A car goes past me way too fast for a parking lot.
“Slow the hell down,” I yell at the car as it passes me.
“There he is!” Izzy screams. She’s jumping up and down. She’s one row behind me and eight or so spaces over. “That blue car!”
The parking lot is full of blue cars. I drop to my knees yet again and the loose gravel on the pavement hurts. “Which blue car?” I call to her, coming to my feet again. I see paper cups, I see a hair tie, I even see a sock under a car. But no cat.
Izzy’s jumping up and down again. She’s wearing jeans that are too short and a King Tut T-shirt; it occurs to me that I should help her dress better. Not that I’m a fashionista, but she could look way cuter than she does.
“That blue one next to the white one!” Izzy hollers.
I follow her line of vision and I see the car she’s talking about. I drop flat to the ground in front of a parked car.
And I see Mr. Cat. He’s next to the right rear wheel of the blue car.
I jump up and walk as fast as I can without running. And the damned cat shoots out from under the car like he’s on fire.
“Kitty! Kitty! Mr. Cat.” Izzy is calling his name and sobbing as she runs around another car, coming at the cat from the opposite direction as me.
The cat stops right in the middle of the lane between two rows of parked cars and I immediately slow down. “Kitty, kitty, kitty,” I say softly. “That’s a good boy.”
His tail is twitching. He sees me.
“Good kitty. Good boy,” I croon.
Then he takes off and I run after him, cutting between cars to try to head him off before he gets to the highway.
I lose sight of him.
“Haley!” Izzy screams.
As I come out from between the cars into the next row, I catch movement out of the corner of one eye, while spotting the cat out of the other. Izzy screams. The car is going to hit the cat.
I react before I think. The car is so close to me now that I can feel the heat from the engine.
I bring the palm of my hand down on the hood and the car slams on its brakes. “Slow down! Who drives fifty in a parking lot?” I holler at the driver as I cut right in front of his car.
I’ve read of Herculean feats in literature and that’s what it feels like as I cross the last couple of feet to the cat. I know he’s going to take off. I know he’s going to run right for the highway and I know he won’t make it all the way across. I’ll be at the front desk of the hotel asking if they have a shovel so I can extricate Mr. Cat from the pavement in front of the Wendy’s across the street.
But somehow I reach him. For some reason he doesn’t bolt this time. Not his day to die, I guess.
I scoop him up into my arms and I pull him to my chest and I have no idea why, but all of a sudden I’m crying. I could hardly cry when I splattered my sister all over the road and now I’m crying over a stupid cat. A second later, Izzy is in front of me. She’s a sobbing, snotty mess.
She puts her arms out to me and I lower the cat to her. “Hold him tight,” I tell her, wiping my nose with the sleeve of my shirt. “His heart’s beating a mile a minute.”
“Mr. Cat, Mr. Cat, I’m so sorry,” Izzy blubbers.
I hear a car tap its horn and I look up to see the car that almost took out Mr. Cat. I look at the driver really evil-like. Then I put my arm around my little sister and I move her out of the middle of the lane so the car can get by.
We walk together back to our car. I have the key in my pocket. Mom was going to the bathroom one more time before we hit the road, so she gave it to me when I saw her in the lobby.
I hit the unlock button. “Get in,” I tell Izzy. “I’ll get your stuff.”
She’s still crying, but not as hard. She gets into the backseat and closes the door and I open the hatch and put her bag and the cat kennel in quickly, afraid that if Mr. Cat has a death wish, he might come over the backseat and I’ll be running through traffic again.
“Haley?”
I hear Mom’s voice as I close the hatch. I turn around.
“Is this your backpack?” she calls from the sidewalk in front of the hotel. She’s holding it up.
“Yeah,” I call back to her.
I wait for her at the car.
“Why did you leave your—”
“I’ll tell you in a minute,” I say. I take my backpack and her bag from her.
She looks at me and I feel stupid because I know she can tell I’ve been crying. I wipe at my face with my sleeve, enjoying the moment when my arm hurts from the friction. “Just get in,” I whisper.
