WHEN JESS WAS very little, before Davey, her parents had taken her camping once. Real camping, in a tent patched with duct tape, blankets making a nest on the ground. She had loved it, the coziness of the tent, the smell of nylon and smoke, her parents drinking beers and cooking over the fire. Had it been Vermont? Michigan, maybe? It didn't matter. There'd been a path down to a lake, and the stars were a heavy swipe of glitter across the inky sky. She got seventeen mosquito bites, but she didn't even care.
That was it for vacations.
When the senior class trip to Philadelphia was announced, everyone had gone wild with excitement. They'd be staying overnight, seeing the sights, then given four precious hours of freedom to wander. Jeremy Lyon, the newest, hottest addition to their class, had an uncle who wanted to take Jer and all of his friends out for dinner. There was talk of going to the Reading Terminal Market, which was filled with places to eat. The Museum of Art, so everyone could run the stairs like Rocky. Everyone wanted to get a cheesesteak sandwich.
The trip cost $229.
Jessica had been to New York City on the sixth-grade class trip, but it was just for the day. She was pretty sure her teacher had paid her fee so Jess could go.
But in Philly, they'd be staying in the city, and the thought of it made her heart bounce like a rubber ball. Based on those five hours in Manhattan, she was pretty sure she loved cities.
Her parents didn't have $229 for field trips, though they might have it for booze. Asking them didn't even cross her mind; she had her own money saved, squirreled away in a hole in the wall behind her bed, secured in a little tin box she'd found by the creek that ran behind the trailer park. At eighteen, Jess wasn't naive; she knew her mom was a helpless alcoholic. Powerless was the word used at Al-Anon. Her father was less extreme, but he was cunning and sneaky. Either parent would use her money for themselves, no matter how you cut it.
So she hid her savings. She'd wait until the house was empty then sneak her tip money and pay into the red tin. Her parents generally didn't go into her room, and they sure didn't move the bed away from the wall to clean or anything.
She'd go on the trip. She'd room with Tiffy and Angela Mitchum, maybe sneak out with Levi...maybe for a walk, maybe for sex, though she often felt like that was habit more than anything for the both of them.
Growing up in the trailer park with Tiffy and Levi and Asswipe Jones--born Ashwick, and really, did his mother hate children?--it bonded people. They were the have-nots, some having less than others. You recognized each other, knew the strategies of eating a big lunch at school, because school lunches were free if you were poor enough. You knew how to glue the soles of your shoes when they started to come off, how to keep an eye on the Salvation Army thrift shop. You might even know how to shoplift.
Things like ski trips or island vacations, dinners out and hotel stays...that was foreign territory for the Dunns. Bad enough that Jess's father couldn't keep a job, and Mom had four prescriptions for Vicodin from four different doctors. Add to basic poverty Davey's special programs and doctor's appointments and new meds that might help with his outbursts but were never covered by Medicaid...there was always less than nothing.
But Jess had almost a thousand dollars saved. Her job at Hugo's earned her more than her father made, and when Davey needed a helmet so he wouldn't hurt himself during a head-banging rage, she was the one who'd paid for it. The private summer program that gave him something to do--away from their parents--ditto. His clothes, bought new, also funded by her, because while she'd been able to handle the middle school mean kids who'd make fun of her wearing Faith Holland's hand-me-downs, Davey deserved better. He already had a big strike against him; he wasn't going to wear used clothes, too. She bought groceries and special vitamins that one doctor thought might help raise his IQ. She paid the gas bill last March when the cold just wouldn't let go and they had no heat, and she'd paid for the repair on the crappy old Toyota that got her to and from work.
Even so, she'd managed to stash $987.45 in the three years she'd been working at Hugo's and, for once, she was going to spend some of it on herself. She was a senior, and college was out of the question. For one, she couldn't leave Davey, and for two, well, she had neither the money nor the grades for a scholarship. She'd try to take a class at Wickham Community College, but her plans for the future were pretty much her plans for today. Work. Take care of Davey. Keep her parents from getting into too much trouble, and when that failed, bailing them out or paying their fines.
