The Opposite Of Tidy

by Carrie Mac

  Was her mother healed, as Kendra was claiming? Junie didn’t think so. She knew that it would take more than a couple of months and a celebrity at your back to change the dysfunction that had accumulated over so many years. But Nigel had given her hope, assuring her that if her mother kept working with the psychologist she might very well go on to live a normal life.

  Normal life.

  What was that?

  Kendra put a hand on Junie’s knee. “A penny for your thoughts?”

  Junie glanced beyond the lights to the rows and rows of shadowed heads. It wasn’t normal to be sitting on the set of one of the world’s most famous talk shows. It wasn’t normal to have a mother who’d been locked in her grief for so long, finding comfort in packages from the Shopping Channel and other people’s garbage left in the alley for her to take home. It wasn’t normal to have a dead brother you didn’t know about. Had forgotten about. A little boy who had been born and loved and then buried in the ground, and buried a second time under all of the trash Junie’s mother had stuffed into the great big hole of sadness.

  “Tell us about what it’s been like for you,” Kendra prompted her. “How has it been to grow up in a house like this?” She gestured behind them, to a photo on an enormous screen. It showed the basement, with its teetering archives of garbage.

  “Hard.” Junie couldn’t find the words. She felt suddenly very private about it all. She wanted to take her mother by the hand and lead her away from the stage, out through the fire exit and into the blazing California afternoon. She wanted to get a taxi to the airport and get on a plane back home. She wanted to go home. For the first time. To her house. Because it was finally a home. She should be there. With her mother. Not here.

  “Tell us more.” Kendra was giving her a sympathetic smile, leaning forward, her elbow cocked on the chair’s arm, chin resting on her fist. Earnestly being her famous self. “Tell us what it was like for you.”

  Junie looked for the camera that was trained on her. She realized that she didn’t actually have to open her soul to the world. There was no way that Kendra could take back her mother’s transformation now. She wasn’t obliged to describe the years of sadness and shame about the state of her home and the state of her mother. Junie blinked a couple of times and then said, “I always wanted my mother to be happy. And she is now. And that’s all I have to say.”

  Her mother reached for Junie’s hand with one of hers and for the box of tissue with the other.

  The rest of the taping seemed to go quickly. Kendra asked her a couple more questions, to which Junie answered again, “I just wanted my mom to be happy.” Kendra gave up on Junie then and focused solely on her mother, bringing Nigel into the conversation halfway through. The show took its shape, without Junie, and that was fine by her.

  Afterwards, Kendra was cold to her, not saying goodbye. Not offering one of her trademark hugs or even one last smile. She gave Junie’s mother one last hug and shook her hand, too, snubbing Junie altogether.

  “Thank you, Marla, and all the best.”

  “No, no,” Junie’s mother said. “Thank you. I can’t even begin to tell you how much—”

  “Okay, you take care now.” Kendra was looking past Junie’s mother at one of her producers, who was waving her over. “Safe trip home.”

  “I am so very grateful,” her mother still gushed, oblivious. “So many people don’t get this second chance.”

  “Okay, kids.” Charlie swept in between them, letting Kendra escape. “Let’s get the two of you on your way back to your charmed life!”

  The Kendra Show and Kendra herself were done with them. Moving on, or having already moved on, to the next bleeding-heart story, the next headline. The next people to exploit. Anger turned Junie’s insides molten, but she kept her mouth shut. Exploited or not, she and her mother were better off because of it.

  “They’re busy, Mom.” Junie kept her voice low, restrained. “Let’s go.” She was afraid if she started to talk she’d turn on Kendra, hollering across the soundstage that she was an opportunistic leech, feeding off people’s misery in order to stuff her bank account. And while she believed that, she also believed that Kendra left a lot of good behind her, so she kept her trap shut and steered her mother toward the dressing room.

  Wade met them at the airport that evening. He had two bouquets of flowers, a small one for Junie and an enormous one for her mother. On the way home, her mom sat in the front and talked about the show and the trip, about all the shiny, glossy people in L.A., the smog, the city that never fell quiet, not ever. Every once in a while, Wade would glance back and give Junie a little smile. Each one warmed her, like small sparks to her heart. She was glad to be home.

  When they got back to the house, Wade came in too, following Junie into the kitchen, where her mother was rummaging around in the tea cupboard, newly organized with everything needed for making a pot of tea all in one place. The house still had a certain ruined smell, but Junie hoped that, in time, that would fade.

  “Peppermint?”

  Junie grinned. This moment was so ordinary. So normal. This was life, lived normally. As it should be.

  “Actually, Marla,” Wade clasped his hands under his chin, “I was hoping that I could take Junie out for a little bit.”

  “It’s a little late to be going out, don’t you think?”

  “Well, actually, I was hoping to take her to Chilliwack for the night—”

  “Absolutely not!”

  “Mom—”

  “Scout’s honour, nothing fishy about it.” Wade held up three fingers and placed his other hand over his heart. “Tabitha is coming too. And Ollie and Lulu. I’m running out of time on my term project for English and I really need to finish the filming so I can get to the edits. The weather tomorrow is going to be perfect. We’ll have mist, or at least Jeremy says so. That’s what we’ve been waiting for to finish.”

