The Boy I Love by Nina de Gramont Page A

ontop of her crowded little desk and said, “Tim seems really interested in you, Wren.”
    I naturally tensed up a little at this, but then decided Tim was a better topic of conversation than the horse that got sent away. “We’re just friends, Mom,” I said. I wished I could tell her the truth, but certainly didn’t plan to break my promise to Tim, even though Mom wouldn’t care about it one single bit, and she certainly wouldn’t tell Devon Kelly, or anyone else at Williamsport High.
    â€œWell,” Mom said. “He seems very nice. Your grandfather would have called him the right sort.”
    For a second I stopped scrubbing the bit. I knew how much she missed her father whenever things got hard. “Mom,” I said, giving up on my idea not to mention it. “I’m really sorry you couldn’t keep the new horse.”
    A funny kind of look came into her eyes, one I’d never seen before. Almost like panic. It scared me a little. “That horse,” Mom whispered. “That horse is the least of it.”
    I felt a terrible sort of emptiness open up in my stomach. For as long as I could remember, my parents had been scrambling and scraping to hold on to this place. But they always did hold on. I knew that two of Mom’s biggest donors had lost a ton of money in the stock market, but somehow I thought that we’d still get by. Maybe I never thought life would get easy, but I never dreamed we’d truly lose the farm. Because how in the world could I ever live anywhereelse? This place was my place, my home, as much as if I’d sprung from the tall grass by the river.
    Mom must have seen the look on my face, because she said, “This isn’t for you to worry about, Wren. Dad and I will take care of it. We’ll find a way to work it out.”
    It took all my strength not to yell at her. Not for me to worry about? Who was she kidding? But then I noticed she seemed to have all these new lines around her mouth, but she also looked as sad as a little kid, young and old at the same time. My mother was the most softhearted person in the world. All she ever wanted to do was take care of things that couldn’t take care of themselves.
    â€œMom,” I said, wanting to give her a little gift, “I need to tell you something about Tim.”
    â€œWhat?” She blinked at me like she felt a little afraid of what I might say.
    â€œHe’s playing Og,” I said. “The leprechaun.”
    Mom smiled at this, but she didn’t light up the way I hoped she would. Later on I called Allie, but she didn’t answer the phone, so I just lay on my bed, staring at the ceiling and thinking about Tim. I remembered that flyer from his church, about gay ministers, and all the things I’d heard Devon say right in front of him. I wondered what Tim was doing, and if he felt weird about having told me. Hopefully he wasn’t worried at all, or wishing he hadn’t done it. Somehow I would find a way to let him know forsure that I would never give his secret away, not to anyone. He might have other things he needed to worry about, but that sure wasn’t one of them.
    *   *   *
    When I got downstairs the next morning, my dad was waiting for me in the kitchen. He had his binoculars around his neck and a wide-brimmed hat on his head. Going-for-a-walk clothes. Sure enough he told me, “Go on up and change. You and me are going for a walk.”
    Sometimes Dad will take me for a walk on forest service land, but I guess today he felt like staying close to home. He told me to keep a lookout for a painted bunting, which he thought he’d heard out by the far pasture the other day. We walked across our back lawn and then into the woods that divided our property from Cutty River Landing.
    â€œYou know, Wren,” Dad said, after we’d walked in silence awhile with no sign of the painted bunting. “That Tim fellow seems