Mom spat. “It’s not Calvin’s fault. He’s a good boy.”
“She ran after him. And I’ll bet he put her up to it. And then there’s that girl, Zoe. She’s trouble if ever I saw it coming.”
Stacey pressed her fist against her mouth, stifling her squeak.
Mom muttered something Stacey couldn’t hear
“Renee,” Dad growled. “She’s another matter. Girl doesn’t have enough common sense to fill a paper cup. But she’ll grow outta that too.”
“Renee is not going through a phase! What if she ends up pregnant? She’s an adult now. We can’t do the consequences and rewards thing with her anymore.”
“Oh, really? We’ll see what happens if she gets caught drinking and spends a little time in jail. Along with Mr. Preston Stiles.”
The water turned off, replaced by packing sounds, loud enough that Stacey envisioned Mom ramming things into her makeup case. “You’re going to tough-love both girls right out of our house. Renee’s halfway gone already. But Stacey is sick. She needs help.”
I’m not sick.
“She’s only sick because she makes herself sick.”
Stop it, stop it.
“How did it get to this point? What did we do wrong?”
Nothing. Shut up. Please shut up.
“I don’t know. Maybe we coddled her too much.”
“So you’re saying this is my fault?”
“What? I didn’t say that. I said we.”
“You know, when she was little and she was heavy, I never said anything to her like, ‘Oh, you need to lose weight.’ I always tried to affirm her.”
Chubbikins! Chubbikins-Chubbikins-Chubbikins! Daddy said it! You thought it was cute!
They came out of the bathroom together, and Mom kept talking. “We need to find a counselor for her.”
“Hush. She’ll hear you. Just get her up, make her eat, and let’s get out of here.”
“Stan …”
There was a long pause, and Stacey dared to open her eyes. In the mirror at the foot of her bed, she saw her parents embracing each other.
“Come on now, don’t cry,” Daddy murmured. “We’ll get through this. We’ll figure it out.”
Do you feel my pain, Daddy? Do you see me crying? You never really stop to look.
The moment they arrived home, Mom scurried into the kitchen, promising sandwiches for an early dinner. Stacey wanted to flee to her room and lock the door, but Daddy would only find a way to open it. Maybe he’d remove the doorknob so she wouldn’t be able to keep any secrets anymore. So instead, she lay down on the living room sofa, carsick and exhausted, and hoped they’d leave her alone.
No such luck. Mom called everyone to the table half an hour later, and Daddy insisted that Stacey get up.
She was met by ham sandwiches piled high with meat, cheese, lettuce, and tomato. A bribe; ham and cheese had been Stacey’s favorite since the time she was able to feed herself. Mounds of chips surrounded the sandwiches. And pickles. Mom said she had an apple pie in the freezer she could bake if Stacey wanted it.
Stacey stared at the picture-perfect meal set before her. “I’m feeling nauseous from the car ride. Can I take this to my room and eat it after I’ve had a nap?”
Can I throw it out my window and hope a stray dog will find it?
“Eat the sandwich,” Daddy said. “It’ll help you feel better.”
Renee dragged herself to the table, dressed in clothes that looked like she might have worn them to bed. She plopped down and rubbed her eyes, then her temples. What had Renee done last night with the house all to herself?
Eating sounds took over. Stacey stared at her plate. The food drew her and repelled her at the same time. They’d forced two meals into her already that day, not knowing that her requests to pull off into rest stops had been to get rid of the food. Mom, driving Stacey’s car, wouldn’t go into such places, so Stacey was free to brave the germs and do what she had to do. But now … couldn’t they let her skip one meal because she was honestly carsick?
“Stacey. Eat,” Dad barked.
She jumped in her seat then touched the sandwich with her fingers.
“Where’d you go yesterday anyway?” Renee asked. “Mom said you ran away.”
Stacey leaned forward, her hands gripping the edge of the table, and shouted at her sister. “I did not run away! Okay? I went to see Calvin, but I got lost, and that’s the only reason anything bad happened.”
