Read Online Firecracker by David Iserson - Free Book Online Page A

here.”
    â€œI didn’t expect to see me here either. But that’s who I am—a master of what’s not expected. Do you really want to go to this thing?”
    â€œOf course. I’m here, aren’t I?”
    â€œWell, then so am I. Shall we?”
    It was a long time before anyone answered the door. It felt even longer than that because I’m not good at small talk. Noah kept looking at me like I was supposed to ask him if he’d had a nice weekend or something. I wondered if maybe no one would ever open the door, and then I wouldn’t get credit for going to the birthday party.
    â€œYes?” asked the woman who answered the door. She wore a nervous smile, as though afraid we were there to rob her.
    â€œI’m Noah,” Noah said. “This is Astrid. We’re here for the birthday party.”
    Then the woman looked absolutely terrified. I wanted to assure her that we needed nothing from her, but then my mind wandered and I almost decided that we should try to rob her just to see what that would be like. She was an easy mark and would be too scared to tell the cops.
    â€œI don’t . . . I don’t think there is a party anymore.” She looked back into the house.
    â€œNo, there is,” I said. “I got an invitation and everything. It was pink. There was glitter on it.”
    There was another long bout of silence, and then I heard Lucy from inside the house. “It’s okay,” she said. “They can come in.”
    The living room was small but bright. There were snacks on coffee tables and more balloons. But there was no music and no people. The place was untouched, as though it were a museum about birthday parties. Lucy was trying to bury herself into the side of the couch. She was chomping away at her hair in what was not a celebratory hair eating. It was the hair eating of sadness.
    Noah walked in slowly and I followed because it had become pretty much impossible, by that point, to sneak away. He sat down on the couch next to Lucy and ate a corn chip with a hefty portion of lumpy, green-and-white mush. He smiled at her as if nothing was odd at all about the party. Then he asked a bit too enthusiastically, “What is in this dip? It’s fantastic.”
    Lucy’s mother gave a tight smile. “It’s artichoke. And there’s also crispy onions in it.”
    â€œWell,” Noah said. “It’s out of this world. Really. Good. Astrid, can I dip you a chip? You won’t believe how good this is.”
    I sat down on the other side of the couch. “No,” I said, “I believe you.”
    Lucy scooted over on the couch so she was now closer to Noah and me but still wrapped up in a tight ball. “No one . . .” she said really quiet.
    â€œWhat?” I said.
    â€œNo one . . . came.” This was pretty obvious at this point, though I hadn’t said it out loud because there was no need. Lucy lifted her head so that she was looking right at me.
    â€œI wouldn’t say no one came,” I said. “We’re here.”
    â€œThank you for coming,” she said. “But I don’t even want to think about what you must think of me.”
    Yes. She didn’t want to know what I thought about her. But to be fair, no one has ever wanted to know what I thought about them. Almost everyone mentioned in this book probably should not be reading this book. But with Lucy—and in that moment—I didn’t think of her any differently than I had before the guestless party. Why would I? “If I had a birthday party, no one would come either. Maybe Pierre, but that’s a good reason to never have a party in the first place,” I said. I wasn’t trying to make her feel better. It was simply a fact.
    â€œHa, ha,” Lucy said. “ Everyone would come. I mean . . . ” Lucy trailed off and her lip quivered, which, coupled with her lisp,