Angry Management Read Online Free PDF Page A

collective guilt; we could be there in two days easy. Drive straight through, we could do it in one. You drive, right?”
    “Yes, Angus, I drive.”
    “That’s it then,” I tell her. “I’ll even let you plug your iPod into the radio.”
    “This must be what love feels like.” Man, this girl has sarcastic down . But she didn’t say no. We’ll miss one of Mr. Nak’s groups, but shit, we should get extra credit for this.
    There is such excitement building in me. Crazy as my life has seemed, if I lost either of my parents the way Sarah lost hers, I don’t know that I could stand up every day. I want her to feel better. I’m telling you, having parents that love you trumps everything, even I know that.
     
    We’re shooting through the Palouse, past rolling wheat fields, about a hundred miles south of Spokane, near the Idaho border where Washington State University and the University of Idaho play Dueling Universities just nine miles apart. Sarah is supposed to go to WSU in the fall; I’m headed for U of I. Nine miles apart; could be worse.
    “If I say turn around, we turn around,” Sarah says.
    “Aye aye, Captain.”
    “I’m serious, Angus.”
    “Do I look dumb enough to keep going if you tell me to turn around? Don’t answer that. But I’m serious, too. If you say turn around, I’ll show you true stunt-driver action.”
    “Even if I say it at the Reno city limits.”
    “Even if you say it at the front door of the restaurant,” I say back. “Even if you say it when we’re sitting in the booth.”
    “If you’re just saying that, and you think you’ll figure some way to change my mind if it happens, I’ll punch your stomach so hard your cousins will double over.”
    “Man, that other fat guy must have been a deceiver of the first order.”
    She’s quiet a minute. “That other fat guy did play fast and loose with the truth on occasion.”
    “Not all fat guys are alike.”
    “All guys are alike,” she says. And then, “All humans are alike.” She plugs her Nano into the radio and turns the sound high enough that I know to shut up. It’s a beautiful day, cool for midsummer, hot for any other time, and the contrast between fields and deep blue sky is so stark we seem like figures in a masterpiece. Words begin to stream through the speakers.
    A friend of mine is going blind
    But through the dimness,
    He sees so much better than me.
    And how he cherishes each new thing that he sees
    They are locked in his head
    He will save them for when
    He’s in darkness again.
    “Who is that?”
    “John Dawson Read.”
    “Who?”
    “Old guy. English. You wouldn’t know him.”
    “He’s good,” I say.
    “He’s better if you shut up and listen.” She flashes a smile.
    “Going blind, huh? There’s a thought.”
    “What?”
    “Nothing. He’s singing about a guy going blind.”
    We cruise along the Salmon River outside Riggins, Idaho, a little past noon, watching river rafters looking like cool-dude astronauts in their thick life jackets and sunglasses, bucking the light rapids. By late afternoon we’re just south of Boise, and finally I’ve jerked awake enough times that I’m getting whiplash, so I pull over to let her drive.
    We’ve not talked a lot—Sarah doesn’t have that need to fill the lapses in conversation, and I’m wondering what we’re heading into. The closer we get to Reno, the more remote she seems. We hit the Nevada border in the dark, me blinking in and out of sleep, Sarah with her eyes glued to the road. My glasses are on the dashboard and she is completely beautiful to me, her blurred features smooth in the dim dash lights. I see what would have been, but for a fit of rage. I wonder how much of her personality has been shaped by people’s reactions, by not looking into that store window for fear of seeing herself, or wondering if those people crossing the street a half block up are crossing because they really have something to do over there or because they don’t want