“We’re fine,” I said. “We’re going for a walk.”
She let out a deep breath but didn’t say anything. And also, she didn’t look much happier or more settled.
That was the problem with being the one who solved everything. I tried to take the stress off my mom, but then, it was more like we both had it.
Sometimes I wasn’t sure if I was solving anything at all.
We walked all the way into town. I was hoping it would tire Sophie out. I was hoping it wouldn’t make Rigby stiff or sore. It was always a balancing act. My whole life was one big act of skating on a frozen pond not long before the spring thaw.
Everybody seemed to know us.
It wasn’t a total surprise. But there was something… more about it that day, and that surprised me. It was a very small town. Just a village, really, and we’d been walking those streets for a year. And it’s hard to miss a teenage girl with a dog the size of a small pony and an autistic kid.
Mostly, I didn’t know them except for their faces. Sometimes I knew how I knew them, like the woman who worked at the post office or the guy who was a checker at the supermarket. I saw three girls I knew from school. Two pretended not to see me back. Or maybe they really didn’t. It’s always hard to tell about a thing like that.
I passed this one woman, and she smiled at us. And she said, “Hi, Sophie.”
I stopped. “How do you know Sophie’s name?” I asked.
“My daughter is in the Special Ed program,” she said. “Sophie’s already in the van when Mr. Maribal stops for her every morning.”
“Oh. Nice to meet you.”
Then we just kept walking. But it was a strange feeling. And it took me awhile to put my finger on why. Something about people noticing us. Knowing they knew us. Knowing we lived around here. Which meant if we were about to not live around here anymore, somebody would actually notice we were gone. It was like existing in a way I’d never been totally convinced I existed before.
I liked it, and I didn’t like it. Both at the same time.
When we got home, Rigby and I walked Sophie upstairs to the apartment. Opened the door.
“Sophie’s back,” I called to my mom. “So you might want to keep an eye on the door for a while. Sophie,” I said, looking down at her. She didn’t look back, of course. “You’ll see Rigby tomorrow, okay? Just like always.”
I handed her off to my mom, and Rigby and I turned and walked down the stairs. Without looking back.
We were halfway across the gravel driveway to the house when I heard it. The famous Sophie shriek. I stopped. Squeezed my eyes closed. Opened them again and looked down at Rigby, who looked back at me for instructions.
“Come on,” I said.
We turned around and walked back to the apartment.
“Don’t look at me like that, Rigby. We don’t have any other choice.”
But, really, she wasn’t looking at me any special way at all. I was the one watching myself from the outside, criticizing. But if there was a better way to handle things, I couldn’t reach it. I couldn’t even see anything better from where I stood.
“So, this is not working out at all,” I said to my mom. “And I really thought it would.”
We were on the back patio of the apartment, looking out at the mountains. Most of their peaks still had snow, in June. Sophie was inside with Rigby. It was really just an excuse to have a hard talk.
“I’m thinking it’s because the dog is with you,” she said. “So she thinks she should get to go along. You know. All the time. When the dog was with a stranger, she didn’t feel that way.”
“What do you think’ll happen when Paul gets back?”
“No idea.”
“What if she goes right in through the doggie door after Paul gets home?”
“We could always lock the apartment door from the inside or something.”
“And then she’ll shriek.”
She didn’t say anything. Neither one of us said anything. For quite a long time.
After a while, I sat down on one of the wooden chairs. My mom called them Adirondack chairs, but I wasn’t sure why. She stood at the railing for a couple minutes more. Then she came and sat down, too.
She looked back, through the glass of the door. So I did the same. But nothing had changed. Just Sophie and Rigby, lying on the rug.
“I’m going to say some things,” she said. “And I’d really appreciate it if you wouldn’t yell at me while I’m saying them. At least let me get the whole thing out before you start to yell.”
I pulled in a long breath. Let it out again. My way of getting prepared, I guess.
“I don’t think I have enough energy to yell, anyway.”
“Good.”
Too long a pause.
So I said, “Please just go ahead and get this over with.”
“I think we’re trying to do something that can’t reasonably be done.”
I sat a moment, letting that roll through me. It didn’t make me want to yell. I hated it, but there was nothing in me that wanted to fight with it. In fact, I felt around and found this place that would be incredibly relieved to admit it was true. Not happy. Just relieved. When something is true, it takes a lot of energy to pretend it’s not. It pretty much uses up the life energy a person’s got and doesn’t leave much energy for anything else. After years of that, you just get so exhausted. Almost everything sounds okay if it comes with a rest.
“You’re not saying anything,” she said.
“I was just thinking.”
“This feels like progress for us.”
“I still don’t want it to end like that.”
“It wouldn’t be the end, Angie. We could go see her all the time. Whenever we wanted to.”
I just sighed. Didn’t answer.
“I don’t want to leave this place,” she said. “I need rest. And peace. Need. Not want. Need. I can’t go through getting thrown out on the street again with two daughters, one with special needs. This place feels like a home, and we need a home. Sophie needs a home, too. It’s not good for her to be living in a tent. Running off into the woods.”
I didn’t say anything for a long time.
We looked over our shoulders again. Nothing had changed inside the apartment. Just Sophie and Rigby, lying on the rug together. Sophie was a perfect angel, so long as I gave her something that wasn’t mine to give.
“Penny for your thoughts,” she said.
“I was thinking you’re talking like you’re the one in charge.”
“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
“Well, it’s both. Since I don’t like what you’re saying much. But it’s sort of a relief for me when you act like the mom. Then I get to step down and be the kid and have no idea what I’m doing.”
