Tune It Out

by Jamie Sumner

  “Nicotine patch. I’m trying to quit.” She laughs then, which turns into a cough. “Amelie went and threw out all my smokes.”

  “Amelie got you to quit.” Emphasis on “Amelie.” I’d been trying to get her to stop smoking for years. Cigarettes cost more than food. But I guess Amelie has more say than her own daughter. I can feel tears start to build in the corners of my eyes. I stare into the latte until they go away.

  “Yeah. I’ve been crashing on her couch, working shifts at Christy’s.” She leans forward so fast it rocks the table. “Trying to save up to get back to you, baby girl.”

  It sounds true. Sounds like something she would do. I can see her in black pants and a white pressed shirt at Christy’s. Talking good tips off people and pocketing them in an envelope marked Lou fund. But something doesn’t add up.

  “Why didn’t you just ask Ginger for money? If that was all that was keeping you away?”

  She leans back now and shoots a glare over at the next table where Melissa and Ginger are politely ignoring each other by typing on their phones.

  “Because I don’t need a handout from my sister.” She can make “sister” sound like a dirty word. Seems like taking in your only daughter is a pretty big handout to me. I push through it.

  “But then we could have been together sooner. Then it wouldn’t have taken eight weeks for you to get here.”

  “Lou, honey, I love you, I do. And that’s why I knew it was best for you to live with family while I got myself together.” She starts peeling apart the soggy tissue on the table. “But you’ve got to let me do things my way in my own time.”

  “But it’s not just about you!” I yell, because the anger that’s been building for weeks now has finally sparked. I am blazing mad. “It’s not just your time. It’s my time and Ginger’s time and Dan’s time and you didn’t even call!”

  This was a huge mistake. Being around Mom is like being around a blaring siren. She is one of my triggers. I’ve got to get out of here. I stand with my back to her. “I’m ready to go.”

  “Lou, baby, don’t be like that,” Mom says to my back.

  “Take your guitar.” I nudge it away from me with my foot, still not looking at her. “I don’t want it anymore.” I’m waiting for Ginger, who is frozen, to get a move on already.

  Melissa calmly checks her watch and says, “You’ve still got seventeen minutes. You sure you’re done, Lou?”

  Behind me, I hear Mom sigh.

  My hands are shaking inside my pockets, and my heart feels cracked wide open by this woman who I can’t even talk to anymore.

  “Yeah. I’m sure.”

  * * *

  It’s quiet in the car, just when I don’t want it to be. Ginger’s lost in her own thoughts about Mom. I fiddle with the radio, but there’s nothing but Christmas music. I’m already sick of it, and it’s just the beginning of December. Ginger keeps twisting her hands on the wheel like it’s a towel she’s wringing out. She’s driving too slow. Old people in Cadillacs are passing us and honking. I don’t say anything. I just want to get away. I don’t care how long it takes to get there.

  Mom’s gone on the patch and got a job and saved up money. But she’s still the same. She’s still opinionated and pushy. I tug at my jacket zipper. How are we supposed to live together when we can’t even have a conversation? Do I even want to live with her again? I’m confused and angry and also weirdly relieved to see that she’s okay, which makes me angry all over again. I let my head rest on the cold window and close my eyes until we get home.

  When we pull into the drive, I spot Well sitting on the front steps hugging a giant trophy like a teddy bear. Ginger gets out of the car and walks inside with a tiny wave good-bye to us. Mom wasn’t exactly Miss Congeniality to her, either. I can’t believe she’d treat her own sister that way. Then again, it’s Mom, so I guess I can.

  I take a seat next to Well.

  “Nice trophy.”

  “I’m thinking of naming her Stella.” He pats it like a dog. “I’m still gonna quit next year, though.” He pulls his hat down low over his ears. “How’d it go with your mom?”

  Through the open door, I glimpse Dan folding Ginger up in a hug so tight I can barely see the top of her head.

  “Let’s take a walk,” I say.

  I grab a blanket from the back of the Lexus and lead Well around the house, across the lawn, through the back gate, and into the forest. He starts humming the opening lines from the play, “Into the woods,” and then cannot help but sing the rest at full volume.

