by Jenny Han
She continued. “You’re right. I’ve been absent. I’ve been so consumed with my own grief, I haven’t reached out to you. I’m sorry for that.”
“Mom—,” I started to say. I was about to tell her I was sorry too, for saying that thing before, that awful thing I wished I could take back. But she lifted her hand up and stopped me.
“I’m just—off balance. Ever since Beck died, I can’t seem to find my equilibrium.” She rested her head against the wall. “I’ve been coming here with Beck since I was younger than you are now. I love this house. You know that.”
“I know,” I said. “I didn’t mean it, what I said before.”
My mother nodded. “Let’s sit down a minute, all right?”
She sat down at the kitchen table and I took a seat across from her.
“I shouldn’t have hit you,” she said, and her voice broke. “I’m sorry.”
“You never did that before.”
“I know.”
My mother reached across the table and took my hand in hers, tight as a cocoon. At first I felt stiff, but then I let her comfort me. Because I could see it was a comfort to her, too. We sat like that for what felt like a long time.
When she let go, she said, “You lied to me, Belly. You never lie to me.”
“I didn’t mean to. But Conrad and Jeremiah are important to me. They needed me, so I went.”
“I wish you would have told me. Beck’s boys are important to me, too. If something’s going on, I want to know about it. Okay?”
I nodded.
Then she said, “Are you all packed? I want to beat Sunday traffic on the way back.”
I stared at her. “Mom, we can’t just leave. Not with everything that’s happening. You can’t let Mr. Fisher sell the house. You just can’t.”
She sighed. “I don’t know that I can say anything to change his mind, Belly. Adam and I don’t see eye to eye on a lot of things. I can’t stop him from selling the house if that’s what he’s set on.”
“You can, I know you can. He’ll listen to you. Conrad and Jeremiah, they need this house. They need it.”
I set my head down on the table, and the wood was cool and smooth against my cheek. My mother touched the top of my head, running her hand through my tangled hair.
“I’ll call him,” she said at last. “Now get upstairs and take a shower.” Hopefully, I looked up at her and I saw the firm set of her mouth and the narrow of her eyes. And I knew it wasn’t over yet.
If anybody could make things right, it was my mother.
chapter thirty-four
jeremiah
There was this time—I think I was thirteen and Belly was eleven, about to turn twelve. She’d caught a summer cold, and she was miserable. She was camped out on the couch with balled-up tissues all around her, and she’d been wearing the same ratty pajamas for days. Because she was sick, she got to pick whatever TV show she wanted to watch. The only thing she could eat were grape Popsicles, and when I reached for one, my mother said that Belly should have it. Even though she’d already had three. I got stuck with a yellow one.
It was afternoon, and Conrad and Steven had hitchhiked to the arcade, which I wasn’t supposed to know about. The moms thought they were riding their bikes to the tackle shop for more rubber worms. I was going to go boarding with Clay, and I had my swim trunks on and a towel around my neck when I ran into my mom in the kitchen.
“What are you up to, Jere?” she asked.
I made a hang ten sign. “I’m gonna go boarding with Clay. See ya!”
I was about to push the sliding door open when she said, “Hmm. You know what?”
Suspiciously, I asked, “What?”
“It might be nice if you stayed inside today and cheered up Belly. Poor thing could use some cheering up.”
“Aw, Mom—”
“Please, Jeremiah?”
I sighed. I didn’t want to stay home and cheer up Belly. I wanted to go boarding with Clay.
When I didn’t say anything, she added, “We can grill out tonight. I’ll let you be in charge of the burgers.”
I sighed again, louder this time. My mom still thought that letting me fire up the grill and flip hamburgers was a big treat for me. Not that it wasn’t fun, but still. I opened my mouth to say “no thanks,” but then I saw the fond, happy look on her face, the way she just knew I would say yes. So I did. “Fine,” I said.
I went back upstairs and changed out of my swim trunks and then I joined Belly in the TV room. I sat as far away from her as I could. The last thing I needed was to catch her cold and be sidelined for a week.
