Almost Home Read Online Free PDF Page B

we take showers first. I stand guard for her outside of Dad and Linda’s bathroom and when she’s finally done and the mirrors are all steamy, we trade off. In the shower I can’t hear anything besides the water and it kind of freaks me out: I imagine someone showing up and seeing Tracy sitting on their bed; they’d call the cops. But the shower feels so good cutting through a week of dirt and grease that soon I mostly don’t think of anything but that.
    When I come out of the bathroom Tracy isn’t there. For a second I freeze and listen: if someone came home there’d be voices. I think about crawling out the window if I need to. But all I hear is Tracy walking around below me. I call out her name but she doesn’t answer so I walk down the stairs, still drying my hair.
    The door to Brian’s room is cracked. I say Tracy’s name again, secretly hoping she’ll come out so I don’t have to go in there, but she doesn’t. I push open the door and walk onto his ugly beige carpet.
    Tracy doesn’t even turn around when I walk in. She just stands there, staring at his bed with her eyes slitted and her nostrils flared and this look on her face that’s really really far away. Brian’s bed is unmade, you can see his imprint in it, and the carpet suddenly feels itchy and gross under my bare feet. I keep walking toward Tracy. When I get up close I can see her cheeks are wet and it’s not from the shower because the rest of her is dry. She’s breathing hard like some kind of little animal and I say her name again, this time super soft like a whisper almost, and she snaps her head up and around to look at me and her whole face rearranges. She inhales hard, then closes her eyes and shakes her head. When she opens her eyes again she grabs my arm. “Come on” she says. “Let’s go raid the fridge.”
    We leave with both our backpacks full of chips and cereal and peanut butter, bread and carrots, plus a jug of water and two sleeping bags. Tracy went through the drawers too and when she found this little knife small enough to fit in a pocket she told me to take it; I wrapped it in a paper towel and slipped it into my jeans. I keep feeling it. I took some twenties too from Linda’s room, memorizing how the bras were stacked and putting them back exactly perfect. I gave the money to Tracy right away; I thought she’d want to carry it. I cleaned everything up better than I’ve ever cleaned before, threw our towels in the hamper and rearranged the fridge so they wouldn’t see the empty parts. I didn’t even go into my room.
    I lock the door behind us; Tracy watches while I put the key back down beneath the plastic rock. As soon as it’s out of my hands I realize the thing I was scared of didn’t happen: I went back in the house without it changing me back to how I was. I even went in Brian’s room and the only thing I thought about in there was Tracy. All of a sudden I feel really light even though my backpack’s ten pounds heavier.
    After that I decide I don’t really want to go back. Or actually it’s not a decision exactly, it’s more of a realization. The whole last week I was procrastinating on going home like it was a math worksheet and every once in a while I’d hear Linda’s annoying voice in my head yelling at me for putting things off and my heart would get all poundy knowing I’d have to do it eventually and the longer I waited the worse it would get. But now all of a sudden it’s like my math teacher canceled the assignment and I just don’t have to do it. Coming down the hill and back toward Hollywood I’m someone different from Elly who goes to school and eats in the cafeteria and sits in class and comes home at night and tells Dad and Linda how my day was. I’m so much bigger now and beautiful and I can go back to the house and just take what I want when they’re gone and I even have a different name. I’m never going back.
    Tracy’s got a ring through her left nostril which I think looks