All the Roads That Lead From Home by Anne Leigh Parrish Page A

very fast. It takes a long
time.”
    The sound
of Pinny’s father’s car in the driveway ended the conversation. They were
sitting side by side with a science book between them when her father came into
her room to say hello.
    Pinny
introduced Carl Pratt to her father, and upon hearing the name he gave Pinny a
good hard look, and went downstairs to watch television.
    “You
better go,” Pinny told Carl Pratt.
    Over
dinner Pinny’s father sipped his beer and watched Pinny eat the fried chicken
he’d bought. His bright blue tie had a grease stain Pinny couldn’t help staring
at.
    “Honey,
about this boy. I’m not the best one to give advice in matters of the heart,
obviously, but you should be careful about who you spend time with. No good
making people jealous,” he said.
    Pinny saw
her father thinking about her mother, who had sent him a letter saying she
might have been wrong, too harsh, too quick to judge, but that she still
doubted his strength to resist the siren call of the young and restless, mixing
mythology with a stupid soap opera in a way that made Pinny wonder who was
dumber than whom.
    “We’re
just friends. He helps me with my homework,” Pinny said.
    “Good.”
    That weekend
the fat girl called and said she knew damn well Carl Pratt didn’t really like
her and only invited her over when he wanted to cop a feel.
    “But
that’s OK, it’s payback time,” she said, with a sniff.
    “What do
you mean?”
    “You’ll
see.” The fat girl hung up.
    Monday and
Tuesday dragged by. Carl Pratt was busy with basketball, and the fat girl was
sullen.
    On
Wednesday, the last day of school, the fat girl appeared with her hair short
and spiky. The nine inches she’d cut off herself were stuffed in a plastic bag,
which she handed to Carl Pratt in front of a crowd of people and said, “This is
the only thing you ever liked about me, so here, keep it.”
    Someone
grabbed the bag, and when the fat girl reached for it, the bag was thrown from
hand to hand, always above her head. “Here, Fat Girl,” and “Hey, Fat Girl, over
here,” people called.
    The fat
girl brought her fists to her face and screamed. A teacher emerged from an open
door, everyone scattered, and Pinny didn’t see the fat girl again all day.
    After the
last bell rang Carl Pratt found Pinny waiting by the fat girl’s locker. “She’s
not here,” he said. “I think she skipped out.”
    “Because
those kids were so mean to her.”
    Carl
shrugged.
    “I should
have stopped them,” said Pinny.
    “You?
How?”
    “I don’t
know.”
    Pinny stared
down at Carl Pratt’s sockless feet, stuck inside his big, torn sneakers. She
was to blame, for wanting Carl Pratt to be nice to the fat girl in the first
place. She hadn’t seen how stupid it was to ask someone to fake what he didn’t
feel. But even if he’d felt nothing, and hadn’t liked her at all, not one bit,
he should have felt bad for the way she’d been teased. Pinny wanted him to, if
only a little.
    “Carl—”
    “Look. I
have something fucked up to tell you. I’m going to California for the summer,”
he said.
    Pinny
lifted her eyes and stared firmly into his.
    “I got a
cousin there, a park ranger. My folks think he’ll make me straighten up and get
all serious about school,” he said.
    Carl’s
grades sucked, everyone knew that. He was in Pinny’s math class, and she
couldn’t believe some of the things he didn’t get. Carl Pratt looked at his
watch.
    “Crap. My
mother wants to take me to get a haircut. I have to go,” he said.
    He pressed
a small gold chain into her hand and said to wear it around her neck every day
until he returned. There was a metal heart hanging on the chain with his name
engraved. Pinny looked at the chain, her throat heavy and tight. Then Carl
Pratt trotted off, his back pack bouncing on his bony shoulder.
    Pinny left
the building and walked slowly home. The air smelled of the season to come.
Hollyhocks would climb below her dining room window,