You're Not You Read Online Free PDF Page B

nine A.M. , and going over the bills, her long graying hair gathered neatly into a ponytail, her sweater sleeves—always too short, my mother was five ten—pushed up to her elbows.
    “All right,” I said. I put my bare feet up on the table. My heel stuck in something. Dried coffee was my guess, sticky with sugar and milk.
    I changed the subject and told her about my new job instead.
    “Well, it would just be a summer job,” my mother said. “You might not want to stay forever, but for the time being it might turn out you have a knack. Remember when you were eight and Kelly Jervis had that operation? You went over to see her every day after school while she recovered.” A note of satisfaction sounded in her voice. She had always been rather proud of me for that, because she hadn’t had to prompt me. My mother loved to see initiative.
    It was true that I had trooped through the yards each afternoon for a month while Kelly was in a body cast, her legs encased in plaster fromhip to toe, a metal bar holding the knees apart, but in fact we spent much of those visits bickering. I could still picture the cast—and the red swell of scars that laddered up the outsides of her legs when it came off—but I couldn’t remember Kelly herself very well. The visits weren’t really on par with Jill’s visits to the nursing home. I think I always knew how nice it looked that I was watching over my friend. And truth be told, she had gotten a lot of new toys to keep her occupied as she recuperated.
    “I don’t think it’s very similar,” I said. I licked my hand and rubbed at the sticky spot on my heel, grimacing. Jill and I had been locked in an unspoken battle over whose turn it was to clean. I was the one who drank sweet milky coffee, so I may as well concede her victory and straighten up this afternoon.
    “Maybe not,” my mother agreed. “But that’s a point in its favor, if you ask me. Branch out. I wanted you to join Jill at some of her volunteer stuff but you always balk.”
    “This isn’t charity,” I retorted. “It’s an actual job.”
    “Oh, Bec. Don’t be so snappish,” my mother said calmly. I heard papers rustling.
    After we hung up I went into Jill’s room and took her guitar from its case. It was just an inexpensive acoustic from a store we loved because the owners’ golden retrievers greeted all the customers. Jill had gotten it with her Christmas money, and after a few months’ painful strumming had let it sit. But I liked to play it, though I had no apparent talent or training. I just liked the posture of it, one foot braced on the bed frame, hunched rather bohemianly over the curved wood and strumming tunelessly while I sang the lyrics to an old Pretenders song. Liam had tried to teach me a few of the chords, but I could never remember them. I remembered sitting with him well enough, though, his hands positioning my fingers and the soft tap of his palm at the small of my back.
Sit up straight.
I pulled my shoulders back and kept playing. Jill wouldn’t have minded, but for some reason I never asked her. Part of the reason we lived together fairly harmoniously was that we let each other’s eccentricities go unremarked. Who wanted to explain every silly thing you felt like doing? I had a carved mahoganybox on my dresser filled with keepsakes from a great-uncle who had died years ago, the contents of which—chunks of uncut amethyst, a few odd seashells, some Russian coins, a Swiss army knife—Jill loved looking at for no better reason than I liked holding her guitar. I had caught glimpses of her hefting the stones in her hand and flicking open the knife to test each tool, but I never said anything about that, either.
    I strummed for a few minutes, idly singing under my breath, but I was too restless to enjoy it. What was Liam up to, anyway? I kept thinking of Evan’s hand on Kate’s cheekbone, those careful strokes of the brush. I’d never just dropped in to Liam’s office, though I knew