(Am I one of their problems?)
(I cannot be one of their problems. I will not allow it.)
I slide the phone underneath the pillows and wrap myself back in my blankets.
It will go away on its own, whatever this is. It has to.
I will make it go away.
• • •
Even sad people have to eventually leave their beds for the most basic reason: hunger.
I have missed lunch, but there are sandwiches in the refrigerator.
I eat only because I know I must eat.
But it isn’t like I want to die.
I have heard of such things as “suicidal thoughts.” Sometimes I have even examined my sadness with that in mind:
Are these suicidal thoughts? Do I want to die?
No.
Do I want to hurt myself?
No. I am simply sad.
So it isn’t that.
But when I eat this ham-and-cheese sandwich, I am eating it like a car consumes gasoline. I am not sure I actually taste it.
There is bread, cheese, ham, mayonnaise.
I am a machine obeying my programming.
(Chew, chew, chew, swallow.)
The house is quiet. Afternoon light pours in through the sunroom and warms my toes.
I hear someone moving around in the garage and peek out the window.
Avery, painting, earbuds in, bandana tied around her head.
I cannot ever tell what she is painting. They aren’t pictures, really; they are more like the floating things you see when you close your eyes. Colors and shapes, and thick brushstrokes that cut the whole thing in two.
My hand rests on the doorknob.
Should I apologize for what happened last night?
Sorry for crying all over your shirt.
Sorry for being gross and sweaty. Sorry you lied for me.
Sorry for being such a freak, Avery.
I cannot do it; I am too frightened.
So I wander.
I could go outside; every now and then I hear one of my cousins shouting.
But . . . shouting. And sunshine, and having to talk, and answering questions: How are you feeling? Are you okay? Did you eat something? Did you throw up?
The prospect is overwhelming.
So I wander through the quiet, cool house.
The carpet is white. The walls are dark. The furniture is polished.
The piano, in the corner of the living room, is old.
I press my fingers to random keys. I don’t know the first thing about playing music, but it seems like the keys I press make a song anyway, which makes me feel a little better.
I even start to think that maybe I will go apologize to Avery. She would understand, right? She seemed to understand last night.
But then I hear a strange sound—like someone crying out in pain.
It is coming from the hallway leading to Grandma and Grandpa’s bedroom.
I have never been to that part of the house, but concern for my grandmother—as much as she terrifies me—pushes me forward.
I don’t think Grandpa is home. He has probably gone for one of his drives.
What if something is wrong with Grandma? I am the only one around.
I sneak down the hallway. It is colder and darker than the rest of the house. Family pictures line the walls, but I don’t see Dad in any of them. They are all of my aunts, their husbands, their children.
I feel like a shadow in this dark hallway, like I do not entirely exist.
Maybe this moment will change things.
I will save Grandma from whatever is distressing her, and prove myself worthy of her.
She will no longer look at me like I am a spot to be cleaned.
She will take pictures of me, and add them to this wall, right beside my cousins.
I feel a tiny tug of happiness inside me.
Then I step into her bedroom, and I see—
Grandma, sitting at her vanity, her eyes red.
Grandpa, holding a syringe to her arm.
Injecting her.
Grandma, adjusting her hair—which moves, all in one piece, sliding across her scalp.
And I understand: That is not her real hair.
It is a wig.
Medicine.
A wig, clean and white and smooth.
I was not supposed to see this.
They turn and stare at me. I must have made a sound.
“I—”
Grandpa sits on the bed and rubs a hand over his face. “Oh, Finley.”
Grandma stares at me, her lips drawn tight.
I was not supposed to see this. Was not, was not.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, and turn and run.
24
I RUN OUTSIDE, BECAUSE IT is the only safe place I can think of to go.
My cousins. They will know what to do.
They can explain to me what I have just seen.
I bypass the stone steps and slide down the dirt wall of the pit.
The Tower—there it is. There they are, painting.
Ruth and Bennett have green, Dex-sized handprints in the center of their faces. They grin at me from their spot in the dirt.
Kennedy has blue paint in her hair and looks exasperated—but less so when Cole puts his hand on hers.
Gretchen is trying to explain to Dex how the spaceship he has painted cannot be as big as the sun Gretchen has painted. It is technologically impossible. Kennedy says, “He can paint whatever he wants, you weirdo.”
And Jack . . . Jack is staring over my shoulder, a paintbrush in his hand.
Someone is following me.
I turn.
Grandpa—hurrying down the stone steps with storm clouds on his face. Staring at Jack. Staring at Cole, holding Kennedy’s hand.
Baileys. My dad’s words return to me.
The Baileys—their dad, I mean—he wasn’t a good kid. He did . . . bad things. He’s not safe to be around, and if he has kids now, I bet they’re not much different.
I wouldn’t trust them for anything. Okay?
(But you’re wrong, Dad.)
(I’d trust Jack in a heartbeat.)
Okay? Finley?
“Finley?” Grandpa is speaking. “Finley!”
