When No One Was Looking Read Online Free PDF Page A

every night because his uncle doesn’t get around to shopping. Can we have him to dinner Thursday night?”
    “Did you invite him, Katherine? Did you?”
    “No,” Kathy lied. “I’m hitting with him Thursday afternoon, though. He’s ranked twenty in Boys’ Eighteen and Under in California.” Another complete lie.
    “He is?”
    “Yes, and he deserves a decent dinner, I think.”
    Her mother’s tone changed. “We can have him. Yes, Kathy, I think it would be very good for you to hit with a good boy for a change, and I feel sorry for him too. But I want to make one thing absolutely clear.”
    “Yes, Mother.”
    “You are too busy with tennis and school to have anything else on your mind right now. You may not start dating and riding around on other people’s motorcycles.”
    “Yes, Mother. And, Mother?”
    “What is it?”
    Oliver has a twelve-year-old Chevy, not a motorcycle.”
    “I think we’ve had enough of Oliver,” said her mother, and she pulled into the driveway beside their house. The hats of three plaster dwarves gleamed on their next-door neighbors’ front lawn. Kathy’s was a common-looking wooden ranch house, painted pink by its previous owners years before, but it appeared to be almost magically silver in the light of the high full moon.

2
    “O LIVER SAID HE’D COME to Quincy to watch today,” Kathy announced to her parents after a few general remarks had been passed about the morning’s weather.
    Her father shoved a picnic basket into the back of the car along with books for Jody and puzzles, games, and pillows for Bobby. “Who’s Oliver?” he asked.
    “Some boy Kathy met at the club last night,” said her mother. “Kathy, you didn’t say anything about him coming to Quincy.”
    “I forgot.”
    “Did you ask him to come?”
    “No. I told him I was playing today, and he said he’d just come along to see. I don’t mind.” Kathy watched her parents exchange glances. Her father took off his glasses and wiped them on the front of his shirt. He squinted up at the colorless sky and said, “Let’s go before it rains.” They’re not going to say much, Kathy decided, because they don’t want an argument before I have to play.
    “I know who he is.” Jody took up the subject as she settled her little brother’s head into her lap in the back seat beside Kathy. “I saw him last weekend at the club. He looks about my age.”
    “He does not,” said Kathy. “Just because he isn’t covered with hair like some ape doesn’t mean he’s twelve years old.”
    Jody smiled. “Kathy has a boyfriend!” she sang.
    “Stop it, Jody,” said their mother.
    “Kathy’s in love. Look at her blush!” Jody went on with plummy innocence in her voice.
    “I’ll bash you with my racket in another minute,” said Kathy.
    “Cut it out,” said her father. “Who’s your first round, Kathy?”
    “I don’t remember. Someone I’ve never heard of. Ruth something.”
    Kathy’s mother moved a cardboard file onto her lap. She shuffled through it and removed a copy of the draw. “Ruth Gumm,” she said. “What a name. Now, Kathy, if this Oliver person in any way affects your game ...
    “Mother, please,” Kathy said, looking sideways at her sister. Jody had rested a newspaper on Bobby’s sleeping head. The newspaper was always present in case Bobby became carsick. As she did with all printed matter that came into her hands, Jody read it. She read at dinnertime, in cars, in the dark, and at courtside during Kathy’s matches. What she read, she remembered, whether it was Time Magazine, Dickens, or the complete set of instructions for the Waring blender, and she had amassed in her head an encyclopedic amount of information of all kinds. “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways,” murmured Jody.
    “Cut it out,” said her father.
    “I was just reading from the paper, Dad,” said Jody, hiding a smile.
    “Kathy, pay attention,” her mother directed. “Now you shouldn’t have any