“I’m sorry,” I said.
Didi sighed. “I may have to share my disappointment with the headmaster,” she said.
I was afraid I would start to cry.
“I have to go,” I said. I waved a quick goodbye to Aaron and hurried out the gate toward the middle school a block away. I looked over my shoulder. Peter was rushing to catch up with me. He took one step to three of mine.
“What was that all about?” he asked, falling in beside me and setting the pace with gigantic strides.
“Slow down!” I panted. He gave my head a gentle knuckle rub.
Too soon we reached the middle school gates. “What happened?” Peter tried again.
“Nothing. I don’t want to talk about it,” I said.
Peter’s face closed. He didn’t like secrets.
Three WISHES
“Grandpa!” yelled Aaron.
“Did Mom call you to pick Aaron up from therapy today?” I asked, surprised to see Grandpa Ben waiting by the curb in front of the office. He winked at me.
“She didn’t want me to go in. Afraid I’ll make trouble,” he said. “So I waited out here.”
Just seeing Grandpa Ben’s white head made me feel a thousand times better. Maybe some of my complaints had gotten through to Mom after all.
“Mom should have told me,” I said. “I could have met up with Peter.”
“Go ahead. I can take it from here,” said Grandpa Ben.
We stopped at the corner bakery. I texted Peter. No answer. Grandpa Ben bought a bag of sugar moon cookies.
“I’ll walk home with you,” I said, disappointed.
“Don’t sound so happy about it,” he said, offering me a cookie.
Back on the street, he sang “Hinkey Dinkey Parlez Vous.” He went down his playlist—“Shine on Harvest Moon,” “Yes, Sir! That’s My Baby,” and my favorite, “Leena Is the Queena Palestina.” His voice cracked on the high notes, and he was hoarse the rest of the time. Aaron sang along. I didn’t feel like singing.
“The show must go on, Briana,” said Grandpa Ben. “We’re on Broadway!” We passed Danny’s Cycles and the Plant Shed and Kim’s Fruit and Veggies. We passed the Metro Diner and Wang Chen’s Table Tennis Club with the faded photos of grinning celebrities I had never heard of in the window. We came to Riverside Park. Grandpa Ben was out of breath.
“Let’s sit a minute,” he said. “You can finish your cookies.” He settled himself on a bench and turned to Aaron.
“Aaron, I have a question for you,” he said. “Do you know what a navel is?”
“A belly button,” said Aaron.
“Right, a belly button,” said Grandpa Ben. “So once there was a little boy—a perfectly normal boy except for one thing. This boy—let’s call him Henry—was born with a golden navel.”
Aaron giggled. Grandpa Ben shook his head, raising a hand in the air for silence.
“Henry’s parents loved their son, golden navel and all, but they wanted him to be like other little boys. So they took Henry to one doctor after another. And what did the doctors find?”
“His golden navel!” yelled Aaron.
Grandpa Ben didn’t crack the hint of a smile. “They found that he was perfect. But he happened to have a golden navel.”
“‘Isn’t there anything we can do about it?’ worried Henry’s parents. The doctors shook their heads. Henry had a golden navel, and that was that.”
Grandpa Ben rose from his bench and took Aaron’s hand. He and Aaron started walking past the shiny black Civil War cannons and rows of cannon balls planted in the sidewalk. Grandpa had forgotten I was there. Aaron hopped up on a cannon ball and leaped from one to the next like a goat.
“Careful,” warned Grandpa Ben.
“Grandpa, I need to ask you something,” I said. “Didi has to know by tomorrow.”
“Know what?” asked Grandpa Ben, turning to me. We walked down the stone steps toward the garden and the dog run. I sprang ahead, taking two steps at a time. Grandpa Ben paused on every step, holding on to the railing.
“If Mom is coming to Aaron’s parent conference,” I said. “If she can’t, I have to tell Didi. And you have to come.”
Grandpa Ben sighed. “Don’t worry, honey. I’ll talk to your mother,” he said, finally getting to the bottom of the stairs.
“When will you talk to her?” I said, leading the way forward. “You have to do it today.” If Mom didn’t show up, Didi would make Aaron go to a special school. We’d have to move. I’d lose Peter. Sarah M. would be his new best friend.
