Read Online Sticks by Joan Bauer - Free Book Online

“All right . . . goodbye . . .”
    She turns to me. “That was quite a performance.”
    I get up and brush myself off.
    “Sit down,” she says, looking gray.
    Camille and I sit.
    “I meant
Mickey
.” Mom gives Camille a little push out of the kitchen and leans against the stove, folding her arms. “I know how much you want Joseph to help you, Mickey, and I’m sure I’d feel the same way if I were you. But there’s something you need to know.”
    “Okay.”
    Mom brushes her bangs back like they’re heavy. “You need to know that when your father was dying, he asked Joseph to look in on us from time to time, just to make sure we were okay. I’m sure your dad saw things in Joseph other people . . . 
couldn’t
. He asked Joseph to get to know you and help you. I never felt comfortable about this because Joseph always had trouble staying around, but he promised left and right that he’d be there for us. He wasn’t.” Mom steps toward me slow. “He moved out to Los Angeles after your dad died, which was certainly his right.” Mom is looking at me all sad and worried. I hate it when she looks like this. She touches her head the way she does when she gets a headache.
    “Mickey, we’re always honest with each other, right?”
    “Yeah.”
    “I want you to know how much it bothers me that Joseph didn’t fulfill his promise. He was your dad’s
best friend
. He didn’t call us. He didn’t bother to write once in nine years. He just moved away. And now he’s back. Nobody’s perfect and we need to try and forgive people when they’re not. But I’ve got to tell you, Mickey, I don’t know if Joseph is the kind of person you can count on.” She takes a big breath. “I’ve known someone else like this. He never changed.”
    “Who?”
    Mom sighs and looks down.
    I’m sitting at the table looking at the mud spot on my sneaker.
    “Are you going to ask him why he didn’t call us?”
    “No.”
    I don’t know how hard it was when Dad died. Camille said the hospital bills kept coming and the insurance wasn’t enough. I’m thinking about Dad and how he trusted Joseph Alvarez to do the right thing. He doesn’t seem like a guy you can’t trust, but like Francine says, you never know about people.
    “I don’t want you to get hurt,” Mom is saying. “I don’t want you to go blindly into working with someone whose history has been that he rarely stays and finishes the job. Are you ready to accept that?”
    “He might have changed,” I say.
    “He might have,” she agrees, “and he might not have.”
    I swallow big. I don’t know what to do. Dad wanted him to help me. Dad taught him how to play. Isn’t that important too?
    Mom shivers and pulls her robe tighter, but it can’t cover the worry in her face.
    “Could I just try, Mom? If he hasn’t changed, I’ll blow it off. I swear.”
    Mom closes her eyes for a long time. The leaky faucet’s going again. Poppy keeps trying to fix it. “He said he’d be back in town on Saturday, Mickey. He has to go to Texas.”
    “It’s okay then?”
    “For now.”
    Mom leans back. Her face looks beat. “But if I don’t like what I see just once, and I mean once, I’m pulling the plug. If Joseph can’t make it work it’s not because of you, Mickey, it’s because of him.”

CHAPTER

    I’m waiting for Saturday to come.
    If Joseph Alvarez shows up I’m going to take that real positive. If he doesn’t, it could mean lots of things because everyone knows truck drivers get stuck in bad traffic.
    Arlen said his uncle Chester went to live in Milwaukee and didn’t contact anyone in the family for seven years and then showed up with a wife, two kids, and ten pounds of bratwurst and everyone forgave him.
    Francine said to wear a bulletproof vest and to call 911 if Joseph Alvarez does anything fishy.
    I promised I’d call.
    Rory Magellan did something stupid—took apart his cousin Marna’s new stereo to see how it worked and couldn’t put it back