The Worst Part

Mom is usually home on Sunday but this week she was going to a big golf game and I was all alone in the house. I was mad at Mom for divorcing Dad.

I kept looking at the telephone until I couldn’t stand it any longer. I picked up the receiver and dialed Dad’s number over in Bakersfield. I even remembered to dial 1 first because it was long distance. “You promised to phone me this week but you didn’t,” I said, feeling I had to talk to him.

“Take it easy, kid,” he said. “I just didn’t get around to it. I was going to call this evening. The week isn’t over yet.”

I thought about that.

“Something on your mind?” he asked.

“I hoped you would call, so I waited and waited.” Then I was sorry I said it.

“There was heavy snow in the morning,” he said, “I had to chain up on highway 80 and lost time.”

I know putting chains on eight big wheels in the snow is no fun. I felt a little better, as long as we were talking. “How is Bandit?” I asked.

There was a funny silence. For a minute I thought the line was dead. Then I knew something must have happened to my dog.

“Well, kid—”, he began. “My name is Leigh!” I almost yelled. “I’m not just some kid you met on the street!”

“Keep your shirt on, Leigh,” he said. “When I had to stop along with some other truck drivers to put on chains, I left Bandit out of the cab, I thought he would get back … I have sent out a call to CB radio, but I didn’t get an answer yet.” I was about to say I understood when there came the bad part, the really bad part. I heard a boy’s voice say, “Hey, Bill, Mom wants to know when we’re going out to get the pizza?”

小题1:We can conclude from the passage that              .

A．Leigh’s mother often went to golf games

B．Leigh was a deserted boy

C．Leigh’s dad never had a rest on Sundays

D．Leigh’s father lived in another city小题2:Which is true about Bandit?

A．It was killed by a truck

B．It was let out of the cab and got lost

C．It was frozen to death.

D．It ran off Highway 80 and into the mountain.小题3:The underlined sentence “Keep your shirt on”（last para） probably means “       ”.

A．Cool down

B．Stop talking

C．Be quiet

D．Keep warm小题4:The worst part in Leigh’s eyes may be that           .

A．he forgot to go to get the pizza

B．his parents got divorced

C．his dad got remarried

D．his dad didn’t love him