Amber Brown Is Green with Envy by Paula Danziger Read Free Book Online

thought they could? I watch television. I listen to people in supermarkets talk. I even heard my dad talk to Steve about the wedding date change, and they wondered if Mom was going to have a baby soon. I don’t tell my mom about that, though.
    I do say, “Mom, I thought that you and Max were going to involve me in any decision-making that has to do with me? This definitely affects me.”
    She laughs and then stops when she sees that I don’t see anything funny. “Amber, this is really something that is between grownups…. between Max and me.”
    “But it affects me. There will be another person, a fourth person in the family,” I say.
    “The decision to have a baby is one that adults make,” she says firmly. “Amber, you used to say that you wanted a baby brother or sister.”
    “That’s when you and Dad were married,” I say. “Now it’s you and Max.”
    I can tell that she is trying to talk her way out of this.
    She says, “Amber. We’re not talking about having a baby immediately. We want to get used to living together, Max and I….. you, me and Max…. a baby may come later.…Just think….. someday, your own baby brother or sister!”
    “Baby half brother….. or half sister. We’ll have different fathers,” I remind her.
    She smiles. “Half brother…. half sister. Does that really matter?” she asks. “Amber Marie, they are going to be part of our family…. all family. Half brother. Half sister. What’s the other half going to be?”
    I think about it and decide to joke. “Tuna fish…. half tuna fish.”
    I try to think about what a half baby-half
tuna fish
would look like.
    Thinking about it makes me laugh. I think that the words tuna fish are funny. I don’t know why.
    “Okay,” I say. “We can have a half tuna fish-half human baby…. but that’s it.”
    Sometimes it’s easier to joke about something serious than to really deal with it.
    As long as they aren’t planning to have a baby for a while, I feel better. Maybe they will change their minds.
    Mom continues to explain why they want and need more room. In addition to wanting more room, they want to live in a house that my dad never lived in…. that they didn’t want him to walk into their house and act like HE was the one who once lived there, who had rights because of that.
    “Amber,” she says, “you can understand. Can’t you?”
    I think about the way my dad acted when he brought me back to the house.
    He shouldn’t have acted that way.
    He just doesn’t get it….. he and Mom are not going to get back together again.
    Sometimes I wonder why they broke up. I used to think that I was the reason they broke up, but now I don’t think so. I’ve given up trying to guess. They won’t tell me.
    Even I, their kid, don’t think that they should get back together…well, mostly I don’t think that they should get back together.
    I do want to suggest one more thing. “Why don’t we just leave things the way that they are? Max in his apartment? We can stay in our house?”
    She shakes her head. “That won’t work. Max and I really want to live together in
our
own home.”
    “Yours and Max’s?” I ask.
    “OURS,” she says. “Mine and Max’s and yours.”
    “If I say that I understand why you want to leave the house, can you understand why I hate it, and why I want to stay in the same town?”
    She nods. “Understanding, though, doesn’t mean that we won’t move to another town…. we still may…. but….. I promise that we will try to stay in the same town. That’s fair to you….. That’s fair to your father too, I guess.”
    I ask her another question that I really want her to answer. “Do you hate Daddy?”
    “No,” she says. “I don’t hate him…. but I definitely do not want to remarry him. I love Max…I want to marry Max….. and I don’t want your father to dictate where or how Max and I will live.”
    It is not easy for me to figure all of thisout…. but this move is because of my dad….