Summerlost Read Free

that you get at convenience stores. Tears ran down his face while he ate them because he couldn’t stand how hot they were but he wanted to suck all the way through one without stopping by the end of the summer. Since the house was in the middle of town, wedidn’t have to walk far to get to a gas station, which meant that Miles had learned quickly about every kind of cheap candy, like Lemonheads and Necco Wafers and gum shredded to look like tobacco. My mom wouldn’t let him get the gum, or the candy cigarettes.
    I liked Lemonheads best. They were so sour they made my nose sweat.
    â€œIt’s raining,” I said.
    â€œIt doesn’t matter,” Miles said. “The rain will feel good.”
    I decided to stay put.
    I stayed put a lot, ever since last summer. My mom worried about it because she thought it meant that I was afraid to go out, because of what happened to my dad and Ben.
    I walked over and opened the window. Even with the wind. Even with the rain. I felt like I might as well let all that sound surround me. I curled up on the bed and waited to see if the house would look at me again.
    The black thing came back. This time, in the daylight, I could see what it was.
    It was a bird.
    It was a vulture.
    I had never seen one up close but I recognized it from movies. Or TV. I wasn’t sure how I knew, but I did.
    It looked at me. It probably wasn’t used to anyone living in my room, because no one had for a while. It watched me and the house watched me.
    If the vulture wanted, it could fly right inside.
    â€œ
I’m not afraid of you,”
I whispered.
    It cocked its ugly red head.
    It knew I lied.

6.
    After the rain cleared up, my uncle Nick brought over an old bike that someone at his work was giving away. “I thought you kids might like it.”
    â€œWe keep saying how dumb we were to leave our bikes at home,” I told him. “Thanks.”
    â€œI stopped by Sports & More and got a helmet too. I knew your mom would want you to have one.”
    â€œGood call,” I said. “Would you like a Fireball?” Miles had brought some back, and I had one lodged in my cheek. I almost drooled.
    â€œAbsolutely not,” Nick said. He said it in a nice way though. “I didn’t even know they still made those.” He leaned the bike against the porch. “Where’s your mom?”
    â€œOut back,” I said. “Working on the deck.” My mom planned to build a deck while we were here. She’d never done anything like that before.
    â€œI’ll go say hi to her,” he said.
    â€œWill you tell her I went on a ride?”
    â€œSure. Where are you going?”
    â€œI don’t know,” I said. That was true and also a lie. The minute I’d seen the bike I’d known what I would do, even though I didn’t know where I would go.
    I had decided to follow Nerd-on-a-Bike.

7.
    I’d never had to lie in wait for someone before. It was kind of hard. I put the bike on the sidewalk that led up to our house. Then I sat on the steps wearing the helmet so that I’d be ready to go the minute he came by. I sat behind the porch pillar just in case, even though he’d never noticed me before.
    It didn’t take long. As soon as he was two houses past ours I jumped on my bike and followed him.
    He rode straight down the street. He stopped and waited for a light so I stopped too. I made it through after him.
    He headed in the direction of the college campus. We rode past fraternities that used to be regular houses. One of them had a rope swing hanging from a tree out front, and another had a yard that was nothing but gravel.
    Then we came to the best part of the campus, the forest. It was my dad’s favorite part because of the pine trees that grew there. They were almost as old as the school and stood very tall and straight. The groundskeeper put Christmas lights on the tallest one every year.
    The forest was big enough to