by Kim Hoover
“It’s one of the reasons we moved.”
“You’re kidding.”
“It’s crazy I know. My parents get these ideas in their heads, especially my mom. She freaks out sometimes. She pressured my dad to find something that would take us away from Houston.”
“Parents can be so selfish.”
“Mine are hot and cold. Most of the time they don’t care what I’m doing as long as I’m not embarrassing them.”
“So they were embarrassed by something about you and this girl, but I don’t understand what it was. Did she get you in trouble? Drinking? Sneaking out?”
“No, nothing like that. It’s not worth talking about. I’m sorry I brought it up.”
“Don’t be.” We sat for a minute or two without talking. The silence started to weigh on me and I worried she’d lose interest if I didn’t come up with something. “Speaking of embarrassing, my parents got divorced this summer.”
The waiter arrived and set our plates down.
“Oh, wow,” Jane said. “Is it tough?”
“I hate it.” I took a bite of taco. “I mean, it’s not like I’m crying every day or anything. It’s more like, I don’t know, like I’m ashamed or something.”
Jane nodded. “I get that.”
“It just doesn’t happen around here—the whole ‘broken home’ thing. Like there’s something wrong with us.”
I felt the heat on my face as it turned red. I hadn’t talked to anyone except Rachel about this. And here I was talking to someone I barely knew.
“That sounds hard,” Jane said. “I’ve had a lot of friends whose parents are divorced. Especially in California. But things are so different here. I saw that right away. ‘Small towns, small minds,’ my grandmother used to say.”
“Yeah,” I laughed, thinking of all the church people sitting in their pews with tiny heads. “I don’t know. It’s just… It’s weird to think about my mom being single. I mean, you know how it is. Your mom is just your mom.”
“Is she dating?”
“No. Why? Who would she date?”
“I don’t know, but she’s so young. I’m sure she wants to meet someone,” Jane said.
“What do you mean she’s young? Did we talk about that?”
Jane shifted in her seat. “Oh, uh, well no, I guess we didn’t, but I think my mom heard something from somebody—”
Somebody said something? Who would say something? And why to Jane’s mom? I felt like a knife slashed through my chest, heat spreading from the wound. Shame. It would never have occurred to me that people like Jane and her parents would gossip about me and my mom. More shame. Humiliation flooded over me. I couldn’t stop it. I wanted to. As much as I wanted to stay and keep soaking in the attention from Jane, I had to leave. I got up and looked for the way out. Tears were coming. I didn’t want to cry. I didn’t want these strangers to look at me. I fumbled for the exit. I forgot my stuff, but I couldn’t go back.
“Cal!” Jane stood and called after me. “I’m sorry! Come on, don’t leave. Please.”
As much as I wanted turn around and go back, I couldn’t. I pretended not to hear her. I kept my head down and walked as fast as I could, looking for a place to hide for a while. The tears finally came, streaming down my face and soaking the collar of my shirt. I ducked into an alley. I wouldn’t be able to take it if I ran into anyone else I knew. I found a covered bus stop and sat on the bench, not making eye contact with anyone. I tried to make sense of what had just happened. It hit me so fast.
People were talking about Mom. Of course, they are. She could do something like that and no one would say anything? Throw her husband out for no good reason? People didn’t get divorced. Women didn’t live on their own. At least not in our town. Ever since the night she told me, I had been acting like she and I lived on our own planet where the normal rules didn’t apply. But Jane was right. Mom was only thirty-four. So what was she going to do with the rest of her life? She must have a plan. She wasn’t the type to strike out on her own. She had never been on her own. She’d gone straight from her parents’ house to my father’s house.
How stupid I had been not to realize that there had to be a darn good reason why my mother left her marriage like it was nothing. That car I’d seen that night. The same car she got into with that man. That had to be it. My heart pounded in my ears as I let it sink in. She did have something—or someone—lined up. But why did she keep it secret? Who was he? What would happen to me in all this?