But this trip...something in her rose up at the thought of it, something bright and clean. She could see another part of the country. Picture a future, magical version of herself, working in the city, living in a townhouse, holding down a great job. No parents, just her and Davey. The Mid-Atlantic. It sounded exotic, so much cooler than western New York.
Whatever the case, she ran all the way home from the bus stop, fueled by excitement and...well, happiness.
"Hey, honey-boy," she said as she came into the kitchen, bending to smooch Davey's head, then frowned. "Did you cut your own hair again?" It was practically shaved in spots, making it look like he had a disease.
"No," he said. "I let Sam do it."
"Honey, don't. I'm the only one who cuts your hair, okay?" That little shit Sam would be getting a talk from her, and if he peed his pants in terror, that'd be fine. The boys were eleven, for God's sake. This wasn't innocent "let's play barbershop" stuff. This was bullying, and it wasn't the first time Sam had decided to pretend to be friends with Davey so he could humiliate him.
"What's for supper?" Davey asked.
"I don't know. Where's Mom?"
"I don't know." He bent over his coloring book. Still loved Pokemon.
Jess glanced in the living room, where her father was in the recliner, watching TV. He seemed to be asleep.
Good. She went into the bedroom she shared with Davey and closed the door quietly. Pulled the bed back from the wall, bent down and stuck her fingers in the hole.
No tin.
It must've fallen back, even if that had never happened before. She stuck her whole hand in, groped to the left, then the right.
It wasn't there.
Her heart felt sticky, its ventricles and valves clogged with dread.
On the wobbly plastic table next to his bed, Davey had a keychain with an LED light on it, in case he got scared in the middle of the night. Jess grabbed it and pointed it at the hole.
No tin. Not to the left, not to the right. It wasn't below, and it wasn't above. It was just gone.
She went back into the kitchen. "Davey, honey, did you find a metal box in our room? In a little hole behind the bed?"
"There's a hole? What's in it?" he asked. "Is there mice in it?"
"No. I had a little metal box in there."
"What color?"
"Red and silver. And there was some money inside."
He chose a blue crayon, its paper soft and furred from use. "I don't know where it is." Davey didn't know how to lie. "Will you make me supper tonight?"
"I have to work."
"But Mom's not home!"
Jess took a deep breath. "Okay." She glanced at the sink; the dishes from breakfast and lunch were still there, waiting to be washed. Seven empty beer cans, too.
So she wouldn't be going on the class trip. She'd just say she had to work. Or that Davey had a thing and she couldn't go. No, she couldn't blame Davey, even if he always did have an appointment and a fear of being left alone. She'd just say the trip wasn't her thing.
Except it was.
Well. She probably didn't deserve it, anyway. Selfish, to be thinking about leaving her brother for the weekend.
She put on some water to make spaghetti and opened a can of tomato sauce. Not much nutrition, but that was about all they had. She'd have to go grocery shopping tomorrow. Then, glancing at the clock, she did the dishes as fast as she could. She had to go to work soon.
Dad had probably taken it. Mom was a little more decent th
at way. Every once in a while, Jess's grandmother would send Jolene some cash, and Mom would take Jess and Davey out for ice cream...then head for the Black Cat and drink the rest away. If she'd known about Jessica's stash...well, it was hard to believe that she would've taken it all, in one fell swoop. It'd be more Mom's style to filch it bit by bit, just enough to buy a few vodka nips and get her through the day.
So it wasn't Mom.
That left Dad, and he wouldn't admit it with a gun to the back of his head. The money might still be around, but he was too smart for Jessica to ever find it. And he'd never give her an honest answer if she asked, just feign ignorance and blink his big blue eyes...and then go out and buy a hundred lottery tickets or go to the casino. If he ever won something, he always managed to find a way to blow that, too.
She'd bet her life he wasn't sleeping, even though he just lay there, eyes closed.
Sometimes, she wished he'd just die. Without him being a bad influence, such a casual drunk, maybe Mom could get sober. Without him, Davey wouldn't have such a shitty role model. Without him, there'd be one less mouth to feed.
