The First True Lie: A Novel by Marina Mander Page A

I wouldn’t swear to it, because at a certain point Mama stopped showing me that picture.
    “I lost it. I can’t find it anymore.”
    So I stand at the door, leaning against the frame, dripping on the floor, unsure of whether to go in or not. I turn around and fall asleep on the sofa. I like sleeping on the sofa even if I have the painting with the yucky weather above my head. I’m a little scared about having nightmares again, but then I fall into a dreamless sleep, my koala on the pillow and Blue tucked up close.

5
    I t’s Saturday, which is just as well.
    School gets out early.
    Mama says she doesn’t understand why children have to go to school on Saturdays, when their parents aren’t working. I don’t see why that matters to her, seeing as how she never goes anywhere anyway.
    “That has nothing to do with it. It’s about sleep. At least on Saturday people can sleep in.”
    She’s right, even if now it’s not a problem anymore.
    My problem is finding my shoes with the laces, because the ones I wore yesterday must sound like they have frogs in them. Everything is in the storage closet: Mama’s fancy high heels that she hasn’t worn in a while; riding boots, even though we only went horseback riding once; even swimming fins; but not what I’m looking for.
    You pay attention to details and then go to school wearing swimming fins in the middle of winter. Not such a hot idea.
    I put on yesterday’s shoes, even though they’re still soaking wet. When I walk in them, they go
croak, croak,
or maybe it’s more like the sound of Mama kneading pizza dough. When you walk in fresh snow, the noise is just like when you crack a meringue with a spoon.
Crunch crunch crunch
. When I was little, I thought snow was made by ghosts.
    At least it’s stopped raining today.
    To make up for it, it’s gotten colder.
    I leave my pajamas on underneath my clothes because they keep me warm and because it’s quicker that way. And anyway, at Saturday school nobody cares about anything because it’s Saturday. Everyone lets things go, already thinking about something else.
    Davide and his parents are going to the mountains because if it’s rained this much here in the city, there’ll be loads of snow in the mountains.
    Chubby Broccolo’s going to stay with his relatives in Puglia for one of their birthdays. They’ll eat heaps of orecchiette with broccoli. I don’t know what Antonella’s doing, but she seems like the type who always knows what to do. The others…I have no idea.
    Luca’s spending the weekend at home with his mother, for all I know.
    I’ve always hated it when they make you write about the weekend for your homework, or the topic is “What did you do on your vacation?” They do it to find out about your business and then use what they find out against you as soon as you mess up.
    So I write a story about the adventures of Blue, who’s a cat who seems like a cartoon. That way everyone has fun, including me.
    Blue’s ears are always cold, so I explain how when he was made, after they’d given him whiskers, a tail, little heart-shaped pillows under his feet, and everything else, they realized they’d run out of ears. They had to attach ones they took straight from the freezer, but first they made a mistake and attached two orecchiette with broccoli, so he meowed in Pugliese like Chubby in the third row and no one understood what he was meowing about. Then they found the proper cat ears and solved the problem. We clink our glasses and say “Cheers!” to celebrate, and Chubby gets an “Excellent” on his homework.
    Making it up as I go, and smiling, I get by.
    Even better than poor Chubby Broccolo from Brindisi, actually.
    One time before we had Blue I told a story about seeing a gigantic mosquito on the wall of the kitchen next to the refrigerator. It was huge, with such long skinny legs that it seemed harmless. But everyone was so worried about the malaria the immigrants were bringing into the city that