Maple Park
The Three Months Prior
SOLD!
Watching the Goldie Wilson look-alike slap the "SOLD!" sign on the ad planted in the front yard is easy.
Talking to the dirty-blonde girl next door, however, is quite the test.
In what Stephen's dubbed the "Twice-A-Month Tag-Along Trip" to the southern suburb, there's not much to do when all the attention's on the plan to renovate the house in hopes of turning it into the home Dad and his new co-workers from the glassy-blue tower see it as.
Dad says it'll be a strong group effort. The zoned-out kiddo would either have to find something to do or Dad would be happy to give him something to do. With no phone (it's in his old room four hours away after forgetting to charge it overnight), the latter becomes a reality.
Maybe he should've brought Peter along.
"Hey! Want to learn how to prime a wall?" Dad asks.
Priming. That's like drawing, right? He can see packs of new brushes as coarse as a horse's tail, high rollers, pans, blue tape, and buckets of the dull white primer in what will be a red living room when completed.
"Come on! It'll be fun, kiddo. You like doing creative stuff."
"...Fine."
It's not.
"Good!"
Only to Dad in a house he says smells like "teachable moments."
B-Boomph!
Not a half-hour into a lesson on painting with primers, Stephen's saved by a knock at the side door.
"Want to get that? I'm tied up."
Speaking of impressions, he's somehow made one already on said dirty-blonde girl next door, because there she is with a lip-biting smirk. Bobbing up and down on the other side of the side door.
"Hi!" she says, fixing her glasses.
Stephen mimics her. "Uh, hey?" he questionably replies with a sniffle.
You're turning red.
"So, whatcha doing?" she asks.
YOU ARE READING
Earhart & Noonan: An "Us Club" Novel (#1)(NaNoWriMo15)
Teen FictionFor the first twelve years of Stephen Vaughn's life, just trying to get others around him to pronounce his first name the right way ("Stee-vehn Vawn") has felt like the hardest task he's had to try and cope with. That is, until his perfect life with...
