Silent Song (Ghostly Rhapsody)

Silent Song (Ghostly Rhapsody) by Ron C. Nieto Read Free Book Online Page B

Book: Silent Song (Ghostly Rhapsody) by Ron C. Nieto Read Free Book Online
Authors: Ron C. Nieto
not bothered because it’s him?”
    “Please, what could I possibly have with him?”
    “You tell me. I know you used to know him, before high school.” Her narrowed gaze became hard and she shot to kill. “Perhaps you miss playing doctor with him, and that’s the reason you’re freaking out because of a joke? Is that why you’re putting Dave off?”
    I wanted to be enraged, but I was ashamed and mortified. I hated Anna at that moment. She was the only one who knew, besides my parents, of course, and while we’d never talked about it and it had been a long time since she’d learned my obscure secret… She had good memory and knew how to hurt.
    So I paid back in kind. Turning on my heels, I tried the most dignified exit I could pull off—and judging by the looks of the other kids in the parking lot, it worked.
    Perhaps it was cowardly, beating a hasty retreat when my friend unburied the war drums, but I was a Bitch Princess, not a National Hero.
    Besides, I needed to do damage control. How many people had learned that Keith and I had shared a couple of years of elementary school? By itself, the admission wasn’t too serious. And we’d not really been friends back then—when you’re a kid, friendships are quite limited. But for a while, our parents had known each other and gotten along in a distant, nice kind of way and so had we.
    Then Keith had moved. I hadn’t seen him at all during middle grade. When we met again, in high school, he was so changed that the only traits remaining were his eyes. And even those had gotten much older.
    By that point, talking to him in public would have been social suicide. I had been curious, though, and had followed him to his place one day to ask how he was, why he’d moved and why his horrid taste forced him to dye his hair with silvery streaks. I never got answers, but I discovered his guitar. I had started taking detours and listening to him baring his soul while he thought he was alone.
    And while the knowing him part wasn’t compromising, the spying on him part was very much embarrassing.
    ***
    I went straight home that day. Dad hadn’t returned from work yet, but Mom was on the sofa, reading a book with the TV on mute.
    “Hey, Mom,” I said on the way to the stairs. Then I stopped, my mind still whirling about Keith and Anna and Lena.
    Why not?
    “Hey, Mom,” I said again, wandering into the sitting room.
    “Yes, sweetie?”
    “Do you remember the Brannaghs?”
    She seemed startled and perhaps ashamed for a second, but then she put herself together and closed the book, leaving her finger to mark the page.
    “Of course. We saw quite a lot of them when you were little. I believe the boy goes to school with you now?”
    I nodded. “Yeah, so… why did we stop seeing them?”
    “They moved.”
    Prefabricated untruth stink coming from a mile away.
    “So…?” I pressed the issue.
    Mom sighed. “Adriana… Mrs. Brannagh died. Cancer.”
    I had no idea. I hadn’t really seen Keith’s mother around, but I’d figured it was because I took pains not to see anyone related to him.
    It made me feel wretched.
    “He never said anything,” I muttered. He never spoke about his father either, or his pets.
    Does he have pets?
    What do I know about him anyway?
    Okay, not going that way. Depression awaits there .
    “Shouldn’t we have been closer to them, then? You know the drill, cookies and friendly support and such.”
    Mom shifted.
    So that’s what makes her uncomfortable .
    “They moved, and then Mr. Brannagh closed up. He didn’t look like he wanted visitors,” she explained, not believing a word she said. “Why do you ask?”
    “Just realized I didn’t know the answer. I’m going up to my room. I got a lot of work, so I might not come down for dinner.”
    She nodded and turned back to her book, and I mounted the stairs in a most unladylike fashion, my mind reeling. Somehow, mocking “Keith, Dracula in Drag” felt great in comparison to mocking “Keith,

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