The Leaving Year

by Pam McGaffin

  “They fit okay.”

  Her angry eyes fall to my loafers, which aren’t so shiny anymore. They have creases where my foot bends, and the right toe has a scuff. There’s a pause. She rubs the side of her head with the tips of her fingers. The bills remain scattered around her.

  “What did you have for lunch?”

  “Spaghetti. But I wasn’t all that hungry.” Now that we’re off the subject of shoes, I think I’m in the clear. I’m wrong.

  “I suppose you spent all the money I gave you even though you didn’t eat.”

  “I ate some.”

  “I can’t afford to buy you food you don’t eat, Ida! I’m not sure I can afford the food you do eat.” She holds her head in her hands and I hear the whimper of her crying. I’m beginning to hate that sound.

  “Maybe I should just starve myself to death!” I run upstairs to my room and slam the door. Then I kick off my shoes and throw them at my closet. They bang against the door and drop to the floor. I hope Mom hears every thud. I pull my blouse over my head without undoing the buttons and hear something crinkle. Oh, yeah, the note from Grandma. I take the piece of paper out of the pocket and read, “ISAIAH 41:10 and 13 and CORINTHIANS 4:16-18. For the service. Love, Grandma Grace.”

  I set it down on my nightstand. A service, as in a funeral? I picture our family, all dressed in black, gathered around Dad’s grave while Father O’Neal talks about how great and kind he was. But how can you have a grave for someone who’s been lost at sea? Do they just put up a stone with nothing under it? Maybe that’s why they have memorials for fishermen, to make up for the empty graves.

  I’m still thinking about this when Mom brings my dinner up on a TV tray two hours later.

  “Are we having a service for Dad?” I ask.

  The meal is a peace offering. She’s made my favorite: pork chops, Tater Tots, and applesauce. I sit up in bed and she places the tray across my lap.

  “Why? Are people asking?”

  “Yeah, Grandma.” I point out the note on my bed stand. “Dena gave that to me at lunch.”

  She reads it and rolls her eyes. “Grandma hasn’t said anything to me, but that’s no surprise.” She sighs. “Like I don’t have enough to deal with.”

  I watch her tear up the note and toss the pieces in the trashcan by my dresser.

  “I didn’t see anything suggesting Bible verses. Did you?”

  I don’t say anything, but I kind of like being in on Mom’s secret, for a change.

  “Anyway, I came up to apologize.” She moves my stuffed animals and sits down on my bed. “I don’t mean to take my worries out on you. I’m just a little scared right now.”

  I suspect she’s more than a little scared, otherwise she wouldn’t admit to being scared at all.

  “I know,” I tell her. “Me too.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Ballast

  Heavy material placed in the hold of a vessel to provide stability

  My shoes just took some breaking in. School is more comfortable now too. Well, except for the gymnastics unit we’re doing in PE. Fortunately, I’m not the only klutz in there. Kathy couldn’t do a handstand if her life depended on it.

  My tragedy doesn’t come up again, with her or with any of my other ninth-grade friends. Most of them seem to have overcome their fear of talking to me, and some have even joined Dena’s orbit at lunch. I’m more than happy to let my cousin hold court while I eat my low-calorie sack lunches: carrot and celery sticks and sandwiches light on the mayo. I’m determined to lose weight, but I don’t make a big deal of it around Gerry. Her face fell when she saw that I wasn’t buying the school lunches anymore. Now she just sneers at my “rabbit food” and tells me I’m not fat.

  I could kiss her for saying that. Speaking of wanting to kiss people, I have yet to have a real conversation with David, but I see him in the halls and we’ve exchanged hellos, which is better than nothing.

  “Does your nana get here soon?” Dena asks, checking her painted nails for a chip. Today they are dark coral.

  I nod since my mouth is full of sandwich and I don’t want to spit food. Mom’s mom, who I call Nana, is coming this Tuesday and will be staying with us through Thanksgiving. I can count on seeing her once a year. Either we go to Montana or she comes here, but never for this long. This time we get her for two whole months.

