn’t say anything. She just walked over to Tru, put her hands on her hips, and let out a sigh. Then, with a pained, stiff motion, she reached her arms out and gave him a hug.
    After swearing that he’d eaten a perfectly fine sandwich on the train, Tru was allowed to escape to Jimmy’s old room and begin moving in. He’d been down there now for half an hour, and I’d been sitting on the living room couch, trying to begin the first book of my summer reading. I couldn’t get through one paragraph. My whole body was on alert, aware of the presencerumbling in the basement. Like a dragon was shifting its bulk and whipping its tail, searching for room in the confines below.
    Tru had his own bathroom and shower down there, and I started to think he’d stay there indefinitely. Not just tonight but all summer. He would never come out; he would just lurk underneath us, doing whatever he did.
    As I was thinking this, Mom came down from upstairs, and I ducked my head toward the unread pages. She walked right over and dropped a pile of towels on my lap, accidentally knocking the book to the floor.
    â€œTake them down, please.”
    I knew it should have been the most normal thing in the world, but the idea of taking those towels to him sent my heart racing. This was it. This was my chance. A chance at what exactly I wasn’t really sure, I just knew I wanted to talk to Tru, to get him to smile at me like he had outside the station.
    Yes, Frannie. Very subtle indeed.
    Arms full, I walked carefully down into the basement. The bedroom was straight ahead at the bottom of the stairs. The lock had been broken for as long as I could remember, but the door was shut tight.
    I knocked lightly, then waited. One second. Two seconds. Three.
    â€œCome in.”
    Tru was in Jimmy’s bed, sitting up against the headboard, his legs stretched out and crossed at the ankle. His things were invisible, either still in the suitcase or tucked completely away indrawers. There was a book next to him on the bed. The Great Gatsby . In his right hand there was . . . something. Something that he was flipping around and around in his fingers, deftly as a magician, making the object appear and disappear from sight. I wondered if it was a little pencil, a golf pencil, when suddenly it was gone, tucked into his T-shirt pocket with a single motion.
    He sat up and turned toward me, sitting cross-legged, hands folded neatly in front of him.
    â€œTowels,” I said.
    â€œThank you,” he said.
    I placed them on a desk chair just to my right, realizing that once again I had nothing to say. Seconds passed in silence, each moment humiliating, but I felt madly compelled to stay. I had to. Just yesterday, I’d been sure the summer would be long, miserable, pointless. Now Tru was here, with all his charm and his jokes and his shit-eating grin, and there