I flinch. Grandpa’s voice sounds even sharper than it did in the car, when he threw the article out the window.
“Yes?”
“You and Kennedy take your cousins back to the house.”
Gretchen protests. “But, Grandpa, we were—”
“I don’t want to hear it. Get back in the house, right now.”
Dex begins to cry. Kennedy hurries away with him and Ruth. After a second Gretchen goes with them.
I cannot leave.
I am afraid for Cole and Bennett. And for Jack.
I have never seen Grandpa look like this. He is red in the face, and his eyes are made of metal. Where is my grandpa who loves Beethoven? Where is my grandpa who looks like Dad and builds tree patios and knows how to pick out the perfect batch of strawberries?
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he spits at the Baileys. “You know you are to never—never—come near this house, this property, or any of my grandchildren.”
Hearing Grandpa say hell is like hearing a clap of thunder.
“Sir,” Jack says, “let me explain—”
“I don’t want an explanation. I want you to get home. Now.”
Bennett bursts into tears, but this changes nothing. Grandpa’s face is made of stone.
“Grandpa, please, it was my fault,” I say. “I invited them over.”
Grandpa whirls around, his arm raised, and for an instant I think he is going to hit me.
Jack runs over and shoves Grandpa away from me.
Grandpa pauses, staring at me like he can’t believe what is happening. His eyes are wide; he is breathing hard. He lowers his hand, looks at it like it is not his own.
I grab Jack’s hand and put myself in front of him. Grandpa won’t hit me, he won’t h
it me, he won’t.
“Grandpa, please,” I say. “I’m sorry. They’ll go home. Okay?”
I squeeze Jack’s hand.
He squeezes mine back.
“Get out of here,” Grandpa says quietly.
None of us move.
“Get out!”
The Baileys run, Bennett crying in Cole’s arms. Jack looks back once, over his shoulder.
Now it is just me and Grandpa and the empty Tower.
Grandpa stares at it for a long time, and then rips down the Everwood banner. Cole’s signature is obvious in the bottom corner.
“I’m sorry—”
“Hush, Finley. You’ve done enough.”
“But they didn’t do anything—”
“You don’t know anything about those boys, or their family. They’re not the kind of people we associate with.” Grandpa stares at the Bailey house for a long time, and I recognize the look on his face. I have seen it many times on my own.
(Grandpa, why are you afraid?)
I cannot believe he would hurt me.
But would he have hurt my friends?
(Not my grandpa, not him, not him.)
“Get yourself back inside,” he says, “and don’t you tell anyone—anyone—what you saw today. I mean it, Finley. Do not test me on that.”
He does not have to be more specific.
I will never forget what I saw in his and Grandma’s bedroom, and what it could mean.
Avery stands at the top of the pit. She must have heard the noise. She watches me as I hurry up the stone steps and rush into the house, but she doesn’t say anything.
I am glad. There are too many terrible things I could say, if I had to open my mouth and answer her.
Grandma is sick.
I hate Grandpa.
There are no pictures of me on the wall outside their bedroom.
To them, I do not really exist.
• • •
No one makes me come down for dinner.
Perhaps they do not want me there.
Fine. That is just fine with me.
I will lie here in my bed with the window open and listen to the trees talking to me, and they will tell me everyone’s secrets, and when I finally go downstairs, I will know everything there is to know, and no one will be able to frighten me.
Not even Grandpa. Not even Grandma.
No one.
I cuddle my pillow, the one I brought from home. It smells like our apartment.
Someone knocks on my door. I do not answer.
“Finley?”
It is Grandpa. My heart pounds itself back to life, but I do not move. He cracks open the door and steps inside.
“I owe you an apology,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry I frightened you. I frightened me.”
I do not answer.
“But you can’t see those boys anymore. All right, Finley? I won’t budge on that, and neither will your grandmother.”
The clock on my nightstand ticks, ticks, ticks. “If I do—”
“You won’t,” Grandpa interrupts.
“If I do—”
“Finley.”
“Will you make everyone stop talking to me, like Grandma did to Dad?”
Tick, tick.
Tick, tick.
“Good night, Finley,” says Grandpa. His voice is a closed door.
When he’s gone, I close my eyes and listen to the trees talking.
What do I do? I ask them.
What do I do?
What do I do now?
Then I lie very still and wait for an answer.
NE MORNING THE QUEEN OF the Everwood awoke to a dark sky.
The trees around her were completely bare. She lay on a nest of brittle, gray leaves. Everything she touched crumbled to ash.
She drew her cloak about her and shivered.
Someone, somewhere was watching her.
“Hello?” she called out into the gloom.
“Your friends are not here,” came a low voice. There was a fluttering of wings, a soft, cold breeze against the queen’s skin.
A crow landed on a nearby branch, its feathers as sharp as its black beak.
The queen reached for the pocket where she kept the dagger.
It was empty.
The crow watched coldly.
“What do you want?” asked the queen.
