Julia's Daughters (21 page)

“What do you mean?” Her voice is normal again.

“I'm beginning to worry. She seems to be dealing with Caitlin's death okay, but two months is a long time to go without talking to you.” I raise my hand and rest my arm across my forehead. “I wonder if it was a mistake not to take her to counseling after Caitlin died.”

“She'll talk to me when she's ready.”

I hesitate, not sure if I should say what I'm thinking, but I plunge ahead. “Have you told her how sorry you are?”

“What do you mean?”

“I—” I seriously consider backtracking. But I'm this far into it now and Haley's a smart cookie. There's no way she doesn't know where this is going. “Have you told her you're sorry about what happened?”

“How could I not be sorry? I think about it every day, every hour, every minute. I think about all the ways I could have changed what happened. If I'd just driven home a different way. If I'd stopped for a Gatorade. If I'd—”

Her voice catches in her throat and I reach across the bed and find her hand with mine. She's squeezing the ball, so I just close my hand over her fist. “It's just a thought,” I say.

And then we drift off to sleep.

Chapter 34

Izzy

 

When I wake up, Mom's not in bed with me. I figure she's in the bathroom, but when I push Mr. Cat off me and roll over, I see her in bed with She Who Shall Not Be Named. When I see her over there instead of here, I'm a little bit jealous. It's been really fun sleeping together, having her here in bed with me so I can just roll over and touch her, if I want. I guess it's only fair that the other one should have a turn too. But hasn't she had a lot more turns than me already? Since she's almost eighteen?

Most people think that the youngest kid in the family is the spoiled one. People talk about how parents give the youngest one whatever they want, how they fawn over them and stuff. Not been my experience. Maybe I was the favorite when I was little. I don't remember when I was a baby. But once She Who Shall Not Be Named went to high school? Everything changed. That's when I became invisible to Mom.

Three years, eight months ago.

I know. I was six; I was in the first grade. How could I remember that? I have a really good memory. Especially about this.

I remember it clearly. The oldest one went to high school and all of a sudden Mom was crazy busy with stuff going on in She Who Shall Not Be Named's life: parents' council, homecoming float chairman, dance chaperone, you name it. And Caitlin was really getting into cheer by then, so Mom was busy on weekends with her, hauling her all over the state to competitions, doing her hair, helping make cheer outfits with other moms.

It's not like suddenly everyone was mean to me, but when my sisters hit high school and became super important, I just kind of faded into the background. Dad started disappearing around the same time. I mean, he was still here, but . . . he didn't seem as interested in me as he'd once been. I guess if I'm really fair, if I'm
objective
(I spelled it wrong on the last quiz. No
k
before the
t
), Dad didn't just start forgetting about me. He started to forget about all of us. I guess he just got tired of us.

Mr. Cat climbs back on top of me and starts to purr. What is it with him wanting to sit on my chest all the time? When I grow boobs, which should be any day now, where does he think he's going to sit?

I scratch his head and glance at Mom and She Who Shall Not Be Named. Something's going on with them. Or something
went
on. The night before last. In the drugstore, of all places. She Who Shall Not Be Named went in and didn't come out. Then Mom went in. Then they both came out looking like they'd been crying. I asked Mom yesterday what happened, but she just shook her head and told me that if I wanted to listen to the radio for a little while, I could. Mostly we haven't been able to listen to it since we left home because we're supposed to be
working through things
. Or at least the one cutting herself with sharp objects for fun is.

I hear movement from the other bed and I look over to see Mom opening her eyes. She smiles when she sees me and it makes me feel so good, the way she looks at me, that it almost makes up for her sleeping with the crazy girl instead of me.

“Morning.” Her voice is soft and floaty.

She looks pretty this morning. And not sad. I've noticed the last couple of mornings that when she wakes up, she doesn't look as sad as she does later in the day. It's like, as the hours pass, the more dead Caitlin is. Which kind of makes sense because when I first wake up in the morning, I sometimes forget that she's pushing up daisies.

“Sleep okay?” Mom asks me, still only half awake.

I nod.

“Good.” She stretches and then pushes her hair back and turns her head to look at me. “Why don't you hop in the shower before Haley gets up?”

I groan really dramatically. I don't like it that Mom thinks I need to be told to take a shower. I'm old enough to know if I need a shower. My hair's hardly even dirty. And when I wash it, it gets all frizzy. And the only thing worse than red hair is
frizzy
red hair.

“Go on,” she says.

And because I can't just flat out say no the way Haley does, I get up to head for the bathroom.

“Put him in his kennel,” she tells me, meaning Mr. Cat.

