I followed, not really sure what had happened back there. It felt like one minute I was dressed and the next I was standing outside in my underpants.
All grades rode the same bus and Mr. McPherson’s rules were that the younger you were, the closer you sat to the front. JJ had to sit in the second row with the little kids. Since Caleb hadn’t ridden McPherson’s bus before, I said, “Come on. We’re closer to the back.” I didn’t like being so far from JJ but he was already talking to the boy next to him.
Our stop is the last one so the seats are always pretty full. I slid in next to Lindsay. Lindsay is nice, clean, and her size takes up more than half the bus seat, but she’s not what you’d call fat. She’s not someone anyone seeks out to be friends with but she’s always nice to you when you need a seat or homework assignment. I tried to ignore Caleb but he sat right in front of me so it wasn’t easy. I also tried to ignore what JJ had just said to me. I was the only stable one in our family and I knew it.
Lindsay asked, “How do you like seventh grade? Last year was awesome, being the oldest kids in the building. But there’s a lot to be said about having a whole building full of new people, don’t you think?” I just nodded once in a while so as not to appear rude. I was jolted back to reality when she whispered, “Caleb doesn’t usually get on our bus. Did he move into your neighborhood?”
“Uh, yeah, for a little while,” I mumbled. We pulled up to the elementary school. That’s when I heard it: JJ was tapping on the window. Caleb was doing the same. Tap, tap, tapping on his window. JJ looked at him like he was the best person in the world and I didn’t get it. But I loved seeing the smile that lit up JJ’s face like it was Christmas morning. And it made me wonder, just a little, if maybe Caleb’s storytelling wasn’t so bad.
With a quick wave to me and Caleb, JJ got off the bus. Then it pulled to our stop for me to begin another day at Hickory Junior-Senior High School.
I didn’t see Ellen until lunch. I walked into the cafeteria and she was waiting in our usual spot, the table beneath the “Save Haiti” banner that told how you could donate your old glasses or shoes to the earthquake victims. I slowed down. The earthquake had been January of last year and the deadline for donations had passed but no one had taken the banner down yet. I’d wondered why Caleb was making up stories about Haiti. He saw this banner every day, too. It must have given him ideas.
Then I noticed Ellen’s hand waving like a windshield wiper—left, right, left, right—trying to get my attention. I waved back and hurried next to her.
“Don’t run,” she said, looking around.
“Huh? I didn’t run, I just came over.”
“It’s just that you want to look cool, you know, happy to see me but not like you’re trying to steal third base,” she said, and laughed. I didn’t. I just looked at her.
“Why the big wave if you didn’t want me to hurry over? What’s the big deal?”
“No big deal!” she said in a chirpy voice. “I just didn’t think you saw me.”
Then she bounced on her seat with excitement. “So, did your clothes fit?”
It took me a minute to remember the clothes she’d bought me. “Oh, yeah. Sure,” I lied, because I hadn’t tried them on. I changed the subject. “Hey, here’s a heads-up—there’s a pop quiz in math today.”
“A pop quiz? Oh, darn!” Ellen obsesses over her grades and I knew it would get her mind off the clothes and party.
“It’s not that hard. Not if you’ve studied.” I started to unroll the top of my lunch bag when Ellen pushed her tray away.
“How can I eat, now? Tell me what you remember.” She pulled out a notebook and pen.
So, hungry as I was, I pushed my lunch aside, too. “Let me think.” I tried to remember the exact math problems. When I looked up, though, all thoughts of numbers flew out of my head as Caleb caught my eye from across the room and smiled at me. I could feel my own eyes widen. “Please don’t let him come here, please don’t,” I prayed. I might as well have prayed to a Barbie doll for all God was listening because here came Caleb.
I realized just how bad Caleb would look to Ellen with his awful haircut and glasses sliding down his nose. And here he was, my worst nightmare, coming right toward me with a big smile on his face.
I scowled at him and turned completely sideways so that I faced Ellen, hoping he’d get the hint. “I can’t remember the problems but they weren’t too hard. You’re smarter than I am and I don’t think I missed any. I think you’ll be just fine. Are you going to eat your potato tots?” I was babbling and I knew it, but I so hoped Caleb had gotten the hint and walked away.
