by Kari Luna
“Both,” Finny said. “But unless your hallucinations are hereditary, the souvenir thing is more important. If this were all happening in your mind, you wouldn’t bring something back.”
“I know,” I said. “Something like this.”
I took the whistle from around my neck and handed it to Finny.
“Whoa,” he said, grinning. “This is from an episode? It’s like holding history.”
Most people would have flipped out on me a long time ago, but Finny just rolled with every new thing I told him, even though each piece was stranger than the last. Maybe Mr. Maxim was right. Physics blew the doors of the mind wide open, giving you plenty of room to wander.
“And every event produces a souvenir?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. “They help me know I’m back.” I always checked my pockets immediately.
“You know we have to talk about your dad,” he said.
I fell back on my bed. He still didn’t know exactly what happened after The Cure. Or Walt. I wondered how many more pieces he could hold before he broke.
“Of course,” I said, fake perking up. “Gathering data has to include everything, I get that. But don’t you have enough to work with for now?”
Finny turned the whistle over and over in his hand.
“Definitely,” he said, handing it back to me.
“Are you sure you’re okay with this?”
Finny threw an arm around my shoulder.
“Of course,” he said. “I’m a scientist. I’m a fan of the unexplained.”
Which meant he was fan of me, too.
“SOPHIE SOPHIA!”
We froze as Mom’s voice floated up the stairs.
THIRTEEN
Her feet sounded like packing up, like hitting the road, like panic. She wasn’t coming to my room to tell me a funny story or tuck me in for the night. She was coming to take me away again.
“And there I was, calling hospitals, driving all over town, while the whole time you were in your room?”
My bedroom door flew open.
“Hi, Mrs. Sophia,” Finny said, waving.
“I think you might want to leave now,” she said. Her chest rose and fell quickly. “There could be consequences for the accomplice.”
Finny grabbed his bag, whispered, “Good luck,” and ran down the stairs.
Mom stood there silent, like a giant, until the door slammed.
“Downstairs,” she said. “Now.”
She stormed off and I looked around my room, taking it in just in case it was the last time.
“It’s okay,” I said, rubbing Balzac’s ears. “Maybe she’ll give me a pardon or something.”
I blew my room a kiss and took each step as slowly as possible. No point in rushing to the execution. When I finally got there, Mom was sitting on the couch with a glass of red wine.
“Was your phone broken?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “You just gave me the thing. I don’t know how to work it, so if it was off, it wasn’t off on purpose. Besides, this isn’t Brooklyn. You don’t have to be so worried.”
“You were three hours late. Besides, I’m your mother,” she said, slamming her glass on the coffee table. “It’s my job to worry.”
“I was at Café Haven with Drew,” I said. “And then I was with Finny.”
“Did you forget what being grounded means?” she said. “I gave you a free pass for an hour, not for the entire afternoon.”
“I know,” I said. “And I’m really sorry. I lost track of time.”
Mom walked over to the stereo and turned on the radio. New Age music filled the room.
“Gawd, this is awful,” I said.
“I need to relax,” Mom said. “I don’t want to say anything I’m going to regret.”
“I could say a lot of things about this music that I’d never regret,” I said.
“It’s calming!” Mom said in a voice that was the opposite of calm.
I tried not to smile, but I couldn’t help it.
“Okay, okay,” she said, smiling, too. “See? I guess it works. Music is subjective, anyway. Who are we to decide what’s right and what’s wrong? Maybe it just is.”
“And this music is terrible,” I said, getting up and changing the station.
Mom took a deep breath and patted the cushion next to her. I sat beside her, and Balzac jumped into my lap, purring.
“I’ve been avoiding this conversation, but I think it’s time to have it,” she said. “You’re getting to be that age.”
“What age?”
“Teenage years,” she said. “When things start to show up.”
Great. We were going to have the sex talk.
“Sophie, you have to be more careful than other people,” Mom said. “You have this imagination that runs wild and gets you into trouble. And now, with the hormones coming in, it could be a difficult time.”
“Uh-huh,” I said. Was she talking about the terrible teens or something else?
“I lived through the whole episodes thing with your father,” she said. “And I see you, and I don’t know.”
Wait a minute. “Don’t know what?”
Mom sighed. “I don’t know if I have the strength to live through it with you.”
And there it was. I got up and went to the kitchen. I couldn’t be in the same room with her, not right then.
“Come back,” she said. “Let’s talk about this.”
I didn’t want to talk, I wanted to feel safe. I wanted to feel like, no matter what, Mom would chalk it up to my imagination and act like everything was going to be okay. Like she always did. Denial had worked well for us so far. And just because I told Finny the truth didn’t mean I was ready to tell anyone else. Especially not when it could leave me homeless.
“Sophie, please,” Mom said. “I think you misunderstood me.”
That’s when I saw it, a brochure for teenage mental illness and a psychiatrist’s card to go along with it. Sitting by the phone.
