Three Little Words

by Ashley Rhodes-Courter

  “Phil, remember how it had a clever poem and picture on the cover that was signed by someone named Ashley?”

  “And you thought it might be the Ashley whose photo was inside,” he continued.

  “Were there two couples and two houses in the drawing?”

  I asked.

  “Yes!” Gay said. She turned to Phil. “I told you it was our Ashley!”

  “Gay fell in love with you then,” Phil said, “but she’s a sucker for sappy poems.”

  So I had won the contest! And the Courters had seen it! What if Mr. Irvin hadn’t talked me into going to the photo shoot that day? Maybe my luck really was turning and this would be my best birthday ever.

  All the kids from Lykes, as well as some of my friends from other cottages, met us at a buffet restaurant. Gay had ordered a cake decorated in the autumn colors I had decided were my favorites. I showed off my twin doll and received a giant card signed by all the cottage residents. Next, it was off to Busch Gardens with Daphne’s family and the Paines—the people who first had told the Courters about me.

  “Did you know that Dave Thomas was adopted?” Phil asked me. “That’s why he wants every child to find a home.”

  At the pavilion Mr. Thomas was about to receive a donation for the foundation in the form of a giant cardboard check. As a photographer positioned everyone for the best angle, the foundation’s director pushed me forward. “Go stand next to Dave. You are what this is all about,” she said.

  I hesitated, but Dave Thomas waved me forward. “It’s going to be all right,” he said as they snapped the pictures. “You’ll see.”

  The next week was Thanksgiving, and my new brothers were coming home for the first time since I had moved in. My room had once been Blake’s. Phil set up a folding cot for him in Josh’s room.

  “Will he be okay with that?” I asked.

  “The boys often shared a room, even when they had their own,” Phil said. “Besides, he went to prep school at Groton almost ten years ago and really hasn’t lived here since.”

  I hovered in the background as my brothers carried their suitcases down the hall. Josh tossed his stuff in his room on the left. Blake headed for mine on the right and then stopped short. “Hey, where am I sleeping?” he asked.

  “There’s a bed in here for you,” Josh called.

  Blake glanced into his old room and saw my stuffed animals littering the bed. “I guess I don’t live here anymore.” He shuffled into Josh’s room and closed the door.

  A few minutes later Phil knocked on their door. “Hey, guys, we have a new mat for the trampoline.” Josh came out. “Why don’t you show Ashley some of your tricks?” Soon Josh and I were jumping together, but Blake remained in the house.

  Ever since the first night I had slept at the Courters’, they had expected me to help in the kitchen. I never had to do dishes at The Children’s Home and resented being treated like a servant. When I did not scrub all the crud off a pot, Gay would say “Reject” and hand it back. The more I tried to rush, the more rejects I received. “If you would do it right the first time, it would be easier.”

  Gay created piles of filthy pots as she cooked the holiday meal. Without anyone asking, Blake or Josh would saunter in, wash a stack, and then go back to playing bluegrass music or working in the shop. I stayed as far from the mess—and the revolting food—as possible. They used a homemade gadget for scraping corn off the cob and added globs of butter, cream, and salt. Everyone raved about this Pennsylvania Dutch specialty, but I thought it tasted gross. One particularly disgusting conglomeration—oyster dressing—looked like baked barf. For me, Gay put out slices of cheddar cheese and added some Wonder bread to the breadbasket.

  Blake held up a piece of the bread and asked his mother, “Why are you babying her?”

  The meal began with everyone saying what they were thankful for, and predictably, everyone said they were thankful that I had joined the family. Then it was my turn. “I’m grateful for everything everyone else said,” I offered grudgingly. I did not want to sound like a perky Annie thanking them for rescuing me from the orphanage.

  “Here’s the moistest piece of white meat.” Phil slipped it on my plate.

  “It’s better with gravy,” Cousin Esther insisted. I pulled my plate away before she could douse it, but the ladle dribbled some on the lace tablecloth.

  “Try the wild rice,” Josh cajoled. “It’s nutty.”