  Her mother knew about the Virginia Woolf project. Tabitha as Vanessa, Junie as Virginia, they’d all been out there for several entire Saturdays but had never spent the night.

  “You’re wondering why overnight, Mrs. Rawley, and it’s a good question. The sunrise with the mist. It’s perfect for the scene in the river. I scoped it out. Spectacular. I thought it’d be easier to spend the night. We’ll be with adults. And Tabitha will chaperone. You know she’s up to the job.”

  “That much is true.” Her mother poured the boiling water into one mug, instead of the teapot, which meant that she was going to let Junie go.

  “I can go?”

  “It’s so late.” Her mother lifted her eyes to the clock hanging over the dining table. It had hung for years in Junie’s grandma’s kitchen, and then had been lost in the basement chaos, only to be found and restored while The Kendra Show was there. Again, Junie felt her heart leap. So much normal, all of a sudden . . . she could hardly contain herself. “I suppose. But separate rooms—”

  “Mom! Please.”

  “Please nothing. I’ll call and make sure they know my wishes. Got it?” She glanced sternly at Junie, then at Wade.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Wade said for the both of them. Junie was too embarrassed to say anything. This new, more attentive, more involved mother would take some serious getting used to.

  “And call me when you get there. And don’t let yourself get too chilled if you’re going in the river. And be careful.”

  “Thank you, Mom! Thank you!”

  Junie ran upstairs to get a few things. She passed the room where Thomas had died. It was a guest room now. The Kendra Show designer had furnished it with a new bed, and a comforter that played on the burgundy walls and the custom drapes. Three square picture frames hung above the bed. In them were black-and-white shots of Thomas. Nigel had helped her mother pick them, and then had sent them away to be restored and blown up. He’d had a set made for Junie’s father, too. When the photos had shown up at his place, he’d called and spoken with Junie’s mother for over an hour. Now they were in counselling toget
her, talking through what they had not even been able to mention just weeks before. Junie wasn’t naive. She didn’t think her family would ever go back to the way it was. And she didn’t want it to, anyway. But it was nice that they were being human to each other. Gentle, even. Even if it was years overdue.

  This was an adult room now, maturely decorated, but Junie could see Thomas there if she closed her eyes and took herself back. She wasn’t sure if it was a memory or a creation of her mind, but she could see the blue curtains dotted with clouds, the crib with the bird mobile above, the little baby kicking his chubby legs, turning his head to look at her as she stood on her tippy-toes, fingers gripping the wooden slats.

  There was a moment while The Kendra Show was there that Junie had known things were going to be okay. The camera crew had been wedged into the corner of the room, right about where there was now a small leather chair sitting at a smart angle, a reading lamp leaning over from behind. Nigel had been at her mother’s side while she went through boxes of old books. She’d slowed down, wanting to keep most of them.

  “You can’t keep this much,” Nigel reminded her. “You need to get rid of at least 90 percent of everything in this room, 90 percent of everything in this house. I’m going to give you five minutes, and I want you to get what you want from this room.”

  Junie’s mother just stood there, looking around, a book in each hand. “I can’t.”

  “Four minutes.”

  “That’s not enough time!” Panic filled her voice. Junie stood in the doorway, wanting to go help her, but knowing better. Her mother had to go through this on her own. “I can’t!”

  “Three minutes, Marla. Think. What in here is truly important to you?”

  “Thomas,” she whispered at once. “But he’s gone.”

  “He is gone. You’re right. He’s not here any more.” Nigel softened his tone, but persisted. “Your house is burning down, Marla. You have a minute to get out of here, what do you take?”

  She looked at Junie just then, her eyes clear, her gaze solid, expression warm. “Junie. She’s all that I would take. Everything else doesn’t matter.”

  Junie and Wade drove along the highway, not saying much. Lulu and Ollie and Tabitha sat in the back. Lulu and Ollie shared a pair of earbuds, heads together. Tabitha had fallen asleep five minutes into the trip.

  It grew even darker as they left the city behind them, crossing the bridge, the traffic thinning on the other side, stars dotting the sky over the farmlands. Wade fiddled with the stereo, and on came Patsy Cline, singing “Crazy,” the same song that had played when he’d first driven her home. He glanced over at her and smiled. Junie took his hand, and held it while they passed under the slices of light from a highway exit ramp.

  This was what it was like, she thought, when things were normal. Room to breathe. Room to screw up. Room to be right. Room to wonder. Patches of darkness, and patches of light, and the moon overhead.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thank you to my agent, Suzanne Brandreth! Here’s to our first project together. And thank you to my editor, Lynne Missen, for all the work you’ve done to make this book shine. Many thanks to Mary Ann Blair, for her care and attention to the manuscript, too. Thank you to my mom for providing free child care so I could write, and thank you to Esmé for going along with it. Thanks also to Jack, for being the best partner and personal chef and co-parent. Without her, I could not write at all. And thank you, Hawksley, for being an easygoing baby who happily nursed while propped on my lap while I wrote.

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  THE OPPOSITE OF TIDY

  RAZORBILL

  ALSO BY CARRIE MAC

  Title Page

  Copyright

  FOR MY MOM,WHO SHARED HER

  Prologue

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Acknowledgments