All That's Missing Read Online Free Page A

the food he’d salvaged out of the trash.
    â€œWe should go now.” Arlo helped his grandfather up from the bench. “Come on. Let’s go home and warm you up.”
    They walked down the sidewalk, across Rotary Street, past Fanucci’s Market, toward home. The wind was cold. Poppo’s lumbering gait slowed them down. It took three times longer to walk home than it had taken Arlo to walk to the ball field by himself.
    As Arlo guided his grandfather toward the porch steps, Poppo lifted his head to the light in Arlo’s window.
    â€œMy grandson lives up there,” he said. “He must be wondering where I am.”
    Arlo’s heart swelled. For a moment, he couldn’t speak. “You’re still shivering,” he said. “Let’s get you in the house.”
    Later that night in bed, Arlo thought about Poppo and Ida Jones and his mom and dad and the whole mystery about why the people on the Jones side of the family hated the people on the Sabatini side.
    The thing about families, Arlo thought, was that there was always some question nobody wanted to answer for you, and it was like a stray thread pulling loose in a sweater. You could tug at it all you wanted, but in the end, all you’d have was a pile of twisted yarn.
    Ida Jones was a stray thread in Arlo’s life. Every time he tried to figure her out, another question popped up. Like today, for instance — the way she looked in that photograph, with her eyes glaring at somebody behind the camera. Why hadn’t he noticed that before? Now that Arlo had seen Ida Jones through Sam’s eyes, he had another family question. Who the heck was she mad at? And why?

By the next afternoon, Poppo was fine. He was having one of his good days, which was kind of unbelievable considering how confused he had been the day before. But that was the way things went with Poppo’s wonky brain. One day he was fine, and then for the next ten days, he might wander around in a complete fog.
    Arlo pulled the album out of the cabinet and carried it to the kitchen, where Poppo was drinking a cup of coffee. Now was his chance. He should ask Poppo to tell him about the people in the pictures while his mind was clear.
    â€œWhat you got there?” Poppo asked.
    Arlo held up the album.
    â€œWhere’d you find that?”
    â€œIn the living-room cabinet.” Arlo set the album on the table. “Sam and I were looking for a game and Sam found this.”
    Poppo nodded.
    â€œMind if I ask you something?”
    â€œFire away.” Poppo pulled out a chair for Arlo to sit down.
    Arlo sat. He spread the album open on the table and turned to the page with a photo of his grandmother sitting on a granite bench beside a stern-looking man. Behind them was a large white house, and beyond that, a wide river stretched to the horizon.
    â€œIs this the house where my dad grew up?”
    â€œThat’s it,” Poppo said. “Right there on the river in Edgewater.”
    â€œEdge — what?”
    â€œEdgewater,” Poppo said. “The town where your grandmother lives.”
    â€œHow come we never go there?” Arlo asked.
    Poppo twisted in his chair. “Too far,” he said after a long pause. Then, glancing sideways, he stood and emptied his cup at the sink.
    â€œHow far is it?” Arlo asked.
    â€œThree hundred and fifty miles,” Poppo said, keeping his back turned toward Arlo. “Probably more. The roads aren’t so good, either. Some of them, anyway. Least they weren’t the last time we went there.”
    Arlo waited while Poppo stood at the counter staring out the window at the empty backyard.
    â€œYou met her once, you know,” Poppo said as he poured himself a fresh cup of coffee.
    â€œI don’t remember her,” Arlo said.
    â€œâ€™Course you don’t,” Poppo said. “You were barely two.”
    â€œAt the . . .”
    â€œThat’s right. After the