The Luckiest Girl Read Free Page B

seized perfectly good roses, probably the last of the season, and stuffed them into the Disposall. Destroyed them. I can’t understand it.”
    â€œBut I don’t want something done for my own good,” protested Shelley. “That’s the whole point.”
    â€œWhat was the argument about?” asked Mr. Latham. “I wasn’t listening to this particular one.”
    â€œMy slicker. Mother knew I had saved my money for a slicker,” explained Shelley, “and she went and bought me a raincoat I didn’t want.”
    â€œBut that is no reason to grind up roses.” Mrs. Latham leaned wearily back against the draining board. “Shelley, sometimes I don’t know what to do with you.”
    Shelley stared at the ceiling. “Let me buy the slicker” was what she wanted to say, but instead she was surprised to hear her own voice telling her mother, “Send me to California.”
    â€œNow, Shelley,” said Mrs. Latham, relenting. “Don’t dramatize so. What you did was wrong, but we certainly don’t intend to—to banish you over a few roses.”
    â€œBut I want to go,” answered Shelley, and knew as she spoke that she meant what she said. Even though it meant living in the same house with Katie, she wanted to go to California.
    â€œBut that is out of the question,” protested Mrs. Latham. “As if we could send you all the way to California.”
    â€œWhy is it impossible?” Mr. Latham asked. “A girl has to leave home sometime.”
    â€œOf course,” agreed Mrs. Latham, “but there is plenty of time for that when she is ready for college. After all, Shelley is only sixteen and young for her age at that.” Mrs. Latham acted as if there was nothing more to say on the subject. Briskly she set the blue bowl and the frog back in the cupboard and shut the door.
    â€œLeaving home and having the opportunity to make a few mistakes is a good way for a girl to grow up,” persisted Mr. Latham. “And this looks like a splendid opportunity for a girl who has never been more than a couple of hundred miles from home.”
    Shelley carefully examined a scratch on her forefinger. It was difficult to believe that her father could be serious, but it would be exciting to spend a winter in California, to wear a dirty old slicker if she felt like it, to go to a different school, and see some of the country, and meet new people—and not go out with Jack. Let Rosemary or some other girl have him. She wouldn’t care, not when she was in California. What was it like down there in California, where history was so colorful and oranges came from trees insteadof bins at the supermarket?
    â€œSend our little girl so far away to live with someone else’s family?” Mrs. Latham’s voice expressed disbelief. “You can’t really mean it.”
    Mr. Latham continued as if his wife had not spoken. “After all, Shelley is an only child and the experience of living with a larger family should be good for her.”
    Shelley considered this. She had always liked being an only child and had felt sorry for some of her friends who sometimes had to go without new clothes because of the expense of keeping an older brother or sister in college, or who had to babysit with younger brothers or sisters. It did not matter. Even if she had to babysit with Katie, she still wanted to go to California.
    â€œBut I couldn’t bear to let her go so far,” said Shelley’s mother.
    â€œI think she should go,” Mr. Latham stated flatly.
    â€œDaddy!” cried Shelley, while Mrs. Latham looked at her husband in silence.
    â€œShe may not have another chance like this.” Mr. Latham went on as if Shelley was not listening. “When she is ready for college we won’t be able to send her any farther than the state university, and going to school a hundred miles from home withthe same crowd she knew in