“He's fine. He's too old to run away.”

A few minutes later, I'm in the shower, scrubbing my pits with a little bar of soap I got from a basket on the sink, when the bathroom door opens. The glass is pretty fogged up, but I can see that it's She Who Shall Not Be Named. She's wearing her stupid black T-shirt and my Little Mermaid pants.

I almost yell,
Do you mind?
but I catch myself. I'm not talking to her. Not ever again. She wasted my sister. In Caitlin's memory, it's the least I can do.

I turn around so if she
can
see through the steamed-up glass of the shower stall, she'll see my bare butt and get the hint.

I hear the toilet lid go up. I can't believe she's got the nerve to pee while I'm taking a shower.

“Mom says to move along. She wants to get on the road.”

I hear her peeing, which is totally gross.

“You hear me, pipsqueak?” She flushes.

But she doesn't leave the bathroom and finally I can't stand it and I turn around. The warm water hits my back.
What?
I want to holler at her.
What do you want?
But I just look at her through the steamy glass, one hand covering my nipples and the other my lady parts. I know she used to change my diaper and stuff, but I have a right to privacy, now that I'm almost a teenager. Don't I?

“Izzy.” She's still standing there, her hands at her sides. She's staring at the floor. “Izzy, I just wanted to tell you . . .” She stops.

I look at her through the steam that makes her seem all blurry. She sounds like she's going to cry and a lump comes up in my throat.

“Never mind,” she says. “It doesn't matter.”

And then she leaves.

Then Mom comes in. And pees.

“Is this a train station?” I holler from inside the shower.

“The phrase is,
Is this Grand Central?
” She flushes. “I'm going to run downstairs and get coffee and talk to someone at the front desk.” I hear her messing around at the sink. Then water comes on. “I don't think they gave me my discount.” Her words are garbled. She's brushing her teeth. “Move along. I put the cat litter box in a bag in the trash. We'll open a new one in the car. Bring Mr. Cat down when you come. I'm not going to come back up. I want to get on the road.” She shuts off the water.

I don't say anything.

“You hear me, Izzy?”

“I hear you. I left my clothes on the end of the bed. Can you bring them in here?”

“Sure.”

I hear her leave and then come back. “Out of the shower, Izzy. For a girl who doesn't like to shower, you sure like the shower.”

She closes the door and finally I'm alone. Next time I take a shower, I'm definitely locking the door.

I get out and wrap my hair up in one towel and I wrap the other one around my body. I take a washcloth and wipe at the steamy mirror. I look different with my hair up in the towel. Older. And a little bit like Caitlin. It makes me smile.

“See you downstairs,” I hear Mom call from the other side of the door. Then I hear the door to the hall close. Great, now I'm stuck here with She Who Shall Not Be Named, who will probably talk to me like she thinks I'm going to talk back.

I dry off and put on my clothes, which is kind of hard to do because the room is so steamy that I can't get completely dry. But there's no way I'm dressing out in the room with
her
.

I dry my hair a little bit with the hair dryer attached to the wall and then I brush my teeth, grab my nightclothes, and go into the room. She Who Shall Not Be Named is sitting on her bed, watching the news. She's dressed; her backpack is sitting next to her on the bed. I turn my back to her and stick my stuff in my bag. I get the little kennel we bought for Mr. Cat and I put it on the bed and then I get him and put him in it. He hates getting in it and I don't blame him. I wouldn't want to go in a cage either.

“It's cold in Maine still,” She Who Shall Not Be Named says. “It went down to thirty-five last night. We're going to freeze our butts off.”

I close the door on the kennel kind of hard and it startles Mr. Cat and he jumps inside. Without saying anything, I grab the kennel and my bag and go to the door. There's no way I'm staying here alone with her if I don't have to. The hotel room door closes behind me before I hear her holler, “I guess that means you're ready to go.”

I hear the elevator ding which means it's going to open and I run for it. I don't want to ride in the elevator with She Who Shall Not Be Named. By the time I get there, people have stepped off and the door is starting to close, but I make it just in time. As I turn to face the doors, they close and I smile.

Guess she can catch the next one.

I see Mom standing at the front desk in the lobby, but I keep walking. No cats allowed in the hotel. I don't want to get caught and have Mom get in trouble. There's no way they're giving her the discount if they know Mr. Cat stayed last night.

It's not until I get to the car in the parking lot that I realize what a dunce I am. I don't have the key to the car. I put my bag and then the kennel down on the pavement. I see a piece of paper stuck under the wiper on the windshield so I walk around to get it. An advertisement for two pizzas for ten dollars.

