“Mmmmmm.”
Tap, tap, tap, tap go my knees. That won’t be the version of Dad who comes today. It can’t be. That Dad wouldn’t come to school.
And then I finally see him. His hair stands up on one side, but he came! That has to mean something. That has to mean he’s a little bit better. Dad pushes through the doors and walks right past me, up to Miss Williams. After signing some papers, he turns around and whispers, “Let’s go.”
I can’t help it. I run up and hug him right there. Last night, I thought I’d never see my dad again, and now he’s here.
“Okay.” He pats my head and then pushes me off, as if I’m the one who’s scraggly. Or maybe nobody’s hugged him in a long time, which makes me want to do it more. But I don’t.
We load into Dad’s small red hatchback. It’s dirty and stinky, too. But right that second, everything smells fresh to me. Like after a rainstorm. Like hope and answered prayers and new plants sprouting.
Dad starts the car and backs out of the parking space.
“I called your mom. She’s going to meet us at your house.”
Your house. Not our house. If you could fill balloons with hope and carry them around like a bouquet, then one of mine just popped.
“I need to … talk to her about something. Could you maybe stay in your room while I do?”
Talking could be good. That thought fills a new hope balloon as I steal Dad’s phone, sliding it off the console next to his seat and into my pocket.
When we pull into the driveway, I leap out of the car as fast as I can and run inside. Mom’s already home, and I have a secret plan. I learned a trick two years ago when Sofia’s cousin lived with her for a summer and we wanted to spy on her.
Mom always leaves her cell phone on the counter when she comes in. So I call Mom from Dad’s phone. Then, before it makes a sound, I answer her phone and mute Dad’s. I slide Mom’s phone toward the edge of the counter, near the kitchen table where she sits. I have a walkie-talkie and Mom has no idea.
Mom clasps a steaming purple mug in front of her and drums her fingers on it, the way she always does when she’s thinking. Seeing her makes all that anger from the principal’s office come back.
“You knew where he lived,” I say. “You knew this whole time.”
I thought maybe she’d try to lie or tell me I was wrong, but she just says, “Is he coming in?”
“He says he needs to talk to you. Probably about being lonely and sad because we never visited him.”
“Katydid—”
Dad walks in the door, and Mom shoots up out of her seat. “Tony.”
Dad acts like it isn’t his home anymore. Like he’s a guest waiting for someone to ask him inside. “Elizabeth.”
“Come in.”
That’s when Grammy walks out of Dad’s office. She’s lifting her gold bag over her shoulder when she sees him and gasps. “Tony?”
“Mom? What are you doing here?”
She rushes to Dad and hugs him. “I live here now. Isn’t that nice?”
Dad gives Grammy a short side hug before turning to Mom. “How long has she been here?”
“About a week and a half. She needed some help and—”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
I’d grown so sick of Mom’s excuses for not calling Dad that I never thought to ask her if she’d told him about Grammy living with us.
I can’t believe I forgot.
Now that he’s standing here in the kitchen, filling up space and replacing memories with realness, all of my anger at her nos comes spilling out. “You haven’t told him yet?” I shout. “You wouldn’t even call him for that?”
Mom puts her hands out. “Whoa. I’m not the bad guy here.”
“I should have been part of this decision,” Dad says.
“Oh, Tony. Calm down,” says Grammy. “It’s a nice thing she’s doing, really. But I’ve missed you.”
And I know this is it. This is all Dad needs. Grammy’s here, and he’ll see how sick she is and realize she didn’t mean it when he asked to play a song with her and she sat at the piano, staring at the music and the keys before shouting, “This is ridiculous. I hate playing this song and I hate making music with you! Don’t ask me to do it again!”
Maybe she’ll even ask him to play a song with her tonight.
But that doesn’t happen.
Dad shakes his head and sidesteps Grammy. “I … I should have … I could have taken her. You didn’t have to do this.”
“I know I didn’t have to,” says Mom. “But family is family, and heaven knows you can barely take care of yourself.”
