Good Daughter (9781101619261)

by Porter, Jane

  “Send a note with her next time when she’s that late.”

  “How late was she?”

  “At least fifteen minutes. Closer to twenty.”

  “But I only kept her a minute or two.”

  Shelley shrugged. “Just telling you the excuse she gave me.”

  Kit nodded and returned to the table in the staff room as the bell rang. Polly’s eyebrows arched. “What did Shelley want?”

  “That new freshman, Delilah, is going to be a challenge.” Kit grabbed her lunch bag, tossed it, and put what was left of her Coke in the fridge.

  “What did she do?”

  “Told Shelley I’d kept her, which is why she was fifteen minutes tardy to PE.”

  “Did you keep her after class?”

  “Just for a minute or two. If that.

  “I don’t know,” Kit continued as they left the staff room and walked through the office and out into the hall. “There’s definitely something going on with her.”

  The first bell hadn’t rung yet, so the hallway was still empty. Their footsteps echoed on the tiled floor.

  “I don’t think this is the right school for her,” Polly said, keys jingling in her hand. “She’s not even trying in math. Hasn’t turned in a single homework assignment yet.”

  “She hasn’t done much in my class either,” Kit admitted. “But I can’t tell if it’s because she doesn’t understand the assignments or if she’s overwhelmed—”

  “Or if she just doesn’t care.” Polly’s lips pursed. “I’m thinking she doesn’t care.”

  “I wouldn’t go there yet,” Kit said. Delilah was obviously struggling. But with what? “She’s still brand-new.”

  “I won’t coddle her. This isn’t a public school. You have to do your work. You have to keep your grades up. And you have to follow the rules.”

  Saturday morning, while doing laundry, Kit found herself thinking about Delilah, which made her think of Michael, who was the last person she wanted to think about. She didn’t like Michael. Didn’t trust him at all.

  And Delilah…what was the deal with her? She was puzzling, too.

  Michael had said he didn’t get along with Delilah, and looking at the girl, Kit could see why. Michael was clean-cut, Mr. Corporate, and Delilah was surly, and moody and emo, but then, she was a teenager. Teenage girls were chock-full of hormones, and fifteen was notoriously difficult…

  So was Delilah to blame for the problems between her and her stepdad? Or was Michael being the problem? Hard to say at this point, but Kit was interested in finding out.

  By noon, though, her attention was diverted away from Michael and Delilah to Meg’s and Sarah’s texts about the cruise. Kit hadn’t even thought about packing for the trip yet, but Meg and Sarah were demanding to know what she planned to wear for the formal night, and if she’d take a costume for the theme night, and whether it made sense to invest in a new swimsuit and cover-up for the pool.

  Before long Meg and Sarah added Cass to the group messages, and then Mom. Soon Kit’s phone and e-mail in-box were swamped with messages about shore excursions and weather forecasts and Dramamine for seasickness. Cass was worried about continuing reports of violence in Mexico and Sarah was nervous about Boone taking the kids ATV riding in Cabo. Mom wondered if any of them had heard from Brianna yet and when she’d be arriving in California. This prompted another flurry of e-mails that now included Brianna, asking her for her flight number and the date and time of her arrival.

  Because of the time difference between California and Africa, they didn’t hear from Brianna until Sunday. Kit saw the e-mail in her in-box just as she was walking out the door for the 8:30 A.M. Mass at St. Margaret Mary. She paused to read the message and ended up never making it to church.

  Apparently her fraternal twin had been sick ever since Christmas. That’s why she hadn’t come home after all. But Brianna being Brianna hadn’t wanted to worry her family, so she was only now sharing her “adventure.”

  Kit had to read the e-mail three times to understand the facts, as Brianna had cleverly glossed over the pertinent ones in her brief, cheery mass e-mail, explaining that she wouldn’t be able to join them on the cruise since she was still recovering from a crazy night in Namibia in the company of a button spider.

  I have a lot in common with Little Miss Muffet, Brianna added, but sadly my little spider, when he sat down beside me, didn’t scare me away. He just climbed in my pants, and bit me on the ass, and I’ve been on IV antibiotics ever since.

