Dear Kurl,
I meant to tell you today that when Shayna arrived home Saturday from taking the SAT, hours before I expected any of you, she stomped straight up to her room and slammed the door. At first she wouldn’t even answer when I knocked. Then she said, “Now we know why you were so interested in that goddamn test. You were prepping Kurl, weren’t you?”
“Can I come in?” I asked.
“No.”
“What happened? Why are you home so soon?”
“I should never even have registered,” she said. “There was no way in hell I was going to score high enough to bother.”
I rested my forehead against her door. It was exactly what Bron had been afraid of: Shayna giving up and not even taking the test.
“Kurl seemed to be killing it,” she said. “He was filling stuff in like a demon. Didn’t look up from the page once.”
“Are you mad we kept it a secret?”
“No, Jojo, I’m not mad. God. Why would I even care?”
“Do we really have to conduct this entire conversation through the door?” I asked.
“There is no conversation,” she said. “Go away.”
Go away. Leave me alone. I’ve been getting a lot of that from my sister lately, on the rare occasions she’s been in the house. Lyle found a pack of matches from the Ace in her bag the other day and hit the roof. She confessed to him she and Bron had been to that open mic night before Christmas, which is technically true, but she did not divulge that she’s been spending most of her time there ever since.
Lyle tried to say that she’s not to go there again, ever, or else. She kept asking him why not: What is his problem with that place in particular, why does he get so worked up about it, why can’t he give her a single logical reason she shouldn’t go there? “Because you’re underage” is clearly not holding water with her.
Yours,
Jo