When we get home on Thursday afternoon, there is a letter from BCIT in our mailbox. Mom doesn’t open it right away. It sits there on the kitchen table while she makes dinner. It sits there on the kitchen table while we eat dinner. It sits there on the kitchen table while we do dishes. The suspense is driving me crazy.
“Why don’t you open it?” I ask for the third time.
“I’m afraid to,” Mom says.
“I’ll open it for you.”
“No, leave it alone. I’ll open it in a minute.”
After we finish at the sink, she goes and sits at the table and stares at the envelope like she thinks maybe it contains anthrax or something like that.
“As long as I hadn’t heard from them, at least I could hope,” she says. But while she’s saying that, she’s finally started to work her thumb under the edge of the flap on the envelope. She goes through the process of opening the envelope, unfolding the single sheet of paper, and smoothing the letter out on the table – all in slow motion. Finally, she starts reading it.
I sit down across from her holding my breath the whole time. She’s so slow, it’s a wonder I don’t collapse. The thing is, I don’t even know what I hope the letter says. I know she really wants to take this interior design course, and so I sort of hope she gets in. But on the other hand, I really want to move, and there’s a better chance of that happening if she doesn’t get in.
She’s finished reading. She just sits there, staring at me. Then suddenly she shrieks! It startles me so much I just about hit the roof. She grabs my hands and pulls me up.
“I got in! I got in!” She’s dancing us both in circles around our little kitchen, screaming like a mad woman.
I can’t help laughing. “Mom! You keep this yelling up and Mrs. Warren will call the police.”
Mom is laughing and crying at the same time. “I don’t care. Nothing would bother me tonight.”
Mom drives me over to Dad’s after school on Friday. She and Dad have things they have to discuss.
Dad’s made tea and he’s bought some Nanaimo bars. I help myself. He pours tea in Mom’s cup and then his own.
“You don’t realize how much stuff you’ve accumulated till you’re faced with the job of having to move it all,” he says. “We need to come up with a plan so we know who’s taking what.”
“Lucy tells me at least you are going to have a house to move into,” Mom says.
“I’m not moving to the house; I’ve rented an apartment in Burnaby.”
Mom turns to me. “I thought you said Dad was buying a house off Eightieth Avenue.”
“I am,” he says. “But I won’t be living there. I’ll be renting it out.”
“And then you’re renting an apartment?” Mom looks puzzled.
“Well, I thought it would make sense to move closer to my job, but I sure couldn’t afford to buy anything in Vancouver or Burnaby.”
“So this house you’re buying is just sort of an investment?”
Dad nods.
“I got in to that course I was telling you about,” Mom says. She doesn’t sound excited about it at all tonight. Mostly she just looks worried.
“Well, good for you,” Dad says. “So will you be staying where you are or moving closer in?”
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she says.
She can say that again. I’ve asked her about a million times and she won’t even discuss it with me. My whole life is in limbo.
“The thing is, the rent’s so cheap there and it’s close to the freeway, so the commute to BCIT wouldn’t take that much longer than if we lived here.”
“So it would make sense for you to stay where you are then.”
“In some ways, but has Lucy told you about Brandy?” Mom asks.
I haven’t, so she does. Dad’s scowling while she talks; it gets worse when Mom tells the part about Mrs. Warren having to rescue me.
“I’ve been driving her to school, and since this happened, I’ve arranged to work through my lunch hour so I can come home early and pick her up from school.”
“But it’s not safe for her to go out of the house, even to walk the dog,” Dad says.
It’s not a question.
Dad stares into his tea for a second or two. Then he says, “Do you mind telling me how much you’re paying for rent where you are?”
“I can’t really see that that is any of your business,” Mom says.
“Five hundred dollars a month,” I say.
“How much did Lucy tell you about the place I’m buying?” he asks.
“Everything,” I say. “I told her it was an abandoned crack house on a nice street. That Roy’s not going to be very happy when he finds out you’re going to be renting it out again.”
“It looks rough, but I’m taking two weeks’ holiday as soon as I take possession, and I think I can get it fixed up in that amount of time. Lucy’s right, though, Roy and the other neighbors will be very upset if I don’t choose really responsible renters.”
“Look,” says Mom. “Shouldn’t we get down to discussing what we’re going to do with all our furniture? We do have to be out of this house in just over two weeks. And that’s why I came over.”
“How do you know what furniture you want to take when you don’t know where you’re going to be living?” I ask.
“Well, that’s the point I was trying to get to,” says Dad. “Kate, why don’t you rent this house I’m buying? I’ll let you have it for five hundred dollars a month.”