“Let me tell you a story for a change,” I said. “Once upon a time there was a girl named Betty.” That was a bad start. Betty wasn’t the right name. “Not Betty,” I said. “Belinda! Belinda was a perfectly normal girl except for one thing. She had more than one heart—”
“I want to hear about Henry,” shouted Aaron, stamping his foot, “not some worm girl like you!”
“Let me finish my story, Briana,” said Grandpa Ben. “Then you can tell yours. Aaron, don’t shout and don’t call your sister a worm.”
“I didn’t call her a worm!” shouted Aaron. “I called her a worm girl.”
“Forget it,” I said. “It’s not a real story anyway.”
Grandpa Ben squeezed my shoulder. I shook him off. I dug my cell phone out of my backpack. Still no text from Peter, but there was a text from an unknown number. I stared at it. TBH your story rocked, it said. It was signed The Wolf.
Neil? “To be honest” sounded like him. But he had never texted me before.
Thanks, I wrote. I tripped and almost dropped the phone. Catching it in both hands, I pressed send. “Briana, put your phone away,” said Grandpa Ben. “Look where you’re going.” I walked faster, ahead of Aaron and Grandpa Ben.
“Henry’s parents worried. They were worriers like Briana,” Grandpa Ben was saying.
“Maybe you should worry more, Grandpa,” I said over my shoulder.
“What?” asked Grandpa Ben. He was getting hard of hearing. How could Mom say Grandpa was her rock? He didn’t look like anyone’s rock.
“Nothing,” I said.
We were passing a basketball court full of boys in bright sweatbands and shorts. The players were taking random shots, warming up. I spotted one as tall and almost as handsome as Peter. He was dribbling, then twirling the ball on his finger.
“So they took Henry to one more doctor,” Grandpa Ben continued. “Well, maybe this last one wasn’t exactly a doctor. Or he just forgot to get his diploma framed and hung up on the wall.”
“Uh-oh,” said Aaron.
“This last guy brought out a tool kit full of screwdrivers. He tried each one on Henry’s golden belly button. It began to glow. Henry decided maybe he liked his belly button just the way it was. Too late. The doctor took out a wrench.”
“Uh-oh,” said Aaron again. Grandpa Ben waggled his eyebrows.
“‘I’ll loosen up your belly button like this,’ said the doctor. ‘When you get home, go straight to bed.’”
I watched a group of girls play with orange Hula-Hoops on the lawn. The circles they spun were bright against the green grass. They looked launched into orbit. It was one of Mom’s little green-eye miracles! Their hips swiveled; their planetary rings twirled. The girls shouted to one another. They belonged just where they were, having fun.
I heard the ping of a text come in. It was from Peter.
Stuck with Rebecca, it said.
Where?
Petra’s house.
Sarah M.’s house?
Yeah. Doing math.
With Sarah?
Yeah. See ya tomorrow.
It was all Mom’s fault. If she had just told me Grandpa Ben was going to pick Aaron up from therapy, Peter would be with me now instead of Sarah M.
“That night, Henry dreamed a pink puffy cloud floated into his room,” Grandpa Ben was saying, “and there on that cloud was a golden screwdriver. Henry took it and fit it into his belly button and turned it three ti
mes . . .”
Aaron pulled up his shirt, showing Grandpa Ben his belly button, and demonstrated with his finger. “One, two, three,” he said. “Whoa, you mean it worked?”
“Henry leaped out of bed, holding his golden navel in one hand and that screwdriver in the other,” said Grandpa Ben. “He called his parents, jumping up and down.”
“Like this?” asked Aaron. He jumped up high in the air three times, landing in a squat.
“Then Henry and his mother and father heard a loud noise. Do you know what it was?” asked Grandpa Ben.
“What?” Aaron shouted.
We were climbing the hill, winding back up to West End Avenue. In a little while, we’d be home. Grandpa Ben stopped walking, squinting at the sunlit Hudson River below. Aaron waited.
“That noise,” said Grandpa Ben, “was Henry’s butt falling off!”
