Read Online Second Nature by Alice Hoffman - Free Book Online Page A

results. Lydia was only a few months older than Connor, but she had specialized in pinching when they were babies, and graduated to snubbing him completely by the time they’d entered junior high.
    “Well?” she said to him now. She held one hand over her eyes to block out the sun. “Aren’t you going to clean your shirt?”
    It seemed impossible that Connor had known her his whole life and had never once noticed how beautiful she was.
    “What?” Lydia said when she saw the look on his face. “You,” Connor said, before he could stop himself, and then he got all flustered, and pretended to dab at his shirt, which had already dried in the sun.
    Lydia chewed a piece of ice and acted as if she didn’t know what he meant, but there were goose bumps up and down her arms. She’d fallen in love with him so slowly she didn’t even know it herself, until it had all but smacked her in the face last week when she’d seen him talking to a red-haired girl before gym class. She’d actually taken sick with jealousy and had to be sent home by the school nurse.
    “Who’s that with your mom?” she asked.
    Connor whipped his head around as though he’d been shot. Over by the long picnic table, set out with pies and cakes, his mother was introducing Stephen to the Carsons and the Simons. Robin was wearing a blue dress and a strand of old pearls that had belonged to her grandmother. It was amazing to see how calm she looked; how young, really, as though she weren’t even Connor’s mother. Robin arched her neck when she laughed at one of Jeff Carson’s jokes, then poured two glasses of lemonade. When she saw Connor staring, she waved, then turned back to Miriam Carson. This was the date they’d been aiming for. They’d anxiously planned for Stephen’s introduction to their neighbors back when it seemed they had all the time in the world, and now it was here, and Connor wondered if he was the only one who was worried. Stephen’s bad haircut had grown out, and he was wearing the clothes they’d picked out for him at Macy’s. Standing beneath a mimosa tree on a beautiful hot day he looked like any handsome young man you might meet at a party. There was an official story they were supposed to tell, with facts Connor had helped them invent, but looking at Lydia he became undone. Could it be that he’d never noticed that her eyes were blue? Lydia turned for a moment, to wave away her little sister, Jenny, so she couldn’t eavesdrop, and when she turned back to Connor, he could feel his pulse quicken.
    “He’s just some guy who’s living with us,” Connor told her. His face was burning hot, and he held his glass of lemonade up to his forehead.
    “He’s gorgeous,” Lydia said, and when she saw Connor’s face fall, she almost laughed out loud. He felt the same way that she did, whether he knew it or not. “For someone his age,” she added tactfully.
    Miriam Carson was pretty much saying the same thing to Robin as she sliced a pecan pie.
    “His cheekbones,” Miriam whispered. “Those eyes.” She turned to Stephen and handed him a fork and a plateful of pie. “Slavic blood?” she guessed. “Ukrainian?”
    Stephen balanced the plate in one hand and looked to Robin for help.
    “The Midwest,” Robin said. “Napkin?” she asked Stephen, because the pie was still warm and the filling dripped over the edge of the plate.
    Stephen had already begun to eat the pie, since it seemed that Miriam wanted him to. It was disgusting, pure sugar, but he had to chew what was already in his mouth and swallow it.
    “I baked that,” Miriam told him.
    “Ah,” Stephen said.
    Robin forced herself to keep a straight face. As soon as Miriam went to look for more paper plates, she pulled Stephen aside, behind the mimosa.
    “If you don’t like something you don’t have to eat it,” she said.
    “No, thank you,” Stephen said, hesitant.
    “Exactly,” Robin agreed.
    Most of the neighbors were already there, including Stuart and