This is an excellent idea.
“No,” she says.
“But Mom! It would be perfect. It’s quite close to Siobhan’s, and it’s not so far from Grandma and Granddad’s, so Grandma could drive me to Holy Name like before.”
“No,” she says again. “Thanks for the offer, Harold, but I’m not comfortable accepting favors like that.”
“You never think of anyone but yourself!” I yell.
She doesn’t even bother to yell back. She just picks up her jacket and walks out. I feel like kicking holes in our walls. Instead, I run up to my room and pound cushions and scream as loudly as I can into my pillows.
When I calm down, I try to call Siobhan.
Her mom says that Siobhan has gone to a movie with Megan.
I throw myself down on the bed again and scream into my pillows until I’m hoarse.
It’s almost bedtime before I go back downstairs. Dad is sitting at the computer playing FreeCell.
“You never did decide how to split up the furniture,” I say.
“Maybe we’ll just have to see if we can get one of those auction houses to sell it,” he replies. “If you’re going to stay in the trailer and I’m in a one-bedroom apartment, neither of us will have room for much of it.”
I’m so mad at my mom that I don’t even want to go back to her place on Sunday night, but what choice do I have? None, just like always. I’m so depressed that if I weren’t Catholic, I would seriously be considering suicide. I spend the whole week trying to think of a way out of this horrible trailer.
It’s Thursday night and I’m taking the dog for the world’s shortest walk. I have to stay within sight of our trailer so Mom can come rescue me if Brandy sees me. Mrs. Warren calls me over. She asks if I told my mom about the humming noise coming from our shed.
I confess that I haven’t. “I don’t think she’d listen to me. I mean, she was complaining about how high the hydro bill was, and I said it might be because Randy had something in that shed that was using a lot of electricity.”
“What did she say about that?”
“She just says it’s none of our business what he stores in his shed.”
“Humph,” she says, and she walks back into her trailer.
It’s hard to tell sometimes whether an idea comes from God or from the devil. That’s how I feel when we walk into English class one day and I hear Brandy talking to her friends. She’s in a total panic. She’s supposed to be doing a book report – out loud, in front of the whole class. She’s only read the first thirty pages of the book.
“Crap,” she says. “I might as well not even sit down. I might as well just go to the principal’s office right now so he can call my mom and tell her I’m kicked out again. Watch me, I’ll be grounded all friggin’ summer.”
She crashes her books down on the desk behind me. I sneak a peek. She’s sitting with her head resting on top of them.
Ms. Phillips comes in. I don’t think I’m really the teacher’s pet like Brandy’s always saying, but Ms. Phillips does like me. Mostly I think she gets bored teaching kids who aren’t interested in English. She always gets quite excited if I ask questions and we get to talking about some poem or story in more detail. A couple of times, I’ve distracted her so badly that she and I have spent the whole period talking while everyone else sat around looking bored. Usually when I realize what I’ve done, I feel guilty. I thinks she feels guilty too, for ignoring all her other students.
“Today,” she says, “we’re going to wrap up our poetry unit and then Brandy and Greg are going to do their book reports for us.”
She gives us some notes about the last three poems in the unit. There aren’t that many, so we copy them from the overhead. When most of us have put down our pens, she looks around the classroom.
“Is everyone finished?” she asks.
I stick my hand up.
“Yes, Lucy.”
“This is going to sound like a really stupid question,” I say.
She nods. Some of the other kids sigh and roll their eyes.
“How can you tell if a piece is even a poem?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, the old poems all rhyme and have sort of a beat. Nowadays, poems aren’t like that. Like that one you read us about the plums.”
“You mean, ‘This Is Just to Say’?”
“Whatever. He just says he ate the plums she was wanting for breakfast and that they were delicious. There’s no rhyme, there’s no rhythm; there are no similes or metaphors. There are just short lines.”
She nods. People around me yawn.
“So what about if I leave my mom a note that says ‘Gone to the mall, Shopping, With Siobhan?’ Is it a poem if I put it on three lines? That doesn’t seem right.”
“That’s a very interesting point, Lucy. There has been a trend toward looser and looser forms of poetry over the past half-century …”
She talks for the next thirty minutes.
“Some of the most noted poets of our day say we need to get back to discipline and structure. George Bowering, who was Canada’s first Poet Laureate, said….”
We never get to hear what he said. The bell rings.
For the first time in my life, it’s me who turns to look at Brandy. I give her a wink. What if she hauls off and punches me? She doesn’t. She winks back.
I have just messed up a whole class so she doesn’t have to do her book report. Should I feel guilty? I don’t.
