Carry Me Home

by Janet Fox

  To all children—and their parents—

  who need a place to call home.

  And to Jeff and Kevin,

  who are my heart’s home.

  1 Now

  THE DAY Lulu’s daddy disappeared was, so far, the coldest morning of the year.

  That’s why she was still curled up tight under the blankets and pressed, back to warm back, against Serena when the sun shot a ray at the mirror that reflected onto Lulu’s face, waking her hard. She squeezed her eyes and rubbed them, saying out loud, “What?”

  She was asking the sun, What?

  Then, “Daddy?”

  Lulu sat up. The Suburban’s windows were fogged and Serena stayed asleep. Their daddy was not in the back seat. His blankets were folded into squares, the way he always started his day. But today he’d started his day without waking them, without the usual rituals of wet cloth to wipe their faces, the bottle of water and toothbrush to clean their teeth, because as Daddy had said, “No matter what, girls, we will practice good hygiene. Cleanliness is right there next to godliness.”

  Lulu, when he’d said this, when she was little and didn’t know her words, envisioned a pair of high jeans, what she’d now call mom jeans, on a saintly figure, halo, raised eyes, with prayerful hands.

  Now that she was all of twelve she knew what hygiene was. She even knew how it was spelled.

  Lulu rubbed at the window as her surprise was replaced by confusion and then by a knot in her chest. Her hand made a round hole on the foggy damp glass but she couldn’t see anything through the branches that encased the Suburban. Nothing moved, except the sun, which now filled the car with cold light.

  It wasn’t Saturday. Or Sunday. It was Thursday, a school day, and they were going to be late.

  Where was Daddy? The knot tightened.

  “Reenie,” Lulu said, and shook her sister’s shoulder. “Wake up.”

  Serena stirred, and her face emerged from the thicket of blankets. “Sup?”

  “We’re late.” Lulu could tell, because it was September and the sun was at that particular slant, that they should already be well on their way. She grabbed the water bottle and wet the cloth and rubbed it rough over her face before handing it to Serena. She yanked on her sweatshirt and jeans and pushed over the seat back from the rear into the second seat where their daddy should be, then shoved the door open with her shoulder.

  Man, it was chilly.

  Lulu rubbed at her arms and hopped a little, foot to foot, before looking to make sure no one was able to see as she relieved herself behind the car. By the time Serena was dressed and out Lulu had cleaned her teeth and found their jackets and backpacks. She hopped foot to foot again against the shivers as she waited for Serena to finish her morning routine. “Let’s go, let’s go.”

  “I’m hungry,” Serena whined. “Where’s Daddy?”

  “No time. Gotta go,” Lulu answered. It was all she said because it was almost all she knew. Except for this.

  When no one else could—could step up, could step in, could do what needed doing—Lulu would.

  But.

  Where was Daddy?

  2

  “ONLY YOUR fourth week in school, Serena Johnson, and already a tardy.” The door proctor pressed her lips together as she fished out the form from her desk drawer and filled it in. “It’s a bad way to start third grade.”

  Lulu shuffled her feet, her fingers tightening around Serena’s. She wished the woman would hurry. She had to leave Serena and make her own way five minutes down the street to the middle school. Being tardy was bad enough, but now she would miss the spelling test.

  Lulu had never once had a tardy in Texas. She won the school certificate for perfect attendance every single year. She pushed against the anger that she felt. Daddy had blown it today.

  Where was he? What now?

  She thought she’d heard him go out at some point when it was still dark. He usually went out and used the showers and got dressed and then came back to wake them up. But not today. Today he went out and didn’t come back.

  When she’d left the Suburban this morning, Lulu found Daddy’s wallet where he always stashed it in the well of the car door with the keys and his cell phone. There were sixty dollars and seventy-five cents in his wallet, and the cell phone was dead. She locked the car and pocketed the keys and his wallet, but left his phone, because phones weren’t allowed in her middle school, plus it was dead, plus there was no one she could call.

