Read Online Snap by Carol Snow - Free Book Online Page B

had ever tasted, though that may have just been because I wasso hungry. Or maybe it was the setting: when the sun was shining, Sandyland didn’t suck at all.
    Still chewing, I tried to give Duncan back his burger, but he just said, “Nah, have more.” My second bite was slightly less greedy than my first, my third bordering on normal.
    â€œI lived in a town called Madison once,” Duncan said after I finally insisted he take the burger back (trying really hard not to gaze longingly at the remaining half). “Is that your real name?”
    It was kind of a weird question. “Well, yeah,” I said, licking my lips. “Isn’t Duncan your real name?”
    â€œNope.” He took a small bite of his burger and then held it out to me. “Finish it.”
    I checked his expression to make sure he was serious about the burger, and then I reached for it slowly, as if he might snatch it away. “You really don’t want it?” Of course he wanted the burger. Why else would he have ordered it?
    â€œI’ll eat the fries.”
    My hunger was so intense that I gobbled the burger quickly, before I had a chance to feel guilty.
    â€œSo, what’s your real name, then?” I asked, using the back of my hand to wipe grease off my mouth in an extremely ladylike fashion.
    â€œI’d tell you.” He held my gaze with his green, green eyes. “But then I’d have to kill you.”
    A smile tugged at my mouth. “That would be a waste of a perfectly good burger.”
    He grinned, and his green eyes crinkled.
    â€œIs Duncan your middle name, then?” I asked, suddenly curious.
    â€œNope. I named myself.”
    â€œAfter the character in Macbeth?”
    He raised his eyebrows. “The donuts.”
    Donuts. Mmm.
    He said, “Used to be, I’d pick a new name every time I moved. But that got confusing. I’ve stuck with Duncan for a while now.” He plucked a ketchup-drenched fry from the Styrofoam container and popped it in his mouth.
    â€œHow many times have you moved?”
    He looked up, thinking. “Twenty-four times? Maybe twenty-three.”
    Twenty-three moves? I shuddered. “Wow. I’ve only moved once, and it was in the same town.”
    A gray gull swooped past before circling back to land near our feet. Duncan tossed a fry, and the bird pounced.
    He said, “I’m on my eleventh school, I know that. There’d be more, but my father homeschooled me for a couple of years.” When he said “homeschooled,” he held his fingers up in quotation marks.
    â€œBut he’s not moving anymore,” Delilah said. “We’re keeping him. My mom said he can stay with us, even if his dad takes off.”
    Duncan didn’t respond, just chucked a few final fries onto the asphalt before closing up his empty Styrofoam shell. Squawking gulls swooped in from every angle to battle over the scraps.
    â€œYou could’ve given those fries to me,” Delilah said.
    â€œWhat about your mom?” I asked Duncan.
    â€œShe joined a cult,” he said, as if he were talking about a job transfer. He stood up from the bench and headed for the nearest trash can.
    â€œDon’t throw that out,” Delilah said, reaching for the container. Duncan gave it to her without question and took his place next to me on the bench. Maybe it was just my imagination, but it seemed like he was sitting closer to me than before.
    â€œA cult,” I said, hungry for details but trying hard to keep all traces of “that’s whacked” out of my voice.
    â€œWhen I was three,” he said. “It wasn’t really her fault. She just fell in with this weird-ass crowd, and they just, like, brainwashed her.”
    Leonardo, his food all gone, offered his container to Delilah. “Nah, I got enough,” she said. When he walked over to the trash can, she took his seat on the bench. In retaliation, he sat on top of