Minnie's purring sounds deafening suddenly.
I wish I could disappear inside her fur.
Dad turns around and blinks like I'm pointing a bayonet right at his eye. "She's a brilliant internist. Her name is Rhonda Richardson. I really think you'll like her."
Dad crosses the room toward me. I notice a photo peeking out from his breast pocket. He pulls it out and hands it to me proudly. I look at it, but I don't take it from him. He is standing on a desert bluff in Africa with his arm around a thin, tall woman with a thick braid of auburn hair snaking over her shoulder. In the photo his fingers are very close to touching her right boob, but she doesn't seem to mind. Scrubby plants and rising dust surround them, and they're both smiling. They are a very handsome couple.
"She's a really amazing person. An accomplished diagnostician, but she doesn't have an overblown ego." Like your mother does, he might as well have said. "And she listens to me. She really listens, so I don't feel like I have to perform. I can be who I am with her, you know what I mean?"
"It must be nice to have someone who listens to you."
"Oh, Kristi, it is." He sits down across from me. "She has been amazingly patient through all of this, and she understands that I come with baggage."
"Baggage?" I stop petting Minnie. Her claws dig into me. I let them.
He stares at me as his face reddens. "I just mean, you know—"
"Me? Mom?"
He shakes his head. "You're twisting my words."
"Am I?"
Dad closes his eyes in frustration. "Kristi, I know this is difficult. Believe me, I've agonized over this decision."
I stare at him. I do not understand this man. I could search his thoughts, but he makes me too tired. I start stroking Minnie again and her claws relax.
"I know this will have an impact on you, but Rhonda thinks that I would be doing you a disservice if I stay in an unhappy marriage. If I do, you'll only learn how to be unhappy."
"How about you leave the unhappy marriage but stay on this continent?"
"Rhonda is amazingly committed to her work there. She won't leave Africa."
"So have a long-distance relationship with her instead of with me."
He looks at me with liquid eyes. "Kristi, Rhonda has changed my life."
"What was so bad that needed changing?"
"When I met her I was very disillusioned. Twenty percent of my surgeries were vasectomies! It had been a long time since I felt really useful as a physician."
"Feel useful as a father."
"Being a doctor is who I am!" His eyes flutter at me. He is trying hard to look at me, but he can't quite make it, so instead he goes back to Aunt Ann's liquor cabinet to refill his glass. "When I met Rhonda, I thought I'd never seen anyone so alive with purpose! She changed everything for me. I had to follow her to Africa. I had no choice." He is speaking to the wall named Kristi again. The wall named Kristi is very understanding. She accepts everything he says.
Wait. Did he just say he followed her to Africa?
He turns back around. "I'm marrying her, Kristi. I need her."
"You followed her to Africa?"
"Yes. That's right." He juts out his chin like a persecuted man who is finally claiming his identity as an American hero.
"You knew her in the States?"
"Yes."
"How long?"
"How long what?"
"How long did you know her before you left?"
Now he seems less sure of his hero status. He stares into his glass for a long time before finally admitting, "She was here doing recruitment seminars for Doctors Without Borders."
"That's not what I asked."
"She was here for two months."
I lay my hand over Minnie's small shoulders, which are as fragile and pointy as a bird's. "You left Mom and me for a woman you knew for two months?"
He opens his mouth, but words don't seem to find their way to his tongue and he drops his chin.
"I thought you left because you were ashamed about the lawsuit!"
"Ashamed?" He shakes his head, laughs a little. "Doctors get sued all the time. That was to be expected. Besides, we settled."
"But you acted so depressed."
"I was. I knew I needed Rhonda, but I was married. I felt trapped."
"I'm a trap?"
"No, Kristi. That doesn't have anything to do with you. I felt trapped by your mother."
"How does my mother not have anything to do with me?"
"You keep twisting my words."
All this time I thought he had left because he felt worthless, like he'd let down Mom and me. But that wasn't it. He left us because some other chick made him feel like a big man.