“Church boy Calvin? I thought y’all broke up.” Renee waggled her eyebrows like she knew some secret. “Besides, doesn’t he live, like, five miles away or something? Where did y’all go together to kiss and make up?”
I hate you. “Nowhere. He was camping with friends and I went to find him.”
“All right, we’re not going to talk about this anymore,” Daddy said. “Eat your dinner, both of you.”
Renee lifted the top of her sandwich. “Needs mustard. I’m gonna sit outside, anyway.” She pushed her chair back, the legs scraping on the floor, and stood.
Dad reached across the corner of the table to grab Renee’s chair. “Sit back down and eat.”
“No. I’m going out.”
Here we go.
There’d been a time when Renee was the shining light of the family, the perfect pigtailed darling who was into Girl Scout merit badges and high school cheerleading. Stacey remembered the times she waited around with Mom while Renee attended gymnastics or cheerleading practice. Mom was the appointed chauffer and Stacey was the unwilling and bored-out-of-her-skull tagalong passenger. No one ever thought to enroll her in gymnastics. Not little Chubbikins. She wasn’t strong enough. Her poor heart … She’d just be embarrassed, like that one time they put her in dance class and she looked ridiculous next to the other little girls. Are you sure you want to go out for the pom-pom squad, sweetie? Those girls are so competitive.
So Stacey drew her pictures and read fantasy novels and dreamed she was someone else. Someone beautiful.
“Can I, uh, I’m going outside too. I need some fresh air.”
Daddy watched her stand, one lowered eyebrow almost pinching his eye. “You’d better eat that sandwich. If I find it in the trash—”
“Stan!”
Stacey fled, leaving her parents to argue. In the backyard, Renee took over the swing, stretching her legs sideways across the slatted seat. Stacey dragged a lawn chair through the wet grass to sit next to her sister. She took a tiny bite of her sandwich. The sweet ham tickled her tongue, made her mouth water. She rolled it around in her mouth, savoring it until the taste faded and the meat got mushy.
“So, why’d you run away? You don’t need to tell me the same lies you tell them. I’m not going to rat on you.” Renee bobbed her feet in time to whatever song was in her head.
Stacey sighed. “I didn’t lie. I honestly did not run away. But …” She looked at her sister. An unlikely, but possible, ally. Renee would hear soon enough that she was anorexic and needed counseling. “They think I’m anorexic.”
“Yeah? Ana-wannabe, maybe.”
“What?”
“Come on. I’ve got eyes. I knew anorexic girls at college. Guys too. They were like you, except they were proud of it. The Little Ana Club. But you, you try to hide it, but you’re not that good. And you like food too much to really be anorexic.”
Amazing. Did Renee sit in her room at night and make a mental list of the most hurtful words she could say? Stacey liked food too much … which was why she was fat.
“Yeah? Maybe I should show you.” With one glance at the house to make sure Daddy wasn’t standing at the patio door spying on her, Stacey stood up and marched to the weedy field beyond the edge of their property. She carefully broke apart each piece of bread and tossed the bits into the field, spreading them far and wide so they wouldn’t be easily noticed. The birds would take care of them. Broken potato chips followed. What was left on her plate looked like a picked-over meal, most of it gone.
She tried to look smug
as she walked past Renee, but the girl laughed at her. “Really, Stace? You think Dad’s not going to figure out what you just did? Give it up and come clean. Seriously, what you’re doing isn’t healthy, and you know it. Just accept who you really are. You’ll be happier that way.”
Stacey stopped and glared at her sister. The ugliest words she could think of bounced around inside her head, so tempting she could almost feel them on her lips. Finally she just shook her head. “You’re not worth it.”
She took the plate inside and left it on the kitchen counter for her parents’ inspection.
Renee had raised one good point, though. How could she possibly keep this up? It was easier before to pick and choose what she ate when she said she was on a diet. Her parents allowed her to do that. And they trusted her enough that they didn’t notice her deceptions. Now she couldn’t count on being able to fling bad food into a field or even purge it after being forced to eat it. Mom’s cooking would have her back to a size thirteen in no time.
