Violet Raines Almost Got Struck by Lightning

by Danette Haworth

  “Violet!” Tootsie runs down the aisle and climbs onto my lap. The choir members and musicians are warming up, so the sanctuary is filled with lots of different tunes. Service is fixing to start.

  Lottie files into the pew, followed by the rest of her family. “Hey, Violet.”

  “New shirt?” My eyes run over the sequins. “I like it,” I say. “It’s sparkly.”

  “Isn’t it pretty? Do you really like it?” She’s about to say something else, but the choir bursts into song and we jump to our feet.

  When the singing is over, Lottie gets real fidgety, looking around and glancing at her watch. The pastor is talking about how when Jesus chose his disciples, he gave some of them new names, like Peter, whose name used to be Simon. He gave them new names because they were now new people. I’ve heard this part before, so for the third time, I crane my neck to see what Lottie’s craning her neck for.

  I pass Lottie a note. What’s so interesting back there?

  Just want to see if Melissa’s here, she writes back. I huff and slip the paper into my Bible. Is that all? Just looking for old gooseneck Melissa?

  I sit forward and try to concentrate on the sermon. Then all the people to my right start shifting or standing and I look down to see Melissa coming down the row. Could she sit at the end of the pew? Could she sit in the back of the church? No, she’s got to work her way to us because, God Almighty, she is a princess. Her parents sit in the row behind us. Lord, these people have a habit of disturbing the spirit.

  Then I see Melissa’s shirt, sequined and sparkly—the same one as Lottie’s. My back curls into a tight whip as I lean and stare at her.

  “Excuse me,” she whispers as she tries to pass me. I roll my eyes, then shift my legs, but only a little.

  Melissa shakes her head and waits. I don’t look at her; I don’t move. Don’t even think you’re sitting between me and Lottie. But then Lottie’s family moves down, and Melissa squeezes past me and sits between Lottie and Tootsie. Tootsie beams.

  I hope it ain’t a sin to be mad in church.

  I try to stare straight ahead, but the corner of my eye is picking up all the sparkliness that’s happening to my left. Even the diamond chip in Lottie’s watch twinkles with light.

  I pull the notepaper from my Bible and scribble furiously. Why is she wearing your shirt?

  Her mom bought them at the mall. Mine was free.

  I think she added the last part to make me feel better, like she got the shirt by accident. I pout my lips and slam back against the pew.

  Now Melissa hands her a note. Without turning my head, I slide my eyes over the words. Her cursive letters swirl over the paper: You look great! Well sure, of course she would think so; they both got on the same shirt. Then I’m hit like a bolt of lightning—she wants to be twins with Lottie.

  My body tightens. I clench my teeth. Lottie smiles at her and writes something back. I can’t see it.

  I scribble my own note and push it into her right hand. What’s she writing about?

  Nothing, she writes back. Just stuff about her shirt.

  On her left comes Melissa’s note. I lean over to get a better view: You have a really good shape! Did you talk to your mom about—

  “Violet!” Lottie snaps and turns the note over. She looks mad.

  Something’s going on. Why won’t she let me see? I pretend to sit back in the pew, but I use my slow-moving statue skills to spy.

  Lottie writes something quick. All I’ve managed to see is: and what if she says no?

  “Who says ‘no’?” I whisper in her ear.

  “Violet!” Lottie says, then clamps her hand over her mouth. Her mom leans forward and frowns at her. Lottie slips the note to Melissa, shifts over to me, and goes, “It’s nothing, okay?”

  I lean my head toward her. “It’s something, or you wouldn’t be hiding it.”

  We sit there, all three of us, facing forward for a minute. Then Melissa slips another note into Lottie’s hand. Despite my best efforts, I can’t see the words.

  I touch Lottie’s arm. “Is it about me?” I whisper.

  “No! Violet, please.” Her eyes plead with me. Is this the privacy she was talking about? From me? My lips press together.

  Lottie starts to write again. Melissa takes the paper from her, scribbles, then hands it back. Lottie cups it with her hands and reads it between her fingers. My Lord, what could be so important? I’m tired of this mysterious note. I try to snatch it. Lottie whips the note away from me, and then her mom stretches across Tootsie and Melissa and grips her arm. In a low voice, she says to Lottie, “Stop, or I’ll pass my own note across your bottom.”

