The Tracks by Sally Royer-Derr (little readers TXT) 📕

clock. “Yeah, I only start at four. Oh…well, I guess I can. I’ll be there in half an hour.”

“Sorry, Emily,” she said, hanging up. “Anne called off sick, and they’re short waitresses. I have to go in early.”

“That’s okay, Mom.” I smiled at her. “I’ll put the rest of the groceries away. I just wish you could have gotten that nap.”

“Me, too.” She turned to walk back down the hall to her bedroom. “But we could use the extra tip money.”

I nodded and watched her disappear into her bedroom to change clothes. I wished she didn’t have to work so hard all the time. I wished we could hop in the car and go to the mall this afternoon. I wished we could shop for new clothes and get those cinnamon sugar pretzels we both liked so much. I wished she would braid my hair before school like she used to when I was younger. I slammed a can of generic green beans on the table a little harder than I’d intended. I wished she’d buy the brand-name green beans she used to buy instead of these crappy ones.

I wished we had Dad back.

Chapter Seven

The warm summer rain danced on the clubhouse roof. I savored its sound. I had always enjoyed the rain. Not only its sound. But its smell and touch, particularly a warm rain. I liked the whole essence of it. The darkness of it felt like a cozy blanket wrapping itself around me. Almost like a secret world only I could see and feel. Rain held a quality I could not fully explain, but I did know its presence was as real as a person sitting next to me. A tangible quality about it existed that I could never quite grasp. Beyond the obvious qualities of wetness and pattering, it held a sensitivity which surged in my very core.

I looked over at Tommy who sat at the plastic table in the middle of the room. He studied me and then went back to the crisp, white piece of paper he drew on. He wanted to draw my portrait, and I was happy to oblige. As long as I could draw his, as well.

“You fidget a lot,” he commented.

“You’re making me nervous. I’ve never had anyone staring at me for so long.” I squirmed on the pillow I sat on.

Tommy chuckled. “I doubt that. You just didn’t know it.”

I rolled my eyes. “Well, yes, I can see how people would be in awe of my beauty. I wonder when I’ll get my modeling contract.”

Tommy was silent as he furiously worked on his drawing. A stroke here. Some shadowing. He dropped the pencil and stood back. “Finished.”

I stood from the green striped pillow I’d brought from home. Leftovers from our old house. I walked over to him and looked down at my image staring back at me. I almost didn’t recognize the girl with bright eyes and dark hair tumbling down her shoulders. He’d even included the slight, barely noticeable scar on my left cheekbone. A remnant from a fall I’d taken against the coffee table in our living room when I was two. The coffee table had won.

“She’s beautiful,” I whispered. I had trouble believing this was me. How he saw me.

“Well, you are beautiful,” Tommy said. “I draw what I see.”

I smiled. “That’s what my dad always called me. Beautiful girl.”

Tommy nodded, his gaze intent on me. “When did he die?”

I turned away from him, not wanting to discuss my father’s death. I hated talking about it even though I thought about it quite a bit. I didn’t like sharing anything personal that really mattered to me. Talking about things like that only created heartache. I felt so exposed and vulnerable. Like I was giving away a piece of my heart. I tried to avoid that feeling. I didn’t want anybody’s pity, or even concern. I’d always felt this way. To share my innermost feelings with someone else meant giving up my self-control and self-containment I enjoyed.

I’d never had a best friend. Not like most girls did. I had friends at my old school. Good friends I still talked to on the phone or emailed once in a while. But not in the sense of sharing all your thoughts and secrets. Those were for me only. I didn’t know if anyone knew the real me. The one who resided inside the body of a typical thirteen-year-old girl. The one who dreamed about faraway places and drawing those places in my sketchbook. And writing about them in my journal. I had a vision of myself, dressed in a flowing black sweater (as black as what I imagine artists wear) and loose-fitting jeans, grasping a leather-bound journal in one hand and a palette of colors in the other. I would draw and I would write. My two favorite things in life. I saw my dream so vividly; I knew it would happen one day. But to share the thoughts of my soul with someone else still scared me. Even with Tommy.

I looked at him. The fact that I felt scared didn’t deter the desire inside me to share myself with him. All my inner thoughts and secret fears. But these thoughts confused me even more. I didn’t understand how or why I felt this way about this boy who’d showed up out of nowhere and suddenly consumed my life. As if I’d known him my whole life, almost as if he’d always been a part of me. It freaked me out.

“Emily?” he said again.

For some reason his voice seemed far away. Like he was calling to me from inside a long tunnel.

“Two years ago in July.” My voice felt as if it echoed in the tiny structure. Rain still fell on the roof. But now it sounded like drums beating on my brain, not the