13 Gifts by Wendy Mass

stays up very late reading those thick books of hers. “Um, maybe we should go down for dinner? I know my mom always gets really mad if whatever she made gets cold.”
    “It’s not really like that here,” Emily says, opening the door. “You’ll see.”
    It seems like at least
one
of the many closed doors we pass on the way back down the hall should be a spare bedroom. It also seems like the smell of food should be in the air. But even when we reach the bottom of the stairs, the only thing I smell is lemon-scented furniture polish.
    The pile of delivery menus on the kitchen table explains a lot. I see Chinese food, Japanese, Thai, Mexican, Italian, and a place for deli sandwiches. Who knew Willow Falls was so multicultural? Aunt Bethany walks in from the adjoining laundry room with a stack of towels. “I ordered pizza. It’ll be here in a few minutes.”
    “We can wait on the porch for it, if you want,” Emily offers.
    Aunt Bethany hands her the money. “Don’t forget the change. Last time you gave him a ten-dollar tip!”
    “C’mon, let’s go out the back way.” Emily leads me through the laundry room and out the back door. She steps onto a large patio with a barbeque grill and table at one end, and a large vinyl shed at the other. Most of the rest of the backyard is taken up by the huge hole where the pool is supposed to be.
    “My mother told me you like to ride bikes,” Emily says. She makes no mention of the gaping pit of dirt, earth, and rocks with the hastily constructed plastic barrier around the edges that doesn’t look imposing enough to keep even a chipmunk away.
    I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Mom told them stuff about me, but I am, a little. “At home I used to ride every night after dinner.” I don’t tell her how hard it’s going to be not riding.I already miss feeling the wind on my cheeks, that sense of freedom, of using my muscles and feeling strong.
    She opens the latch on the shed and the door swings open easily, letting out a musty smell. “You can use mine while you’re here. I never use it.”
    My heart leaps. “Really? That’d be great!” Then my eyes land on the bike. It’s pink. Like bubblegum pink. Knotted tassels hang limply from the handlebars, a white wicker basket secured between them. Stickers of Clifford the Big Red Dog cover the banana seat. One gear, no hand brakes.
    “I know it looks small,” Emily says, “but if you raise the seat you’ll be able to use it.”
    My thank-you comes out a bit forced, but Emily doesn’t seem to notice.
    “You can go for a ride right now, if you want, while I wait for the pizza guy.”
    I eye the bike, which looks like something I would have ridden when I was seven. “Um, that’s okay. I’ll just wait with you.”
    “No!” she says, so forcefully that I take a step back.
    She seems just as surprised herself, because she quickly adds, “I mean, it’s fine, I can do it myself.”
    “Okay. I’ll, um, go unpack.”
    “Okay,” she says, visibly relieved that I’m not going to follow her. She shuts and latches the shed.
    I watch until she disappears around the side of the house. Have I worn out my welcome already? Maybe I should have made a bigger deal over the bike. I’m tempted to climb down into the hole and hide out there until the summer is over. I peerover the edge and am sorry to see that the mixture of dirt, tree roots, and slabs of wood doesn’t look very inviting.
    So I push open the laundry room door, only to hear a male’s voice say, “Oomph!” and a second later, the sound of glass shattering on the tiled floor. I peek in to see Ray staring down at the remains of something green.
    “I’m so sorry! I didn’t see you. I hope that wasn’t a really expensive … bowl? Vase? Glass frog?”
    “Bowl,” he says cheerily. “No worries. It wasn’t exy. Only cost a few quid. And that one was just for practice anyway.”
    “Practice for what?”
    “I’m a glassblower,” he says, thumping his