by Trish Doller
“I’d like to know you. If that’s okay?”
I nod. “Sure.”
We fall into an awkward silence.
“I should, um—” I aim my thumb over my shoulder in the direction of the backyard. “Theo’s expecting me at the shop soon. I should probably get ready.”
As I head for the door, Phoebe says my name and I turn back.
“Did Greg stop by?” she asks.
I consider telling her the truth so she can feel bad for not trusting me, but I shake my head instead. She looks a little relieved as I lie. “Nope.”
Chapter 15
“I love Christmas,” Kat says, as we loop sponge garland around a fresh evergreen decorated with multicolored starfish, plastic crustaceans, bleached sand dollars, and white lights. All along Dodecanese, the holiday decorations are going up today, as if we’ve crossed some invisible Christmas meridian, leaving regular December behind. The utility poles are ringed with strings of lights, a life-size plastic Santa stands outside the door to one of the soap shops, and even the pilings along the dock are circled by a glittering red-and-green garland. “The best part is the break from school, but I love the music, the decorations, picking out just the right gifts for people, and even the Christmas Eve services at church. You should come.”
The holidays have always been hit or miss when it comes to my mother. Some years she’d go all out—decorating a Christmas tree, visiting Santa, and hanging stockings near the window, since we didn’t usually have a chimney. Other years—ones I now recognize as years when she was depressed—we’d have nothing at all. Once she wore her pajamas from December 24 until New Year’s Day. My holiday feast was a packet of microwavable maple- and brown-sugar oatmeal, and by the end of the week her hair was shiny with oil and she smelled so bad I couldn’t sit beside her. I didn’t mind the oatmeal so much, but I felt like a ghost whenever she looked through me as if I wasn’t even there.
The best Christmas—also the worst—was when we lived with Frank. He took us to a Christmas-tree farm out in the country, where we chopped down the biggest tree on the lot. He tied it to the roof of the car with twine, and when we got back to the house, Mom put on holiday music. We sang along with Brenda Lee as we decorated the tree, and for Christmas Eve dinner, Frank fixed baked ham and my favorite cheese potatoes. I went to bed that night buzzing with anticipation of what I’d find under the tree on Christmas morning. But when I woke up, not even the American Girl doll whose dark brown curls and brown eyes matched mine could erase the memories of what happened in the night.
We left a month later. It was sudden and immediate because Mom was having what must have been a manic episode. I was building a snowman in the front yard when she came out of Frank’s house with our suitcases already packed. As I followed her to the car, my mittens soggy from the snow, I asked about my doll.
“We don’t have time for your stupid doll.” She slammed the trunk and snapped that I needed to get in the car before Frank came home from work because it was his car.
As we drove to the bus station, I started to cry. Mom thought it was over the doll, and she made a promise—that she never kept—to buy me a new one.
“Just like it,” she said. “Or, an even better one.”
But it wasn’t about the doll.
I was crying because I was so goddamn happy to be leaving.
“What do you want for Christmas?” Kat asks, interrupting my memories.
I want traditions. Eggnog. Peace on earth, goodwill toward man. I want to kiss Alex Kosta under the mistletoe. I want memories untarnished by ugliness. I want all of that without feeling guilty about wanting it. And I want my mom to get help—although peace on earth is probably a more realistic goal.
“I don’t know.” I stick my finger between the pincers of the plastic crab I’m holding and swing it back and forth. “Maybe I’ll ask Santa to help me design a website, so Theo will stop asking me if I’ve finished it yet.”
Kat’s eyes roll back and she shakes her head at me. “Dude, why are you still torturing yourself over learning code? This is not something you need to know, especially when the Internet is full of do-it-yourself website builders. Google it and move on. Do you want to go Christmas shopping this weekend? We could go down to Tampa after work on Friday.”
“Okay.” I nestle the crab on one of the branches. “The idea of Christmas shopping is a little—”
“Surreal?”
“I’ve never really done it before. I mean, it was always just me and my mom, and I didn’t have enough money to buy her anything.”
Kat smiles wide. “It’s kind of exciting, huh?”
