Ten Ways to Make My Sister Disappear Read Online Free PDF Page A

that? Maybe … and maybe not. But Dakota got the job. She always gets all the good stuff, stays up the latest, sees the most TV shows, and talks to Dad first and longest. It’s just not fair.
    â€œYou know what I wish, don’t you, Cora?” The dog licks Sprig’s face and gazes sympathetically at her. “Not that I would want anything bad to happen to Dakota,” Sprig adds. No, despite everything, she just wants her to go, the way smoke goes in winter. In all the cold weeks, you see the white smoke curling out of the chimneys, sometimes going straight up into the air, sometimes taken this way and that by the wind, but always, poooof, it disappears. It’s gone. If smoke can do it, why not a person? Why not Dakota?
    Leaning her head against Cora’s warm back, Sprig narrows her eyes and looks up into the sky, and, yes, she sees her sister up there. Dakota in a gauzy, smoky white dress that floats around her like, well, smoke. And like smoke rising, Dakota too is rising. Rising, rising, rising. Becoming smaller and smaller, fainter and fainter … until … poooof … she’s gone.

“W HAT are you trying to do, Sprig, kill that hamburger?” Standing at the sink, Dakota shakes the lettuce in the colander. “Hurry up, I want to get everything done before Mom comes home.”
    â€œI’m almost finished.” Sprig takes another chunk of hamburger and slaps the meat between her palms. She loves this job, the rhythmic slap slap slap . It reminds her of being little and playing with clay, and how she used to think about things when she did that.
    She’s thinking about things now too, thinking about how Dakota got that job away from her slap slap slap and how today is the tenth day slap slap slap slap slap slap that Dad has been gone. Okay, she has to think about something else, like the Mighty Pest and how Bliss keeps saying he’s cute, and how maybe Mr. Julius will think her essay is just wonderful and give her an A and —
    â€œOkay, stop!” Dakota has come over and is inspecting the plate of raw patties. “That’s plenty. Wash your hands and get me the tomatoes.”
    â€œGet them yourself. I’m not your servant, Dakota,” Sprig says, but she ambles over to the refrigerator, takes a tomato from the vegetable bin, and puts it on the far end of the counter so Dakota has to reach for it.
    â€œJust one?” Dakota says. “Mom likes a lot of tomatoes in the salad. Get me some more. They’re a very important fruit.”
    â€œHa, ha, you mean vegetable.”
    â€œHa, ha, I mean fruit . Tomatoes are fruit, for your information, and they’re way good for you. Tons of vitamin C, vitamins A and K, plus potassium, plus —”
    â€œOkay, okay. Don’t give me a food lecture.” Sprig flings open the refrigerator door.
    â€œWhile you’re there,” Dakota says, “get me a couple of cucumbers too.”
    â€œSay please.”
    â€œCome on, Sprig, just get me the stuff.”
    Sprig’s hand hovers over the vegetable bin. “Okay, now you have to say, ‘Please get me tomatoes and cucumbers, my beloved Sprig.’”
    â€œIn your dreams, girl. Just get me the stuff.” When Sprig doesn’t move, Dakota sighs and says, “Please.”
    Later, as they’re finishing supper, Dad calls. Mom talks to him first. Before she takes the phone into the dining room for privacy, she says, “Girls, you did a great job on supper. I’ll tell your father.”
    â€œLet’s surprise Mom and clean up too,” Dakota says, and starts clearing the table. “I’ll do the dishwasher, you sweep. I talk to Dad next,” she adds.
    â€œNo,” Sprig says. “I want to talk to him next.”
    â€œSorry, tonight it’s in order of age. Mom, then me, then you.”
    Dakota’s logic is perfect — and maddening. Sprig grabs the broom and sweeps furiously