Absolutely Almost(68)

            “Sometimes I wonder how I ever got so lucky to get a son like you, Albie.”

            Lucky.

            That’s what she said.

            I hugged her again, around the side.

            Maybe it was silly to not be upset at all when I could still hear my dad and Grandpa Park shouting at each other in the dining room. Maybe I should’ve been. But I wasn’t.

            Right then, I felt pretty lucky too.





being famous.




            I wish I was famous,” I told Erlan. We were sitting in his new bedroom, which was smaller than his bedroom at his old apartment, but at least it was only his bedroom, no brothers. Plus, Erlan had put the quilt up in front of his door, so he said the entire room was a quilt fort now, which meant no cameras ever.

            “No, you don’t,” Erlan said. He was setting up the cards for our card game. The one called Spit, which Calista taught me. I was pretty good at that one, better than Erlan even, because you didn’t have to count or anything, it was all about being fast. But it took forever to set it up every time, that was the only problem. Erlan was better at that part than I was.

            “Yes, I do,” I said. If I was famous, maybe I could have a bigger apartment too, like Erlan’s family did. Maybe my family could have a billboard even, like the Kasteevs, with our faces on it, smiling happy. Maybe I could have all the toys I wanted, and everyone would like me and be friendly and nice to me, and my dad could quit his job, like Erlan’s did, and just be home all the time with the family.

            “No,” Erlan said again. “You don’t. Oh, man, I lost track. Now I have to start again.” He scooped up all the cards.

            Erlan was a smart kid, I knew that. You didn’t get all Excellents on your report card every year, and win the chess championships too, without being really smart. I knew that. But sometimes he could be dumb. “You don’t even know what’s good,” I told him. And for some reason, I wasn’t sure why, I said it really angry.

            I felt angry.

            Erlan’s head shot up at me.

            “You complain all the time,” I told him, the angry still in my voice. “But what’s so bad about being famous? You’re on TV. That’s so great!”

            If I was on TV, instead of “no release!” Darren wouldn’t make fun of me whispering behind his hand all the time. He wouldn’t smash his finger into all my birthday cupcakes.

            Erlan rolled his eyes. “You want to know what’s so great about being on TV?” he said to me. He wasn’t setting up the game. He stopped. I wanted to tell him that he should start again, but I didn’t. I waited. “Nothing. That’s what. No one at school will even talk to me anymore. Everything that happens on that stupid show, they laugh about it all week. Even if Erik was the one who screamed like a girl when he saw that mouse, and everyone at school made fun of me for it. Erik pretends to be sick like every day so he doesn’t have to go to school, and Karim just acts like a jerk, like he’s so important. And Roza and Ainyr and Alma, they . . . It doesn’t matter. I don’t even care.”

            “Oh,” I said. “I never even knew all that.” I stared at the piles of cards. “How come you never told me before?”

            Erlan shrugged. He scooped the piles together and started over setting them up. One, one. Five, five. Seven, seven. He counted out thirteen for the big piles. “You’re the only one who treats me normal.”

            When the piles were all set up and it was time to start playing again, I picked up my pile of five, and at the same exact time, Erlan and I flipped over the one piles. And we were off.

            Being famous maybe sounded like it would be fun, I thought, before you knew what it was really like. But it turned out it really wasn’t at all.