Kitchen Chaos Read Online Free Page A

up for an official watering shift today, but we go through the motions anyway since we have to kill time before heading to Lillian’s. We troop down to the janitor’s closet near the gym toget enormous watering cans and the wrench to turn on the hose. Mike, the janitor, salutes us when we pass him on the stairs.
    Filling up the cans at the spout, Liza watches me, like I’m a time bomb ready to go off.
    â€œFrankie,” she says, almost cautiously, as we slosh our way to the front of the building. “Did we really have to do this today? I thought our day was tomorrow.”
    â€œNo, it’s today,” I lie. “Or maybe not, I can’t remember. But I thought we should just go ahead and do it rather than put it off. It’s the responsible thing to do.”
    Liza takes one of the watering cans and I take the other as we work our way from planter to planter.
    â€œHmm, and that’s Francesca Caputo, always the responsible one, right?”
    â€œLiza, if you have something to say, say it.”
    â€œFranks,” she says, giving me one of her smiles. Doesn’t she get exhausted, being so bright and cheeryall the time? “I think you didn’t want to walk home with Lillian.”
    â€œSo sue me if I want to hang out with my best friend for two seconds, is that such a crime?”
    Liza drops her almost-empty can and pushes her curls back from her forehead. “No, I guess not. But we’re working with Lillian on this, and you need to make more of an effort to be nice. I know you don’t really know her—I don’t either—but she seemed so lonely during that interview that I just had to ask her to team up with us.”
    â€œBut that’s just it, Liza,” I say. “You just went ahead and asked her without even consulting me.”
    Liza rolls her eyes. “Didn’t you ask Evan Jacoby without consulting me?”
    She has a point. We round the corner to the last set of planters. There’s just enough in the watering cans to dampen the soil, but I don’t feel like going all the way back to the faucet. I’m not that responsible.
    â€œHey, that’s different,” I say. “Evan is really—” I stop because Liza’s eyes are pleading.
    She puts her hand on my shoulder. “Frankie, it won’t kill you to be a little nicer to Lillian. You don’t have to be friends, but we’re a team for this project and she’s going to be great. Better than Evan Jacoby—I promise.”
    I sigh. “Okay, okay. I’ll try. It’s just that usually we rock this stuff, and I feel like we’re getting off to a bad start. Conner Berman’s group is already cutting wood for dioramas, and we don’t even have a topic!”
    We pick up our empty cans and head back to the closet to put them away, dodging all the stragglers racing out of school who practically mow us down.
    â€œHey!” I say at the receding backs of a bunch of thick-necked guys who remind me of my brothers. “What are we, invisible? We are trying to walk here!”
    Liza laughs and hooks her arm into mine as we head down the hill to the subway station.
    â€œConner Berman, Franks? I think he’s what youmight call OCD, and I don’t exactly see us modeling our study habits after his. Does that kid ever eat or drink or sleep or turn on a TV?”
    We hop on the train for the short ride to Lillian’s. She’s right, of course.
    â€œNah. I know. We just have to rock this project.”
    Liza laughs and gives me a look. There’s no way she suspects I have a crush on Mr. Mac . . . is there? “Sure, Frankie, sure,” she says. By the time she stops giggling, we’re practically at Lillian’s.

CHAPTER 6
Lillian

    As soon as I walk in the door, I hear it: “Shoes off in the house, Lillian!”
    This is how my mother greets me every day. This afternoon it’s just her voice issuing