The Harder the Fall by Lauren Barnholdt

Author:Lauren Barnholdt
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Aladdin

Chapter

8

“It must have been a power surge or something,” my dad says that morning as he hands me a granola bar. “I’m not sure what time the power went out, so we probably shouldn’t eat anything in the fridge.”

“Yeah,” I say. “Probably not.” I open the granola bar and take a bite, wishing it was French toast, or at least cereal. But of course we can’t use the milk. I know exactly what time the power went out—3:12 a.m. But to tell my dad that would be admitting that I know something about it.

Once Mrs. Dunham finished her big show, she disappeared. I crept out of my room and down the hall, to check in on my dad. He was sleeping soundly, although the whole house was dark.

I slid back into my bed and lay awake, listening to my iPod pretty much all night. I was too afraid to go back to sleep. I debated whether or not I should wake up my dad, but I didn’t want to deal with all the questions. I was afraid I’d break down and maybe tell him something that would make him think I was crazy.

So I just waited until he woke up at six. He went into the bathroom and tried the light switch, and then I heard him say, “Huh.”

I’ve been pretending like I don’t know anything about what happened. Which isn’t a total lie. I mean, I don’t know exactly what Mrs. Dunham did to our electricity. I’m not an electrician. And any information I tell my dad isn’t going to help him anyway. I’m sure whoever he hires to come over and fix it isn’t going to be like, Oh, a ghost did this? Why didn’t you tell me? It would have saved me a lot of diagnostic work.

“Well, I’ll have to take the morning off from work,” my dad says. “Hopefully, we’ll be able to get someone to come out and look at it right away.”

He’s over at the kitchen table now, typing away on his laptop, looking for an electrician to come over and look at things. I chew on my granola bar slowly, thinking about how serious this situation is becoming.

I mean, blowing out the electricity in my house? What if she’d started a fire or something? What could be so bad that Mrs. Dunham is that determined to keep me away from Brandon? And then I remember the picture of her in the yearbook. The one of her with my mom.

Could my mom have anything to do with this? Part of me really doesn’t want to know. But the other part of me realizes that it might be time to find out exactly what’s going on with Brandon’s mom. Up until now I guess I’ve kind of been avoiding it. Mostly because I’m afraid to find out.

“So, Dad,” I say nonchalantly as I take a sip out of the glass of water he set in front of me. “You knew Mom in high school, right?”

He frowns and glances up from his laptop.

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