Out of Place Read Free Page B

sale?”
    Harry nodded. “Yeah, it is. I’ve had no good offers. I may just keep it for a while. I’m not going to give it away.”
    “Remember when you did that burnout and the cops came right around the corner?” Ren said.
    They laughed . Harry just shook his head and said, “Talk about your all-time screw-ups.”
    “Yeah,” Roland added. “That cop was so pissed at you. I thought he was going to blow a gasket.”
    “I love that car.” Emily picked a green grape off the bunch and popped it into her mouth. “You should buy that for me, Dad, as a graduation gift,” she joked.
    “Sure,” Roland replied. “I’ll just ask Yale for the deposit money I sent them. You can have the Mustang instead of a college degree.”
    Emily raised a thumb up. “Awesome, I don’t really want to go to college that badly , anyway. Besides, I’ll probably be done with school in three years. A convertible ‘66 Mustang, on the other hand, lasts a lifetime.”
    “Three years!” Harry exclaimed. “Geez, kid, take your time, savor it. You’ll appreciate it. Don’t be in such a hurry to grow up.”
    Emily shrugged. “I never thought about it like that. But I’ve planned out my curriculum and it maps out in three years. I don’t plan on taking summers off.”
    Ren tossed a box of crackers into a plastic bag. “Not me . I’m going to party every summer and drag this sucker out for five or six years if I have to. I might just go to college forever.”
    “See ?” Harry said. “Renner has the right idea. You’ve got to enjoy these years, Emily, they go by so fast. College is only going to last so long, and before you know it, you’re in some crappy job, or your business is sinking and your wife is divorcing you for everything you’ve got.”
    Roland stepped to ward Harry. “Harry? Are you kidding me? Arlene is divorcing you?”
    Harry nodded. His naturally sad, dark eyes looked even sadder than usual. “She filed a few days ago. She’s packing right now and said she’s moving back to Texas to her sister’s.”
    Roland nodded to Erica , who moved over to Harry. “Do you want me to talk to her? I should go talk to her. I’m going to talk to her.” Erica left the kitchen via the back door to the deck. Roland put his arm around Harry and led him out of the room.
    “Wow ,” Ren said to Emily. “That’s a shocker.”
    Emily blew an audible breath. “Seriously. I almost feel a little bad leaving.”
    “Yeah, I can imagine.”
    “Harry and Arlene are like family. They’ve lived next door for fifteen years.”
    Ren propped up the plastic food bag and dropped a few bananas and oranges from the fruit rack on the kitchen island. “How come you were never friends with their daughter?”
    “ Cheryl?” Emily shrugged. “We were friends a bit when we were real young. Dunno, I guess since she’s a bit older we grew apart quickly.”
    “She’s like four years older, right?”
    “Yeah, when we were freshman she was a senior, but she missed a year of school for some reason when she was young and was like a year older than her class.”
    Ren nodded and made a face. “All I remember is that she was a bitch.”
    “Renner , that’s not nice.”
    “Might not be nice , but it’s true.”
    “We didn’t run in the same groups , anyway.”
    “Where’d she go to school?”
    “I think ASU, but I’m not sure what she’s doing now. Last I heard she was going back to get her master’s or something. They don’t talk about her much.”
    “ I looked at ASU, big party school.”
    Emily nodded. “It’s apparently the most popular plan-B school in the country. Or so they said on the news the other day.”
    “ Plan-B for you, maybe, but you’re a genius.”
    Emily rolled her eyes. “I’m not a genius.”
    “You got good grades.”
    “You don’t need to be a genius to get good grades in high school. You just need to show up, pay attention and do the work.”
    Ren turned a frown. “I showed up, I sort of paid