“Crap,” I said under my breath. I forced a smile as I got out. “Hey, Dad!”
“Where have you been?” he barked.
“Adrienne’s. Why? Did you need me? Cynthia said that Randy would pack—”
“That’s not the point.” He broke off as Denny came up.
“Is something wrong?” Denny looked at me, then at my dad, and then at me again.
My dad’s smile looked as phony as mine felt. “Nothing you did. Clancy should have checked with me before leaving the grounds.” He made it sound like a prison.
I said, “Sorry. I thought it was enough to tell Cynthia. Next time I’ll check out with you personally. Or have you thought about installing a time clock?”
He shot me a look that meant I’d be in trouble if there hadn’t been a customer present, and I took advantage of his forced self-restraint to say, “Thanks for lunch, Denny.”
“Okay,” Denny said uncertainly. “See you.”
I felt their eyes on me as I walked to the hangar. Randy, of course, was nowhere to be seen, and he had barely made a dent in the pile of rigs. No wonder my dad was angry. But it wasn’t my fault; it was Randy’s. I cussed him out under my breath as I swung the first rig onto the packing table. “Self-centered son of a—”
“C.C.” It was my dad.
I didn’t answer.
“Clancy.” He sounded tired.
I kept on packing until he laid a hand on the slider before I could position it. I whirled around. “What?”
“You know what. I don’t know that young man. He seems nice, and he’s certainly eager to learn to jump, but you shouldn’t have gotten in his car without checking with me. I don’t know anything about him.”
“You don’t need to,” I muttered.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Nothing.” I wiped my nose with the back of my hand, sure I was leaving a black streak on my face. Whatever. I turned back to the rig.
“And he let you take the blame for leaving. He should have stood up like a man and said that it was his fault.”
“But he didn’t know there was anything to take the blame for!”
“Young lady—”
I made an exasperated grunt, and he started over. “Clancy, you don’t have a good track record in choosing friends. Remember that girl Miranda who told those lies about—”
I spun on him again. “Miranda? Miranda? Dad, that was in elementary school. You can’t keep punishing me for Miranda!”
He went on as though I hadn’t spoken. “And you wanted to go to the eighth-grade dance with that boy whose brother was in jail.”
“Really? The best you can do is come up with things that happened years ago? And what Sammy’s brother did wasn’t Sammy’s fault. He was a nice kid.”
He ignored my question. “You were too young to date, anyway. In some ways you still are too young, except with someone as responsible as Theo.” I was so tempted to ask him how old my mom had been when she started to date—she was only nineteen when they got married. Before I could give in to the temptation, he went on. “But I never would have let you go out with a boy from a family with a felon in it. Honey, let’s just say that you don’t have the best judgment about people.”
“Oh no? What about Theo?” I challenged him.
He smiled. “Okay, I’ll grant you Theo. Go sit in the office and cool off for a bit. I’ll finish this one.”
“I can do it,” I said, but he stopped me.
“Don’t ever pack when you’re upset.”
“Well, then, don’t upset me when I’m packing,” I snapped. I stomped out of the hangar and into the office. When I was in middle school and we had a fight, I used to write MAD AT DAD on my hand so I wouldn’t forget and be nice to him by accident. But these days I didn’t need any reminders.
Noel and Leon were in the lounge and I didn’t feel like talking to anyone, not even them, so I went to the office and sat on one of the folding chairs along the wall. A bunch of students milled around. I gathered they’d been waiting to get rigged up for a while and were starting to wonder what was taking so long. I would kill Randy the next time I saw him. I held a Jump! magazine in front of my face so no one would talk to me.
Cynthia called a load and most of the students disappeared. I pulled out my phone and texted Theo: See you tonight?
No answer. He must have been on duty. But why hadn’t he texted me during a break? Surely he’d have had at least one by now. He always texted me during his breaks. Maybe he’d forgotten to charge his phone.