  The woman reached through the window and handed Lulu the slip, and said, “Right away, then, to her class.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Lulu mumbled, tugging Serena through the door and into the hall.

  “I’m hungry,” Serena said, her voice quiet. Lulu paused. She could’ve at least scrounged out a Pop Tart if she hadn’t been so flustered. It made her mad at Daddy all over again.

  “Go on. I’ll see you at three,” Lulu said. She stared at Serena’s tiny back, her tattered Hello Kitty pack, the one that had been Lulu’s, swaying back and forth.

  Lulu ran from Serena’s to her own school, got another scolding, picked up another slip, and tried not to run (running was frowned on) on the way to her homeroom.

  Miss Baker put her finger to her lips as Lulu opened the door. The spelling test, almost over.

  Lulu slid into her seat, catching side-eye from Deana, who wrinkled her nose as if she smelled something bad. Miss Baker said out loud, “Last word. ‘Ridiculous.’ ”

  Lulu wrote down the word, the only word on her paper, then her name, then the date, then Miss Baker’s name. As they handed the papers forward, Deana, nose still wrinkled up, whispered, “Ridiculous.”

  Lulu’s face flamed.

  3 Before

  AFTER ALL that badness, all the stuff that happened with Mama, all the stuff that made Lulu feel she needed to step up and do what needed doing—after all that, their daddy had tried so hard.

  He tried to make it work. He tried to make their lives feel normal. Like when they were driving away, that first day on the road, the sun a purple thread in the east, the Suburban loaded.

  “Now, don’t you see, this car, it’s pretty comfy, don’t you think? We can save a ton of money.”

  Lulu watched his eyes as he glanced into the rearview, catching her expression. Next to her Serena stared out the window, silent, watching the post oaks and flat fields fly by. Their first day, just past dawn, the sleep crud still coating Lulu’s eyelashes.

  “I miss home,” Serena said in a whisper.

  “I know, honey,” Daddy said. “But we got ourselves a road trip to better times. Right?”

  A ton of quiet settled over them until Daddy said, “Hey. Did you girls know that in the olden days they used to drive cattle from Texas to Montana? So we’re going right along that old trail here. I’ve got a tape someplace here of cattle drive songs.” He fished in the storage well next to him, pulling out one tape after another until he found the one he wanted. “Good thing this old vehicle has a tape player, right? ’Cause I kept all my old tapes. We got ourselves the perfect car. The perfect home away from home.” He punched the tape into the deck and a bunch of fiddles blasted out of the speakers, with harmonic men’s voices singing about dogies and sagebrush.

  Daddy sang along until he got both Lulu and Serena singing, too. It was one of Lulu’s favorite things, singing. She loved singing even when the memories of singing made her heart hurt.

  But these songs about cowboys were funny and Daddy was cheerful and Lulu forgave him in that moment because he was trying so hard to make it work.

  4 Now

  LULU HAD discovered that if she walked just slow enough from math to lunch she could find a table to herself.

  “Honey, you’re down to the last in your account,” the lun
ch lady said. “Make sure your daddy makes another deposit before the end of next week.”

  Lulu nodded, eyes cast away.

  She slipped into a chair and opened the milk carton, drinking the cold milk down in one long series of swallows.

  “Pretty thirsty, huh?”

  She opened her eyes and rubbed her hand over her mouth. The boy—Jack something, from her homeroom—sat down across from her, the silver sliding clattery on his tray as he edged it onto the table.

  “What do you suppose is inside that tortilla?” Jack asked, poking at it with his knife. He glanced up at her.

  Lulu shrugged, then took a bite. It wasn’t bad. It wasn’t good. Not Texas good. But it filled her belly. She thought about Serena, hoping she was eating a good lunch.

  Jack said, “I don’t like milk but they make me take it. Want mine?”

  Lulu paused, mouth full. Was he okay?

  She had her guard up. She could take care of herself. But there was Jack, staring at her, arm extended, cold, cold milk in that unopened container, waiting. He seemed okay.

