Horse Camp Read Free

Married people can’t just wake up one morning and get a divorce, like they can here. And the people there are very, very concerned about keeping the nuclear family together. They also have very pretty beaches and water. They have good food, not like roasted goat or yams, which is all they seemed to eat in Africa unless you order special food from America. That’s what we did most of the time because Dad said the native food gave him gas.
    And the Philippines is where we picked up Pauly, our little brother. I love him like crazy, and, not to brag or anything, but I’ve basically raised him these past three years. Pauly’s got the best nature of any kid I’ve ever met, and I can’t understand how any mother could’ve abandoned him. But that’s exactly what happened. One morning, Mom opened up the front door to sweep the dirt outside. She looked down and saw him sitting on our doorstep, with a note pinned to his shirt:

    Pauly looked up at Mom and smiled, and she was hooked. To look at him, you instantly know why. He’s really adorable. I sometimes wish I had big dark brown eyes and long black lashes like his, but then I remember it’s a sin to be envious, and I’m just happy that I can enjoy those features on Pauly.
    I used to be Pauly’s favorite person by far, but since we’ve come here, Stretch is the one Pauly follows around all day long, from the house to the barn to the pigpens to the field. Stretch lets him feed the horses and even sets him on top of the pigs. He gives him rides on the tractor and makes him homemade pancakes every morning because they’re Pauly’s favorite food. Stretch lets Pauly pour on his own syrup and doesn’t monitor him when he brushes his teeth, which is not how a responsible adult should act.
    Stretch’s farm is located on a gravel road at least ten miles from the nearest town, so we’re miles from people who need to be saved by God’s grace. Compared to the exotic places we’ve lived, this area is quite boring. The town has two small schools (one regular, one Catholic), a gas station/bait shop (L IVE N IGHT C RAWLERS H ALF O FF !), and a café run by a woman who also operates a beauty parlor in the same building. Stretch goes there often to buy people’s hair from her. He says he uses the hair balls to repel deer and rabbits from his young vegetable plants. I think he just goes to the beauty parlor because he likes to ogle the breasts of one of the beauticians. She seems pretty nice, but she does flirt with Stretch.
    The town also has a farm equipment dealer, a grain elevator, a small medical clinic, a funeral home ( RESPECTFUL QUALITY THROUGH CARING COMFORT — BURY YOUR LOVED ONE WITH DIGNITY ), an American Legion, and a butcher shop where Stretch sometimes brings his animals for slaughter. The town is so small it doesn’t even have a shopping center or a movie theater, though it does have a library, which has a couple of computers with Internet service. A nun named Sister Alice is the librarian, and she’s not very nice, but she did used to be a missionary, like my parents, so she can be pretty interesting to talk to if she’s not crabby. I think she’s bitter about having to wear that hot and itchy habit all day.
    I try to be good and nonjudgmental and righteous in the Lord’s eyes. I do not like how my mom has ruined our family. I do not like how she embarrassed my dad and his church and all of us. You might think I’d be really, really angry at her, but I’m not. I’m just very, very disappointed. I do not like staying at Stretch’s farm while she’s on trial for distributing prescription drugs without a license to people who couldn’t afford them.
    When Mom said she was sending us to an uncle we’d never even known, we were scared, so she tried to make it sound better by referring to Stretch’s place as Horse Camp , since she said Stretch had always