  Brianna ended her e-mail saying she was finally back home from the hospital and “almost well” but tragically not strong enough to travel, and she hoped that they’d have a great cruise without her.

  After the third reading, Kit glanced up to the top of the e-mail to see all the addresses Brianna had included and there was Mom’s. Marilyn was an early riser and she would have seen it by now.

  Kit reached for her phone and called her but got her voice mail. She left a message. “I got Brianna’s e-mail. Can’t believe she’s been so sick. Think I should go to the Congo instead of on the cruise so I can kick her butt.”

  Apparently everyone else in the family was having the same thought. Dad, Meg, and Tommy all offered to get on a plane and head to Africa to make sure Brianna was okay. Kit looked up flight options but it was Tommy who actually reserved a ticket.

  Brianna’s humor deserted her when she learned that in less than twenty-four hours a concerned family delegate, most likely Tommy, would be en route to see her. ABSOLUTELY NOT, she e-mailed them all in another mass message. DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT, she continued shouting (yes, just like that, in caps) that she would disown all of them, her entire Brennan-Roberts-Walker family, if even one of them barged in on her when she was trying to rest in the privacy of her own home.

  Brianna’s group e-mail devastated Mom, and so Meg shot Brianna a curt (private) e-mail telling her that this wasn’t the time to be selfish when Mom had so little time left. Brianna responded (in a group e-mail) that she was perfectly aware that Mom’s time was limited, and thanked Meg for reminding her, saying she didn’t know what she’d do without her to depress her and make her feel like shit.

  Kit was still reading—and cringing from—Brianna’s brutal response when her phone rang. She knew without looking it was Meg calling. “I was just reading the e-mail,” she said to Meg as she answered.

  “What’s wrong with her?”

  “She’s been really sick.”

  “But why send that e-mail to everyone? Why not just send it to me?”

  “Because Bree was making a point. She doesn’t want us there, doesn’t want us fussing. And this is her way of making us back off.” Kit sighed, thinking of Bree in her little apartment in Kinshasa, Congo’s capital. “And you know, it’ll work. Everyone will back off. They’ll leave her alone. And she’ll become invisible all over again.”

  “It’s like she doesn’t want to be part of the family.”

  Brianna had gone to Africa as a medical volunteer when she was twenty-six. She’d just earned a graduate degree in infectious diseases and had joined the six-week program to get some practical field experience before taking a job with a hospital in Miami. But she never returned. She cashed in her airline ticket, applied for a permanent job in Congo, and stayed. “I just think she’s been gone so long now that she forgets what it’s like to be part of our family.”

  “She makes it hard to love her.”

  “Yeah,” Kit said quietly, thinking of her twin. “That might be intentional.”

  Hanging up, she made herself a cup of tea and returned to the living room, with the stack of notebooks piled high on the coffee table. It’d been two weeks since she last read student journals, which meant she had dozens to review today.

  The student journals were quite personal. Some students wrote very little. Some wrote a lot, filling page after page with teenage anger and angst, hopes, dreams, and irritations. The sophomores were the most arrogant. (They’d survived their freshma
n year and thought they’d made it.) Juniors were focused on getting into college. Seniors could taste college. And her freshmen…her freshmen felt everything so intensely.

  Kit identified with her freshman and sophomore students. Their adolescent emotions burned razor sharp, fueled by hormones and intense wants and needs. Love. Hate. Fear. Desire. They all wanted to be somebody. They all craved something. Attention. Sex. Validation.

  Kit understood. There were still so many things she wanted, things that were becoming impossible dreams.

  Summoning fresh energy, she settled down to read, scribbling notes in the margins here and there, adding a smiley face or an exclamation where appropriate. She was moving swiftly through the freshmen journals when she came to Delilah Hartnel’s brand-new notebook. It was black, and plain (why was she not surprised that Delilah had chosen black for her notebook color?) and contained just the introductory paragraph Kit had asked her for three days ago.

