Eleven and Holding by Mary Penney Read Free Book Online Page A

into my mouth, grateful for the taste of anything else. “What are you doing in here?” I hoped snottiness would hide my humiliation.
    â€œMight ask you the same.”
    I shrugged a shoulder and tried to get my vision back in line.
    He cocked his head and studied me. “I see you around the coffee shop, right? You hang out with that chick, Tweetie?”
    â€œTwee,” I said, with a look meant to maim. “And you almost got her killed yesterday. Not to mention knocking me on my keester!”
    He passed me one of his famous slow and easy smiles. “Sorry about that.”
    â€œAnd you made this poor old lady crash her bike into Nana’s window, a window that had managed to survive nearly thirty-seven years—until you wrecked it.”
    He opened his mouth, but I cut him off, lightning-quick. “Even worse, you rode off and left. That’s hit and run, you know. It’s against the law.”
    His brows crossed. “I made sure nobody was hurt before I took off. You just didn’t see me.”
    â€œA decent person would have stayed and apologized!”
    â€œI couldn’t,” he said. “I thought the cops might come, and I wasn’t in the mood to see them.” He ran his hands across his white-blond buzzed hair. “I did go over to that lady’s house afterward. Made sure she was okay. Chuck told me where she lived. Heck, I even offered to help her find her lost dog.”
    I nodded suspiciously. “Yeah, she told me. She thought you were Mr. Manners in the flesh.”
    Switch looked past me out the window of the bus. “Here comes Big Boy.” He backed up, snatched apaper sack and his skateboard off a seat, and hurried down the aisle. “Come on, kid. Unless you got a ticket, you better get off too.”
    I rushed out behind him, and we both vaulted into the street, not slowing down until we turned the corner. We skidded to a stop in front of a row of newspaper racks. I sucked in my breath, still feeling a bit green. Switch dug into his pocket and fed a quarter into the Daily Post machine. He lifted a dozen papers out in one swoop.
    â€œWhat are you doing? You can’t take them all,” I said, indignant. “They’re a quarter apiece, not a quarter a pile.”
    He shrugged.
    â€œYou gonna go sell them? That’s classy,” I said.
    â€œI’m not gonna sell them.”
    â€œOh, right, you’re going to read them all yourself!”
    He shifted the papers over to his bony hip. “They’re not for me. There’s a nursing home over in my old neighborhood. I take them there.”
    â€œYou’re stealing . . . for old people?”
    â€œI’m not stealing; I’m delivering. I hand out some papers and wish a few old geezers a good morning. They like having a fresh paper of their own. Not the day-old ones that the staff leave around.”
    â€œIt’s still not right,” I said, thawing slightly.“You should just ask the Post . Maybe they’d donate the papers, and then you wouldn’t have to raid their machines.”
    â€œYou call it raiding; I call it goodwill.”
    â€œLet me see if I get this: you’ve got a big soft spot for old people, but you hate veterans?”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?” he asked.
    â€œI suppose you think you got away with it, but I saw you throwing stuff at the veterans’ float at the parade a couple years back.”
    Switch’s expression didn’t change, but a muscle in his jaw flickered. He spun the wheels of his board with his hand.
    â€œRemember? You were up on the roof of my nana’s coffee shop. I saw you from down below.”
    â€œI remember.”
    â€œMy dad was on that float! You nailed him with a water balloon!”
    â€œSorry ’bout that. I wasn’t trying to hit him . I was—” He shifted the papers on to his other hip. “You know what? Just forget it.”
    I could feel