Ellen looked up first. Her eyes turned into slits. “What do you want?” she asked him.
Caleb didn’t say anything. I forced myself to look toward him. His smile was gone. He sat a lunch sack on the table, then left.
“Gross!” Ellen said. “What was that about?” She flipped both hands out toward the sack the same way you’d shoo a stinky stray dog. “Get that thing out of here!”
I picked up the sack and carried it to the trash can, peeking at it before I did. There was a peanut butter sandwich, a bag of chips, and a juice bottle. In other words, my lunch. That meant I had Caleb’s. He was just trying to exchange lunches, and instead he’d left without anything to eat.
* * *
Caleb, JJ, and I got off at our bus stop nearly eight hours after we got on. We trudged home, all of us too worn out from school to talk. I took my key out of my bookbag and opened the door.
“Mama?” I called. “We’re home.”
“She probably figured that out when she heard your voice, Ivy,” JJ said. He put his arms straight behind him so that his bookbag slid off his shoulders. He left it where it fell and headed toward the kitchen. Caleb hadn’t looked at me since we got on the bus. I didn’t know what to say to him so I walked to the stairway.
“Mama!” I called.
“She left a note.” JJ carried it along with a stack of cookies and a cup of milk. The note was already milk-stained so I grabbed it before it suffered more damage.
“Dear Kids, Things happened fast. Magdalena and Ed need me today. I’ll be off at six and will bring home dinner. Have a snack and do your homework. Love, Mom.”
“How far away is six?” JJ asked.
“Not long,” I fibbed. Six o’clock seemed forever away, especially if we had to wait that long to eat.
“Come, JJ,” Caleb said. “We’ll do our homework.”
“I’m in kindergarten!” JJ said. “I don’t have homework!”
“Isn’t this your home?” Caleb asked. “Homework is not just about school. It can be about taking care of your home. I’ll do my science and math in your room while you pick up your toys. Then we will both be doing homework.”
“Okay,” JJ said. “Race you!”
“Don’t run with milk!” I yelled, but it was too late. Splashes of white dotted the wooden floor. “That’s great. Just great!” I said. I walked into the kitchen and kicked the trash can. It toppled over, spilling wadded paper towels and coffee grounds across the floor.
I grabbed the can and said, “I hate you, I hate you, I hate you,” with every item of trash I threw back into it. I wasn’t sure who I hated. It felt like I hated the world. When I got the trash picked back up, I grabbed the spray bottle of cleanser and a roll of paper towels from under the sink. I went into the living room to clean up the milk spills but the floor was gleaming. Caleb must have done it.
I squirted the floor, anyway. Because it’s my job to clean up messes. And because I wanted to squirt Caleb away. Squirt-squirt. “I hate you,” I said again, but deep down I knew it wasn’t Caleb I hated. Right then, I hated myself.
7
“I’m hungry, Ivy! Is Mama ever coming home? Can’t we call her or something?” JJ whined. Let me tell you, I was really getting tired of the complaining. Not to mention I was starving, too, since I hate fruit so I’d only had cheese for lunch. Now it was 6:20 and still no Mama.
“I’m too hungry!”
“Then how about another story?” Caleb said. “This one is a sad one. It’s about what it’s like to live on the streets of Haiti and not have food at all.”
“People in Haiti don’t have houses or food?” JJ asked.
“Some don’t. There are people everywhere who don’t have enough food or shelter. Even here.”
JJ’s eyes widened. “Like Daddy showed me! Behind Harmony Street Blues. There were people who were hungry. Daddy gave them money.”
“Yes, like them. Your mama will be home soon with food for us,” Caleb said. “We’re lucky.”
He had a point. We were lucky. There was food in the house, and while I didn’t know how to cook very many things, I could cook a little. I decided to make an executive decision (which is what Mama always called any decision she made without asking Jack Henry or anyone else) and fix us all something to eat.
“We’re not calling Mama, JJ. I’ll cook supper.”
“But she said to wait. Can’t you call her so she can tell us it’s okay?”