I kept my eye on my watch since the only thing that could make this situation worse would be to miss the ride back. When it was almost time to meet the group to go back to camp, I headed over. I slipped onto the bus and went straight to the back without looking at anyone.
Jane made her way to the back and sat down beside me. She opened her mouth to say something.
“Please,” I said. “I really don’t want to talk about it.”
“I just want to say I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“I know that. It’s not you.”
“Here,” she said, handing me my bag. “You forgot this.”
“Thanks,” I replied, but I didn’t look at her.
She took my hand and held it in her lap. My heartbeat pounded in my chest and sweat broke out on my forehead. I tried to pull my hand away, but she held on. When she finally let go, I slumped back into the seat, my eyes closed. My brain throbbed against my skull. Tacos churned in my stomach. I felt one of my sick headaches coming on and hoped I could make it back without puking in the bus. I got lucky—I fell asleep.
Chapter Five
Rachel was waiting for me as I got off the bus behind Jane. “I’m sorry for acting like a jerk in town.”
“That’s okay. I knew you didn’t mean anything by it.”
“What happened? You look like a truck ran over you.”
“Let’s take a walk,” I said, waving goodbye to Jane.
We didn’t say anything until we got away from the others.
“I’ve been so dumb.”
“About what?”
“Something Jane said made me realize people around town are talking about my parents’ divorce. And you know why? Because it doesn’t make any sense. Not for a woman like her. Have your parents said anything?”
“Not a word.”
“Why would my mom divorce my dad? What if there’s someone else? Do you think that’s it?”
“Why don’t you ask her?”
“Are you kidding? Do you think she would tell me if there was? You know she won’t talk to me about anything personal.”
“I guess that’s right. Maybe we should spy on her.”
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea. Let me think about it. If she caught us, she would kill us.”
Rachel gave me a hug. “You’re my best friend,” she said. “Always.”
In the dorm that night, I noticed Jane settling in with the older girls at the other end of the room. She looked up and caught my eye at one point and smiled. The flutter went through me again and I looked away.
The next day, she found me at breakfast and wanted to apologize again for bringing up the gossip about my mom.
“No, I apologize for acting like such a weirdo,” I said. “It just caught me by surprise. I’ve been living in my own little shell since it happened. Almost like Rachel and I were the only ones who knew about it. It was dumb.”
She convinced me to start meeting in the prayer garden to practice guitar. It helped me get my mother off my mind. Jane wasn’t very interested in Bible study or really anything going on at the camp, and we started skipping most classes so we could hang out together and play music, which wasn’t like me. I was the one who always showed up with notes on the lesson, so prepared everyone made fun of me for it.
After a few days of this, Rachel confronted me. “Camp is always you and me, but all of a sudden, it’s like you’re not even here.”
I looked away and couldn’t think of anything to say.
> “Why are you spending so much time alone with Jane?”
“It’s the guitar,” I said, a little too quickly. “She’s teaching me.”
“Is she your new best friend?” Rachel said with arms crossed and eyes narrowed.
“No, it’s not like that.”
“Well, then what is it?”
“You’re my best friend. You’ll always be my best friend. I love you.”
Rachel smiled. “You better. Can I come to the prayer garden with y’all then?”
“You don’t have to ask permission.”
Later that afternoon, after Jane and I had played every song we knew, the three of us lay on our backs in the dry hot desert sun. Jane broke off a piece of cactus and wiped the oozing liquid from the broken stem to a cut on her elbow.
“It’s aloe vera,” she said.
“I know,” I said. “That stuff grows on my grandmother’s farm.”
“What farm?”
“It’s outside of Sweetwater, near Abilene.”
“A ranch in the family!”
Rachel laughed, shaking her head. “It’s mostly red dirt and tumbleweeds.”
“You’ve been there? I’m jealous. How big is it?”
“She always says it’s half a section,” I said, “whatever that is. Somebody leases most of the land and runs cattle on it.”