Dad’s face twists like Mom dropped a brick on his toe.
Grammy blinks. “Ouch, Liz.”
“I’m sorry,” says Mom, stepping away from the table. “You’re right. I should have involved you. But maybe we could discuss this … alone?”
Dad nods at me. “Katydid?” Then at Grammy. “Mom? Do you think we could get some privacy?”
I look from him to Mom, and I just know this is like one of those movies where everyone has a big fight and then everything gets patched up and goes back to happy. Things started off kind of shaky with the whole Grammy thing, but that only means we’re about to be a bigger family when it’s all done.
“Of course,” says Grammy. “In a jiffy.” She takes my hand and walks me back to my bedroom.
“He wants to talk!” I say as Grammy closes the door behind us. “That’s a good thing, right?”
She sits on my bed and pulls a skein of yarn from her bag. “Don’t count your chickens before they hatch, Kate.”
But it’s too late. I’ve already counted chickens and eggs, and my hopes are higher than a hot-air balloon. I pull the phone out of my pocket and wave it in the air. “I made a walkie-talkie. Want to listen?”
Grammy begins rolling her yarn into a ball. “Of course. Bring that little eavesdropping device right over here.”
I sit down next to her and put the phone on speaker, holding it a few inches from our faces as mom’s voice crackles out of it. “How have you been?”
“Fine.”
“Fine!” I whisper. “Do you hear that? He’s fine! That’s better than sad.”
“Sshhh!” says Grammy.
“You wanted to talk?” Mom asks.
A chair scrapes against the floor. Mom just sat down. Or Dad did. Maybe both. “Kate came to visit me yesterday.”
“I … I know.”
“Did you …”
“No, I didn’t tell her to. I didn’t even know until after.”
“Made me spaghetti sauce and sang to me …”
“Tony, I’m sorry. I told her you wanted to be alone.”
“No, it’s okay.”
I swing my feet in the air. “It’s the magic. It’s working.”
“It made me realize something … important.”
Grammy starts swinging her feet, too. “I think maybe you’re right.”
Dad’s coming back, I can tell. I’ve been waiting and dreaming and filling hope balloons just for this and here it is.
“I want a divorce.”
Divorce. It’s the ugliest word I’ve ever heard.
Just like that, my hope balloons all explode.
Grammy drops her yarn. “No, no, no. He doesn’t mean that.”
“What?” says Mom.
“Kate took care of me yesterday. She did a better job at being a parent in one hour than I’ve done my entire life. It’s time … you’re better off without … someone like me.”
“That’s not true. You know that’s not true. You are a wonderful—”
“Don’t blow sunshine, Liz.”
“If you would get some help. Just see someone. I know you’d feel better and you’d—”
“Why can’t you accept me the way I am?”
“Because this isn’t you. Tony, this is not the man I married.”
“Which is why I’m asking for the divorce.” A chair scrapes again, and I know he
’s standing up. “I’ll send the papers.”
“Tony, it doesn’t have to be like this.”
“I’m sorry.”
I can’t move. I can’t breathe. I can’t do anything but listen to Dad telling Mom I made him decide to leave us. Me! And spaghetti and singing. He doesn’t want to be my dad anymore.
“Did he really just say that?” I whisper to Grammy. “Divorce?”
“Oh, no,” she replies. “Oh, no, no, no. We must have heard wrong.”
“I don’t think so.”
I drop the phone and run out of the room. He’s not going to leave, disappearing without a goodbye. Not again. I’m not going to wake up tomorrow morning with everything changed and no dad like last time. I have to make him see, have to make him understand. I have to make him say goodbye.
But I’m too late. Dad’s already in his car and driving away. I look at Mom. She’s staring at the table like maybe Dad left a message on it.
“This is your fault!” I yell. “This is all your fault. He NEEDED us and you wouldn’t let us help. ‘No, no, no. Don’t get your hopes up!’ I hate you! I hate you!” I run back into my room and throw myself on the bed.
