Dear Blue Sky (10 page)

CHAPTER 22

WALKING INTO WALLS

I WOKE IN
the dark. There was a loud bang and then the sound of shattering glass downstairs. I thought it was whoever beat up Jack. I jumped out of bed.

Dad said, “What's the matter with you, Van?”

“Nothing.”

“Something is. What have you been doing?”

“Nothing.”

“Are you drunk?”

“No.”

“Were you drinking?”

“No.” She giggled.

“What's so funny?”

“Nothing, I'm just really tired.”

“Where were you?”

“Finn's.”

“Go upstairs. We'll talk about it in the morning.”

Van stumbled into our room, unzipped her high black boots, and let them clunk to the floor. Then she got into bed in her clothes and pulled the covers over her head. Van, who had always done everything right, was high on something again and walking into walls and tables and then hiding in the dark. We were all hiding from each other.

I took my blue stone from under my pillow. It smelled like salt. I waited for a sign that Sef was close by. But there was nothing. I stared at Van sleeping. I had told Sef I'd keep an eye on her, and I hadn't.

I woke in the middle of the night and tiptoed down the hallway to the bathroom. Jack was patting Van's back as she knelt beside the toilet.

• • •

The next morning everything outside was covered in white. The lamp on the end table in the living room was gone. Van was standing in sweats and a T-shirt in front of the mirror in the bathroom holding her toothbrush like a cigarette. Her dark eyes were half closed, and her head was tilted back so her wet hair fell straight down her back. She rocked back slightly, her free hand gripping on to the white porcelain edge of the sink. Her weight shifted from one leg to the other.

“Thanks for getting up last night when I was sick,” she said in a small voice.

Jack's face gleamed. He held out the purple heart I'd cut from cardboard and tied with a purple ribbon the night before. When I gave it to him, I said, “Because you're so brave. Like Sef.” Now he wanted to give his purple heart to Van.

Her eyes lifted a little. But there was no light in there. Where did it go? I took a step back. Jack lifted the purple heart closer to Van.

“Van,” I said, “Jack has something for you.”

She dropped her toothbrush into the sink and spun around, those lightless eyes searching us. “What?”

“Actually, you can't give it to someone else, Jack,” I said, pulling him away from Van. “It's yours.”

The air buzzed as Van started to blow her hair dry, cutting us off.

“Van?” I said.

“Van?”

Buzzzzz.

“Just wanted you to know, if you ever want to talk, you can talk to me,” I said to her.

CHAPTER 23

THE KISS

THE MAIL FROM
Saturday was still in our mailbox. There was a postcard for Jack of some famous building in Kuwait. It read,
Hey Jack, Hope you are taking care of everything there for me. Miss you, buddy. Love, Sef.

I waved the postcard in front of Mom and Jack at the kitchen table. She clutched it to her, then read it out loud. Jack grabbed the card and tore out of his seat. He put on his coat and ran outside with it. Mom and I watched through the kitchen window as he raced through the snow to the chestnut tree, slicing the air with his postcard.

When I went outside, Jack was standing under the chestnut tree, staring at the postcard.

“Ask me to read it, Jack,” I said, “and I'll read it to you.”

He didn't say anything.

“Blue Sky's brother stopped talking too. You're going to talk to me, Jack. Soon, okay? Because I miss you.”

He rested his head against the bark.

“I know you can hear me, Jack.”

• • •

Inside, Mom was asleep on the couch. The TV was blasting. I thought of Blue Sky without electricity. How could she have so much hope when her world was falling apart around her? I wanted to be strong like that. I wanted to believe that things would get better. I decided right then that I really was going to make things better. I'd already told myself that I was going to be good, but I swore now that somehow I was going to reach Mom. I was going to find out what happened to Jack. And I was going to talk to Van.

I started collecting dirty plates, scraps of hot dog and doughnuts, wineglasses, and coffee cups around the house and stacked them in the sink. I filled the sink with soap and water and washed everything. I cleaned the kitchen counter and dragged a cloth over the floor. I stuffed all the dirty clothes into the washing machine, dumped in some soap, and turned it on.