“I can only imagine…” Jane said, gazing off as if visualizing every detail.
“When I was a kid, I used to spend the whole summer there every year. Just me and Grandma.” I closed my eyes, remembering. It was the smells that stood out—the stinky cow patties, the freshness of the hay bales, especially after a rain, the sour smell of cattle feed.
“What was it like?” Jane asked.
“We had our routines,” I said. “On Saturdays we’d go to the library in town and get a stack of books for the week. Mondays were grocery shopping day. And I had chores. I had to feed the chickens every morning.”
“I’d love to see it,” Jane said, sitting up with her arms around her knees.
“Why?” I asked, squinting in the sun to look at her.
“It’s just so Texas,” she said, twisting her hair around her finger as she looked off toward the mountains in the distance.
She jumped up and extended her hands to me and Rachel, pulling us to our feet. On the walk back to the cabin, I fantasized about taking Jane to my grandmother’s farm. I imagined walking her to the creek, crossing it and heading up to the pasture to check out the cows. I had walked it dozens of times with my mother and grandmother. Jane would be impressed. The story developing in my mind was interrupted as I came into the cabin door.
“You’re on KP tonight,” the Youth Minister said, pointing to a bag of corn ears to be shucked.
Jane and Rachel ran the other way before I could rope them in.
The last few days of camp flew by and before we knew it, the last night arrived, and with it the final performances of the entire camp. Jane and I had decided to play and sing a song we had written. The group gathered in the amphitheater with the 150 kids and adults who had been there over the two weeks. I was so nervous my hands were shaking, and they were so sweaty I wasn’t sure I could hold onto the guitar.
“I don’t know if I can do this,” I told Rachel as Jane and I stood off to the side, waiting to go on.
“You’ll be fine,” Rachel said, clasping her hands together in excitement as if she were the stage manager.
“What if I forget the words?”
“I taped them to the floor.” Jane pointed to a spot in front of the microphone.
“Oh my gosh,” I said as Jane dragged me onto the stage.
The performance was mediocre since we stepped on each other’s words and missed a few transitions, but the two of us were having such a great time that the crowd really got into it and cheered us on. As we left the stage, this feeling hit me, a feeling like I was about to lose something—like I better take this all in and not ever forget it. This had been the most amazing two weeks, but the next day we would head home, to the routine of an ending summer and eventually back to school. I felt almost sick at the thought of not seeing Jane every day. We would be at the same school in the fall, but juniors and sophomores did not cross paths much.
“Y’all go on,” Rachel said. “I told them I’d help put away all the equipment.”
As we walked under the stars on that moonlit night, the coolness of the desert chilling our skin, Jane put her arm around me.
“I’m going to miss you, kid,” she said, hugging me close.
“Yeah, I was just thinking that.”
We walked several steps arm in arm and then Jane stopped and faced me. She got really close.
“Will you call me?”
Something about the way she looked at me made me feel dizzy. I had to swallow before I could find my voice. “I’d like to,” I whispered.
“Okay, then.” Jane smiled. “I’ll wait to hear from you.”
On my way to breakfast the next morning, I looked for Jane, but I couldn’t find her. I looked everywhere, feeling silly and panicked at the same time. I didn’t want to act like I was obsessing about it, but I had to know where she’d gone.
“Oh, her mother picked her up early this morning,” the Youth Minister said. “Something about soccer camp in Arizona.”
It felt like someone pushed me off the side of a mountain, like there was no ground under my feet. Why hadn’t she said anything? My brain scrambled my thoughts. She could have at least told me I wasn’t going to see her on the ride home. How could she do this to me? Suddenly I felt like the past two weeks had been a fantasy. It didn’t really happen. Maybe I made it all up. The tears were coming.
I ran to the girls’ restroom and into a stall. I couldn’t stop crying, and it was all I could do to stay quiet enough to hope no one could hear me. Finally, I came out and washed my face.