  By the time he’s done, we’ve made it to the little wooden bridge. The stream is lined with snowy leaves on either side. We lean on the rail, and I open the blanket to wrap it around both of us, leaving an inch or so of space between our shoulders.

  “So?” he asks again.

  “Mom was Mom,” I say finally.

  “Which means?”

  “Which means I don’t know how to be around her anymore. Or if I want to. She’s doesn’t even know me—not the me that’s here and does theater and has friends and oh—”

  “What?” he asks.

  “I didn’t even tell her about the iPhone.”

  “So tell her. Tell her all that stuff.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why?” He kicks a stick off the bridge and into the water. We watch it disappear behind us.

  “She doesn’t know about the SPD. She won’t even believe it’s a real thing.” I sigh.

  “So tell her.”

  I throw the blanket off.

  “It’s not that simple!”

  “Why not?”

  “You know, I don’t like this version of you—this Mr. Miyagi from the Karate Kid version of you.”

  “Ohhh, look at you quoting movies at me. And an Asian reference, at that.”

  “Ha. Ha.”

  We sit down on the bridge facing each other. The snow sinks into my jeans. Well is still in his tennis shorts. He’s got to be cold. How do I explain our old life, living in a truck and falling asleep to the sound of our stomachs growling, to a boy like Well, who has a theater in his basement and a credit card on file at Little Caesars?

  “You don’t know how we used to live. Things are too different now. I can’t talk to her. It’s not like talking to you or Ginger. She’s a force, Well. A force.”

  Well leans toward me, too close for comfort as always. “So are you, Lou. You’re like… a superhero who doesn’t know your own strength. You just have to test it out. And who better to test it out on than your mom?”

  I like the me that Well sees. But Well is good at make-believe. I picture myself turning into Wonder Woman and lassoing Mom and holding her still until she sees me, really sees me.

  “The key here,” he says, leaning in close and settling the blanket back around my shoulders, “is to remember that with great power comes great responsibility.”

  “Wow. You actually had me up until that last bit.” I throw some snow on him.

  Well shrugs. His favorite move.

  13 The Show Must Go On

  In the dark like this, being in the middle school gym is kind of like being underwater, with nothing but the dim strips of glow-in-the-dark stage tape to light my way. Sounds are muffled. I have to fight the urge to hold my breath. I keep looking up and around for a source of light. It’s the very last rehearsal, and it’s not going well.

  Mary Katherine still doesn’t know all her lines, and Lacey, our Rapunzel, keeps tripping on her wig. And though I’m not going to be the one to tell him this—because Mrs. Nicky has already done it enough—Well is overacting. Big time. He keeps yelling his lines.

  “Maxwell! Stop flirting with the crowd. Forget about the crowd. Sing to your wife, sing to your undiscovered child. Sing to anything that will make you wipe that smarmy car salesman look off your face!” Mrs. Nicky is having a rough night. She turns to me at our table in front of the stage. “Lou, where is Evan? We need our Prince out on stage in two minutes.”

  “I
’ll find him.”

  I don’t have to find him. I know where he is. He’s in the hallway with Mary Katherine. He is always somewhere with Mary Katherine. The only time he ever makes it onstage in time is when he’s supposed to be in a scene with Mary Katherine. Unfortunately for all of us, this is not one of those scenes.

  * * *

  Rehearsal ends at nine. Not because it’s over and perfect and we’ve nailed our last run-through, but because the parent’s association says all extracurriculars for middle schoolers have to be over by nine, a fact that Mrs. Nicky threatens to appeal at least once every rehearsal.

  “Hey, we’re headed to Sonic. Want to come?” Geneva asks on our way out to the parking lot. She’s left her witch makeup on. It works on her.

  “Cherry limeades and tots FOR THE WIN!” Tucker cheers. He’s been working double time trying to get the set finished, which means double dinners plus snacks. They both hop in Geneva’s mom’s SUV, and Jacob climbs in after. Jacob has maybe the best theater job. He can hide up in his AV box away from the chaos. But it must have been a rough night for him, too, because he’s got that glassy-eyed look he sometimes gets after playing too many video games.