“I want you to leave here,” replied the crow, “and never come back.”
“Leave? Leave the Everwood?”
The crow inclined its shining head.
“But why? I am the queen.”
“Queen?” The crow let out a small, rough laugh. “A crown does not make a queen.”
“But they chose me.”
“Who did? Your friends? Of course they did. They don’t know what you carry inside you.”
The queen bristled. “And you do?”
“Only you can truly know.”
“Then what are you doing here? If you’re not going to help me, leave.”
Howls, hungry and fierce, made the queen whirl. She expected to see bared teeth and glowing eyes, but she saw only trees bending in the wind. Gray leaves fell; the air smelled of smoke.
The crow perched on the queen’s knee. “Child,” it said, “they are coming.”
“Who? How can I stop them?”
With its beak the crow pulled aside the queen’s collar.
There, over her heart, beneath her skin, roiled a shifting darkness.
The queen recoiled. “What is that?”
“You know better than I do,” said the crow. Then it pecked her chest, and with each strike it drew out strings of darkness like tar from a pool.
The queen shuddered to look at this thing inside herself. She hated the sight of it.
When the crow began to gasp and heave, she shoved it away. Its feathers cut her fingers.
“It’s hurting you,” said the queen. “Please, stop.”
“It hurts me only because you are fighting me,” explained the crow. “Do not be afraid of yourself. We are all both light and dark. We are both joy and—”
“This darkness is not me,” snapped the queen. “You know not of what you speak.”
The crow regarded her calmly, and the pity on its face was too much for the queen to bear. She turned away. “Leave me, I said. You know nothing.”
“I know we might already be too late,” said the crow, and it glided away into the night.
25
WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A HART
• You look pretty even after sprinting across a forest.
• You look completely unaffected even when you are up to your eyeballs in garbage that smells like feet and rotten eggs.
• If something is wrong with you, it must be fixed.
ON THE FOURTH OF JULY, Dex cracks under pressure.
Upon questioning him, Aunt Bridget discovers that, on top of befriending the Baileys, we have also been visiting the Bone House.
When she tells Grandma and Grandpa, I am standing right there in front of them.
Aunt Bridget shoots me concerned looks I can see out of the corner of my eye, but I do not look back at her.
Traitor. I thought she loved me, and here she is, ruining everything.
Walking in on Grandma’s shot was bad, but this is worse. Grandma does not get angry or make threats. She smooths down her shirt and says, “I’m so disappointed in you that I can hardly think, Finley.”
“Candace, hold on,” Grandpa begins. “She doesn’t know—”
“Go upstairs to your room, right now.” Grandma turns away, as though she cannot stand looking at me. “We’ll speak about this later.”
But we don’t speak about it. Not that night, watching the fireworks in town.
(Everyone laughing, everyone gasping and pointing—except for me. Except for Grandma and Grandpa.)
Not the next night either.
WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A HART
• If something is wrong with you, it must be fixed. Quietly.
; • • •
It has been decided that, considering recent events, something really ought to be done about me.
It’s not that I am a bad kid.
But I am problematic.
I hear Grandma say so. Over the next couple of days, Hart House is full of whispers:
Before Finley came, our grandchildren never—never—associated with white trash like the Bailey boys. They would never have even thought of it.
Before Finley came, our grandchildren would never have wandered off into those dangerous woods. All the way back to That House, can you believe it?
“That House” is obviously the Bone House. For some reason Grandma and Grandpa speak about it in code words, but it’s obvious what they mean.
(But why wouldn’t they just say the Travers house?)
(Why do they not speak about my heroic aunts? The Hart girls: Wonder Woman times three!)
Did you know? I found Finley in the bathroom the other night, crouching in front of the toilet. She said it was a stomachache, but I don’t believe her.
How can you believe someone who has been sneaking her cousins off into the woods like a bunch of delinquents?
Do you think she got into the liquor? Those Bailey boys might have put her up to it. I wouldn’t put it past them.
That notebook of hers . . . if she’s not dragging her cousins through the woods, she’s making lists in her notebook. She has pages and pages of them.
Isn’t that a bit obsessive?
Doesn’t she strike you as somewhat . . . troubled? Gretchen says Finley writes in her notebook to keep from being sad.
What does that mean? Sad about what? Has she said anything to you? Why doesn’t she say anything?
She’s so different from us.
Lewis was always quiet too, and look what happened with him. He left us. He was never like the rest of us.
I think it would be best if—
Plus, it would get her out of her head—
And we should keep the other kids away from her, for a while—
Don’t you think?
It’s for the best.
• • •
“It” is meeting with a children’s psychologist once a week.
All I know about psychologists is that they treat people who have something wrong with their brains.
(Twelve-letter word for “Freud, for example.”)
On Thursday, Grandma sits in Grandpa’s office and tells Dad about the situation over the phone.
I sit in the hallway outside the closed glass doors and watch her, trying to read her lips.
Some Kind of Happiness Page 14