A few days later, Jeremy Lyon gave her a ride home in his expensive little convertible. It was raining, so the top was up, and it was so cozy and clean and pretty in that little car that Jess wanted to live there.
With Jeremy. She loved him. Everyone did.
But boys like Jeremy didn't go for Jessica Does--as in Jessica Does Anyone--class slut, poor white trash. Sure enough, Jeremy had fallen hard for Faith Holland, otherwise known as Princess Super-Cute, one of the rich girls--a little dim, it seemed to Jess, and someone who never wanted for anything.
"So I heard you're not going on the trip," Jeremy said.
"Oh, right," Jessica answered, pretending it had slipped her mind. "I have something going on that weekend."
"Well, here's the thing," he said. "You know how I am. Incapable of having fun if my friends aren't all with me. Curse of the only child or something. So I was thinking, if cost was the issue, please let me cover you, Jess. You'd be doing me a favor, because it won't be any fun without you, and I'll be miserable and lonely the whole time."
The guy was such a prince, it hurt her heart sometimes. He was also a liar. He was best friends with Levi, in love with Faith in such a sappy way that it was a shock that bluebirds didn't follow them around. Jer was friends with everyone he'd ever met.
As they pulled into West's Trailer Park, Jess let herself imagine that Jeremy was her boyfriend. That he'd dump Faith and fall for her, and love Davey--he was already good to Davey--and take care of them for the rest of their lives.
"What do you say, Jess? Will you do that for me?"
She cleared her throat. "That's really nice, Jeremy, but it's not the money. Philly's really not my thing, you know? Plus, I'm working that weekend. But thanks." She blew him a kiss and ran inside before the casual act slipped.
That Friday night, when her classmates were in the city of brotherly love, a huge party of middle-aged fraternity brothers came into Hugo's, and Hugo gave the table to Jess. They left her a tip of $250.
Too little, too late.
On Sunday she took Davey to the fair in Corning and bought him corn dogs and popcorn and root beer. She screamed on the roller coaster, and he put his arm around her, laughing with glee. He loved when she was the one who was scared and he got to protect her. They both ate candied apples and then scraped the gunk off their teeth with their fingers, Jess more successfully than Davey.
When he wanted to play Shoot the Balloon, she made sure the carny got a good look down her shirt so that Davey won a huge stuffed animal, even though he only managed to pop one balloon.
It was the best day she'd had in a long time.
"I love you," Davey said sleepily on the car ride home.
In that moment, she was so glad to be exactly where she was, with her brother, her best bud, the boy who'd had an uphill battle since the day he was born.
A battle which was largely her fault.
"I love you, too, honey-boy," she said back, her voice husky.
Nothing was ever more true.
But as Davey slept, his head against the window, snoring slightly, Jessica couldn't help wondering about the view she might've seen from that hotel, and the little soaps and shampoos, which she had fully intended on bringing home to her brother.
*
WHICH IS WHY, at the age of twenty-one, Jessica Dunn had never stayed in a hotel before.
It was three years past graduation, and Jess and Angela Mitchum were the only ones who hadn't left Manningsport. Angela was a mother now, having gotten knocked up senior year. She lived on the hill with her parents and was going to school part-time to become a nurse. Sometimes, the Mitchums came to Hugo's for dinner, and Jess always admired the baby, who was really cute.
Jess was doing what she'd always been doing--waiting tables at Hugo's, doing a little home health aide work on the side, looking after her brother. She still lived in the trailer park, but that was going to end soon; she now saved her money in a bank, and in four more months, she'd have enough to rent a decent place in town. Two bedrooms, because of course she wasn't leaving Davey at the mercy of her parents' negligence.
Lately, Dad had been offering him drinks, which Davey was only too happy to take. For some completely unfathomable reason, he worshipped their father, who thought it was funny to see Davey tipsy. Mom wouldn't like Jess taking Davey, but in the end, she'd give in. Her Vicodin was now supplied by the grungy guy at the laundromat, since the doctors had finally figured out that there was nothing wrong with Mom except addiction.
