The Girl On The Half Shell Read Online Free Page B

house had transferred to my dad when grandpa had gone into the nursing home, but the fence had stayed until after Jack Senior passed away. We didn’t live here full time until I was five. It was the year Mom got sick.
    Now I feel teary because I’ve thought of Mom. There are more emotional punches inside, but in the driveway tonight the first emotional punch is Mom.
    Jack climbs from the car. “You girls are going to have to share your room, Chrissie. There is not a spare room in the house, I’m afraid. And stay away from the pool house. Its current occupant doesn’t need you bothering him.”
    That’s it? That’s what he has to say to me after I created that enormous scene? I nod and focus on pulling my cello case from the trunk.
    Rene smiles and takes her bag from Jack. “Maybe I’m exactly what your pool house guest needs.”
    I start to laugh. That comment I didn’t expect, but it effortlessly lifts the mood. Even Jack seems to be unbending, I notice, which is strange, because before the unbending I didn’t even notice he was tense. Rene probably saw it and I didn’t. Too close to the problem is what she always tells me. Perhaps she is right.
    Jack’s smile this time is pleasant. He ruffles Rene’s dark hair. “Not on your life. I want you somewhere I can keep an eye on you.”
    I watch and follow them into the house. Jack’s relationship with Rene is more father-daughter normal than it is with me.
    The house smells good, Maria cooked dinner tonight, and for about the hundredth time I wish we hadn’t gone out to dinner and had just come home. It smells like enchiladas and I love enchiladas made at home.
    We find Maria in the kitchen busily tidying the mess created from feeding a house of guests. She has been with us forever, a refugee from Somoza, whom we all pretend is legal, but isn’t.
    Maria carefully rinses a used paper towel. Everything has value to her. Nothing is ever thrown away after a single use. We have adjusted to living with her—the used paper towels, the giant balls of foil, and the wrapped half-finished meals in the refrigerator.
    I watch her flatten the Brawny across the twenty-thousand dollar marble counter.
    Maria’s round, matronly face softens when she sees me. “Chica. You are home. I have missed my beautiful girl. ¿Cómo está mi niña”
    The feel of Maria’s embrace is familiar and warm, but I slowly grow agitated because it lasts longer than I am ever comfortable with, and the perfume on her flesh is slightly smothering.
    I disengage and step back quickly. “Is Daddy being good to you? You tell me if he’s not.”
    Maria looks aghast. Jack laughs. I stare at the used paper towel spread neatly on the marble.
    “Señor Jack, he is no trouble. Never. It is good when there are people in the house. Señor Jack’s band is like family. I don’t mind the extra work. It is never work for family. And the new one, the young one, he is like a ghost. A sad ghost. Four months he’s been here and so sad and no trouble. It is good he is here with Señor Jack.”
    She crosses herself in silent prayer for her sad ghost and I struggle not to laugh because I am really a very bad Catholic and Jack is an atheist and no one prays at the drop of the hat faster than Maria. And whoever Jack has tucked away in the pool house is most likely not sad, most likely an atheist, and most likely just a burned out musician in need of a crash pad.
    Rene sticks her finger into the guacamole, loudly sucks it off the tip, and makes a popping sound as she pulls her nail through her lips. “A sad ghost in the pool house. I am intrigued.”
    Jack squeezes Rene’s shoulder. “Be intrigued some other time. I mean it, little girl. Stay away from the pool house. Now go away.”
    Chiding, parental and smoothly charming. Jack can be so multifunctional with Rene.
    “Before you disappear, go out on the patio and say hello to the guys,” Jack says to me. “Just a smile and a hello, Chrissie. Then you two can run