I can't do anything but stare at his hands. I used to hold them when I crossed streets. I used to watch his hands when he would practice tying vascular sutures before a big surgery, looping quickly and easily so the patient wouldn't have time to bleed. I thought nothing could ever hurt me as long as Daddy was around to sew me up and wrap me in bandages. Back then, I never imagined he'd be the one to cut me.
Minnie hops off my lap and butts her head into the door of Aunt Ann's bedroom, which clicks open and swallows Minnie up.
I hear a key in the front door. Aunt Ann pokes her head in with her eyes closed, calling, "It's me! Stop making out!"
She opens her eyes, and her mouth drops open. "Kristi!"
"Making out?" At first I'm totally grossed out that Aunt Ann imagined I was making out with my dad, but then I realize what it really means. I turn to Dad. "What?"
"I didn't have a chance to tell you..." Dad says helplessly. Seeming to accept defeat, he sets his glass down on the cabinet and calls, "Hon?"
I hear a swinging hinge, and suddenly there's another person in the room with us. She is tall and beautiful, with pink polished skin and a narrow, pointy nose. She is holding Minnie against her shoulder, and Minnie Mouse is purring like a lawn mower. "Hi, Kristi," she says with a super-warm smile.
Rhonda Richardson has been in Aunt Ann's bedroom the whole time. She has been listening to my conversation with my dad. She is holding my cat.
I turn on my Aunt Ann. "How long have you known about this?"
She backs up a half step, hugging a shopping bag to her body. "Kristi—" she starts, and looks at my dad.
"Honey." Dad reaches for my arm.
I jerk away from him and charge past Aunt Ann out the front door. They all run out to the yard, yelling at me, offering me a ride. I take off at a full run, even though I'm wearing the sandals I cut from an old tire. I don't stop running until I get to the gas station at the corner, where I use a pay phone to call Mom.
Our house is across town but she gets here in ten minutes. She honks the horn at me and I run across the oily parking lot to get in. She takes off even before I've fastened my seat belt. "What happened?" Her lips are crunched together, and I can see she's grinding her teeth.
"Did you know about this?" I shout at her. If Mom's been lying to me all this time, I think I'll lose it.
She pulls a cigarette out of her pocket and jabs it into her mouth. She doesn't light it; she just sucks on it. "Know about what?" she says warily.
"Dad has a girlfriend."
She takes a deep breath, as though she's been expecting this. "Who is she?"
"Her name's Rhonda. I hate that name."
"Tell me what you know."
I tell her the whole sickening story. When I tell her how Dad had known Rhonda for two months before he left, she finally lights the cigarette. She takes a deep drag on it and then swears through a long, steady stream of blue smoke.
"So you didn't know about it."
She's quiet for a long time and I think she's not going to answer, but she finally says, very quietly, "No."
"Dad's a selfish bastard, isn't he?"
"That's not why he didn't tell us." She pulls the car onto our street and parks in the garage before she finishes her thought: "He didn't tell us because he's"—she pauses, thinks
better of badmouthing my dad to me, and substitutes a word—"afraid."
But I know what she's really thinking. She's thinking the word coward.
That's just what I've been thinking myself.
EXPLORATIONS OF NATURE
I come to school super late on Monday morning so that I miss Morning Meeting altogether. I can't face Mallory. And I sure can't face Gusty. I'm so depressed and strung out from lack of sleep that I didn't even have the heart to raid my found wardrobe. I borrowed a black V-neck from Mom and put on some jeans Aunt Ann bought for me a year ago. Maybe I'm dressing this way to escape detection. But really, I just don't have the energy anymore.
I get to Explorations of Nature late to find everyone has already paired off and is working noisily over their little diagrams. David is leaning over Hildie, explaining the lymphatic system of mammals to her. She straightens up as if he's the most interesting humanoid she's ever encountered and says, "So it's like phloem and xylem in plants?"
