Liar & Spy Read Online Free

hundred percent fine .”
    Except that I have just lied. I hate lying. And I don’t even know why I did it.
    Dad says, “How about we go to Yum Li’s for dinner tonight?”
    Yum Li’s is one of my favorite restaurants of all time. I feel kind of guilty because I know he’s suggesting it to cheer me up about something that didn’t really happen, but I say, “Yeah, Yum Li’s sounds good,” and let Dad squeeze my shoulder and pat me on the head.
    “Why don’t you get started on your room,” he says. “I’ll finish up these bookshelves.”
    When I think of all the work Dad put into our house it’s pretty sad. But mostly I feel sorry for myself, because the coolest thing about it was my room. A long time ago, Dad took apart a fire escape—a real fire escape, from a building that his office was demolishing—and he rebuilt the bottom level of it inside my bedroom. He bolted it to the wall, and even attached the original ladder. I had a bed up there, and he made me these built-in cubbies for all my stuff. I had the most excellent room of any kid I know, and we had to leave it behind.
    “It’s built in,” Dad explained. “Part of the house. And the buyers love it.”
    So do I , I wanted to tell him. But I didn’t, because he looked so miserable.
    At our new place, I have Dad’s old bedroom furniture from when he was a kid—a bed, a desk, and a bookshelf, all made out of the same dark wood. His mom kept it in her garage all these years, and a couple of weeks ago Dad drove it to Brooklyn in a rented van.
    I start to unpack my boxes, wondering whether there’s a kid in my room at this very moment, climbing up and down my ladder and putting his stuff in my cubbies.
    We’re crossing the lobby on our way to Yum Li’s when I see Candy and a woman who must be her mom coming in through the front door. Candy’s lips are stained bright blue.
    “Hello,” the woman says, smiling and holding the door for us. Dad says hi back and I wave at Candy, but she staresstraight ahead as if she doesn’t even see me. I forgot that we’re not supposed to know each other.
    “They must live in the building,” Dad says when we’re outside. “I wonder if that little girl has any older brothers or sisters.”
    “She does.” Oops.
    “She does? When did you—”
    “I mean, probably she does. She looks like the little-sister type.” Now I’m feeling guilty again.
    He gives me a funny look, and so I do what Candy did—just stare straight ahead and act as if I don’t notice.
    At Yum Li’s, I forget all about feeling guilty. Just looking at the food on other people’s tables makes my mouth water. We order soup, scallion pancakes, cold noodles with sesame sauce, and spicy shredded beef with broccoli.
    Yum Li’s isn’t like most Chinese restaurants, where they rush the food out right away. Here, you have to wait. No bowls of crunchy noodles and orange goop, either. It’s just ice water and the smell of other people’s dinners.
    Once Mom told Yum Li that he could have a big classy restaurant in Manhattan if he wanted to. “The big-business types would pay triple for your food,” she told him.
    But Yum Li looked around at his peeling wood paneling, laminated menus, and hanging plants, and said, “What, more classy than this?”
    I shake some vinegar into my hot and sour soup and stir it in. Dad only likes won ton soup, even though sometimesYum Li teases him: “That’s kid soup!” he tells Dad. “Time to grow up!”
    Dad wants to talk. I can tell by the way he leans toward me and says “So? Tell me things!” Which is his playful way of asking me to pour my heart out.
    “You tell me things,” I say. I’m just being dumb, but he gets this serious look on his face and says, “Okay. Well, today has been tough. It’s really hitting me, I guess, that—on top of, you know, everything—the house is someone else’s now.” He fishes in his soup for the last won ton dumpling. “I had a good talk with Mom on the