She stands there looking at me for another second and I see that she looks better than she did a couple of days ago. She still needs to dye her hair and she’s too skinny, but her face doesn’t look so . . . haggard. It actually seems like there’s some color in her cheeks. Maybe this trip is doing her some good.
“Are you okay?” she asks quietly.
I open the hatch. “I’m fine. Let’s just go.”
Once we’re in the car, headed for the interstate, Izzy relates the whole tale of the escaping cat. We go through a doughnut drive-thru place and Mom and Izzy get breakfast sandwiches. My stomach still feels sick from the near cat-astrophe, but I order an iced coffee and Mom gets some of the sour cream doughnuts I like. For later.
“Poor Mr. Cat,” Mom says as we pull away.
She’s handed me all of the stuff from the order and I pass Izzy her sandwich and juice and I start unwrapping Mom’s sandwich for her.
“You’re just lucky your sister was there,” she tells Izzy. “I hope you told her thank you.”
There’s a deafening silence from the backseat. Izzy even stops balling up the paper from her sandwich.
“Izzy Mae,” Mom says. “Your sister saves your cat’s life and you can’t even tell her thank you?”
“Mom.” I say it quietly. I don’t need Izzy to tell me thank you. I’m just glad I was able to save the cat. I’m glad that for once I could do something right. Something that didn’t make people cry. “It’s okay.”
Mom glances at me. “It’s not okay. She can’t keep this up. I won’t have it.”
I meet her gaze. “Let it go,” I say. “Just give her some time.”
Mom opens her mouth to say something and then closes it. Thank God.
A few minutes later we’re on I-90.
“Ninety-five miles to South Bend, Indiana,” I say, and I sip my iced coffee. “Association game or disassociation?”
I glance into the backseat.
Izzy’s still holding the cat in her lap; I can hear him purring.
She meets my gaze and for once she doesn’t look away.
Thank you, she mouths.
I smile at her and for the second time this morning, tears come to my eyes. You’re welcome, I mouth back.
Chapter 36
Julia
Maine
“How much farther?” Izzy asks as she gets into the backseat, shoving Mr. Cat over. Since his adventure yesterday morning, he seems content to stay put and not risk shortening his life expectancy by another cat life.
I get behind the driver’s wheel again. “Half an hour.” I was exhausted forty-five minutes ago, but after a bathroom stop and getting something quick to eat, I feel revived. And now I’m excited. We’ve been in this car five days. I made it to Maine. We made it. “I texted Laney to let her know how close we are. She was going to hold dinner for us, but I told her we already ate.”
“Maybe we could walk to Farmer’s Ice Cream when we get there,” Izzy says, buckling in.
“Maybe.” I glance at Haley sitting next to me. She’s been quiet for the last couple of hours. Not unpleasant, just not talkative. “You okay?” I ask her as I back out of the parking space in front of a little deli just outside of Portland where we stopped.
She looks out the window. I can tell she’s worried about something. My first response is to start asking questions, but I bite my tongue and wait. I�
�m trying to learn to be a better listener.
“Are we staying with Aunt Laney?” Haley asks.
“Tonight. After that, I don’t know. Her parents’ cottage on the lake is empty. She says we can go there, if we want. Why?”
She shrugs. “I guess you told her—” She stops, exhales, and starts again. She continues looking out the window as she speaks. “I guess she knows all my shit.”
At some point, I need to tackle Haley’s bad language. I cringe every time she curses. But I haven’t exactly been setting a good example over the last week. Pick your battles. I’m learning that. It’s right up there with one day at a time, sometimes one minute at a time. Good parenting mottos.
“She does know what’s been going on with you. I’m sorry if that upsets you, but I have to have someone to talk to, hon.” I look at her, then both ways on the street, and I pull out.
