Blue Moon (21 page)

“What subject?” she asked.

“History.”

She nodded hard, so her chin just about bumped her chest. T.J. could tell that she didn’t buy it, but she’d decided not to argue. “Okay, then,” she said. “Anything you want me to tell your sister?”

“Nothing special. Just ‘hi.’”

His mother kissed him and left. The funny thing was, T.J. sort of wished she had yanked him by the hair. The second he heard her and Belinda leave the house and start up the Volvo, T.J. grabbed the spare truck keys and headed out.

The October air felt chilly. He rode his bike into the wind, weaving down the long hill toward the wharf. He sped through red lights, bounced over cobbles, dodged slow-moving tourists. You needed a mountain bike in Mount Hope just to avoid hazardous old people. Pedaling onto Keating’s Wharf, he tried to act nonchalant. He parked his bike beside a few others locked to the chainlink fence.

His father had left just yesterday morning, which meant he would be gone for a week. There was the truck, parked in a lot his grandfather reserved for fishermen. T.J. glanced around; you didn’t really have a clear view of this spot from either Lobsterville or the warehouse, but you never knew who might be on the prowl. He wished his father hadn’t parked right here in the middle of the lot, but what was T.J. going to do? Ask his father to leave the truck in a nice dark alley so T.J. could steal it easier?

The engine fired up. His heart pounding, T.J. hunched low in the seat, so no one would see him. He stepped on the brake, the clutch, the gas, getting a feel for the pedals. Without moving, he shifted through all the gears. Then he backed out of the parking spot, shifted into first, and pulled carefully into the traffic cruising down Memorial Highway.

T.J. had known how to drive for two years. His mother had taught him one summer afternoon when he was thirteen. She’d let him drive up and down a dead-end street in the industrial park for an hour. “This’ll be our secret,” she’d said, letting him know he shouldn’t tell Belinda or his father. T.J. had kept his word; he had already promised his father he wouldn’t tell anyone
he’d
taught T.J. to drive two months earlier.

Until now, he’d never driven without one of his parents in the
front seat. He hadn’t even planned to take the truck until last night. He’d been lying awake, thinking about stuff, when suddenly the idea hit him: the truck’s just sitting there, no one will ever know. And once the idea took hold, he couldn’t shake it. The details just burned in his mind: wait till they leave for the hospital, get the keys, ride your bike down to the wharf, get in the truck, and take off.

He wanted to take off from Belinda, dressed for the hospital in her church clothes. It bugged the shit out of him that she was visiting Josie every day. Like she even cared. She probably had a crush on some young doctor; she was probably just hanging around Josie’s room hoping Dr. Wonderful would drop by. When Belinda came home, she’d talk on and on about how tiny Josie looked in her hospital bed, how brave she was, and Belinda would have a worried, reverent look in her eyes, like she considered Josie a saint.

But what really got T.J. was seeing his mother so freaked out. His aunts didn’t even want her driving to the hospital alone, that’s how upset she was. Now that his dad was away, Aunt Bonnie took her in the mornings and Aunt Nora at night, but his mother insisted on driving in the afternoon, because she thought it was important “the other kids”—meaning Belinda and him—see their little sister.

T.J. had heard all this last night, when Aunt Nora came for a cup of tea. His mother had thought he and Belinda were asleep, but she kept her voice low, anyway. Then he heard Aunt Nora say, “That’s okay, let it out,” and his mother said in an icy voice, “Sometimes I hate it so much, I want to leave. Just leave.”

After that, only Aunt Nora talked, and T.J. figured his mom was crying. From then on T.J. kept thinking about the plates crashing on Josie, how it was his fault she’d almost died. That was when he decided to take a long ride.

So it actually amazed him when he found himself driving past the Slow—Hospital Zone signs. He drove once around the zone’s outer block, then slowly past the hospital itself. There was his mother’s car, parked on the street. He searched the hospital windows, hundreds of them, as if he might actually see Josie, and he nearly ran a stop sign.

“Whoa!” he said out loud, coming to a complete stop. Then he
peeled out the way his father used to, laying rubber like Mario Andretti. His father never drove wild with T.J. anymore, and he talked about “responsible driving”—probably because T.J. would be getting his license next year, driving for real, and his father wanted to set the right kind of example. T.J. thought it would be neat if Josie had been looking out the window at the exact moment of his burnout, but that would mean that his mom was looking, too.

