Read Another Pan for Free Online

begin forgetting birthdays.
    But in the real world, even adventurous men grow old, and sometimes, pretty young wives don’t stop being young and pretty. Sometimes, they get bored. Sometimes, renowned Egyptologists become underpaid high-school teachers living in school-owned brownstones — happy, obscure . . . aging.
    Sometimes, pining graduate students come along and sweep pretty wives away with the promise of adventures yet to come. When she left, Professor Darling had told Wendy, he felt it was entirely
his
fault. For promising too much. For being a never-never man, the way all husbands are at first.
    When Wendy thought about Connor, or even boyfriends in general, she wondered if she should feel about him the way her mother felt about her father or if she should feel the way her mother felt about that grad student. Wendy imagined that Mrs. Darling’s relationship with this other man was all fire and passion and illicit meetings in dark hallways. She imagined that it was thrilling, that it was the kind of thing that made you shudder in your sleep. Connor and Wendy were definitely not like that. Connor was nice to Wendy. He took her out to group events and made a point of including John in everything. Connor was definitely the “Mr. Darling” of this situation, and even though there was no magic or fire between them just yet, the comparison made Wendy want to stick with him — to show her mother that it could be done and that Mrs. Darling had been a weak and cowardly woman for leaving. That she had put her own base desires over the happiness of the entire family. Now that Wendy was sixteen, she realized that her biggest ambition in life was to become as little like her mother as possible.
    Downstairs, Wendy caught her father packing and repacking his old leather briefcase, trying to fit in a stack of notes he was probably afraid would be stolen by Egyptology-enthusiast thugs while he was out of the house.
    “Daddy?” she said, only to get a grunt as a response when he tried shoving his fist in after the papers. “I was gonna drop by that café after school . . . um . . . for that job I told you about?”
    Professor Darling looked up with alarmed eyes. “Right,” he said. “I’ve thought about it, and it really isn’t a good time —”
    “Daddy, I really could use the money. And John, too . . . I know you think all the kids at Marlowe are over-the-top extravagant, but John could use some real friends this year.”
    “He doesn’t need the kind of friends that require cash payment,” Professor Darling huffed, and looked away from his daughter. “That’s not what I’ve taught him.”
    “It’s not
them,
” said Wendy. “They’re cool. It’s all in John’s head.”
    “OK, Wendy, let me think about it some more. But this is a very busy year for you . . . with tougher classes . . . and the exhibit.”
    “The exhibit?” Wendy tried not to yell, but this was exactly the kind of thing her father pulled all the time — ignore the issue and pretend you’ve won, until everyone forgets and you eventually do win by default. “I never said I’d do that!”
    But Professor Darling was determined to plow through with his own point. “John should do it, too. I was supposed to get an assistant from the British Museum to help catalog all the items, but he was mugged by a street gang and then his flight was canceled. Or something like that. Anyway, he’s not here, and I’m swamped.”
    “And what about my job?” said Wendy. “How am I supposed to do both things?”
    Professor Darling shrugged.
    “Daddy, you can’t fix it so it’s impossible for me to negotiate.”
    “Sure, I can, honey. And you’d better get used to it. Minimum-wage laborers often find negotiation impossible.”
    “No, they don’t!” Wendy huffed, gathering her backpack. “Stop being so elitist. I hope you don’t say that stuff in public.”
    As Wendy ran back upstairs to get John, she overheard her father mumbling, “The big