  Miss Brennan,

  You asked me to tell you about myself. You asked about my family. I’ll tell you. My name is Delilah Hartnel. I’m fifteen. And I’m wonderful. My family is wonderful, too. My mom and stepdad are the happiest couple I know. They are so much fun to be around. We have a great time together and we like to move a lot. We moved a month ago from Bakersfield, after moving from Houston, after moving from Mineral Wells, Texas, where I was born and where my grandpa still lives. But now I live in beautiful San Leandro and go to this great school in Oakland and every morning I wake up and think, I’m so lucky. I’m the luckiest person I know.

  Kit stopped reading and pursed her lips, stifling a sputter of shocked laughter. She could see why Michael would describe Delilah as mouthy. She had fire. Attitude. And from what Kit knew of Michael, he wouldn’t like that.

  Kit studied Delilah’s handwriting a moment, noting how the girl wrote in a jet-black felt tip with dark smudges and exclamations with words underlined. Teenage girls thrived on drama, but Kit sensed that in Delilah’s world, the drama was real. She and Michael didn’t get along, and Kit imagined that her mother, Missy, was caught in the middle. Not a comfortable situation for any of them.

  Kit touched the scrawl—I’m the luckiest person I know—thinking that Michael wouldn’t like his stepdaughter’s journal entry. But then, he’d already made it clear that he didn’t like her.

  After a moment Kit took her pen, a blue ink gel that wrote practically effortlessly, Tell me about Mineral Wells. What was it like? Do you miss it? Do you miss your grandfather?

  Abruptly she lifted her pen, considered what she’d written, wishing she could ask the questions she was most curious about—where Delilah had gone to school for the past month, why her parents had chosen Memorial for her, and how she felt about her mother reconciling with her stepfather. But she didn’t ask.

  This was Delilah’s journal. Delilah’s story. And Delilah would share when she was ready to share.

  Delilah wasn’t having a good day, but then, when were Mondays ever good days? Today was worse than usual, though. Howie had left late last night for a trip, which meant that Mama overslept this morning and Delilah ended up missing her shower, breakfast, and her normal bus. She arrived at her stop to see Bus 57 pulling away, and by the time the next bus arrived, she was already twenty minutes late.

  Sister Elena spotted her in the office waiting for a tardy slip, and lectured her on the importance of being organized and on time.

  Grimly Delilah headed off for her first class, math, arriving in time to be handed a test but not having time to complete it.

  By the time she reached her third-period class, English, her stomach was growling loudly and the kid behind her laughed. Mortified, she slid lower in her seat, chewed on her thumb, and watched Miss Brennan pass the stack of graded journals back, returning them to each student’s desk.

  Delilah bit a hangnail, feigning boredom, not wanting to act like she cared about this class, or Miss Brennan, because who knew how long she’d be here? Howie might put his fist through Mama’s face and knock her teeth out again and then they’d be packing up and moving somewhere new again. Someplace where no one knew them. Someplace where no one could call the cops and say Missy Dempsey has a black eye and is missing one of her nice white front teeth.

  The black spiral-bound notebook dropped onto the corner of her desk and Delilah didn’t look up until Miss Brennan had walked on.

  She was dying to open her notebook and see how Miss Brennan had responded to her first entry. Would the teacher realize she’d been ironic? Or would she read Delilah’s entry and think, Ah, lovely, Delilah has such a lovely life?

  Delilah’s upper lip lifted, curled. Adults were so stupid. So oblivious to what was right before their eyes. Only most people didn’t pay attention because they didn’t want to know. Because if they knew…if they saw…then maybe, just maybe, they’d have to get involved.

  With a careless flick of her wrist, she flipped the notebook open to the first page with her introduction and Miss Brennan’s response. Tell me about Mineral Wells. Do you miss it? Do you miss your grandfather?

  Hot emotion filled Delilah’s chest, licking at her heart, making her hurt, making her sick.

  Mineral Wells was small and poor and in the middle of nowhere but it was home. It was who she was and what she’d always known. But then Howie came along and convinced Mama that better things were waiting elsewhere. Fewer fights. More money. Happier times.

  Delilah picked up her pen and set it to the page. I hated Mineral Wells until I found out that other places are worse. Like Bakersfield. We were only there four months, thank God, because that place sucks. It’s ugly. And smells like shit. Even the sky is brown.