I found a text from Denny, though, with a link to his jump video, which I opened on Cynthia’s computer when she took a bathroom break. He didn’t look at all dorky. He looked—well, he looked pretty hot, if anyone can look hot with the wind slamming them around and with huge goggles covering half their face.
My dad would be going up in the next load with his AFF student, so the coast was clear in the hangar. Cynthia came back, and I went in and packed the rest of the rigs, listening to my iPod so my brain would be occupied.
The AFF went well and the student said she was going to sign up for the full course. A few loads of tandems went up, and then Cynthia called a load of fun jumpers who were celebrating the seventieth birthday of one of them. I took a break and went outside to watch them land. Nobody has more fun than skydivers who’ve been jumping for decades, even though they always spend a lot of time saying how much the sport has changed since the eighties (good thing, too, my dad always says), and my mood finally improved when I saw how happy they were.
And then my mood improved even more. A familiar voice called my name, and I turned around.
“Angie!” I shrieked.
“Hey, baby!” She wrapped me in her arms.
People were always surprised when I told them that of all the SkyWitches—Angie, Patsy, Michelle, and Louisa—Angie was the one who had taken my mother’s place the most. She was lean and hard-bodied, not warm and cuddly like you’d imagine a substitute mom. But while I was close to all of them, Angie was the one who told me about periods and where babies come from, and she helped me buy new clothes when I got tired of the T-shirts and jeans I always wore to the DZ. And she always gave me exactly the right present on my birthday, usually something I hadn’t even known I wanted until I opened it.
“How’s Leanne?” I asked.
“Still crying over that loser.” I didn’t know Leanne’s husband, Jesse, very well, but he had never gotten along with Angie.
She walked arm-in-arm with me to the hangar.
“Are you back for good or just visiting?”
She popped a piece of nicotine gum in her mouth. She’d quit smoking when her kids were little, but now she was addicted to the gum. “I’m just in town for a couple of days. I came for Jackson’s jump.”
I hadn’t seen her son since he’d left for Vanderbilt, where he had a full scholarship.
“He’s jumping?” I asked.
Angie nodded. “Tandem. I told him I could get a discount on an AFF but he wasn’t interested.” She sat down on the packing table. “So how are things?”
I told Angie about how my dad was loosening up just a teeny bit, letting me drive at the DZ and into Knoxton, and she high-fived me. I also told her about how Theo was getting on my nerves and how I seemed to be getting on his. She didn’t like Theo much—she never said why, just that I could “do better”—but she listened without comment, letting me finally get some things off my chest. I knew I was safe with her; I could say bad things about Theo to blow off steam and she wouldn’t use them against me later, to try to convince me to dump him.
Cynthia’s voice came over the PA system: “Sean, Carla, Josh, Kenny, and”—a dramatic pause—“Jackson, go to the hangar.” It always made the DZ staff proud to see a kid of one of their own do a first jump.
Jackson smiled at me shyly as Randy rigged him up. I hadn’t seen him in a long time and hardly recognized him. I rigged up the girl, Carla, who was chirpy and excited. Their instru
ctors came out and ran through the instructions one more time, and then they all trooped out, nervously tightening and loosening their goggle straps.
“Have fun, kiddo!” Angie called after Jackson. A few parents and friends of the other jumpers also yelled things at them over the sudden noise of the engine. None of them looked as relaxed as Angie did, which wasn’t surprising.
The plane taxied out and climbed to altitude really quickly. Norton always did that to be kind to first-jump students, since he knew they didn’t want to spend any longer in the plane than they had to. Plus, the longer the ride took, the more chance of someone getting nervous enough to back out and cost my dad some money. He gave a fifty percent refund to anyone who changed their mind. He always said he didn’t want anyone to feel pressured into doing something they weren’t ready for because they were afraid of losing money.