  MOM calls her mother Kooky Kathleen, but even she seems to realize that we need to bring some life back to the house. Just preparing for Nana’s visit has helped her mood. Today when I get home, she actually hums as she prepares the spare bedroom. I help her put fresh sheets on the mattress—white with yellow roses to match the walls.

  “Ida, get that corner would you?”

  I pull the fitted sheet around the end so it’s tight and smooth. Then I help her fluff the pillows, shake out the gold throw rug, and cut chrysanthemums from our garden for the top of her dresser. When we’re done, the room’s so pretty I want to move in myself.

  I’M in school when Nana arrives. I come home to the sweet smell of cinnamon and cloves, and Nana running in from the kitchen wearing one of Mom’s aprons and an oven mitt. Her hair has changed color since I saw her last. It used to be light brown streaked with gray. Now it’s orange.

  She gives me a giant hug. “Let me look at you,” she says, holding me out at arm’s length. “What a beauty you’re becoming!”

  “Thanks.” I hug her back and the smell of cloves hits me harder. My mother is stretched out on the couch with a book in her lap, looking more comfortable than she’s been in weeks.

  Nana and I talk about high school, miniskirts, and Lady Bird Johnson’s wildflowers. She’s going on about how we need more color in our lives when I smell something burning.

  “Are you baking something?” I try to be delicate about it.

  “Uh-oh.” She rushes off to pull a tray of very dark brown cookies from the oven. “I thought you’d like an after-school snack.” She flips the cookies upside down on a cooling rack and hands me three that aren’t completely black on the bottom. “Charcoal’s good for you. Absorbs gas.”

  I’m always so hungry after school that I’ll eat almost anything, including things that aren’t on my diet. Grandma’s cookies are hard to bite into but the molasses taste isn’t bad.

  As I sit at the kitchen table eating, I can’t help staring at her hair.

  “It came out a little too brassy, even for my taste,” she says. “Some things you shouldn’t do yourself. Clairol Nice ’n Easy, my fanny.”

  I laugh.

  “Oh, I brought you a belated birthday present. Have your mother show you what’s in that cardboard box in the living room. It was too bulky to wrap.”

  The box sits on the floor next to the couch where Mom is reading. She watches with anticipation as I walk over and kneel down next to it. Inside are books. Most of them are old, slightly musty hardbacks, with embossed titles in silver and gold. I pull them out one by one. Pride and Prejudice, The Scarlet Letter, Treasure Island, The Swiss Family Robinson, Little Women, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and The Railway Children. There are also two new paperback books with funny names: The Phantom Tollbooth and From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.

  Nana comes in from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron. “I was wondering what to give you now that you’ve outgrown trolls and stuffed animals, and your mom suggested her old books. To think those have been sitting in my attic all these years! Well, all except for the two new ones. The saleslady at the bookstore recommended them.”

  Mom hands me the book she’s reading, Jane Eyre. “This is yours too,” she says. “It was my favorite, but I loved them all.”

  I get up and give them each a hug. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome,” Mom says.

  “That should keep you reading for at least a week,” Nana adds.

  I grin. “I’ll try to make them last.”

  “You are your mother’s daughter. I had to yank books out of her hands to
get her to go outside. Not that I have anything against reading, mind you, but kids need to run around and get dirty.”

  “Oh, she does a fair amount of that too.” Mom winks at me.

  A small gesture, but that wink warms me to the core. I read. I run around. And I’m becoming a beauty. I don’t really believe that last one, but I want to hug my grandmother for helping my mother see that I do have good qualities.

  NOW I look forward to coming home, if only to discover what Nana’s cooked up, whether it’s slightly burned baked goods, thick soups full of mystery seasonings, or plates heaped with crackers and cheese and peanut butter and celery—protein for growth, celery for nerves. Mom doesn’t mind. They make the perfect pair. One likes to cook but not clean. The other likes to clean but not cook. Between the two of them, the house feels lived in again.

