The Mystics of Mile End Read Online Free PDF Page A

writing, like I was very concentrated on my thoughts. After a while, I saw Ms. Davidson’s dress out of the corner of my eye, so I pressed my nose close to the page for extra believability. Then she said, “Lev? The bell rang a few minutes ago. Shouldn’t you be getting home?”
    I looked up fast and checked the clock, then made my eyes wide to show how surprised I was. I followed her out of the class and down the stairs and into the empty lot behind the school.
    â€œI left my bike over here,” I explained. “I love biking, don’t you?”
    She smiled. “Love it!”
    We reached the second-to-last rack and she started unlocking her bike. I leaned over to unlock mine, which was so close to hers it was actually touching. For a second I was nervous that she might get suspicious, but when she saw what I was doing she just laughed.
    â€œWell!” she said. “Look at that.”
    She was already pulling her bike out of the rack, so I knew there wasn’t any time to lose. Using my most casual voice, I asked, “When’s your favorite time of day to go biking?”
    She thought about this for a second, and while she thought, I prayed. Then, because God sometimes listens to you if you pray really hard, she gave the exact answer I was hoping for.
    â€œNight,” she said with a laugh. “I like a good middle-of-the-night bicycle ride! Why do you ask?”
    â€œThat’s so funny! My dad loves to go biking at night. He does it all the time!”
    â€œIs that so?”
    â€œSure!” I said. Then I started to tell her about the time Dad took me and Sammy out for a bike ride in the middle of the night. “It was four in the morning, ” I said, to make sure she knew how much he liked the thing she also liked. “We went all the way from our house, which by the way if you want to know is 5479 Hutchison, all the way to the mountain and then all the way back! And we didn’t get home until sunrise .”
    â€œWhat a fun adventure!” she said, climbing onto her bike. “Well, Lev, I’ll see you—”
    â€œWait!” I wanted to tell her some more interesting things about Dad, like that he was a professor and highly intelligent and understood completely about Very Private Things and could make macaroni and cheese better than anyone else’s dad in the neighborhood, which I knew for a fact was true even though he hadn’t actually made it for us in ages, but all of a sudden I looked down and something very small and very white caught my eye.
    There was a flower in her pedal. From the way it was sticking out, I could tell she hadn’t put it there on purpose. It’d just gotten caught as she rode her way through a forest or meadow or something like that. It made me feel sad, but I didn’t understand why.
    â€œLev? Was there something else you wanted to tell me?”
    I shook my head.
    â€œOkay.” She smiled. “I’ll see you tomorrow!” And she pedaled away.
    I walked my bike down the street, trying to find the reason why I’d suddenly felt so sad, but I couldn’t. This was a thing that happened to me sometimes, I got sad for no reason. Once, when I was eight, I’d asked Sammy what she thought was causing it. I thought maybe it was some kind of sickness, and if it was a sickness it probably had a name, and I wanted to know the name of it. But she just told me not to worry, it happened to her, too, it happened all the time.
    When I turned the corner, I saw that Mr. Katz was out on his lawn again. He was sitting on the grass surrounded by the cans of green paint. He had the paintbrush in his hand, and even though he’d already gone over all the leaves once, he was going over them all again.
    Because I had nothing better to do, I asked if I could help with the second coat. He said okay, so I sat down and picked up a leaf. The sun was shining and the birds were singing and I felt like I could