  “Leave her be,” Grampy Weisman said. “She doesn’t look like she’s starving.”

  Although Gay did not comment, her silence was almost worse than her nagging.

  As soon as I could, I ducked into my room. Blake knocked on my door. “I have one question, Ashley,” he barked. I opened it slightly. “Are you a guest or a family member?”

  Josh came around the corner. “Hey, Blake, take it easy.” He gave me a crooked grin. “Listen, Ash, we want a sister, but it’s new for us, too.”

  “Yeah, sis.” Blake snapped me with a dishtowel. “Do you want to wash or dry?”

  By early December, I was more comfortable with the Courters’ routine. One afternoon I rushed into the house, plopped my backpack in the hallway, and pitched my sweater in the middle of the living room floor.

  “Ashley, your backpack and sweater …”

  I rolled my eyes, retrieved my backpack, and then went to my room, closing my door with a purposeful thud. The phone rang, so I had to come out and walk by Gay to get it in the kitchen.

  When I hung up, Gay pointed to the sweater, which lay between us like a thrown gauntlet. “Ashley …” She exhaled. “What’s the deal with the sweater?”

  “What’ll happen if I leave it there?”

  She wrinkled her brow as she considered the question. “I would prefer your cooperation, but I’ll pick up your stuff for fifty cents. I’ll give you one warning, then if it isn’t put away in a half hour, I’ll deduct the money from your allowance.”

  I calculated quickly. “Not worth it,” I mumbled, and removed my sweater.

  The phone rang again. It was my new friend, Brooke. She had just moved to our neighborhood from another city. Her gossip was more amusing than a sweater war with Gay. I took the portable phone in the other room and complained about Gay.

  “I have ways of getting back at my mom when she annoys me.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “Just do something that will piss her off but that she can’t pin on you.” She gave me a cunning laugh. “I drop my mom’s ironed shirts on the floor and make it look like they fell off the hanger.”

  I found a lizard that the cats had partially eaten. I plopped it into the toe of one of Gay’s favorite shoes. I never heard what happened when she found it, but she probably thought one of the cats put it there. One of my dumber tricks was to pee in her favorite rosebush, which was planted in a pot on the patio outside my bedroom door. Another time I slicked the rim of Gay’s travel mug with dish soap. I did not hear any complaints and wondered whether she had guessed what I had done. Maybe she was making a misconduct list so she could justify sending me back.

  I hid out in my room as much as possible, although Gay often tried to get me out, if only to do chores. I was on the portable phone with Tess when Gay knocked on the door. When I did not reply, she cracked it open and said, “Dinner will be in about an hour. Sometime before that, would you please empty the dishwasher and set the table?”

  I turned my back and thought she had gone. “Gay’s such a demanding bitch!”

  Gay was still standing in the doorway. She struggled to compose her face. “Do you want broccoli or cauliflower?”

  “Cauliflower, I guess.” She closed the door with a hard clunk.

  When I came out at the last possible minute, Gay had begun to place the napkins herself. “You know I heard what you said on the phone.” I crossed my arms and waited for a lecture. “Ash, I am not the mother who abandoned you.” Her voice took on a tone I had never heard before. It was deeper and it commanded that I listen. “I am
not Mrs. Moss. I am not the ten others who sent you away for one reason or another.” I tried to block her voice by humming inside my head, but her words penetrated anyway. “I am the mother who will be here for the rest of my life.” She started tossing lettuce aggressively. “You can blame me for anything that is my fault, but you can’t hate me for what the others did to you.”

  Phil came into the room whistling. “What smells so good, girls?” he asked. He saw us scowling at each other. “I can see this is going to be another pleasant family meal,” he said facetiously. “What’s going on?”

  “Gay’s always on my case!” I yelled.

  Phil backed away from both of us. “I’m going to sit in the car until you work it out.”

  “What about your dinner?” Gay called.

  “It’s already ruined,” he said, and left the house.

  I was not sure whether I had won or lost.

