Nothing Real Volume 1 Read Online Free Page A

shorts.
    â€œI don’t know,” I say. “I’m thinking about going to Colorado for college.” This is a fabrication, made up on the spot, inspired by Alan’s nuts and chewed food.
    â€œMajor party school,” Alan notes. “Didn’t take you for such the part aay girl.”
    â€œI’m not,” I say. “I just like the idea of going someplace far away.” I am, ill-advisedly, confessing my deepest, unknown-even-to-myself feelings.
    â€œI hear that,” Alan says, and he nods and points his sandwich at me. “You know what I really need, babe?” he asks. “I need a lift down to Eddie’s, you know, on Wharburton?”
    I nod. Eddie’s is the auto body shop owned by a guy a few years older than Alan, one of those guys who drives home the perils of not going away to school. Four years out of high school, and the guy has a beer gut, and only about half his hair.
    Jess looks at me like I’m crazy when I say I’m giving Alan a ride, but she doesn’t give me a hard time.
    To go downtown, Alan slips his sneakers halfway on and walks on the smashed-down backs. He sits in the front seat of the car with his legs wide apart and cranks up the radio, so we don’t talk.
    Seeing Alan there in the passenger seat gives me a little chill down my back, like hearing a secret. When I stop at the light on Wharburton, I arch my back, give myself a good long stretch, arms over my head, and I catch Alan stealing a glimpse.
    At Eddie’s, he gets out, hesitates, and drums his fingers on the roofof my Corolla.
    â€œHold up a sec,” he says. “Gotta see if it’s ready.” He trots off, the sneaker backs dragging. When he comes back, he’s shaking his head. “Fuckers,” he says, and slides back in. “They said they need another hour. Shit about putting on the wrong brake pads.”
    â€œWhat do you want me to do?” I ask. “Go back to your house?”
    â€œNah,” he says. “We’ll be turning right around.” He pauses. “How about we get a sixer? Sit over at Arnold Pond?”
    â€œAren’t you in training?” I ask. Alan’s the kind of guy who acts like being on a high-school sports team is a sacred rite.
    â€œLacrosse isn’t football,” he says mysteriously.
    Alan buys a six-pack of Heineken at the Indian deli, and I realize I am in over my head. Arnold Pond is a puddle with a fountain in the center. It is like the town planners were designing a place for kids to go in their cars. If you’re telling a story about some girl you don’t like, it’s called Blow Me Fountain.
    By the time we get back to Alan’s car, the guys at Eddie’s are ready to close, and Alan has to beg them to open the garage and get the car out. He’s red in the face when he is yelling at the guys, like the last thing in the world Alan wants is to be back in the car with me.
    When I get home, my parents and Kate have just gotten in from Connecticut, and they’re all about going out for dinner, since mom isn’t into cooking after a day of driving. I end up spending that Saturdaynight at my family’s favorite Italian place, Mardino’s, which is, as luck would have it, across the street from Arnold Pond.
    When I break up with Kev, he cries a little, and that makes me cry too.
    We are on his back porch. It’s this big screened-in thing that would be nice if they didn’t have just a couple of old plastic chairs and some rotten piles of firewood in there. It’s after school on a Thursday, and it’s been raining since morning. During math, it thundered, and everyone got distracted and sat there staring out the window, watching for the jagged strikes of lightning.
    It’s still raining hard, and is too chilly to be outside. Kev has just taken an enormous hit off a fat joint when without warming up to it at all, I say I think it is over between us. He nods at