Water Balloon

by Audrey Vernick

  I hear the screen door slap shut. "Open your eyes when you're running!" Lynne screams from the porch. I wince, realizing I should have said that. Then I'm thinking, hmm, she's comfortable leaving me, inexperienced, unlicensed me, alone with her kids for weeks and she saunters outside when it's convenient to judge how I watch them? She turns to me and asks, "They're making dandelion wishes?"

  What's this? Some veiled criticism about me letting her kids spread dandelion seeds all over their lawn? It's a mess anyway. Just because she might be my dad's girlfriend doesn't mean I can just entertain her kids all day and keep them from blowing dandelion seeds and making her lawn worse.

  Did I really once think she was nice?

  She looks like she's waiting for an answer. "Yeah, they're just making wishes," I say. "Dandelions never lasted long enough on my lawn for me to make wishes. My dad's like a lawn nazi." Is she going to tell my father everything I say?

  "What'd you say, Marley Bear?" Grace asks, pulling at a belt loop on my shorts.

  "I never got to blow dandelions at my house when I was your age."

  "How come?" Grace is practically climbing me, trying to wrap herself around my leg.

  "My father's sort of a dandelion hater."

  "That doesn't surprise me," Lynne says.

  Yeah, because you know him so well.

  "No bunnies for Marley," Faith says. "No dandelions for Marley."

  "Poor Marley!" Grace hugs my leg and pats my lower back. "Is your mother mean too?"

  I laugh. "No. She's not mean." She's just away. And not that good at returning phone calls.

  "It really wasn't too bad," I tell the girls. "My grandmother always let me blow dandelions all over her yard. I made ton of wishes." I think about those wishes now, and they seem so simple—a red bike, a trip to Disney World. I should have made just one, a big one: Please, oh please, let things stay exactly as they are now.

  "We had a lot of different theories about dandelions when I grew up," Lynne says. Was her voice always this annoying? "My Aunt Bemmy always said that if you rubbed the fluid from inside the stem of a dandelion on a wart, it would make it go away."

  "Hmm," I say. The twins set off again, scouring the lawn. Grace runs alongside Faith until Faith trips her and takes the lead.

  Grace looks around, as though she's deciding whether or not to cry, then gets up and follows her sister.

  "There was another dandelion trick where I grew up," Lynne says. "Take one of the yellow flowers, Marley."

  Why is she out here today? Shouldn't she be holed up in her little office? Who's watching Jenna? I put the other flowers down and hold a perfect yellow dandelion.

  "Now hold it under your chin," she says.

  I do. She starts to look at my neck, from left to right, then back again, concentrating on something, looking at me so closely that I can't look back. I look down, but all I see is the flower.

  "They say that you can tell if the person holding the flower is in love from the reflection of yellow on her neck."

  I don't know if my neck is yellow, but I do know, without even being able to see it, that my face is bright red. Does she get off on embarrassing people? Stealing fathers away from Perfectly Good Lives and having dinner with them?

  And I'm not in love with Jack anyway. Obviously. Stupid know-it-all Jack. I'm disgusted with him.

  "We used to eat them too." Will she ever shut up? "We'd make salads, fritters, even ice cream."

  "How 'bout that?"

  Faith and Grace keep running back to pile more dandelions (and other things that are not dandelions) on top of the bunches they already handed me.

  Lynne is still droning on. "And my mother—she grew up in England—she said people there believed that if you smelled a dandelion, you'd wet your pants."

  The twins start to scream with laughter. I have never heard children laugh so hard. Grace falls down and Faith falls on top of her.

  "I'm going to get back to work now," Lynne says. "You seem to have things under control out here."

  That she could look at a pile of laughing, snorting twins and consider that under control worries me. Was she checking on me, making sure I was working? What happens here when I'm not around?

  Faith and Grace both try to stand up and then fall right back down, howling with laughter, gasping for breath. Before long, they regain what passes for their composure. Then Faith stands and walks over to the pile of dandelions she picked earlier. "Marley Bear?" she says.