Friday night we’re just finishing dinner when we hear a car pull up outside our trailer. I look out the window. It isn’t Gina. The dog starts barking. Mom goes to the door. The dog rushes out to sniff the shoes and ankles of the two men standing on our little porch. They are wearing casual clothes, but one of them flashes a badge.
“RCMP,” he says.
Mom’s face falls. “Is something wrong? My parents? Harold?”
“Oh no, ma’am, nothing like that. We’d just like to talk to you, if you don’t mind.”
Mom steps back from the door. “Come on in.”
No one sits down. The three of them just stand there. I’m back by the cupboards, watching.
“It’s about your shed, ma’am.”
“What about the shed?” she says.
“We’ve had a complaint.”
Mom spins around. “Lucy, did you …?”
I shake my head no.
“Would you mind if we checked it out?” the bigger of the two guys asks.
“I don’t care, but I can’t let you in. I don’t have the key.”
“And who would have it?” asks the other fellow.
“My landlord, Randy.”
The larger cop takes out a notebook and writes something down. “Does this Randy have a last name?”
“Larson,” she says.
“And where does he live?”
“Just two trailers down, on the other side of the road here. Lucy, why don’t you go see if he’s home.”
“It’s just a padlock,” I tell them. “You could break in pretty easily, I think.”
I’ve seen these things on TV.
“We don’t have a warrant,” says the smaller guy. “We were just hoping you’d want to cooperate. Our informant didn’t think you were involved.”
“Involved in what?” Mom asks.
She can be so naive!
“The informant suspects there might be a small marijuana grow-op in the shed. Says she hears humming noises and that you complain that your hydro bill is very high.”
Mom glares at me again. I just shrug. I think we both have a pretty good idea of who the informant is.
“Do you want me to go see if Randy’s home?” I ask the officer.
“No, I don’t think that would be wise. Thanks for your help. We’ll just wait outside here till there’s another officer available to talk to this Randy.”
They walk out and get back into the dark blue Chevy Caprice they’ve parked in front of our trailer. We watch them through the window. One of them is talking on their radio. They don’t start the car.
Mom grabs the phone and looks in her address book for a number. Her hands are shaking a bit as she punches it in.
“Randy, what have you got in that shed?” she asks.
There’s a pause.
“Well, I’ve got two police officers in my driveway, and I think they just called for backup.”
There’s another little pause, and then she hangs up without saying good-bye.
“He’s coming over.”
A police cruiser pulls in behind the Caprice. The two officers in this car are in uniform. Randy walks up just as they’re getting out. He’s talking to them, but I can’t hear what anyone is saying. I step onto the little porch. The dog is barking like crazy. This is way too much excitement for her.
A third car pulls up. We have a traffic jam in front of our trailer. A woman gets out and comes up the steps toward me.
“Are you Lucy?” she asks.
“Yes.” Who could this be, and how does she know my name?
Mom has stepped outside and is right behind me.
“Mrs. Jensen?” the woman asks.
“Yes.”
“My name’s Hilda Thompson. I’m a social worker with the Ministry of Children and Families.” She hands Mom her card.
Randy and the four police officers have gone around to the other side of the shed.
“We’ve had a report that your daughter may be in a dangerous situation, and I’ve been sent to investigate. I’ll want to talk to you too, of course. But first I’d like to speak to Lucy alone.”
My mother is looking totally shell-shocked.
The social worker turns to where the police are still gathered at the end of our lean-to and says, “I wonder if Lucy really needs to see all this. Maybe it would be better if I took her back to my office. You and I can talk after you’re finished with the police here.” Then she turns to me. “Would you be comfortable with that, Lucy?”
“I guess so.” Actually, I’d rather stay and see what happens here, but I don’t want her to think I’m just a snoop.
“Would that be okay with you, Mrs. Jensen?”
Mom looks at the business card the worker gave her. “Your office is on Guildford Way?”
“Yes. There’s a bit of a strip mall there.”
“And when do you think you’ll get back to me?”
“Oh, it shouldn’t be more than an hour.”
Mom nods. “Okay,” she says. She’s still standing there, looking at the business card, when we drive off.
Ms. Thompson doesn’t say much while we’re driving to her office. It gives me time to think. If she decides that I’m not safe at my mom’s house, I won’t have to live there. And I already know that my dad can’t look after me because he works such long hours. They might send me to a foster home. If I could get into that group home on Siobhan’s street, I’d be able to see her every day. Of course, I’d miss my mom, and she’d be heartbroken if I was taken away. But I’m sure she’d visit me every single day – even if it is a long drive. When I’m in Langley, I’m lucky if I see Siobhan once a week. And Siobhan is making new friends. My mom isn’t going to get a new daughter just because I’m not around as much as usual. I’d never have thought of a plan like this myself, but God has let it fall right into my lap. I guess He’s listening after all.