Aaron stared at Grandpa Ben. Then he threw back his head and laughed. Grandpa Ben laughed, too. Snorts came out of his veiny nose. Wrinkles multiplied all over his face. Aaron howled like a monkey, pounding his skinny chest and stomping his feet. Grandpa Ben thumped him on the back. If he noticed I was standing there, he didn’t let on.
I scowled. Grandpa Ben thought Aaron was perfect. He thought Aaron was special. I made a wish. I wished I had a normal brother. Grandpa Ben would say I should love Aaron just the way he was, but he didn’t live with us. Except for special times like today, he picked Aaron up from school only once a week. He had never seen Aaron throw a Rock Face tantrum.
I made a second wish. I wished Aaron would throw a Rock Face tantrum right there with Grandpa Ben. Please. Let Grandpa Ben see Aaron at his worst.
Once a long time ago in Cape Cod, during one of Aaron’s tantrums, I had wished my little brother had never been born. I closed my eyes. If I wished hard enough, could my Dad heart turn time back to Before Aaron? Mom was stuck. Maybe I could get stuck, too. Maybe we could all get stuck in Before Aaron.
It was a crazy wish, but everything had been crazy since Dad died. No one had asked me if I wanted to be thirteen. No one had asked me if I wanted Aaron to be my brother. No one had asked me if I wanted to live without Dad. I clenched my fists and squeezed my eyes shut.
I made a third wish.
The EYEBALL Sisters
When we got home, the message light was flashing. Didi had called. Mom was still in bed. She had baked cookies before shutting herself up in her room. They were laid out in perfect rows on the kitchen counter.
A mountain of crusted spoons and measuring cups were piled high in the sink. The drawers and cabinet doors hung open. Mom had swept up a broken glass but had left the jagged pieces in the dustpan. Sticky eggshells were piled on the counter, which was covered in flour. The cookie sheets were brown with drips of sugar and chocolate.
“Do you want to listen to the messages before you go?” I asked Grandpa. He shook his head, staring at the mess.
“You tell that teacher I’ll come to the conference,” he said. “I’ll be there whether your mother comes or not.”
“You said you’d talk to Mom,” I reminded him. “Do you want to knock on her door?”
“I’ll knock,” said Aaron.
“No, Aaron, not you,” I said, but Aaron lunged forward, kicking over the trash can by the sink. He rapped on Mom’s door with his fist, then his foot.
“Stop it!” I said, grabbing his hand and blocking his foot with mine. He kicked me in the ankle.
“Ow, Aaron, that hurt!” I yelled.
“What’s all the fuss?” asked Mom, opening the door. She was in a pink nightgown. Her breasts peeked out like twin faces, veiled in lace. She had wrapped a white sheet below her waist. “Hi, Dad,” she said, surprised. “Is it Wednesday?”
“You asked Grandpa to pick Aaron up at therapy today, remember?” I said.
Mom blinked. I gave Grandpa Ben a significant look. He would tell Mom about Didi now. He would convince her to go to the conference. Mom would listen to her own father.
“How about a cup of coffee, Lil?” said Grandpa Ben. Stepping backward, he made room for her as she moved into the kitchen. She held herself tall, trailing her sheet like a bridal gown.
“I want some of Mom’s cookies,” said Aaron.
“No more cookies,” said Grandpa Ben.
“You can come with me, Aaron,” I said. “Come to my room,” I added, so he’d understand the prize I was offering. Aaron ran to hug Grandpa Ben goodbye, then danced ahead of me down the hall into my room.
“Tell me about Medusa,” he whispered.
“I’m not telling you that story, Aaron,” I said. “It gives you nightmares.”
“That was a long time ago,” said Aaron. “I’m older now. Grandpa always tells it.”
I didn’t have time for this. I had a job to do. I had to listen in on Mom and Grandpa Ben. “Wasn’t Grandpa’s belly button story enough for one day?”
“Grandpa always tells me two stories—at least two.”
“I don’t think I could top that first one,” I said.
“Please,” he begged. “Medusa and the Eyeball Sisters.”
“They’re called the Gray Sisters,” I said. “Perseus finds them.”
Find them, said my Dad heart. LEGO LEGO LEGO . . .
