On a Clear Day by Walter Dean Myers Page B

answered.
    “You like Michael?”
    “What does that mean?”
    “The others you nail with your look—it’s like
     you’re penetrating them,” Anja said. “Michael—you always
     kind of side-glance him.”
    “You like him?” I asked.
    “Not like that,” she replied.
    “Not like
what
?”
    “Dahlia, I didn’t mean
     anything … honestly!”
    “No problem,” I said.
    “Wednesdays?” she came back.
    “Wednesdays what?”
    “When we get filthy rich for one day a
     week”—Anja’s smile widened—“we’ll go shopping
     at Marks and Spencer on Wednesdays.”
    “You’re on!”
    As soon as I started cutting up the veggies I had bought, I realized how
     hungry I was. It was a residence hotel, and the small tuxedo kitchen was neatly tucked
     behind a sliding fabric-framed door. There was only one large skillet in the kitchen,
     but it was enough. I started sautéing some onions in garlic and margarine, and
     they filled the room up immediately with good smells. I added some mushrooms and carrots
     and turned the heat down.
    I set up my computer, brought up the news, and saw that
     the reception was lousy. I switched to
boost
mode, and the picture came up but
     I lost the color. No big deal. The Tories were debating whether or not the government
     should take over the London
Times
as a cultural institution.
    “No, because if you do, it won’t be a cultural institution
     anymore, dummies!” I said aloud.
    It really made me mad when things got screwed up in the same way all the
     time. Somebody was going to “save” something and ended up destroying it by
     making it into something it had never been intended to be. I threw some extra garlic
     into the pan in protest. I had bought thinly cut “chicken filets,” and I
     sliced them up and stir-fried them into the other veggies. They looked like real chicken
     but they weren’t real chicken. I knew a lot of people didn’t eat them
     because they didn’t know what they were. I didn’t know what was in half
     the food I ate anymore. Nobody did.
    I looked for a grater, couldn’t find one, and diced up a few pieces
     of ginger as the guy who ran some theater talked about putting on a musical version of
Hamlet
. Sounded boring, and I was about to switch to another news outlet
     when there was a knock on the door. I opened it and saw Michael with a newspaper and a
     bag in his hand.
    “I just wondered if everything was okay,” he said.
    “Yeah, I’m all good,” I answered. “How are you
     doing?”
    “Good. I went down the street and picked up a paper and a sandwich.
     I should have asked everyone first to see if they needed anything.”
    “What kind of sandwich you get?”
    “Uh—it’s kind of an egg salad sandwich,” he
     said, holding it up so I could see it.
    “It looks pathetic. You want something to eat?”
    “You don’t mind?”
    I moved away from the door, and I thought he hesitated a second before
     coming in.
    “Smells good, whatever it is,” he said.
    “It’s just some veggies and fake chicken—you eat fake
     chicken?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Sit down.” I found the wooden spoon I had been using and
     pushed the veggies toward the center of the skillet. It did smell good now that the
     ginger was getting into the act. “Have you been to England a lot?”
    “Not a lot, but a few times,” Michael said. “We
     performed here at the Coliseum and in a few clubs in Brixton.”
    “What’s leading a band about?” I asked.
    “It’s seriously together,” Michael said. “If
     you’re doing it right, you’re bringing people together and they’re
     creating something. You get the right people and you can see it happening. And if
     you’re communicating, the audience sees it happening too. Then all you have to do
     is keep it going. You know what I mean? A lot of good things could happen in the
     world
—would
happen in the world—if people just weren’t
     afraid of the momentum. The momentum builds and then somebody feels the