The Visibles Read Online Free PDF Page B

chair, her hands folded in her lap.
    “Because it was in French?” I asked.
    “No.”
    Because you’re fat? I pictured fat clogging up her brain, impairing her memory.
    I flipped to the start of the genetics chapter. Claire leaned over and tapped a drawing of a tightly wound coil of DNA. “I heard a Peninsula sub freaked out about genetics on Monday.”
    I raised an eyebrow. “Kind of. I was in the class.”
    “What happened?”
    “It was this guy, Mr. Rice. He was subbing for Mrs. Hewes—she’s on maternity leave. He told us that DNA is magnetic. We’re stuck with our parents, and they’re stuck with us, whether we like it or not. DNA can explain everything we do, except we’re too stupid to understand that yet. Only the aliens can understand it.”
    “Aliens?” Claire giggled. “Even my teachers in France weren’t that messed up.”
    “He didn’t seem messed up, really.” I clutched a pillow close to my chest, curling away from Claire. “Maybe our school is just being narrow-minded.”
    Claire stared at me. “You believe him?”
    “I just think it’s an interesting theory. I don’t believe the part about the aliens.”
    She shifted positions, moving closer. “So why do you think it’s interesting?” Her tone of voice was curious but delicate. It was the samevoice she’d used when we were friends, as if I were the most fascinating person in the world.
    After a thoughtful moment, Claire added, “Is it because you like the idea of everything happening for a reason? Or that if you looked hard enough, you’d be able to understand why people do the stuff that they do? Like why they go away without telling you where they’re going?”
    If she said one more thing, I would punch her puffy face. I would point out that she wasn’t one to talk—she’d found her mother fooling around with that young Frenchman, after all. I pictured Claire throwing open the double doors to her parents’ bedroom, seeing Mrs. Ryan and the boulangerie baker tangled in bed together, the sheets on the floor. The baker was wearing a black beret and nothing else. The soles of his bare feet were dirty, and so were his hands.
    Claire pressed her lips together coyly. Even in her current state, she could be her old self with me—the one who always said, It’s okay. You can tell me. I’ll still like you. But she didn’t like me in the end, did she? She didn’t let me into her world; there was something horribly wrong with me. Maybe it was an obvious thing, something a lot of people saw.
    Still, I thought about the thing bumping around inside of me. The thing I was afraid to admit, even to myself. Part of me wanted to tell her. Part of me needed someone to tell.
    “Do you remember when we used to roll down the hill in the park?” Claire asked quietly.
    I bit my lip hard, startled. “We used to have races.”
    “Rolling races.” Claire made a small smile. “That was fun.”
    “And we used to play a lot of Monopoly,” I said, as if just recalling.
    “You were always the guy on the horse.”
    “And you were always the shoe.”
    “And I used to tickle you.” Claire giggled.
    “I hated that.”
    “C’mon. It was so much fun.” Claire looked thoughtful, then wily, almost like she was considering tickling me right then. She moved toward me. In anticipation, I moved back on the bed and jerked myfoot away quickly, sideswiping the softness of her stomach. It felt substantial and… mushy.
    Claire jumped back and crossed her arms over the spot on her stomach that I’d kicked. I tucked my foot underneath the bed skirt. “Sorry.”
    “I was just getting my highlighter,” Claire mumbled. It had fallen on the floor; she reached down for it. At that moment, the holiday tree came on. It was on a timer, playing a different Christmas song every fifteen minutes. This time it was Perry Como singing “Oh By Gosh By Golly.” Claire and I both jumped.
    The mood changed fast, from light to awkward. Claire sat back down and we went