Footer Davis Probably Is Crazy

by Susan Vaught

  Angel took a lot of pictures, and when I downloaded them Sunday night, I found proof that maybe somebody was watching us. I attached the picture. It shows a shoe. I know you can’t see if there’s a leg in it, but it’s pretty definitely a guy’s shoe, and it had to get there some way. Captain Armstrong might have been wearing it. He’s a veteran too, but he’s not a police officer. I’m not turning him in or anything, because he’s a really nice man, and he’d never murder anybody, but he does have shoes like that. Peavine and I checked the trail to the farm early this morning, and the shoe was gone. We didn’t find any footprints, but we’re not very good at looking for footprints.

  We hope you will investigate this lead. Peavine wants to be a detective. I want to be a journalist. Never mind Angel, because she barely speaks normal English, and I think she wants to be an astronaut or a dragon rider, so she doesn’t count. All three of us want to help, though.

  Thank you very much,

  Footer Davis

  footGurrrl@mmail.com

  Sent from my iPhone

  From the Notebook of Detective Peavine Jones

  Interview of Regina Jones, Eleven Days After the Fire

  Location: Television Room in Footer’s House

  Mom: Don’t you think it’s awfully close to bedtime to start a criminal interview?

  Footer: We’re interviewing suspects in the Abrams fire, not criminals.

  Mom: Then this will be fast, because I was at a church potluck with my kids when that fire was set. About forty people saw us.

  Footer: [Journalist frowns. She’s still pretty, though.] You have a point. What’s for dinner tomorrow? Dad said you were cooking for us.

  Mom: I’ll have to see what you’ve got here, but I’ll go to the store first, so no worries. I’ll make sure it doesn’t have any flies in it, or snake guts. That a deal?

  Footer: No walrus meat either.

  Mom: [Suspect raises right hand.] Word of honor. I was thinking more like baked chicken.

  Footer: What do people do after they win the lottery?

  Mom: Well, I didn’t win a gigantic jackpot, so I just paid off our debt, set up some savings and investments, stopped working for the county, and took a part-time job doing the accounting for my church.

  Footer: You never have problems like my mom, do you?

  Mom: Everybody has problems, Footer. Remember when you first met Peavine, back when you two were in kindergarten—before he got strong enough to really use his forearm crutches?

  Footer: Sort of.

  Mom: That first day at school, he had so much trouble just walking up the front steps, and he cried, and you were the only one who didn’t laugh at him. You were the only one who helped him. [Suspect looks sad, and I wish she wouldn’t talk about that stuff.] I was a mess all that day, to be honest. And that night, and all the next week. Every surgery Peavine’s had to help him stand up straight and walk better, the day the doctor told me Angel might have some social and learning problems, the night I came home and found their father gone—no family is perfect, and I’m sure not, myself. Trust me, I’ve been a mess lots of times.

  Footer: But you haven’t had to go to that hospital in Memphis.

  Mom: No, I haven’t. [Suspect looks sad again. I really hate it when she looks sad.] You and your dad and mom have always been there for us, though. You’ve never let Peavine or Angel down, and your parents were right there with me when I’ve had to go through my big problems. So, if I ever did have to go to that hospital in Memphis, I bet you and your dad would help Peavine and Angel while I was gone—and your mom would help, too, if she was feeling up to it.

  Footer: Of course we would.

  Mom: [Suspect hugs journalist.] Okay, now, seriously. It’s time for bed, both of you. Peavine, find your sister and get your things.

  Extra note: I bet older detectives do not have bedtimes or have to put up with people hugging their suspects and journalists.

  CHAPTER

  8

  Twelve Days After the Fire

  “Captain Armstrong took all Dad’s guns away last night. He’s going to keep them at his house.”

  Mom didn’t say anything.

  “When he came over,” I told her, “he had on black running shoes. They look like this shoe in a picture Peavine and I took at the crime scene.”

  Mom still didn’t say anything.

  “Do you think Captain Armstrong could be an actual suspect?” I stared at Mom, who wasn’t moving, and who wasn’t really looking at me. “Not a practice one, like you and Dad. Since he used to be a soldier and all, maybe he’s shot people before?”

