The Truth According to Ginny Moon by Benjamin Ludwig (books to read for self improvement txt) 📕

the trial! Think about your health! Your doctor said—What the hell would I do if—School counselor or not, you’re barely holding yourself together! I know you’ve got all those sick days, but it’s been too long for me. Now some of my patients are starting to leave! Look, we can’t expose a baby to all this! I won’t!”

Then their voices get quiet. I know they’re walking away to talk somewhere else. I know that when my Forever Mom said She isn’t safe! she wasn’t talking about my Baby Doll. But my Baby Doll isn’t safe either and I’m the only one who can do something about it.

EXACTLY 6:22 AT NIGHT,

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 17TH

My Forever Dad is sitting with the man in the leather Patriots jacket and hat. Mostly I’m guessing he likes blue and red. They are talking a lot. It is like they are BFFs.

There is a girl here who pulls her socks up all the time. She reaches down and pulls up the left one and then the right one and then makes two fists and says Yes! when it’s her turn to do a drill or go in the game or practice a layup. She says her name is Katie MacDougall. Not Katie McDonalds. She is visiting with Larry from a different school, she says. Larry is her cousin. And Larry says he is her cousin too. I didn’t ask her which one and I didn’t ask her where she lives or when her birthday is or what her favorite color is but I’m guessing it’s black and gray because that’s what color her socks are. My Forever Parents say when I meet someone new I shouldn’t ask where they live and when their birthday is and how many cats they have because that is a little too forward.

On the other end of the court Katie MacDougall is pulling her socks up again. I pull mine up too. Having my socks pulled up makes me feel even more ready for anything than tightening the laces on my sneakers. Larry comes over to me on his arm braces and takes his arms out so he can shoot hoops. Katie MacDougall walks over to us. She has her mouth open a little and she is breathing loud. “Katie MacDougall,” I say when she gets here, “I have known you since approximately 5:42.”

“Yeah,” she says.

“Will you tell me your birthday?”

“My birthday is September 20th,” she says.

“September 20th,” I say. “That’s exactly two days after my birthday. No one told me I was older than you!”

“I really like your socks,” Katie MacDougall says and pulls hers up some more.

I grab mine and pull them up as high as they can go. Which is higher than hers. “Yeah,” I say. “They are the bomb.”

I start passing the ball back and forth with Katie MacDougall. She throws the ball too hard and I miss it. It bounces past me and rolls to the bleachers. The man in the leather Patriots jacket catches it. He stands up and I see that my Forever Dad isn’t with him anymore. My Forever Dad isn’t anywhere.

The man is standing in front of me holding the ball. I am walking toward him. “Here you go, Ginny,” he says. He holds the ball out. I take it.

“Thanks,” I say. I don’t know if he’s a stranger or not because a stranger is someone you don’t know and I have seen him here before.

“Great job out there tonight,” he says. “You’re really pretty good.”

So I say thanks again even though We do not talk to strangers.

He keeps looking at me like we have been talking for a long time. “Your dad will be right back in a minute,” he says.

And I say, “He must be in the bathroom.”

The man in the leather Patriots jacket is supposed to sit down again or say, Well, you better get back out there. He is supposed to act like a regular stranger. But he doesn’t. He just stands there looking at me and when I look at his eyes he looks at the ground. Like he did the other day. I look where he is looking but I don’t see anything interesting or different there. I keep looking.

Then in the gym I hear Katie MacDougall talking about how she wants to try to be one of the Harlem Globetrotters. I look to the side and see my Forever Dad walking out of the bathroom but I want to know what the man in the leather Patriots jacket is looking at so I pick my head up and ask him.

“What are you looking at?” I say.

He swallows and doesn’t look up. “Just a really pretty girl who turned out okay,” he says.

His eyes look wet. It’s like he’s going to cry which doesn’t make sense because he’s a man. So I’m guessing he has something in them. I look down at the ground again. I see my sneakers and his work boots. When I look up again my Forever Dad is standing there.

“Excuse me,” he says. “What’s going on?”

So I say, “This man has wet eyes.”

The man in the leather Patriots jacket wipes them. “We were just talking,” he says.

“Not anymore you’re not,” my Forever Dad says. His voice is angry. “This isn’t what we agreed on.”

“The ball rolled over here to the bleachers,” says the man in the leather Patriots jacket. “I caught it and gave it back to her.”

My Forever Dad looks at me. I hold up the ball. In my hands it feels as big as the whole world.

“She’s not supposed to talk with strangers,” says my Forever Dad.

“I’m a stranger?”

“We’re trying to help her build good habits. So until you’re introduced at the agreed-upon time, a stranger is exactly what you are. Right, Ginny?”

I nod my head yes. “Exactly,” I say.

The man in the leather Patriots jacket steps back one step. He puts his hands up. “Okay. Got it. My bad,” he says. Then to me he says, “It