Counting Thyme (4 page)

WHAT BROUGHT ME HERE

MR. ELLISON HAD A PRETTY DIFFERENT WAY OF CALLING
class to order, which I noticed the second I followed Emily into homeroom. James Brown's raspy voice was bouncing off the walls, and every single kid was jumping in time to the music next to their desks. And Mr. Ellison, who had to be the tallest human being I'd ever seen, was spinning in place at the head of the room with his eyes squeezed shut.

“Excuse me, Mr. Ellison!” Emily shouted, and the teacher fell out of his spin and nearly flattened me before he caught the edge of his desk.

“Whoa!” His stubbly chin stopped just inches from my face. He grinned, and a bead of sweat tracked down his dark brown cheek. “That was a close call, little lady.” He straightened up, towering over us. He had broad shoulders and huge hands, but his eyes were kind. He reminded me of one of the nurses at the hospital in San Diego, a guy who used to come to work in different costumes every single day, just to make the kids laugh. I liked that. So did Val.

“One second,” he said. Then he cut the music off, and all the kids stopped dancing and looked to see what was up. As
Mr. Ellison pointed out my desk, I could feel every single eye in the classroom boring into my skin, straight through my stupid winter coat.

I walked to my row with my eyes on the floor, but halfway to my desk, a boy's leg blocked the aisle. “Excuse me,” I said, but he didn't move his leg out of the way.

“We had to switch seats so you could sit in alphabetical order.” I looked up. The boy was small for a sixth grader. He had spindly arms and a snub nose, along with a nasty smile. “You bumped Jimmy out of our row. Now he's stuck at the front.”

“Sorry.” I wished I could disappear. Again.

I stepped over his leg, dumped my bag by my desk, and shrugged off my coat as quickly as possible. Which wasn't quickly at all. My sweater seemed to have bonded to the jacket's fleecy lining. After an embarrassing amount of shaking and wiggling, I finally gripped the end of one sleeve with my teeth, ripped the coat off, and flopped miserably into my seat.

“Don't hurt yourself,” the boy with the snub nose said, loud enough to cue a ripple of laughter from his buddies. I wondered if he liked to pick on everyone or if I was just super lucky.

Mr. Ellison clapped his hands. “Everyone, let's welcome Thyme Owens to our homeroom,” he said, and the other kids clapped along with him, which only made me wish I could disappear even more.

“Now let's all introduce ourselves. Share your name and something about yourself.”

One by one, the other kids stood up and said their names and something short, like what their favorite subject was. When it was Emily's turn, she shot to her feet and said she was a singer
and
a dancer, and that she couldn't wait for the Spring Fling, whatever that was. There were more than a few claps, and I realized that Emily wasn't just nice. She was popular. The kind of girl you ask to show the new kid around. Not the kind of girl who made friends with me.

Which was fine, I told myself. I wasn't looking for new friends, anyway.

Emily went on about how she hoped to win the lead in the Spring Fling, and how excited she was that they'd chosen
The Wizard of Oz
. I got the feeling she would've gone on forever if Mr. Ellison hadn't stopped her. “That's quite enough, Emily. Let's move on. We've got ten minutes until the bell.”

Emily beamed at the class one last time and slid gracefully into her seat. Then the boy behind her stood up and mumbled a name that sounded like Dusty Hairnet. Followed by a Sheila Turnip—or was it Hurtlip? I didn't know if it was the blood rushing in my ears or the echo in the room, but I didn't really learn anyone's name until the row next to me, when two identical girls in matching dresses stood up and spoke loudly enough to make me jump.

“I'm Delia,” one said.

“And I'm Celia,” said her twin.

“We like fashion and making videos,” Delia said.

“And you should totally sit with us at lunch!” finished Celia. They bowed and dropped back into their seats while the other kids laughed and groaned.

The introductions continued down our row. When we got to the boy in front of me, the one who hadn't moved his leg, he announced his name was Darien without even looking back. Obviously, he hated my guts.
It doesn't matter,
I told myself. I really wanted to believe that.

Then someone tapped my shoulder. I twisted around. The boy behind me waved. He had brown skin and hair that stuck out like springs all around his head, dark at the root and sandy brown at the end, as though he'd spent a lot of time in the sun.

