Season of the Witch (5 page)

I look over at my dad. I wonder if he’s thinking about Katherine.

Another way you know “everything’s fine”? You never, ever hear the name Katherine in our house.

Last year, you heard it a lot. Katherine the savior. Katherine the miracle worker. Katherine, my dad’s graduate assistant, who was such a huge help to my dad and even my mom, because she did things around the house. Not only did she answer the phone so my dad could work, help him with research, and do clerical junk, she picked up dry cleaning, shopped, and kept track of my mom’s schedule too. My mom once said Katherine was like some good fairy who had decided to live in our house and work magic with a wave of her wand.

This was, of course, before we knew that Katherine and my dad were having a … whatever.

No, that’s not fair. I can’t call it a whatever, it was more than that. It went on for almost a year. And I’m not entirely sure? But I think my dad was in love with Katherine. Katherine was definitely in love with him. That I know—because she told me.

It was a Sunday afternoon in June. My mom got this weird impulse to drive to Westchester to see old friends. Like, all of a sudden: We must see David and Pauline! I wanted to stay home. So I said, That’s nice, you kids have a good time.

My dad wanted to stay home too. He pointed out to my mom that it was Sunday and Sunday was his day to play basketball at the Y. But she said, “Skip it.”

Usually when my mom says skip it, my dad skips.

But this time he said, “I don’t like to let people down, Claire.”

“Okay. Then don’t let me down,” said my mom, her voice tight and angry. “Skip it.”

There was this long, ugly silence. Then my dad shrugged. “Okay.”

Even at the time, I wondered why they were getting so weird about one afternoon. But then I remembered the general rule that all parents are insane and forgot about it.

As I said, my dad’s a historian, and every so often he drags me into one of his research projects, I’m guessing to build up my academic bona fides. That week, I was supposed to be looking up some facts about the WPA. Only I decided I deserved the day off.

So I was sitting on the couch, catching up on
True Blood
, when the door buzzer rang. Walking to the door, I thought, Maybe it’s a deranged psycho killer come to murder me.

Peeking through the hole, I saw Katherine.

My parents are dead, I thought instantly. They had an accident. Katherine’s here to tell me they’re dead.

Opening the door, I said, “Hey, what’s up?”

For the record, I liked Katherine. She was like a cool big sister. Usually my dad’s assistants threw me a hey or hello, then ignored me totally. Katherine treated me like a bud, joking with me, asking me where I shopped. It felt good to get compliments from her, because Katherine had it together. She had long brown hair and big gray eyes, and you could tell she ran and swam because she enjoyed it, not just to get a banging bod—although she did happen to have a banging bod. I always wondered if it was the exercise that made her so up and positive. Like if I ran ten miles a day, I’d feel that strong and confident too.

But Katherine wasn’t looking so together. Her eyes were red, her arms folded tightly. She was wearing a nice skirt, but it was wrinkled, and the T-shirt looked like she had pulled it out of the wash bin. Her hair was pulled back with two combs, but it was coming loose. Strands of hair hung limp around her face. Her lips were chapped, as if she’d been chewing on them.

This is bad, I thought. Really bad.

Then she said, “Hi, Tone.” She was straining to keep her voice normal. “Is, uh, your dad here?”

I felt immediate relief. If she was asking about my dad, she was not here to tell me he was dead.

“No. He and my mom went to Westchester.”

“Westchester?” She said it like she had never heard of the place.

“To see friends.” I opened the door wider. “Do you want to come in, by the way?”

She wandered in, still lost in her thoughts. For a few moments, she stared around the apartment, as if making sure my dad wasn’t hiding someplace. She noticed a row of family photos on the side table in the dining room. She picked up a recent shot of my mom and dad, laughing with their arms around each other. Then she set it down, hard.

“What’s in Westchester?” she asked bluntly.

“Friends. My mom wanted to go.” I don’t know why I felt like I had to add that. But I was nervous. I didn’t know this harsh, unfriendly Katherine.

She frowned. Then muttered, “Well, that’s just great. He—”

I said, “What?”

Turning, she said in a loud voice, “I was about to say, he was supposed to see me.”

