“Actually,” she said to me, “why don’t you give me your number? You never know.” She reached into her purse and started digging around.
“Okay.” I stepped out into the street and crossed over toward her.
“Hold on a sec,” she said as she pulled out her phone and started fiddling with it. “I’m not near as fast as you kids are with these things. All right, there.” She started typing. “Okay, Lucy. Go ahead.” Then she looked up at me.
Thomas’s mother had startlingly blue eyes. I guess I just hadn’t been close enough to notice them before. Between those gorgeous azure things and my father’s pale blue ones, there was no way Thomas was not going to have inherited his enviable peepers.
“Your number?”
I told her, and she punched it in, stabbing at the phone with the index finger of one hand the exact same way my own mother did it, the same way I was always telling her not to—she needed to use her thumbs, I always said; that’s the way it was designed.
When she was done she dropped the phone back in her bag. Thomas was still standing by the car but he got in when his mom did.
“See ya.” He waved as he pulled the back door closed.
I watched the car back out onto the street, swing away from the curb, and disappear as it turned onto Prospect Avenue. I figured it was the last I’d see of them.
I was wrong.
A week later, right at the end of summer, my phone rang. I did something I hardly ever do when I don’t recognize a number—I answered it.
“Lucy?” the voice said.
“That’s me.” I was a little leery.
“This is Katharine Eaves. Thomas’s mother.”
It took longer to respond than I intended. But finally I managed to get something out.
“Oh,” I said—eloquent, right?
“How are you?”
“I’m good. I’m just hanging around in my room.”
“Oh, that’s nice. I’m sure it’s a lovely room.”
“It’s not, actually,” I blurted out. “I mean, it’s totally fine. It’s just not anything all that special.” I didn’t know why I was saying all this.
“So, Lucy,” she went on, “you still up for a little babysitting?”
“Oh,” I said again. I realized I had still been expecting her to yell at me. “Sure, no problem.”
“Great, Thomas would enjoy that. How’s next Tuesday afternoon?”
I told her that next Tuesday afternoon was fine.
“Do you know where Lincoln School is?”
“I went to school there when I was his age.”
“Oh,” she said. “Of course.”
There was a short pause that I had no idea how to fill.
“Well, Thomas is just finishing up his basketball day camp, so . . .”
“Got it,” I told her.
“So if you’d just pick him up and take him back to the apartment for a few hours until I get home, that would be great.”
“I can do that,” I told her.
“Do you need to ask your parents if it’s all right?”
“No, that’s fine,” I assured her. “They’re good.”
“Okay,” she said. “Then I guess we’re all set.”
She asked if I had her phone number and I told her that I did; it showed up when she called.
“Oh, of course,” she said, and sort of laughed a little.
I told her I’d text her after I had retrieved Thomas and we were on the way back to their place.
“That would be perfect,” she said.
The following Tuesday I waited outside Lincoln School. I hadn’t been back there since I graduated. I suppose it should have felt strange that Thomas was going to my old school, sitting in those same beat-up desks that I had, drinking from that same grungy low water fountain on the second floor that I used to drink from, but somehow it didn’t. He gave me a big wave as he came through those big metal doors. I texted his mother and we headed back toward his home.
Thomas and Katharine lived up on the second floor. You entered into a big room, a combination living room, dining room, and kitchen. Four windows overlooked the street and the park beyond. Thomas wanted to practice his dribbling skills in the parking lot outside, and had to go to his room to get his basketball. “I’ll be right back,” he said, and ran through one of the two closed doors at the far end of the apartment.
“Okay,” I called after him. “Take your time.”
The place had a nice feel. It was neat and clean, but not fussy. It was a place where people lived. There was a huge couch that looked like it would be comfortable to fall into and watch a movie, with a large, squishy ottoman in front of it. The art on the walls was nice, but nothing fancy—a painting of fields and flowers, and an old poster for a movie with Charlie Chaplin, whoever he was. A black-and-white photograph showed a man kissing a woman; her head was thrown back, and he had a cigarette between his fingers. They were in a European city, maybe Paris—it had that kind of feel. Between two windows there was a full bookshelf. It wasn’t in perfect order, but the books looked like they’d been read, or at least looked at, recently.
I walked back to the kitchen area, past a small table with one wooden chair on each side, and took a glass from the open shelves. I filled it at the sink—I didn’t want to open the refrigerator. I took a huge swallow of water and wandered toward the view. I glanced out the window, exactly the way Thomas’s mom no doubt had done to keep an eye on him, the same window from which she must have first spotted me. My gaze drifted to the bookshelf beside me and I caught sight of a tall, thin hardcover book. I couldn’t believe my eyes.
That’s a ridiculous expression, I know, but in this case it was true—I actually couldn’t believe it and had to pick up the book to make sure. It was the same one I had as a kid, about the Japanese farmer. Their copy looked as well read as mine. I flipped through it to take a look at the paintings, but then I started to read.
