We Fell Apart: A We Were Liars Novel(47)

“Is Ball their last name?”

“No. Middle. Their last name is Sugawara. If you take an animal to the vet, they write your last name as the animal’s.”

“So is it Puddleglum Sugawara or Puddleglum Cello?”

“She’s Cooper-Lee. So now we have Cotton, Malt, Hair, Bowling, and Fire.” Meer is pointing at poultry, assigning names as they toddle around. “Do you like Volley?”

“Meh.”

“Oh, Foot!”

“Foot is good.”

“This one is Foot.”

“How ’bout Sour?” I say.

“Sour Ball. Yup. That’s seven balls. Eight if we use Volley,” says Meer. “Oh wait, let’s chuck Volley and do Masquerade instead. You can be Masquerade Ball,” he says to the bird with the long neck. “You’ll like that, won’t you? It suits you really well.” He looks up at me. “And then Sunshine Ball and Basil Ball Fluffington Webster. Is that good with you?”

“Just Basil Ball Webster is better.”

“Oh my god, it makes no sense,” says Meer, collapsing in giggles. “I love it all so much.”

Glum’s ears are on alert. She stares at us through the glass.





43


Tatum and I are in an unspoken, awkward truce, pretending we never kissed,

pretending we’re not looking at each other,

pretending neither of us is angry.

Over the next few days, with that going on, the four of us try to build a hutch for Meer’s poultry.

It turns out to be hard. None of us has any skill with tools. The supplies are expensive, and Brock rolls his eyes as he puts down his credit card.

We put the hinges on wrong.

We haven’t bought enough chicken wire.

Our supports tip inward because they’re not anchored or not even, or something.

The roof won’t go on the way we thought it would.

After four days of trying, we give up. Meer decides to let the chickens keep living in the lounge, even though Tatum thinks it’s a bad idea.

He can’t help but be charmed by them when he visits them in the pool house, though. He sits on the floor, long legs tucked under him, and memorizes their names. Foot and Cotton seem to like him, especially.

The days are strangely empty once we abandon our hutch project. We go clamming again one day and pickle cucumbers another. We have a poker game at the picnic table using buttons for chips. We play Scrabble and drink beer.

June stops joining us for dinner completely. She has started baking in the middle of the night, when we’re all asleep. Each morning a new loaf of bread sits on the wooden cutting board, but she is nowhere to be found.

I try not to look at Tatum. I try to pretend nothing ever happened between us, even when he’s the only one in the kitchen with me. Even when he’s blending strawberries and collagen and chia seeds and putting a smoothie in front of me, early in the morning.

One day Tatum has a new trespassing idea. We all meet that night in the garage and he leads us on foot across South Road and up a long driveway. “The Robertson estate,” says Tatum. “All ours.”

“Why have we never done crimes here before?” asks Brock. “It’s so nearby.”

“The owners are always home. But this year, they cleared out to do like, a tour of Europe.” Tatum taps one ear. “You hear a lot when you drive the taxi van. I found out today that they’ve been gone more than four weeks already.”

We reach the estate and he leads us through an opening in a hedge. There, surrounded by trees and far from the house, sits a large rectangular pool. It’s edged in stone. Around it are lounge chairs, low tables, and a rectangular gazebo for shade. Under the gazebo is an outdoor kitchen.

Brock throws off his sweatshirt and cannonballs into the water. Meer does likewise. I’m kicking off my sneakers and struggling with the zip on my hoodie. When I look up, Tatum is staring at me.

His dark eyes with their fringe of black lashes meet mine, then look away.

“What?” I ask.

“I’ve been meaning to tell you. I bought these—I bought something,” he says, very soft.

I stop with my zipper and step toward him. I think: This boy, this closed-off and infuriating boy, this dutiful and hardworking boy who

kissed me once, whose

cold hand on my leg completely derails my thoughts, who seemed to understand about my mother leaving me— he’s going to

let me in.

Meer and Brock are out of the pool already and rummaging in a small outbuilding that contains blow-up floaties, foam noodles, and beach balls.

“What did you buy?” I ask Tatum.

Meer hits Brock with a foam noodle.

Brock hits Meer back. “That was an illegal move!” yells Meer.

“This is a lawless swimming pool!” yells Brock, whapping him again with the noodle.

Tatum has turned his attention to them now.

“What did you buy?” I ask again.

“Um. No, it’s stupid,” says Tatum. He shakes his head.

“How come?”

He shakes his head again. “Never mind, Matilda.”

“What?” I ask again.

“You don’t need to know. It was a bad idea.”

“Tell me.”

He’s closed back up again, like a book that’s been slammed shut.