Foes & Cons by Carrie Aarons (i am malala young readers edition .txt) 📗

And my dad chooses, aside from me, to let people love him who can do so from a safe distance. Friends, coworkers, his buddies who go on ski trips and kayaking adventures with him. He was burned so badly by the woman he would have loved for the rest of his life if she let him, that he’s terrified to try again.

In some ways, that’s what I feel with Sawyer. It’s why I’ve never bothered trying to date, or even have a crush on anyone else. I loved that boy completely, and he shredded my heart without even knowing.

What would happen if I allow someone to love me and they leave me even more jagged than he had?

“She wants to come visit for Christmas.” Dad’s statement interrupts my thoughts about my former best friend.

“Um, what?” My voice is incredulous. “I hope you said no.”

Dad shrugs as he ladles batter into the waffle maker. “She’s your mother, Blair. She has a right to see you, and if she wants to spend a holiday with you, I don’t see how that is a bad thing.”

My temper is rising, because I don’t understand how he can be so naive after all this time. “Um, maybe because she hasn’t spent a holiday with us in, I don’t know, five years? She’s usually jet-setting to Paris or on some yoga retreat in Thailand. Why this year? And why should we have to forgo our usual traditions, traditions which I love, to accommodate her? She’ll just talk about herself the whole time and end up making me feel depressed, Dad.”

He turns to me, a sad expression on his face. He knows what she is, an undiagnosed narcissist, but at the same time, Dad is one of those people who is always willing to give someone like Mom a second chance. He simply can’t see past the woman he fell in love with, to realize how terribly she wounds me every time she comes around.

Again, this is his one downfall.

“Just consider it, okay? She sounded really sincere this time.”

I haven’t told him about her phone call the other week at school. She sounded sincere then, too. And look how that conversation had ended.

I sigh loudly, signaling to him that I don’t want to talk about this anymore. Instead, I try a different tactic.

“Actually, I was thinking maybe you and I could take a trip over Christmas. So, we wouldn’t even be here.”

“Oh? And who is paying for this trip?” Dad smiles wryly.

I shrug, half-ignoring him. “I kind of thought it would be cool if I showed you Haiti. I’ve been emailing with the director of my program, and they’re doing a two-week build over Christmas. They need volunteers …”

Ever since I came back to the States, I’ve been itching to go back to Haiti. The summer was tough, wonderful, eye-opening and emotional all wrapped into one. I miss the little girls I built that school for; I miss the full-time non-profit workers who are doing so much good over there. If I have an opportunity to go back, to show Dad just what he’d allowed me to experience over the summer months, I think it would open his eyes, too.

“Hmm …” He taps a finger to his chin. “I would love to see just what kind of place made my daughter better with a hammer and saw than I am. I’ll think about it. But for now, we need to see what this new Drew Barrymore show is all about, and if you think she’ll outlast Bethenny Frankel.”

He aims the remote at the TV, and our Sunday morning routine lives on.

Thoughts of Mom, Haiti, and Christmas swim in my head.

First things first, though, I have to get through Thanksgiving. Which includes an entire day in the presence of the boy who I simultaneously want to hold and hit.

17

Blair

Thanksgiving, surprisingly, hasn’t been entirely awful.

Mallory greets us with open arms the minute we arrive, ushering me into the kitchen with her where we women cook and chat without interruption from the men. Dad broke away and went to watch football with Thomas and Sawyer, and that’s perfectly fine with me. I assist my surrogate mom in basting the turkey, whipping the mashed potatoes, and wrapping all the dishes in tinfoil so that they stay piping hot.

By the time we all sit down to the table, the three men are discussing architecture, of course. The conversation flows easily, turns to my summer in Haiti, and then to some local gossip Mallory has about a hairdresser who was caught sleeping with her husband’s adult nephew.

All in all, Sawyer and I aren’t exactly friendly, but we make it through the day without ripping each other’s throats out. I don’t have to talk to him, and he barely looks my way, but we coexist peacefully for our parent’s sake, and I’m left with a full stomach and not much animosity in my veins.

I walk into the kitchen after dinner, my plate and Dad’s plate in hand, ready to clean, and stop short when I see Sawyer standing at the counter.

His back is to me, and for some reason he hasn’t heard me come in. I watch as he wraps up the apple pie, a dessert that should be going out on the table. In past years, aside from the one we spent with Grandma, the Thanksgiving spread at the Roarke’s has noticeably missed the apple pie, or at least I’ve realized it. But whenever I dig into the leftovers bag that Mallory sends home with us, there it is. I thought maybe she just knows how much I like it and saves it for me, but as I watch Sawyer gently wrap it in the same orange saran wrap it goes back to our house in every year, my view begins to shift.

“What are you doing?”

Sawyer jumps at the sound of my voice. “Nothing.”

That one word is spoken way too swiftly not to be suspicious. “Are you … do you plan