"Exactly. Excellent, Hildie." And then he reaches out with his hand and almost touches her shoulder, but catches himself and instead strokes his super-cool goatee.
I sneak up right behind him and clear my throat.
He jumps as if I'm a detective from the special-victims unit. "Kristi! You're late."
I give him a wicked grin as I reach toward Hildie's shoulder but then exaggeratedly stroke my chin, just the way he did. He blanches, and I catch a feeble thought in his mind. Oh Jesus. She can tell.
Poor bastard.
"We were just learning about lymph nodes, Kristi."
"Oh good! I've been thinking I should heighten my awareness of glands," I say, with a meaningful glance at his crotch.
Did I mention when I get depressed I become super evil?
He clears his throat, backing away from me.
Hildie is watching me with very narrow eyes. I narrow my eyes right back at her, but I probably don't look very scary because I didn't have the energy to put on my eyeliner today.
"Hildie," David says extra briskly, to show that his relationship with her is absolutely aboveboard and completely non-lecherous. "Show Kristi today's lesson, will you?" He takes refuge at his teaching stool.
This I should have expected. Being evil always has consequences. Believe me, the universe keeps score.
Hildie stares at me coolly. Just to show her that I don't care what she and Eva said about me over the phone, I take the chair right next to her and scootch up real close. "Hiya, Hil. So you and David were talking about nads of some kind?"
"Lymph nodes, Kristi. When will you grow up?"
"How difficult. Lymph nodes! No wonder you needed extra help from David. He's such a great teacher, isn't he, Hildie? He really cares about his students."
Chad Marx snickers. Hildie looks around the room nervously, and I can hear her thinking, She can tell. "You should keep your mouth shut, Kristi!" she whispers. "I know all about what you did to my brother on Saturday."
This hurts, but I expected her to say something about it and I have an answer ready. "Mallory and I are friends."
"That's not what Eva says."
I expected this, too. "The only time Eva should open her mouth is to eat something. She'll have to start shopping at babyGap if she loses any more weight."
"You don't know what you're talking about." Hildie shoots a desperate look at David, who has detached himself completely from her and is staring at the ceiling. "Eva is having a really hard time right now, so just shut up about that."
"I'm so glad you can be there for someone! The second my dad left, you stopped hanging around!"
"You were getting so paranoid! You kept asking me what I was thinking and acting so nutso! Of course I started hanging out with Eva. At least she's normal!"
"She's anorexic and evil! You call that normal?"
"You always assume the worst about people!" You psycho bitch, she thinks.
"I do? I do? You're thinking I'm a psycho bitch right now!" I shriek.
"What are you talking about?"
"Don't deny it! I heard you think it!" She's looking at me quizzically, which pisses me off so much because she knows I'm psychic. She was there when I was starting to figure it out, and we did all kinds of mind-reading experiments together. "You know I can read minds, Hildie. You were there when it started."
"Those were just stupid games, Kristi."
"It started out that way, but I freaked you out more than once!"
"No, that was pretend," she says, but her thoughts tell a different story. She's remembering how shocked she'd been and how she'd felt scared when I'd asked her why the words "little brat" kept bouncing around in her head. She'd turned eggshell pale and said she'd had a fight with her mom. That made me appreciate my own mother, for about a week. At least Mom has never called me a name. Not even when I deserved it.
Maybe that's why Hildie stopped being my friend. It wasn't because of Gusty or because I got depressed about Dad. Hildie stopped being my friend because I saw too much, and she was scared of me. And she still is.
"Why are you denying it, Hildie? I can hear you thinking about how psychic I am right now."
"You can hear me think?" Hildie stares at me, her lip curled over her perfect teeth. She feels torn. It shows on her face and in her thoughts. She's thinking about coming clean, but she's too filled with fear. She can't handle it, and so she turns on me. "Are you insane?" She laughs nervously, glancing around the room.
I suddenly remember where I am. And I notice that where I am is very, very quiet. All the other students have stopped working on their diagrams of the lymphatic system and are staring at me. I can hear their thoughts bouncing in my head: Did she just say she can read minds? I always thought she was crazy.