  I know what's coming. "Yes, Faith."

  "I need you to smell this dandelion."

  "I don't think I can help you with that."

  Grace stands up and approaches me from the other side.

  "You're going to have to, Marley."

  "Why's that?"

  "'Cause we wanna see if it's true."

  "You smell it," I say.

  "No! You! YOU!"

  "You. Are. Angering. The. Marley. BEAR!"

  They scream again and take off in different directions, like fireworks snaking down to the ground. I hear one of them, not sure which, start to taunt "Marley's scared of peeing!" I'm pretty sure it's Faith. It always is.

  ***

  When I'm ready to leave, Lynne steps onto the porch. "Can I speak with you for a minute, Marley?"

  Can I say no?

  "Are you okay?" she asks.

  "Fine."

  "Is something wrong?"

  Please don't, lady. I might break. I don't answer, my eyes locked on the gray porch floor.

  "Anyway, I just wanted to thank you, Marley. The girls are really enjoying their time with you." I'll bet she's only saying this because she knows kindness makes me cry.

  I fight to keep myself from squirming. I have to say something. "I was wondering," I say. "Could we go to the park again one of these days, maybe with their bikes? I think they'd really like that."

  There's something in Lynne's eyes—maybe memories about when she was there with her husband, when the twins were babies? "Sure, whatever you'd like. I'm sure they'd love that."

  "Thanks."

  "Thank you, Marley, for everything."

  What a bitch; she's being nice.

  In a House Atop the Trees

  It's gotten so bad that some days, most days, my time at the Krolls' is the high point. I've lost one of my best friends. And now even Leah's being weird. She stood me up and now she doesn't answer her texts or voice mails. It's not that different from how it was before we started to work everything out; I'm still alone.

  But the worst part is that everything is all screwed up with Jack. I've been avoiding him since he became my dad's top defender. His number one fan.

  And I can't help wondering if I'm the problem. Maybe whatever it was that drove Jane away is having the same repelling effect on Jack. Now that he's seen the angry and depressed me, the real me, there's no spark of anything special between us anymore. We sometimes say a quick hello in the mornings, when I'm out with Rig, but he hasn't been willing me out after work and I haven't gone looking for him. I keep thinking he'll come over to remind me about that Yankees game we're supposed to go to, or say something, anything to make it better, but he doesn't. And I can't figure out a way to do it myself.

  The only person who ever calls me is my mom. She talks about her new old friends and getting Grandma ready for surgery. Sadly, these conversations are often the most exciting of my day.

  I'm a total no-friends loser who almost looks forward to spending time with five-year-olds because at least, for minutes at a time, it takes my mind off everything else. Except that the twins' mother is there too and I get a very uneasy feeling whenever I'm near her.

  And then, of course, things get even worse during a game of tag. Grace and Faith are running in frantic circles in the backyard, and I can't even remember who's "it," but it doesn't matter because they're both laughing and running like scary wild things, and then, out of nowhere, I hear a howl. A loud scream of a howl. Grace is on the ground—she's cut her leg, pretty badly, on
the old metal table, and she's bleeding.

  I help her to her feet and hold on to her while she hobbles in the back door. Faith goes to get their mother. Lynne gets weird—sort of frantic, yelling. "I have to call the pediatrician. Or Ed. Someone!" She opens drawers, lifts out papers, and slams the drawers shut again.

  I want to say, It's just a cut, but she is in full frenzy.

  "I have no idea where Ed filed their immunization forms, and if Grace isn't up to date on tetanus, well then, we have a really big problem here."

  I'm holding a compress hard against the long scratch on Grace's leg.

  "It hurts, Mommy!" Grace says.

  Lynne stops what she's doing and turns her face so she's looking right at me. Not nicely. She gives Grace a quick hug, then says, "I'm going to look for that form in my office."

  Dad always tries to distract me when I'm upset. It annoys me, but I can't think of anything else to do now than talk. "You know, Grace, I was thinking about something you said to me. About putting dandelions in balloons and getting two wishes. Maybe we could do that one day."