When we get to the office, Ms. Thompson takes me to a room that has a sofa and an easy chair in it. There’s a fridge in the corner.
“Would you like a soft drink?” she asks.
“Yes, please.”
When I’m comfortable, she sits down and starts asking me questions.
“Do you know why the police were at your home this evening?”
“I’m assuming it was Mrs. Warren who called them,” I say.
“Well, I’ve suspected there might be marijuana growing in that shed, and I told my mom about it, but she said I should just mind my own business.”
“So did you tell anyone else your worries?”
“Just Mrs. Warren. That’s why I think it must have been her who called the police. The thing is, I’m on my own a lot – what with my mom working and then going out on dates or to nightclubs – and I didn’t like having that Randy lurking around our trailer.”
Ms. Thompson is taking notes like mad.
“Mom even complained that our hydro bill was as high for that little trailer as it had been for our house, which was over three thousand square feet. You have to worry about the fire hazard too, if he’s got such big lights in such a small shed.”
“What is your mother’s relationship with this Randy?” Mrs. Thompson asks.
“He’s our landlord.”
“Does your mom have a social relationship with him as well?” she asks.
“Well, he came to a party she had at our house once.”
“But they aren’t dating or anything like that,” she says.
“No, it’s Randy’s roommate, Jake, she dated.” I’m trying to think of whether there’s anything else I can say to convince her I should go to a foster home. “Mrs. Warren almost called the police once before,” I say. “There’s a girl who lives in our trailer park who has been bullying me. She was about to beat me up, and Mrs. Warren came out with her phone and said she was calling the police. That scared Brandy off.”
“Where was your mother when that happened?”
“She was still at work. Mrs. Warren didn’t think it was safe for me to be in our trailer on my own, so I stayed at her place till my mom got home.”
When Ms. Thompson is finished asking me questions, she asks if there is somewhere other than my mom’s place that I could spend the night.
“There’s a foster home on One-hundred-and-eighteenth Street that just started up. They only take teenage girls, and they can have up to three. I happen to know they only have one right now.”
“Do you know someone who lives there?” she asks.
“No, but my best friend, Siobhan, lives just two doors down, and she told me all about it.”
“I’ll just call your mom and see if she has any other suggestions,” she says.
Why ask her?
But Ms. Thompson does ask, and when she comes back, she tells me that Grandma will be picking me up.
I expect Grandma to be really mad at Mom, but she isn’t talking about it. She’s just generally crabby. She doesn’t even ask me what happened. She’s only interested in finishing her packing. She and Granddad are leaving for Las Vegas tomorrow. They’re going with Fred and Muriel, a woman Grandma met at her bridge club. Grandma and Granddad went to the casino with them too. I don’t really think it is appropriate for old people to be hanging around casinos, but still I’m glad Grandma and Granddad are going away. When they leave, the social worker will have to send me to that foster home.
I don’t care if Grandma wants to ignore me. I know Siobhan will be totally blown away when she hears my story. I call her right away, even though it’s getting pretty late.
“Two patrol cars?” she says. “Your mom must have been so embarrassed. Did they have their red and blues flashing and everything?”
“No. Actually, the first officers who came weren’t even in a police car.”
“Oh, it was a police car, I’m sure,” Siobhan says. “Some of them are unmarked so they can take people by surprise.”
“So did they handcuff Randy?”
“I had to leave before then, but I imagine they’d have to do that before they put him in the cop car. Did I tell you that the marked police car had that grating between the front and back seats so they could haul away the criminals?”
“What was the social worker like?”
“Quite nice. I told her I wanted to go to the foster home Megan is in.”
“That would be so cool! But Megan won’t be there. Didn’t I tell you that her dad’s coming to take her back to Saskatchewan?”
“That’s okay,” I say. “I just wanted to go there because it’s so close to your place.”
“But then why are you at your grandma’s?”
“It’s just temporary. I’m just here while Ms. Thompson is finishing her investigation. Grandma and Granddad are leaving for Las Vegas tomorrow. I might spend the weekend with my dad, so I probably won’t get into the foster home till Monday.”
It’s not long before I am totally disappointed. Mom calls Grandma’s house and says they’ve sorted everything out and I can come home.
“But did Ms. Thompson say I could?” I ask.
“Yeah, she’s finished her investigation.”