“I don’t think I’m going to misunderstand this,” I said, marching into the living room, thrusting the card in her face. “Care to explain?”
“It’s exactly what it looks like,” she said.
“Mom?”
“What am I supposed to do?” she said. “All the articles say that mental illness shows up in the teenage years, and you’re there. And then you almost got suspended? I thought we were through with that. So if you’re hallucinating—”
She’d never used that word. Not once. Not even when talking about Dad.
“I don’t hallucinate,” I said.
“Have episodes,” Mom said. “Whatever you and your father call it. If it’s happening, and you’re not telling me, I can’t keep you safe.”
“I’m fine,” I said. “I told you what I saw.”
“So tell someone else,” she said. “I want you to talk to this doctor.”
“No way,” I said. “Are you forgetting about California?”
“I’m remembering California,” she said. “That’s why I talked to a friend at work about you—not specifics—but she’s having trouble with her daughter, and she gave me this brochure and referred me to this doctor. It helped them. Maybe it could help us. Because I don’t want a repeat of San Francisco.”
“And I don’t want to be locked away,” I said. “One appointment, and you know that’s what will happen.”
“We don’t know that,” she said. “It’s just one appointment. Don’t be so dramatic.”
And just like that, it came tumbling out of me. All of it.
“Dramatic is seeing a marching band made up of giant pandas,” I said. “Or stage diving to a Ramones cover. Or playing with The Cure in a café only to hurt my hand while doing a guitar windmill. Dramatic is Walt.”
“Who’s
Walt?” Mom scooted toward the edge of the couch, tapping her nails on her knee.
“My shaman panda,” I said, wishing I could control the words coming out of my mouth.
“Your shaman panda.”
I could see her unraveling.
“He’s more of a guide,” I said. “It’s his job to help me.”
“Oh, really? Is he the one who helped you stage dive during lunch? “He sounds like a great influence. Maybe next time he’ll help you walk on broken glass or jump off a bridge.”
“It’s not like that,” I said. “Those things were accidents.”
“Wait, I’ve got it!” she said, ignoring me. “Maybe your panda could help you pull off a stunt at my office and get me fired. Or at school so you’ll get expelled. Yes! And then we can move again, and you can start a new school again, and we’ll act like nothing happened. Except everything will have happened and your panda won’t be there to explain it to me or clean up the mess because I can’t see him.”
“Mom,” I said. I tried to take her hand, but she pulled it away. Her face was red. “It’s not like that.”
“Tell that to your new doctor,” she said. “Because I don’t want to hear it.” She ran her hands through her hair. They were shaking.
“I’m not going to that doctor,” I said.
“You are,” she said. “I can’t control what you see. And I have no say in whether or not you take your shaman panda to school with you. But I’m your mother. I can make you get help.”
“I don’t need help,” I said, even though I did. I just didn’t need it from a psychiatrist. “This is ridiculous. I’m being persecuted because I see the world differently than everyone else.”
“Not differently,” Mom said, sighing. “Insanely. Everyone else walks through the world with their sanity intact.”
I felt blood rushing up against my bones.
“Including Dad?”
“Your father had problems,” she said, her voice softening. “Sophie, he was very, very far from normal. You had to have known that.”
I sank to the floor like a stone thrown into the ocean.
“I didn’t know that,” I said, sitting cross-legged, leaning against the couch. Tears flowed down, covering my face. “To me he was just Dad.”
That was why we never talked about him, why Mom had been avoiding the subject for years. If I’d known how she felt about him—really and truly—then I would have known how she felt about me, too.
“That came out wrong,” Mom said. “I didn’t mean it.”
But she did, and she knew it. And now I knew it, too, which meant nothing would ever be the same. I grabbed my backpack off the floor and headed toward the door.
“Put down your bag,” Mom said. “It’s dark out there.”
“I know,” I said. “But I can’t be in the same space with someone who thinks I’m crazy.”
I slammed the door and popped the Delirious Dusk mixtape into my Walkman and hit Play. Dad loved walking around New York City at night. He said there was something about the sky and the way the light hit the buildings that made the city come alive. That was why he made a soundtrack to go with it, full of brooding music that was dark, like the fading night, but inspiring—Tones on Tail, Bauhaus, Jesus and Mary Chain. It featured driving guitars to match the driving thoughts in my brain.
How to Survive Having a Mother Who Thinks You’re Crazy by Sophie Sophia
Put it somewhere deep in the back of your mind and ignore it.
When it comes back up, and it will, cry it out. Sometimes that’s the only thing that works.
Confide in your real friends, not your shaman panda one.
Remember Lewis Carroll and van Gogh. It wasn’t sanity that made them great.
And, most importantly, prove her wrong.
“Ooof!”
I tripped on a horse apple on the way to Finny’s house and almost fell flat on my face. Just like I’d been doing all day in one form or another. I picked it up and hurled it against the concrete wall of an office building. It left a satisfying print on the wall, so I kept throwing them.