  Tears fill Lottie’s eyes and pink creeps up her neck and into her face. She slides the note into her Bible and doesn’t look at anyone for the rest of the service.

  Neither do I, ’cause I’m thinking about how to get ahold of that note, but service lets out before I can develop a plan. If I changed my name today, it would be Suspicious Violet or Mad Violet. Well, maybe not Mad Violet, because sometimes “mad” means crazy, so I’d have to think twice about that. But I only have to think once about Lottie’s new name: Benedict Arnold.

  14

  Yesterday, I was boiling hot mad in church when Melissa and Lottie were passing notes back and forth and Lottie wouldn’t even tell me what they were talking about. When church was over, I grabbed Momma off that platform and said, “Come on, let’s go.” I barely even looked at Lottie when we left.

  But later, after Momma and I had gotten a good ways down the road, the Townsends’ truck roared by. Mr. Townsend honked the horn and the girls leaned out and shouted, “Violet! Violet!” Lottie hung out the window and waved. “See you in a few!”

  Well, my heart swelled up and I waved back and watched their truck tear down their driveway, spinning out a cloud of dust.

  “Going to the fish fry?” Momma asked.

  “Yep.” ’Course I was. I couldn’t be mad anymore, not after the whole Townsend family practically fell out of the truck to make sure I was coming.

  “I think I may take a nap, then,” Momma said, as if this wasn’t the same conversation we had every Sunday.

  After she lay down, I got myself ready and ran over to Lottie’s.

  “Where’s Melissa?” I asked Lottie soon as I walked through her back door. Figured I better prepare myself.

  Lottie raised her eyebrows and handed me a paring knife for the lemons. “I think Melissa’s done with fish fries.”

  “That’s too bad,” I said. I didn’t mean it, of course, but it seemed like the right thing to say. I made a clean slice through a lemon and it squirted me on the cheek.

  “Yep,” Lottie said. “Just you and me.”

  I couldn’t help but smile even though I’d just stuck a lemon in my mouth.

  So things are right back to normal today. Lottie and I are in her kitchen making crusts for apple pies. I’m pressing out a perfect pastry circle. This is a chore I like, pushing the rolling pin like a steamroller across the dough. I stretch the dough till it’s almost breaking. Then I poke two holes in the top half for eyes and a bunch of holes, snowman-style, for a smile.

  “Look,” I say.

  Lottie stops rolling for a second, looks up, and laughs. Setting aside her rolling pin, she pokes some holes in her dough. “Look at mine!”

  Her face is even better—she made Xs for the eyes and a line for the lips, so her dough face is either asleep or drunk. We giggle and ball up our dough to roll it out again.

  When I look up, I notice Lottie’s got her bathing suit on under her shirt. Yesterday, too. Well, it is hot in here. They don’t have air-conditioning either, and the fans are just blowing the hot air around.

  “We going swimming later?”

  Lottie tilts her head. “What?”

  “We going swimming?” I point to her neck where her bikini top is tied. “You got your suit on.”

  Lottie licks her lips. “Oh, that. Um . . .” She looks down, rolls a little
dough, looks back up. “I don’t know if there’ll be time.”

  “What do you mean? I’ll just run and get my suit after we get these pies in.” No big deal.

  “Well, I mean, like—” She sets her rolling pin down and looks at me straight on. “Okay, don’t be mad, but Melissa invited me over to watch Paris Heights with her.”

  My eyes narrow into slits so thin I can barely see out of them. My cheeks turn into stone.

  Her shoulders droop. “Violet!”

  “What?” I say and purse my lips.

  “She’s nice. I don’t know why you don’t like her.”

  “I never said that!”

  Lottie leans her head. “It kind of shows.”

  I look away from her so she can’t see that I know what she’s talking about. “She tries to be so glamorous all the time.”

  “She thinks you have pretty eyes.”

  Okay, I do like hearing that. But still, I’m not giving up my best friend for “pretty eyes.” I shrug so’s Lottie can see I don’t care about that.

  She heaves a big sigh. “I’m allowed to have other friends, you know. You do.”

