Heart's Desire (5 page)

Chapter Eight

THE SUMMERHOUSE DOOR OPENS AND THE SHADOW OF MY mother appears, backlit by bright sunshine with thousands of tiny dust particles swirling through it. I must have dozed off for exactly ten minutes.

“Mom!”

“Oh Hallie, I’m so
glad
that you’re back. Mrs. Muldoon said she saw you driving down Main Street with boxes tied to the roof rack.”

It’s a relief to know that the Cosgrove County grapevine hasn’t been experiencing any technical difficulties while I’ve been away.

My mother’s cheeks are flushed pink, her voice is quivery, and her eyes brim with tears, just like when she’s pregnant.

“Oh my gosh!” I put my arms around her. “You’re pregnant again!”

She bursts into tears and I lead her over to the daybed. To myself I’m thinking,
This will make nine kids! We’ve just gone from being
a sports team to having our own militia.

But to her I say, “It makes perfect sense that you’d be concerned about bringing another life into this world. How far along are you?”

She dabs at her eyes with a tissue that she’s miraculously produced out of the sleeve of her summer sweater, the way mothers of small children are programmed to do in order to catch snot and spit-up before it makes contact with clothing and furniture.

“About two months,” she says, and places a loving hand on her abdomen, where the infant in question is not yet visible, but allegedly in residence, rent-free. “I’m absolutely thrilled. You kids are all growing up so fast.” She scrolls her eyes up and down my five-foot-eight frame and then touches my almost pimple-free face as if that’s all the proof anyone needs.

Unbelievable—a woman who still has six kids living at home is experiencing empty-nest syndrome? But I quickly change course to make sure she doesn’t think that I was suggesting she might not want the baby. “That’s terrific. Congratulations! I just meant . . . all I meant was . . . you don’t look very happy.”

“It’s Louise!” she blurts out. “Oh, Hallie. She came home late one night last week and I
know
she was intoxicated. I didn’t dare tell your father.”

“Mom, even Eric came home drunk a few times while he was in high school. It’s not the end of the world.”

“It’s
more
than just that, Hallie. Louise made the varsity cheerleading squad and when sophomore year started they traveled all the time for games. She came home late on school nights and was gone most weekends and I didn’t notice anything wrong at first. But then her grades dropped and she started running around with a bad crowd, going off to parties at the University of Akron every Saturday night.” Mom starts to sniffle again.

“Mom, most fifteen-year-olds go through that whole rebellious thing.”

“But Hallie, she hardly says a word to any of us. And when I ask about her friends or where she’s going and what she’s doing she gets
so
angry, as if it’s none of my business.”

“Okay, but I’m not exactly sure what
I’m
supposed to do about it.”

“You can
talk
to her. Eric tried during spring vacation but she wouldn’t listen to him.”

“I don’t know anything about cheerleading or traveling on buses to football games.”

“No, but you went
through a phase
and now you’re fine.” She looks up to the shelf with the Greek vases featuring naked people in strange positions, and obviously these make her think twice. “I mean, you managed to graduate and you’re in college now. You never got into drugs or alcohol. And those girlfriends, Gwen and Jane, they were always polite when they called or came over to the house. But Louise’s friends honk their horns in the driveway until she comes out or else they phone and don’t even say
hello,
or
please
when they ask to speak with her. And the
outfits
they wear, if you can even call them that! I mean, where
are
their mothers? Can’t the families afford full-length mirrors?”

It appears that Mom is going to start sobbing again just at the thought of young ladies not saying please and hello. Let’s not even consider wearing inappropriate clothing.

“Okay, okay. I’ll talk to her,” I give in.

“Oh, thank you!” Mom gives me her brightest smile, the one normally reserved for toilet training. “Your father grounded Louise for staying out until five o’clock in the morning this past Saturday and so she’s home right now.”

I think back to when I was grounded, more or less for life, and ended up running away. Dad really needs to add some new stuff to his punishment repertoire. Although in order to take away our allowance I guess he’d first have to start
giving
us one. Dad has this old-fashioned notion that working around the house is your contribution to the family and we should all just be thankful we’re not doing chores on a farm like when he was a boy.

“Louise, of all people, is probably going to have to attend summer school,” moans my mother, as if this is like hanging a big scarlet letter S on the front door. “Why, in middle school she practically had straight A’s.” Mom may have a lot of kids, but she can always give you a grade-point average.

“So do you want to ride home with me or take your car?” she asks.

“Oh gosh, Mom. I’ve been up for, like, two days.” I rub my eyes with weariness. “Forget about driving, I don’t think I can even stand. How about tomorrow?”

“But Hallie, she won’t even
speak
to us. What if something terrible happens?”

I assume that “something terrible” is a reference to running away. Or perhaps tackling the rubbing alcohol in the bathroom medicine chest.

The tears begin to flow again and there’s no chance of winning an argument with a pregnant woman. “I’ll take my own car,” I say, and drag myself off the nice comfortable daybed while realizing she didn’t once ask me how
I
am. Come to think of it, nobody has. The downside of not being constantly followed around by the police seems to be that people assume you no longer have any problems of your own, and are therefore ready and willing to tackle all of theirs.

Chapter Nine

MY OLD HOUSE HASN’T CHANGED EXCEPT FOR THE EIGHT OR TEN square feet that it appears to shrink every year as all the kids inside grow bigger and bigger. There’s a Playskool lawn mower in the middle of the living room where someone has obviously been giving the stained carpet a good cutting. Though what it appears to need more is vacuuming, especially where the Oreo cookies have been crushed into it. My mom is actually a conscientious housekeeper, but how can one human being keep up with a baby, a toddler, three kids between eight and twelve, and one angry teenager? I move a sippy cup that sits precariously on the edge of an end table while the unmistakable yelling of the twins suddenly rises from the play area in the basement and fills the air like a factory whistle.