"You don't really think you can read minds, do you?" Hildie whispers at me, but loud enough that everyone can still hear. She's finishing me off now. Really putting on a show for everyone.
"Uh," I say. I feel like I'm having that dream where I show up at school naked and I have my whole wardrobe in my locker, but I can't remember my combination. Only this time the lock is on my mouth, because I can't think of a single word to say.
I glance at David, who is looking at me with an expression of deep concern. "Kristi." He steps forward, putting himself between Hildie and me. "Why don't you go to the Contemplation Room and wait for me there, okay?"
I could cry right here. I could lose it right this second.
I pick up my books and slink out of the room. If I had a fluffy tail like Minnie's, it would be between my legs.
I sit in the Contemplation Room and stare out the window, trying not to think about what just happened with Hildie. I imagine Hildie telling Gusty what I said, her green cat eyes flashing meanly. He'll wrinkle his face in revulsion, thanking his lucky stars he never got together with such a psychopath.
I may as well give up on him now.
The corners of the windows are misted over. It's starting to get cold outside even though it's super sunny. I wish I didn't feel so dark and cloudy in my mind.
Now everyone will think I'm crazy. They're going to send me to a mental institution. They will put me in a psych ward with people who dribble on themselves as they fight over what game shows to watch. I will go to group therapy and listen to psychotics describe their fantasies about killing their doctors. I will become extra fond of a particular brown sweater that I will wear every day. I will play solitaire and look at the birds flying outside. I will become accustomed to psychotropic drugs and cafeteria food. I will eventually become attached to the place, and I will be afraid to ever leave.
Actually, it doesn't sound half bad.
I hear footsteps behind me. David knocks his knuckles on my table to get my attention and beckons over his shoulder. He leads me to a conference room, sits down at the little table, and points at a chair across from him. I sit down, and he says, "Are you okay?"
I shake my head and shrug at the same time. I guess that means "no" and "I don't know."
&
nbsp; "You're not looking like yourself."
"Is that such a bad thing?"
"What you said just now—"
"I don't really believe I can read minds."
"Really?" He narrows his eyes at me, and I hear him thinking, Maybe I can get her into special ed and out of my class.
"I was just screwing with Hildie."
"Whether you actually believe you can read minds or not, Kristi, you must recognize it's a pretty odd thing to say. Right?"
"Absolutely. That's me. Zany sense of humor."
He leans toward me, knitting his fingers together. "Just the same, I think we'll probably call your parents, okay?"
"That's really not necessary. I'm fine."
"I think it's best for me to err on the side of caution."
"What's on the other side? Indifference? Because I think you should lean toward that."
He takes my hand and holds it until I meet his eyes. "I'm not going to say anything bad about you. I just think your mom needs to know about this, okay?"
I probe him for any weak spot in his thinking, but his thoughts come at me loud and clear.
She needs help.
I hate Hildie Peterson. She keeps ruining my life.
KRISTI THE PARIAH
Only Jacob is loyal. Only Jacob is true.
He pounces on me just as I'm walking into the Bistro. "Hi, Kristi! I hear you had a weird episode in Explorations of Nature—is that right?"
"Yeah." I look around. The Bistro is especially quiet today, and everyone is looking at me. Hildie is squinting meanly as she whispers into Red Hutchins's ear. They both snigger, and then all the people around them start sniggering.
"Can you really read minds? What am I thinking right now?" Jacob closes his eyes tightly and scrunches up his nose, trying hard to send me a thought. He opens one eye. "Well?"
It is probably best not to mention the embarrassing image of my breasts coated in delicately placed bite-size mounds of mascarpone cheese, so I hazard a guess. "You are hoping I notice your new shoes. They're nice. Very retro chic."
"Wow! That's amazing!" he says, but I can't tell if he's humoring me or not.
The truth is, I'm not totally sure what he was thinking.
Vibes Page 14