  Christmas made me nervous for a lot of reasons. In foster homes, holidays always had a way of making me feel like an outsider—and now the stakes were higher. I wondered if Blake would still be upset that I was sleeping in his bed and if the food would be even weirder than at Thanksgiving. The gifts that had been donated to The Children’s Home were lavish and expensive, and we had been warned not to expect as much after we were adopted. The Courters hadn’t asked me to make a list, and I had no idea what they might give me—or what I was supposed to give them. They carried on with all their holiday traditions, and I didn’t know how to join in.

  “Come help,” Phil coaxed as they decorated the Christmas tree that touched the ceiling in their two-story living room.

  I was snuggled under an afghan on the sofa. “I hate decorating trees.”

  “What did you do at the cottage?” Blake asked.

  I tucked the afghan tighter under me. “We stood in line, were given one ornament, placed it on a branch, and then had to go back to the end to wait our next turn.”

  “That doesn’t sound like much fun,” Blake agreed. “Here it’s a free-for-all.”

  Josh was standing on a ladder, but he could not reach the tip of the tree. “I have an idea.” He brought in an extension ladder. “Ash, we need you to place the angel.”

  “But the ladder isn’t leaning against anything!” Gay warned.

  “We’ll steady her,” Josh replied. “Blake, you should have seen her on the climbing wall at Hampshire. She’s a natural.”

  I jumped off the sofa, gave Gay a dare-me stare, and zipped up to the top without looking down. As I reached for the angel, the fifteen-foot ladder swayed a bit, but I slipped the decoration into place.

  “Hang in there!” Blake called. Josh handed up more ornaments with an extended pincer tool, and I snagged them on the branches.

  “Isn’t she cool?” Josh said admiringly. I scampered down and took a bow.

  Gay’s family also celebrated Hanukkah. On December 23 we lit the first candle and I received my first Harry Potter book.

  Luke had moved in with the Hudsons by now, and our families got together on Christmas Eve. Every few minutes he would call, “Mom, look at this!” or “Dad, watch me!” I was relieved he would not have another holiday at The Children’s Home.

  On Christmas morning there was a mountain of gifts under the tree. Josh, in a Santa hat, made piles for each person. “Youngest first,” he insisted.

  I opened a package. It was a nightgown. I tossed it behind me on the floor and opened the next. It contained two CDs. I started for the third.

  “Who’s that from?” Gay asked.

  “I dunno,” I replied.

  Phil retrieved a tag from the trash that had accumulated at my feet. “This card is from Grandma Courter. Which was her gift?”

  “Maybe the nightgown?” Gay suggested. “No, wait, Aunt Robin sent her that.” Her voice was exasperated. “Let’s mark down what you have received so far.”

  “Why do you have to ruin everything?” I screeched.

  Phil sat on the footrest in front of me. “When you were in foster care, you received presents from donors, so it didn’t matter who they were from. But now someone who cares about you selected each one of these gifts. All we want to know is which present came from which person so they can be acknowledged.” His voice was warm yet firm. “That’s how we do it in this family.”

  “My turn,” Josh said to get me off the hook.

  The big family gift was a hot tub. “Let’s have a girls-only hot tub,” Gay suggested when the boys were out with their friends.

  We each found comfortable positions. Gay leaned back and closed her eyes.

  “You will always love Josh and Blake more than me, won’t you?” I blurted.

  It was too dark to see the expression on Gay’s face. “Yes,” she said in a throaty voice, “that’s if length of time equals amount of love. On that basis, I have been with Phil the longest, so I love him the most. Even though I have only known you a few months, I know love is growing in my heart, because—” She waited a long beat. “Well, I almost had a heart attack when you were on that ladder!” She turned off the hot tub jets to make certain I was hearing her. “You are our chosen child, our only daughter. We missed so much of your life, and we cannot erase some of the tragedies.” Gay started to climb out of the hot tub. She turned and smiled. “All we can do is help you be the person you want to be from now on.”

  I had never been able to stay up until midnight, but the Courters allowed me to ring in the New Year. Phil poured champagne for the adults while my friends and I drank fizzy grape juice.