I picked up around the sofa where Mom had fallen asleep. Sef's high school photo was on the cushion beside her. He had on a flannel shirt, and his brown hair fell over his forehead. His bluish green sea eyes were looking at me. In that second, I imagined his eyes were my eyes, his hair was my hair, his smile was my smile, and I was the one Mom missed.

I put my face close to hers. Her breath was warm, and her mouth was open. She was so pretty, even with the lines around the corners of her eyes and mouth. I wanted to tell her that it was going to be all right. I wanted to make things right again. I wanted to kiss her just as I'd seen her kiss Sef's picture. I leaned closer, and Mom stirred and shifted away. I stepped back and ran upstairs.

The shades were still drawn in Mom and Dad's room. Mom's bottles of cream and powder, blush, eyeliner and mascara were spread over her makeup table. Her clothes covered the chaise lounge. I fingered her creamy-colored silk shirts, her wool skirts, cashmere sweaters, light peach nylons as if I was going to find something that would tell me who she was.

I walked slowly down the hallway. I could see Jack's toys and puzzles on the floor of his room. I hadn't been in there for weeks. On his Thomas the Tank Engine night table were Dad's pens, gum wrappers, and change. His work pants were draped over the end of Jack's bed. I wondered how long Dad had been sleeping in there. My chest tightened. Everything was wrong.

I picked up a card from the comforter. It had a picture of a flock of ducks lifting off a pond, flying toward the blue sky ahead—an anniversary card with some gushy love poem written inside it. Their anniversary was over two weeks away. I let the card fall through my fingers to the ground. Dad really loved her. And despite everything, he wanted her to love him. I wanted her to love me too.

• • •

When I came back down, Mom was curled up on the couch. She opened her arms, and Jack slid inside. He wasn't talking, and he was her baby again. They were looking at the postcard from Sef.

I said, “I'm going to Kim's now, Mom.”

She shifted closer to Jack and smiled blankly. “Okay.”

I took off, breathing in the cold sharp air and breathing out puffs of white.

CHAPTER 24

JESUS STUFF

KIM WAS WATCHING
for me in the lobby of her apartment building. She came clonking down the front walkway in her suede clogs and tight jeans, the ones with peace signs on the back pockets. Snowflakes clung to her hair.

“You're totally insane.” She laughed at me.

A pickup truck drove in front of the apartment building. It was fixed with plywood signs along the sides painted in red capital letters: J
ESUS
I
S
M
Y
F
RIEND
, J
ESUS
I
S THE
A
NSWER,
and J
ESUS
I
S THE
R
EASON FOR THE
S
EASON.

“I'm insane?” I asked. “Who's that?”

“The one and only Jesus,” Kim answered. “He lives in the middle building. Freak is his middle name. Supposedly he fell off his ladder one day, and when he woke up, he thought he was Jesus Christ. My mom says he's too lazy to work, so he pretends he's Jesus. Don thinks he's pretty fantastic. I think he's a creep.”

A thin man with long straggly brown hair, wearing an oversized coat, jeans, and work boots, got out with a cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee.

“Who would have guessed Jesus liked Dunkin' Donuts so much?” Kim rolled her eyes.

Inside his truck, Dunkin' Donuts cups, half-eaten doughnuts, napkins, flyers, and pamphlets covered the dashboard, and a worn-out Bible pressed up against the window. He waved and walked slowly toward us, stopping in front of me. He said slowly, “Something very difficult is going on with you.” His eyes were soft and brown, prying into mine. They brightened. “It's your family. I can see it. You can tell me. I'm here to help.”

He handed me his card. It said
Jesus at your service
above his phone number. Behind us, the wind rattled the plywood sign on his pickup, shaking the red words H
E
W
ILL
C
OME
A
GAIN.

“Thanks,” I said to him as Kim dragged me toward the door.

Waiting for the elevator, Kim said, “Don't worry. He says that to everyone. It's always ‘the family.'”