  The other day, I walked in the front door to find Nana using all our dining room chairs to untangle a big shopping bag of leftover yarn she brought. Each chair appeared to be wearing a thick, brightly colored woolen belt, and the effect was so cheerful I wanted her to leave them that way. But she had other plans. She hopes to make us an afghan before she leaves. “I’ll have to knit like the wind,” she said. I thought she was exaggerating, but she wasn’t. Her needles move so lightning fast that I could stare at them for days and never figure out exactly what they’re doing. So she gave me a lesson, slowing the process down into steps so I could see that knitting is just row upon row of interlocking loops. She even gave me my own yarn and needles so I can practice, but my hands are slow and awkward. And, anyway, I’d much rather watch her.

  While Nana’s cooking or working on the afghan, she listens to my mother. After weeks of mostly silence, the dam holding back Mom’s emotions has given way, releasing a torrent of talk. They don’t have these conversations in front of me. They go into the kitchen and close the swinging door behind them. But that door doesn’t latch, so I can pretty much hear what Mom and Nana are saying if I stand with my ear cocked up to the line of light between the door and the frame. What I’ve learned from this eavesdropping is that, more than anything else, Mom is afraid. I’m afraid, too, but it’s just a sensation of panic that comes and goes like fever spikes or hiccups. Mom’s afraid of specific things, like bills and debt and the prospect of having to get a job to support us. She’s afraid of me coming of age without a dad. She’s afraid she’s not up to being a working, single mother. And she’s afraid of being alone.

  “But you’re not,” Nana points out. “You have us.” I can’t make out Mom’s response to that, but I can hear Nana loud and clear. “And you have Ida. Let her help out, share the burden. It will be good for both of you.”

  Listening to what I’m not supposed to hear, I learn that I have a powerful ally in my grandmother. Funny how understanding skips generations.

  IT’S late on a Saturday night, and I just came downstairs for a glass of water only to find my way to the kitchen blocked. So I’ve taken up my usual position behind the door, ear to the opening. Mom and Nana are drinking wine, and Mom’s making no attempt to keep her voice down.

  “Ida doesn’t know,” she says. “She thought Steve walked on water.”

  “That’s probably for the best,” Nana says.

  What’s for the best? That I don’t know? Or that I thought my dad walked on water?

  “One more reason not to have a funeral,” Mom says.

  “Honestly, you think the women are going to come up and introduce themselves? Besides, there would be so many people there, it wouldn’t matter.”

  “That’s what his folks want. A big Catholic whoop-de-do! Well, I won’t be pressured! They’re nothing to me. They never liked me. To hell with ’em.”

  “They’ve lost a son, honey,” Nana says.

  Mom doesn’t say anything to that.

  “If not for them, then for Ida,” Nana adds. “She needs to say good-bye to her father. It might be good for you, too.”

  I hear a cupboard bang, then footsteps.

  “I can’t.” Mom’s voice cracks. “I can’t have a funeral when I’m not even sure he’s dead.”

  What? Did I hear that right? She’s not sure Dad is dead? Does that mean she thinks he’s still alive?

  I peer into the crack, waiting for her to say more. She’s right next to the door, her body blocking the light. But she doesn’t say more. She pushes. Hard.

  A silver flash. The room goes white. I fall back. My face, I can’t feel it. Something warm and salty runs into my mouth. I touch the wet. Blood.

  Mom gasps and drops down next to me. “Grab a towel!” she yells to my grandmother. “And some ice!”

  The trip to the car is a frenzied blur of words and arms and hands fluttering about me, holding me up, pushing me forward. My nose throbs under a cold and bloody tea towel. I nearly throw up as Mom and Nana ease me down onto the cold vinyl of the backseat. Nana folds her sweater for a pillow to keep my head propped up. Then she gets in the backseat with me and continues to hold the towel of ice to my nose while Mom drives.

  At the hospital, we’re led back to a curtained-off space with a bed and a sink and anatomy charts on the walls showing people front and back without skin. A young doctor shines a light in my eyes and tells me to follow his finger as he moves it from side to side and up and down. He examines my head and neck and has me tilt back so he can stick a tube up my nose and look inside. It hurts more than the little bit he says it will. Once he’s satisfied that my head’s okay and my nose took the brunt of it, he says there’s not much he can do until the swelling comes down.

