Sammy Keyes and the Wedding Crasher Read Online Free PDF

Marissa’s family had a nanny, a maid, a gardener, and a grocery service, and running away would have involved a limo. “Did she drive you?”
    “No! I just called her when we got here so she wouldn’t worry.” She hesitated, then said, “Are you making fun of me? Because we’re in crisis mode over here, in case you haven’t noticed!”
    I mumble, “Sorry,” then say, “Look, we’re kind of in crisis mode over here, too, and it’s almost nine. I doubt Grams is going to let me come over.” I glance at Grams, and sure enough she shakes her head. She also gives me the cut-it-short signal, so I tell Marissa, “Actually, I’ve got to get off the phone now. We’re waiting for a callback from Lady Lana.”
    “What’s going on?”
    “I can’t get into it now. I’ll come by Hudson’s tomorrow and we’ll catch up, okay?”
    She says, “Sure,” and I get off the phone.
    Trouble is, my wonderful mother doesn’t call back.
    Not that night.
    Not the next day.
    I wasn’t exactly hanging around, holding my breath that Her Royal Flakiness would return one of Grams’ twenty phone messages, but by noon I was sick to death of hoping Casey would call, so I finally grabbed my skateboard and told Grams, “I’m going over to Hudson’s and then to the mall for shoes.”
    “Shoes?” she asks, all hopeful-like.
    I laugh because I know she’s thinking that maybe I’m sick of my torn-up high-tops and ready for a pair of “decent” shoes. “Yeah, Grams, shoes.” I pull the swatch of fabric from my jeans. “Lavender ones.”
    Her face crinkles. “To match the bridesmaid’s dress?”
    This totally surprises me because with the whole Lady Lana thing, I hadn’t even told her about the Mountain of Lavender or having to get shoes dyed. “Uh … yeah.”
    Her face crinkles harder. “Are the men wearing lavender cummerbunds?”
    I tilt my head a little. “How do you
know
these things?”
    She swipes some invisible sweat from her forehead. “I cannot see Gil Borsch carrying off lavender.”
    I laugh. “Me neither.”
    “Debra’s sewing everything herself?”
    I nod. “Yup.”
    “Poor dear,” she says with a sad little shake of her head. “Poor, poor dear.”
    Grams has our door open and is checking the outside hallway to make sure the coast is clear, seeing how it’s against the rules for me to be living with her and all. When she’s sure it is, she whispers, “Run along. And call me if you’re going to be later than six.”
    So I sneak down the hallway to the fire escape door, go outside and down the five flights of steps to the ground, then make my way along some bushes and across the grass to the sidewalk and jaywalk across the street over to the outskirts of the mall.
    It feels good to tear around the mall on my skateboard.The walkway doesn’t get walked on very much because everyone drives to get to where they want to go, but it’s a winding path that’s like a strip of parkway—it’s narrow, but there are lots of little sections. Shrubs. Grass. Pine trees. More shrubs, more grass, more pine trees. I like the parts where the trees are big and touch across the walkway because I feel like I’m skateboarding through the forest.
    Anyway, I had a nice ride over to Hudson’s, and then a nice time
at
Hudson’s. Mikey was there, and it’s not like I didn’t recognize him, but I did notice a change in him. He’d lost weight, for one thing. Not tons, but some. I noticed it most in his face because I could actually see his eyes. Before they were pretty much just dark slits in folds of fat, but now I could actually
see
them.
    “Looking good, Mikey!”
    “Thanks,” he said back.
    “How’s fourth grade going?”
    “Pretty good,” he said with a little nod.
    And that’s when I started noticing the other change in him.
    He wasn’t bratty or whiny or belligerent, he didn’t argue or call names or try to pull stupid pranks.
    He was just … quiet.
    “Wow,” I said after I’d been there awhile