It feels good to be covering these last few miles. At times, I felt as if we would never get here. Ben certainly didn’t think I could do it. But I’m also a little sad to know we’ll be there in half an hour. There’s been a certain amount of comfort in being in the car for the last five days with Izzy and Haley. Even though things haven’t always gone smoothly, or the way I imagined they might, I’ve felt insulated from the world in this car. Protected. Stepping out at Laney’s means entering the big bad world again. I don’t know if I’m ready for it. What if I fall apart again? It won’t do my girls or me any good if I just take to Laney’s bed.
Haley hasn’t responded to the fact that Laney knows the details of her recent behavior. Choices. Whatever you want to call it.
“You know,” I say, “Laney’s not going to judge. She just wants what I want, what we all want and that’s for you to be okay. We want you to be able to get past Caitlin’s death and go on and live a happy, healthy life.”
She thinks on that for a minute and then turns to me. I haven’t seen the black eye pencil since we left Vegas. The black nail polish is gone too. Her hair’s still that unnatural color, but it doesn’t seem so shocking to me anymore. I see her face now and not the black clothes or hair. Her beautiful face that’s so full of sadness most of the time. I wish I could kiss it away, the way I kissed her boo-boos when she was little.
“You really think that’s possible? For me to be happy?” Her tone isn’t antagonistic. She seems to really want to know what I think. Before I can answer, she goes on. “Do you think you can be happy with Caitlin dead?”
I grip the steering wheel. An interesting question for six o’clock in the evening, after driving twenty-eight hundred miles in five days.
I don’t know how to answer her.
I don’t think I’ve considered my own happiness since Caitlin died. Of course I can never be happy again. Or can I? If I think Haley can be happy, why shouldn’t that apply to me?
It should, shouldn’t it?
I’ve had happy moments over the last few days. Just seeing Haley actually smile makes me smile. That’s being happy, isn’t it? Even if for the briefest moment? Hearing Haley or Izzy laugh makes me happy. The pleasure I got from drinking that frozen Icee the first day in the car made me happy. If I string enough of these moments together, can I be happy?
I look at Haley again. “I didn’t think I could ever be again,” I answer truthfully. “I think that’s at least partially why I couldn’t get out of bed for those first few weeks.”
“Months, if you want to get technical,” Haley points out.
I lick my finger and hold it in the air. One for Haley. But I don’t want to get bogged down in that conversation right now. We need to talk about this matter of happiness and it’s only fair that if I’m asking Haley to bare her soul to me, I should be able to do the same.
“I guess what I’ve been thinking about, over the last few days, is that my life can never be the same. My life without Caitlin”—I touch above my left breast and my voice catches—“it can never be what it was. But I still have you and Izzy and your dad and—” I exhale. “I think I owe it to you guys, and maybe even to myself, to find happiness. And I don’t even know that I should think I’ll be less happy without Caitlin. I’m just going to be . . . different happy.” I can feel my forehead creasing. “Does that make sense?”
“Caitlin says I shouldn’t be sad,” Izzy speaks up from the backseat.
Haley cuts her eyes at me. It’s her “there she goes talking crazy again” look. I glance in the rearview mirror. “I think you’re right. She wouldn’t want us to be sad.” I look at Haley again. “Would you rather we go to the cottage than stay with Laney?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. Where are we all going to sleep at Aunt Laney’s?”
“I guess I’ll sleep with Laney tonight. You two will go in one of the boys’ rooms and Liam and Garret will bunk together. Can the two of you sleep together without doing bodily harm to each other?”
“I can sleep out on the couch.” Haley looks over the seat, in her sister’s direction. “If that’s what the pipsqueak wants.”
“As long as we don’t have to sleep in the same bed.” Izzy’s clearly not happy with the idea, but she’s not adamantly opposed, either. “I guess it will be okay.”
I smile. I might be kidding myself, but today I feel like we’re actually making some progress on several fronts.
Thirty-five minutes later, we turn onto Laney’s street. She lives in a sweet yellow and white Victorian house in the little town of Larkgate, only a couple of miles from Sebago Lake. The town has a main street that was revitalized ten years ago after folks from Portland began restoring the Victorian homes and businesses began to crop up. The downtown area, a block from Laney’s house, now features all sorts of funky, artistic shops.