  Nothing from Mom.

  “I mean, he could have had one of his flashbacks. Some people in town think that. There are rumors that maybe he was over there that night, or running past the farm for some reason and thought Mr. Abrams was an enemy. It could happen, right?”

  “Enemy,” Mom muttered, and I jumped. I leaned toward her, hoping she’d keep talking, but she went right back to staring at nothing.

  “I don’t think he did it,” I said. “Captain Armstrong wouldn’t kill anybody now, would he, Mom?”

  Nothing.

  Alone with Mom in a visitor’s room at the hospital psychiatric unit, I looked down at my scratched knuckles. I couldn’t believe I beat up a little kid yesterday. Did I really hit Max Selwin over and over? I kinda remembered doing it, but kinda not, too. Mostly I remembered smelling fire and seeing darkness and then seeing the creep in the plaid shirt watching from across the street.

  He had been smiling.

  The suspicious stranger.

  Captain Armstrong and the creep were more likely to have had something to do with the Abrams crimes than my mom. I felt sure of that.

  Outside the visitor’s-room door, Dad and one of the nurses talked in low voices. I wondered if they were discussing Mom or me. Did this place have a unit for kids? I hoped it didn’t.

  Mom shifted in her rolling recliner, making her hospital blanket rustle. I glanced up at her, hating the way her face just hung on her bones, not moving. I double-hated knowing she couldn’t even walk, because her thoughts were moving so fast, she couldn’t pay attention to anything for long, not even her feet.

  The room we were in was about the size of Ms. Malone’s classroom at school. It was painted all whites and yellows with pictures of flowers and words stenciled around like BELIEVE and HOPE and I AM MORE THAN MY ILLNESS. It was bright and cheerful and everything smelled like coconut air freshener, but my mother looked like a zombie.

  “I think I have a brain tumor,” I told Mom.

  No reaction.

  I tried again. “The lady from Children and Family Services, her names is Stephanie Bridges. She’s the one who made Dad get rid of his guns. I guess she was afraid you’d shoot me instead of a snake.”

  Mom stayed still in her chair. Her mouth dropped wide, but not like she was surprised. More like she was about to snore with her eyes open.

  “Are you awake?” I muttered.

  “I’m awake,” she said, slurring the words. “Guns. Sorry, my fault.”

  It was her fault, so I didn’t tell her it wasn’t.

  “Shotguns and rifles are dangerous,” she added. “Maybe it’s for the best.” Then she mumbled for a while, not saying anything that made sense. The medications did that to her sometimes. She told me that was one of the reasons she didn’t like taking them.

  I’d rather be crazy than stupid, Fontana.

  Not me.

  If somebody gave me pills to chase away crazy, I’d take every one of them, just like I was supposed to.

  “I think I’m losing my mind,” I whispered.

  Mom sat up a little straighter, and the wheels on her rolling recliner creaked. “You’re fine, honey.”

  “I’m not fine.” Flutters started in my belly, and I couldn’t look at her. The closest picture to me had roses and daisies mixed together, and it didn’t look normal, all that red in the white and yellow. “I keep seeing things.”
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  “If you were losing your mind, you’d hear things, not see things,” Mom said. “What are you seeing?”

  My eyes went from roses and daisies to the shadow of Dad outside the visiting-room door. “The fire. Cissy Abrams.”

  “Sshhh. Hush now.” Mom’s face tightened and now she sat as straight as any normal person. “You slept through all of that, remember?”

  I picked at the cut knuckles on my right hand, making them bleed. “What if I didn’t?”

  Mom kept blinking, like she wanted to nod off but was too scared to do it.

  “When did you lose your barrette?” I asked her.

  She blinked faster. “We don’t need to waste time talking about barrettes. That’s over and done.”

  My heart did a big plummet, right down in the fluttery flitters. It wasn’t over and done. Nothing felt over and done. “It’s not wasting time. Mom, if you were there during the fire, if I was there, we can’t just pretend it away.”