  She nodded.

  “Great. ’Cause it’ll just go to waste.” He plopped the carton onto her tray. “You just moved into town, right? How d’you like Montana?”

  Here it comes, Lulu thought. She shrugged again. “It’s okay.” She hesitated. She didn’t want to seem too weird, saying nothing. “Kind of cold.”

  “Not cold yet. Just wait. Hope you’ve got a heavier jacket.” He pointed with his fork, talking while he chewed. “Where’re you from?”

  Daddy had said, “It’s best if we keep it to ourselves, girls. The past is the past. We’re starting fresh. Just have to get our feet on the ground, that’s all. Just get started.”

  Lulu hoped Daddy would explain where he’d been and why when he met them at after-school. She was still angry at him. But she remembered his words. “Keep it to ourselves.”

  “Oklahoma,” Lulu answered Jack, a lie.

  Jack put down his fork, and burst into song. “O-o-o-klahoma where the wind comes whipping down the plain,” he sang.

  The kids around them went silent, staring, then laughing. Deana said, “Ridiculous,” really loud. Lulu slid halfway under the table.

  “Sorry,” Jack said, not sounding sorry. “I love musicals. Show tunes. I sing a lot. You must know that one, right? Since you lived there.”

  She didn’t know that song, but she understood what he meant. Because she liked to sing, too. Just, not in the lunchroom. Not where other kids were watching. They were watching her because she had funky secondhand clothes, funky rarely cut hair, and now they were watching her because she was here with Jack who was nice but maybe a little weird. She picked up her tray, standing. “Gotta go.”

  “Oh. Okay.” Jack gave her a bright-eyed look. “Later.”

  All those other eyes on her back. The sneering snide whispers. Deana saying something about smells. Then, laughing, laughing, laughing.

  5 Way Before

  THE HOSPITAL room was dark, except for the lights that blinked green and red and blue and white. Lulu sat very still, listening.

  Listening to beeps. Listening to breathing. Listening to her own heartbeat.

  From the hallway she heard the whispers. She tried to hear the words but she couldn’t make them out. She wanted to know, but then again she didn’t.

  She wanted to do something. Say a prayer. Make a promise. Make a wish. Anything.

  She stopped trying to hear the grown-ups and began to sing softly, a church song, a favorite song. It was the thing she could do to feel better, to make her heartbeat slow down, to drown out the other stuff in her head, in this room.

  That was back at the beginning.

  6 Now

  WHEN SCHOOL ended for the day Lulu went straight to the elementary for after-school. She was the only middle-schooler who went, which was actually kind of a relief, a reprieve from those prying eyes and snide whispers. Deana was picked up by a slim woman—her mother, Lulu thought—in a brand-new black Toyota. Deana began chattering to her mom nonstop as soon as she opened the car door.

  Deana seemed to still be chattering and Deana’s mom looked away as the big black car—gosh, it looked a lot roomier than the Suburban, even—passed Lulu on her way to after-school.

  Serena was already there, sitting with a stack of colored paper and some strange lumpy paper things scattered across the table.

  “Lookie!” Serena said, holding up one of the lumps to show Lulu. “It’s a dinosaur!”

  “Right,” said Lulu. She dropped her backpack and pulled out her English notebook.

  The proctors were high school girls. They were nice enough. They gossiped and giggled in between setting up activities.

  “It’s called rigahmee,” Serena said.

  “Origami,” one of the girls, Laurie, corrected. “The art of Japanese paper-folding.”

  Lulu bent over her work, reading a paragraph and the questions so she could write her response.

  She leaned back in her chair. Huh. That was weird. She read the paragraph again, a summary of a book they were about to read. The book was about a Japanese girl who survived the Hiroshima bomb in World War II, but then developed leukemia. There was an old Japanese belief that anyone who made a thousand paper cranes by folding them in the origami way could make a wish and that wish would come true, so the girl began making paper cranes, wishing to get well.

