Read The Fifty-Seven Lives of Alex Wayfare for Free Online

possibility of never having another vision, of being normal, tugs at my sleeve. It taps on the window. I look out through the glass and see myself sitting in the school cafeteria, talking casually to Jensen Peters, flipping my hair over my shoulder and flirting with him like I actually know what I’m doing. I see myself standing in front of Mom’s full length mirror, wearing a dress for the first time in my life, ready to go on my first date. I’m hanging out with Claire, laughing and talking about her latest Hollywood crush, whom I’ve never heard of, and I don’t feel the urge to make fun of her mercilessly. I’m reading one of the countless novels Audrey has recommended to me. I’m strolling through a college campus, I’m tall and grown up, and I haven’t had a sleepless night in years.
    I look happy.
    A pill could do that for me, couldn’t it?
    â€œWhy don’t we meet a few more times,” Dr Farrow says, “before we talk about medication?”
    All my hopes deflate and fizzle. They drop to the floor at my feet with a thud, one by one, like dead birds.
    I knew it wouldn’t be that easy.
    Normal is never easy.
    Â 
    MOVIE NIGHT
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    It’s an hour’s car ride back to Annapolis from DC, and I’m silent the whole way home. I feel empty and hollow, like Dr Farrow sucked everything out of me, leaving behind a cold, hardened-steel shell. My eyes glaze over as I stare out the window in the back of Mom’s Civic. The sun set long ago. Glittering lights fade to black as we leave the city, and then, one by one, they multiply again as we near the Bay. It’s the same route Mom takes every day to and from work. She knows it like she knows the freckles on my shoulders. If she’s tired of the same old boring drive, she’s never said. I know she’d drive all day, every day, if it brought her one step closer to Audrey’s cure. Still, I feel bad she has to make the extra trip just for me.
    For me and my issues.
    It isn’t until I’m back home in the kitchen and smell Gran’s lemon poppyseed muffins that I finally let my guard down. The hardened-steel shell begins to melt. I’m exhausted, like I ran an emotional marathon. All I want to do is trudge up the stairs and collapse face-first into my pillow, but a hug from Gran and a mouthful of muffin soon sets me to rights.
    Thankfully, tonight is our family movie night – a time-honored tradition in the Wayfare house – which means homemade pizza, soda, popcorn, and no chance for serious discussion over the dinner table. I have no desire to fill the whole family in on my talk with Dr Farrow.
    While Dad and Gran put the finishing touches on the pizzas, Mom enlists Claire and I for Mega Couch duty in the den. Ever since I can remember, we’ve always pushed our two couches and three ottomans together to make one massive lounging zone. Dad calls Mega Couch “the ultimate movie viewing experience,” and I totally agree. I can’t wait to sink down into the cushions, get lost in a film I know is “safe,” and worry about everything else in the morning.
    â€œSo what’s on the playbill tonight?” Mom asks me as she nudges the last ottoman into place with her knee.
    I pull one of my favorite films out of the DVD cabinet: Charade, with Audrey Hepburn and Cary Grant. It’s a delicious murder mystery, full of the best kinds of twists and turns. No one is who they say they are, and it keeps you guessing all the way until the end. I hold it up and Mom grins. It’s one of her favorites too.
    She showed it to me for the first time when I was nine and laid up with chicken pox. It was the only thing that kept me captivated long enough to keep my mind off all the itching. I remember lying stretched out on Mega Couch, oven mitts on my hands, sipping chocolate milk through a purple curly straw. I remember falling in love with Cary Grant. I remember hating him