  Well lifts his eyebrows at me before stepping up onto the foot rail of their car. It’s his “Whaddya say?” face. But I spot Ginger’s Lexus under the glow of the farthest parking lot light.

  “Nah, there’s something I’ve got to do. Thanks, though.”

  “Oh, mystery. I’m intrigued. Tell me about it tomorrow.” It’s not a question, and he doesn’t wait for an answer before piling in with the others. I follow their headlights all the way down the drive and really, really wish I could just go get a slushie at the drive-in instead of what I’m about to do.

  Twenty minutes later, Ginger and I pull up to the Cracker Barrel off Cool Springs Boulevard. Melissa is already there, leaning against a black Camry.

  I point to the car.

  She shrugs. “I do sometimes have to transport kids, you know. Can’t ride my bike all the time,” she says, and then nods toward the porch. “Your mom’s up there. Take whatever time you need. She’s on a red-eye flight to California tomorrow night. This might be the last talk before your court date in a few weeks.” I look at Melissa in her black leather jacket and biker boots and wonder, not for the first time, how in the world she got into social services. But I’m glad she did.

  Mom’s the one who called this meeting. At first I told them I couldn’t go, that I had rehearsal. But Andrea talked me into it. After the botched meeting at the Good Cup, I told her I thought Mom was one of my triggers, and she said I had to approach her like that, then. Find a way to cope, work on a strategy, like a five-second rule for Mom. “Because as with any trigger,” she said, “you can’t just ignore it and expect it to go away.” I beg to differ, but I guess we’ll see.

  Mom agreed to meet wherever and whenever. She said she just wanted ten minutes. I don’t know what she thinks will change in that amount of time.

  I walk up the steps and then down the long row of rocking chairs all decorated with Christmas bows and holly. My stomach is knotted into a complicated pattern of nerves. I briefly consider making a break for it, stealing Melissa’s car, and fleeing to Sonic.

  Too late. Mom spots me from where she’s sitting in the very last rocker with two to-go cups in her lap. Her hair’s up in a high ponytail like a teenager. She looks tiny in that big chair.

  I sit down next to her. She hands me one of the cups.

  “Hot chocolate.”

  “Thanks.” I hold it but don’t sip. Drinking it seems like giving in somehow.

  “And look—” She pulls a green-striped candy cane from her pocket. “They had the spearmint kind. Your favorite.” She starts to hand it to me and then stops, like maybe that’s the wrong thing to do, and I realize she’s nervous. I’ve never seen her nervous in my life. My stomach unknots a little.

  “So, Ginger tells me you’re in a play!”

  “I’m not in the play. I’m helping direct. Wait. You talked to Ginger?” Since when have they made up? I grip the cup tighter. I thought Ginger was on my side.

  “Yeah, we, uh, had a good chat. It was good. It’s been a long time.”

  “Because you made it a long time.”

  Mom kicks off against the porch to get her chair rocking and sighs. “Yes, because I made it a long time.”

  “Because she wanted to help you, help us, get a fresh start.”

  You can’t just smooth over the past months with hot chocolate and candy canes, I want to add. But Mom holds up a hand before I can get there.

  “Listen, Lou. I know I haven’t always made the right choices. Lord, I know that. But I thought I was doing what was best for you. You were skittish, even back then. No one but me could settle you. I thought it would be better if it was just the two of us.” She twists the lid of her hot chocolate.

  Skittish. Jittery. Sensitive. Shy. Mom had so many words for me, except none of them were right.

  “But you left home when you were pregnant. Was I ‘skittish’ before I was even born?”

  She sighs again. I don’t care. That’s what happens when you’re finally allowed to ask questions after twelve years. It all comes out at once.

  “That’s a whole other ball of wax. Me and my parents had a complicated relationship. I know what it’s like to grow up in that house. I didn’t want that for you.”

  “At least we would have had a house.”

  Mom jerks her rocker to a stop. “That’s enough now,” she says in her old voice. The bossy one. That’s better. No more fake politeness.