While we waited, Angie caught up the rest of the regulars on Leanne’s situation. “Any idea where Jesse is now?” Randy asked, and Angie shook her head. I’d been so happy to have her to unload on that it hadn’t even occurred to me to find out how she was. I resolved to fix that as soon as Jackson was on the ground. She must have been worried about Leanne. And no matter how much she loved her grandchildren, I couldn’t see her moving to New Mexico for good. At least I hoped she wouldn’t.
“There’s the cut,” someone said, and the whuffos looked nervous.
“Cut? What are they cutting?” one dad asked, and while someone explained about slowing down the engine, the first tandem came out, followed closely by the second. The plane circled and the other two exited.
“Which one is Jackson?” I asked Angie.
“Your dad said he’d put him out last. He’s with Leon.”
The other spectators exclaimed about how fast they were falling. One said she was praying, and another asked nervously how long it would be before their parachutes opened, and another said he didn’t see why anyone would jump out of a perfectly good airplane.
“It’s okay,” Angie said. “Everyone’s doing just fine.”
“You wouldn’t be so calm if you had a child up there!” the praying woman said.
“She does,” I said.
“What’s Jackson going to major in?” Noel asked, ignoring the whuffo.
Angie shaded her eyes with her hand. “He says engineering, but I notice the only class he’s talked about is philosophy.”
The praying woman looked from one of them to the other as though they were crazy to be talking about majors and philosophy while their loved ones were falling to the earth at more than one hundred miles per hour.
One by one, the tandems landed. Randy even managed a stand-up landing with his student because the student was so short there was no chance his feet would touch the ground before Randy’s. Jackson and Leon landed last. They slid a bit on the grass before jumping up. Jackson’s face was split in a huge grin, and he hugged Angie hard after gathering up his gear. “I guess I can forgive you for spending all that time out here when I was a kid if it’s always that much fun!” he said.
“Trust me,” she answered. “The more you do it, the more fun it is.”
Mad Jack trotted up, still wearing his camera helmet. “Hey, Angie! You making a jump?”
“You bet. My rig’s in the car. Be right back.”
After making two jumps, Angie said she had to go home, but she promised we’d get together before she left. She waved out the car window as she peeled out of the parking lot.
Now that the days were so long, I was starving by the time Dad and I left the DZ. I kept my earbuds in so I wouldn’t have to talk until we stopped for dinner on the way home. I was surprised to look up and see that we were in the parking lot of a new Thai place. Dad doesn’t like Thai and I love it, so stopping there was a kind of peace offering.
“Going out with Theo when we get home?” Dad asked. I shook my head. I had texted Theo again before we left the DZ, and he still hadn’t answered. I texted Julia and asked if she’d seen him but she said no. A few minutes later she texted again and said that Justin thought he was busy doing something for his mom. Huh. Theo hadn’t mentioned that.
When we got home, I let myself in the house while Dad took stacks of order forms and a bundle of nylon out of the trunk. During the week, when he wasn’t at the DZ, he repaired and customized rigs and made new ones to order.
I closed myself in my room. I had long ago taken down the sign on the door that warned of excruciating punishment if anyone came in, as my dad had finally learned that my room was off limits. I opened my art history book, but my mind wandered until I gave up.
I pulled my laptop over and googled “leukemia.” It turned out there were lots of different kinds, and I wondered which one Frederick had. It looked like childhood leukemia was a lot more curable than the kind adults get. Did a teenager count as a child or an adult?
My phone pinged and I leaped on it. A text from Theo, finally. Home yet?
I texted back: Just got in. You?
Theo: At Macks with J & J. Want to come?
Yay! He asked instead of just telling me he was coming to pick me up. Mack’s was a burger place near Julia’s house. I wrote back: Sure. Come get me?
A pause. Finally he answered.
Theo: Aren’t you too tired?
A longer pause. Me: Ok never mind
I held down the power button until the phone turned off, and flopped onto my bed. What was going on? Theo asked me if I wanted to go out and then acted all surprised when I said yes. Maybe my dad was right that texting was a bad way to communicate.
