Read Online The Elephant of Surprise (The Russel Middlebrook Series Book 4) by Brent Hartinger - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Brent Hartinger
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Now he was a lot more filled out (how he'd gained weight as a freegan, I didn’t know).
But it wasn't just that. I remembered him looking sort of shell-shocked, which isn't something a freshman usually thinks about a senior. Now he wasn't like that at all: he seemed bold, confident, a natural born leader—a different person completely.
"You're probably thinking I had this terrible childhood," Wade said. "That my parents divorced, that I grew up miserable, and now I've rejected the whole middle class lifestyle."
"No!" I said, except that's pretty much exactly what I'd been thinking.
"Well, it's sort of true. I mean, my early childhood was great. My parents were great. I was an only kid, but I was a good student, so they had big plans for me—my whole family did, my grandparents, my aunts and uncles. I was going to be the first member of my family to go to college. I was going to be the one to change the world. It was all going according to plan, but then when I was about twelve, my dad got sick. A year later, he died."
"Wow, that sucks," I said.
"My mom took it hard. But it didn't change anything. She was determined to keep the house, even if it meant her working two jobs. Which it did. But everything was different. Before, the future—my future—had been this happy, joyful thing, like we were all on this road trip to California. Now it was the exact opposite of joy. Now it was something I absolutely had to do, the only thing that would make my mom and my dead dad's whole lives worthwhile. It started to feel like I was heading somewhere completely out of my control, like I was marching off to some kind of prison camp. But of course, I couldn't tell my mom any of this."
I nodded. My childhood had been totally different than Wade's, but I understood where he was coming from. Especially the part about not being able to tell your parents what you really feel.
Without another word, he started forward on the bike again. I guess that meant we weren't going inside. For all I knew, his mother didn't even live there anymore. Even if she did, how likely was it that she'd accepted her freegan son? From a parent's point of view, that had to be even worse than being gay. (And what if he was freegan and gay, which is what I desperately hoped?)
As we headed down the street, we passed a woman in an orange waitress' uniform scraping dog shit off her shoe in the gravel next to her driveway. At first, she just scowled at us, but Wade waved, and she recognized him and smiled, rolling her eyes at her messy shoe. I wondered if she knew he was a freegan now.
He led me down a couple more streets, then into a vacant lot and up a trail to a grassy hill where we could look out over the city on the other side, and I couldn't help but think of that Charles Dickens story A Christmas Carol, where the ghosts take Ebenezer Scrooge on a tour of his life, except that rather than show me my life, Wade was showing me his.
Wade pointed to the building right below—it was white and boxy like a hospital. "That's where my mom worked the night shift. It's a nursing home. It's also where she lost it one night."
"Lost it?"
"She cut the cords to all the call-buttons. Basically, she snapped. So she got 'sent away' for a while."
"Sent away?"
"A mental hospital."
"Ah," I said. "How old were you?"
"Seventeen. It was halfway through my senior year."
Talk about shell-shocked, I thought.
"Some relatives pitched in, and the plan was for me to stay in the house by myself until my mom got better, or until it was time for me to go away for college."
"Yeah? So?"
He pointed again, to a building down the road beyond the hospital—a supermarket. "I had a job—I'd had a job all through school. First, I was a bag boy, but I worked my way up to checker. That's where I met my first freegan. For a long time, I'd been surprised by how much food we threw out—even after the food banks came and took all the expired food they could. Then I noticed these people who
But it wasn't just that. I remembered him looking sort of shell-shocked, which isn't something a freshman usually thinks about a senior. Now he wasn't like that at all: he seemed bold, confident, a natural born leader—a different person completely.
"You're probably thinking I had this terrible childhood," Wade said. "That my parents divorced, that I grew up miserable, and now I've rejected the whole middle class lifestyle."
"No!" I said, except that's pretty much exactly what I'd been thinking.
"Well, it's sort of true. I mean, my early childhood was great. My parents were great. I was an only kid, but I was a good student, so they had big plans for me—my whole family did, my grandparents, my aunts and uncles. I was going to be the first member of my family to go to college. I was going to be the one to change the world. It was all going according to plan, but then when I was about twelve, my dad got sick. A year later, he died."
"Wow, that sucks," I said.
"My mom took it hard. But it didn't change anything. She was determined to keep the house, even if it meant her working two jobs. Which it did. But everything was different. Before, the future—my future—had been this happy, joyful thing, like we were all on this road trip to California. Now it was the exact opposite of joy. Now it was something I absolutely had to do, the only thing that would make my mom and my dead dad's whole lives worthwhile. It started to feel like I was heading somewhere completely out of my control, like I was marching off to some kind of prison camp. But of course, I couldn't tell my mom any of this."
I nodded. My childhood had been totally different than Wade's, but I understood where he was coming from. Especially the part about not being able to tell your parents what you really feel.
Without another word, he started forward on the bike again. I guess that meant we weren't going inside. For all I knew, his mother didn't even live there anymore. Even if she did, how likely was it that she'd accepted her freegan son? From a parent's point of view, that had to be even worse than being gay. (And what if he was freegan and gay, which is what I desperately hoped?)
As we headed down the street, we passed a woman in an orange waitress' uniform scraping dog shit off her shoe in the gravel next to her driveway. At first, she just scowled at us, but Wade waved, and she recognized him and smiled, rolling her eyes at her messy shoe. I wondered if she knew he was a freegan now.
He led me down a couple more streets, then into a vacant lot and up a trail to a grassy hill where we could look out over the city on the other side, and I couldn't help but think of that Charles Dickens story A Christmas Carol, where the ghosts take Ebenezer Scrooge on a tour of his life, except that rather than show me my life, Wade was showing me his.
Wade pointed to the building right below—it was white and boxy like a hospital. "That's where my mom worked the night shift. It's a nursing home. It's also where she lost it one night."
"Lost it?"
"She cut the cords to all the call-buttons. Basically, she snapped. So she got 'sent away' for a while."
"Sent away?"
"A mental hospital."
"Ah," I said. "How old were you?"
"Seventeen. It was halfway through my senior year."
Talk about shell-shocked, I thought.
"Some relatives pitched in, and the plan was for me to stay in the house by myself until my mom got better, or until it was time for me to go away for college."
"Yeah? So?"
He pointed again, to a building down the road beyond the hospital—a supermarket. "I had a job—I'd had a job all through school. First, I was a bag boy, but I worked my way up to checker. That's where I met my first freegan. For a long time, I'd been surprised by how much food we threw out—even after the food banks came and took all the expired food they could. Then I noticed these people who
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