Out of the Blue

by Sarah Ellis

  “She probably wears makeup. I mean she’s a grown-up. Mum doesn’t wear makeup, but I think our sister will. Maybe she’ll let us try it on. Do you think so? Hey! Hey, Megan, do you think so? Are you asleep?”

  Megan’s top-bunk mattress began to bounce up and down. “Betsy, get your feet off the bottom of my bunk.”

  “Okay. What do you think? Long hair or short hair? I hope it’s long. I hope she’s pretty.”

  “Oh, good grief. She’s not a Barbie doll, you know.”

  Betsy giggled. “You’re funny. A Barbie doll! I know that. I know she’s a human being. Maybe she’ll come and live with us. Oh no, I forgot, she’s going to get married. So she’ll go and live in her own house. But I’ll bet she has us for overnights sometimes. . . .”

  Megan lay curled up and quiet and, at long last, Betsy dropped off to sleep in the middle of a word.

  Finally, space to think. Some room to take out her tangled thoughts and have a look at them. Megan stretched out long and stiff in the bed and reached her arms up to press against the roof. A lie. Mum and Dad had been lying to her for years. Maybe not in words but in silence. “Just tell the truth,” they always said, “even if you’ve done something wrong. In the long run it gets you into less trouble than lying, and you don’t have to carry the lie around.” Yeah, right. Good advice from liars. What else had they lied about? Why should she believe them about anything?

  Megan’s arms and legs felt as though they would explode if she had to lie in bed one more minute. She stuck her head over the side of the bunk and listened to Betsy. Deep, regular breathing. She was gone. Carefully Megan stuck her feet out and found the rungs of the ladder. She climbed down, front side forward. Her toes curled on the cold linoleum. She touched the back of the door and felt something soft, somebody’s jacket or robe. She pulled it off the hook, opened the door, and stepped out into the living room.

  The dying fire lit the room softly. The door to the big bedroom was closed. Good. She looked at what she had grabbed. Uncle Howie’s kangaroo jacket. She pulled it over her head. It was as long as a dress. The sleeves hung down like flippers. She crawled into a corner of the couch, stretched the soft fabric over her knees, and pulled up the hood. It smelled like seaweed and smoke.

  She stared through the screen into the fire. The worst thing was the way Mum seemed to expect her to be, like, thrilled. And they were so happy with the way Betsy was acting. When it was only that Betsy was too dumb to get it. Well, forget thrilled. She wasn’t thrilled. She wasn’t thrilled and she wasn’t going to lie about it. She would be polite. She wasn’t about to sulk or have a Betsy-style tantrum. It wasn’t worth the effort. But this Natalie person was not her sister. She was just an accident. Why did you have to include an accident in your family?

  The firelight played over the scrapbooks in the bookcase. Would Natalie want to come here? Would she be writing in the book? Maybe she would want to bring her husband when they were married. Maybe they would have a baby, and it would be one of the births recorded. Hey, hold it, was there anything . . . ?

  Megan did some arithmetic. If Natalie was twenty-four years old, then she was born in September of . . . Megan pulled her arms out of the flipper sleeves and reached over to the bookcase. That was too early. Here it was. Surely there would be some hint. She turned the pages. Records of storms and seal sightings, recipes, some driftwood sketches that Gram had made. On the day Natalie was born, some family called the Gills had been for the weekend and had fed lettuce to the rabbits. Nothing. So these books were a lie, too. All that stuff just closed over the top of what had really happened and hid it.

  Megan let the book fall to the floor. Fwap. She hunched down in her jacket and listened. But there was no noise from the big bedroom. There was no noise at all. Just the sound of ash falling in the fire, a whispering sound, a sound like a secret.

  Chapter Seven

  TUESDAY MORNING BEFORE school Megan phoned Erin to book her for recess. Erin wasn’t sure. “I wanted to play volleyball.”

  “Forget volleyball. I need to talk to you.”

  “What’s happening?”

  “Tutankhamen’s tomb.” Tutankhamen’s tomb was a code reserved for serious occasions. It meant, “Can’t talk now. Parents might be listening.”

