Lost Read Online Free Page B

his brand-new ten mil Auto Glock 20 with the fifteen-round magazine. “Somebody special.”
    6. Worse Than Sex
    Fern has been my best friend since the first day of first grade. She sealed the deal by finding my shoes. Brand-new shoes strapped onto my pudgy little feet by my mother barelyan hour before a group of marauding third-graders—big as invading Huns to me—knocked me down on the playground, pulled up my dress and threw my brand-new shoes into the woods behind the school.
    There must have been adults overseeing us, but I have no recollection of that. All I remember is being devastated. Destroyed. These were the shoes I’d insisted on when shopping for my new school outfits. Expensive, from the way my mom pursed her lips and looked worried, but I’d made a fuss and she’d given in. Now the precious shoes were gone. I couldn’t go into the school barefoot—mortal shame—and I couldn’t go home. I was lost. The new world of first grade had ended before it even began.
    I cried so hard I couldn’t see. And then this big girl came out of the fog of tears, a lovely girl three years older than me, with bright, beautiful, almond-shaped green eyes and wonderfully curly hair. She put her arm around my shoulders and helped me smooth down my dress and promised to find my shoes. She did find them, and helped me strap them on, and twenty-five years later whenever I get irritated with Fern, or find her wearisome, I think of the shoes, and that seals the deal all over again.
    So it’s Fern who gets the first distress call.
    “Kelly ran away,” I say, my voice breaking. “With a boy.”
    “Oh, Jane! No way! I have to sit down.”
    Fern has the wireless, carries it to her favorite chair, the soft leather recliner that belonged to her ex-husband. Poor Edgar. A sweet guy but no match for Fern, not in marriage, not in divorce, not in life. I know she’s using Edgar’s old chair because I recognize the sound of the squeaking springs as she settles in, pushes back, lifting her size-ten feet. “There,” she says. “Tell me everything.”
    I try, but naturally, Fern being Fern, she interrupts long beforeeverything gets told. “So you’re telling me Kelly stayed out all night and skipped out on her summer job? Welcome to the club, Jane.”
    “But she’s never—”
    “That you know of. Please. She’s sixteen. Everything but their name is a lie. Sometimes the name, too. I got these calls for Cheyenne? Frat boys looking for Cheyenne. Is that like a stripper name? Jessica was calling herself Cheyenne at some club, gave out her home number. Unbelievable. Jess has a tested IQ of one thirty-five, but at clubs it apparently drops to about sixty-five.”
    “So you’re telling me not to worry.”
    “No, no, no. Be very worried. Just don’t think you’re alone.”
    “But what if she’s having sex?” I ask plaintively.
    That gets a laugh out of Fern. Laughter so hearty it seems to warm the receiver on my phone. “If, Jane? Did you say
if?
Of
course
she’s having sex! Why else would she stay out all night with Smike?”
    “Seth. His name is Seth.”
    “He told Kelly his name is Seth and she told you. He could be Smike for all you know. Or Squeers. Or Snagsby. Probably something with an
S.
Like Sex.”
    Fern is riffing now, trying to make me laugh. I know what she’s doing, but I can’t help responding, and my heart unclenches. A big, tension-relieving sigh and anxiety begins to recede like the tide.
    It’s so much easier on the phone. If Fern was here I’d be worried she’d see the tears in my eyes and go all soft, and then we’d both be blubbering.
    “I hate it that they grow up,” I tell her, taking a deep breath.
    “No you don’t,” she responds. “Not so many years ago youwere praying she’d get the chance to grow up. Your prayers were answered.”
    “True.”
    “The miracle kid. She’s a character. They broke the mold. What a personality she has! If the average person has a hundred watts, Kelly has