The story was about an old farmer whose horse ran away one day. His neighbor came over to offer condolences. Such a thing was very unfortunate, the neighbor said. The old farmer nodded his head slowly and replied to him, “Maybe.” The next day the horse returned, bringing with him two wild stallions. The neighbor saw this and came over to congratulate the farmer on such good luck. “Maybe,” the old man replied. The next day the farmer’s son climbed up on one of the wild horses and was thrown off and broke his leg. The neighbor came by to offer his sympathy. “Such bad luck,” he said. “Maybe,” the farmer answered. The day after that, the army came to draft all the healthy young men to fight in the war. When they saw the farmer’s son with his leg in a cast, they didn’t take him and went on to the next village. “What good luck,” cried the neighbor. “Maybe,” said the old farmer.
I never really understood the story all that much when I was little. Maybe it wasn’t actually a kid’s book.
Outside, Thomas wanted to work on dribbling between his legs and behind his back. He started to walk from one end of the paved area to the other, bouncing the ball between his legs with each step. My job was to count each successful pass through his legs until he messed up—a typically dumb boy’s game. At first he made it three steps before he kicked the ball. Then he got up to six, then ten, and then eleven. He got to nineteen three times but couldn’t break the twenty mark. He was really concentrating, I had to hand him that. Then in one turn he got a good rhythm going, I could tell right from the start. I counted along.
“. . . eight, nine, ten . . .”
You could see he felt it too. He started to grin.
“Concentrate,” I called to him. “. . . thirteen, fourteen . . .”
He was slapping the ball back and forth with authority now. The smile was gone. He was the picture of focus.
“. . . sixteen, seventeen . . .” I must confess, I started to get really excited. It was just a stupid game, but damn, he was going for it.
“. . . eighteen, nineteen, TWENTY . . .” I shouted out.
&nb
sp; He kept dribbling. He got to twenty-five, then thirty. He got to thirty-seven before he kicked it.
“AW!” he yelled. But he was thrilled.
“Thirty-seven!” I shouted.
We both jumped toward each other and slapped a direct hit high five. It made a sharp, satisfying snap. I’m not sure who moved first, but we leapt into a quick hug. He squeezed me pretty hard with a little grunt; my arms wrapped around his sweaty little back for a second before we let go.
I hadn’t felt this childishly happy and satisfied since I don’t know when. My face hurt from my grin.
The late-summer sun shone down on us. There was a slight breeze moving through the leaves on the trees. Thomas was now trying to twirl the ball up on his fingertips. It kept falling off after less than a second. He was going to need a lot more practice to get any good at that. When the ball spun off his finger, it bounced away from him. He had to chase after it almost to the curb. When he looked up he saw someone—someone I had seen just a second earlier—come striding up the road.
He was back from Utah.
“Hi-ho!” Simon called, waving both of those skinny arms over his head like he was signaling for a ship from a desert island.
“Hi-ho!” Thomas called back. He ran to Simon and gave him a high five. Then he turned to me. “It’s the Sime-ster.”
Both Simon and I laughed.
Maybe having a little brother wasn’t the worst thing in the world.
Maybe.
Acknowledgments
My deep gratitude to Elise Howard, who kept asking for more until she didn’t—I could not have wished for a finer, more supportive editor. Thanks to Eileen Lawrence for handling the book with such elegance and to Michael McKenzie for getting it out there with passion. I love what Erin Fitzsimmons did with the cover art and design, and a big thanks to Dan Janeck, who gave the book much more than just a cursory once-over. My appreciation goes to Brunson Hoole for his thoughtful oversight, to Sarah Alpert for taking care of lots of moving parts, and to Elisabeth Scharlatt for welcoming me into the Algonquin family so graciously.
Thank you to David Patterson for representing me with such quiet commitment and care.
My thanks to Susan Dalsimer, who read very early drafts of this book and offered strong encouragement when it was needed. I am beholden to my first teen reader, Alexandra Wilhelm, who reassuringly promised me that Lucy sounded just like her friends. A big nod goes to Joanne Steglitz, who read an early version of this book with great care and offered sage advice.
Thank you Sam, Willow, and Rowan, whose spirits permeate these pages and inform every character. And my deepest gratitude goes to Dolores—there really isn’t much without her.
BRIAN HARKIN
Andrew McCarthy is the author of the New York Times bestselling travel memoir The Longest Way Home. He is an editor at large at National Geographic Traveler magazine. He is also an actor and director. He lives in New York City with his wife, three children, two fish, and one dog. Just Fly Away is his first novel. You can find him online at andrewmccarthy.com or on Twitter: @AndrewTMcCarthy.
A well-read life begins here.
Visit AlgonquinYoungReaders.com for more information on Algonquin Young Readers titles, including
Book Excerpts
Original Author Essays
Character Sketches
Author Q&As
Extended Author Bios
Educator Guides
Reading Guides
Activities
And more!
And connect with us online:
Follow us on twitter.com/AlgonquinYR
Like us on facebook.com/AlgonquinYoungReaders
Follow us on AlgonquinYoungReaders.tumblr.com
Published by
Algonquin Young Readers
an imprint of Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
Post Office Box 2225
Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27515-2225
a division of
Workman Publishing
225 Varick Street
New York, New York 10014
© 2017 by Andrew McCarthy.
All rights reserved.
eISBN 978-1-61620-711-3
Just Fly Away Page 18