Where Do You Stay by Andrea Cheng Page A

writing it says Sharon XOXO Wilson .
    I shut the diary quickly. I shouldn’t be reading somebody else’s private business, I know that. Underneath the box are a whole lot of moldy-looking books. I pick one up. Catechism for Children , it says on the cover. I open it to the middle and a dried worm falls out. I drop the book.
    Monte finds a pillowcase to put our stuff in. Then I start opening every box to see if maybe Bach and Brahms are somewhere. We have to hurry because whenthe dumpster is full they’ll drive it to the dump. All that dust gets me coughing.
    “You boys better get out of there,” Tom says, throwing in a stack of screens. “You could get hurt.” He looks at Damon. “You want to start on the shack tomorrow?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    Tom smiles. “No need for the ‘sir.’ Oh, and you know that book I was telling you about? I’ll bring it for you tomorrow.”
    “Thanks,” Damon says.
    Monte’s eyes meet mine like Was that really my brother thanking someone?
    Then I almost tell Tom that Mr. Willie stays there, it’s his home, not a shack, and after it’s gone, he won’t have any place to stay. But Mr. Willie might not want everybody knowing his business. Anyway, he hasn’t been around in a little while. My stomach flips. Maybe Mr. Willie found some other place to stay, someplace clean and nice and far away from here.
    I climb out of the dumpster first. Monte hands me the pillowcase and scrambles over the top. We carry it home together.

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    Damon eats like he’s been starving, chicken, potatoes, green beans, pie. He’s real talkative at dinner, telling everyone how Ginny and Tom asked him to help them for the rest of the summer, hauling, painting, whatever needs to be done. “They’re in a hurry to get the school ready,” Damon says.
    Aunt Geneva looks at Uncle James. “The boy got himself a job,” she says.
    After the dishes are done, Monte asks if we want to play capture the flag, but Damon says he’s outgrown that stuff.
    “So what do you want to do?” Monte asks him.
    Damon is standing at the door. He’s wearing a jacket even though it’s almost ninety degrees. “I’ll be back,” he says.
    We sit on the porch and watch Damon cross the street. He reaches into his jacket pocket, takes out a cigarette, and lights it.
    Me and Monte head up to the carriage house and wait for Mr. Willie in the dark. The air is hot, but there’s a breeze in the treetops and it smells like rain.
    “What if Mr. Willie doesn’t ever come back?” Monte asks.
    “He’ll be back,” I say, trying to sound sure. “If he left, he would’ve taken his stuff.”
    “When you left your house, you didn’t take all your stuff.”
    “I couldn’t.”
    “Why not?”
    “They had an estate sale.”
    “What’s that mean?”
    “They sell everything.”
    Monte’s picking up rocks and sorting them into piles in the dark. “Even the piano?”
    “Yup.”
    Monte throws a rock far into the woods. We hear it fall through the leaves. “My mom had no right to do that,” Monte says. “Because it wasn’t even hers in the first place.”
    “She needed the money.”
    “Still,” Monte says. “It wasn’t hers.”
    We are quiet then, feeling the wind pick up.
    “Jerome?” It’s Miss Ginny calling from the mansion. We can hear her voice but we can’t see her face. “Is that you?”
    “Yes, ma’am. Me and Monte.”
    “Just checking,” she says. “I thought I heard something out in the woods. You boys better be getting home. There may be a storm coming.”
    “Are you sleeping here tonight?” I ask.
    “Just working late,” she says. “We’ll be leaving in a few minutes. Now go on home before it starts raining.”
    Me and Monte sit up in our room on the beds. The window’s wide open and the wind is blowing. Lightning fills the room with the thunder close behind.
    “I’m scared,” Monte says.
    “Me and Mama used to watch the storms come,” I say. Mama always said she didn’t want to live