  “You think it was an easy choice? I was basically a child myself. I want you to hear something.” She leans back in her chair and starts rocking again, like she’s settling in to tell me the truths of the universe. “People won’t give you an inch, so you’ve got to take a mile. I was taught to fight my way up in this world, and that’s what I wanted to teach you. You’re a fighter, Lou.”

  That stupid word again.

  “I have a sensory processing disorder. SPD.” I spit it out. She puts her feet down to stop her chair, and I consider running. She squints at me. Like I’m telling her a lie. Like it’s a bunch of mumbo jumbo. And against everything I told myself before coming here, I find myself backpedaling. “That’s, um, what Andrea, the counselor at school, thinks, anyway.”

  She starts shaking her head, and now I really want to run. I can’t do this with her. She makes me feel so small and wrong. But something makes me stay. Mom’s a force, but Well told me I was a force too. I’m not the same person I was two months ago, and Mom needs to hear what I have to say. There’s no way forward now but through.

  “SP—” she starts.

  The cup shakes in my hands, but my voice is steady when I speak.

  “SPD, Mom. It means crowds and loud noises and hugs and handshakes get all tangled up in my brain, and my body can’t sort it out. I freak out. You already know that. You knew how it was for me. But you still made me do all those karaoke nights and shows at the fairs and farmer’s markets and street corners. Mom, why?”

  In our tiny world of two, she was always the talker and I was the listener. I never thought to ask why until we got separated. I assumed that however hard those shows were, she was trying to do what was best for me. I don’t think that anymore.

  She’s quiet for so long, I’m not sure what to do. I can’t tell if she’s mad or trying to think up an excuse or what. It’s like sitting next to one of those street performers who pretend to be a statue. You wait and watch for signs of life. I can hear my own heartbeat in my ears. It’s too fast.

  Finally, she speaks, and it’s so predictable, I’m mad I ever thought it could be different: “You have such a gift.” I slump down in my seat, ready for the rest. “I just wanted you to see you could make it big. Really be someone great, Louise.”

  “I never wanted to make it big, Mom. I just wanted to be with you.” It comes out ragged. I’m all fought out.
r />   Something happens then. Something I’ve never seen before. Her face falls in on itself, and she starts to cry, really cry. She’s faked it plenty of times to get out of parking tickets and stuff like that. But this is the real deal, and it makes my own throat close up, like when someone yawns and you have to do it too. I made my mom cry. She starts to reach for me, but I flinch, and she lets her arm fall in her lap.

  “Oh, my baby. I am so sorry.”

  I swallow hard. She thinks I’m done. The big revelation is over. But she needs to hear the rest, what Andrea and I practiced in her office earlier today. But it feels even scarier to say than the SPD stuff. I’m about to take a hammer to everything that made our relationship work.

  “I’m done with the shows, okay?”

  I can’t look at her after I say it. But out of the corner of my eye I see her wipe her face with a napkin. She sits, for a minute, or an eternity. I focus on the cars in the parking lot. Count the trucks. There are eight. Count the shrubs along the sidewalk. There are twelve. I feel like a spinning coin getting wobblier and wobblier and waiting to fall.

  Finally she whispers, “Does that mean you want to live with me again?”

  She listened. She actually listened! It shouldn’t be earth-shattering, but it is. I take a sip of hot chocolate to give me a second to breathe. If she’d asked me a month ago, I wouldn’t have had to think twice about it. But now all I can say is, “I—I’m not sure.”

  She plunges ahead. “We’d get a real apartment this time. Stay in one place. Make a real go of it.”

  I fiddle with my jacket zipper. This is confusing. I’m so happy she isn’t going to make me sing in front of people anymore. But I’m terrified of what it’ll be like, just the two of us again. I look at Ginger talking to Melissa by the front doors. What about her and Dan? What about Well and my new school?

  “Can I think about it?” I whisper over my hot chocolate.

  “Yes. Of course. One day at a time, baby girl.”

  We don’t say good-bye. We don’t know how. But I wave to her as Ginger and I drive away, and she waves back. I know I’ll see her again in just a few weeks, but still I have to take short, quick breaths to keep from crying as she disappears in the rearview mirror.