Read Intentions for Free Online Page B

give him a big smile. His grin expands to fill his whole face.
    I don’t say a word to my parents, partly to hang on to that moment, partly in self-preservation. They don’t talk either.
    When we get home, I mutter, “Good night,” go right up to my room, which is too neat to look like my room, and fall onto the bed and into a dream-filled, fitful sleep. I dream of devil’s food cake and Jake and Adam and Alexis. I wake up with a start, heart pounding, don’t know why.
    It’s three in the morning. I am parched .
    In the kitchen I drink a glass of orange juice and a gallon of ice water. On my way back upstairs I hear rustling in the living room. Dad’s sleeping on the couch again.

CHAPTER 8
    THE MORNING AFTER
    I think I have a pot hangover. And I’m stuck on the pot. Which makes me a captive audience to Mom and Dad’s fight downstairs.
    Now I know what is meant by “the morning after.” I don’t ever want to do that again. I’m not sure what I mean by that —getting stoned or eating enough sugar to fuel a third-world nation. That nation being an angry and hungry one whose army is, at the moment, fighting my intestines—and winning, hands down. Or butt down, really.
    If I ever get out of this bathroom, I’m going to go online and make a significant contribution to our armed forces.
    Do they think I can’t hear them? And of course, to completely drive me mad, I hear only some sentences—the ones that are really screamed.
    Dad: “I know you never really loved me! I know you think you settled!”
    Can’t hear anything for a few minutes.
    Mom: “How do you know anything? You never LISTEN to me!”
    Dad: “All I DO is listen to you! You never let me get a word in edgewise!”
    Could this be any dumber? It’s like they’re reading a movie script of a fight!
    Dad again: “You wish you had married that other guy, don’t you? Steve whatshisname?”
    Holy crap. What’s that about?
    Mom: “What are you TALKING about?”
    Dad: “I can tell you’re not here with me so much of the time. You’re somewhere else. Are you in touch with him, Evie? Is that what you’re doing every night, talking to him?”
    Not Steve Somebody, Dad, I want to shout, it’s the rabbi ! But no, I don’t know that. I don’t. It can’t be.
    I don’t hear anything for a long, long time.
    Then my dad’s voice, sad, soft, but loud enough for me to hear, which means they’re standing at the bottom of the steps by the front door. “I don’t know what to do. What to say to you. I just don’t.”
    “I know you don’t,” says my mother loudly. “And that’s the whole problem.”
    Slammed door.
    “Shit!” says my dad.
    Another slammed door.
    Car engine. Another car engine.
    I poop my guts out for a few more minutes and finally get up. I look out the window. Both cars are gone.
    Not my parents. Please not my parents.
    Two hours later and nobody has come back. I have to get out. My bowels have calmed down, so I text Alexis.
    I need perspective. Maybe she can give me some. Because of her brothers, she’s always seemed older than me. That used to be a good thing. She was generous with her wisdom. It was one of the best things about her. Is. Still. I hope. Maybe she’ll come through for me. At least we could laugh.
    She texts me right back.
    Yes .
    Yes!
    I get on Sir Walter and pedal with more energy and optimism than I’ve had since “Oh, Rabbi.” I love fall, the colored leaves, the crisp, cool air. I tilt my face to the sun.
    And yet … I probably shouldn’t have my hopes up. But I do. I did say I’d treat her to a coffee, but still …
    When I get to the Starbucks by the Acme, I worry by the way she’s standing there that she’s got her wall up. I smile anyway. She says she’ll find a table while I get the drinks. I consider bolting, but I don’t.
    “Took you long enough,” she says when I sit down with my peppermint tea and her latte. I bristle. It was her drink that took so long—and, by the way, was more