  “Okay, see you later.”

  Erin was so amazed by Megan’s news that she stopped eating her cookie in midchew. Erin never forgot about food. “Wow. You’re so lucky.”

  Lucky? “I don’t see what’s lucky about it.”

  “Getting to have an older sister. You know Tyler in Mrs. Frame’s class? He has this older sister, from when his dad was married once before, and she lives in California and he got to go there for the whole of spring break.”

  “That’s completely different. He’s known about her for his whole life, right? Not like some surprise. This Natalie could be a space alien, for all I know.”

  “So when do you get to meet her?”

  “She’s coming for dinner a week from Sunday, and Mum spent the whole weekend talking about it. Like the queen is coming or something.”

  “Aren’t you just dying to see what she looks like?”

  “No, not really. Why would I be?”

  “To see if she looks like you, space case.”

  “I hadn’t thought of it. She’s not going to look like me. She’s old. After all, she’s about to get married.”

  “Will you get to go to the wedding?”

  “Mum said we were invited.”

  “Oh! Weddings are so great.”

  “Have you been to one?”

  “Yeah, my uncle Dave’s. The summer after fourth grade. We drove to Saskatchewan. It was the best time. We stayed in this big motel and all the adults got really silly. On the day of the wedding we were walking up the street toward the church, and Mum was walking with Uncle Barry, and we passed this lawn sprinkler. And Uncle Barry said, ‘I dare you to run through the sprinkler,’ and Mum just gave him this look and put her purse down on the sidewalk and ran right through it. I couldn’t believe it. She sat all through the wedding with water polka dots all over her. Uncle Barry told me that when they were kids they had to be careful what they dared Mum to do because she would always do it.

  “And after the wedding in the church there was this big party and Uncle Dave polkaed me so fast he lifted me right off the floor. Even after Uncle Dave and Monique left, in their honeymoon clothes, people kept eating and drinking and dancing. Everyone forgot about us. Nobody made us go to bed. Some little kids just fell asleep under the tables. I’d love to go to another wedding.”

  “You can go to this wedding disguised as me. I don’t want to go.”

  “You’re crazy. Weddings have great food.”

  “Can we talk about something else?”

  “Okay. What’s Natalie going to call your mum — ‘Mum’?”

  “No way! She already has a mother. You can’t just go calling somebody ‘Mum.’ Besides, didn’t I just say could we talk about something else?”

  “I thought you meant something else other than weddings. I didn’t know you meant something else other than the whole subject. Anyway, don’t get mad. You’re the one who Tutankhamened me, remember?”

  Erin was right. Why get mad? It was just that . . . All she knew was that she didn’t want congratulations. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Hey, I almost forgot to tell you. I get to have my ears pierced. Want to come?”

  “Sure.”

  Megan pulled out her apple. “Are you mad?”

  “No. I just don’t get it.” Erin noticed the forgotten cookie in her hand and took a big bite.

  That was it. That was the problem. Erin didn’t get it. Betsy didn’t get it. Mum didn’t get it. Nobody got it. She hardly got it herself.

  After Erin’s reaction Megan didn’t feel like telling anyone else the news. Not that she needed to. Mum was
doing a good job spreading the word. She was always on the phone, talking about Natalie. She said the same things over and over. She might as well have put it on the answering machine.

  “Yes, a great surprise but such a happy one.”

  “Studying for a PhD in astronomy at the university — sure didn’t get those brains from me.”

  “No, it is like we’ve known each other for years, right from the first moment.”

  It was better to be out of the house. Saturday morning Megan woke up to the sound of Mum already on the phone. She could tell by Mum’s voice that this time it was to Natalie, not about her. That was the worst. During these conversations Mum’s face sort of melted and her voice went all soft and mushy. She laughed a lot, as though Natalie was some sort of comedy star. But when she repeated her remarks later, and she always did repeat them later, it was just ordinary boring stuff. When she hung up she would sit and sigh. It was revolting.