Or maybe Theo was sure I’d say no and that he’d get good-boyfriend points for asking me, but for some reason he didn’t want to see me. He was having too good a time, maybe, or he didn’t want to drive all the way to my house. A little voice in me said, He might be out with another girl. But then I scolded myself. One, Theo wouldn’t cheat on me, and two, he knew that Julia would kill him if he showed up with someone else. I was being paranoid and ridiculous.
I turned my phone back on and called his number.
He didn’t answer.
I woke up a few times that night. I didn’t know what was going on—I had made Theo mad or something, and he wouldn’t tell me why. He would never talk about it when things weren’t good. Julia always said Theo was a typical male and not to worry when he wouldn’t communicate. I didn’t believe that all males were like that, and I wasn’t worried. I was frustrated.
Finally, I gave up on sleep and went to the kitchen. I drank a mug of coffee while the sun came up, my textbook open on the table in front of me. I couldn’t read a word. And then of course I started feeling sleepy just as soon as it was time to catch the bus to meet Julia at the salon. My dad had left a ten-dollar bill on the counter with a note saying Get yourself a haircut too, if you want. My treat. Clearly, he had no idea what a haircut cost these days, but it was still nice of him.
A familiar car was idling in front of the bus stop. Julia. I ran up to the window, which she lowered with a grin. “Just happened to be in the neighborhood,” she said. “Need a lift?”
“You’re evil!” I let myself in.
A lidded paper coffee cup stood in the cup holder between the seats. I knew it would have extra milk and two sugars, just how I liked it. I was happy that Julia had thought of it. There’s a difference between being thoughtful and taking care of someone who doesn’t need it, I told myself.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to pick me up?” I asked as she pulled out. The feeling of triumph over fooling my dad was so exhilarating that it squelched the little bit of guilt I felt about getting into Julia’s car.
“I was afraid you’d say no.”
“Why would I—” I stopped, but Julia answered my unspoken question.
“You’d say that if your dad found out, he’d get all upset. I figured once I was here you’d come along.”
I took a sip of coffee. “He would, you know. He’s getting more like a fascist all the time.”
“He isn’t that bad,” Julia said sharply.
I looked at her, surprised. “He’s not?” She’d always sympathized with my complaints about my dad and his strictness before.
She kept her eyes on the road, but her fingers were clamped tight to the steering wheel. “At least he cares. At least he’s around. It’s better to be too protective than not to give a shit.” She wiped the back of her hand across her nose. She stopped at a red light.
“Jules…” I gave her a tissue. “It has purse crumbs on it, but it’s clean.”
She blew her nose. “It’s just that it was Celia’s birthday yesterday”—Celia was her little sister—“and Daddy didn’t even call or send her a card or anything. She didn’t cry, but she was really sad.”
Poor Celia. Sometimes she was a drama queen, but that must have really hurt.
“He’s such an ass,” she muttered.
“I’m sorry, Jules.”
She nodded, the light turned green, and we moved on. We didn’t say anything more about it—we didn’t need to.
“Oh, guess what?” I said. “Angie’s here!”
“For good?” Julia sounded excited—she was crazy about Angie.
“Just a few days. Jackson made a jump, so she came here for that. I think she also needed a break from Leanne and the twins.”
“I don’t blame her,” Julia said. Being with kids at the miniature-golf place must have been getting old.
“So how was Mack’s?” I asked after a while.
“Good. After, we went to a party at Jacob’s house. Danced a lot.”
“Theo too?”
“Uh-huh.” I could hardly understand her through the yawn.
“What time did you get back?”
“One thirty? Two? Something like that.”
We stopped at a light, waiting to turn into the mall, when Julia asked out of the blue, “Are you and Theo okay?”
I glanced at her, but her eyes were fixed on the stoplight. “Yeah, sure. Why?”
She shrugged as the light turned green, and she waited until she could turn left. A gap in the oncoming traffic appeared and she gunned the engine. Brakes squealed and horns blared, but she didn’t seem to notice. “Jules, be careful!” I said.
Freefall Summer Page 7