“Yeah.”
“So, beside your mom, who are you going to buy presents for this year?” She wriggles beneath the tree and plugs the cord into the outlet. As I settle the last crab into place, the lights flicker on. Our ocean-themed Christmas tree is one of the prettiest things I’ve ever seen.
“Well, you, Greg, Phoebe, Tucker, Joe, Yiayoúla, Al—” I catch myself before I say Alex’s name. “And, um, maybe something for Theo.”
Kat doesn’t seem to notice my misstep. “That’s cool,” she says. “Maybe you can help me pick out a present for Nick. I’m totally stumped.”
“Sounds good.”
I gather up the empty decoration boxes and stack them in a corner of the back room. It’s about time for my lunch break and I’ve been thinking it might be time to try something other than hummus and Coke. When I come out, my grandma is standing in the middle of the shop, admiring the tree. She’s wearing a pair of jeans with a celery-green cardigan open at the neck to reveal her fine clavicle bones, and again it strikes me that I am a younger version of her.
She smiles when she sees me. “There’s my sweet girl. I’ve come to take you to lunch.”
“And me?” Kat makes puppy-dog eyes and tucks her hands up under her chin like paws. “I’m hungry, too.”
Yiayoúla pats her cheek. “Next time, Ekaterina. There are things I need to discuss with Callista.”
Kat shoots me a “what does that mean?” look and I answer with an “I have no idea” shrug, although I suspect my grandma wants to talk about Alex and his mom. I was hoping she’d forget, but it seems like she has a very long memory.
“Bring me back a Coke?” Kat asks, and I nod as I follow Yiayoúla out onto the street. She tucks her hand in the bend of my elbow and leads me to a narrow restaurant that smells of char-grilled meat and olive oil. We’re seated at a table near the back and my grandma waves off menus, placing our order in Greek.
“Today we try something different. A specialty.” She folds her hands primly on the table and gives me a look loaded with questions.
“I’m not going to do it.” I don’t look at her as I unwrap my silverware. “You can tell my dad that I’ve been seeing Alex if you want, but his relationship with his mom is none of my business.”
Yiayoúla doesn’t say anything, and it feels as if the volume in the restaurant has gotten louder. In her silence I can still hear what she wants from me. I scrape the tines of my fork down the place mat, leaving score marks on the paper as I avoid her eyes. She unfolds her napkin and places it on her lap as the waitress returns with glasses of water. It all feels so heavy.
“It’s not fair,” I say, when the waitress is gone.
My grandmother’s slender shoulders rise and fall. “Life isn’t fair.”
Fury sweeps through me the way the dust storms whirled through that tiny crossroads town in New Mexico—and oh my God, I’ve forgotten its name. How could I have forgotten already? Pieces of me are falling off, getting lost.
I put down my fork.
“I’ve had a whole life of not fair,” I say, meeting her eyes. “And then I came here and thought maybe, for once … except everyone just wants more from me than I can give. Greg expects the daughter he’s always imagined. Kat wants slumber parties and double dates. And you—you keep pushing me to be Greek when I’m not even sure what that means yet. Can’t I just be me
until I figure it out?”
“Oh, Callista, of cour—”
“Alex accepts me the way I am,” I say. “You have no right to ask this of me.”
“Ordinarily, I would agree.” Yiayoúla touches her hand to her heart. “And if you want the truth, I love the way you told me off just now. You’re a stronger girl than you’ve been given credit for, I think. But … this is not ordinarily. Evgenia doesn’t have much time, and she can’t bear the thought of leaving this world without saying good-bye to her son. And because she is my best friend, I’m going to make it happen.”
“He’ll hate me.”
“Not forever,” she says. “He cares about you for the very same reason you care about him. He’s not going to let that go.”
I think about the transient boys. The ones who didn’t really want me, let alone try to keep me. “That’s not how life works.”
“Of course it is,” she says. “The good ones are the ones who are smart enough to stick around. And despite what the rest of the world thinks it knows about Alex Kosta, he is one of the very best.” I look away and my cheeks grow warm. Yiayoúla reaches across the table and squeezes my hand with her cool fingers. “It will be okay. I promise.”