  Megan nearly turned over and went back to sleep when she remembered Art Experience. Today was the first day of the latest class that Mum and Aunt Marie had cooked up for her and John. Well, mostly Aunt Marie. Mum and Dad weren’t that big on classes and lessons. But Aunt Marie wanted John to widen his horizons, explore new areas and be well-rounded. Aunt Marie wanted John to be exposed to the many facets of our rich world. That’s the way Aunt Marie talked. Trouble was, John refused to go to anything by himself. So Megan usually got roped in.

  She didn’t really mind expanding her horizons. Some of the classes had been good, like group guitar and Slugs and Bugs. And if Art Experience would get her out of the house for the morning, she was grateful.

  She met John in the lobby of the art school. They were early. There was a whiteboard sign with all the classes listed. John found their listing: “Art Experience, Rm. 210, J. Evans.”

  “I wonder what J. Evans is like?”

  “Probably wears a beret,” said Megan, “and a big beard.”

  “And a long shirt not tucked in,” said John.

  “As long as he’s not like Mr. Daynard.”

  “Aagh,” said John strangling. “Remember ‘Deeper! Richer! Wider’!”

  “He was a nut,” said Megan. Mr. Daynard had taught Creative Drama, and he always wanted them to be deeper, richer, and wider when they were just trying to remember their lines.

  John looked at his watch. “I think we can go now.”

  J. Evans turned out to be a she, with plain brown hair and a regular dress. She looked like somebody’s mother. She told them they should just wander around and look at things for a few minutes. The room was like a treasure house. There was so much of everything — rolls of paper and big tins of paint, jars of colored pencils, blocks of clay, rolls of wire, big brushes. Megan took a deep whiff of the dusty smell of paper and the sharp smell of paint.

  The project for the day was to create an imaginary garden, with flowers and animals and insects that you just made up. Megan started with a pencil and drew a huge flower with every petal different. Then she switched to pencil crayons. They were the good kind that spread their colors like butter. As she concentrated on filling the shapes with scarlet lake and burnt umber, her fingers remembered the pleasure of coloring in the pictures of her second grade workbook. She wasn’t like Betsy. She liked staying inside the lines.

  The rhythm and concentration of coloring made Megan feel as though she were living inside her space-alien flower and as though everything else had disappeared. She was startled when J. Evans came around to collect the pictures.

  “Look at this wonderful variety of styles.” J. Evans tacked the pictures to the corkboard. Two girls called Anna and Su-Lin had worked in pastels and their gardens were beautiful. They were obviously going to be the stars of Art Experience.

  John had concentrated on a pencil drawing of one insect. He had erased so many times that his paper had holes in it.

  “Tell us about this,” said J. Evans.

  “It’s a Venus peopletrap,” said John. “It traps people and then digests them with its special human-dissolving saliva.”

  Anna and Su-Lin broke into “eeeeoooo” noises and “Oh, gross.” But J. Evans just smiled. “I like the way you’ve made the mechanics very clear.”

  Then, oddly enough, it was Megan’s picture that J. Evans decided to concentrate on. “See how Megan has outlined all her shapes, like a coloring book?”

  Megan started to get nervous. She knew you weren’t supposed to like coloring books, in case they stifled your creativity. But J. Evans didn’t seem to care about that. “Many artists have been fascinated with the idea of blocks of contained color.” She pulled out some art books and showed them pictures of paintings like quilts and checkerboards. Megan liked them. They were very tidy.

  “Try to imagine this one huge,” said J. Evans, pointing to a picture of a single red square, “as big as that wall.” She turned to the front. “Oh, no, is it noon already? Time is a tyrant. Okay, here’s your thought for the week. Lines are just pretend. There aren’t any lines in nature, just edges, the edge of one color and the beginning of another. So next week we’re going to forget all about line and color and get out the clay. See you then. Remember to look around you.”

  It had begun to pour while they were in their class, and John phoned his dad to see if he could come and get them. They waited in the lobby and looked out the window. The blossoms lay soggy in the gutter.

  “Okay,” said John, “what’s this about a sister?”

