I know, I write. I really am sorry. I didn’t know what else to do.
How about take the heat for whatever you did! How about NOT pulling me into it!
You’re right. You are. I’m so sorry.
She doesn’t answer.
At home, Mom’s car isn’t in the driveway yet, which is a relief. I guess it’s good Dad drove us home. I put Vlad the Rapid and the trailer in the shed and go inside. Mitch’s door is closed and everything feels cold and hollow and wrong.
I miss my family. Even my stupid self-absorbed brother, who under all his dumb ideas and bad plans just wants the girl he likes to like him back. Wants his dad to come home.
I open the fridge. I’m not hungry, but maybe I’ll feel better if I eat. Or at least less . . . empty. The only thing that doesn’t require cooking is my leftover Thai from the other night.
Mitch comes in while I’m microwaving it. He sits at the table and crosses his arms, his face stormy. “She hates me now.”
“She’s mad at me too.” The microwave beeps and I take my food out.
He kicks the table leg. “Why’d you let me do that?”
“Let you? Do you even remember how that conversation went?”
“I looked so stupid! She right away was like, ‘Is this some dumb white-boy twin-swap crap?’ and I was like, ‘No, it’s me giving you this,’ and I handed her the music box and she—”
“I don’t need the details.” It’s too pathetic to even think about.
He drops his head to the table. “I am such. An. Idiot.” He thumps his head on the oak surface with each word.
I’m not gonna argue with that. I poke my rice with a fork. I should eat, but . . . ugh. To the infinite power.
I check the weather on my phone. Tonight’s forecast has changed. It’s supposed to get colder sooner, and now it’s going to rain too.
Mitch sits up and eyes my screen. “What the flip is up with your weather obsession?”
“None of your business.” I shove the phone in my pocket and leave the kitchen.
Mom comes home from volunteering at the food bank in a quiet mood, like she usually does after so much socializing, so Mitch and I are spared her all-up-in-your-business game. She just reminds us to get our weekend homework done and make our lunches, and then she spends the rest of the afternoon curled up on the couch with a book. The cover has a woman in yoga pants sitting cross-legged in a photoshopped flower.
I bring my homework to the living room and settle into the chair by the window. Mitchell’s angst is leaking through my bedroom wall. I can’t deal with his vibe.
My English assignment is straightforward, a worksheet that’ll be the basis for an essay, but I keep yawning and sneaking glances at Mom. She looks so . . . unbothered, reading with her legs tucked under her. Not like someone whose husband moved out so he could see another woman. Not like the parent of one kid who doesn’t get girls’ boundaries and another kid who’s been sneaking out every night and lying and is always two seconds from breakdown.
Her chill would be so crashed if she knew about Dad. They’d get divorced, probably sell the house. We might live in an apartment, which I’ve never done. Maybe there would be a custody battle. Or maybe not, because Dad doesn’t seem like he wants us. It’s not like he tried that hard to connect today. He just dodged the dog problem and drove us home.
I wonder how I didn’t notice my photos on his wall.
Well. Grace.
I read the last question on the worksheet for the hundredth time and fail to answer it. Again. I can’t stop thinking about Chewbarka all alone in that stinky tent. It’s killing me.
Mitchell tells Mom his homework is done and asks if he can go to Zach’s house. She says to be back by six thirty for dinner. I’m exhausted after the ride, so I bluff my way through the last question and go collapse in a sorry heap on my bed. The next thing I know, I’m waking up groggy and confused to the sound of Mom calling me for dinner.
I check the forecast again: still cold and rainy. Still no reply from the last Tina Martin.
Apparently while I was asleep, Mom looked at GradeFolder, because she’s back to grilling me and Mitch about homework. Trying to manage us like we’re projects at her job. I tell her what she wants to hear while I stare at Dad’s empty chair and think about him having dinner with Grace. Drinking wine. Smiling. Playing footsie under the table.
It’s hard to eat.
I blunder through my math homework after, then pretend to get ready for bed. Mom comes in while I’m climbing under the covers and says she’s glad I took a nap, that I look more rested than I have and that she hopes I had a good weekend.
“I hope you did too,” I say. “How was volunteering?”
She talks for a while about a family who just lost their apartment because of a rent raise and another where the single mom lost her job. It’s depressing. I listen to the rain on the roof, to the wind picking up. It’s hard to focus on her words while I’m thinking of Chewbarka. What if she’s scared of rain and thunderstorms like Frankie was? What if she’s trying to claw her way out of the tent? What if she does claw out?
“—distracted.”
I blink back to the bedroom. “What?”
She studies me for an uncomfortable moment. Finally she gives me a fake smile. “Is it a girl?” She ruffles my hair.
I slump in relief. If she thinks it’s that, she’ll tease me instead of hassling me for being emotional. “Sort of.”
“Tell me about her.”
“Well. She’s . . .” I lean against the headboard. “She’s smart, and funny, and . . . you know, all those good
