Read Online Things I’ll Never Say by Ann Angel - Free Book Online Page B

have’. And then I plugged him right between the hairy eyeballs!”
    My favorite story, though, was the one Mrs. Kepner never finished. She started it the last time we went shopping. On the way, Ruthie kept trying to pump me for her book report on
Shiloh
, but I was a lot more interested in her mother’s potboiler. This one was about a princess who started out so poor that, in order to make the rent, her family forced her to marry a hideous beast who, even though he looked like a giant wolf, had a palace that was high and dry and paid for.
    â€œSome girls, they’ll settle for anyone with an open wallet, right? But this princess, she didn’t care about men with fancy airs or panty hose. She wanted a guy who knew how to have fun, you know what I mean?” Mrs. Kepner stopped, cradling her Pic-Fresh bag, to light a cigarette; as we continued down the street, I watched the ashes grow longer and longer. “Most men, I don’t care if they’re Lord High Whatchamacallit, they just don’t get it. They think romance is turning down the TV for dinner.”
    I couldn’t take my eyes off that fragile cocoon at the end of Mrs. Kepner’s cigarette. Each time she inhaled, the end lit up and grew longer. The sun glanced off her hair, turning it orange. Her makeup, more liberally applied than Ruthie’s and mine at our makeover, made her a cartoon cover girl, a face like the ones Maynard Owens drew on top of balloon boobs and passed to me in science.
    â€œTurns out, then, this princess fooled everyone. ’Stead of being miserable with that saber-tooth boy toy of hers, she was happier than she’d ever been. He brought out the best in her, you know?”
    â€œHow does it end?” Ruthie, walking between us, was still focused on
Shiloh.
“Does the dog die?” She claimed she hadn’t read the last chapter, but I figured she hadn’t even started the book. The report was due the next day. “I’ll bet the dog dies. Am I right?”
    I told her I didn’t want to spoil the surprise for her, but the truth is, if she’d been one of my for-real friends, the ones I needed more than they needed me, I would have given her a plot summary on the spot. Instead, I looked at Mrs. Kepner over Ruthie’s shoulder. “So?” I said.
    â€œSo the two of them had more fun together than either of them ever had alone. Every day, they slept in the beast’s big carved bed, but every night, they partied in the forest. The beast took her for long rides on his hairy back, and they played this game where if she fell off, he’d jump her bones. And her bones were pretty hot, you know?”
    â€œMom!” Ruthie stopped walking. She put her bag of groceries on the sidewalk. “This is way too heavy. I got all the bottles in here.”
    Not very gently, I took Ruthie’s bag and put my own into her arms. When I’d made the switch, I turned back to her mother. “So then what happened?”
    Mrs. Kepner took another drag, frowned at her daughter, then started down the street again. “Well, you girls have hardly lived long enough to know it, but good times? They’re over before you know you’ve had them. Turns out, that beast wasn’t no beast at all.” (Exhale.) “He was a legitimate, card-carrying prince who’d been put under a spell. It took the kiss of True Love to break it.”
    Ruthie, who had given up trying to wheedle
Shiloh
crib notes, tore a piece of paper off the edge of her grocery bag and put it in her mouth. She chewed on it thoughtfully as Mrs. Kepner explained what happened next.
    â€œSee, the princess was falling in love with this hairy fool.” (Drag.) “She loved the way he looked at her with his wolf eyes. And she loved the way he put his paws on her face but kept his big old claws pulled in.” (Exhale.)
    â€œI’m bored.” Ruthie, who had undoubtedly heard every one of her