Read 44: Book Six for Free Online Page A

on street corners around town and looked right past them. Sometimes I saw ghosts attached to them.
    Kate and I talked about the homeless sometimes, especially if we were waiting at a light and saw one sitting by the side of the road with a sign.  Kate always gave them money.
    “No one should be hungry,” she would say.
    “But how do you know that’s where the money goes?” I asked her once. “How do you know they buy food with it?”
    “I know that drugs and alcohol and mental illness account for how a lot of these people wind up on the street,” she said. “And it’s not like giving someone a dollar makes me a better person or that it’s going to make a real difference in someone else’s life. I don’t know what they do with the money.
    “It’s out of my hands after that,” she said, smiling. “All I can control is what I do. It’s just a little thing. But sometimes little things add up. I don’t think too much about it really. It’s just a habit.”
    “Abby Craig!” David said, swinging open the door and letting me in.
    He smiled, but I could tell he was anxious. It had been almost a week, and he hadn’t heard anything regarding his audition.
    “Not yet, huh?” I asked, taking off my coat.
    “Nothing! I’m not sure what it means, but it can’t be good. Anyway, I’m glad you’re here. And I’m glad I’m here. It’s good to get some perspective sometimes.”
    I knew what he meant.
    “You too, huh?” I said. “But dreams really matter too. Don’t lose hope, David. They still might call.”
    He nodded and smiled weakly.
    I looked around. There were rows and rows of tables with benches and at the far end was the kitchen. The smell reminded me of my old high school and I cringed for a moment thinking about my senior year. The tables looked exactly the same and I flashed back to sitting by myself, while some of the girls from my soccer team ignored me. Sometimes I forgot how nice it was to have those days behind me forever.
    A short woman in a plastic apron and hairnet walked up to us.
    “Hi, I’m Angie,” she said, sticking out her hand. “You must be Abby and David from Back Street.”
    “Yes!” David said, sounding like his old self, like we had just won a contest or something.
    The woman smiled. She had bright hair and judging from the freckles splashed across her cheeks and nose, I figured it must have been red.
    “So do either of you have any experience doing this kind of thing?”
    We both shook our heads.
    “Well, it’s pretty simple,” she said. “Follow me and I’ll show you the ropes. You’ll get the hang of it in no time.”
    She showed us the kitchen and introduced us to four others.
    “Tonight is spaghetti and meatballs night,” she said. “We also have garlic bread and a little salad. They’ll line up here and we let them take whatever they want. But they only get to come through the line once. Try to watch for that. A few will try to get through again. Just let us know and we’ll handle it.”
    “But not if they’re kids,” one of the other volunteers said, looking at me a little too long. A cold chill ran down my spine when he licked his lips. “If it’s a kid or a teen who wants more, I look the other way.”
    “Oh, Abby and David, this is Sutter by the way,” Angie said.
    He crossed his arms and gave us a nod. He was in his 40s, had dark sloppy hair and small gray eyes, half opened with heavy lids. His energy was strange, both light and dark, jerking around him in stops and starts.
    The spaghetti sauce hung in the air like dirty laundry. It reeked of boiled onions and a heavy hand of oregano. It made it hard to focus.
    We walked back out to the main room, standing near the stacks of dishes and the long table of food on hot plates. Two older women with gray hair were rolling plastic silverware in napkins next to us and stacking them in a pile.
    Angie handed us plastic aprons, gloves, and those creepy hairnets.
    “The important thing is to keep the