I don’t know if it’s all five-year-olds or just JJ, but he was always doing that. Begging me for something and then changing his mind once he got it. And I would have loved to call Mama because I didn’t really have a plan for what to cook and I also couldn’t figure out why she was late. But I didn’t because I knew she needed this job, and if there’s one thing I’d learned from Ellen, it was that she’d better be on fire if she called her mom at work.
“I have another story for you,” Caleb said. “It’s about animals. I’ll tell you after dinner if you’ll draw a pig and a goat for me.”
JJ ran off to find paper and crayons. I went into the kitchen and found six eggs left in the carton. I knew how to scramble eggs. It would get us through until Mama came home. I got out a bowl and whisk.
“Do you need help?” Caleb asked from behind me, and I swear, I jumped a foot off the ground.
“Don’t do that!” I yelled. “Don’t ever sneak up on me.”
“I wanted to help you” was all he said. He didn’t say “I’m sorry.” Or “I didn’t mean to scare you.” His responses were starting to annoy me to death.
But then I remembered that he hadn’t had any food since breakfast. If I was hungry now, he would be starving.
“Well, I’m scrambling us some eggs. Maybe you can look around and see if there’s something that will go with that.”
He walked to the bread box, took out a loaf, and began filling the toaster.
Be nice to him, I willed myself. I saw him use the last of the bread so I said as nicely as I could, “Mama keeps a list on the refrigerator. Would you please write ‘bread’ and ‘eggs’ on it?”
He picked up a pen, the kind that you have to push the button on the top to get to write. Only, instead of using his finger to push the button down, he turned the pen upside down and rammed it onto the top of his head! Then he proceeded to write as if that’s just what a person should do to a pen. I decided the only way I could really be nice to him was by not talking or looking at him. So I didn’t.
Once the eggs and toast were ready, I poured milk into glasses. Caleb went to get JJ, who dived into the food. Caleb did, too. Let me tell you, six eggs don’t make very much when you’re hungry so I let the two of them have them and I filled up on toast.
JJ ran out of the room at top speed but Caleb stayed and put the dishes into the sink. When the phone rang, I grabbed it. “Mama?” I said.
“No, your mama has a much better figure than I do. Just don’t tell her I said that. It’ll go to her head.”
“Aunt Maureen! Hi!” I immediately felt better.
“Hi yourself, Ivy Greer,” she said. “I haven’t talked to you in forever! How’s my favorite girl?”
“Well, not so great.” I put my hand over the receiver and said, “Caleb, can you keep JJ busy so I can have some privacy?”
He didn’t answer, but he did leave the room.
“What’s going on?” Aunt Maureen said, her voice stern like Mama’s gets when she’s worried about me.
“It’s six forty-five and Mama was supposed to be home at six. We haven’t heard anything from her. I was afraid to call the restaurant but I’m worried.”
“Oh, honey. I know forty-five minutes can sound like a lot when you’re young but didn’t your mama tell you she got off work at six?”
“Yeah.”
“And a restaurant has people coming in for dinner at that time. She probably has to wait until the next shift has things under control, so she wouldn’t get home before now. That’s why I waited to call.”
“But she said she would. She said she’d bring supper.” It came out a whine that sounded more like JJ than me and I hated it. Especially when I finished lamely, “We were hungry.”
“Have you eaten anything?”
“Some eggs and toast.”
“Good girl. See how resourceful you are? And that will tide you over until your mama comes home, which I predict will be any minute. Now you listen here, you get JJ to take his bath. I know that’s hard work. But by the time he’s done I just know your mama will be home. And, Ivy?”
“Yes?”
“You can always call me anytime you’re scared or don’t know what to do. I’m always here so you just call your Aunt Maureen and we’ll work things out. You’re never alone, you hear?”
“Mm-hm,” I mumbled because I was afraid I’d cry with her being so nice to me.
“Okay, sweetheart. You go take care of your brother and I’ll be sitting by the phone if you need me.”
We said our goodbyes and I screwed up my courage to battle JJ, who is like a cat and thinks water is evil. I wrestled him into the bathtub.