“Why are you still here?” she asked, blowing her nose.
“It’s too hot outside,” I said. “Wanna watch a movie?”
“It’s not that hot outside.”
“How would you know if you haven’t been out there?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Did your mom make you stay inside with me?”
“No,” I said.
“Ha!” Belly grabbed the remote and changed the channel. “I know you’re lying.”
“I am not!”
Blowing her nose loudly she said, “ESP, remember?”
“That’s not real. Can I have the remote?”
She shook her head and held the remote to her chest protectively. “No. My germs are all over it. Sorry. Is there any more toast bread?”
Toast bread was what we called the bread my mom bought at the farmer’s market. It came sliced, and it was white and thick and a little bit sweet. I’d had the last three slices of toast bread that morning. I’d slathered it with butter and blackberry jam and I’d eaten it really fast before anyone else got up. With four kids and two adults, bread went really fast. It was every man for himself.
“No more toast bread left,” I said.
“Conrad and Steven are such pigs,” she said, sniffling.
Guiltily, I said, “I thought all you wanted to eat were grape Popsicles.”
She shrugged. “When I woke up this morning I wanted toast bread. I think maybe I’m getting better.”
She didn’t look any better to me. Her eyes were swollen and her skin looked grayish, and I don’t think she’d washed her hair in days because it was all stringy and matted looking. “Maybe you should take a shower,” I said. “My mom says you always feel better after you take a shower.”
“Are you saying I smell?”
“Um, no.” I looked out the window. It was a clear day, no clouds. I bet Clay was having a blast. I bet Steven and Conrad were too. Conrad had emptied out his old first-grade piggy bank and found a ton of quarters. I bet they’d be at the arcade all afternoon. I wondered how long Clay was gonna be outside. I might be able to catch him in a few hours; it’d still be light out.
I guess Belly caught me staring out the window, because she said, in this really snotty voice, “Just go if you want to.”
“I said I didn’t,” I snapped. Then I took a breath. My mom wouldn’t like it if I made Belly upset when she was all sick like this. And she really did look lonely. I kinda felt sorry for her, being stuck inside all day. Summer colds sucked more than anything.
So I said, “Do you want me to teach you how to play poker?”
“You don’t know how to play,” she scoffed. “Conrad beats you every time.”
“Fine,” I said. I stood up. I didn’t feel that sorry for her.
“Never mind,” she said. “You can teach me.”
I sat back down. “Pass the cards,” I said gruffly.
I could tell Belly felt bad because she said, “You shouldn’t sit too close. You’ll get sick too.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “I never get sick.”
“Neither does Conrad,” she said, and I rolled my eyes. Belly worshipped Conrad, just like Steven did.
“Conrad does get sick, he gets sick all the time in the winter. He has a weak immune system,” I told her, although I didn’t know if that was true or not.
She shrugged, but I could tell she di
dn’t believe me. She handed me the cards. “Just deal,” she said.
We played poker all afternoon and it was actually pretty fun. I got sick two days later, but I didn’t mind that much. Belly stayed home with me and we played more poker and we watched The Simpsons a lot.
chapter thirty-five
jeremiah
As soon as I heard Belly come up the stairs, I met her in the hallway. “So? What’s going on?”
“My mom’s calling your dad,” she said gravely.
“She is? Wow.”
“Yeah, so, don’t, like, give up already. It’s not over yet.” Then she gave me one of her wrinkly-nose smiles.
I clapped her on the back and practically sprinted down the stairs. There was Laurel, wiping down the counter. When she saw me, she said, “Your father’s coming over. For breakfast.”
“Here?”
Laurel nodded. “Will you go to the store and get some things he likes? Eggs and bacon. Muffin mix. And those big grapefruit.”
Laurel hated to cook. She had definitely never made my dad a lumberjack breakfast. “Why are you cooking for him?” I asked.
“Because he’s a child and children are cranky when they haven’t been fed,” she said in that dry way of hers.
Out of nowhere, I said, “Sometimes I hate him.”