Louise is upstairs in our old bedroom, which she now shares with eight-year-old Darlene. The last time I was sentenced to spend a night in here I ended up climbing out the window once and for all. Plastered across the walls are posters of scantily clad teen rock stars, male and female, and beer ads. Dad, who won’t even let his daughters wear belly shirts, must
love
this.

“Hey, Hallie.” Louise comes over and we give each other a sisterly hug. Darlene is still downstairs fighting with her twin brother, Davy, and so I fall onto my old bed, which is now covered with a Barbie comforter weighted down by ten tons of stuffed animals.

I nod toward a poster of a well-oiled hunk leaning against a surfboard. “You’ve redecorated.”

“You are
so
lucky to be
out of here
!” She throws an evil look in the direction of Mom and Dad’s room that I assume is meant for them.

So much for hello and how are you, the point in the conversation where I get to respond that I’m basically living my dream— going into monumental debt and unable to keep a boyfriend for more than two weeks. Make that two days, more often than not.

“Why’s that?” I try to sound casual. “Are you the next one to slide down the drainpipe?” That’s how I made my getaway. But then, I wasn’t wearing the shoes Louise has on—black designer sandals with skinny three-inch heels.

“I wish!” says Louise, and gives a combination sigh and eye roll that only fifteen-year-olds have the lung capacity and muscle elasticity to perform. “You always had money, or were able to make some easily enough.”

Yeah,
I think,
the good old bad old days back when I was flush.

It feels as if I haven’t seen Louise for five years rather than only five months. She’s transformed from an angular girl to a young woman with soft curves and a strikingly beautiful face, deep-set hazel eyes, and perfect bone structure. Her golden chestnut-colored hair falls into soft curls around her face. Only, what happened to the cute cheerleader with the pigtails and pink lip gloss? Now she’s wearing Visigoth makeup—thick black eyeliner, maroon mascara, and reddish-brown lipstick. With her scoop-neck black jersey, push-up bra, and the silky strap of a thong peeking above skintight low-rise jeans, she looks closer to twenty. A stunning and slutty twenty. About one trip to the mall away from “Excuse me while I powder my nose ring.”

Louise has always been the great beauty in the family, ever since she was a baby. When we were little Mom was twice approached to have Louise model children’s clothing for catalogues and be in TV commercials. People tried not to come right out and say how extraordinarily pretty she was when I was around, or if they accidentally did, they’d immediately try to follow up with some compliment for me, too, such as, “And you have such nice . . . you’re so good in math.” Math gene, beauty queen. Not a hard choice. Except you don’t get a choice.

No, there’s nothing in fashion magazines about apricot, which is what I am, from tip to toe. My hair is sometimes described as “strawberry blond,” but you can tell it’s more of a question than an expression of admiration. Beauty is about the dramatic splendor of nature—having yellow sun-drenched locks or a cascade of hair as dark as night, rose red lips, and blue eyes the color of forget-me-nots or deep green like the ocean. It is
not
about nature’s fruit. Not strawberries, and especially not apricots. Or freckles the color of Granny Smith apples.

“Hey!” Louise’s eyes widen so much that I can actually detect patches of white through all the eyeliner and mascara. “Maybe you can teach
me
how to play poker. All I get is a few bucks for baby-sitting and Dad even begrudges me that. He says that I should do it for free because they’re my own brothers and sisters. As if!”

“Actually, I have a few things you can add to your list of grievances. Mom doesn’t like your friends, she’s worried about your grades, says you have to attend summer school, and that you came home drunk.”

“That’s
such
bullshit!”

“And she’s sent me on a mission to turn you back into the sweet little girl she gave birth to,” I add.

Louise flashes me a hostile look that basically demands to know,
Whose side are you on?
“It’s all because that attendance asshole Dick Collier called Mom and Dad after he caught me hanging out with some friends in the parking lot during gym class.”

“I have to agree with you that this is one case where Dick isn’t just a nickname,” I admit wholeheartedly. “But it doesn’t sound as if that’s
everything.
”

“My friends just happen to be cool, that’s all. They’re older and they have cars. And that way we can get out of this hick town.”

Yes, it’s obvious Louise isn’t going to be bicycling anywhere in
that
outfit.

“Well, Louise, I think Mom has a point about college guys. It’s a slightly different scene.”

“Oh, fuck you! Just because you graduated early and go to
college
you think you’re some big shot and want to give me all kinds of older sister crap.
Puh-leeze,
Hallie, I remember when you were the local juvenile delinquent being accused of robbery, truancy, underage gambling, and God knows what else! Not to mention those lunatics you live with, including the high school geek.”

I deduce from her remark that despite Brandt’s starting to look and sound normal, a perceived behavioral and social gap still remains between him and most of the adolescent world.

From the way Louise turns away from me in a huff it’s obvious that she’d like to storm out of the room in order to finish making her point. But since she’s grounded and not allowed to leave the house, exiting will only lead her directly into the grubby hands of the little kids and possible assignments of table setting or laundry folding. So she turns to her computer and pretends that I don’t exist.

That talk went really well,
I think.
Maybe I should be studying international diplomacy rather than graphic arts.
I flop down on my old bed, pull Darlene’s stuffed Tigger to my chest, and fall into a deep sleep. In my dream Tigger becomes the perfect boyfriend—devoted, considerate, and incapable of sending mixed messages, giving ultimatums, or playing mind games.