“I still don’t understand why I need to be a part of this,” I say, as the waitress approaches with our lunches. “I mean, why can’t you just take her down to the tour boat on a Sunday afternoon when he can’t escape?”
“I like the way you think.” Her smile is devious. “If you and I are the conspirators, Alex will blame us, not Evgenia. Yes. We’ll do it this weekend.”
“Great.” There’s no enthusiasm in my voice as I answer, and even less when the waitress sets a plate piled with tentacles on the table in front of me. There is absolutely no way I’m eating octopus, even if it tastes like proverbial chicken. “I’m sorry, but I really, really don’t want this.”
The waitress looks to my grandma for approval.
“Box it up,” Yiayoúla says. “I’ll take it home for later. Bring Callista whatever she wants.”
“I, um—I’ll have some hummus, please. And two Cokes.” The first time I wake up, I’m slumped over the table in the Airstream with my face stuck to a page of the GED study guide. The exam is coming up, and I’m nervous about the math segment because kindergarten addition and a battered old textbook can only carry you so far in life. I’m strong in language arts and social studies, and I’ve managed to reason my way through the science practice questions, but I’m having difficulty solving for x.
The next time I wake, it’s three in the morning and my mom slides under the blanket beside me, wrapping her arm around my waist. As I settle back into the comfort of her embrace, my sleepy brain spins her presence into something that feels like a dream. Except her hair is drenched in the scent of cigarettes, and she’s beer-breathy as she whispers through my hair that she loves me, so I know it’s really her.
“Mom, you can’t keep coming here,” I whisper back.
In the stillness between us, I hear a car drive past on the next street over and a distant dog barks once, then again.
“I always wanted hair like yours.” Her voice is soft and hoarse, her tongue thick with alcohol. She strokes my head. “So wild and beautiful.”
“If you get caught, you’ll be sent back to jail.”
“This time will be different,” she says. “You’ll see. We’ll settle somewhere nice. Maybe by the ocean. Somewhere you can make friends and maybe get a job, or even go to college.”
I roll over to face her. In the dim light, I can see the sadness wedged in the fine lines around her eyes and mouth, so I don’t mention that I already have all those things right here, right now. I press my forehead against hers. “Is there somewhere you can stay … you know, until we leave?”
I don’t know if this is truth or lie, but it feels false in my mouth. Her lips spread into a dreamy smile and my next heartbeat is spiked through with guilt.
“I had a room at a motel with someone I used to know”—she closes her eyes and her words get slow and sleepy—“but that fell through. I’ll find something, though. Don’t worry.”
“Greg is renovating a house over on Chesapeake.” Even as I’m saying it, I know this is a bad idea, but I can’t bear seeing her looking so lost and alone. I don’t want her sleeping in dirty motels with strange men. “There might be construction workers on-site during the day, but you could sleep there until, um—until we’ve got enough money to go.”
She kisses my forehead. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
Her face goes soft with sleep, and it’s here in this moment I’m overcome with love. She can’t handle jail. She needs to go to that imaginary someplace where she can settle down and not be looking constantly over her shoulder. I think for a while about the money I have stashed in the guitar. I doubt it’s enough to buy even a cheap car, but there is enough for bus fare and some food. If I give it to her, she can leave.
We can leave.
I dream I’m locked in a jail cell with thick iron bars across the front like a cage, at the end of a long gray hallway. The concrete floor is cold under my bare feet, making my toes go numb, and my too-short Hello Kitty nightgown offers no protection from the shivers that shudder through me. In the corner of the cell is the dark form of a person I can’t identify. All I know is that I am afraid.
At the other end of the hall is a door, and I can hear distant muffled conversation coming from behind it. It’s white noise, a continuous and steady sound that doesn’t waver when I call for help.
“I don’t belong here!” I shout, wrapping my hands around the bars. “I want to go home.”
The door opens and the chatter grows louder, spilling into the hallway as my grandma comes in. She’s speaking Greek as she walks toward me, but I understand every word.
