Cheating for the Chicken Man Read Online Free PDF Page B

Mom’s hands at the same time. “Angela, please. It’s time to forgive. It is time to move forward.”
    Kate’s mother looked up again. Her eyes glistened and then closed. “I am trying.”
    Another heavy, dead silence followed. Kate wished her mother would try a little harder and say something. But this was how it was now. She knew her mother wasn’t well, but it wasn’t the kind of sickness you could cure with antibiotics or a week of rest. Something inside her mother was broken.
    â€œIt’s okay,” J.T. said. Then he asked for the bread basket, which got everybody moving forward again.
    The bigger disappointment came after dinner, when J.T. wanted to go to bed early and Kate’s grandmother had to fetch the key to unlock his room. Kerry followed, and so did Kate, bracing herself because she knew the bed had never been made.
    â€œI had no idea!” Grandma gasped, scooping up dirty socksfrom the floor and sending Kate to retrieve fresh sheets. “Give us five minutes,” she told J.T.
    He went to sit on the stairs.
    Kerry, cradling the docile black cat in her arms like a baby, went to sit beside him. “Do you want to hold Jingles?” she asked.
    â€œFive minutes!” Grandma called out to him again while she and Kate hurriedly tucked the bottom sheet around the mattress corners. “We’ll have this place fixed up in a jiffy!”
    Kate glanced out the door, but all she could see was J.T.’s back, hunched over, unmoving.

~4~
    UNSPOKEN
    I n the morning, Kate’s phone woke her with the ding of an arriving text. She reached out from the covers to grab her phone from the night table.
    Jess:
You up? Mom’s taking
me to the mall. Sun
glasses and a new ba
thing suit. Want to
come? We can get ped
icures! She’ll pay!
    Kate hesitated. She and Jess had talked about getting new bathing suits together. Would Jess go without her? Just like that? Kate sat up so she could text back with both hands.
    K ate:
JT’s first day
home.
    She set the phone down and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Should she ask Jess to hold off on buying the suit? They hadn’t even decided one piece or two. And Jess was going to help Kate find some of that lotion that gave you an instant tan. Why couldn’t she just wait?
    Jess:
Is JT okay?
    Kate picked up her phone. She wasn’t going to get into what had happened yesterday.
    Ka te:
Fine.
    Jess:
Sure
you don’t want to c
ome?
    Kate was imagining the pedicure. She and Jess and two other friends had gotten pedicures for Jess’s eleventh birthday, andKate had enjoyed the trip to the salon, picking out the color, getting the foot massage, seeing her toes transformed. Reluctantly, she texted back.
    Kat e:
I should stay hom
e.
    Jess:
    Kate:
Sor
ry
    Jess:
ttyl
    Downstairs, everyone else was already up. J.T. was even dressed and handing his mother a note at the breakfast table.
    â€œI wrote down all the things Uncle Ray did for us. I can take over now,” he said.
    As she passed by, Kate peered over her mother’s shoulder at the list:
    CULLING
    CHECK THE FEED
    CLEAN THE STANDPIPES . . .
    â€œThank you,” Mom said softly.
    J.T. put on his baseball cap, giving it a tug front and back, and said, “Uncle Ray won’t need to come anymore. I know he’s here this morning to mow, but I told him I could learn how to do that, too.”
    Suddenly, Kate felt hopeful. Quickly, she ate a bowl of cereal and got dressed so she could follow J.T. outside.
    â€œGassing up for Uncle Ray,” he said when Kate approached the pump down by the tractor sheds where he was standing.
    Kate smiled. “I’m glad you’re home.”
    â€œMe too. You have no idea.”
    She waited for him to hang up the nozzle and cap the tractor’s fuel tank.
    â€œSorry about Mom,” she said, eager to talk. “I mean, the way she is now.”
    J.T. wiped his hands on a rag he pulled