Inferno Read Online Free PDF Page A

should be. Mom does it all the time. I guess she’d rather avoid the truth if it isn’t what she wants to hear.
    â€œSure,” I say. “Good day.”
    Mom is short and fine-boned, with fair hair and brown eyes. It’s hard to believe we are related. I’m definitely my dad’s kid though. I have his wiry dark hair—now cut the same as his, come to think of it—his tall, broad-shouldered build and his blue eyes.
    I have my dad’s obsession with books and reading too. When I was little, he used to read to me all the time:
The Wind in the Willows, Peter Pan and Wendy, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
. The original unabridged texts, never the Disney versions. When I was in first grade, we moved on to
The Jungle Book, Treasure Island
and
Gulliver’s Travels
. Poetry too—T.S. Eliot, Edward Lear, Lewis Carroll. We memorized
The Hunting of the Snark
together. I used to spend hours reciting it to myself.
    None of which really equipped me to deal with classmates raised on morning cartoons and after-school sitcoms. It was probably just as well that I’d also inherited Dad’s loner tendencies.
    â€œAnything interesting happen?” Mom asks, ever hopeful.
    I think about my day. “Not really.”
Unless you countcutting class and going to the Juvenile Detention Center with a girl with no eyebrows
.
    She starts dishing the bright orange soup. Clearly she is on a health kick again. I suspect one of her magazines is to blame for this rather toxic-looking dinner. Maybe it’s supposed to make my hair grow faster.
    â€œWhat are you up to this evening?” she asks. “Any plans?”
    â€œNope.”
    â€œHomework?”
    â€œSome. I might just read.”
    â€œYou read too much. You always have your nose buried in something.”
    â€œSo? I like reading.”
    She presses her lips together. “It doesn’t seem right. You’re a beautiful girl, Emily. You should be going out with friends, buying clothes, talking about boys...”
    She’s unreal. “Mom, are we seriously having this conversation?”
    â€œWhen I was your age, I’d have loved to go to parties and dances and all that.”
    â€œRight. Mom, I’ve been to parties, okay? Everyone plays drinking games and gets wasted. Then they either make out or have stupid boring conversations about nothing. I’m so not interested.”
    She looks a little shocked. “I’m sure not all the parties are like that.”
    â€œYeah, well. Just be glad I’d rather read.”
    â€œOh, honey. Of course I’m glad you like to read.I just don’t like to see you spending so much time on your own.” She hesitates. “There’s a course I was looking at...”
    â€œReally? You’re going to do a course?”
    â€œNo, no. For you.”
    I should have guessed. “What kind of course?” I ask.
    â€œIt’s a...well, a social thing. A group for girls.” She shifts in her chair and looks at Dad instead of me. “Self-esteem. Social skills. That kind of thing.”
    Dad looks at me, eyebrows gathered and forehead wrinkled. “First I’ve heard,” he says apologetically.
    I ignore him and glare at Mom. “Please. My self-esteem is fine. My social skills are fine.”
    â€œOf course they are, sweetie. I just thought it might be a good way for you to make some new friends.”
    â€œYeah. If I wanted friends with low self-esteem and poor social skills, I’m sure it’d be terrific.”
    â€œEmily...”
    â€œI’m going up to my room.” I push away my orange soup and stand up. “To be anti-social in private.”
    Upstairs, I lie on my bed for a while. I check my e-mail. I do a hundred sit-ups and fifty push-ups. The big old-fashioned clock on my wall ticks away loudly. I wonder if Parker and her friends are going to steal the sign tonight. I realize I never got a phone number