Since You've Been Gone (Morgan Matson) by Morgan Matson

Author:Morgan Matson
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Published: 2014-05-06T00:00:00+00:00

“This is a really nice house,” Dawn said, her voice dropping to a whisper as she stepped inside, her expression looking much like I had a feeling mine had when I’d seen it for the first time. Since my car had been buried behind everyone who had parked in our driveway, Dawn had driven us all to Frank’s in her convertible, her driving making me very glad that Frank lived so close to me.

“Thanks,” Frank said easily, leading the way inside. “Collins!” he yelled, just as he slid around the corner in his socks.

“Hello,” Collins said, a wink somewhere in his voice, smiling at me, stretching out the word more than usual, and giving it a few more o’s.

“Um, hi,” I said, giving him a smile. “What’s up?”

He looked behind me, saw Dawn and her shirt that read Captain Pizza—A great COLONEL of an idea! and brightened. “Did we order pizza?”

“No,” Dawn said, looking down at her shirt. “I’m off the clock. I’m Dawn.”

“Matthew Collins,” he said. “Matthew with two t’s and Collins with two l’s. But call me Collins. Although,” he said, raising an eyebrow, “let me be Frank.” He cleared his throat and gave me an earnest, serious look. “Emily,” he said, his voice both softer and deeper. “Is there anything—anything—I can do to help you? As soon as I finish saving the planet, I promise to get right on it.”

“Collins,” Frank said, walking past him and into the kitchen, but not before I saw that there were two dull red spots on his cheeks. “Will you stop it?  That joke was old back in middle school.”

“I’m just being Frank with them,” he said, giving me an actual wink this time. “Want something to drink?” he asked as he followed Frank into the kitchen and pulled open the fridge, clearly as comfortable in Frank’s house as Sloane had once been in mine.

“Sure,” Dawn said, heading over to join him in the kitchen. As I watched her walk closer to him, I couldn’t help but wish I’d had some way to warn her about Collins, and the fact that he’d probably be hitting on her relentlessly within seconds. But to my surprise, he just stood back respectfully to let her get a clearer view of the fridge, and didn’t ask her if it hurt when she fell from heaven.

“Emily?” Frank called to me from the kitchen area, and I realized a moment too late that I was the only one still standing by the front door.

“Yeah,” I said quickly, walking across the floor to join the group in the kitchen. Everyone was standing around the big island in the center that looked like it was made of granite or slate—some dark mineral, at any rate. There was a bag of tortilla chips on the counter that Collins opened as Frank grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge, and then handed one to Dawn.

“So,” Collins said, rubbing his hands together and looking at me. “I was thinking about your list.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.