She wandered into the living room. Her father wasn’t there, but Mom sat in her favorite chair and lifted her feet onto the ottoman. Her manicured toes wiggled as she leveled the remote at the television.
“I’m going upstairs to check my emails.” Stacey pointed to the stairs.
“Wait a minute, sweetie. Come sit down.”
Stacey groaned and perched on the edge of the sofa.
“You know, I understand what you’re going through. How many times have I been on one diet or another? It’s hard.”
Yeah, you lost weight and gained it right back. And then some.
“At some point you just have to accept that you are who you are. I mean, I know we can do better with the way we eat. All of us. Maybe we should find a meal plan that’s healthy, stop eating so many fatty snacks. You don’t need to be rail thin, Stacey. You just need to be healthy.”
What, did you and Renee read the same memo or something?
“What is it, Stacey? Why are you so unhappy with the way you look? Are kids teasing you at school again?”
“No, Mom.”
“Kids can be so cruel. It makes them feel better about themselves if they can pick on someone they see as weaker.”
I so don’t want to hear this lecture again.
“You’re a beautiful young lady,” Mom said. “Don’t let anyone tell you any differently.”
“No one is picking on me, Mom.”
“No? Then why do you eat so little? I’m so worried about you, sweetheart.”
“I’m fine, Mom. I promise I’ll do better and eat more. Can I go check my emails now? Please?” Before Daddy confiscates my computer?
“Sure. Come back down when you’re done and watch a movie with me? Let’s spend some time together.”
“Okay. Give me a few minutes.”
Mom smiled sweetly, yet a little tear glimmered in the corner of one of her eyes. Stacey’s breath caught in her throat for an instant. How scared Mom must have been when that phone call from the park rangers came last night. Did she really think that Stacey was going to leave her? Really run away?
“Umm. I can do that stuff later,” Stacey said. “Scoot over.”
The oversized chair allowed both of them to snuggle together. While Mom flipped channels looking for a movie, Stacey leaned into her side. Soft, warm, yielding. Safe.
“Want some popcorn?” Mom said. “I can make some. Or not. We don’t have to have it.”
Hmm. The ally Stacey needed might be right there in the chair with her. Mom would be easy to manipulate.
Chapter 32
The tachometer needle shuddered near redline even though Calvin wasn’t touching the throttle. Heat radiated off the engine and exhaust pipe, cooking his legs. Calvin pinched the bridge of his nose. His pounding sinuses made it hard to think.
His ride yesterday had been anything but fun. The Yamaha had choked out at the top of a rise, was a bear to start up again, and then limped back to camp. Calvin couldn’t risk taking it out again until he fixed the problem.
Okay, engine running hot and idling way too high, but cutting out if he revved it—carburetor problem. Still running lean, even though he’d replaced the plugs and double-checked the timing—too much air getting into the cylinders. Somehow.
Flannery joined him, drying her hands on her pants legs after cleaning up the breakfast dishes. “Dude, that ain’t right.”
“You noticed.”
“Hard not to. You’re smoking up the place.”
Good thing people at the nearby campsites were four-wheelers and bikers too. They’d appreciate the need to make repairs in the woods.
Calvin sighed. “Do me a favor. Hold the bike up while I check something.”
Flannery took hold of the handgrips while Calvin shimmied off the back of the bike. He knelt beside the muffler. Whitish exhaust fogged his vision and breached the gunk clogging his nose, even though he held his breath. Popping sounds, but no different than yesterday. He traced the shape of the exhaust pipe, his hand an inch from the metal, searching any air movement that would indicate a crack. He rubbed his stinging palm against his thigh as Tyler walked up beside him.
“Figuring it out?”
Calvin shifted his weight to a more comfortable squatting position. “Running lean. But not bad plugs or timing. I’m wondering …” Cylinder head, gasket … He didn’t want to voice those possibilities tugging at his thoughts. They’d be bad.