  THE pain pills the doctor prescribed give me weird dreams. I am sifting through sand, trying to find Dad in the granules. Not a drop of water anywhere. When I wake up, my mouth is so dry that my tongue is a thing apart, the tongue of a shoe. In another dream, Dad’s telling me a story about clams. I interrupt him to tell him he’s supposed to be dead, and he just keeps talking. The dream is so real, I wake up thinking my waking life was the dream, that Dad never was lost or drowned. The delusion pops like a soap bubble, and I mourn all over again.

  The next couple of days and nights melt together in a fuzzy half-sleep. The afternoons, when I should be in school, are the worst. I can’t read my books because the pain pills make me too drowsy, so I watch soaps—One Life to Live, All My Children—even though the characters are too dramatic to be believed.

  Nana and Mom take turns bringing me ice to pack on my nose and moist, non-chewy, non-crunchy food to eat. Nana insists I eat lots of broccoli, which she cooks and mashes into a paste that makes me glad I can’t taste anything. “It’s high in vitamin C, great for healing.” She also starts some home remedies for my bruising. After all that ice, I enjoy the hot washcloths she puts on my nose, but I’m not so keen on the soaked cabbage leaves and crushed parsley.

  “You’re getting the green-glop treatment,” Mom says, making me laugh. It hurts to laugh. She looks at my nose without looking at me—the cotton tubes caked with blood that are sticking out of my nostrils, the red-purple bruise curling below both eyes. “I think the swelling’s come down.”

  We go to our doctor to reset my nose. This time, when I’m told it might hurt, I brace myself. The pain makes my eyes water.

  “Young bones heal quickly,” he says. “But it was a bad break, so she’ll have a slight crook in her nose.”

  Nana says it gives me character, which I guess is a good thing, but I’d rather not have it—the crook, that is. Mom feels so bad about the accident that she lets me use her makeup before going to school, but no amount of foundation can hide the rainbow of colors under my skin. Funny thing is, way more people come up and ask me about my nose than ever asked me about my father. Apparently, a hurt you can see is much easier to talk about than one you can’t. I don’t tell my friends what I was doing behind the door. I don’t tell Mom, either, and she doesn’t ask. She’s probably hoping I didn’t hear anything, or else that I’ll forget what I heard. But I plan on asking her, when the time’s right, wh
y she thinks Dad might be alive.

  CHAPTER 6

  Heel

  The lean of a vessel to one side or the other while maneuvering or sailing

  It takes about two weeks for the bruises to fade away. Not so the memory.

  Mom’s in our basement defrosting the freezer box. Her ponytail wags from side to side as she chips away at the ice. On the floor beside her is a pile of frozen lumps, the last of the fish and all that sympathy food we’ve yet to eat.

  “What is it, Ida?” she asks without turning around.

  I walk around her so she can see me. Her skin is flushed and slightly puffy around the eyes from bending down, but her expression is open, not angry.

  “You know when I broke my nose?”

  “How could I forget?”

  “Well, I heard you and Nana talking about Dad.”

  I wait for her to volunteer something, anything. She stands up but doesn’t say anything.

  “You said that he maybe isn’t dead.” There, it’s out.

  She bites her lip. One rubber-gloved hand balances on the edge of the freezer. “Ida … you’ve got to stop taking things so literally. That’s not what I said or what I meant.”

  “But I heard you!”

  A stray tendril of hair falls into her eyes. She fumbles with her rubber-covered fingers to get a hold of it and tuck it behind her ear. “I know you’re grieving,” she says. “So am I. But I think this is wishful thinking on your part.”

  Am I really hearing this? How can she pretend she didn’t say what I clearly heard her say? How can she act like I’m the crazy one?

  “It’s not wishful thinking on my part! Maybe yours.”

  The slow shake of her head, her eyes, half-lowered in pity … the lie. Damn her!