  Her hands twitched under her white blanket. “I want you to feed the mice, Footer. Can you do that for me? Feed the mice in the basement, so they don’t die like my squirrel.”

  “What are you talking about? Mom—”

  “Rifles and shotguns are too dangerous for little girls, even if we have a right to them.” Mom blinked and blinked and blinked. “Our country was founded on the Bill of Rights. Did you know that? This is a great country—”

  I stared at her, not hearing her anymore because a high whine had started in my ears.

  Rifles and shotguns are too dangerous for little girls.

  The whine got louder, until it buzzed.

  No. Not now. Not here.

  But I couldn’t help blinking like Mom did, too fast, over and over, because it was happening again. The world was changing. Hallucination. Flashback. Mice and dead squirrels. Help me.

  I dug my fingers into the chair arms and the room turned into fire, and—

  Cissy Abrams stands in front of me, covered in moonlight. . . .

  She holds out her arms. . . .

  A shotgun appears in her hands. . . .

  Dark flecks rain down. . . .

  Mom appears beside Cissy. . . .

  She puts her hands on the shotgun. . . .

  “Hurry,” she says. . . .

  They look at me. . . .

  I start to fall. . . .

  “My country, ’tis of theeeee,” a voice sang so loud, it broke the night around me. I threw out my arms to keep from hitting the ground, and my fingers brushed soft blanket.

  My eyes focused on Mom. Mom in her hospital rolling chair, without a shotgun or any fire burning around her.

  “Mom!” My heart thumped as I gripped the blanket on top of her. “I saw—I thought I saw you and Cissy and—”

  Mom giggled and stuck out one of her hands. “I have a piano in my wrist, see?” She sang again, louder than ever, “Sweet land of liiiii-berty, of thee I sing!”

  I fixed my gaze on her arm, and tears ran down my cheeks. Everything inside me hurt, but I tried again anyway. “Mom, I thought I saw you at the fire. Just now. It happened again. Talk to me, Mom, please?”

  “Land where my faaaaa-thers died, land of the piiiiiiil-grim’s pride!” Mom didn’t even look at me as she sang, only now it was more like yelling.

  Dad and the nurse came in and tried to talk to Mom, but she babbled about feeding mice and wearing barrettes, then fell asleep before they could get very far.

  “Sorry,” the nurse told me as I wiped the tears off my face. “We’re still a little early in getting her calmed down. If you come back next week—”

  “Piano,” Mom mumbled, then moved her fingers on her arm like she was playing the piano and went back to snoring.

  I felt sick.

  Dad shook his head as the nurse pushed Mom out of the visiting room and back toward the big metal double doors that led into the psychiatric unit. As the nurse punched in a code, Dad ran his fingers through his brown curls. My brain registered that his hair always stayed flat on top, like he had just pulled off his police-uniform hat. He wasn’t wearing his uniform because we were visiting this hospital. He had on jeans and a black button-up shirt, and I could see the round outline of a chewing-tobacco tin in his back pocket.

  The doors to the locked psychiatric unit swung open with a whoosh. I got a strong blast of alcohol mixed with body odor and old poop and something like spinach. The nurse pushed my mother through and the doors swung shut, trapping Mom in all that disgusting stink, and I wanted to cry all over again. I couldn’t keep crying, though. If I did, Dad would never bring me back here, and I’d have to wait weeks to see Mom again.

  Dad’s big hand rested on my shoulder. “Want to grab a hot dog from Chicago Eats, Footer?”

  I tried to nod, but my neck felt too stiff. I probably did have a brain tumor, and it was gigantic and weighed three hundred pounds, and it would kill me by tomorrow. Since I’d probably be dead before sunrise, I should eat as many hot dogs as I could.

  “Cheese,” Dad added as we walked out of the little room with pictures of roses and daisies. “And some chili. Maybe onions and kraut. Onions and kraut are vegetables.”

  “Kraut’s not a real vegetable, is it?” I asked, trying to make myself focus on hot dogs ruined by pickled cabbage, but thinking about brain tumors and mice and barrettes and shotguns.