  Lulu looked up. Serena was folding a blue piece of paper. She stopped and smiled at Lulu. “See?” She held up her blue sort-of-looked-like-a-dinosaur.

  At four thirty the girls began to tidy the room and ready the kids for home.

  Home.

  Lulu packed her homework and got Serena’s things together. “Can I take this one?” Serena asked Laurie.

  “Sure. Take all the ones you want.”

  “This one’s s’posed to be a crane.”

  “Right,” Lulu said. That one did look like a crane. “Nice work, Reenie.”

  If she ever once had believed in coincidences, she didn’t now. Still. Weird.

  They went outside to the usual spot where they’d meet Daddy. Laurie was there, coatless, waiting as the few kids and their parents came and went, her arms wrapped around her. A cold wind had begun to blow down from the mountains, and Lulu turned up the collar on her thin jacket. The wind smelled like the inside of a freezer, all dry and ice.

  Daddy was not there. Lulu looked up the street one way, and looked down the other way. Anger was bubbling into something else. Into something hard that landed at the bottom of her stomach as if she’d swallowed a rock. Lulu bit her lip.

  “Golly,” Laurie said, rubbing her arms and jumping a little. “I think it might snow.” She glanced at Lulu. “Your dad’s late.”

  “I forgot. We’re supposed to meet him at home today,” Lulu lied. “I know how to get there.”

  “You sure?” Laurie was still hopping and seemed relieved.

  “Sure,” Lulu said. “Sure.”

  “Well, okay. See you tomorrow.” Laurie beelined for the door.

  “What’d you tell her that for?” Serena asked as they made their way down the street.

  “Because it’s cold and she wasn’t wearing a coat,” Lulu said. “Because I wanted to get going. Because I know the way.”

  Because.

  No Daddy.

  7 Before

  “MONTANA HAS it all,” Daddy said. “Mountains, rivers, lakes, forests, even wild animals.”

  “Wild animals?” Serena asked.

  “Bears and stuff,” Daddy said. Then he added, “But they’re nice bears. You know. Not to worry.”

  Where they were at that moment had none of that. What Lulu saw, leaning against the car window as they rolled down the narrow street a week out from Texas, were drill rigs, derricks, trailers, well pumps, trucks, and flat bare land stretching as far as the eye could see in all directions.

  Daddy pulled up by a trailer that was labeled WELL BOSS, and underneath that, EMPLOYMEN
T. “Now, you girls stay in the car for a minute, okay? I’ll be right back.”

  Serena flopped back against the car seat. “Is he going to get us a house?”

  “A job, first, I think,” Lulu said. “Then a house.”

  Daddy was back after a time and he opened the door and got in with a sigh. He didn’t turn around. “There’s plenty of work for a guy like me. Trouble is, there’s no place to live. They’ve got too many workers here and haven’t built fast enough.” He raised his eyes to the rearview. “You girls okay with that for a time longer? This car okay for you?”

  “Sure, Daddy,” Lulu said.

  “Sure, Daddy,” Serena echoed.

  8 Now

  ONE THING Daddy had for sure done right was finding this spot to park in this small Montana town. That was after they’d left the drill site. After the incident at the drill site when only Lulu was right there to stop it. After they’d driven another half a day west.

  From the Suburban it was ten minutes’ walk east toward school. Ten minutes’ walk west to the food bank. The library and the laundromat were not far beyond the school, and the parking spot itself was well hidden in the trees to give them privacy, but they were right in the RV park, with a toilet and a washroom with showers just down the dirt road. And the RV park was fenced to keep out the bears and stuff. Until Daddy had mentioned the wild animals this was something Lulu had never thought about before.

  Plus, Daddy’s job here was timed now for their school days, perfect, and it too was only a longish walk away.

  They had a routine.

  Saturdays they went to the food bank first, the laundromat second, and the library third. During the summer they’d spent the sunny weekday afternoons at the public pool in the park while Daddy went to work, because nobody seemed to mind two girls who might or might not have been on their own. Sundays they took drives, exploring.