“What is wrong with you?” I said out loud, looking in the mirror. “Get over it!”
I had a hard time making conversation on the ride home. My head was spinning. Jane, Jane, Jane. I couldn’t stop thinking about her. Rachel gave up trying to talk to me. She knew I was obsessed with Jane and that she’d disappeared on me. I think she felt sorry for me. Eventually, I was hypnotized by the passing landscape as the bus made its way back to Texas, red dirt and mesquite trees dancing in the desert heat. But I couldn’t shake the unsettled feeling that gripped me and kept me off balance all the way home.
Chapter Six
By the time August rolled around, with the beginning of school looming, I stopped thinking about Jane so much. This year was especially exciting since Rachel and I were finally in high school. It was still a few weeks away, and the school had sent us our schedules in the mail. I spent hours and hours going over the details of my classes, the names of the teachers, and studying the map of the building. I called around to find out which teachers were nice and which were tough. I wanted to be ready.
“You must have memorized that thing by now,” Mom said over breakfast one Sunday morning before church as I looked at the schedule again.
“I have,” I said, smiling and tucking it back into the front of my new calendar notebook.
She rolled her eyes, but I didn’t care. So what if she didn’t get me?
“I guess you’re proud of that.”
I ignored her and finished my breakfast.
“Did you see this?”
She pushed a letter across the table. It was addressed to me.
“You have been elected by the members of the boys’ junior varsity football team to this year’s JV cheerleading squad,” I read. “Really? What am I supposed to do?”
“Well, sweetie, you’re supposed to cheer,” she said, the sarcasm revealing her annoyance. “The mom who is in charge called last night to say the boys picked you and five other girls to be their cheerleaders for the season. We have to design a uniform for you girls and you have practice a few times a week.”
“When does thi
s start?”
“I think they said the first practice is Tuesday night, and I guess I’ll be spending my precious time driving you up there,” she said.
Her agitation put me on edge and made me want to just drop the whole thing. What did I care about cheerleading? I hadn’t done it since sixth grade. I probably couldn’t do a cheer anymore anyway.
“I don’t have to do it,” I said. “I didn’t ask for it.”
“No, you’re doing it. I’m not giving people in this town another reason to talk about my business. They do enough of that already.”
“What are they saying?” I asked, surprised she would bring this up.
“It doesn’t matter. But if word got out that I pulled you from cheerleading, it would just be an excuse to talk about what a bad mother I am.”
“Who says you’re a bad mother?”
“Your father for one. He went to a lawyer. Thinks he can get custody.”
My stomach clenched. “Whoa, what?”
“Don’t worry about it. He won’t get anywhere. It’s all about money anyway. He doesn’t want to pay child support.”
No way was I going to live with my dad. “But what could he say about you that’s bad?”
“Nothing. Nothing he can prove anyway.”
“Are you hiding something?”
“Watch it, Cal. Don’t talk to me that way. Some things are for adults only. I told you not to worry about it.”
“Will he have to pay child support?”
“He better. Otherwise, I don’t know where I’m supposed to get the money for this uniform. And the shoes too.”
I knew where this was going. I wanted to keep the peace with her.
“I’ll help! I can get more babysitting. Don’t worry.”
“I might tell the other mothers I’ll sew all the uniforms if they’ll pay me. I could do it in a weekend.”
“Thanks, Mom. I’m sorry this is so much trouble.”
“Hey, maybe it’ll improve my reputation with all these busybodies. I’ll tell you what. None of them can sew a button on a shirt.”
Mom and I got to church a few minutes early and she headed off to sit with the adults. I looked around for Rachel, since we usually sat together, but I couldn’t find her. Her parents had probably let her skip again. Then as I turned a corner, I found myself face-to-face with Jane. In a split second, my heart pounded into the base of my throat so hard I thought I was going to choke. I hadn’t thought about her in weeks. Now the memories of New Mexico rushed over me like ocean waves.