  Megan’s stomach tensed up. For a whole morning she had forgotten about Natalie. “Half sister.”

  “Whatever. Mum told me a little bit. When do you get to see her? Is she really an astronomer?”

  “She’s an astronomer student. And she’s coming for dinner a week from tomorrow.”

  “Do you think you’re going to like her?”

  “What’s to like? She’s a perfect stranger.”

  “But she’s your sister. Okay, half sister. I mean, aren’t you curious? Like, bam! all of a sudden there are three kids in your family.”

  “She’s not a kid. She’s twenty-four.”

  “You know what I mean. Are you excited?”

  “I don’t need to be. Mum and Betsy are excited enough for our house.”

  John stood in the doorway and tried to push the frame apart. “This means I have another cousin. She won’t be my oldest cousin, though. That’s Murray the Mountie from Manitoba.”

  “She’s only your half cousin.”

  “Whatever. Do you know what she drives?

  “I don’t even know if she has a car. I don’t really care.”

  John got a thoughtful look on his face. “You know, she’s not my half cousin. She’s my whole cousin.”

  “She is not. She’s my half sister, so she’s your half cousin.”

  “No, look.” John started to draw a diagram on the misty window. Across the top were Marie and Judy and Josh. Three little lines came down from Judy, one from Marie, and none from Josh. “Okay. Now, the reason we’re cousins is because your mum and my mum are sisters. It doesn’t matter who your dad is, or mine. Therefore, Natalie is just as much a cousin to me as you are.”

  Megan reached up with her jacket sleeve and wiped out her family. John was right. Right and totally wrong. Add him to the list of those who didn’t get it. Oh good, there was Uncle Howie. “Look, there’s your dad. He’s stopped in the bus zone. Hurry!” They pulled their jackets up over their heads and ran out into the teeming rain.

  Chapter Eight

  MUM EMERGED FROM HER Natalie daze long enough to remember about Megan’s ear piercing. She made an appointment for Thursday after school. All week long Megan obeyed J. Evans’s instructions and looked around her, at ears. At first she just surveyed pierced and nonpierced. But then she started noticing the variety of ears. By Wednesday everyone’s ears were starting to look extremely strange. It wa
s like saying a word over and over again until it sounds like nonsense. After five days of observation all ears looked like tide pool creatures glued to the sides of people’s heads.

  Erin was very happy to go with Megan. “Any chance they’ll give you a general anesthetic?” she asked hopefully.

  “Erin! This is ear piercing, not surgery.”

  “I know,” said Erin sadly. “I’ll never get to see surgery. It’s not fair. If you want to be a librarian, you can join the Future Librarians Club and you get to go downtown and visit behind the scenes at the central library. But if you want to be a doctor, there’s no Future Doctors Club and no way to get into an operating room.”

  Mum picked Megan and Erin up at school the following Thursday and drove them to the mall. “I really can’t come into the beauty shop with you,” she said. “You know me. Will you be okay with Erin?”

  “Sure,” said Megan.

  “It’s good premedical experience,” said Erin.

  “Yes,” said Mum. “I remember when you wanted that plastic woman model for your birthday when you were, what was it, six? Have you still got it?”

  “The amazing transparent woman? No,” said Erin, “she broke after I operated on her to remove her appendix. I wish you could buy one made with some kind of soft plastic that you could cut into. . . .”

  “Enough!” said Mum with a shudder. “We’re a bit early. Do you want to have a snack before the deed is done?”

  “Yes, please,” said Erin. “They have a great cinnamon bun place in this mall.”

  They were licking their buttery, cinnamon-syrupy fingers when a man came up to Mum and said shyly, “Judy Schlegel?”

  Mum turned her head to the side. “Ye-es.” Then she grinned. “It can’t be. Randy Fuller? Mrs. Ironsides’s fifth grade, right?”

  Megan rolled her eyes at Erin. Mum had lived in the same neighborhood her whole life and was always meeting people from the olden days. It was boring. Any minute now Mr. Fuller would say, “You haven’t changed a bit.” She concentrated on unrolling her last spiral of bun.