  At one o’clock Gay turned to my friends and me. “Girls, time for bed.” Blake’s and Josh’s friends were going to continue their party on the patio. A few hours later voices in the living room awakened Gay. She peered over the balcony and saw Tess and me sitting in the living room with my brothers and their friends.

  Later that day I overheard Gay scolding her sons. “It was inappropriate for those sixth-grade girls to be prancing around in their nighties around your friends.”

  Josh tried to calm her down. “The girls just wanted to hang out.”

  “Did I get you in trouble?” I asked him when Gay went to stew in her study.

  “Let’s go for a walk,” Josh suggested.

  It was windy out, and I hadn’t taken a sweater. Blake joined us. When he saw me shivering, he laughed. “Florida girl.” Halfway down the street Blake said, “Even though we’re a lot older than you, we’re not your parents.”

  Josh added, “But we do want to be your brothers.”

  “In other words, we are always going to support you, not the ’rents,” Blake continued.

  “If Mom hadn’t seen you last night, we never would have said anything,” Josh added.

  “But now she knows,” I said. I was trembling from the cold, as well as from anxiety.

  Josh put his arm around me. “Oh, don’t mind her. She’s like a match. If she rubs up against something, she flares up for a second, but then she fizzles out very quickly.”

  “And Phil?”

  “He’s harder to pin down. He’ll let something eat away at him without mentioning it, but if you really disappoint him …” Josh let the words linger.

  “The point is, they are the best parents ever,” Blake said. “They have always been there for us and they will always be there for you. And so will we.”

  11.

  what do i have to do?

  In the back of my mind I kept wondering what I would have to do wrong for the Courters to send me back. Refusing to eat something or having a messy room was not going to annoy them enough. I had found all sorts of ways to incite a quarrel between Phil and Gay, which gave me a perverse satisfaction—until Phil lost his usual cool and stormed out to his workshop. I never wanted to hurt his feelings; but I did love to see Gay crumble.

  “Want to go to the mall?” Gay asked on a Saturday morning.

  “Not particularly.” I was painting my stubby nails.

  “Are you sure? There are some great clothing sales
.”

  After lunch Phil wondered if I wanted to go to the mall with him. “Sure,” I said.

  Gay blew up. “I was going to buy her clothes!”

  Phil put his hands up in surrender. “I’m just getting a battery at Sears.”

  Gay fumed for a while, but the next morning she was cheerful. “Every day is a new day,” she said. Then her voice darkened. “But Phil is different. He’s very slow to anger, but it takes him a long time to forgive and forget. He’ll go the extra ten miles, but if you break faith with him …” Her words trailed off ominously.

  Over at the Hudsons’, Luke was testing limits more and more. I overheard Gay trying to calm down Georgia over the phone: “They love to wave the red flag in the bullring. But you don’t have to react.” Gay nodded sympathetically. “I know, I know. I lose it too!”

  After Luke was cruel to their dog, the Hudsons admitted that he may have not been ready to live with them, and he returned to The Children’s Home.

  I was furious—not at the Hudsons, who had been so patient and loving, but at Luke, who had blown his big chance.

  He was not the only reject. Daphne’s sister was sent back for intensive therapy. Will bounced into and out of a family, and Sabrina’s adoption disrupted. We were the boomerang kids. No matter how far we were thrown, we ended up back at our place of origin. I was determined to enjoy my freedom while it lasted.

  The Courters traveled for their film business and usually took me along, pulling me out of school for a few days. In January of my sixth-grade year, Josh joined us as a second cameraman at a judges’ conference in Santa Barbara, California. After a long day of shooting, Phil and Gay went to a meeting while Josh and I rented recumbent bikes on the beach. Alone with Josh, I felt a genuine acceptance that I had not yet sensed with his parents. With the wind in my hair and the surf pounding in my ears, I thought: This is about as far away from foster care as lean get. But I still warned myself not to let down my guard.

  A few weeks later we were off to film again in Washington, D.C. I tagged along while Phil and Gay interviewed some members of Congress. A group of staffers invited me to explain the problems faced by foster children. They were shocked by how often I had changed schools.