So Much Pretty by Cara Hoffman

Author:Cara Hoffman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Megan Osterhaus

HAEDEN, NY, 2007

IT SNOWED IN early October, a thin blanket covering the fallen leaves. Alice and Megan swung on the trapeze in the cold barn while Theo dug through boxes in the loft. They were bored. They were killing time.

Megan lived up the road, and the girls had shared a fort in the lilac bushes that separated their two properties when they were little, but Megan had strict rules, even though she was older and wasn’t often allowed over. This was irritating, as there were no other neighbors within biking or walking distance, and the girls had become close again because of swim team. Megan was a very sweet-looking girl and knew it. She also had a filthy vocabulary. She tried not to swear so much, but she liked to, and half the time it was by mistake anyway. Also, if you swear, people think you are making your own way. They don’t know you’re the kind of person who has an early curfew or a million chores. She was allowed to swear all she wanted at Alice’s, but somehow she never did as much. Things were confusing at the Pipers’. They all seemed like roommates or something, friends who lived together.

“Found them,” Theo called.

Alice jumped off the trapeze and stood with her hands on her hips, looking up at him. Then raised her hands.

“I’m not going to throw it at you, dummy—it’s the whole set.”

“Why are we gonna play in the cold and dark, anyhow?” Megan asked.

Megan was often afraid she would get in trouble for playing with them. She never knew what the rules were there. Or if there were any.

Theo and Alice’s parents let them sleep over at each other’s houses, and one day last summer, when it was really hot, Megan went to Alice’s and no one was home but her and Theo, sitting in the bathtub naked, reading comic books. They had dumped a bag of ice in with them. It was like they didn’t care. Like it didn’t matter that they were naked or anything. It wasn’t sexy or anything. It was, like, boring. They were really bored, and it was too hot. She put her feet over the side and sat there talking with them. They read out loud from the comic books in funny voices, but the whole time she was afraid somebody’s parents would come home. For some reason it made her even more uneasy when she found out their parents didn’t care. Also, since Theo had gone away to school, he smoked cigarettes right in front of everyone, and no one said a thing. And she thought it was kind of gross the way they still played Circus, and once she heard them talking in a made-up language. There was something dirty about the whole thing. Like Alice and Theo were brother and sister but also in love and they didn’t even know or care that other people thought it was weird.

Theo walked down the steps with a big square metal suitcase, set it flat upon the floor, and then opened it.

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