“This is your home now, Callista,” she says. “We are your family.”
She morphs into my mother as she continues down the hall, the tap of her footsteps echoing off the smooth, sterile walls. Mom is carrying my guitar case and the brown tweed suitcase I threw away after it broke. Her lips are painted bright red, making her teeth look so white, and she’s wearing the sparkly barrette in her hair that she always says makes her feel like Courtney Love.
Behind her, the door swings open a second time and the chatter gets louder again for another moment as Alex enters the hall. He’s wearing his old-fashioned dive suit without the bell helmet, and his footsteps boom as his metal shoes meet concrete, the sound bouncing off the walls and hurting my ears.
“Callie, wait,” he says. “Wait for me.”
Mom stops. When he catches up to her, her arm slithers around his waist and she snuggles up against him.
“No!” Panic rises up inside me as I realize he thinks she’s me. “I’m here, Alex. I’m right here.”
“I’ve got the money.” Mom lifts the guitar case, indicating she knows where I’ve hidden my stash. “So we can leave whenever you’re ready. Go someplace nice. Maybe Colorado. You can learn to ski.”
“Alex, please.” The words come out as a whimper. A plea. “Don’t leave me.”
Without even looking in my direction, they turn back in the direction of the door. Alex walks out of his heavy boots, leaving them in the hall. His dive suit falls away, crumpling like a hollow person on the floor.
They disappear behind the door and I’m alone with my fear. Until I feel Frank’s hand on my shoulder. His smoky breath whispering that he’s going to make me feel so good.
I wake up the third time when the first light of morning squeezes through the crack below the curtain and warms the back of my eyelids. My cheeks are tight with the dried tears I shed in my sleep. It’s barely seven and my mom is gone again.
I get out of bed and open the closet where I keep my guitar. It’s there. I open the case, remove the instrument, and shake it until the rubber-banded bundle of cash appears behind the strings. My insides go soft with relief and then tighten again with guil
t for thinking the worst about my mom. I get annoyed all again when I spy a yellow page, torn from a phone book, with an ad for a pawnshop circled in red. It’s lying on top of the built-in dresser between my hairbrush and a tube of lip balm. I was hoping she’d get my computer back, not make me go buy it.
Joining my dad, Phoebe, and the boys for breakfast is comforting after an unhappy night. The heat from the stove cuts the chill from the air, and Tucker’s nonstop chatter sweeps the darkness like cobwebs from the corners of my brain.
“Big plans for your day off, Cal?” Greg asks.
The pawnshop ad is tucked in the pocket of my jeans. Even though I know I’m going to have to pay for my own computer, I’m getting it back. I pour syrup on my plate of waffles.
“There’s a first-aid class at the Methodist church. I might check that out.” It’s a half-truth. I saw a notice for the lesson in one of the free weekly papers we have on the counter of the shop, but wasn’t planning to attend until after I take the GED exam.
“Good idea.” Greg takes the syrup bottle from me. “I was thinking that tomorrow night we’d go get a pizza—just the two of us—and then go take a look at the house. They’ve made a lot of progress this week. Almost done.”
A bit of waffle stumbles on its way down my throat and I cough, my heart beating in double time at the thought of him finding Mom at the new house. And I realize—I have no way to warn her. I can only hope that she won’t be there when we arrive.
Chapter 16
The pawnshop is close enough for me to ride my bike. It’s a hole-in-the-wall kind of place, with a doorbell that sticks on the first of two notes and the dry, burnt-toast smell of old, dusty things. Inside, it’s as if someone erected a building around a yard sale: shelves and aisles overflowing with stereo systems, power tools, televisions, lawn mowers, bicycles, and musical instruments. Handguns and rifles hang on the wall behind a glass counter filled with rows of watches, rings set with a variety of gemstones, and dozens and dozens of gold necklaces. I step over the handle of a leaf blower as I look for the computer aisle, imagining my mom in this place trying to charm the broker into giving her more than he thinks my laptop is worth. She’s always loved places like these. Says they have character.