Read Online The Truth about Us by Janet Gurtler - Free Book Online

there’s a stage. On it, there’s a microphone on a stand. A couple of men are standing behind it, talking. I speed toward the stage and run up the stairs.
    â€œWe have a lost boy!” I shout at the men. “Kyle. I was watching him for Flynn.” My face burns. My heart is ready to explode right from my chest. I should have found someone to look after him while I went to the washroom. I didn’t know kids could slip out and disappear so quickly, even when you told them not to.
    One of the men nods and steps up to the microphone. “Attention, please. We have a lost little boy. Kyle Carson. He’s five. Brown hair.”
    I glance around the room and see Flynn. The panic on his face as he runs toward the stage makes me want to pass out.
    â€œEveryone in the building, please search the area around you,” the man says over the mike.
    â€œWhat the hell?” Flynn says to me when he reaches the foot of the stage. “Where the hell did he go?” He runs up the stairs and grabs a hold of my arm. Hard. “Where did he go?”
    My heart freezes, yet somehow a hot tear drips down my cheek. I shake my head, my lips tight. I have no answer. What were we all thinking, leaving me in charge? I’m not cut out for caring for myself properly, never mind a child.
    A buzz travels through the crowd outside the building as the guests discuss what’s going on inside, and someone asks if lunch is going to be late. I close my eyes and try to breathe. We have to find him. I have to find him. There’re bad people in this world. I know that for a fact.
    â€œFor God’s sake,” Flynn says to no one in particular. “Where the hell is he?”
    I’m ready to throw up or run away myself. What can I do? I think of my dad’s words. “You can’t always hide away from your trouble,” he says. Not even ironically, as if he doesn’t notice that everyone in my family has gone into hiding.
    Hiding.
    I remember the story my mom used to tell. From when I was a kid. Hiding in closets. I run off the stage and hurry through the dining room and into the kitchen. I keep running and don’t stop until I reach Stella’s office. I pull open the first cupboard level with the ground. Nothing. I pull open the next. Nothing. I run to the closet and take a deep breath. And then I open that one.

chapter seven
    Kyle’s curled up in a ball on the floor. Sleeping.
    The what-ifs I’ve been holding back rush into my brain, and I sink to my knees.
    â€œKyle?” I say. His eyes open and he smiles at me, his little face innocent and sweet.
    â€œAre you crying, Jess?” he asks.
    â€œKyle Carson,” a voice yells from behind me. Flynn races to the closet and stares down at the two of us on the ground. “You scared the living shit out of us,” he says.
    Kyle looks up at him with huge eyes. “Flynn, you swore ,” he says.
    I can’t stop. It’s as if a dam has been opened in my head, and I can’t shut it off. I sniffle and sit on the floor, crying like a big old baby. I’m not sure it’s even about Kyle after a while.
    Flynn kneels down beside me and puts a hand on my shoulder. “Hey,” he says softly. “It’s okay. He’s okay.”
    I shake my head, but my face and my nose are running and gushing gross liquids all over the place. What if he hadn’t been there? I feel like a complete and utter failure.
    Flynn’s hand stays on my shoulder. “It’s okay,” he mumbles, like I’m the little kid.
    Kyle sits up and crawls into my lap and wraps his arms around me. It shocks the snot out of me.
    â€œWhat were you doing, buddy?” I ask him and hiccup and sniffle.
    â€œI was really tired, Jess.” He yawns and puts his head on my shoulder. The warmth of his hug quiets all the noise that’s warring inside of me, and I’m filled with a gooey kind of calm.
    â€œKyle,” Flynn