Free Things Go Flying by Shari Lapena Page B

thinking about Nicole and how he was going to manage to sneak out of the house to meet her without getting caught.

CHAPTER FIVE
    S upper that night was more animated than usual.
    Often, Harold found family meals a bit of a strain. Audrey viewed family meals as a time to instill values, teach proper table manners, and enjoy civilized conversation. They all felt the pressure. As a result, the atmosphere was frequently tense, and the conversation stilted. The boys naturally wanted to talk with their mouths full, interrupt each other and trade mild insults, but Audrey wouldn’t allow it. It usually ended up with nobody saying much of anything. The sound of everybody chewing, Audrey’s questions about school, and the boys’ monosyllabic answers, made Harold miserable.
    But the night of the identity theft was different. Harold ordered pizza, because Audrey was still too woozy from fainting to cook. Pizza they were allowed to eat with their hands. Also, Audrey was still in shock about the mortgage and wasn’t enforcing the rules as closely as usual. The boys were full of questions, which they mostly asked with their mouths full.
    â€œWhat’s going to happen?” John asked anxiously, looping a piece of stretchy cheese around his finger.
    â€œNothing’s going to happen. The bank will take care of it. It’s all going to be fixed, don’t worry,” Harold said, hoping it was true. He remembered uneasily all the screw-ups the bank had made on their mortgage.
    â€œHow does someone steal your identity anyway?” Dylan asked through a mouthful of pizza dough, cheese, and pepperoni.
    â€œApparently, it’s surprisingly easy,” Harold said. “Although it can be complicated, too. My case is complicated.” He still couldn’t believe it had happened. “Someone—probably whoever took my wallet—got enough information about me to access my bank accounts. So they withdrew all our money. And there are all sorts of credit card bills—sports cars, you wouldn’t believe.”
    â€œHow do they do it, though?” Dylan asked, wanting the details.
    As Harold explained what the bank manager had told them, Audrey, who still hadn’t touched her pizza, blurted out, “It’s going to take a lot of work to clear all this up!”
    After supper, Harold decided to go for a walk. He wanted to clear his head, and he didn’t think sitting in his chair with the newspaper would do the trick tonight. He stepped off the porch into the early stirrings of a storm.
    It was a dark, moonless, autumnal evening. As Harold walked along the streets away from the house, the wind wrestled with the trees high above him, whipping the branches around. It wasn’t raining yet, but it probably would, Harold thought, realizing that he’d left his umbrella behind. But he was far enough into his walk to think twice about going back to get it. He decided to take his chances.
    He came to the end of one residential street and turned down another, his eyes fixed on the sidewalk a few feet in front of him, his thoughts gloomy, startled each time a dog entered his circle of vision before its owner loomed up behind it at the end of the leash, arm extended.
    Harold soon found himself at the edge of Riverdale Park and stopped to cast his gaze far across the valley, in the direction of his childhood home. His thoughts turned to the different trajectories of his life and Tom’s. He and Tom were so different—no wonder they’d had such different lives. It was inevitable that they grow apart. Tom had never been depressed. He’d always lived life to the fullest. And thinking of Tom, Harold was startled by the sudden sharpness of his grief. All at once he wanted to weep—for Tom, and for himself.
    Harold turned away from the park, walking faster. Eventually, his mind began to empty. He’d even begun to tell himself that with a little fortitude, he’d get through