“But I read that it isn’t safe to live in a house where there’s been a grow-op. There’s mold and stuff, and then half the time they’ve done weird things to the wiring so it’s a fire hazard. I think I should stay in a foster home, at least till everything has been checked out.”
“Lucy,” she says, “it’s been checked out. The humming you heard was Randy’s deepfreeze.”
“But what about the big hydro bills?”
“He had one salmon and a couple of pounds of freezer-burned hamburger meat in there. That was all. It was a full-size freezer, and when there’s so little inside, it really uses a lot of power.”
“So he wasn’t charged with anything?”
“Last I heard, it wasn’t illegal to leave an almost empty freezer plugged in. Anyway, he’s unplugged the freezer and taken his meat over to Jake’s so it’s probably safe for you to come home.”
I feel like an idiot.
“You must be about ready for bed now.”
I am.
“Let me talk to Grandma.”
After she talks to Grandma, she wants to talk to me again.
“I’m going to look at a house tomorrow morning, but Grandma says you can stay there tonight. I’ll pick you up around three tomorrow afternoon.”
“What about Dad? It’s the weekend. I should be going to his place.”
“He’s busy too. He says he’ll pick you up from here around five.”
Do I get any choice about any of this? No way. You’d think I was a piece of baggage. “And who’s looking after the dog?” I ask.
“She’s fine,” Mom says. “I’ll walk her before I go out tomorrow, and she’ll be with me when I come to get you.”
And I suppose I have to be satisfied with that, though it turns out that that is not what happens at all.
The next morning, I’m sitting there eating cereal in front of the TV (I would not be allowed to do this at home) when the phone rings.
It’s Muriel. I can only hear Grandma’s half of the conversation, but it sounds like there’s some kind of problem. There is. It’s me. Muriel wants to leave early. The bus they’re catching from Vancouver to the casino doesn’t leave until late afternoon, but she and Fred forgot that their son has their camera. They want to pick it up at his house in Vancouver first. Muriel thinks that if they are going in early anyway, they might as well go out for dim sum. I hear Grandma telling Granddad about it.
“Well, call Kate,” he says. “She’ll just have to take Lucy with her.”
I don’t wait for them to call. I know when I’m not wanted. I call Mom to see if she can come and get me early. I get no answer. It doesn’t matter. It’s not like I’ve never been left by myself before. I tell Granddad and Grandma they should go ahead and meet their friends as long as they don’t mind taking me home first. Grandma’s all apologetic, but while she’s apologizing, Granddad is loading their suitcases into the car and he tosses my backpack in on top of them. The matter is decided.
It’s not quite nine o’clock when they drop me off at our trailer. Mom’s car is there, but things look pretty dead. She’s probably still asleep, so Grandma doesn’t come in.
The dog comes pitter-pattering out from my bedroom. I pick her up and give her a cuddle. I take her for a little bit of a walk. It’s not until I come in the second time that I notice the pair of men’s running shoes placed neatly behind the door. They’re white with silver markings, and there’s a small, royal blue crescent-shaped logo on the side. The lining of the shoes is the same royal blue. I look around the place. I can’t see any clues as to who they might belong to. I creep down the hall. I stop outside Mom’s bedroom door and listen. I hear heavy breathing. My mom is a light breather. Someone with a deep voice gives a small cough. My mom is not alone in there. She has a man in her bed.
She’s the one sleeping around, so why am I so embarrassed? I sneak back out of the trailer. If she caught me catching her, I’d just die. How could she do this?
I start out toward the entrance to the trailer park. As I pass Jake’s trailer, I see his car’s there. It makes sense; he’d hardly bother to drive over to our trailer. I wonder if she changed her sheets. He probably wouldn’t even care.
I don’t know where to go. Grandma’s on her way to Las Vegas. I don’t want my dad knowing Mom’s in bed with some guy. That leaves Siobhan. Her mother’s not going to drive all the way to Langley to get me, but if I just turn up on their doorstep, she’s not so hard-hearted that she’d just throw me out.
I’ll have to get there on my own. I check my wallet. I have five dollars. There’s a bus stop just down the street from the entrance to the trailer park. The trouble is that this time I don’t have a trip plan from the bus company’s Web site to guide me.
I wait until a bus pulls up, and then I stick my head through the door and ask if this bus will get me to Surrey.
“Well, not directly,” he answers. “Where in Surrey are you going?”
“Scott Road and Eighty-sixth Avenue,” I say.
“You’ll need to make a few transfers, but you should start with the C61 to Langley Centre.”
