The Littlest Bigfoot Read Free

during her winter in Vermont . . . but the lake, and the forest, looked pretty.
    â€œIt’s an open environment. It’s a working farm, so the children can learn about the world in a really hands-on way,” Miss Merriweather had told her, before reaching over to give Alice’s hand a squeeze. Dimples flashed in her cheeks when she said, “I have a good feeling about this one,” and Alice found herself smiling back before she ducked her head, remembering that her teeth, like everything else about her, were too big . . . and that Miss Merriweather had also had a good feeling about Alice’s seven previous schools.
    â€œWe’ll miss you, kiddo,” her father had said to her that morning. In a T-shirt and pajama bottoms, Mark was long-limbed and lanky, and in his suits he looked as solid andsubstantial as a wall, with thick black hair neatly combed, polished black shoes, and that morning, a silky tie the deep bluish-purple of a bruise. He brushed the top of her head with his lips, his Wall Street Journal tucked under his arm, an iPad in one hand, and an iPhone—one of three he used—in the other. “We’ll see you for Christmas.”
    Alice stood in his dressing room, surrounded by his suits, wishing he’d stayed longer or said “I love you” before he left. She wished she could hide against the wall, concealed by hanging jackets, the way she had when she was a little girl. She’d wiggle the suits, making them talk in squeaky voices, while her father pretended that he didn’t know she was there and asked the suits if they’d seen her.
    Instead, after saying good-bye to her father, Alice had straightened her shoulders (“Don’t hunch!” she heard Felicia scolding in her head) and made her way toward her mother. Felicia’s dressing room was lit by lamps lined with pink satin—because, she’d once told Alice, that was the most flattering light for a woman’s skin. It smelled like Chloé perfume, hairspray, and the secret cigarettes that Felicia occasionally smoked, and it looked like a dollhouse, with the furnishings and the clothes all slightly smaller than what a regular-size person would require. It was where, when Alice was five years old, her motherhad said, “I’d like it if you could call me Felicia instead of Mommy.” Her mother’s red lips had curved into a smile. “It makes it sound more like we’re friends, you know?”
    You’d never pick me to be your friend, Alice thought but did not say.
    She stood and watched as Felicia, elegant before her mirror, used tweezers to painstakingly glue individual fake eyelashes to her real lashes, then tilted the perfect oval of her face, with its high cheekbones and elegantly arched brows, this way and that.
    â€œHow’d you sleep, baby?” Felicia finally asked.
    â€œFine,” Alice lied. She’d had one of her strange not-quite-nightmares again, but she knew, from experience, not to bother Felicia about that.
    â€œI’d take you up to the school myself,” Felicia murmured as she painted her mouth with a tiny brush she’d dipped into a pot of bloodred gloss, “but I’ve got a meeting.”
    Alice nodded. Her mother didn’t work, but her volunteering was practically a full-time job. Diabetes on Mondays, Crohn’s disease on Tuesdays, cancer on Wednesdays, and heart disease on Fridays, with Thursdays reserved for the hair salon, mani-pedis, and Pilates lessons.
    Felicia got to her feet, put her slender arms around Alice’s shoulders, and pressed her cool, powdery cheek tothe top of Alice’s head, all the while keeping her body angled away from her daughter’s. As if I’m catching, Alice thought, wondering, for the thousandth time, how she could have ever emerged from this slim and perfect woman, and wondering why it was so hard for her to leave.
    No one here wanted her. She was an