Puzzled, I said, “He does basketball Sundays.…”

She laughed. A short, ugly bark.
“Basketball—”

Now she was making fun of me. It was clear: Katherine was here to fight.

She laughed again. “Basketball. Jesus Christ.”

Annoyed, I said, “Yeah, basketball. Big round orange ball goes into the net.”

“Yeah,” she said dismissively. “Henry doesn’t play basketball.”

Henry? What happened to Professor Thurman? “Sorry, he does. Only not today because, like I said—”

“He’s in Westchester,” she finished for me.

“Right.”

“But all those other Sundays he was playing basketball,” she said, pleasant-nasty.

One thing I hate? When people want to tell you something, but they don’t just come out and say it, because it’s not a
nice
thing and they’re supposedly
nice
people. So they go
blah blah blah
and expect to get points for being sweet when really they’re kicking your ass.

Wanting to push her into a place where the claws would come out, I said, “Look, Katherine, is there something you’re saying here?”

“What do you
think
I’m saying?” she asked sarcastically.

“Honestly, I have no idea.”

She gave me an exasperated look, like I was the dumbest creature on the planet. “Basketball. I cannot believe that’s what he told you. I mean, of all the lame, stupid lies …”

Then she did a weird double take. As if she’d been sleepwalking and just woken to realize someone—me—was in the room. Her mouth twisted up and her eyes started leaking tears. “Oh, God,” she said in a strangled voice. “Oh, God, I’m sorry.”

Utterly confused, I said, “No, it’s okay.”

She sank into one of the dining room chairs. “You must hate me. Saying these crazy things. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

All of a sudden, I understood. Not the words, but what they meant. That everything was completely different than I thought it was. That Katherine was a different person. My dad was a different person. That they had this whole life, this whole other reality, and I didn’t have the first clue.

In a tiny voice, Katherine whispered, “Just, I love him, and I don’t know what to do.”

That’s when the images started. What the word “love” really
means: Basically, two people naked and getting sweaty as they hump all over each other. And one of them was my fifty-four-year-old dad.

I thought of him. Weak. Desperate. Grateful. My stomach turned over.

I bet he’s really into her, I thought numbly. Look at her. There is no way he chooses us over that.

Everything in me twisted like piano wire, tight and deadly. I started vomiting words like “Get out, I fucking hate you, get out.” When I ran out of words, I just screamed, as if I could blast her out of the apartment. Katherine scrambled up from the couch, pathetic and scared as she blubbered, Yes, yes, absolutely. Her fear made me feel powerful, and I practically chased her to the door, hurling every ugly name I could think of as she flung I’m sorrys back at me like used Kleenex.

Then she was gone. I fell into one of the dining room chairs and thought, Okay. What now?

It doesn’t seem possible that I could have done nothing but wander from room to room all afternoon, buzzing and blank like a broken TV. Maybe I knew that if I did anything more complicated—opened the refrigerator, took a walk in the park—my brain would have to switch itself back on.

At one point, I decided to take a bath. Sliding into the full tub, I looked down at my belly, white and trembling under the water. My thighs enormous, my chest bobbing half above the surface. Every part of me felt swollen and sensitive and disgusting. I clawed at my stomach and inside thighs, trying to rip the soft fat away. Bone. I wanted pure, hard, unfeeling bone.

But in the end, I couldn’t do it. I bunched up my wet hair in
front of my face and cried. I let myself slide under the water; my hair floated up and away. If you rise up, it will choke you, I told myself. Stay down. Stay down.

Of course I didn’t. I’ve never been good at holding my breath.

Katherine, in the meantime, was calling my dad. I’m sure she thought she was doing the right thing; that’s usually what people who screw up your life tell themselves. Later, my mom told me she knew something was wrong when my dad said he had to take a call right in the middle of lunch—and he went outside to take it. She worried it was me. That something had happened. Which it had, but it had happened to her too.

After a while, my dad came back to the table and said with a big smile, “Everything’s fine. False alarm.”

But on the drive home, he told my mom the truth.

I don’t know what happened in that car. When my mom came home, she was alone. I was hiding under the covers.