He had just finished and put on his pajamas when the key turned in the lock and Mama walked in carrying a box.
“My goodness! What a night!” she said as she came through the door. “I had no idea waitressing was such hard work!”
But the thing is, she didn’t look worn out. She looked really happy.
JJ came barreling past me and threw himself into her, almost knocking her down. “Mama, we were worried! And Ivy wouldn’t call you!”
Mama staggered against his weight and laughed. “Oh, I’m sorry, sweetheart. But you shouldn’t have worried.”
“We were hungry,” he said accusingly.
“Hungry, you say? Well, look what I’ve brought you.” She sat the box on the coffee table and handed JJ a Styrofoam container. “We’ve got meatloaf, fried chicken, and today’s special, popcorn shrimp. What would you like, Caleb?”
“Ivy cooked for us, ma’am. I’m fine,” he said.
“She did? Why, Ivy, I am so impressed!”
“It was nothing,” I said, and looked down. It felt good to impress Mama because it wasn’t something I did on a regular basis—if ever. And, as much as I hated to admit it, it was nice of Caleb to say so.
“Well, when I was told I’d get off at six, I thought I’d get to leave, but no. That just means it’s an hour after the dinner shift comes on and sometimes it gets too busy to walk out. There could be times when it’ll be later, more like seven o’clock.”
Seven o’clock. Close to JJ’s bedtime. I looked at him but he was engrossed in a drumstick and didn’t seem to catch on that he might not see her much after school.
“But it’s seven-thirty now,” I said.
“I know. But I’m new. I’ll get the hang of it.” She smiled at me. “So, how about this, how about I put these dinners in the refrigerator and then tomorrow night you guys can have them?”
“Okay,” I said.
“Is that all right with you, Caleb?” she asked.
“That’s fine, ma’am. Thank you.”
So Mama put the containers in the refrigerator and then the phone rang. She answered.
“Oh, Maureen! I’m so glad you called. I have so much to tell you! But I just got home and I ha
ve to put JJ to bed.”
I tapped Mama on the shoulder. She put her hand over the phone and said, “What is it, sweetie?”
“I’ll put JJ to bed. You go ahead and talk.”
She smiled real big and pulled out a chair. You don’t have to be a Mama/Maureen phone-listener like myself to know that meant she was in for a long talk. JJ needed to get to bed. He was always cranky in the mornings, even after getting the proper amount of sleep.
I went into the living room, where he and Caleb were.
“Hey, JJ, it’s time for bed, buddy,” I said.
His face scrunched up. “But Mama just got home! I haven’t seen her. She’s putting me to bed.”
It was going to be a long night.
“She’s tired, and besides, she’s talking to Aunt Maureen. It’ll be late when she gets off the phone.”
“Good!” He grabbed the television remote and clicked on a cartoon.
“I’m going to bed now,” Caleb said.
“You are?” JJ said. “Caleb, you never go to bed this early. Besides, you promised to tell me about the animals.”
“Then maybe you should come with me.”
JJ looked uncertain. He looked from the cartoons to Caleb. Caleb shrugged and walked toward the stairs. JJ turned off the TV and ran after him.
And me? I didn’t know what to think anymore. Caleb was some sort of pied piper to JJ. I just hoped Mama was right about him and he was a good guy. I hoped he wasn’t someone who would hurt my little brother because then I’d have to kill him and I’d hate to be a seventh-grade murderer.
I picked up JJ’s Styrofoam container and headed toward the kitchen but stopped outside the door to listen to Mama talking to Aunt Maureen. Her back was to me so I sat outside the doorway but within earshot.
“I hadn’t counted on the tips. I got so many! Magdalena said it was because I’m pretty. Can you imagine?” Mama laughed. “Oh, nobody caught my eye. No! I didn’t flirt. Magdalena tied this pert bow with my apron strings and set it just so. She said that when I smiled and turned, the men would all be looking at my bow as I walked away and I’d be sure to get a good tip, but I just couldn’t do it. I mean, I’m there to make money, sure, but not if I have to pull stunts like that.”
Ivy in the Shadows Page 5