Chasing Forgiveness Read Free

Eleven-year-olds don’t cry. It’s a known fact. Not if they want to be taken seriously by friends and teammates. Of course my Grandma Lorraine always tells me that it’s good for a boy to cry every now and again—but that’s what grandmas are supposed to say. I doubt if she really believes it.
    I stop the tears before they come, and I push them down, way down, into another universe entirely. I pretend nothing is wrong, but that lie detector above my head begins to blink again. Russ sees I almost lost it.
    â€œHey, listen,” he says, thinking he understands completely, “fights are fights, and everyone’s parents fight. It’s no big deal.”
    â€œI know,” I say, echoing his words. “It’s no big deal.” But deep down, I scream, Yes! Yes, it is a big deal! Because they never fought before—not until this year. They never fought, never had anything to argue about. They were perfecttogether—like that day when we won on Family Feud —and it wasn’t just my imagination—I know because I was there.
    â€œMaybe . . . ,” says Russ, “maybe they should split up.”
    â€œNo way,” I say, real calmly. “Like you said, everyone’s parents fight. No big deal.”
    The ball lobs back and forth between us without any power—like we’ve forgotten all about the match but didn’t tell our hands or Ping-Pong paddles. The ball must be very bored.
    â€œLots of families are better off broken up,” says Russ.
    â€œNot mine.”
    â€œLots of parents still stay friends afterwards—they just live in different places.”
    â€œShut up,” I tell him.
    â€œIt’s great! You get to have two homes!”
    â€œI said shut up!”
    The brainless little Ping-Pong ball pongs on my side of the table, and before I know what I’m doing, I haul off and smash it with all the power my right arm can muster. It flies in a straight line—a white bullet, whistling through the air. In an instant it smacks Russ square between the eyes. I was aiming for his big fat mouth, but I still get my point across.
    Russ throws down his paddle onto the table with a hearty bang and flies around the table to me, almost as quickly as the ball flew at him.
    â€œButthead!” he shouts, and he pushes me, and I push himback, and he pushes me again, which, I’ve discovered, is the way friends fight.
    Then I hear something, and I have to grab Russ’s arms to end our little pushing war.
    â€œShut up!” I tell him.
    â€œI was trying to help,” he says.
    â€œNo, I mean shut up now!” He stops struggling, and I listen. “You hear something?”
    â€œOf course I hear something,” he says, referring to the world war going on inside the house. But beyond that I hear something else. I hear the muffled noise of a car engine, then a car door opening and closing.
    Forgetting Russ for a moment, I race off down the alley on the side of the house, toward the front yard.
    â€œWhat is it?” yells Russ, following close behind.
    There, in our driveway, my little brother, Tyler, is being dropped off by one of his friends’ parents. He fumbles with his papers and pencil case, with his lunch box and thermos. He has never figured out how to keep it all in his backpack. But then, he’s only in kindergarten.
    Tyler sees me coming out of the alley. “Hi, Preston,” he says with a big smile. Tyler’s a good kid. He doesn’t talk much, but he always has this big smile on his face, and most of the time no one notices that he’s quiet, because they’re too busy trying to figure out what he’s smiling about. That’s what I like best about him. Everything could be going up in flames, andhe would be smiling as if the whole world was a giant finger painting with a big blue house and a happy green tree and a grinning yellow sun.
    Today, I don’t smile back at