Suzie’s House 203 : And I’m Sticking To It

Ben emptied his pockets onto his desk as soon as he walked into his room. He’d let a permission slip go through the laundry a couple of days ago, and Mom was still taking about it. Better to not have anything in his pockets too long, just in case.

There was some change, a piece of string, a flash drive, and someone’s old cell phone he found on the sidewalk. Good thing he took all that out. Flash drives don’t do real good in water. At least he didn’t think so.

The cell phone was busted. There was a big old crack in the black casing. Perfect for taking apart and poking at. He had tiny screw driver for the kind of screws you find in things like watches and cell phones. He flopped into the chair in front of his desk and went to work on the cell phone.

“Hey.” Lisa called from the door.

“Hey back.” Ben stayed in his chair but pushed it back so he could look at her better. “You’re early.”

She shrugged as she walked in the way she always did, sticking to the edges of the room and looking at everything but him like a cat walking into a room where it’s never been before.

“What’cha doing?” She reached the desk, leaned over it.

“Nothing.” He didn’t mind this time. Seemed like she was always leaning over him, looking at whatever he was doing at his desk and sometimes it really bugged him. But not today. He pointed at the cell phone parts scattered around. “Cool, huh? I found it in the street. Looked like someone ran over it.”

“Cell phone?”

“Yeah.” He went back to work on it, prying off a little board, kind of a computer chip thing.

“You should get a real one. One that works.” She took the battery, messing around with it.

“Yeah.” He’d love to have his own cell phone. That, and maybe he should have a wallet, and maybe some keys. But he didn’t really need them, right? But back when they kept the house locked up all the time he needed a key. He was older now. By a few months, anyway. You’d think he’d need one more now, even though they didn’t hardly lock the house at all any more with everyone coming and going all the time and no one trying to kill them anymore.

“What are you thinking?” She’d put the battery down and was messing with something else now. His flash drive.

“Put that down!” He grabbed at it.

“What? This?” She held up the finger sized plastic thing.

Ben grabbed for it, knocking it out of her hand.

“What did you do that for? What’s on it, anyway?”

“It’s got…” No way he was going to tell her it was his diary. “My writing. My writing’s all on that.”

“Pshaw. Sometimes I think you take that writing business too seriously.” She crossed her arms and looked away, but Ben didn’t care.

He dropped to all fours to look on the rug under his desk, feeling for the flash drive as much as trying to see it.

“What’s it to you?”

“Nothing,” she said all tight and fake-casual. “It’s got nothing to do with me at all.”

Ben felt all defensive. Cause really, it didn’t have anything to do with her and never would. But he got the feeling she was going to make it about her. He found the flash drive tucked up behind a back leg on the desk and left it there. For some reason, he’d rather Lisa thought he’d lost it all together.

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