Grammy’s still sitting there, but her hands are filled up with yarn from the ball that she’s now unraveling. “Oh, it’s just not right. It’s not right. Look at this mess. I’m sorry, Kate. I made this huge mess.”
I can tell she’s lost. But I don’t help her. All I can do is curl up into a ball and remember. Why do I have to remember?
When Dad left the first time, I was awake. I could hear Mom and Dad in the hallway.
“At least say goodbye,” Mom said.
“What good will that do?”
“You’re going to break her heart.”
There was a pause and a sigh. “She’s sleeping.” His footsteps clomped to the door. It opened. His car started. He drove away.
I used to think if I’d known that was the last time I’d see Dad, I would have chased after his car. I’ve dreamed about it hundreds of times. Running after him down the road, right past Mr. Harris’s almond trees. They were filled up with nuts and leaves then. I would have run all the way to the end of the trees. And Dad would’ve stopped and turned around, because you can’t ignore someone who runs through an entire orchard for you. You just can’t.
Chapter 26
“Oh, Kate. Someone’s coming. Someone’s coming. Help me clean this up. I don’t want anyone to see me like this.”
I lift my forehead off my knees. “Nobody’s coming, Grammy. Don’t worry.”
“I can hear it. It’s getting louder. Oh, look at this mess.” Grammy frantically gathers loose yarn into her lap, winds it around the ball, knots it even worse.
I listen and wait. Sure enough, the growl of Dad’s car is getting louder, not quieter. He’s coming back and I didn’t even have to chase after him.
I jump out of bed, scoop the phone off the ground, and slide across the tile hallway as I run out of my bedroom. “He’s back!” I shout. “He’s coming back.”
Mom’s eyes are pink as peaches. “What?”
I look out the screen door as Dad’s car pulls into the driveway. “He’s here. He’s not leaving.”
Mom stands but still keeps one hand on the table, like it’s holding her up.
Grammy walks out of my bedroom with yarn in her arms and trailing behind her. “Oh, I’m such a mess, such a mess. Don’t let anyone see me like this.” She shuffles into Dad’s office and closes the door.
Then Dad walks back in. Without knocking, or waiting. Like he lives here.
It’s really like a movie now, where everything seems lost, and right when you think there’s no happy ending, the hero realizes he made a big mistake and returns. Dad’s still scraggly and sad, but now it’s in a handsome way. I know he’s going to march across that kitchen, grab Mom around the waist, lean her back, and give her a big kiss. Just like the movies. Just like he used to. We’ll all cry and talk, and he’ll never, ever leave again.
But Dad doesn’t do any of that. He stands there with his hands in his pockets, frozen.
I wait for the kiss and I love yous. But when Dad opens his mouth, all that comes out is “I left my phone.”
I stare down at that ugly black rectangle and then back up at him. “Don’t go, Dad.”
He puts out his hand. Not asking to hold my hand, but waiting for his stupid phone. I put it in his palm just as gentle as I can, but I can’t let go of it. I squeeze it until my knuckles turn white. I visualize crushing it like a stupid, empty soda can.
But phones don’t break so easy, I guess. At least, not when you want them to.
“Please,” I whisper.
Dad’s fingers close around the phone, touching mine as they do. They’re cold, and I let go.
He puts his hand on my shoulder. “Goodbye, Katydid.” And then he walks out the door.
For weeks after Dad left the first time, we kept finding things he left behind. There were cologne traces, footprints on the tile, lost shoes.
There won’t be any of those things this time. He’s really gone.
Mom falls back into her chair. She can’t stand there, holding herself up any longer.
Grammy comes out of her bedroom without her yarn. She wipes her hands on her dress and says, “Tony? I was thinking.” She looks around the kitchen at me and Mom. “Where did he go?”
That’s when I hear the weird gasping thing Mom does when she’s trying not to cry.
I escape back to my room and lie on my bed again.
“Please,” I begged at the door to his room. My guitar was already strapped around my neck. I ran my thumb over the strings. “Will you come sing with me, Dad? It’s not the same without you.”
