Circle the Soul Softly Read Free Page A

I go into the house and realize this is, indeed, major. I have gotten a lead in the play. A boy has driven me home. My smile is so connected, I think I must have discovered my real self.

SIX
    Michael’s pissed. My way-cool, nothing-ever-bothers-me jock of a brother is stomping around like a two-year-old throwing a tantrum. I hear him slam the front door and pound up the stairs to his room, across from mine. He slams that door too, then turns on the awful hard rock noise he calls music. I go back to my laptop, adding screen names to my “buddy list” from the e-mail addresses the A.D. typed up so the cast can get in touch with each other.
    Mom and Robert come in about twenty minutes later, and Mrs. Hoyt, the housekeeper (we have a housekeeper!) calls us for dinner. It’s the first time in a week we’ve eaten together. Mom is beaming, and she and Robert are acting like they always do—giddy. He’s got to be twenty years older than her and I can’t imagine him running anything, let alone his own million-dollar accounting firm. Of course, I only see him around my mom, and I seriously doubt he’s ever had a girlfriend as pretty as her. She’s certainly never had a guy as rich as him, at least that she’s told us about. It’s disgusting when your mother acts like she’s in eighth grade.
    Michael comes late to the table, and for some reason I get a flash of our dad, even though I don’t think Michael particularly looks like him. Whatever’s going on, being around Robert doesn’t help. Michael’s face is closed and stormy. He’s scary when he’s like this because you can’t tell what he’s thinking and he won’t admit to anything. I decide to hold on to my casting news until later.
    Mrs. Hoyt brings food. Mom and Robert chatter about going to Cabo for their honeymoon. Michael eats quietly and quickly, mumbles “Excuse me,” and pushes back from the table.
    â€œWhy don’t you wait until we’re all finished, son?” Robert asks.
    Michael mumbles rather than speaks, staring down at the floor.“Well, for one thing, I’m not your son.”
    It’s silent at the table. Mom sighs and picks at her plate. Robert does the please-remember-this-is-my-house transformation and glares meaningfully at my brother.
    â€œSorry,” Michael grunts. “I had a bad day, okay?”
    â€œHappens to all of us,” Robert says. He’s entirely too reasonable to be part of this family. “Sit down. We’ll talk about it.”
    â€œNothing to talk about.” Michael smiles his tight, awful smile, the one he got after our father died. He wants to snap back at my mom like he used to; instead, he sits down. Rules have changed since we moved to Robert’s.
    â€œHow were tryouts?” Mom asks him. She’s hopeful it will be this easy.
    â€œDidn’t go.”
    Robert is surprisingly wise and doesn’t respond. Mom is star-tled. “But I thought you—”
    â€œNo summer practice, no varsity team. That’s the rule.”
    â€œBut we didn’t live here this summer,” I blurt.
    â€œYeah. Well. I don’t really care. The team sucks.” Michael’s face is out of balance somehow. “Am I done?”
    Robert nods almost imperceptibly, except we all see, and Mom nods out loud. Michael leaves. I think I’ll save my news for tomorrow or maybe next year, because I’ve just now realized that last night was the second anniversary of when our father died—if anniversary is what you call it.
    How could I not know that?
    The pain is unexpected; it almost knocks me over.
    My father is dead—I will never see my father again—this could not have happened….
    I look at my mom talking with Robert. I see the last of Michael going up the stairs.
    Did they cry?
    Once, each of them, that I remember.
    Did we talk about my dad?
    No.
    We did the wake and the funeral and