She hesitated before saying, “Sometimes I do too.”
And then I waited for her to say, “But he is your father,” the way my mom used to. Laurel didn’t, though. Laurel was no bullshit. She didn’t say things she didn’t mean.
All she said was, “Now get going.”
I got up and gave her a bear hug, and she was stiff in my arms. I lifted her up in the air a little, the way I used to do with my mom. “Thanks, Laure,” I said. “Really, thanks.”
“I’d do anything for you boys. You know that.”
“How did you know to come?”
“Belly called me,” she said. She narrowed her eyes at me. “Drunk.”
Oh, man. “Laure—”
“Don’t you ‘Laure’ me. How could you let her drink? I count on you, Jeremiah. You know that.”
Now I felt awful too. The last thing I wanted was for Belly to get in trouble, and I really hated the thought of Laurel thinking badly of me. I’d always tried so hard to look out for Belly, unlike Conrad. If anyone had corrupted her, it was Conrad, not me. Even though I was the one who bought the tequila, not him.
I said, “I’m really sorry. It’s just that with my dad’s selling the house, and it being our last night, we got carried away. I swear, Laure, it’ll never happen again.”
She rolled her eyes. “‘It’ll never happen again’? Don’t make promises you can’t keep, hon.”
“It’ll never happen again on my watch,” I told her.
Pursing her lips, she said, “We’ll see.”
I was relieved when she gave me another grimace-smile. “Hurry up and get to the store, will you?”
“Aye aye, sir.” I wanted her to smile for real. I knew that if I kept trying, kept joking, she would. She was easy that way.
This time, she really did smile back at me.
chapter thirty-six
My mother was right. The shower helped. I tilted my face toward the shower head and let the hot water wash over me and I felt much, much better.
After my shower, I came back downstairs a new woman. My mother was wearing lipstick, and she and Conrad were talking in low voices.
They stopped talking when they saw me standing in the doorway. “Much better,” my mother said.
“Where’s Jeremiah?” I asked.
“Jeremiah went back to the store. He forgot the grapefruit,” she said.
The timer went off and my mother took muffins out of the oven with a dish towel. She accidentally touched the muffin tin with her bare hand and she yelped and dropped the tin on the floor, muffin side down. “Damn!”
Conrad asked if she was okay before I could. “I’m fine,” she said, running cold water over her hand.
Then she picked the tin back up and set it on the counter, on top of the towel. I sat down on one of the counter stools and watched my mother empty the muffin tin into a basket. “Our little secret,” she said.
The muffins were supposed to cool a little while before you took them out of the tin, but I didn’t tell her that. A few were smushed but they mostly looked okay.
“Have a muffin,” she said.
I took one, and it was burning hot and falling apart, but it was good. I ate it quickly.
When I was done, my mother said, “You and Conrad take the recycling out.”
Without a word, Conrad picked up two of the heavier bags and left me the half-empty one. I followed him outside to the trashcans at the end of the driveway.
“Did you call her?” he asked me.
“I guess I did.” I waited for him to call me a baby for calling my mommy the second things got scary.
He didn’t. Instead, he said, “Thanks.”
I stared at him. “Sometimes you surprise me,” I said.
He didn’t look at me when he said, “And you hardly ever surprise me. You’re still the same.”
I glared at him. “Thanks a lot.” I dumped my garbage bag in the bin and shut the lid a little too hard.
“No, I mean . . .”
I waited for him to say something, and it seemed like he might have, but then Jeremiah’s car came down the street. We both watched Jeremiah park and then bound out of the car with a plastic grocery bag. He strode up to us, his eyes bright. “Hey,” he said to me, his bag swinging.
“Hey,” I said. I couldn’t even look him in the eye. It had all come back to me when I was in the shower. Making Jeremiah dance with me, running away from Conrad, and him picking me up and dropping me in the sand. How humiliating. How awful that they saw me behave that way.
Then Jeremiah gave my hand a squeeze, and when I looked up at him, he said “thank you” so sweetly it hurt.