  "That's unpossible," Faith says.

  "Maybe," I say. "But we can try. Would you like that, Grace?"

  She nods. "And maybe we could blow a bubble around the dandelion and put both in the balloon."

  Faith shakes her head. "You can't. That's stupid."

  I pick the compress off Grace's leg and the bleeding has almost completely stopped. The cut, which had looked raging and angry, has softened to pink. "I'm okay, Marley. I'm just gonna tell Mommy I'm okay now."

  I step into the bathroom. I wash my hands and sit on the closed toilet seat for what feels like an inappropriately long time. Lynne seemed a little over the edge. I guess parents can get crazy protective when their children are hurt. Well, some parents. My dad hasn't shown too many signs of that animal instinct this summer.

  When I come out, Lynne says, "She's had her shots. Marley, can I trust you to keep them away from that table in the future?"

  To which I would like to reply, Do you think it is the best idea to have a rusting metal table in your own backyard? But of course I don't say anything. That's my specialty.

  ***

  When I walk into my dad's after work, I want to lie down and try to sleep through most of the rest of the day or summer, but the message light's flashing. A lot. I'm pressing the button as Dad comes into the room.

  It's Mom's voice. "Robert. Are you there? Please pick up." A surge of homesickness swells in my chest. "I'll call back." Then a click. Another click—a hang-up.

  "Robert? You know, you really need a cell phone. It's Wednesday morning and the surgery is over. I think everything is going to be fine. I really do. Mom lost a lot of blood but they say that's not unusual. It's just hard to see her so weak. And she can't get a transfusion until tomorrow at the earliest." My mother makes some weird noise that I think is a stifled cry, then says, "I'm really okay," and clicks down the phone.

  Dad looks at me, waiting to see if I'm going to explode.

  I sit down on the couch. I feel nauseated, like something thick is stuck in my throat.

  "Can I call Mom?"

  "I'm sure she'll call when she knows something."

  I sit on the floor and Rig comes right over. He presses his head into my chest and I rub his ears.

  The thought of my grandmother all, I don't know, weak and old, and my mother feeling sad, it just makes me want to pound things.

  "We should go to the hospital," I say.

  "What?" Dad calls from the kitchen.

  "I said that we should go to the hospital, right? Isn't that what we should do?"

  "I don't think so, Marley."

  I do. I very much do.

  Weird feelings are racing around and they're all telling me one thing—I need to be there. The pain and fear and sadness inside me remind me of that big hole I felt when my mother left me at preschool. But this time, I'm old enough to do something about it. I need to get to the hospital and see them. It's weird, but it's a real physical need, like thirst.

  But this is another one of those Dad things. He's going to want to do things his way, or the way he thinks they should be, without listening to what I want. And he has a long history of vetoing every request I make.

  I will wait until I can figure out a way to make him understand.

  But I need to do something now. I go in my room and make my bed, even though it's afternoon. I brush my hair and my teeth. I look around my room and pick a piece of dust off the floor. What am I doing?

  I check for messages—nothing.

  I text Leah. No answer.

  I take Rig outside. It's cloudy and hot, and I just sit there, looking at the back of Jack's house. Rig walks a circle around me and settles at my feet.

  I don't know what to do. I don't feel like I can trust myself to even talk without bursting into tears. Who would I talk to anyway? Leah's been blowing me off. I will not even mention Jane. I blew it with Jack, or maybe he blew it with me, but it doesn't really matter who blew it because there's nobody.

  I don't have anyone.

  "Marley!" My dad's calling me from the back door. "Your mom's on the phone!"

  "Come on, Rig," I say. He just looks at me, then closes his eyes. "Fine."

  Dad's holding the door open. "Is everything okay?" I say to him. He just puts the phone in my hand.

  "Mom!"

  "Hey there, my girl," Mom says. Her voice is so tired and so sad that my stomach drops. Mom's an only child, like me, dealing with all of this by herself.

  "What's going on? How's Grandma?'

  "I'm not sure yet, to tell you the truth, honey. I think it will be fine. She lost a lot of blood, but they don't seem too concerned. They say it happens a lot."