His room was dark.
He lay on his bed.
He didn’t move or say anything.
He was gone the next day.
I try to think of something else. Anything else. I try to remember happy times. Try to imagine Dad here with me. But there’s nothing but that dark room, and the silence, and that question. Will you come sing with me?
Dear Dad Tony,
Mom says that sometimes when something hurts super bad, your body stops feeling it. I think thoughts can be the same way, and my brain is trying to protect me. It won’t let me imagine you here with me, singing, getting ice cream. I can’t picture it. That’s how I know you really aren’t coming back.
Does that mean you aren’t my dad anymore?
Kate
Chapter 27
I lie there for a long time. The sky turns orange and red, and my back starts aching. I sit up, rubbing at my eyes. They’re sore and swollen. My guitar leans up against my bed. There’s so much sadness in me, I guess it wants to come out, because without really thinking, I pick up the guitar.
Cradle it like a baby.
Put my fingers on the strings and try to sing. My voice is wobbly, but I keep going.
“And some folks thought ’twas a dream they dreamed
Of sailing that beautiful sea.”
I close my eyes and imagine all the bits of sadness spiraling out of me like tiny threads of spider silk.
“Wynken and Blynken are two little eyes
And Nod is a weary head.”
I stop playing.
What a stupid song. Dad actually sang this to me?
I lie back down on my bed, put the body of the guitar on the ground, and let go of the neck so it falls to the floor with a crash and a twang.
“Oh, my,” says Grammy, opening my door. “That didn’t sound good.” She comes into my bedroom. I can tell by the sound of her footsteps that she’s back to herself finally. She always walks a little louder then, like she knows exactly where to put her feet, rather than the shuffling she does when she’s lost.
Grammy sits on the edge of my mattress and puts her hand on my head. “Tony’s gone, isn’t he?”
I roll onto my back, away from her. “You lied to me. There’s no such thing as magic.”
Grammy pulls her hand away. “What makes you say that?”
“What makes me say that? I gave Dad all the magic I possibly could, and it didn’t do anything. It made things worse! I made things worse.”
“That’s not true,” she lies. Again.
“Yes, it is. Didn’t you hear him? He left because of spaghetti and singing. That’s not magic. That’s the opposite of magic. I can’t believe I ever believed you.”
Grammy sighs and scooches back farther on my bed, trapping my legs against the covers. “I think it’s time I teach you the last rule of Everyday Magic.”
I roll over to face the wall entirely, just like Dad. “I don’t want to hear it.”
“Well, I’m going to say it,” says Grammy. “So unless you put in some earplugs you’re going to hear it. The third rule is a tricky one. It’s the reason most people don’t believe in magic, you know.”
“They’re smart,” I mutter.
“Trust. You have to trust the magic. That means you can’t give it away expecting a certain outcome. You can’t put demands on it and say it only worked if everything goes how you wanted it to, or when you wanted it to. Magic has its own timeframe and its own ideas about what should happen. You can hope it will cause some event, but sometimes it will do something else entirely. That doesn’t mean it didn’t work.”
“That doesn’t sound like magic. That sounds like what Sofia says about praying.”
Grammy pats my arm. “You’re a smart girl, Kate. You get that from me, of course.”
I sit up. My chest aches so much with all the sad thoughts I’ve refused to let out for months, that some finally burst free of me. “Grammy, are we still a family?”
“What?”
“Are you and me still family? Dad––no––Tony’s gone. He doesn’t want me to be his daughter. Does that mean you’re not my grandma anymore?”
“No,” Grammy whispers strong enough to shoot nails through a wall. “No, no, no.” She scoots closer and looks me straight in the eye. “It doesn’t matter what your father does or says. I am still your grandma.”
Her two dimply hands gobble mine up between them.
“But we’re broken,” I say. “I tried to fix us and I made everything worse. I made him leave.”
The Three Rules of Everyday Magic Page 12