Read Online Looking for Cassandra Jane (The Second Chances Novels) by Melody Carlson - Free Book Online Page B

family, Bryn.” I smirked at her and pointed my finger in mock accusation. “Just let it go to show you that if you keep up your wild-thing drinking ways this might happen to you, too.”
    She threw back her head and laughed. “Oh yeah, I’m so sure. I can just see me at an AA meeting now. Hi, my name is Bryn and I’m an alcoholic.” Then she got serious. “Is that why you won’t drink none, Cass?”
    I shrugged. I usually tried not to make a big deal about it when I refused a beer or whatever the going thing might be, but I suppose she was partially right. “I just don’t like the taste of alcohol,” I admitted, which was not untrue.
    She laughed again. “Ya don’t hear me complaining none. That just means more for the rest of us. Hey, where does your dad hide his booze, anyway?”
    I showed her one of his secret little hiding spots beneath the bathroom sink and watched as she poured herself half a glass of amber liquid. I didn’t really care if she emptied the entire bottle, didn’t care if he noticed it missing or not.
    By then he and I were like ships that passed in the night, anyway. I made sure I only spoke to him when I stopped in to see him at work when he was mostly sober—and then it was always just to say “hey” and joke around before I’d hit him up for some cash. I’d found that was my best chance of obtaining money during those on-again, off-again drinking days. If I waited for him to come home at night, his head would often be swimming and his pockets empty. But when I caught him on a payday, every other Friday, he’d usually give me enough for groceries and then some. Problem was, he sometimes got a draw on his check, and I could never tell exactly when that might be.
    As a result I ate at Bryn’s home quite a bit. And here’s one more thing I’ll have to give Bryn—she may have been a liar and way too loose with the boys, but she had a most generous and giving spirit. And so did her mother, Mrs. Tuttle. In some ways, looking back, I see those Tuttles almost like angels in disguise. Okay, so maybe the disguise was laid on a little thick, but I’m not quite sure what I’d have done without them. Or maybe things would’ve just unraveled all that much sooner.
    By the time I turned fifteen (the summer before entering high school) I was already feeling somewhat old and frayed and worn down in my spirit. And, I suppose, just slightly jaded, too. Life no longer seemed to hold much promise or sparkle. Not that it ever had, but at least when I was a kid, I’d had Joey around, and together the two of us weren’t afraid to dream big, and in those days we could even believe in those impossible dreams. And dreams could carry you a long ways back then. But more and more now I felt just like a kid standing outside and gazing longingly through a candy store window. I saw others living the kind of life that I knew I could never have, and I suppose it was finally getting me down. For years, I’d tried not to pay much attention to those other girls—the ones like Sally Roberts and the like. And you’d think it might’ve gotten easier over time, but it never really did. In fact, I’m sure it only became harder. And for some reason the summer of ‘69 pushed me to the limits.
    Sure, I still had Bryn. She and I still hung out a lot of the time (at least when she wasn’t with her new boy-of-the-month). I knew she was better than nothing—and better than being the town’s social outcast all on my own little lonesome. And her home really did provide a handy haven from my daddy’s fits of drunken rage, which had been coming on more frequently and with more regularity once the warm weather came upon us. For some mysterious reason, my daddy thought summertime was drinking time.
    The honest truth was I liked Bryn’s company less and less as time went by—and even that made me feel bad. More and more, I found myself wanting something more, something beyond all this. I just wasn’t exactly sure what