Holly in Love by Caroline B. Cooney Read Free Book Online Page B

dollars.
    Of course, on Sunday my father’s sermon was about Christmas giving. We were collecting for migrant workers in the Southwest. “Sometimes,” said my father in a slow, sad voice, “these families live in windowless shacks for weeks at a time.” He surveyed an unwilling congregation until they all began to fidget. “What would it be like to have no windows? No electrical appliances?” People began reading the backs of their service leaflets, to get away from the sermon. He was going to ask for money again, and nobody wanted to hear about it. “If all of us gave a dollar for every window, bed, clean sheet, and new toy in our houses, how we could help the poor!” said my father.
    Two hundred people shifted guiltily in their pews.
    I thought of the oriental rug I’d been yearning to put in my dollhouse parlor, and I thought of skinny children hanging in the doorways of their shacks and how my fifty dollars could put sturdy shoes on their cold little feet. The trouble is, I thought, I’m so shallow and worthless that I would rather have the oriental rug.
    Maybe it would be best not to win the fifty dollars. Then I wouldn’t have all these wrenching financial decisions to make.

Seven
    I N HOMEROOM, WHEN I had finally peeled off all the layers required to protect my fragile flesh from a temperature hovering at ten degrees and a wind that howled through every scrap of fabric, Hope said timidly, “Holly?”
    I thought she had laryngitis. “What?” I felt very strong. I was even prepared to be nice to Hope that day. I had decided that if I won the fifty dollars I would give half to the migrant workers. Nobody could expect more of me than that, and I could still afford the miniature oriental rug and the tiny electrified wall sconces.
    “Do you remember a few weeks ago when Grey came to pick me up after school in a silver Corvette?”
    Vividly. The silver Corvette had been absolutely beautiful. Just to be mean I wanted to say, no, I can’t remember, how boring. “Yes,” I said. I thought, Come on , Holly, practice lying .
    “It wasn’t Grey’s car, you know. He has a Chevrolet.”
    It was not like Hope to make Grey sound ordinary. Perhaps Hope was breaking up with Grey in order to date the silver Corvette.
    “The guy with the Corvette is a fraternity brother of Grey’s,” said Hope. “A really gorgeous man. His name is Jonathan Byerly.”
    “Oh.” So now Hope had two handsome, rich college men on her string. Really, it was depressing. How come nobody ever wanted old Holly Carroll? I had lots of fine qualities, I was sure of it. Untapped gold mine, that’s me, I told myself, and congratulated myself on finally telling a good lie.
    “Jonathan noticed you at the bus stop,” said Hope, her voice getting timid again. “He thought you had beautiful hair. You were wearing it in one very long French braid that day, down the middle of your back, and Jonathan said it reflected red highlights in the sun. He wondered who you were, and I told him a little bit about you.”
    I thanked God that Hope knew nothing of my dollhouse. I hadn’t worn the single long braid since Christopher said it made me look like Heidi and all I needed were a mountain, some goats, and a cheese.
    “Jonathan,” said Hope, “would like to date you. He wanted to know if I would fix it up.”
    If she had thrown herself down the nonexistent stairs of her ranch house, she couldn’t have surprised me more. I looked at her searchingly. She had a new expression on her face. Not superior but hesitant.
    “Jonathan said you sounded like the first interesting girl he’d heard of in this town,” said Hope.
    I could not imagine what Hope had said to make Jonathan think that. Clearly, Hope could not imagine what she had said either.
    “Jonathan’s on a full scholarship in the premed program,” said Hope. “He hates northern New Hampshire but he has to be here.”
    Jonathan was a brilliant premed student who hated cold climates and drove a