It was October, always a poignant time of year for Jess. The leaf peepers, those tourists who came up by the busload to see the foliage and drink Finger Lakes wine, were heading home, and aside from the Christmas Stroll, Manningsport would soon be quiet. Hugo closed the restaurant after Veterans Day, so Jess would have to see if she could get more hours as an aide. It didn't pay nearly as well as waiting tables, but she didn't have a lot of other options.
Hugo called her into his office before she started her shift that night. "I want you to take a wine class," he said without preamble. "Felicia kills you in bottle sales, and the markup is incredible. What do you think?"
"Um...sure," Jess said, scratching her wrist. "But I don't really drink."
"I know, honey." He knew about her family. Everyone did, and just in case they didn't, Dad crashed into the restaurant at least once a year, asking where his "baby girl" was and wondering if old Hugo would give him a drink on the house. "But you're twenty-one now. You should know about wine. What goes with different kinds of food, how to talk about it, what to recommend."
"I just recommend the really expensive stuff," she said.
"Which I appreciate. Still, I want you to do this, kid. It classes us up if you can talk knowledgeably about what people are drinking."
"Yeah, okay." It was true. Felicia could sell a bottle of wine to just about anyone, and was full of phrases like "that particular region of France" and "long, lingering finish with notes of fresh snow and blackberry." It sounded pretty ridiculous to Jess, but Felicia's clients spent more, and that meant bigger tabs, which also meant bigger tips.
"Blue Heron Winery is having a class next week," Hugo continued. "You went to school with Faith Holland, didn't you? Want to go there?"
"I'd rather not take that one," she said easily. "If that's okay. Next week is a little packed."
Hugo nodded. He'd hired her to bus tables when she was fifteen, promoted her to waitress and was now teaching her to bartend. He never asked why she didn't go to college like all the other Manningsport kids, or enlist, or leave town to find something other than a waitressing job.
He knew why. He probably knew more than she wanted him to, including why she'd try to dodge a class at Blue Heron.
"Okay, kid," he said with a nod. "I'll see what else is around."
"Thank you." The words didn't come easily to her, but she rubbed the top of his head,
said, "Lucky bald spot," and went back to work, stuffing down her feelings.
Manningsport was a moderately wealthy town. Full of vineyards and families that went back generations, like the Hollands, or wealthy transplants, like the Lyons, or families whose parents earned a lot of money, like the O'Rourkes.
And scattered in between, like weeds in a garden, were families who were poor, and had tussles with the law, and had drinking problems or drug problems and always, always had money problems. Families where the mother was milking the system, claiming a lifetime disability from a vague knee injury she got four days after being hired at the high school as a lunch lady. Families where the father couldn't hold a job and had been driven home in a police car more times than a person could count.
Her family, in other words.
But she had Davey. If not for him, she would've left Manningsport the second she could drive, moved somewhere far away from anyone who knew why she was called Jessica Does. Maybe she'd live in Europe. Italy, where she'd fall in love and learn the language and become a clothing designer or something.
But there was her brother, and he was her responsibility and hers alone, so none of those thoughts were worth more than a few seconds. Davey made staying worthwhile and then some.
A week later, Hugo handed her some papers and walked away. "Don't say no," he said over his shoulder. "You can figure it out."
The first page confirmed her enrollment in a day-long wine class at the Culinary Institute of America, down in Hyde Park, a good four hours' drive.
The next page was a hotel reservation at the Hudson Riverview Hotel.
He was putting her up overnight.
Hands tingling, Jess went into the office, which was empty, and Googled the place.
It was beautiful. A four-star hotel overlooking the Hudson. Full complimentary breakfast and a welcome cocktail. The beds were king-size; Jess still slept in a twin in the room she shared with her brother. A huge tub and a fancy, glassed-in shower. A flower arrangement in the lobby the size of a small car.
She turned around and saw Hugo, smiling sheepishly. "I thought you might like to get out of town."
"Hugo," she began, but her words stopped there.
"Just promise you'll go. I can even check in on your brother, okay? And don't you cry! Are those tears in your eyes? Don't you dare, or I'll fire you."
Anything for You Page 3