The Gospel According to Larry Read Free

help make the world a better place. It sounds amazingly corny, but pushing civilization forward has always been my highest priority. Not with more technology, not with more money, but with more ideas, more meaning. When we studied Darwin last year, his ideas burned off the page. All of us, evolving, moving forward, consciously or not. It’s probably what was in
the back of my mind when I moved those plastic numbers across the refrigerator; it’s what’s on my mind as I type this now.
    If Larry was a way to delve into life’s deeper meaning, then count me in.

Beth made a list of all the kids in our homeroom and who they had been in a past life. We passed the list back and forth filling in the blanks—Jack Furtado, Victorian cellist; Laura Newman, Russian cosmonaut—until the bell rang.
    Out in the hall, my enthusiasm pinned Beth to her locker. “You’re right! Everything Larry wrote about on his Web site had something to do with my life.”
    â€œDidn’t I tell you?” She couldn’t have been happier.
    â€œWhen I thought about what a consumer glutton my stepfather’s girlfriend was, Larry wrote about shopaholics. When I missed my mother, he talked about attachment. It was uncanny!” I didn’t want to lay it on too thick.
    Beth’s lips shone like a hot mocha coffee. “He puts into words exactly what we’re thinking.” She corrected herself immediately. “He or she.”

    â€œBut what’s with the photos?” I asked. “Are we supposed to guess Larry’s identity?”
    â€œLarry has less than eighty possessions. He posts them on his Web site, a few at a time, daring people to guess who he is. Right now, everyone’s clueless. I mean, what can you tell from a pen and a hairbrush?”
    â€œMaybe you’ll be lucky and the next clue will be his—”
    â€œOr her—”
    â€œLicense.”
    Beth smiled. “I’m sure Larry’s saving that one for last.”
    I asked her if she wanted to come over later and talk about my ideas for the club.
    She frowned. “I can’t. I have to study for that calculus test.”
    Beth was a lot of things—gorgeous, smart, determined. She also was a terrible liar. I stared her down.
    â€œOkay, I promised I’d help my father with inventory.”
    I kept staring.
    â€œDamn it, Josh. I told Todd I’d help him clean his basement tonight. Okay?”
    â€œCould you please explain how someone as committed to personal growth as you are can
vacuum the basement of the class cretin just because she thinks she’s in love with him?”
    â€œI don’t want to hear it,” Beth barked back. “There’s no one more inconsistent than you. You’re a computer geek who hikes in the woods for days. You hate to buy things, yet you always go to Bloomingdale’s!”
    â€œThat’s different. But forget it, you made your point.”
    She was just gearing up. “Look, you’re my best friend. We’ve been bailing each other out since grade school. But not everyone wants to go through life being a hermit living in the world of ideas.” She made quotation marks with her fingers when she said the word ideas. It was one of the only things Beth did that drove me out of my mind.
    She finally got around to sputtering out the truth about Todd. “He’s the only cool guy who’s ever liked me. I know he can act like a jerk, but do you mind if I let his popularity rub off on me for a while?”
    For some reason the bare-bones honesty of her plea only fueled my growing sense of annoyance. “I’m out of here.” I made those fake quotation marks around the word out, then walked
toward lit class. I could feel her behind me even before she spun me around to face her.
    â€œI hate fighting with you,” she said. “Hate it, hate it, hate it.”
    We stood silently for a few minutes.
    â€œIt’s just