Everything, Everything Read Free Page B

sounds of the outside world. I notice things that I paid very little attention to before. I hear the wind disturbing the trees. I hear birds gossiping in the mornings. I see the rectangles of sunlight that slip through my blinds and work their way across the room throughout the day. You can mark time by them. As much as I’m trying to keep the world out, it seems determined to come in.
    “You’ve been reading the same five pages in that book for days now.” She nods at my copy of Lord of the Flies.
    “Well, it’s a terrible book.”
    “I thought it was a classic.”
    “It’s terrible. Most of the boys are awful and all they talk about is hunting and killing pigs. I’ve never been so hungry for bacon in my life.”
    She laughs, but it’s halfhearted at best. She sits on the couch next to me and moves my legs into her lap. “Tell me,” she says.
    I put the book down and close my eyes. “I just want them to go away,” I confess. “It was easier before.”
    “What was easier?”
    “I don’t know. Being me. Being sick.”
    She squeezes my leg. “You listen to me now. You’re the strongest, bravest person I know. You better believe that.”
    “Carla, you don’t have to—”
    “Shush, listen to me. I’ve been thinking this over. I could see this new thing was weighing down on you, but I know you’re going to be all right.”
    “I’m not so sure.”
    “That’s OK. I can be sure for both of us. We’ve been together in this house for fifteen years, so I know what I’m talking about. When I first started with you I thought it was only a matter of time before depression would take you over. And there was that one summer when it came close, but it didn’t happen. Every day you get up and learn something new. Every day you find something to be happy about. Every single day you have a smile for me. You worry more about your mother than you do about yourself.”
    I don’t think Carla has ever said this many words all at once.
    “My own Rosa,” she continues, but then stops. She leans back and closes her eyes in the grip of some emotion I don’t understand. “My Rosa could learn a thing or two from you. She has everything I could give her, but she thinks she has nothing.”
    I smile. Carla complains about her daughter, but I can tell she spoils her as much as she can.
    She opens her eyes and whatever was bothering her passes. “You see, there’s that smile again.” She pats my leg. “Life is hard, honey. Everyone finds a way.”

LIFE IS SHORT™
    SPOILER REVIEWS BY MADELINE
    LORD OF THE FLIES BY WILLIAM GOLDING
    Spoiler alert: Boys are savages.

FIRST CONTACT
    TWO DAYS PASS and I’ve stopped moping. I’m getting better at ignoring the neighbors when I hear a ping coming from outside. I’m on my couch, still mired in Lord of the Flies . Mercifully, I’m close to finishing. Ralph is on the beach awaiting a violent death. I’m so eager for the book to end so that I can read something else, something happier, that I ignore the sound. A few minutes later and there’s another ping, louder this time. I put the book down and listen. Pings three, four, and five come in rapid succession. Something’s hitting my window. Hail? I’m up and at my window before I can think better of it. I push the curtains aside.
    Olly’s window is wide open, the blinds are up, and the lights are off in his room. The indestructible Bundt is sitting on his windowsill wearing googly eyes that are staring right at me. The cake trembles and then tilts forward, as if contemplating the distance to the ground. It retreats and trembles some more. I’m trying to see Olly in his darkened room when the Bundt leaps from the sill and plunges to the ground.
    I gasp. Did the cake just commit suicide? I crane my neck to see what’s become of it, but it’s too dark to see.
    Just then a spotlight illuminates the cake. Unbelievably, it’s still intact. What is that thing made of? It’s probably best that we didn’t try to eat it.
    The