Read Online The Second Summer of the Sisterhood by Ann Brashares - Free Book Online Page B

hour or so later she checked her messages. There was one from Paul, returning a call of hers. There was one from Porter. The notorious after-date phone call. If a guy called within three days, he liked you. If he waited a week, that meant he didn’t have any better options and was probably just trying to get lucky. If he didn’t call at all, well, that was obvious.
    Porter’s call fell just inside the three-day mark. And an hour before, this also would have mattered to her.
     
    Tibby,
    Well, here are the Pants. I admit I didn’t exactly set the world on fire. I got scolded by my boss and watched a trendy fifty-year-old try to buy them. I hope you’ll do better.
    Anyway, I don’t know what Carmen told you, but I’m totally okay about Kostos and his new girlfriend. I was the one who broke up with him, remember?
    Have fun with the Pants. I miss you. Call me later tonight if you are not out being cool and sophisticated with your cool and sophisticated new filmmaker friends.
    Love,
Lena



 
    L ena loved Carmen’s kitchen. It felt safe and contained, unlike the sprawling renovation at her house, with all its gleaming white and silver steel and too-bright halogen bulbs. Also, Lena loved the food Carmen’s kitchen had in it. It was all avocados and low-fat chips and herbal teas—girl stuff. None of the giant twelve-packs of beer and endless pork chops that jammed up the fridge at her house. There were so many fewer compromises in an apartment for two than in a house for four.
    “Honey, would you like a glass of iced tea?”
    Lena looked at Carmen’s mom. She appeared to be rearranging the pots in the lower cabinets. Her hair was back in a ponytail, and she looked like she was about twenty. Christina was always pretty, but Lena had never seen her look as animated and happy as she looked today.
    “I’d love one,” Lena said.
    Carmen was scanning the movie section of the newspaper. “I’ll have one too,” she said without looking up.
    “How’s your mom?” Christina asked over the noise of the sink. She always asked this of Lena in a slightly guilty way, as if she were trying to pick up her dry cleaning without the ticket.
    “She’s all right.”
    “And how is your boyfriend? What’s his name?”
    “Kostos,” Lena said reluctantly, never eager to discuss her love life. “But he’s not my boyfriend anymore. We broke up.”
    “Ohhh. I’m sorry. Was the long-distance thing too hard?”
    Lena liked that explanation. It was succinct and it didn’t necessarily make her sound like a lunatic. “Yes. Exactly.”
    Christina took a full pitcher from the refrigerator. “Reminds me of your mother. She must know what you’re going through.”
    Lena was bewildered. “We haven’t really talked about it.”
    Christina didn’t seem to realize that not all mothers talked to their daughters about everything all the time.
    “Anyway, I don’t think she knows anything about long-distance relationships,” Lena said.
    Christina lined up three glasses. “Of course she does. She was with Eugene for at least four or five years.”
    Lena looked doubtfully at Christina.
    Christina and Lena’s mom hadn’t been close for a long time. Christina’s memory seemed to be getting jumbled, maybe on account of her own love affair.
    “Who’s Eugene?”
    Carmen had now torn herself from the movie section. She was looking back and forth from Lena to Christina.
    “Who’s Eugene?” Christina repeated. The look on her face slowly transformed from surprise to uncertainty to anxiety.
    “Uh . . .” She turned her back to the girls and poured the tea.
    “Mama? Hello? Helloooooooo?”
    Christina took a long time stirring in the sugar. When she turned back around, her face didn’t look open anymore. “Never mind. I might be mixed up. It was all a long time ago.”
    Christina was a lovable, big-hearted, totally sweet person, but she was a bad actress and a horrible liar. Lena
had
believed she was mixed up before. Now she felt certain