Independence Day Read Online Free PDF Page A

now.” Her younger daughter’s grousing wafted down the stairwell, followed by an indistinguishable response from Nick.
    Second thoughts stabbed her as she rummaged in the living room for her John Philip Sousa CD. Hadshe ruined a holiday with unreasonable demands? Had she mistaken wants for needs?
    No, dammit.
    She hadn’t behaved selfishly today. She’d merely issued a wake-up call for Nick and the girls’ own good, as well as her own. Growing up, she’d observed her workaholic father drive himself to an early grave. As an adult, she’d watched as too many of her friends had spoiled their children to the obnoxious stage. She’d seen husbands and wives grow to be strangers. If she lay down and became a doormat, what kind of a match was she for Nick? What kind of a role model for Izzy and Gabby?
    Having found the desired CD, she headed for the furnace room where she tripped over the cat litter box, out of place and full to overflowing. Normally, she would stop what she was doing to clean it for the sake of the cats her daughters had begged to bring home from the shelter. (“We’ll take care of them. Promise.” Right.)
    The new Chessie found a scrap of paper, a marker and a broken tomato stick. Skewering the paper with the stick, she wrote, “Yo! This ain’t no toxic waste dump. Clean it up! The Cats.” She jammed the stick in the corner of the litter and left the box in the middle of the floor.
    Highly satisfied with no-holds-barred Chessie, she hunted up sparklers, the beach boombox and bug repellent, then forged ahead to the darkening terrace where she immediately began slathering on lotion. Despite the fact that the mosquito seemed to be theMaine state bird, she wondered if her family—should they choose to join her—would think to lather up without a motherly nag.
    Ah, but she’d washed her hands of nagging, negotiating, coercing, reminding. She’d now moved into the fluid rinse cycle of mature communication. In the future, she would treat her family as individuals—as she wished them to treat her. She only hoped she hadn’t hung herself out to dry.
    Content that she’d protected every exposed inch of skin, she flipped on the Sousa CD. Perhaps if she seemed happy, her family would be lured to join her. She hadn’t meant to drive them away. On the contrary, she was searching for a way to draw them closer. In a more equitable fashion.
    She struck a match to a sparkler. The slender wand sprang to life, adding its cheery glow to that of the myriad fireflies dancing in the dusky gardens. Chessie raised her little torch to the heavens.
    “Huzzah,” she said softly, not sure whether she felt the proper revolutionary or one rather isolated wife and mother. An exile by her own design.
    Footsteps crunched against the stones on the terrace. She turned to see Nick standing behind her.
    “Truce?” he asked, his voice weary.
    At the sight of him, her heart beat faster. “Care to join me in the hammock?”
    “Sure.” He smacked the side of his neck with the flat of his hand, a clear sign he hadn’t put on bug lotion. Oh, well, he was a big boy.
    As Chessie sat in the hammock, Isabel called from the kitchen window. “Mom, what did you do with my Zinc Noze Boyz CD? It was in my portable player.”
    The sharp pain in Chessie’s backside told her exactly what someone had done with the player and headphones. “Isabel, you left it in the hammock. I hope it wasn’t here overnight when it rained.”
    “Criminies!” The teenager’s footsteps echoed through the house.
    “Zinc Noze Boyz.” Carefully sitting next to her in the hammock, Nick chuckled. “Now there’s a recording I wouldn’t want ruined.”
    Isabel burst onto the terrace, her arms outstretched. “Thanks,” she mumbled, grasping the player and jamming the headphones over her ears. Leaning against the house, she quickly became lost in the music, with only occasional swats to various body parts. No bug lotion. Like father, like daughter.
    Nick