And Then Things Fall Apart Read Online Free PDF Page B

Amanda.
    Amanda, it’s true, is sort of hot, if you are into girls like her. And if you are a stupid hormone-driven idiot like my dad. My mom isn’t chopped liver, though. She has longish brown hair, not unlike a mermaid’s, and her ears are pierced more than once, which is a little lame but hot if you areher age. Which is something I honestly do not know—more than forty and younger than fifty is my best guess. She is very amazing, and although she has abandoned her only daughter at this suburban version of the Bates Motel, she is, actually, or at least often is, my favorite person
    Amanda. Ugh. If you were looking for the polar opposite of my mom, it would be her. (See chart.)
MOM
AMANDA
Brunette with auburn highlights
Blonde (greasy from pizza)
BA from University of Wisconsin
Triton Community College student
Triple-pierced ears
Tacky navel ring
Great family (Auntie, me, etc.)
Brother in jail for check fraud
Awesome boot collection
Ballet flats (cool, but still opposite)
Green eyes
Brown eyes
Been around the world
Been to Canada, once. Camping
Great cook (inspired, really)
Doesn’t like fish because it’s too fishy
Married to Dad
NOT married to Dad
    I could go on and on and freaking on. But they are also opposite in ways that are more complicated. My mom works all the time. And when I say all the time, I mean every day and late at night and early in the morning. She doesn’t even sit down to eat lunch because she is always on the go, and it makes her perpetually exhausted and angry.
    There was a time, before my parents got the restaurant, when we actually went out to dinner. But the whole business is tainted now. Any place we go, Mom’s always tallying how much profit they are clearing. Even at weddings and catered graduation parties, I can see the wheels in her brain clicking away, calculating their markup and wondering who did their draperies. Should she get a guy in to stencil some maps of Italy on the wall? Should she add a weekly pasta special or would that be too much for Jorge and Sebastian to handle in the kitchen?
    She used to be more fun too before the D&D. We talked a lot more. She sang around the house and actually baked cookies once in a while. How Martha, I know. But the cookies were good, and it was fun and she was totally cool to be around.
    Amanda, on the other hand, goes to community college part-time and works at the Dine & Dash. She goes to concerts downtown and sees lots of movies. She shops and buys (or occasionally shoplifts) expensive nail polish with stupid names. How noble. She screws marriedmen for fun. That’s about it. I don’t think she even reads books.
    !
    Mom’s the one who
hired
Amanda in the first place, which is possibly the most depressing thing ever. Mom said Amanda had “good energy” and would be “great with customers.” Did my dad think,
Nice tits,
or,
How will she look wearing obscene lingerie, dancing in the walk-in freezer for an audience of cheese, bags of ice, and me?
That’s where Mom said she found them, ridiculous underwear and all. Oh, the humanity.
    What hurts so bad, and I mean Bell Jar bad, is that I really liked Amanda. Why I would befriend such an insane, undermining, manipulative whore from the underworld is beyond me. Before I found out about her and Dad, we were so close that she was the one who helped me bleach and dye my hair for the first time. Said she had done it before. Said, “It will look so much better than your hair now.” Said, “What are you, chicken?”
    Anything hair-related was something I would normally have done with Nic. She was my go-to style guru and we were always deeply involved in each other’s evolving look. It’s what we did together. But there was nothing normal about me at that point. Things at home with my parents fighting all the time and with Matt and our white-hot love were spiraling out of control.
    At Amanda’s apartment I sat in a folding chair