  * * *

  The jelly was gone. When I looked in the pantry, we were out of peanut butter and bread, too. And a bunch of other stuff, like my fruit drinks and the cookies I always took in my lunch.

  Mice in the basement, Mom?

  More like rhinoceros rats.

  Except it wasn’t rats or mice, it was probably me. Jeez. Did I eat that much when I walked in my sleep Sunday night? Well, Monday too. Still, it was hard to believe I could take out an entire jar of jelly without throwing up grape for days.

  I burped chili hot dog, then yelled, “Dad, we need to go to the store.”

  “Why?” he asked from the living room.

  “Because we’re out of everything.”

  “There was half a jar of peanut butter and a whole loaf of bread when I made your lunch yesterday.” I heard the creak of his chair as he got up to come see what I was talking about.

  “You must have thrown it away by mistake, then, because it’s gone now.”

  Mom’s mice ate it. Yeah. Great big huge hallucination mice. My lips twitched. Smiling about anything right now seemed wrong, but I couldn’t help it. I kept seeing dinosaur mice with purple, jelly-smeared whiskers.

  “Huh.” Dad came into the kitchen, gazed into the pantry, scratched his head, and closed the door.

  The phone on the counter rang, and I picked it up, figuring it was Peavine. “Hello?”

  Silence answered me. I pulled the phone away from my ear and read the display. It said OUT OF AREA.

  “Hello?” I said again, ramping up my annoyed tone and wondering if it was a stupid telemarketer.

  “May I speak to Adele Davis, please?” a woman asked, her words a little slurred.

  “She’s not here right now. May I take a message?”

  “No. That’s okay. Thanks.” The woman hung up.

  I punched the receiver off and dropped it back in its cradle, wondering who the woman was. Probably somebody from one of Mom’s online support groups for bipolar disorder. She knew a lot of people that way.

  “It’s okay, Footer,” Dad said. “We’ll run to the store tomorrow afternoon. Maybe you could help me make a list?”

  I leaned against him as he opened a drawer and pulled out a pad. “Just get everything we like. And some ice cream.”

  Fish sticks, Dad wrote, instead of ice cream.

  “Are there walruses in fish sticks?”

  “Uh, no. Pretty sure not.” He glanced down at me and grinned, which made me feel better about all of life, at least for a second.

  “Okay.” I covered my mouth and burped chili hot dog again. “But could we do chicken nuggets instead, just for a l
ittle while? Chicken nuggets definitely do not have walrus meat.”

  “Sometimes I worry about you, Footer.” Dad sounded tickled more than worried as he wrote ice cream.

  “Sometimes I worry about me too, Dad.”

  He patted my head, then sent me to get ready for bed. I let him tuck me in, then waited until he turned his light off. Then I pushed my door until it was almost closed, so the light from my lamp wouldn’t wake him. After that I sat at my desk because I didn’t want to get into bed, because if I got into bed and shut my eyes, what if I had more hallucinations?

  The thought made my heart beat funny, and I didn’t like it. After a minute or so, I opened my computer and read about hallucinations and bipolar disorder. I read page after page on the two big symptoms of Mom’s illness, mania and depression. Sometimes I could match myself to the mania stuff, like, talking very fast and jumping from one idea to another and being easily distracted. I could even go for being restless and having trouble sleeping.

  Weird.

  Didn’t everybody have times when they talked fast and thought fast and got distracted? Was I the only person in the world who got bored and fidgety in class, or sometimes when I didn’t have things to do in the afternoon? And sleeping. It wasn’t always a problem.

  Besides, I didn’t think I had an unrealistic belief in one’s abilities. Spending sprees were out, since I didn’t have any money, and impulsive business investments . . . Yeah. Maybe someday, but not now. None of the depression symptoms seemed to fit me either, except maybe the restless and irritable part, and the change in eating and sleeping habits.

  And, of course, I didn’t think I had a piano in my wrist.

  If I wasn’t getting totally sick like Mom, and I wasn’t really hallucinating, then everything I saw was probably a flashback.