  "Can I come visit her?"

  "Not yet. Definitely not now."

  "I want to. I want to see her. I want to see you."

  "I'll tell you what. Let's talk again tomorrow. Maybe she'll be doing better."

  "I wish I were there, Mom. I really do."

  "I know, Marley. I miss you."

  "I miss you too."

  I wait until I hang up to start crying. It's automatic, and I don't even bother trying to hold it in. I don't want my father's comfort right now, so I go out back where he won't hear me. And there's Jack, rubbing Rig's stomach.

  "Marley?"

  "Oh, God." I cover my eyes with my hands. No. No, no, no, no. Jack is not seeing me like this. Please. How much worse is life going to get? I'm snorfling and disgusting and I have no tissues and I desperately need tissues. "I'm a mess," I say.

  He looks at me, his eyes filled with something that looks like pain. "Oh," he says. "Uh. What can I ... um, hmm. Wanna walk?"

  I nod. He takes my hand and leads me to the front of his house.

  Oh my God. I'm miserable and I'm crying but holy oly oly crap! Jack's holding my hand. Did I wipe snot on it? Oh God, let me not have wiped snot on it. My God, Jack's hand! His hand is in my hand. Oh! But no.

  My grandmother. I can't.

  I need to go to sleep and wake up in a few weeks. When this is all over. When it's already better.

  Except right now, I'm holding Jack's hand.

  "Hey, look at that," he says. Stuck in the hedges that line the walk from Jack's house to the street are three Opportunity Knocks cards and Baltic (Baltic: just relax). Jack gathers them and brings them to the trash can.

  We walk down the block and across the street. Rig remembers the tree house and settles himself at the bottom. I know I have to let go of Jack's hand to climb up the ladder, but I'd pay significant cash to hold on. I even like the feel of the calluses where his fingers meet his palm. I let go and climb up.

  I breathe in the old rot smell.

  Jack asks, "Just ... is there anything I can do?"

  I shake my head.

  "I'm so sorry, Marley. I acted like an idiot. I should have just shut up."

  Because of the strange mechanics of laughing and crying at the same time
, I snort.

  "You snort?"

  "Not usually." I'm almost laughing and then I'm back to crying. There has never been a bigger mess than Marley Baird, one summer night in a house atop the trees. "My grandmother is going to be fine, so I don't really know why I'm crying. I snorted because that's why I'm crying. Not because you were an idiot." It occurs to me that I may be lacking a basic filter that would keep me from saying things that other people have the sense to just think. "Sorry," I say.

  "No, I was an idiot. You needed to figure stuff out. I was just pissed about a lot of my own things and it all came, I don't know, like shooting out of me. I'm really sorry."

  "I'm sorry too. I was kind of crazy that night. I shouldn't have been so pissy at you. I've missed you," I say, then wonder if I can get that filter installed somehow. A person ought to be able to think things without blurting them.

  "I felt like I dented our friendship or something." He shakes his head.

  I start crying again.

  "So is it bad? Is your grandmother really sick? Or hurt?"

  "It was just an operation and she lost a lot of blood but honestly, it doesn't seem like it's going to be bad—I think she'll be fine—so don't ask why I'm crying because I have no idea."

  He's looking at me with such soft eyes, with some kind of gentle warmth behind them. He's listening. He's more than listening. It's like he's feeling what I'm saying.

  It occurs to me that I'm showing Jack who I am right now, the worst of who I am. The part of me I should be working hardest to hide. The force of all that's happening is as hard and fast as a bigtime waterfall—not the kind of thing that's easy to stop.

  The tears are threatening to start up again. "Hey, Jack? Could we talk about something else?"

  "Sure," he says.

  "Have you heard from Will?"

  He presses his lips together and shakes his head. "It's not easy to stay friends when you can't hang out, you know?"

  "I'm not sure it's easy to stay friends even when you can." He looks at me for a second as though I've lost him, but then he gets it. As if I willed him along in the conversation. "Your friend Leah, right?"