Since he was in the neighborhood, he cruised down Marcellus Boulevard. He could hardly believe people lived in these mansions. They were castle-sized, with stone towers, statues in the yard, and turnaround driveways. Some of them were open to the public, like museums. T.J. was looking around, wondering which one Alison lived in, when he saw her riding her bike. He did a wicked U-turn.

“Hey,” he said, stopping across the street from her. She sped up; she probably thought he was a gross old horny guy trying to flash her. “Alison!” he shouted.

She slammed on her brakes. “T.J.?” she said, her mouth dropping open. “What are you doing driving?”

“I felt like going for a ride. Want to hop in?”

“You drive?” she asked, just standing there. “You have your license?”

“Yeah,” T.J. said, thinking she looked gorgeous in her tight white sweater and white jeans. No one but Alison wore white jeans during the school year.

“You’re not old enough,” she said.

“I stayed back,” T.J. lied. “In first grade. Come on.”

“Okay. Wow,” Alison said.

T.J. stuck her bike in the truck bed. Then he got in the cab. Alison was looking around, dazed, as if she’d just agreed to take a ride in the space shuttle.

“I’ve never been in a truck before,” she said.

No kidding, T.J. thought. Her parents probably had a Mercedes. “I could have brought the Volvo,” he said awkwardly. Never mind that it was the family tank, fifteen years old—the same age as T.J.

“No, this is awesome,” she said. “I can’t believe you drive.”

They cruised along without saying anything. T.J. was in shock
that his first time alone behind the wheel, he’d picked up Alison McCabe. It seemed like this was meant to be. He glanced sideways at her. She had such a beautiful athletic body, clean swishy hair, and the cutest profile. Everything turned up: her thick eyelashes (from this angle T.J. could see she wore violet mascara), her nose, the corners of her mouth, even her chin.

“You have dimples,” he said.

They deepened, her smile growing wide. “When I smile.”

“You’re always smiling,” T.J. said.

“You don’t know me very well,” she said. “I have my moments.”

“Oh, you mean a deep, dark secret?” he teased.

“Yes, I guess it is.”

She sounded serious. T.J. shifted down, so he could look right at her. She wasn’t smiling.

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“Oh,” she said. “I have problems.”

“Like what?” More than anything, T.J. wanted Alison to tell him her problems. Maybe she had a split personality. Maybe no one in her family understood her. T.J. pictured them taking the truck to California, right now. Two misunderstood kids escaping their families—the kind of kids River Phoenix and Winona Ryder always played in the movies. They could pretend to be from the same troubled family, a brother and sister in need of lodging. They could call teenage hotlines, stay in runaway shelters. Late at night, when all the other runaways were asleep, they could hold each other under the blankets.

“Like what problems?” T.J. didn’t want to press her to tell him painful things, but he thought he’d explode if he couldn’t know. “I have problems, too.”

“What, like your parents are too strict?”

Suddenly her voice had a mean, bitter edge that T.J. had never heard before.

“No. Like my sister almost died because of me,” T.J. said.

“Really? How?” Alison asked. She sounded suspicious, like she didn’t really believe him.

“She’s only four, and she can’t hear. The one who answered the phone when you thought Belinda was ragging on you.”

T.J. hadn’t told this story to any of his friends—even Sean, who was there the night of Josie’s accident. T.J. had only said he felt bad for Josie. He’d left out the part that it was his fault. Right now, he didn’t know whether Alison was going to be nice about it or jump out of the truck. He just didn’t want her thinking he was a run-of-the-mill kid with wimp teenage problems, like acne or strict parents.

“Oh, T.J.,” Alison said. “That must be so awful for her.”

“Yeah.”

“She’s still in the hospital?”

“Uh-huh.” T.J. had thought that telling the story would make him feel better, but instead he felt more depressed.

“I don’t think it’s your fault. You didn’t know the waiter was coming that exact minute. I think it’s really horrible of your mom to make you feel so bad.”

“She took it back.”

“Look, you still feel it, right? It’s written all over your face.”

T.J. tried to laugh, wondering what she meant. Did he look ugly? Was he going around with a frown all the time? He knew how quickly a frown could turn a person ugly.