  I lay my perfect pie circle in a pan. I grit my teeth as I roll out the next ball. “No, I don’t.”

  “What do you call Eddie?” She settles a crust and rolls out another ball too. “Half the time you’re out doing something with him.”

  I roll faster, harder. “Eddie doesn’t count. He’s a boy. Besides, you don’t like doing some of the stuff we do.”

  We got the crusts in the pans and the tops rolled out. The windows darken as we work.

  “Maybe there’s stuff I like to do that you don’t like to do.” She pinches around the crust so the top and bottom’ll stay together. “I’m just saying that you have other friends and I don’t get mad about it.”

  It’s true. She don’t ever get mad when I’m out with Eddie. But like I said, Eddie’s a boy. Melissa’s trying to get my spot. I try to get the madness out of my face. It’s still in my heart, but I don’t want Lottie to know that. I just want everything to be like it always is. I grab the apples and a knife and start cutting. “I don’t see what’s so interesting about Paris Heights.”

  Lottie laughs and grabs an apple. “You’ve never even seen it.”

  I am beginning to simmer. She knows Momma don’t allow me to watch programs like that. I use my knife like an ax. Chop. Chop. Chop. I’m done cutting apples. As we mix the apples with sugar and spices, a long train of thunder rumbles by.

  “I wonder if we’ll have time to bake these pies,” Lottie says.

  “Plenty of time,” I say. I dump the filling into both pans and we lay the tops on. “That thunder is far away.”

  Then it booms again.

  “I don’t know,” Lottie says, a worried look on her face. “Sounds like it’s getting louder to me.”

  Thunder drums in the clouds again. Irritation crosses over me. I know what she’s getting at. “You just want to hurry up and go to Melissa’s.”

  “No, I don’t. I just don’t know if there’s time for these pies to bake before the storm starts.”

  “You can’t tell when a storm’s going to hit? Well, I can tell you.” I grab the pies, open the oven, and slide them in. “It ain’t hitting now, so these pies are going in.” I slam the oven shut. Paris Heights will have to wait.

  I spin around and look at her. “What do you want to do now?” I ask. “We can’t go swimming.”

  Lottie fingers the ties at her neck. “Let me clean up this mess first.” She goes to the sink, looking out the dark window as she runs the water.

  A soft light flashes inside the clouds. One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three—crack!

  Lottie turns around. “I think we should turn everything off.”

  I stand up and cross my arms. “No! That storm is three miles away.”

  A bright strike flashes through the back windows and I forget to count.

  Lottie frowns at me and stomps over to the box fan. “That’s it. I’m turning everything off.” She twists the knob, crosses her arms, and looks at me.

  Static rushes across my scalp and down my arms. All my hairs stand up. I look at Lottie in slow motion and my mouth starts to form her name. Then light races down the kitchen wall and flares out the oven and at the same time—BOOM!—a bomb explodes. My ears are deafened. My heart hammers against my chest.

  I start crying.

  A fire is burning inside the oven. The smoke detectors shriek and Lottie’s screaming and I’m screaming too ’cause I don’t know what to do— Lord, help me—and then I’m getting up, I’m grabbing Lottie, and we stumble out of there and cross the yard, slipping and falling through the rain till we climb my steps and fall into my house. We hug each other and cry.

  Then I remember learning 9-1-1 in school. I let go of her and run to the phone.

  “What’s your emergency?” the lady asks.

  I sob into the phone.

  The lady says, “Take a breath and speak clearly. What’s your emergency?”

  I take one big breath. “My best friend’s house just got struck by lightning.”

  15

  My best friend is homeless. Actually, it’s worse than that. My best friend and her sisters are staying at Melissa’s house.

  “It’s just temporary,” Mrs. Townsend told the girls when everyone was still at our house. By this time, some of the neighbors had come out to see what happened. Including Mrs. Gold.

  Mr. and Mrs. Townsend decided to stay in their house so they could work on it. But Lottie, Hannah, Ashley, and Tootsie needed somewhere to stay.

  Momma offered right away for them to stay with us, but Mrs. Gold rushed in with her offer, making it sound better. “We have all that room and it’s just going to waste. You come,” she said, nodding. “We want you to stay with us.”