Smash, a slider for Dad. Crash, an overhand for that psychiatrist. Smack, a fastball for hallucinations in general. I threw several more to get into the rhythm of it. Getting rid of whatever was inside of me. And then I wound up my arm, like I did with The Cure, and threw one as hard as I could. It blew apart when it hit the wall and scattered mealy bits all over the parking lot, white chunks glistening under the streetlights.
“That was for you, Mom.”
I gathered more apples in a pile at my feet threw them, horse apple after horse apple, covering the ground with muck. I saw chunks of green and white everywhere. And then I saw part of a Converse, right in the thick of things.
“You look cute when you’re angry,” Finny said, standing beside me.
I glared at him.
“Your mom called. She thought you’d be with me, so I told her you were.”
I glared again.
“Can I at least join the party?”
“No,” I said. I picked up another horse apple.
“That’s cool. Just pretend I’m not here,” he said. “Unless, of course, you want to talk, because I’m here. You know that, right? Come hurricane or earthquake or anything?”
I nodded.
“Can I spend the night?”
“It’s already approved.”
I wanted to say thanks, but the words stayed stuck in my brain. Like the horse apple cradled in my hand.
“I’ll leave you to it, then,” he said. “Be there in fifteen and there’s a chocolate soda in it for you.”
He left and there was silence, like before I began. And then there was the sound of horse apples, crashing against the concrete.
FOURTEEN
I walked by my house before I went to Finny’s. I didn’t realize I was going that way until I was already there, standing outside the window. I saw Mom upstairs, sheer white curtains revealing a silhouette hugging her knees to her chest, rocking back and forth on the bed. I heard U2’s “With or Without You” at full volume, which meant she was thinking about Dad. She had probably assumed we’d moved on—new town, new school and the appearance of actual friends. But then I almost got expelled again, reminding her that no matter how far she went, his crazy would always be with her—in the form of a living, breathing, fourteen-year-old me.
“I thought Peeping Toms were supposed to have fun,” Walt said, appearing beside me.
I threw my arms around him, fingers sinking into fur.
“Hello to you, too,” he said, holding me, replacing my frustration with calm. His hugs were the ultimate Zen move. “Rough night?”
“You have no idea,” I said, letting go and wiping my tears on my sleeve. “Or maybe you do.”
“Sorry,” he said. “I had a gig in Vancouver.”
He pointed to the black bandanna tied around his head. I hadn’t even noticed it, or the black leather wristbands with tassels that he twirled around.
“How’d it go?” I asked.
“Two encores,” he said. “Walt and the Pandas rocked it. But how was your night?”
“I told my mom about you,” I said.
Walt stood back and put his paws over his chest. “I’m honored, truly.”
“It was an accident,” I said, bending down to smell a flower that had no smell. “She wasn’t ready to hear that I was seeing things again, much less that I like to stroll the suburbs with my second-best friend who’s a panda.”
“Again,” Walt said, bowing, “honored.”
“I’m glad you feel that way,” I said. “Because I need a favor.”
“Name it.”
I stopped in front of the yard that had two angel fountains in front.
“I need you to appear to my mom,” I said.
He laughed. “And I need you to play guitar in my band. It would be awesome, but it’s not going to happen.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“I don’t have the authority to appear to anyone but you,” he said. “It’s against the rules of the High Panda Council.”
“Wait, you have a boss? And there are rules?”
“First, everyone has some kind of boss,” he said. “And rules are there to protect people. You’re my client, not your mother, so I can only appear to you. Unlike pizza with sausage and mushrooms, I’m not meant to be shared.”
“But you’re evidence!” I said. “Like souvenirs. That’s what convinced Finny these are more than hallucinations.”
“So show your mom a souvenir,” he said.
“They’re too common,” I said. “You see keys, whistles and guitar picks everywhere. And while I know they’re from somewhere else, I can’t prove it to my mom. You, on the other hand, are irrefutable.”
“And scary,” Walt said. “She would completely freak out.”
“Yeah, but at least she’d know there was something else going on,” I said. “She was married to my dad, so she’s familiar with the unexplained. One whiff of that, and she’ll call off the whole psychiatrist-leading-to-loony-bin thing.”
“Would that I could,” he said, waltzing along the sidewalk. “But I cannot.”
The calmer he was, the more agitated I became. “You’re supposed to be helping me,” I said. “How is this helping? And don’t give me some crap about how the best guidance is within myself.”
“But it’s true,” he said. “There’s always a solution. Just because I’m not it doesn’t mean that a solution doesn’t exist.”
“I couldn’t be less in the mood for your fortune cookie wisdom,” I said, kicking a row of bushes.
“I know you’re angry,” he said. “But rules are rules.”
“You never struck me as a goody two-shoes,” I said, walking ahead of him.
“Only when it comes to this stuff,” he said. “But I’m not going anywhere. I’m here. It’s still my job to guide you.”
He stood under a streetlamp, which gave him an angelic glow, although I knew better.