Alison undid her seat belt and slid across the seat toward him. She brushed her fingertips across his forehead, just above his stitches. “How did that happen?”

“Trying to get to Josie.”

“Your mom sounds really sick,” Alison said. “Blaming you when you got hurt trying to help.”

“Aren’t you going to tell me?” T.J. asked, really wanting her to get off the subject of his mom.

“Tell you what?”

T.J. didn’t like being played with, and he knew that was what Alison was doing. So he kept his mouth shut and drove along, like he didn’t care.

“Oh, you mean about my problems?” she finally asked.

“Yeah.”

Alison exhaled, as if she were trying to get up the courage to tell him.

“What?” he asked.

“I started off kidding, saying I have problems. I mean, people always say that, but the problems turn out to be something stupid, like their parents are getting divorced. You know?”

“That’s stupid?” T.J. asked, thinking that someone’s parents getting divorced counted as a pretty big problem.

“But then you told me about Josie. So maybe I can tell you.”

“You can.”

“Okay,” Alison said. “My parents are getting divorced.”

Billy drove the
Norboca
across the waves, through the night, into the North Atlantic. The two guys on watch, Cliff Sherman and Joe Markopolous, stood on deck talking. Their voices drifted back to Billy in the wheelhouse; he saw their cigarettes glowing in the dark. He steered out to sea, but his thoughts turned back to home. To Cass.

This morning, he’d seen her emotions veering out of control. He’d felt it at the breakfast table. Leaving her now, with Josie still in the hospital, had been one of the hardest things he’d ever done. When he’d looked at her eyes, at the face he loved more than any in the world, he’d seen her hiding some terrifying fear. As if she hadn’t expected her life to turn out to be so difficult; as if, somewhere along the line, their lives had gotten too complicated for her to handle, and she didn’t know what to do. It killed Billy, because he didn’t know what to do, either.

He hadn’t wanted to leave, but now it felt good to be away. He breathed the cold air, so dry it made his throat ache. Overhead, the stars blazed. Billy knew these northern stars; he followed them to the fishing grounds. Even with all the electronic equipment onboard, Billy still would rather steer by the stars. The Milky Way swept across the sky, filmy as a woman’s scarf.

“Pretty night,” Cliff said, coming into the wheelhouse. “We’re making good time.”

“We’ll be fishing before dawn,” Billy said.

“Maybe I’ll sleep a little,” Cliff said. “If you can spare me.”

“No problem.”

“Hey, it’s great, you buying your own boat. If you need crew …” Cliff left the offer hanging.

It seemed strange to be fishing without John Barnard; they’d been together on over a hundred trips, and they knew each other’s style and pattern of fishing. Billy glanced at Cliff, wondering if he—or any of this crew—would ever fit in the way John had.

“Thanks,” Billy said. “I’ll let you know.”

“Hey, how’s your little girl?” Cliff asked. “Joanie said she was in the hospital.”

“She’s doing better,” Billy said, turning his attention back to the helm. “She’ll be fine.”

The silence stretched out. Cliff arched his back and yawned. “Well, I guess I’ll turn in. See you at four.”

“Good night,” Billy said.

He checked his course, adjusted the wheel. He stared at the stars, tried to conjure their magic again. But it wasn’t there. His emotions were pushing it away: feelings for Josie and Cass. Thoughts of his wife, seventy-five miles behind him, and her desperation, overshadowed the magic of the stars.

W
hen Cass arrived at the hospital on Josie’s fifth morning there, the doctor gave her good news.

“The swelling’s gone down,” she said. “So I’m sending Josie home.”

“Today?” Cass asked, feeling her heart leap.

The doctor gave her a bright smile. “Tomorrow,” she said. “We’ll watch her one more night to be absolutely sure.”

“Thank you,” Cass said.

Cass poked her head into Josie’s room. Josie held her new doll, a gift from her grandparents, between her stomach and the cast on her left wrist.

“Guess what?” Cass asked, kissing her. “The doctor says you can come home tomorrow!”

“Yay!” Josie bounced in her bed. But she seemed to have something else, equally exciting, in mind. She wedged her doll under her left arm. With her free, right hand, she saluted Cass. Then she tapped her chin with her thumb and wiggled her four fingers.

“Are you playing?” Cass asked.