Read Trigger for Free Online Page B

the words. Todd was straightforward and honest. If he’d been jealous or had a problem with me, he would have said so, and we would have worked it out.
    Maybe Todd changed. You don’t really know him now, After, do you? Maybe he even changed Before .
    “Ectoplasm. You talk too much, chump.”
    The floor creaked.
    “Jersey?”
    My head jerked up and I snatched my hand off the yearbook cover like I shouldn’t have been touching it. “Mom? You’re home. Time—it isn’t. Ectoplasm. I mean, I didn’t know it was time for you to be home.”
    She stood in the doorway and glanced around my room. Her eyes lingered on the bed, the pillow, the football rug I was keeping spread out where it was Before. She seemed to be studying everything but me. “Who were you talking to?”
    “Um, I—myself, I guess. Bored, looking up faces in the yearbook, and … and stuff.” I felt like a big idiot, and I couldn’t tell her about J.B. No way. Besides, the ghost seemed to have taken off the minute she made a noise.
    “Where’s your father?” She glanced around the room again, like Dad might be hiding somewhere in a corner.
    “I think he went to the ectoplasm. I mean, grocery store. Something about getting a bunch of boy food—easy food—for after he starts back to work next week.”
    Mom jerked like I had hit her. “Did he actually say he was going back to work next week and leaving you here alone?”
    “I didn’t—I didn’t write it down.” I had made a big mistake here, but I had no clue what it was. “But, I think he said that. Food. Boy food. It’ll be fine. Really. Boy food.”
    Mom’s eyes closed. I realized that her normal banking suit, the blue skirt and jacket with the white shirt, was wrinkled. Her pantyhose sagged like they were too big for her.
    “How long have you been here? How long has he been gone?” Her voice came out murder-quiet. It gave me chills.
    “I didn’t write it down.”
    When Mom opened her eyes, she stared at where I was on the bed, but I didn’t think she was seeing me. Not now, not in the present, anyway. “Have you been okay alone?”
    “Sure.” I shrugged. “I’m seventeen.”
    “No thoughts about … what happened?”
    I think about what happened all the time. Every minute . The words wanted to rush down from my brain into my mouth, but in an unusual fit of pragmatics and social awareness, King Jersey the five-year-old genius figured this was the wrong answer. Do not pass doorbells. Do not collect deserts.
    “No thoughts,” I lied. “Pragmatics. I’ve just been trying to figure out who this girl Elana was. Ectoplasm, and stuff.”
    Mom stiffened and hardened, turning into that scary ice statue with moving lips. “The girl you dated?”
    All thoughts of pragmatic deserts dropped out of my head. “You know who she was? I dated her? When? Ectoplasm!”
    Mom’s mouth opened and closed, opened and closed. “You said you were bored, right?”
    “Well, yeah. Dated. Dad said I had to stay here until at least Saturday, so I’ve been trying to find things to do, and—”
    “Clean up and come downstairs. I’ll call a cab to take you over to The Palace to see Mama Rush.” She closed her mouth again. Took a deep breath. “Can you handle a cab, Jersey?”
    “Sure, practiced at Carter. I can handle it.”
    “You positive?”
    “Sure. Cab.”
    Mom sighed.
    Pay the driver. Pay the driver. I could do easy math. I could count change and money and stuff. If I remembered to pay the driver. If I walked off and forgot, he’d call the police and send me to jail. Pay the driver. I clung to my memory book and the bills Mom had given me. The plastic bag with Mama Rush’s presents felt heavy on my weak wrist. Don’t forget to pay the driver. Jail. Don’t forget to keep enough money to get home. Jail. Don’t forget to pay the driver.
    The taxi pulled slowly to a stop beside a long sidewalk. A bunch of flower bushes lined the sides of the white concrete.
    Pay the driver.
    “Pay the