  She paused to read what she’d just written.

  And then other images of Bakersfield flashed to life. Images of Mama’s jaw swollen and her fingers crushed, broken. Images of Mama hushing Delilah, telling her not to cry and not to argue with Howie. Telling her that fighting back would only make things worse. Better to just take it. Better to just let him get it out of his system because tomorrow everything would be better. Tomorrow things would be good again.

  Liar.

  Delilah clenched the Bic pen so hard it snapped in her fist, black ink splattering her palm.

  Miss Brennan was passing down the aisle on the other side of Delilah’s desk and paused. “Need a pen?”

  Delilah kept her eyes on the tiny ink splatters puddling across her pale wrist. “No, ma’am. I have another one.”

  Miss Brennan moved on and Delilah wiped the wet ink across the open journal with her wrist, smearing the whiteness of the paper with black.

  Serves the page right. Nothing escapes life unscathed.

  Furious, Delilah yanked the page from the spiral-bound notebook and crumpled it up.

  A girl next to her looked up at the ripping sound. “You can’t do that to your journal. You have to leave all the pages in.”

  Delilah stared at the girl with the red velvet headband, dark eyes, pale skin, and glossy brown hair. She had that money look about her. Delicate little watch. Long straight hair. Little pearls in her ears. Definitely rich. “I don’t care,” Delilah said, shutting the notebook and shoving it in her backpack. “It’s a stupid assignment anyway.”

  “Journals are ten percent of your grade.”

  “So?”

  The girl’s forehead furrowed ever so slightly before she shrugged and muttered, “Whatever. Be a loser.”

  And then bad got worse when Miss Brennan assigned them scenes from Twelfth Night, and partners, too, telling them they had two days to rehearse before performing their scene in front of the class.

  Of course Delilah’s partner would be the Little Rich Girl with the red hair band. Delilah was going to say something to Miss Brennan, but Kendra, her spoiled-rich-girl partner beat her to it. Miss Brennan, though, refused to assign her someone else.

  Delilah watched Kendra with the perfect hair flounce back to her seat and waited for her to sit down before glancing over
at her. “I didn’t want you either,” she said, biting yet another hangnail and spitting it out.

  Kendra shuddered. “That’s gross.”

  “I know,” Delilah answered, peeling off another tiny strip of skin and rolling it between her teeth.

  “You’re disgusting and messed up.”

  “Thank you.”

  “It’s not a compliment.”

  Delilah’s eyes met Kendra’s and held. “Says who?”

  “I do.”

  “And who are you? No one.”

  Tuesday, Delilah and Kendra had to sit off in a corner and rehearse their lines. Kendra refused to look at her, so they read their lines to the storage cabinet. Delilah didn’t mind. She didn’t want Kendra to like her. Wasn’t interested in making any friends. It was so much easier moving when you had nothing, and no one, to leave behind.

  Delilah sauntered to PE, arriving a minute later, but Miss Jones had to be a hard-ass and make her run two extra laps for tardiness, and then two more for having attitude. Delilah told her she wasn’t having attitude, so she had to then do ten push-ups. She couldn’t do even ten girl push-ups, which made a bunch of the kids laugh. So Delilah got mad, tripped one by accident, which Miss Jones said wasn’t an accident, and assigned Delilah a three-page paper—typed, double-spaced, Courier font—on respect.

  Due tomorrow morning before school started.

  By the time Delilah stepped off her bus and walked the four blocks to her house, she was in a foul mood. Mama didn’t help things by shouting at her when she entered the house to get started on her homework right away.

  Delilah went to her bedroom, slammed and locked her door, and threw herself onto her bed. She hated Memorial High. Hated Kendra. Hated Miss Jones. Hated everyone.

  An hour later she sleepily opened her eyes to the sound of loud knocking on her locked bedroom door. “Dee. Dee, what are you doing in there? Open the door.”

  Delilah slowly opened her eyes and turned over on her back. She stared up at the ceiling, chilled. She’d had the weirdest dream. It’d been so real. Shivering, she reached for her bedspread and pulled it across her body.