The three of us walked back to the house. The Police were singing “Message in a Bottle” and the stereo was very loud. Right away my head started pounding and all I wanted was to go back to bed.
“Can we turn down that music?” I asked, rubbing my temples.
“Nope,” my mother said, taking the bag from Jeremiah. She pulled out a big grapefruit and tossed it to Conrad. “Squeeze,” she said, pointing at the juicer. The juicer was Mr. Fisher’s, and it was huge and complicated, one of those Jack LaLanne ones from the late night infomercials.
Conrad snorted. “For him? I’m not squeezing his grapefruit.”
“Yes, you will.” To me, my mother said, “Mr. Fisher’s coming to breakfast.”
I squealed. I ran over to her and wrapped my arms around her waist. “It’s just breakfast,” she warned me. “Don’t go getting your hopes up.”
But it was too late. I knew she’d change his mind. I knew it. And so did Jeremiah and Conrad. They believed in my mother and so did I—never more so than when Conrad started cutting the grapefruit in half. My mother nodded at him like a drill sergeant. Then she said, “Jere, you set the table, and Belly, you do the eggs.”
I started cracking eggs into a bowl, and my mother fried bacon in Susannah’s cast iron skillet. She left the bacon grease for me to fry the eggs in. I stirred the eggs around, and the smell of the eggs and the grease made me want to gag. I held my breath as I stirred, and my mother tried to hide a smile as she watched me. “Feeling okay, Belly?” she asked.
I nodded, my teeth clenched.
“Ever planning on drinking again?” she asked conversationally.
I shook my head as hard as I could. “Never, ever again.”
When Mr. Fisher arrived half an hour later, we were ready for him. He walked in and looked at the table in amazement. “Wow,” he said. “This looks great, Laure. Thank you.”
He gave her a meaningful look, the adult co-conspiratorial kind of look.
My mother smiled a Mona Lisa kind of smile. Mr. Fisher wasn’t gonna know
what hit him. “Let’s sit,” she said.
We all sat down then. My mother sat next to Mr. Fisher and Jeremiah across from him. I sat next to Conrad. “Dig in,” my mother said.
I watched Mr. Fisher pile a mound of eggs on his plate, and then four strips of bacon. He loved bacon, and he really loved it the way my mother made it—incinerated, almost burned to a crisp. I passed on the bacon and eggs and just took a muffin.
My mother poured Mr. Fisher a tall glass of grapefruit juice. “Fresh squeezed, courtesy of your eldest,” she said. He took it, a little suspiciously. I couldn’t blame him. The only person who had ever squeezed juice for Mr. Fisher was Susannah.
But Mr. Fisher rebounded quickly. He shoveled a forkful of eggs into his mouth and said, “Listen, thanks again for coming to help, Laurel. I really appreciate it.” He looked at us kids, smiling. “These guys weren’t too keen on listening to what I had to say. I’m glad to have a little backup.”
My mother smiled back at him just as pleasantly. “Oh, I’m not here to back you up, Adam. I’m here to back up Beck’s boys.”
His smile faded. He put down his fork. “Laure—”
“You can’t sell this house, Adam. You know that. It means too much to the kids. It would be a mistake.” My mother was calm, matter-of-fact.
Mr. Fisher looked at Conrad and Jeremiah and then back at my mother. “I’ve already made up my mind, Laurel. Don’t make me out to be the bad guy here.”
Taking a breath, my mother said, “I’m not making you out to be anything. I’m just trying help you.”
Us kids sat absolutely still as we waited for Mr. Fisher to speak. He was struggling to stay calm, but his face was turning red. “I appreciate that. But I’ve made up my mind. The house is for sale. And frankly, Laurel, you don’t get a vote in this. I’m sorry. I know Suze always made you feel like this house was part yours, but it’s not.”
I almost gasped. My eyes darted back to my mother, and I saw that she, too, was turning red. “Oh, I know that,” she said. “This house is pure Beck. It’s always been Beck. This was her favorite place. That’s why the boys should have it.”