The bus pulls away. I stand there waiting for the C61. It arrives and I get on. At least this time, the bus isn’t crowded and there are lots of seats. I remember to ask for a transfer.
“I’m trying to get to Surrey, to Scott Road and Eighty-sixth Avenue. Which bus should I take after this one?”
The driver hems and hahs but finally suggests I try the one to Surrey Central.
Three buses and two-and-a-half hours later, I get to Siobhan’s. And people wonder why we have gridlock on our highways. Why would anyone ever take a bus if it always takes four or five times longer than it would by car? I can’t wait to be old enough to drive and add my share to the pollution.
Siobhan is totally surprised to see me, but at least she’s home and not out somewhere with Megan. Her mother is unpacking groceries, and all the kids are hanging around, whining or fighting.
“Can I go out now?” she asks her mom. “Lucy and I want to go down to the mall.”
Actually, I don’t want to go to the mall at all, but what are the choices? I can’t talk to her here, with her mom and all these kids listening.
“I don’t have any money,” I say.
“Like, what’s new? We never have any money. But guess what?”
I can’t guess.
“All that’s going to change! I’ve got a real babysitting job for next Saturday.”
I don’t know why she’d be excited about a babysitting job. She’s always babysitting, and I don’t even think she likes it.
“Five dollars an hour and they only have two kids. Sure beats being treated like slave labor.”
Siobhan’s mother rolls her eyes and reaches for her purse. “Well, I can’t compete with wages like that, but you have to consider that I do provide you with free room and board.” She hands Siobhan a ten dollar bill. “Don’t spend it all in one place. And that’s for tonight too, so don’t get any funny ideas now that you’re in demand.”
“Maybe Lucy could stay over and help me with the kids tonight,” Siobhan says.
She makes it sound like this is something I’d be dying to do. Still, it would better than having to face my mom or dad.
“I’d have to ask my mom,” I say.
“You can use the phone in my room,” Siobhan says.
I’m praying Mom is home because otherwise she’s going to turn up looking for me at Grandma’s in an hour or two. I’m in luck. She says she was just heading out to go grocery shopping. I tell her Grandma and Granddad left early, and I’m at Siobhan’s. She doesn’t ask how I got there. She says I can stay over if it’s okay with Siobhan’s mom, which it is.
On our way to the mall, I tell Siobhan about what I walked in on this morning. “You have no idea how sleazy it feels,” I say, “knowing your own mother is in bed with some guy just a few feet away from where you’re standing.”
“And you were standing with your ear right up to the door?”
“Right. I’m absolutely sure it was a man’s breathing and a man’s cough … I mean, I’d have known anyway, what with the shoes out there by the door.”
“So you think it’s that Jake?”
“That’s what I’m assuming. There was no other car. He lives close enough to walk over.”
“Or maybe it’s Randy. He lives in the same place, doesn’t he?”
“I didn’t think of him,” I say.
We’re so wrapped up in our conversation we don’t even bother to go shopping. We just go into one of the coffee shops and order colas and fries.
“You know, just because there was no other car there doesn’t mean it had to be someone who lived close enough to walk,” Siobhan says as soon as the server walks away to fill our order.
“How else would he have got there?”
“Well, if your mom met someone at a club or at the pub, she might have just brought him home. Especially if one of them had been drinking too much. They’d just leave their car at the bar overnight.”
I think about it. I suppose she’s right. Sometimes when I’m feeling bad about things, Siobhan is a really good friend to have. She can completely take my mind off my troubles. This isn’t one of those times. It felt bad enough when I thought Mom was in bed with Jake, but that’s not as bad as thinking maybe she picked up some stranger when one or both of them was too drunk to drive.
“I have no idea what’s got into her,” I say.
“This has been a really exciting month for your mom. You know, first she got accepted for that course, so she knows she’ll be quitting her prissy old job at the convent. And now your parents have sold the house, so she’ll have all this money and she can do whatever she wants with it. Maybe she just wants to make a fresh start and be like a totally different sort of person. She’s only twenty-eight. She’s still got time to change if she wants to.”
I feel like kicking Siobhan. Maybe because she’s just said exactly what I’ve been thinking. I wish I’d said it. And I wish that when I did, Siobhan had told me I was crazy.
Instead, all I say is, “She’s twenty-nine next week. I get tired of hearing how young she is. I’ll be glad when she’s thirty.”
I’ve babysat with Siobhan before. It’s not too bad if her parents don’t go out until seven o’clock or so, like tonight. Her mom’s got the little ones in bed already. Rebecca and Jasmine, who are a bit older, are bathed and in their pj’s. Their mom has told them they can watch one show. Kevin and Damien are the most trouble. They’re nine and twelve. They hate it that Siobhan gets to be the boss of them. They never want to do what she says.
