The Visitor Read Online Free PDF

what’s for dinner?”
    My mother winced. “Pizza? Chinese? Anything else you can order over the phone? I’m sorry, but I have this brief and I have court in the morning.”
    â€œMom,” I told her for maybe the thousandth time, “I don’t mind pizza. Sorry, but your cooking isn’t all that great, so it’s no big deal ordering pizza.”
    â€œWell, at least get some veggies on it,” she said.
    After dinner I called Jake.
    â€œDo you want to come over?” I said. “I got that new album, if you want to listen to it.”
    There was no album, of course. It’s just that we always have to be careful. Like I said, Jake’s brother, Tom, is a Controller. He could be listening on the extension. Then I called Cassie and Marco and told them the same cover story.
    When they arrived I told them about Melissa, and then I told them about my little run-in with the creep. I did not tell them about Chapman driving me home. I don’t know why. But when I saw the way Marco exploded, I was glad I hadn’t told them the whole story.
    â€œOh, that was dumb! Dumb! DUMB!” Marco said. “What if that guy is a Controller?”
    â€œHe wasn’t a Controller,” I said scornfully. “Why would the Yeerks want to make a Controller out of a punk? They want people in positions of power.”
    â€œWe don’t know that for sure,” Jake said. “Tom isn’t in a position of power.”
    â€œAnd how about people driving by in their cars, or looking out of the windows of their homes?” Marco asked. “And what if he runs and tells someone about this girl who suddenly sprouted a trunk and tusks?”
    â€œNo one is going to believe a lowlife like that,” I said.
    â€œHis friends won’t believe him,” Marco said poisonously, “but a Controller
would
believe him. A Controller would know what it meant.”
    Yes. A Controller would know what it meant. A Controller like Chapman. Or even Melissa, if she were one of them.
    I felt sick. It was like my whole life was nothing but lies. Lies to Melissa. Lies to my mother. Now I was lying by not telling the others the whole truth.
    â€œOkay, I screwed up,” I muttered.
    â€œYou sure did!” Marco crowed. “You screwed up so—”
    â€œMarco, let it drop,” Jake said. “Rachel knows she made a mistake. We all make mistakes.”
    Marco rolled his eyes.
    Cassie gave me an encouraging smile. “It
was
dumb putting yourself in that position, Rachel. You need to be more careful. But still, I’d have paid my next ten allowances to see the look on that guy’s face.”
    â€œThe important thing is that it doesn’t sound like Rachel can use Melissa to get close to Chapman,” Jake said. “Not if she’s a Controller herself. And not if she’s going to continue being weird to Rachel.”
    â€œI guess we’ll have to find another way,” I said quickly. “I mean, we know where Chapman’s office is. We know where his house is. Maybe we could just morph into some small animals and hide out.”
    â€œSmall animals like what?” Marco asked. “When Jake turned into a lizard he got stepped on. He lost his tail. Besides, what are you going to morph into? A cockroach?”
    We all shuddered at the thought. The smallest, strangest thing anyone had morphed so far was when Jake had done the lizard. It creeped him out big-time. A roach would be even worse.
    â€œThe problem with being a cockroach,” I said, “aside from the fact that it is too gross to believe, is that roach senses might not even be useful to us. Can a roach ‘hear’ in a way that would make it possible for us to understand
what
we’re hearing?”
    We all looked at Cassie. She’s sort of our expert on animals.
    Cassie held up her hands. “Oh, come on. Like I know how a cockroach sees and hears? We don’t take