When I pull into a parking spot in front of Laney’s house, she’s on her front porch, leaning over the rail, waving both hands. She runs down the steps like I’m her long-lost sister. I suppose, in a way, I have been pretty lost and she’s definitely the sister I never had.
I catch my foot on the edge of the floor mat and almost fall out of the car trying to get to her. We’re both laughing.
Laney throws her arms around me to balance me and I hug her. “Laney.” Tears well in my eyes.
“You made it,” she murmurs, hugging me tightly.
“I made it.”
We hold each other for a long minute, but I still don’t feel like it’s long enough, when I finally let go.
“Oh, don’t cry,” she tells me. But her eyes are teary too. Laney’s the complete antithesis of me. She’s tall and dark-skinned with the most beautiful inky-black hair. She takes after her father, who’s Native American, the Penobscot tribe.
I laugh and wipe at my face. “I know I look horrible.”
“No.” She stands back to look me over. “Skinny, with gray roots, but not horrible.”
I tug at my hair and bend over laughing. Seeing Laney, feeling her arms around me, is like a shot of adrenaline and love in the same syringe. I’ve missed her so much. Needed her so much.
Izzy gets out of the car and hangs back, suddenly seeming shy.
“Izzy!” Laney throws her arms around her and hugs her so hard that she lifts my daughter off the ground.
Haley gets out of the car, but she just stands there. I move my head, indicating she should join us.
“I’m so glad you came,” Laney bubbles to Izzy. “I’m so glad you didn’t let her leave you home.”
Haley slowly comes around the car.
Laney lets go of Izzy and turns to Haley. She smiles, and in her smile, I see such a mix of emotions. She’s sad and happy and angry with Haley, and so glad to see her still in one piece.
“What?” Laney opens her arms. “You too old now to hug me now that you’re almost eighteen?”
Haley smirks and walks over and gives her a brief but genuine hug.
“I’m glad you came. I mean it,” Laney tells her before letting go of her. She turns and claps her hands. “So grab your stuff.” She eyes Izzy. “Your cat, wha
tever, and come on inside. Garret and I were thinking about a walk over to Farmer’s Ice Cream. Anyone else interested in ice cream?”
“Yes!” Izzy squeals, jumping up in the air and fist pumping. “I told Mom we should go to Farmer’s.”
Twenty minutes after dumping our bags and leaving the cat in Garret’s room, we’re headed for the ice cream shop, only three blocks away. Izzy and Garret, a year older than Izzy, walk ahead of us on the sidewalk. I can hear them talking about lizards and why they’re the best reptile. Laney and I walk behind them and Haley brings up the rear. Liam, a freshman in high school, is at a friend’s, staying the night after a track meet.
“So what’s the deal with Ben?” Laney asks me quietly. “Is he coming?”
“I don’t think so.” Just saying it makes me so sad. I can’t believe that when I asked him to come, telling him things with Haley were even worse than we first thought (if that’s even possible), his response had been to say he’d have to check with work.
“Izzy!” A girl leans out the window of a car that’s stopped at the traffic light ahead of us and waves.
“Megan!”
I recognize the blondie now. It’s Megan, a girl Izzy’s age, from down the street from Laney. The last two summers, when we’ve come for vacation, Izzy and Megan have hung out. She comes from a nice family. Her mother, Elaine, has always been so warm and friendly to our family. Last summer, we attended a barbecue in their backyard.
“What are you doing here?” Megan shouts.
I can hear someone in the car telling her to put her seat belt back on.
“Visiting Aunt Laney!”
“Come tomorrow!” Megan hollers as the light turns green and the car pulls away.
Izzy turns around to face me. “Can I, Mom? Can I go to Megan’s?”
“I don’t see why not,” I answer. “We’ll check with her mom tomorrow.”
We all start walking again. I glance over my shoulder. Haley’s still with us.
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