It Looks Like This Read Online Free Page A

don’t say anything for a second.
    Then I say, Like what?
    Dad says, Like a sport. I dunno, you used to play basketball.
    Toby says, That was in like elementary school.
    I used to play basketball in fourth grade, but I never really liked it. It was just something Dad suggested I do and I thought it would be cool and gave it a try, but I didn’t like it. I wasn’t that good.
    Dad gives Toby a look and then turns back to me.
    He says, Well, do you think you’d want to give it a try again?
    I say, I dunno.
    He says, What about something else? Like swimming or football?
    I say, I dunno. I’m already in Art.
    He says, Yeah, but you need a sport.
    I don’t say anything.
    He says, Mike, I asked you a question.
    I say, I don’t want to do swimming or football.
    He looks at me for a while and then turns back to the TV. He picks up the remote, presses the power button, stands up, and goes to the kitchen.
    I can hear the fridge door opening and then, a second later, the hiss of a bottle cap.
    I get up and walk down the hallway to the back door. I open it and walk out into the garage and sit on a crate.
    I just sit there and watch the rain, watch it come down in sheets, watch it cover everything and blot the sky. It drums against the houses and the mailboxes, bangs against cars parked at the curb. It pours down driveways and into the streets, building into rivers that carry leaves and twigs and bits of trash away, swirling them down the block and into the drains. I watch the rain come down harder and harder, watch it wash the asphalt and the grass, and wonder if it will wash me away too.
    Everything is still wet the next morning.
    It stormed for a long time, into the night. I woke up twice from the thunder, the last time at four thirteen in the morning. I could even hear the thunder in my dreams.
    When I have to get up for school, it’s over, but the whole world is soggy.
    Toby and I walk up the road toward school, past houses and houses that all look like mine.
    Whenever we pass a block, I slow down and kind of look left and right down the side streets.
    After a while Toby says, What are you looking for?
    I say, Nothing, Toby.
    But my face flushes a bit and I think she notices because she says, Then why do you keep looking down every block?
    She always notices things.
    I say, I’m just looking to see how much water’s backed up. Or if any trees fell down in the storm.
    Toby doesn’t say anything, just keeps staring at me as we walk. I try not to look at her but I can tell she’s staring, so finally I turn my head a bit and say, What?
    She looks away and shrugs.
    She says, Your face is all red, that’s all.
    I don’t say anything. But I keep looking down the streets.
    Toby stops bothering me about it, though.
    A couple blocks before the one with all the rich people, I look down one of the streets and see an old, faded blue Ford Bronco parked in the driveway of a house.
    The house is a two-story, like ours. White trim, red bricks, two trees turning orange with the fall. Like ours.
    I stare at it for a bit, actually stopping this time. Right above me is the street sign: Hyacinth Court. I read over the white letters of the sign a couple times.
    Then Toby and I go on.
    I don’t look down any more streets after that.

Mom drives me to the mall.
    I don’t want to go but it’s getting late and I know I have to at some point, and I figure I might as well just do it.
    Toby comes along and she and Mom go off to look at new school clothes even though school started last month. But a week ago Toby tore her pink pants and got mud on her good shirt while she was at school.
    She says it was because she slipped on the wet ground when she went outside during lunch and landed right on the curb and tore her overalls and smeared her shirt.
    But she looked a bit funny when she told Mom about it and I wondered.
    They go off to look at clothes and leave me alone, and I walk over to the Grand Slam store.
    On the way I pass by a lot of teenagers,