  I bet they did. I could just imagine Melissa giving Lottie daily movie-star lessons.

  Mrs. Townsend’s eyes welled up. “If you’re sure it wouldn’t be too much of a burden.”

  “I’m looking forward to a house full of kids. I’m home all day. You can do what you need to do and I’ll watch the kids.” She looked like she wanted to say more, but she stopped and waited.

  I waited too. I couldn’t believe this was happening. Momma couldn’t top that offer—she had to work.

  Mrs. Townsend bit her lip. “I don’t know what I’m going to do about clothes. Everything in there is soaked.”

  Mrs. Gold waved her hands and shook her head. “Don’t worry about that. We’ll shove everything they need into plastic bags. I’ll run the wash when we get home.”

  After that, there was nothing left to say. The two of them went over, filled the bags with clothes, and came back for the girls.

  I hug Lottie hard when they leave. “I’m going to miss you,” I say, tears streaming down my face.

  She’s crying too. “I’ll miss you, too, Violet.” She wipes her eyes and laughs. “But I’ll just be down the street. We’ll still see each other.”

  “Yeah,” I say, but I don’t believe it. Melissa will guard Lottie like a bulldog. There’s something else I got to say. It’s hard, but if I don’t say it, it’ll crush me—it’s that heavy. “I’m sorry I made you bake those pies.”

  Lottie’s eyes fill. “It wasn’t the oven,” she says. She leans closer and whispers, “It was the antenna. The firemen said so.” She widens her eyes and leans back. “They said it was like a lightning rod.”

  “Oh, my Lord,” I say. That old TV antenna of theirs sticks way up. My heart feels good and terrible at the same time—good ’cause it wasn’t my fault, and terrible for feeling good.

  It’s nighttime when they leave. Momma and me wave till we don’t see them no more, then Momma slips her arm around my shoulders and we step into the empty house. In my mind, I replay the lightning and the screaming and 9-1-1 and the taillights of the car I just watched disappear down the road. My breath comes in ragged, and my lips pull back tight.
I clench my eyes shut. I turn into Momma’s side and push my face into her. For the third time tonight, I’m bawling like a baby.

  16

  Lottie’s house looks normal from the outside. I stare at it real hard as I pass by on my way to Melissa’s. It’s hard to believe that something that looks the same as it always has is suddenly so different on the inside.

  Lord, I can’t believe how hot it is today. I swear if Lottie has her suit on, I’m running through the sprinkler with my clothes on, that’s how hot I am.

  Eddie flies around the bend on his bike, pops a wheelie, and rides it. I can’t help but be impressed. He races down the road and skids to a perfect stop right in front of me, causing clouds of dust to puff up around us.

  “Don’t get me dirty,” I say and keep walking. “I’m going somewhere.”

  He hops off his bike and walks alongside me. “Where you going?”

  “Melissa’s.”

  His eyebrows shoot up into a question.

  “I been there before,” I say. “Besides, Lottie’s staying there.”

  Eddie’s jaw drops. “What?”

  He doesn’t even know about Lottie’s house! I describe everything—the explosion, the lightning racing down the wall, and how, if I’d have been touching that oven, I would’ve been struck down dead, dead, dead.

  “Whoa!” Eddie says. “Man!”

  I like that he’s impressed.

  “But why are they staying at Melissa’s if the house didn’t burn down?” he asks.

  “It didn’t burn down,” I say. “It was burning inside the walls. The firemen had to chop it all open and hose down the wires.” I know this ’cause I overheard Mrs. Townsend telling Momma and Mrs. Gold. I remember something else. “The firemen said the antenna was a big lightning rod.”

  Eddie looks off to the side, and I realize he’s picturing that antenna looming over Lottie’s house. “Man.” He shakes his head. “But you know what they say, Florida’s the lightning capital of the United States.” He raises his eyebrows. “We’re in lightning alley.”

  I get the shivers hearing him say that.

  We walk down a bit, pushing lovebugs out of our way. Don’t ever swat lovebugs. You’ll kill them, that’s how delicate they are. The sun’s burning me flat into the ground. It’s so humid, my shirt sticks to my back. I sweep up my hair and hold it up with one hand while we walk.