Free Spoiled Rotten by Dayle Gaetz Page A

think about the good times because that would make me weak.
    â€œThen what’s so different about this year?”
    I couldn’t believe he would ask such a stupid question.
    â€œEverything!” I shouted. I didn’t mean to shout, but there was something about his face that made anger well up inside me.
    â€œLast year…” I paused and lowered my voice. “Last year there was just you and me, a beat-up canoe and two backpacks.”
    I turned my back and stared down at the treetops. I could not let him see my watery eyes. “This year there’s you, me, your precious Patti and her snotty little daughter.” I shuddered just thinking about Amy. It was hard to believe she was almost twelve. Amy was worse than the worst nerd in my entire school. She had “perfect little angel” written all over her. In short, she was disgusting.
    â€œWorse than that, we’ll all be jammed together on their stupid boat.”
    I could tell my dad was getting angry again. And that was good. I knew how to deal with his anger. It was the deep, hurting sadness I couldn’t handle.
    He put his hands on my shoulders and twirled me around to face him. He waved a finger in front of my eyes, so close I blinked. “Don’t you ever speak that way about your stepmother and stepsister again.”
    â€œThey aren’t my step-anything.”
    â€œThey will be by next week. And you’re going to have to get used to that.”
    I glared at him. “Isn’t it bad enough thatyou caved in to what Patti wants? How could you tell me here,
in Mom’s place
?”
    His face went pale; he stepped back.
    I picked up my pack and started toward the cliff.
    â€œJessica!” he called. “Wait for me. Don’t be so stupid!”
    I wasn’t stupid, no matter what he said. I stopped to put my backpack on properly and turned around to climb down the rock face.
    My father needed to gather up our stuff, so he was a few minutes behind. When I reached the bottom, I didn’t wait. I started for the trail. I needed to get away from him.
    I pushed through bushes that came up to my waist. My father’s words rang in my head:
You’re going to have to get used to that.
But I didn’t want to.
    I didn’t want things to change. Until today I had been sure my father would come to his senses. I thought he would realize how wrong Patti was for him. I never thought he would cancel our trip together.
    I reached the trail and started down. Anger made me walk fast.
    If Dad couldn’t see it, why didn’t Patti? Why did she want to marry him anyway? They had nothing in common. He liked to paddle a canoe on a quiet lake. She liked a big noisy boat with a smelly engine that polluted the ocean.
    Her first husband had been a professor at the University of Victoria. A brainy guy, big time educated. Nice man, until he ran off with a younger woman. Patti hadn’t seen him in a year.
    Patti was an accountant—a neat clean office-type. So why would she marry a hardworking mechanic who comes home with grease under his fingernails? More to the point:
How could she do this to me?
Didn’t she know I would always love my mother? Didn’t she realize Dad still loved Mom too? That would never change. There was no room in our lives for Patti, and sooner or later my dad was going to figure it out.
    I really hoped it would be sooner.

chapter two
    As his wedding day got closer and closer I watched my father, hoping he would come to his senses. I knew the marriage would be a disaster, so how come he couldn’t figure it out?
    I tried to help him along by acting super grumpy. But he didn’t notice. So I stopped talking to him. He didn’t notice that either. Then I got to thinking that he might
like
it when Ididn’t talk, so I started talking all the time, yak-king about anything I could think of.
    Nothing worked. He walked around the house with a stupid grin on his face like