Chapter 18

HERE IS WHAT HAPPENED

People always want to know what happened.

The answers are: no, no, not more than most people, and yes.

Look, my mom isn’t a horrible person. She’s just kind of flaky. Which is great if you’re piecrust, but not so great when you’re responsible for the welfare of another human being.

My mom goes through boyfriends faster than I go through a box of Kleenex during a Bridesmaids marathon. Whenever she starts a new fling, she disappears for a few days. That has been happening since I was seven or eight.

The thing is, my grandmother used to live across the street from us. So when Mom would disappear, I’d just head over there. Mom usually came back after a day or two. The longest she was ever away was five nights.

But Grammy died two years ago. And this time, Mom has been gone for two months, eleven days, and fifteen hours.

For the first two days, I hardly even worried. I just ate peanut-butter sandwiches and made sure I got to school on time. But after a week, I was low on food. Mom hadn’t left me any money.

After two weeks, I started bursting into tears at the slightest problem.

After a month, my hair started to fall out in clumps. I lost eight pounds. I was flunking math.

Finally, after my Bridesmaids meltdown, the Freakshow staged an intervention and demanded to know what was going on. I didn’t want to get Mom in trouble, but I didn’t know what to do, so I told them.

Naturally, Brainzilla was on the case right away. She called Child Protective Services and got in touch with Mrs. Morris, my neighbor. Mrs. Morris said that of course I could come and stay with her, but the state wanted me to have an “observation period” before they released me into her custody. So I got down at Crazytown.

And that’s how I ended up in this life.

Poor Mrs. Morris. I know she feels bad that she scared me out there in the garage. It isn’t her fault, of course. It isn’t my fault, either.

There’s no one to blame. No one who’s around, anyway.