This Is Me From Now On by Barbara Dee Read Free Book Online Page A

soul-patch thingy. It’s kind of ‘I’m so cool, I’m not really a grown-up.’ Don’t you think, Evie?”
    Mrs. Guptil made a
tsk
sound. “Nisha, my darling, show some respect for your teacher, please. And shut the refrigerator if you’re not taking anything out.”
    Nisha grabbed a bunch of green grapes. She popped a couple in her mouth, then offered the rest to Lily and me. “So, Moms,” she said ultra-casually, in a way I knew Mrs. Guptilhated, “do we still have Great-grandpa’s scrapbook?”
    â€œOf course we do,” Mrs. Guptil said. “It’s in the attic. Do you think I’d just creep up there one day and toss it in the garbage? It’s your
heritage,
Nisha, my darling.” She shook her head at Lily and me. “My daughter is such an American,” she said, sighing
    After we finished the grapes and listened to Mrs. Guptil complain about her landscaper, Nisha went up to her attic and came back down to her bedroom with a big leather box. As soon as she opened it, I knew it was incredible. I mean, totally apart from the fact that it was like the whole Attic Project was lying there on her bed, all ready for Step 3, it was just an amazing thing to see: an enormous scrapbook covered in purple silk, with thick cardboardy pages full of faded photos and typed letters and fountain-pen-written notes. All of it was about Nisha’s great-grandpa Mohan, who’d been a doctor back in Delhi. He was great at it, Nisha said, but when he came to Baltimore in the twenties, no hospital would hire him because his skin was dark and he had an accent. So he worked as a janitor in the local veterans hospital, and became president of the Baltimore Socialist Party. He sent a million letters and photos back to India, which some relative stuck in a scrapbook. And one day when he was visiting Delhi, therelative gave him the scrapbook to bring home to Baltimore.
    â€œAnd now it’s mine,” Nisha said, making a cartoon mustache with her index finger. “All mine.”
    â€œPlus whoever you’re working with,” I said. Then I bit my lower lip. “So how are we going to decide who’s working with who?”
    â€œMaybe we don’t have to,” Lily said in a soothing voice. “Maybe Espee will let us all work together.”
    â€œShe won’t,” I insisted. “The assignment is to work in pairs. Meaning one attic, two people. Not three.”
    Lily put her arm around my shoulders. “Let’s talk to her tomorrow, okay? We’ll explain how we are.”
    I nodded. “What if she says no?”
    â€œThen we’ll deal with it,” Nisha said confidently. “Besides, what are you so worried about? After that answer you gave today, you’re totally her pet.”
    â€œI’m not—”
    â€œYes you are. You and Francesca. Who’s all in favor of lying.”
    Later, when I got home, Grace was sitting in the kitchen doing her AP Calculus. She immediately told me Francesca had called. Twice. And wanted me to call her back.
    â€œOkay, thanks,” I said, not reaching for the phone.Because I had a pretty good idea what the call was about: She wanted to pair up on the Attic Project.
    Grace carefully erased something in her notebook. “So how was your first day?”
    â€œI survived.” I opened the fridge, even though I wasn’t hungry. “When you had Espee you had that Attic Project, right?”
    â€œOh, who remembers
seventh grade
?” She gave me one of her superior smiles. “Oh, riiiight. You mean where we had to find family junk in the attic and then do all this research?”
    I nodded. “And was there anything?”
    â€œOf
course
not. You think Mom would keep any of that stuff? The way she cleans?”
    I closed the fridge and got a gigantic glass of ice cubes out of the freezer. “So did you look anywhere else? I mean, besides the