The Key to the Golden Firebird by Maureen Johnson Page A

You’re going to need it. Think about it.”
    â€œI have thought about it.”
    â€œYou couldn’t have, or you wouldn’t be doing this. How elseare you going to get a scholarship? You’re not going to get an academic one, and we can’t pay full tuition.”
    â€œI’ll work.”
    â€œAnd make ten or fifteen or twenty thousand dollars?” May said. “Doing what?”
    â€œWhy is this your business?”
    â€œIt’s all of our business. There’s only one pool of money for tuition. We have to figure out how to divide it.”
    â€œLike that’s up to you,” Brooks said. “Besides, you’re the only one whose school costs money. Why don’t you just go to our school?”
    â€œWe don’t pay my tuition,” May said quickly. “Grandma and Grandpa Gold pay it.”
    â€œSo? Couldn’t we use that money for something? It’s what, six thousand dollars? Seven thousand?”
    â€œIt’s different.”
    â€œHow?”
    â€œI don’t throw it away,” May said, her voice rising. “I actually work. If I get a scholarship, it will all be worth it. It’ll be worth more .”
    Palmer started chomping furiously at her nails.
    â€œI’m telling Mom,” she said.
    â€œGo ahead,” Brooks replied, meeting Palmer’s gaze.
    There was a knock at the front door. May made a move to get up and answer it, but Palmer beat her to it. She had to get up or she would start screaming.
    Pete was waiting there when she opened the door, dressed in a loose pair of jeans and a blue T-shirt that said 100% Hawaiian Pure.
    â€œHey,” he said. “Is May here?”
    He looked just over her head, in the direction of the kitchen. Palmer waited a minute before answering, trying to figure out a way to get him to come in and join the conversation. Maybe he could talk some sense into Brooks. Before she could think of anything, May came up behind them.
    â€œI’m ready,” she said, stepping around both Palmer and Pete and out the door.
    â€œYou can come in,” Palmer said to Pete, even though it seemed like the wrong time to finally say this.
    â€œThat’s all right,” he said. He looked over his shoulder at May. “We’re just going to go, I think.”
    â€œUh-huh,” May said, folding her arms over her chest. “Definitely.”
    She walked across the lawn toward Pete’s car.
    â€œSee you later,” Pete said, smiling at Palmer.
    â€œLater.”
    Palmer watched Pete follow May. When she turned around, she saw Brooks coming up behind her and heading for the stairs.
    â€œI’ll tell Mom myself,” she said.
    Palmer shut the door.
    â€œWhatever,” she said. But Brooks was already gone.
    Â 
    Pete’s car was saunalike. Waves of heated air came blasting from the vents.
    â€œSorry,” he said. He threw his arm over her seat and craned his neck around to back out of the driveway. “My radiator is leaking.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œMy radiator. I have to keep the heat on so the car doesn’t overheat.”
    â€œYou have to turn on the heat to keep the heat down?” May asked. “That makes no sense.”
    â€œIt pulls the heat out of the engine and pushes it inside the car. That’s how heaters work.”
    â€œIs this a joke? Like the one from the other night?”
    â€œNo,” he said. “This just sucks.”
    May noticed that his skin was flushed and he’d stripped off his sweatshirt, so he probably wasn’t kidding. Pete tried to turn on the radio, but the stations drifted wildly every time he turned the steering wheel, so he had to switch it off.
    â€œI think my car’s possessed,” he said. “And I just finished paying it off, too.”
    â€œDidn’t your parents buy it?”
    â€œYeah, but I’ve been paying them back. It was fifteen hundred bucks.”
    â€œI didn’t