Free Fragile by Lisa Unger Page B

ever figure it out?”
    “Nah. But she’s not seeing that guy anymore.”
    Marshall had a gift for figuring out passwords. It really wasn’t that hard; most people were pretty lazy, wanted something easy to remember and then used that same password for everything. He knew his mother’s password for the wireless router at her place was his name and the year of his birth. Marshall figured it was probably the same for Facebook, and he was right. Last week, he and his dad had logged in to her account and left a wall message on her boyfriend’s page: I don’t want to see you anymore. Your dick is too small. You’ve never satisfied me.
    Marshall hadn’t seen or called his mother since then. If his mother suspected him of hacking into her account, she didn’t get in touch to say so. Marshall noticed that she’d “unfriended” the loser she’d been dating, and that her boyfriend (now ex-boyfriend) had done the same to her. Mission accomplished.
    Josh, Amber’s boyfriend, had been equally easy. His nickname on the football team was All-Star. Marshall guessed that was his password, and, again, he was right. Now the school was buzzing with Josh and Amber’s breakup. But, of course, she still didn’t seem that interested in Marshall, not even with the cool car and smokes. In fact, she’d practically run away from him.
    His father went back to his hammering. It took Marshall a minute to realize that whatever nail Travis had been hammering was already sunk deep into the wood. Why was he still hitting it like that? Marshall stood and started to move back up the stairs.
    Marshall didn’t have a lot of good memories of his father. Dr. Cooper had asked him to think of some moments when he’d felt happy and safe with his dad. He wasn’t sure what the point of that exercise had been, unless it was to make him feel more like shit than he already did. But he did come up with two occasions.
    There was the time they went to the zoo together and his father had bought him an ice cream. He remembered that because it was his own cone; he didn’t have to share it. They’d seen some tigers. His father had said, “Man, they’re beautiful, aren’t they?” Marshall remembered lookingat his father’s face and seeing something strange there—maybe it was awe. Travis had dropped an arm around Marshall’s shoulder and squeezed him tight. Marshall remembered that his happiness had felt like a swelling in his chest.
    Once, Travis took him to the beach. Neither of them had been wearing bathing suits, so they swam with their pants on. They’d jumped huge waves and laughed when they wiped out. They’d driven home wet and shivering, ordered a pizza, and watched a game afterward.
    Also, it was always safe to be around Travis when he was busy building something. His temper didn’t flare when he had his mind on a project, or when he was having a good time doing something. It was places like the dinner table or the couch that should be avoided, anytime Travis was idle and looking for someplace to direct his attention.
    “Need some help?” Marshall asked.
    His father shot him a look, a kind of up-and-down appraisal, ending in a sneer of disapproval. “An hour ago maybe. But not now.”
    Marshall stood for a moment, watching his father’s thick arm lift and drop with the hammer. He wanted to say, Dad. You got it. You can stop hammering . But he didn’t. Then, when it was clear his father didn’t intend to look up again, Marshall turned and shuffled back up the stairs. He took the sack of egg rolls from the fridge, threw it in the microwave for a few seconds, and carried it upstairs.
    Marshall closed the door to his room and waded through the junk on the floor—gaming magazines, clothes that needed washing. He accidentally kicked an empty Coke can, and it rattled under the bed. He sank into the tattered gray computer chair in front of his homemade desk—two planks of wood balanced between stacked red milk crates. The familiar sense of