A car goes by me in the parking lot and I check out the people inside; there's a mom and a dad and a little boy and an old grandpa. I never had a grandpa. Dad's and Mom's dads are dead. Mom didn't know the first one. Her stepdad died before I was born, which I guess isn't a big deal since apparently no one liked him, not even my grandmother.

I walk around to the back of the car again. Still no Mom, but I see She Who Shall Not Be Named coming out the front door. I wonder if she has the key.

Another car goes by. Just a man in a suit. No kids. No grandpa.

I glance down at Mr. Cat's kennel.

I'm so shocked that the paper drifts out of my hand.

The door to the kennel is open and Mr. Cat is gone.

I feel like I can't breathe and my eyes fill up with tears.

I look around and I don't see him. Then I see something dart out from under a car and cut across the space between this row and the next row of cars. It's something furry. A tabby cat!

Before I can think, I turn toward the hotel and scream, “Haley!”

Chapter 35

Haley

 

I hear Izzy scream and my head snaps in the direction of her voice. She's standing at the car hollering for me and I get this weird chill that scares the shit out of me. I drop my backpack on the sidewalk and run toward her, darting in front of a car. The car toots its horn; I ignore it and keep running.

“Izzy!” I don't know what's wrong. She's standing there so she can't be hurt. “Izzy?” Is it Mom? It can't be Mom. I just saw her in the lobby.

“Haley! Help me! Mr. Cat got away!” Izzy shrieks, shaking her hand.

I cut between two rows of cars in the hotel parking lot. I'm still running toward her. It seems like it's taking forever to get to her. “Do you see him?”

“He got out.” She's blubbering now. I can hardly understand her. “He got out of his kennel! I don't know how it happened. I don't know how the door opened! I put him on the ground and—”

I reach out to her and put out both of my hands to rest them on her shoulders. I look right into her eyes. “Did you see which way he went?” I ask her, calmly, even though my heart is pounding and I'm breathless from running. I was afraid she was hurt. It's just the cat. You can replace a cat. You can't replace a sister.

“I—I don't know. That way!” She points in the direction of the highway that has three lanes running in each direction.

I look, but I don't see him. I just see cars and the busy traffic beyond the parking lot, out on the highway. “You're sure he went that way?”

She rubs at her runny nose with the back of her hand. “I think he went under that white van.” She points. “But I don't know! I don't know. He disappeared.”

I turn to the van she's pointing to. It's in the next row, closer to the street. “Okay. You go that way.” I point. “I'll go this way.”

She takes off.

“Don't run! You might scare him!”

She slows down, but she's still trotting.

I move quickly, cutting between the rows, a couple of cars down from the van she pointed out. I keep dropping down to the pavement and looking under the cars. There are cars moving everywhere in the parking lot. People are checking out of their rooms, heading to their destinations. I wonder what will get Mr. Cat first, a car in the parking lot or one on the highway.

I can't believe Izzy didn't latch the kennel.

I drop to my knees and look in every direction. No cat. No damned cat. I get up and dart between two more cars.

How could she have not latched the door on the kennel? She loves that cat. Oh, God, she'll be devastated if he gets killed in this parking lot. I'm still not running, but I move faster. “Do you see him?” I holler to her. “I don't see him!”

A car goes past me way too fast for a parking lot.

“Slow the hell down,” I yell at the car as it passes me.

“There he is!” Izzy screams. She's jumping up and down. She's one row behind me and eight or so spaces over. “That blue car!”

The parking lot is full of blue cars. I drop to my knees yet again and the loose gravel on the pavement hurts. “Which blue car?” I call to her, coming to my feet again. I see paper cups, I see a hair tie, I even see a sock under a car. But no cat.

Izzy's jumping up and down again. She's wearing jeans that are too short and a King Tut T-shirt; it occurs to me that I should help her dress better. Not that I'm a fashionista, but she could look way cuter than she does.

“That blue one next to the white one!” Izzy hollers.

I follow her line of vision and I see the car she's talking about. I drop flat to the ground in front of a parked car.

And I see Mr. Cat. He's next to the right rear wheel of the blue car.

I jump up and walk as fast as I can without running. And the damned cat shoots out from under the car like he's on fire.

“Kitty! Kitty! Mr. Cat.” Izzy is calling his name and sobbing as she runs around another car, coming at the cat from the opposite direction as me.

The cat stops right in the middle of the lane between two rows of parked cars and I immediately slow down. “Kitty, kitty, kitty,” I say softly. “That's a good boy.”

His tail is twitching. He sees me.

“Good kitty. Good boy,” I croon.