Just as her dad is getting into his jacket, Siobhan says, “Dad, tell Kevin and Damien what time they have to go to bed. I don’t want to spend all night fighting with them.”
“Damien, Kevin, Nine-thirty. Got it? I don’t want to hear that you’ve given Siobhan a hard time or there will be consequences. Understand?”
Damien and Kevin scowl at Siobhan, but they nod their heads. Then they disappear down the stairs to the basement to play some video game. Siobhan goes into the kitchen. She changes the time on the clock on the stove. Now it says eight o’clock instead of seven. Then she changes the time on the microwave, and on the alarm clock in her parents’ room.
At seven-thirty, when the TV show they’re watching is over, Siobhan tells Rebecca and Jasmine it’s time for bed. They’re pretty good about it, especially when I tell them that once they’re tucked in I’ll read them a story. They find the one they like. It’s called Curious George Flies a Kite. They sure didn’t pick it for the cover. The book is old, and it looks like it’s been dropped in the bathtub or left out in the rain. It smells funny too. Why do they even want me to read it? They have it memorized. When I try to hurry things up a bit by skipping parts, they catch me and make me go back.
Siobhan is down checking on the boys. When I’m finished the story, she comes in and gives her sisters goodnight kisses. Then she turns out the light. We go to the kitchen and make some popcorn. We can hear the girls talking and giggling a bit, but after awhile, it’s quiet.
Siobhan takes some of the popcorn to the basement for the boys.
“Nine o’clock,” I hear her say. “Here’s a snack. You need to get into your pajamas pretty soon.”
I look at the clocks around the kitchen. Right. They all read nine o’clock.
Half an hour later, she herds them off to bed. They complain. She threatens to tell her dad. They grumble. They argue with her and with each other. I just stay out of it. There are times I’m glad I’m an only child. Finally, when all the clocks say it’s ten-thirty but it’s really nine-thirty, things quiet down. Siobhan goes around and changes all the clocks back.
“If I’d started trying to get them to bed when it was really nine-thirty, I’d still be fighting with them an hour later,” she says. “It works better this way.”
We both flop down on the couch. Siobhan had turned the TV off when she was trying to get the kids to bed, so now it seems very quiet.
“What a day. I think we deserve a drink,” she says.
I agree. I don’t know what she has in mind. Her family never has pop in the house. Siobhan’s mom always says that water’s better for us. When we get to the kitchen, Siobhan doesn’t even go to the fridge. She pulls a chair up beside it, steps up on it, and begins looking through some bottles in the high cupboard over the fridge.
“Here it is,” she says. “Baileys Irish Cream. I tried it at Christmas. It’s not like most booze. It tastes really good.”
I’ve never had alcohol before, but even Grandma takes a drink now and then. She says Jesus did, too. It’s only a sin if you get drunk, but one glass is okay.
Siobhan steps down, opens another cupboard, and takes out glasses. She fills one for each of us. When I have mine, we wander back to the living room. We’re still wondering what to do about my mom.
“She’s never been the smartest about sex, has she?” asks Siobhan.
“No, I don’t think she knows much about things like condoms.”
“My parents neither.”
I take a sip of the Irish cream drink. It’s quite good. It’s almost like chocolate milk, but with a little bit of a bite to it. I take a bigger drink.
“Nice, isn’t it?” says Siobhan.
“Very.”
She takes another sip too. “Yes,” she says, “you really should have a talk with your mom.”
“I’d be too embarrassed. I don’t even want her to know that I know.”
“I know it will be hard, but if she’s already bringing guys home to spend the night, she needs to be using some kind of protection.”
We talk about it for quite awhile. Siobhan thinks maybe I could print out something about condoms from the Internet and just leave it where Mom would find it. I’m more interested in finding some way to persuade Mom not to sleep with these guys at all. How do I try to talk her out of being a floozy without telling her I know she’s been acting like one?
“I guess I’ll have to …” I start.
I’ve only drunk about two-thirds of my Irish Cream, but I’m feeling odd: queasy and funny in the head.
Siobhan takes another big swallow from her glass. “It’s probably too late to talk to her about just saying no,” she says.
I get up to go to the bathroom. “Excuse me. I’ll be back in a minute.”
