Frost Read Online Free PDF

It’s fun.”
    David laid a napkin over his pasta, as if covering a corpse. Blots of red seeped through the thin, white paper. “How’s this?” he said. “I had to leave school—Pembroke—because they busted me for cheating. At the same time, my dad’s mental illness got really bad and I didn’t want him to have to live in a group facility, so I moved home to help my mother take care of him. But I guess I didn’t do a very good job because he decided the government had sent me there to poison him. Barcroft took into account the extenuating circumstances, and the fact that I got really good grades at Pembroke, and let me in. Any questions?”
    The sounds of other diners’ conversations, laughter, and utensils clanking against their plates seemed to swell around us as we sat there staring at our food. I struggled to come up with the right words. A schizophrenic father. God.
    Unfortunately, Abby spoke first. “You might want to put a different spin on that for the radio show,” she said.
    I knew she was hoping to lighten the moment, but she just sounded harsh.
    David didn’t look up.
    The meal ended quickly. On my way out of the dining hall, I stopped to put my tray—minus silverware and uneaten apple—on the kitchen conveyor belt. David placed his after mine.
    “Sorry,” he said. “Long day. I should have sat alone.”
    “It wasn’t you.” I plunked my utensils in the designated bin of murky dishwater, trying not to let any splash on us. “They meant well, though.”
    We followed the flow of students into the hallway and down marble stairs that were smoothed unevenly by years of footsteps. I let Viv and Abby go on ahead, instead keeping pace with David.
    Outside, he said, “I have my ride,” and gestured to the bike rack at the north end of Commons. I was walking the same general direction, so I drifted next to him.
    “Is, um, is your father okay?” I asked as he squatted by a blue road bike. He’d obviously gotten sick of answering questions. Still, I couldn’t leave it hanging like that.
    “Depends what you mean by okay,” he said, undoing the chunky padlock. “He’s alive. Living in a facility, for now.”
    “I think it’s amazing that you took care of him,” I said. “Schizophrenia must be so . . . scary.”
    “He’s actually not schizophrenic. Something similar.”
    “Oh. The one . . . what’s it called . . . with mood-disorder symptoms?” I asked.
    David stood up, massively thick chain in his hands, brows drawing together. “Schizoaffective,” he said. “Yeah. Do you know someone—?”
    “No, no. I took Intro Psych last year.”
    “Oh.” He wrapped and fastened the chain around his waist. I couldn’t believe he could bike with it on. “Well, yeah. It’s scary. In lots of ways.”
    I watched the late sun stream orange through plum-colored clouds. Probably one of the reasons it was scary was because it has a genetic component. The things I didn’t want to inherit from my parents—selfishness, undependability—were things that were under my control, not predetermined, but I still worried about them. This was a whole different story.
    “When is Celeste getting here tomorrow?” I asked as David backed his bike away from the rack.
    “Not sure yet. You know . . . what Abby said in there . . .” He stopped and met my eyes. “You guys don’t have to pretend you’re happy to live with her. I know you’re not, and I don’t blame you. You had this nice, private thing going on.”
    Even though he didn’t sound defensive or judgmental, my first instinct was to lie, to tell him that we really were happy to live with Celeste. Then I wondered what the point was.
    “It’s not that I dislike her,” I said, twisting the stem of my apple. “I mean, I love how creative and . . . passionate she is. But she makes me nervous. Sometimes, I think she might not even like me.”
    “Really?” he said. “I know she can be a pain in the ass, but she definitely likes