Out of the Box by Michelle Mulder Read Free Book Online

we’re in a neighborhood of streets lined with enormous oak trees and old mansions, and I’m enjoying the shade. I ask Sarah what she thinks of the sock-to-bowtie book, and she says it’s given her a lot of ideas. She looks serious, so I try not to laugh.
    For one thing, I’m not sure why she thinks she needs a more interesting wardrobe. Yesterday she showed me photos of herself at various schools. In one shot, she’s on an old wooden dock, striking a diver’s pose in a sleek one-piece swimsuit. In the next, she’s got her hair twisted back and is wearing thick glasses and a long-sleeved dress that makes her look like part of some religious group. In a third, her hair is short and spiky, her clothing black and her face covered in white makeup. In all of them, she’s surrounded by what appear to be friends. I know it’s silly, but for a moment I wonder if I should pay more attention to my own clothes.
    I don’t dwell on the thought for more than half a second, though, because we’ve reached the school. From across the street, it looks like it’s all chain-link fence and parking lot, with a patch of yellowing grass at the far end. I squint against the sun.
    â€œHey, I was wrong about no one being here in the middle of July. I guess you’re not the only keener in Victoria, Sarah.” Across the parking lot, in the shadow of the school, two boys—one our age and one much younger—are sitting on a curb, poking at the dirt. The older boy holds a jar, and the younger one is dropping bits of earth into it with a stick. They’re talking and laughing, and it looks like they’re having fun. I’d love to know what they’re doing.
    Sarah jerks her head in their direction, and we wander closer to the school. Both kids are dark, with thick black hair. The older one is wearing a red ball-cap backward, low-slung jeans and very white running shoes. He looks like he’d be part of the school’s cool crowd, not someone who would sit in the dirt with a little boy, talking and laughing. If I were a different person, I would leave Sarah to her investigation of the school and go talk to them.
    Sarah is peering in the school windows.
    â€œWhat do you think?” I ask.
    She shrugs. “This art room looks better than most. Come look at the mural.”
    She stands back, and I press my face up against the glass. On one wall of the classroom, someone has painted life-size images of kids painting a wall of a classroom. I wonder if the kids did it themselves, and what kind of teacher might let them do that. All at once, I wish I were the one coming to this new school. I’d reinvent myself, be braver than I am at home. I picture myself wandering back to Jeanette’s place by myself or with friends, spreading out my homework on her sunny kitchen table and listening to music while she chats with friends in the living room or works in her garden. Sunshine and music instead of silence or shouting.
    And suddenly I feel like the most ungrateful kid on the planet. Here I am imagining all this when I have a perfectly good home with two parents who need me. I shake my head and try to think of something else.
    â€œLet’s go.” Sarah steps back from the window. “I’ve seen everything I need to see.”

E IGHT
    â€œC are to come with me?” Jeanette asks. We’ve just hauled two big bags of postage stamps up from the basement, and she’s putting on her sandals and bike helmet. “Louise lives close to Chinatown. Maybe we could stop for red-bean cakes afterward.”
    â€œDeal.” I slip on my shoes and hoist one of the bags. “Who knew postage stamps could be so heavy?”
    â€œI don’t know where Louise plans to keep them,” Jeanette says. “Their condo is tiny, and both she and her husband collect all kinds of stuff. You’ll see. They’re quite the characters.”
    Louise, from the soup kitchen,