Free Is Anybody There? by Eve Bunting

wished them back as soon as I’d spoken them.
    “Look,” Nick said, “I’m sorry I scared you. I just didn’t think you’d hear. Man, you have some great ears on you!” He smiled but I didn’t smile back.
    “I thought you didn’t come in here secretly,” I said.
    “Let’s say this time’s an exception. And I don’t think it would be a good idea to tell your mother about it.”
    “Oh, you don’t.” There was a thick, hard lump in my throat. “Well you just quit sneaking around our place. From now on, stay out of our garage. And out of our house.” I wanted to add, “And out of our lives,” but that sounded too nerdy.
    I ran back up the steps, slammed off the light, and locked the kitchen door behind me.
    It was a few minutes before I heard the faintcreak and swish as the big door closed. What had he been doing? I should have stayed instead of jamming out like that. Was he inside now or out?
    Out.
    From around the side of the living-room drapes I watched him lope up the steps to his apartment. Whatever he carried in front of him was hidden by the breadth of his back. He had taken something. He
was
the one. I could tell Mom now and she would believe me.
    So why was I feeling so rotten?

CHAPTER
11
    When I woke up Christmas Eve morning I didn’t feel happy the way I do most Christmas Eves. It took a while to remember why: Nick, and last night.
    Mom was in the kitchen eating a toasted muffin and jelly and drinking coffee.
    “Want some?” she asked.
    “No thanks.” I got out the fruit-and-bran cereal and a dish.
    Mom watched me over the top of her coffee mug. “It’s such a pain having to work Christmas Eve,” she said. “But I’ll be home at five and then Christmas will really begin.”
    “I know.” On the table there was a bowl of red roses that Miss Coriander had sent over. Mom loves roses and Miss Coriander is about the only one who has them this time of year.
    “Nick won’t be home today,” she said.
    “Too bad,” I muttered, pouring cereal into my dish.
    “But if you feel the least bit …” She paused and then started over. “If you feel too much alone, go next door. Everything’s safe, of course, with the new locks. But Miss Sarah and Miss Coriander will be starting their cooking today. You might want to see what they’re doing.” Miss Sarah and Miss Coriander always bring a ton of food when they come for Christmas dinner, including creamed onions and spinach souffle and their special molded salads filled with nuts and cranberries. They won’t take the leftovers home, either, so Mom and I eat our way right into New Year’s.
    “You could learn to make that spinach souffle,” she said. “Then we wouldn’t have to wait until Christmas every year to have it.”
    “I thought maybe I’d ask Robbie to come over, if that’s OK.”
    “Sure. Good idea. But you two monkeys stay away from under the tree. No untying the gifts and checking them out then tying them up again.”
    “Mom! We were nine years old.”
    “No switching labels!” she added.
    “We were ten!”
    “So now you’re thirteen. Stay away.”
    “Party pooper,” I said.
    A small pitcher of milk was on the table and I poured some on my cereal, careful not to look at her. “Mom? Last night Nick was in the garage.”
    “Marcus! Are you going to start—”
    “You said to tell you if something was bothering me. You said I had a responsibility.”
    Her voice softened. “I know. You’re right.”
    “I didn’t want to bring it up again. I didn’t mention it last night because I wanted to think it through. But … but … and now he has a key again.”
    Mom stood up. She looked pale and she said something quietly that I couldn’t quite hear, something like “This isn’t going to work, Caroline.” To me she said: “I’ll ask him to give the key back, Marcus. See you tonight.”
       I took a quick look around the garage after she left. Nothing seemed to be missing. ThenRobbie came, and he and I shot