“What?” Tyler knelt beside him.
Would Dave have brought many tools on the trip? Flannery’s bike was new, Tyler’s just a year old. And it wasn’t like they’d come for anything more serious than messing around in the woods. Not like a motocross race, where making repairs would be serious business.
“Flan, think your dad would have any Stick Weld?”
She leaned toward him, the bike tilting with her shifting weight. “Maybe. He had a toolbox in the back of the SUV.”
A toolbox. She was probably thinking about the big tackle box where he kept all his fishing lures. Didn’t matter anyway. Dave and little Nigel had headed out in the SUV again to go fishing.
The Yamaha’s engine sputtered, idled down, and coughed.
Calvin snapped his gaze to Flannery. “What’d you do?”
Wide-eyed, she shook her head. “Nothing.”
He stood to stretch out his knees. “Man, I totally don’t need this now.”
A break in the exhaust pipe might suck air back up into the cylinders. He could fix that with the Stick Weld. But if the problem was a crack in the cylinder head or a bad gasket, that would mean he was done riding. Maybe for a long time.
“Wish Dad was here.”
“He should be back soon,” Flannery said.
“No, I meant my dad. Whatever.” Calvin pressed the heel of his hand to the middle of his forehead. “Who am I kidding? I can’t fix it good enough to ride today. Cut the engine, will ya?”
She merely looked at him.
Tyler knuckled Calvin on the shoulder. “Come on, man. If anyone can fix it, you can.”
“If it’s a crack in the exhaust, and if I can find it, and if Dave has any putty. Forget it. I’m done.” He stomped toward the tent. “Cut it off, Flannery!”
The campsite got quiet. Calvin plopped into a camp chair and stared into the underbrush. “Y’all go on. I’ll stay here. My head hurts anyway.”
Someone kicked Calvin’s chair. The tilt of her head and slightly narrowed eyes suggested Flannery stood somewhere between compassion and anger. “Come on, don’t give up. Maybe someone around here’s got some tools.”
Calvin gazed at the old bike. Tyler stood beside it, his expression pinched—trying to figure out the problem or deciding whether to shove the bike over.
Flannery slapped her thighs. “Fine. Give up. Sit there. I don’t care.”
Calvin scowled at her.
She scowled back. “Hey, I’m here to have fun. Not sit around and—and cry over Stacey.”
“Hey!”
; “I mean, I’m sorry she’s sick. Really sorry. But her parents know now and they’ll take care of her. And all you’ve done for two days is pout and snivel. No, I take that back, you were acting that way even before she showed up. She’s been ruining things for you for weeks!”
“Flannery, what the—” Tyler jumped between them, forcing Flannery to step back from the chair. “What’s the matter with you?”
Calvin groaned and tugged at his hair with both hands. “Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.”
“We’re here to have fun!” Flannery said. “Maybe he’d feel better if he just let himself have fun, like he used to before—”
Calvin surged up out of the chair. He lunged toward Flannery and shoved her shoulder. “I said shut up! I don’t wanna hear it, okay?”
Tyler thrust his flattened hand into the middle of Calvin’s chest. “Stop! I know you’re not going to fight a girl.”
Calvin stopped. His eyes flicked back and forth between his two friends, both glaring at him. What? What did I do?
Her full lips pouting despite the anger flaring in her eyes, Flannery turned away. “Maybe I should have gone fishing with Dad.”
Her mother leaned out the camper door. “What’s going on? What’s with the bad vibes?”
“Nothing. We’re done.” Flannery squeezed past her mother into the camper.
Calvin snorted back mucus. He flopped down into his camp chair. “Y’all go riding. I’ll read a book or something.”
Tyler glared at him, no sympathy in his narrowed eyes. “Did you even bring a book?”
Calvin waved his hand uselessly.
“So Flannery’s right. You’re going to sit here and play the martyr.” Tyler pointed at the Yamaha. “Why don’t you go over there and fix that piece of junk and get out on the trails?”
Running Lean Page 28