The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton

Author:Leslye Walton [WALTON, LESLYE]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
ISBN: 978-0-7636-7034-4
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Published: 2014-08-28T04:00:00+00:00

IF MY MOTHER KEPT a list of the reasons she confined me to the house on the hill, she’d have a length of paper that could stretch all the way down Pinnacle Lane and trail into the waters of the Puget Sound. It could choke passing sea life. It could flap in the wind like a giant white flag of surrender atop our house’s widow’s walk. To put it simply, my mother worried. She worried about our neighbors’ reactions. Would they break me with their disparaging glances, their cruel intolerance? She worried I was just like every other teenage girl, all tender heart and fragile ego. She worried I was more myth and figment than flesh and blood. She worried about my calcium levels, my protein levels, even my reading levels. She worried she couldn’t protect me from all of the things that had hurt her: loss and fear, pain and love.

Most especially from love.

During that spring when the rains had disappeared, Cardigan and I spent most afternoons sprawled in the browning grass in my yard, pretending to study as Cardigan beguiled me with tales of her latest beau.

By the tender age of fifteen, my best friend, Miss Cardigan Cooper, was already well versed in the complicated attributes of physical love. Jeremiah Flannery, the boy who’d once crushed a bird’s wing under his boot, was her latest acquisition.

“The poor bastard follows me everywhere.” Cardigan snorted. “And you should see the way he stares at me. I practically have to wipe the drool from his chin before I can kiss him. It’s pathetic.” She smiled wickedly. “I love it.”

I laughed as I attempted to make sense of Cardigan’s haphazard algebra notes.

That was another thing my mother worried about: my education. She modeled my daily home-schooling lessons off of Cardigan’s messy composition books.

“Is this a five or a three?” I asked.

“No idea. Looks like an R to me.” Cardigan arched her back like a cat and threw her arm over her eyes to shield them from the sun. I rolled my eyes. It was already late April, and though finals weren’t far off, Cardigan seemed quite content to maintain her C-minus average.

On the other side of the house, my mother was on the front porch, washing the windows in soapy methodical circles, when Henry came flying around the corner and screamed, “Pinna hurt! Pinna hurt!” His eyes were wide with fear. Trouver was right behind him, barking madly.

In one fluid motion, Viviane dropped the soapy sponge, flew down the porch stairs and around to the backyard to find me, leaving Henry on the porch, pounding his ears with his open palms. As she ran, my mother thought, This is it. This is the reason not to love. If I didn’t love, then whatever I find, no matter how awful, wouldn’t hurt.

My mother found me lazing in the grass with Cardigan. She reached down, grabbed my arm, and yanked me upright. “What happened?” she asked, frantically looking me over for signs of injury.

“Nothing,” I replied, blinking.

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