I smell coffee. Dad and I are sprawled on my blue rug. Before Aaron. LEGO pieces from two Star Wars sets are scattered around us. It’s late at night. Dad is drinking a giant cup of coffee. We got carried away, he says, yawning. Let’s just leave everything where it is and get some sleep. We’ll figure this out in the morning.
We shouldn’t have opened two sets at once. Now it’s all mixed up, I complain.
It’s okay. We’ll figure it out.
I shake my head. We’ll never get it right! I say. Tears sting my eyes.
We’ll make it up as we go along, says Dad. We’ll improvise.
He tosses a piece that doesn’t fit over his shoulder. It lands in the pile behind my chest of drawers where all the pieces that don’t fit go. Dad never worries about following diagrams.
Dad? I say. Do you think we could make a real FX-6 droid like the one that fixed Darth Vader?
Why, Beautiful?
We could make it for Grandpa Ben.
Do you think he needs a droid?
He does. He looks sad.
Dad gives me a hug. Would a droid make him happy? he asks.
FX-6 could bring Grandma back and fix her up. It could set the new grandma to live the same number of years as Grandpa Ben.
Dad shakes his head and sighs. Grief has a long tail, Beautiful, he says.
I picture Grief as a dragon with a tail five times its length, swishing back and forth, back and forth. With each swish, a building topples until a whole town is crushed.
Were those missing LEGO pieces still there behind my bureau? If I found all the pieces that hadn’t fit and put them together, would they spell out some message from Dad, some clue about how to live without him?
“Wait a second, Aaron,” I said. “I have to find something.”
“There are three sisters with just one eyeball,” said Aaron. “They pop it out and pass it. Ask Grandpa.”
“Right,” I said, kneeling down by my bureau.
Aaron plopped down on the rug and pulled off his muddy shoes. He tossed them to one side. He wiggled his toes, making the pattern of cows on his socks move. I pulled out the bottom drawer, my special spot for all the LEGO sets Dad had given me. I took the boxes out and ran my fingers along the wood. Nothing. I dragged the drawer out and scooched down, reaching deep into the darkness. My fingers grazed some puffy balls of dust, then landed on something hard. A piece left behind? Two pieces? Three, four!
I swept the pieces into my palm and pulled them out. I squinted at them. I blew the dust off. One was gray, two black, one red—random leftovers from hours I had spent on the floor with Dad building complicated things.
“What are you doing?” asked Aaron.
“Help me find some more,” I said.
>
He shrugged. “Story first,” he said.
I pulled out three more pieces. One yellow, two white. I reached in again. One green. I stared at the pieces, then arranged them on the floor in a line.
Aaron watched me.
I sorted the LEGO pieces again, this time into a circle with the blacks and whites in the middle. Nothing. I shifted the pieces into two rows: white, gray, black, then red, yellow, green beneath. It was no use. There was no message from Dad. No matter what the order, they were just little dusty squares of plastic. Thrown away. Left behind.
Find them, said my Dad heart. LEGO LEGO LEGO.
“I found them,” I exploded. “So what? What do you mean ‘Find them’? Find what? You have to tell me.”
“Who are you shouting at?” asked Aaron.
Angrily, I dumped the stray pieces into my LEGO drawer and slammed it shut. “Forget about Medusa,” I said. Aaron’s eyes were deep, the eyes of an old soul. Suddenly, he dropped to the floor and hit himself in the face, turning one cheek and then the other—slap, slap.
“Stop that,” I said. He stopped. He just sat there as still as a toy I once had, a little bird doll that climbed up the wall with suction cups until, at the same height every time, it fell off onto the floor. If you came across it that way, without having seen it climb, you would never have guessed it could move at all.
“Please,” he whispered.
I took hold of Aaron’s arm and gave him a shake. “That’s enough!” I barked. “Get up!” He made me so mad.
“Leggo!” he whined. “You’re hurting me.”
Let go? Was that what my Dad heart was trying to say? Let go, let go, let go?
“You’re a genius, Aaron,” I said, letting him go. “I give up. You win.”
MEDUSA
Aaron grabbed a towel from my dressing table and rubbed an imaginary hero’s shield with all his might. He held it up.
The Girl with More Than One Heart Page 5