Then he takes off and I run after him, cutting between cars to try to head him off before he gets to the highway.

I lose sight of him.

“Haley!” Izzy screams.

As I come out from between the cars into the next row, I catch movement out of the corner of one eye, while spotting the cat out of the other. Izzy screams. The car is going to hit the cat.

I react before I think. The car is so close to me now that I can feel the heat from the engine.

I bring the palm of my hand down on the hood and the car slams on its brakes. “Slow down! Who drives fifty in a parking lot?” I holler at the driver as I cut right in front of his car.

I've read of Herculean feats in literature and that's what it feels like as I cross the last couple of feet to the cat. I know he's going to take off. I know he's going to run right for the highway and I know he won't make it all the way across. I'll be at the front desk of the hotel asking if they have a shovel so I can extricate Mr. Cat from the pavement in front of the Wendy's across the street.

But somehow I reach him. For some reason he doesn't bolt this time. Not his day to die, I guess.

I scoop him up into my arms and I pull him to my chest and I have no idea why, but all of a sudden I'm crying. I could hardly cry when I splattered my sister all over the road and now I'm crying over a stupid cat. A second later, Izzy is in front of me. She's a sobbing, snotty mess.

She puts her arms out to me and I lower the cat to her. “Hold him tight,” I tell her, wiping my nose with the sleeve of my shirt. “His heart's beating a mile a minute.”

“Mr. Cat, Mr. Cat, I'm so sorry,” Izzy blubbers.

I hear a car tap its horn and I look up to see the car that almost took out Mr. Cat. I look at the driver really evil-like. Then I put my arm around my little sister and I move her out of the middle of the lane so the car can get by.

We walk together back to our car. I have the key in my pocket. Mom was going to the bathroom
one more time
before we hit the road, so she gave it to me when I saw her in the lobby.

I hit the unlock button. “Get in,” I tell Izzy. “I'll get your stuff.”

She's still crying, but not as hard. She gets into the backseat and closes the door and I open the hatch and put her bag and the cat kennel in quickly, afraid that if Mr. Cat has a death wish, he might come over the backseat and I'll be running through traffic again.

“Haley?”

I hear Mom's voice as I close the hatch. I turn around.

“Is this your backpack?” she calls from the sidewalk in front of the hotel. She's holding it up.

“Yeah,” I call back to her.

I wait for her at the car.

“Why did you leave your—”

“I'll tell you in a minute,” I say. I take my backpack and her bag from her.

She looks at me and I feel stupid because I know she can tell I've been crying. I wipe at my face with my sleeve, enjoying the moment when my arm hurts from the friction. “Just get in,” I whisper.

She stands there looking at me for another second and I see that she looks better than she did a couple of days ago. She still needs to dye her hair and she's too skinny, but her face doesn't look so . . . haggard. It actually seems like there's some color in her cheeks. Maybe this trip is doing her some good.

“Are you okay?” she asks quietly.

I open the hatch. “I'm fine. Let's just go.”

Once we're in the car, headed for the interstate, Izzy relates the whole tale of the escaping cat. We go through a doughnut drive-thru place and Mom and Izzy get breakfast sandwiches. My stomach still feels sick from the near
cat
-astrophe, but I order an iced coffee and Mom gets some of the sour cream doughnuts I like. For later.

“Poor Mr. Cat,” Mom says as we pull away.

She's handed me all of the stuff from the order and I pass Izzy her sandwich and juice and I start unwrapping Mom's sandwich for her.

“You're just lucky your sister was there,” she tells Izzy. “I hope you told her thank you.”

There's a deafening silence from the backseat. Izzy even stops balling up the paper from her sandwich.

“Izzy Mae,” Mom says. “Your sister saves your cat's life and you can't even tell her thank you?”

“Mom.” I say it quietly. I don't need Izzy to tell me thank you. I'm just glad I was able to save the cat. I'm glad that for once I could do something right. Something that didn't make people cry. “It's okay.”

Mom glances at me. “It's not okay. She can't keep this up. I won't have it.”

I meet her gaze. “Let it go,” I say. “Just give her some time.”

Mom opens her mouth to say something and then closes it. Thank God.

A few minutes later we're on I-90.

“Ninety-five miles to South Bend, Indiana,” I say, and I sip my iced coffee. “Association game or disassociation?”

I glance into the backseat.

Izzy's still holding the cat in her lap; I can hear him purring.

She meets my gaze and for once she doesn't look away.

Thank you,
she mouths.

I smile at her and for the second time this morning, tears come to my eyes.
You're welcome,
I mouth back.