Frannie and Tru by Karen Hattrup Read Free Book Online Page A

at Carnegie Mellon in the fall. She said that Baltimore was smaller than she’d expected and so pedestrian , and I knew she was using that word in a way that I didn’t understand.
    Sparrow sucked deeply on the joint and told Tru that despite it all she didn’t miss home, not one little bit. She was ready for something new.
    Tru turned, walking backward to look at me.
    â€œSparrow’s mother is an ex–ballet dancer and her dad is a big shot at a credit card company,” he said. “That’s why she’s the perfect woman. Beautiful and rich.”
    She shoved him again and he spun back around, kept sauntering along. She dropped back to walk beside me.
    â€œTru said you’re at a magnet school—is it the one for the arts? Devon’s at the one for the arts.”
    I told her no, I was at the math and science one. She just smiled, so I stuttered out a little more. “I’m . . . I don’t know, into science I guess. I like science.”
    Tru called to us over his shoulder. “Way to make her feel like a dork.”
    Sparrow ignored him and told me that her aunt was a scientist of sorts, and that we should meet. Then she went on and on about Devon and how he played the violin all day and all night. She said I should meet him and his friends, too—she was pretty sure one of them went to my new school.
    Sparrow handed the joint back to Tru, and asked for a piggybackride. She was taller than him by about an inch, and the two of them arranged their bodies awkwardly, almost falling, laughing, then righting themselves at the last moment. He carried her for a couple of blocks, her arms wrapped tightly around his neck. I trailed behind them quietly, wishing that someday I might have that kind of easy affection.
    We dropped Sparrow at her car, which was sporty and red. Tru made promises to see her soon, and we headed for home.
    I convinced Tru that we should stray at least to the outer edge of the lacrosse field, as if giving it a passing glance would somehow lend truth to our lie. We moved toward the lights and came just close enough to see the impression of the girls on the field. From where we stood, they were blurs of colors, nothing more than birds swooping and tittering in the distance. I said that was good enough and we turned around.
    We walked quietly for a while side by side. As we came to the edge of the park by my house, Tru stopped and turned to me.
    â€œI was trying to be good, Frannie. I was trying really hard. But if you want . . .”
    He was extending the end of the joint in my direction.
    I had tried a cigarette before. Three times. No—maybe four? But as I took this from him I felt right away that it was different. The paper was delicate. I handled it like a buttercup, the kind we used to hold under our chins to look for the yellow shadow. I did a quick scan and we were alone, still a couple of minutes’ walk from home. I stared at the nub and couldn’t quite bring it tomy lips—it didn’t seem right. Not yet, at least. I’d been trying so hard to be cool, but there in the dark, I said the only thing I could think of. The truth.
    â€œI haven’t even had a drink,” I said. “It seems wrong to do this first. Like I should do things in order?”
    He laughed, and I tried to laugh, too.
    â€œMust be the scientist in you,” Tru said, and I was more embarrassed than ever, because I wasn’t a scientist. I just liked nature. I knew the names of trees and plants, and I’d aced freshman biology, winning a prize for my poster about photosynthesis. I guess it looked nice—a maze of green and brown, showing all the structures and systems, the parts that had to teem and whirl just to keep things alive. But it was a dumb science fair project that somehow became this thing that defined me, made me into someone in people’s minds. A science girl. I tried to find a way to say all that to Tru, but ended up keeping