“Hey. I'm Jake Reese.” A pair of white earbuds hung from his shirt collar. He stuck out his hand, and I shook it. Then he smiled. I smiled back, and a floaty feeling sloshed through my insides. Not a bad feeling, but not an entirely good feeling, either.

“Thyme, huh? Just like Simon and Garfunkel,” he said.

My smile slipped. Was he making fun of me, too?

“Um, can I have my hand back?” His fingers tugged against mine.

“Sorry.” I dropped his hand like a rock and spun around. As the last few kids introduced themselves, I silently begged the bell to ring so that I could escape without having to introduce myself.

“Thyme, would you like to tell us a little bit about yourself now?” Mr. Ellison said. “Where you moved from, and what brought you here? Maybe your favorite subject?” He nodded three times, as if his enthusiasm would make me eager to answer, too.

I stood up. Emily was busy whispering with the girl next to her. I sucked in a breath and fixed my eyes on the clock over the door. “I'm Thyme,” I said, still looking at the clock.

The second hand clicked. 8:59.

“I moved here from California.”

There was a rumble of interest.

“My favorite subjects are social studies and math.”

The clock was frozen at one minute to nine. Mr. Ellison nodded again.

“And we came here . . .”

I glanced at Emily. She stared back at me.

“We came here because of my dad's job.”

The bell finally rang, and I plopped back into my chair without mentioning what had
really
brought me to New York. Because at some point, they'd all find out what had brought me here anyway.

One day, someone would notice Val, with his bald head, and his hearing aids, and his scars that showed if his shirt hung too low. Then, no matter what anyone thought of me, I'd become the poor girl whose brother has cancer. Neuroblastoma, to be specific. That's nerve cancer. The worst kind. And then that's all they would care about, because cancer is
the most fascinating thing in the world when it isn't happening to you. It's like a train wreck in slow motion. Everybody stares. They can't help it.

And they can't help assuming things, either. Like, that cancer boy's sister wouldn't want to participate in the end-of-year talent show, because, obviously, she's too busy with cancer-y things to do a skit (not that I was particularly talented—but, really, how much talent did it take to put on a grass skirt and lip-sync to music?).

Once people knew about the cancer, I wouldn't be able to stop them from talking about Val every time they saw me. And then I would stop being me, because me time was something I could only buy at home.

IT COMES FROM MICE

BY THE TIME THE FINAL BELL RANG, I WAS SO BEAT, I HATED
the idea of walking home, even though the apartment was only a few blocks away. But when I spotted Mom and Val waiting at the bottom of the steps, I forced my face into something like a smile.

“T!” Val shouted when he saw me.

Mom was tapping at her phone. “Everything go okay?” she asked, without looking at me.

“Fine.” I squatted down to see Val, who was tucked into the stroller wearing his Batman mask. He reached his arms out, and I let him pull me into his warm, stinky nest of blankets.

“I missed you, T.”

I kissed his cheek. “I missed you, too, V. How was the train?”

His face lit up. “There was a turny thing, and we had to buy a card but Mom didn't know which one, and Dad said it didn't matter but I got to keep it.” He held up a shiny yellow and blue card with
MTA
written across the front.

“We should get going,” Mom said. “Val needs to rest, and I need to get these groceries put away.” There were grocery bags hanging from the stroller handles. She put her phone away and glanced at me. “You look tired. Let's hang your bag on the stroller.” She reached for my shoulder strap.

“It's okay,” I said. “I've got it.” I straightened my spine, even though my shoulders ached from carrying a full bag all day. I hadn't exactly gotten the hang of my locker. Mr. Ellison said I needed to check the combination with Principal Williams, but I hadn't had a chance to.

Mom smiled. “You're such a trouper, Thyme.” She looked like she meant it, too.

I spotted Emily hopping into a sleek black car at the curb.

“Let's go,” I said, pushing Val's stroller away before she saw us.

After that, I kept quiet and concentrated on dodging sidewalk muck. Mom surprised me by telling me about Val's checkup, although I think she was talking to herself more than anything because she kept stopping to make notes on her phone.

