“You were the only one who wasn’t dying to sit next to Miles—you even seemed irritated by him. You’d just sit there drawing these really amazing pictures, and your projects were always so much better than mine. It was like you had more important things to deal with than the hottie sitting next to you. I wanted to find out what your secret was.” She laughed.
If Kaylie ever did find out the real secret, she wouldn’t think it was so funny. “I don’t have a secret,” I lied.
“Yes, you do,” she said. I felt a momentary flutter of dread, but I knew she wasn’t anywhere near the truth. “Your secret is that you really
“I’m not,” I said. “It’s just that tonight… I can’t come tonight.” I didn’t want to tell her how much I really did care about what Josh thought and what he was doing. And who he was doing it with. Leaving yourself vulnerable was the quickest way to have anything good taken away from you. If I’d learned anything from Mom, it was that.
“Well, I’ll totally keep an eye on him for you,” she said. “I’m not going to let him get away, in spite of you.”
I managed a smile. “Thanks, Kay,” I said. I tossed back the last of the coffee in my cup. “I really do have to head back,” I said, and stood up.
Kaylie sighed. “If you say so. Do you want me to walk with you?”
“No, it’s cool. I have to stop at Safeway.”
She leaned over the table and gave me a hug. “I’ll call you if anything good happens.”
I nodded and picked up the second cup of coffee I’d ordered.
“Didn’t you just have coffee?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “This one’s for Mom. I promised her I’d bring some back with me.” The one thing I didn’t have set up in my room was a coffee maker, and I was going to need all the help I could get if I was going to keep working until late at night.
“Don’t let my mom hear you say that,” she said. “She already thinks you’re the perfect daughter. She’s always joking that she’d like to adopt you and have you come live with us.”
I could never tell Kaylie how perfect that would be. As much as I wanted to grow up and be on my own, I wished for someone to take care of me so I wouldn’t have to worry all the time. I thought of my mother’s sheet- covered body lying in the hallway at that very second. Every time I started to feel guilty, I had to remind myself that I was doing it for all of us. But that still didn’t change the fact that Mom was dead, and I was sitting here talking and drinking coffee. I wondered what Kaylie’s mom would think about that. “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m not so perfect.”
Josh was busy up front, so I just walked out the door without another word. It was probably best this way. It felt like a solid lead ball was sitting in the pit of my stomach. I couldn’t stand thinking about him at the party tonight. As much as I liked to think I was special, there would be so many girls there, he wouldn’t even notice I was missing. He’d probably be going out with someone else by the time vacation was over.
Walking home, I carried a bag from the grocery store and balanced the coffee in one hand, hoping that and some egg rolls from the deli would keep me at least until tomorrow. I’d really wanted fried rice, but as I bent down to look at it in the deli case, all I could think of was the maggot I’d brushed out of my shirt earlier. As much as it used to be my favorite food, thanks to one lone, preadolescent fly, fried rice was probably lost to me forever. I’d also loaded up on more rubber gloves and those paper face masks that supposedly protect you from chemicals and irritants. We should probably have been living in these all along.
The walk was short, but it felt good to be out in the cold air. I zipped my jacket up to my chin so only the top of my head and my face were freezing. It was starting to get dark, and most of the houses still had their Christmas lights on outside, which made the cold darkness seem not so bad. Like it had a purpose, even.
As I walked up our street, I looked in the windows of the houses I passed. I could see people sitting down to dinner, or the blue glow on the walls from the TV.
The Callans a few houses down had their curtains open, and I could see the Christmas tree all lit up by the window. I was sure Mrs. Callan would be in the kitchen cooking, waiting for Mr. Callan to come home. Hanging out in their house had made me realize that not everyone had parents who loved their stuff more than they loved their kids.
The air smelled like a campfire, and I thought about how nice it would be to sit by a warm fire on such a cold night. Maybe we could get the fireplace working again once everything was done. Phil and I would keep a big stack of wood on the porch and feed it to the fire every time it started to die. Maybe we could have regular movie nights in the winter, where we’d invite people over, make popcorn, and sit in front of the fire, watching movies with all the lights off. At this point I should have probably stopped with the “maybes” and “what-ifs,” but whenever the now got bad, thinking about the future always made me feel better.
chapter 11
5:30 p.m.
“Lucy!”
I stopped dragging the green bin across the dining room and listened. It was high and faint, but it was definitely my name. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up, and my heart beat faster.
I pulled down my face mask. “Mom?” I whispered cautiously, and immediately felt ridiculous. I had to be hearing things. Since I’d only put on lights in the dining room, it was pitch black in the rest of the house now—and starting to get a little creepy, if I let myself think about it. I slowly tiptoed out of the dining room and down the hall, trying to calm myself. Mom was definitely dead the last time I looked. No amount of moving her stuff around and looking in forbidden boxes would turn her into an angry ghost. At least, that’s what I hoped.
I got to the back hallway and flicked on the overhead light. The sheet was still there. I swallowed hard and tried to reason with myself. This was crazy. Whatever I was hearing, it definitely wasn’t Mom calling me. At least not from the hallway.
I walked back to the dining room and started moving boxes again. As I was stuffing some newspapers in a garbage bag, I heard it again. A small voice calling my name.
“Stop it!” I yelled out loud this time. I was starting to panic when movement at the window caught my eye. Before I could react, the curtains parted, and TJ stuck his head through them.
“Hey!” he said. “Didn’t you hear me calling you?”
“Man, TJ,” I said. My knees wobbled with relief, and I felt like I had to sit down. “You scared the crap out of me.”
“Did I?” he said, not looking ashamed. “I wasn’t sneaking up on you or anything. I yelled and stuff.” He scrunched up his nose and looked around. “What stinks?”
I ignored that last statement and crossed the room until I was standing above him at the window. “What are you doing out there?” I peeked out the window and saw him standing on the stack of plastic bags. Only TJ wouldn’t think to ask what a giant stack of plastic bags was doing along the side of the house.
He looked around the room. “Are you moving or something? Who’s going to babysit me when Mom goes out?”
“Knock it off,” I said. “We’re not moving. I told you, I’m just cleaning up some stuff.”
“Cool.” TJ looked behind him. “Can I come in?”
“No!” I answered just a little too quickly. “You can’t come in. It’s not a good idea. You said yourself it stinks in here.”
“I didn’t mean it. Come on,” he said. “I can help. Plus, you said you’d see if you could find some of Phil’s stuff for me to go through.”
I hesitated just long enough for him to see the crack in my resolve. TJ was one of those kids that spent his free time wandering the neighborhood waiting for someone to ask him to come over. Whatever the reason, he hated being home—a feeling I understood more than anyone else on the block. Plus, he was a pretty good kid.