My mom came straight back to my room and gathered me up.

“Everything’s going to be okay,” she murmured to me. “Everything is going to be just fine.…”

“Henry?”

It’s the second time my mom’s said it. Only now my dad hears her and looks up. “Hand me the pepper?” she asks.

“Certainly.” He reaches, gives it to her.

Though we never talk about her, Katherine is still with us. You can feel her in the air, hear her in the silences. But if we keep talking to each other, fill up the house with sound, there will be no room for her.

“Thank you, darlin’.”

“You’re welcome, sweetie.”

It’s supposed to be a joke, my parents using these fake country accents. So I add, “Aw, shucks, honey.”

My mom smiles. “So, seriously. First day back. Scale of one to ten?”

My dad nods, as if he suddenly remembered. “School. Yes. Tell us.”

This time, I will not be able to say “Nothing.” My mom is asking me to keep things going, to make sure the little drifts of Katherine won’t pull together, take shape, and gain power.

So I think of what happened today at school.

Get ready for hell
.

The girls closing in on me.
Everyone knows
.

I should tell them about that.

Only there’s no way I can. Because here’s what would happen: My mom would demand, Why would these girls do this to you? What is wrong with them? My dad would march to the phone to call Chloe’s family. My mom would rant about bullying, kids who pick on kids for no reason.

And in the end, I’d have to say, Well, uh, not exactly no reason. I kind of messed around with her boyfriend.

After that, I imagine silence. As we all think about that other person, the one who messed with our lives this summer. All that anger and hatred Mom and I have for her. How would my mom feel if she thought I did the same thing as Katherine?

My mom would want to still call the school, still yell at Chloe’s parents. But all along, I bet she’d be feeling it was my fault. While
my dad would think it was his fault. And I’d know, really, the whole damn sorry mess was my fault.

“Fine,” I tell my mom. “It was fine. A definite seven at least.”

That night, I’m lying in bed trying to figure out how I’m going to get through the rest of my life when my phone buzzes.

Text message from Ella.
I suck! Sorry! Meeting took forever! Yogurt on me?

Yep, I think, tossing the phone down. You do suck, Ella. Not always. But sometimes.

Almost as soon as it hits the blanket, the phone buzzes again. I am just so popular.

This message is from Chloe. It also starts with
Sorry!

My heart leaps. It’s over. They got what they wanted, realized they were wrong. Because they’re not heinous people, they’re basically okay.…

I read.

Sorry! We made you a promise. We promised you hell—but we really didn’t give it to you today. Our bad. We’ll make it up to you tomorrow, we promise
.

Sleep tight!

I will kill her, I think. Seriously. I have had it with this crap. Tomorrow, I will …

Will …

The three of them pressing in on me. So thrilled that they could scare me.

I have to not be scared, I tell myself.

My phone buzzes again. Furious, I snatch it up. If it’s Chloe, I am texting her back this time.

But it’s Cassandra. She must have gotten my number from the school directory.

She writes

Sorry. I know you were trying to be nice
.

Of course it doesn’t take a psychic to know that’s what I was trying to do. It’s not like Cassandra read my mind or anything.

So why does it feel like she did?

THE NEXT DAY ON THE way to school, I make a decision. Summer did not happen. Katherine, the parties, Oliver—none of it. And if other people want to see it differently, that’s their problem.

At first, it seems to work. I hit the lockers, go to homeroom, then head to my first class. Nobody crowds me. No one insults me. We’re all just doing our thing.

Good, I think. Maybe it was just the first day. Now everybody’s over it.

In the afternoon, I spot Chloe on my way to science. I stiffen, will myself to keep walking. Chloe sees me, too. For a split second, our eyes meet. Then she turns to the girl she’s with—Elana something—and whispers.

Elana something stares at me.

I take a deep breath, keep moving. So, Chloe’s trashing me to kids I don’t know and don’t care about. I can live with that.

But the next day, in art class, a group of girls suddenly goes
silent when I pass them on my way to the pottery wheel. Behind me, I hear
bzz, bzz
.

It could be not about me.