Free The Bad Decisions Playlist by Michael Rubens

you.”
    â€œI’m impressed. I didn’t mean​—”
    â€œIt’s fine. You’re right to think I’m dumb. I told you so myself.”
    I’m not sure why I’m working to keep her here, not giving up. Maybe just to overwrite our first two conversations, the real one in the classroom and the virtual one while I was mowing.
    â€œI suppose the pickup’s probably useful for all the hauling you have to do on this here farm, milk the chickens and whatnot.”
    â€œI’m pretty certain you don’t milk chickens.”
    â€œPigs?”
    â€œThat sounds closer. Look, you think it was
my
choice to get the truck? Or live in this house?”
    â€œI didn’t say it was. And let’s be honest​—​this is really more of a mansion, right?”
    â€œIt’s got six bathrooms, so yeah, I think that’s fair.” Now she checks her watch again.
    â€œWhat’s it like?” I say quickly.
    â€œHaving six bathrooms? There’s never a line.”
    I laugh. I have a flash of her deadpanning jokes in that manner at the family dinner table, dry as dust, offhanding them for no one’s entertainment but her own. “I mean,” I say, “your dad running for senate and all. Is it . . . fun?”
    She regards me for a moment, then twists around, double-checking to make sure no one is listening. Then steps out onto the front porch and lets the door close behind her.
    â€œIs it ‘fun’? You mean, being a prop in campaign appearances? That? Standing next to my parents and my sister and smiling and pretending that I’m happy to be there, when I’d rather someone just lit me on fire? Yeah, I adore it. That’s what I am to them, a prop so that my dad can get his prize, because he got rich firing people and that means he deserves to be a senator.”
    â€œSo . . . pretty fun.”
    â€œYeah, it’s great. And you wanted to know where I work? I’m going to campaign headquarters to spend all day calling really unpleasant people to ask them for money. For him.”
    â€œI’m guessing candidate Lindahl shouldn’t depend on your vote.”
    â€œIf I were old enough, I’d vote against him twice.” Then she says, “I don’t know why I’m telling you this.”
    â€œDo you love him?”
    She looks at me oddly.
    â€œWhat kind of question is that?”
    â€œI don’t know. A bad one. I forgot we’re not really friends. You might have noticed that stuff just comes out of my mouth now and then.”
    She leaves that one alone.
    â€œSo . . . do you?”
    â€œLove him?” She shrugs. “He’s my dad. Can it be the thing where I love him without liking him?”
    â€œYeah, sure. That counts.”
    â€œDo you love
your
dad?”
    â€œI don’t know. I love my mom. I like her too, ’cept when she’s moody. Which is usually my fault, so . . . But my dad, he was dead when I was born.”
    â€œOh. I’m sorry.”
    â€œIt’s okay​—​he got better,” I say, and start to laugh again.
    She watches me. “You going to expand on that?”
    â€œAh, it’s complicated.”
    â€œSounds like it.”
    There’s another space where neither of us says anything, and she doesn’t seem to be trying to flee. Like we are, sort of, friends.
    â€œI find it hard to believe this is your family,” I say.
    â€œYou and me both,” she breathes. “I’m sort of counting the days until I can go to college.”
    â€œWhere do you want to go?”
    â€œColumbia. That’s my top choice.”
    â€œThat’s New York, right? That’s where I’ll be. We should hang out. I mean,” I add, “if we were actually friends.”
    â€œRight.”
    One more glance at her watch.
    â€œI really do have to go,” she says.
    â€œOkay. You want the