I’m a bit dizzy. I bump into the coffee table. When I get to the bathroom, I go to hit the light switch, but I miss it. It takes me two or three tries. Mind you, it is dark, but I don’t think I usually have any trouble. My stomach feels awful. I’m trying to think of what I ate today. Pretty soon I know. I barely make it to the toilet, and I hurl; it looks like popcorn mostly. It takes me by surprise. I didn’t get the seat up. It’s splattered all over. I take some toilet paper, and I’m down on my knees in front of the bowl, trying to clean up, when it hits me again.
This is so totally gross. I’m here on my knees, hanging on to the sides of someone else’s toilet. Where is my mother when I need her? I’ve got it on my shirt. I pull myself up to the sink and use a washcloth to try to clean it off. The smell of the puke makes me gag. I barely make it to the toilet again. The sweat is pouring off me. I just sit there on the floor for awhile, leaning against the wall next to the toilet. I don’t know how long I’m there. I’m starting to feel a little bit better, so, being careful not to make any sudden moves, I start trying to clean up the mess I’ve made.
Siobhan must think I’ve died in here. I’m surprised she hasn’t come to check on me. I wash my face. I look at myself in the mirror. I’m awfully pale. Maybe I’m coming down with something. That Irish Cream probably didn’t help any.
When I think I’m okay, I come out of the bathroom and walk back down the hall. I bump into the walls a couple of times, but I don’t have any major problems. When I get to the living room, I see why Siobhan hasn’t come to check on me. She’s sound asleep on the couch. Our dirty glasses are sitting there. Both of them are empty. I thought I’d left some in mine. Whatever. I take them to the kitchen and put them in the dishwasher. I tidy up a bit, even though I’m still kind of clumsy and keep bumping into things. It’s eleven o’clock. Siobhan’s mom and dad will be home pretty soon. We should be getting ready for bed ourselves. I really need some sleep. I’m so tired I can’t think straight.
“Siobhan, wake up. Time for bed.” I give her shoulder a little shake.
Then I laugh at myself. That sounds weird, telling someone to wake up because it’s time for bed.
“Siobhan!” I say it louder this time, and I give her shoulder a harder shake.
She doesn’t even open her eyes. She’s breathing slowly, like she’s in a really deep sleep. At least she’s breathing. Why won’t she wake up? I grab her by both shoulders and shake her hard, yelling at her to wake up. Her eyelids flicker, but she just drops back into the corner of the couch like a rag doll when I let her go. Water! Maybe I should throw a glass of cold water on her. It would get on the couch. Her mother would have a fit. I run to the kitchen and soak a dish towel with cold water. I’m coming back to put it on her face when I hear the car in the driveway.
I wipe her face down and pinch her hard on the soft part of her inner arm.
“You girls still up?” I hear her dad ask.
Then both he and her mom are standing there, looking at us.
“I can’t get her to wake up,” I say. “She’s breathing and everything, but she won’t wake up.”
Siobhan’s dad is standing over her. He half lifts her off the couch and shakes her hard. Her eyes flutter and she makes a bit of a grunt, but that’s it. Her head lolls on her chest. If he let go, she’d fall in a heap on the floor.
“I’ll call 911,” Siobhan’s mom says.
“Never mind,” her dad says. “I’ll carry her to the car. It will be faster than waiting for an ambulance.”
Siobhan’s mother bends over Siobhan so she can help carry her. She sniffs. “Liam, she’s been drinking. I can smell it.” She looks at me. “What have the two of you been in to?”
“We just had a glass of that Irish Cream.”
They’re walking toward the front door. They each have Siobhan under one arm. Her feet are dragging along the carpet. The bathroom is just two doors down the hall.
Siobhan’s mom sniffs again. “Who’s been puking? Has she been sick too? I can smell it.”
“No,” I say. “That was me. Siobhan wasn’t sick, but now she won’t wake up.”
I’m following them, and I misjudge where the railing is and bump into it.
Siobhan’s mom looks like she’s going to cry. “You’re not in much better shape than she is.”
They get her downstairs and out to the car. I’m following them. I don’t have a jacket on; I’m shivering. Siobhan’s dad gets her into the front seat, and her mom leans over from the driver’s side to fasten Siobhan’s seat belt.
“She won’t wake up,” I say.
Siobhan’s dad looks at me but says to Colleen, “You better take this one too. If she’s been as sick as she smells, she should at least be checked out.”
He gets me into the backseat and helps me with my seat belt. Siobhan’s mom has started the engine.
“Don’t worry ’bout me,” I say. “The thing is, Siobhan won’t …”
“Shut up, Lucy. I know she won’t wake up. You’ve told me about twenty times,” Siobhan’s mom says.
Her dad goes back into the house and we drive away. I must fall asleep.