The Facts and Fictions of Minna Pratt Read Online Free PDF

smiled.
    â€œTwig could sneak up on a cockroach,” said Lucas.
    â€œTwig has,” said Twig ominously, disappearing into the dark cave of a dining room with some dishes. “But,” she stuck her head back in the kitchen, “don’t tell your Mum and Dad.”
    Lucas gave Minna a level look.
    â€œAnd that is Twig,” he said.
    And that is Twig . Minna walked to the dining room door and opened it with one finger, peering in. Just what I need. Another wish. I wish I had a vibrato . Minna sighed. Now I wish I had a Twig .
    Lucas’s parents arrive late and are very polite. They are short with high foreheads, and though they do not look like Lucas, they look very much like each other. They speak, thinks Minna, in the manner of kings and queens.
    â€œAm I to presume you are Melinda Pratt?” asks Mr. Ellerby, shaking her hand.
    â€œYes,” says Minna.
    â€œDelightful,” pronounces Mrs. Ellerby. “And you are a cellist?”
    Minna smiles. She likes that. She has never before thought of herself as a “cellist”; until this moment she has only played the cello.
    â€œWe are honored to have you here,” says Mr. Ellerby. “You must plan to come again.”
    Minna loves their talk; she is hypnotized by it.
    Dinner is chicken by candlelight and good china with no chips. Over dinner the Ellerbys’ conversation changes; it becomes soft and legato, like music; like a small quiet stream with no rocks. Little punctuation, no outbursts.
    The street will be repaved soon, dear, says Mrs. Ellerby.
    Is that so? says Mr. Ellerby.
    The price of eggs, I hear, is up, says Mrs. Ellerby.
    Oil, too, says Mr. Ellerby.
    Twig drifts in and out of the room on her soft-soled shoes, creeping up on conversation, sneaking in on thoughts. Minna cannot stop looking at her.
    You will be fine musicians someday, Melinda and Lucas, pronounces Mrs. Ellerby.
    Lucas’s foot touches Minna’s under the table.
    That is so, says Mr. Ellerby, without looking up from his braised chicken.
    Lucas grins across the table at Minna, and Minna smiles into her plate.
    Maybe, maybe no , thinks Minna. You are quiet and polite and clean people, Mrs. Ellerby, Mr. Ellerby. You know lots about the price of eggs and oil. Your conversation is splendid and organized. But there is something you don’t know. I know it, though. Lucas knows it .
    Minna looks up as Twig slips her plate away, one entire congealed serving of cold creamed onions still there, hidden by a lettuce leaf. She winks at Minna.
    Twig knows it too, Mr. and Mrs. Ellerby. Maybe we’ll be fine musicians one day. But there is more .
    I will be a ferret. Your son will be a frog .
    And that is so. Tra-la .

SIX
    F or the first time in Minna’s life she is on time for something. It is not a mistake. Minna has planned it, an early cello lesson before chamber group. She has wakened at dawn, even though it is a Saturday, in order to begin plans for the rest of her life on a sheet of notepaper. Minna’s early life has been strung out in ordered sentences on paper, like an outline for her life.
MINNA, AGE 7:
Ware plad skirt to school .
 
Punch Richard .
MINNA, AGE 8:
Do not forgit spelling list .
MINNA, AGE 10:
Plan to be a movie star .
 
Learn to faint .
MINNA, AGE 11:
Living by the sea is preferable .
    Minna stopped planning her life all of a sudden. Now it is time to plan again. Minna sits on her bed with a blank sheet of paper. Thoughts of Lucas’s peaceful clean house fill her mind: quiet dinners, soft lights, polite and kind parents, murmurs. And Twig, like an orchestra conductor, leading them all calmly through a symphony dinner, from beginning to end without mistakes, without interruption, without clutter. “Is there anything you wish?” Lucas’s mother asks her. “Anything at all?” After dinner, each person goes to his place: Mr. Ellerby in his study, Mrs. Ellerby in her solarium, Lucas in his