We got off on the third floor and walked down the mustard-carpeted hallway. Kim's mother was on the couch in a white bathrobe, a book in one hand and a cigarette in the other. She was blowing loops of smoke around their living room. She lifted her masked face to us. Wet curls hung to her shoulders.

“Oh, hi. Hope you don't mind, I'm doing a peel before work.”

I said, “My mom does them too.”

“Doesn't seem to do any good for this old prune face, but I'm still trying.”

“Cassie, Hannah, my mom. Cassie just got to meet Jesus downstairs.”

“Lucky you. Did he give you a card?”

I held it up.

“Well, I'd rather live next to him than some child molester,” she said.

“How do you know he's not a child molester?” Kim asked.

“Don't even say it.” Her mother sucked in her breath.

After her mother went in to get ready for work, Kim and I started the poster. We wrote in red and green capital letters: C
HRISTMAS
D
ONATIONS FOR
T
ROOPS
F
IGHTING IN
I
RAQ
. On either side, I wrote in smaller letters: “Support Our Troops!”

“So what does this Jesus guy do, anyway?”

“I dunno. Prays, I guess.”

“Have you ever called him?”

“No way. Please tell me you're not going to call him.”

I shook my head. It wasn't like Jesus could bring Sef home. “Do you believe in heaven?”

“Sorta, I guess. Like I believe in magic. It feels sort of like believing in the Wizard of Oz.”

“Well, I could use a little magic to make Jack start talking again,” I said. “He stopped yesterday.”

“What's up with that?”

“I don't know. He got beat up and stopped talking. I bet it was Ben Adams, the kid next door who's always picking on him. Kristen Adams's stupid little brother. But I don't know for sure because Jack won't say anything. I'm going to find out, though.”

“I'll help. Was it bad?”

“Bloody nose, bruised cheek, broken heart,” I said with a little smile.

“Poor kiddo.”

“You know what's weird? Blue Sky's brother stopped talking too. After their house was bombed. He's only two, but it's weird how we have these things in common. Even though I live here and she lives there. I feel like I can tell her things, and I don't really know her.” I looked up. My cheeks were warm. “It's like that with you too. I mean, I can tell you things.”

“Thanks,” she said. “Except that I kind of wish
my
brother would stop talking. He thinks I talk a lot. He never shuts up.”

After a while coloring in the block letters, Kim asked, “Think anyone's going to donate anything?”

“Sure. Rob said he would. Mr. Giraldi will.”

“You like Rob, don't you?”

“How'd you know?”

“Your eyes tell everything.” She smiled. “What about your friends—will they donate?”

“My so-called friends? Actually, I still miss Sonia sometimes.”

“I know.”

“It's weird not talking to her anymore. We used to be so close. Then she got busy with other stuff, and we ended up going in different directions. Our parents sort of got in this thing, too.”

“Thing?”

“Yeah. It's complicated.”

Kim waited, but didn't press me. She said, “Well, people change, right? Not always how you want them to.”

Kim put on a Prince CD and danced. I used to dance with Sonia sometimes. Now I danced with Kim as I colored in the last letters. It felt good. She didn't judge. She wasn't watching me. She was busy shaking her own hips.

When we finished the sign, Kim showed me some video clips on her computer. One was of some troops in Iraq. They surrounded a statue of Saddam Hussein and started pulling it down with ropes. It toppled over. I remembered watching it on TV with Sef when the war first started. We had cheered afterward.

“Look,” Kim said, pointing. “See the US military vehicle? Almost all American soldiers.”

One of them draped an American flag over Saddam's face. Then the clip ended.

“Weird,” I said. “I thought the Iraqis pulled it down.”

“Our government wanted you to think that.”

“Why?”

“So it looks like the Iraqis support our war. Like we're all in it together and doing something fantastic.”

“That's pretty dumb,” I said. “Kind of like that Wizard of Oz Jesus stuff.”

“Yeah.”

Did Sef know about this?
Why did it feel like I was always getting tricked because adults said one thing and did another? Like
I
was supposed to figure out what was right and what wasn't all the time.