Going Wild by Lisa McMann Read Free Book Online

something encased in bubble wrap, and a folded piece of paper. Charlie unrolled the bubble wrap and pulled out a bracelet.
    â€œSweet!” Charlie turned the bracelet over in her hand. It had a solid, silvery-metallic band with a small, square, black screen. Tiny buttons protruded from both sides. It kind of looked like one of those expensive health-monitoring bracelets that athletes wear.

    She pressed a button, and then another, but nothing happened. Probably needs a battery , she thought. The bracelet was cool but not flashy, and it might even make Charlie look like a more serious soccer player at tryouts tomorrow, which wouldn’t hurt. She turned it over again. It had a metal clasp with a release button. She pressed it. The clasp separated, but it immediately tried to stick together again, as if the two pieces were magnetic. “Ooh, cool,” she breathed.
    Charlie slipped the bracelet on her wrist, securing the clasp. It fit just a little bit loosely. If she wore it partway up her forearm, it was snug enough that it wouldn’t bounce around.
    â€œI bet the magnetic clasp is for balance or something scientific like that,” she mused, twisting her wrist this way and that, admiring it, then held her arm out. She liked the bracelet a lot, probably even more because it was so professional looking. It was the kind of thing Charlie’s soccer hero, Alex Morgan, would wear. Or Jessie Graff from American Ninja Warrior . She picked up the folded piece of paper and opened it.
    Charlie, it’s time. You know what to do.
    There was no signature.
    The handwriting kind of looked like Charlie’s grandma’s.
    Charlie’s grandma was sciency like Dad, so she might think a bracelet like this was interesting. But why would Grandma leave a gift on the doorstep like that without coming in or saying something?
    Maybe it was a going-away present from Amari and her othersoccer friends in Chicago, and they tried to disguise their handwriting so she’d be surprised. Charlie pulled out her phone and texted Amari. “Did you leave a sports bracelet at my house as a gift?” She took a quick photo of it and sent that to Amari too.
    â€œNope!” came the quick reply. “But I wish I had—that’s cool! Just pretend it’s from me, haha. Are you doing better?”
    â€œA little. I miss you, though.”
    â€œMe too,” Amari replied, with four rows of crying emojis.
    â€œI’ve got soccer tryouts tomorrow,” wrote Charlie. “Wish me luck!”
    â€œLUCK!!” replied Amari. “Don’t worry. You’re a superstar! You know what to do.”
    Charlie smiled forlornly. You know what to do. Amari had written the same words that were in the note. Maybe the mysterious gift was a sign that she’d do well.
    But not if she didn’t find her gear. Reluctantly she replied to Amari with a variety of hearts and put her phone away. It was almost easier to handle the loneliness when she didn’t talk to Amari. Then she could pretend her life in Chicago never really existed.
    Charlie turned back to the bracelet and examined it more closely, studying some etchings near the clasp. “Well, thank you very much, whoever you are,” Charlie said, and shoved the paper and bubble wrap back into the package. With the recycle bin already overflowing, she left it on top of a stack of boxes totake care of on the weekend. “That’s one emptied,” she said, looking over the piles of boxes filling the garage. She pulled her sleeve down over the bracelet in the chilly garage. “Only forty thousand more to go.”
    With renewed energy Charlie began her search once more, tossing boxes left and right with little effort, even the ones full of books. “And Andy said these were heavy,” she scoffed. “Weakling.” She made it all the way to the bottom of the second stack before she found what she was after. “Finally!” she