Val had gotten a set of scans, which were like pictures of the inside of his body. The doctors needed to look at them before he could start his new medicine. This new medicine—called 3F8—was a special kind of antibody, as well as the reason we'd moved all the way to New York. Thanks to months of chemotherapy, Val's cancer was mostly gone. But cancer has a way of coming back, especially neuroblastoma. That's
why Val needed the 3F8. The antibodies would kill off any cancer cells that Val's chemo had missed and, hopefully, keep it from coming back.

“The medicine comes from mice!” Val shouted from the stroller.

“That's cool, V.” I was happy for him, but I was also wishing we were already back at the apartment, and that San Diego was in the same time zone as New York so I could talk with Shani. We'd only managed a quick phone call over the weekend. Between the time difference and her soccer schedule, it was going to be difficult to stay in touch. I tried to ignore what that might mean for us and focused on the twenty-seven hours of time sitting in the Thyme Jar next to my bed.

When we got to our building, Mom folded the stroller and slung it over her shoulder. We started up the stairs to our apartment, with Val counting the steps as we went. Mom hovered behind him in case he crashed. The hospital always wore him out, even if he was just getting scans. I saw how it worked once, when Dad took me to visit. Val had to lie in the doughnut hole of a big white machine and stay perfectly still. For a whole hour. I wondered if I could ever be that patient about anything in my whole life.

When we got to the third-floor landing, I spotted Mr. Lipinsky watching us again, but he shut his door before I could get Mom's attention. Her focus was on Val, anyway. He was looking pale.

“Take this,” she said, passing me the stroller. She scooped Val into her arms, which wasn't easy at her small size. He collapsed against her like a rag doll, too tired to hold his head up. His body was still weak from months of surgeries and chemotherapy. He could go from okay to exhausted in minutes. What was I doing, worrying about Shani and Mr. Lipinsky when I should have been thinking about Val?

One time, right before Val was diagnosed, I'd come home to find him crying on the couch and saying strange things, like he didn't know where he was or who we were. He'd had a fever on and off for two weeks, and Mom and Dad had taken him to three different doctors. The last doctor said it was the flu, but my parents knew it was something else. Something worse.

That night, they left me and Cori at Shani's while they took Val to the emergency room. Shani had these glow-in-the-dark stars on her ceiling. Her mother said the adhesive would ruin the paint, but Shani said sleeping under the stars was worth getting grounded. I remember staying up late into the night, counting stars and making promises long after Shani and Cori fell asleep, offering to trade every good grade and every nice thing I had—anything for Val to be okay.

That was the most terrible day ever. Every other day seemed easy by comparison. That night, I hadn't known if I would still have a brother when I woke up in the morning. And once you've had that feeling, it never really goes away.

Inside the apartment, Mom settled Val on the couch for a rest. Dad had gone to get Cori, so it was just the three of us. I went into the kitchen and put the groceries away: kale chips, pomegranate juice drinks, and enriched milk shakes for when Val was feeling low on energy. But no turkey and no Swiss for me. I would have to take Chinese leftovers for lunch again.

When I went back into the living room, Mom was reading a story with Val.

I told her that I put the groceries away, and she said, “That's right. I owe you time.” I got the notepad from next to the phone, and she wrote me a slip. “There's an extra hour for you,” she said. “I'm really proud of you for how well you did today.” Which was strange, because I hadn't really told her much about my day. Not about getting lost trying to find my classes or listening to the twins finish each other's sentences at lunch. Or how it was impossible not to notice Jake. I blamed this on his springy brown hair, which stood out above the crowd.

Mom went back to the book she was reading with Val, so I went to my room and dropped the new time slip into my jar. I thought about Mom giving me extra time for trying so hard at my new school, and I felt a pang of guilt. If only she knew what I was saving for.

When Dad got home, I asked him if he'd ever heard of a “Simon and Garfunkel.”

“Sure,” he said. “Simon and Garfunkel is a classic band.
They even have a song about you. ‘Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme.' Why do you ask?”

“No reason,” I said, but I was surprised at how nice it felt that Jake hadn't been making fun of me after all. He'd even gotten my name right.