A long silence. Maybe three or four minutes. Or more. It was still only about seven, but the sun was on a long slant, nearly ready to go behind the mountains. Even though it was one of the longest days of the year. The sun sets behind the mountains quite awhile before it sets on the horizon. Especially when the mountains are tall. And close.
“If we placed her somewhere, could we ever get her back? You know. If we stayed here and saved up money for a place? Maybe someplace a long way from the closest neighbors? I could even get a weekend job and help.”
“Oh, now you want to make money and help.”
“If it would get Sophie back.”
“She’s not gone yet, kiddo.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“Because I don’t know. I would think so. But I really don’t know. I could look into some options. How ‘bout if we just take this one step at a time? First thing is to see what happens when he gets back.”
“Right,” I said.
“When do you think that’ll be?”
“Probably soon. He said things are falling apart really fast.”
“You talked to him?”
“Yeah. He calls.” Then the silence felt a little stran
ge, so I said, “You know. To see how Rigby is. And to keep me posted on when he’ll be back. I mean, as much as he can know a thing like that.”
“So… best guess.”
“I don’t know. A couple or three weeks, maybe.”
“Weeks? You said he’d be gone months!”
Then we both looked again to see if either Sophie or the dog had caught the upset. But they both looked asleep on the rug.
“I said he’d be gone till his brother died. Which the doctors thought would be two to four months. But Paul always thought it would be more like two and less like four. And now he says it’s going really fast.”
“I’d better start doing some research into places.”
All of a sudden, I didn’t feel like I could be there anymore. I got up and went inside. Didn’t say goodbye to my mom. Didn’t say anything.
Sophie was indeed asleep on the rug next to Rigby. But not actually touching any part of the dog. I put my hand on Rigby’s head, and she woke up and looked into my face to see what would come next.
“Let’s go back to the house,” I told her.
So that’s what we did.
For the second night in a row, I had a hard time sleeping. So I was pretty groggy when Sophie flapped through the doggie door in the morning.
I raised my head, and Rigby raised her head. But this time, we both knew exactly who to expect.
When I saw her face in the doorway, I said, “Game over, Sophie. And we all lose.”
I don’t know why I said a thing like that to her. I just did.
Then I got up and walked Sophie and Rigby out the back door and up to the apartment. And asked Rigby to stay there while I went back to the house. Not that she had much choice. The door was about to be closed again. But the least I could do was talk to her. Tell her what was expected of her. What was about to happen.
Then I went back to bed.
I never got back to sleep.
I just lay there, nursing this strange feeling that we wouldn’t be a family anymore. Just my mom and me didn’t feel like a family at all. I thought about what it would be like with just us. It pretty much felt like two people who sometimes almost got along but mostly didn’t. Two people who didn’t feel all that related, considering they were. It was Sophie who tied it all together into something that felt like a family.
At least, for a couple more weeks, she did.
Paul called later that night. Nearly midnight.
I’d been asleep for a change, and it was hard to pull myself awake. But I was still glad to hear from him.
“I just had to tell you this,” he said. “Dan and I had that moment. The one you were talking about.”
“What one was I talking about?”
“The one you wished for us. You said when someone is near the end, sometimes you can be close to them in a different way.”
“Oh. Right. That. I remember that. What happened?”
“He had this moment. He’s been nearly unconscious. Most of the time. Almost all day and night. But all of a sudden, a few minutes ago, he had this lucid moment. Just out of nowhere, he opened his eyes and looked right into my face. And he said…” An awkward pause. “He said… ‘I’m sorry we broke your heart.’”
“Whoa.”
“That’s what I thought. He never would have said anything like that to me before this. Ever. He never acknowledged that. I wasn’t even sure if he knew.”
“How long have you felt this way? You know. I mean… about her?”
Then I immediately thought I’d been wrong to ask. And that he’d say something sharp. Like “Hey. I didn’t say I was up for Twenty Questions.”
He didn’t.
He said, “Forty-nine years. Since I was seventeen.”
“You’ve known her since you were seventeen?”
“Yes. Since before she met Dan. She was an exchange student studying over here. But the thing is, she was nineteen and a half. She’s two and a half years older than I am. I know it doesn’t sound like much now. But she was in college. She was a sophomore in college, and I was a junior in high school. At the time, it felt huge. Like she was a grown woman, and I was a kid. I was friends with her before she even met Dan. Turns out she was hoping for an introduction to him. And I was hoping she’d see beyond the difference in our ages.”
Silence for a moment, filled with shadows moving on the bedroom wall. I was stunned that he would tell me so much. But I was afraid if I pointed it out, he might stop.
So all I said was, “Ouch.”
“I don’t mean to give you the wrong impression. It’s not like she was just using me to get to him. She’s not like that. She was a good friend. Always has been. It’s just that he was the one she had the romantic feelings for.”
I wanted to say, “Maybe that could change now. Or sometime. Maybe when she gets over this huge loss.”
I didn’t. I still felt like his life was none of my business. If he wanted to tell me about it, that was fine. That was up to him. But I didn’t feel like I had the right to comment much.
I said, “I’m glad you had a good moment with your brother.”
“Well,” he said. “A tough moment. I guess it was good, though.”
“What did you say? When he said that?”
“Not much. Just what I tell him a million times a day. That he doesn’t have to worry about anything anymore.”
Long, fairly comfortable silence. I knew that was all he’d called to tell me. And I wasn’t sure where that left us.
After a while, when he didn’t rush off the phone, I said, “Would it be okay if I told you something that’s going on with me?”
“Of course. I’d like that.”
“I’m not sure it feels right, though. When you’re down there going through all the stuff you’re going through.”
“Please do. It would be good to get out of my own head for a change.”
“I think we’re going to have to put Sophie in some kind of a home.”
A beat of silence. I wondered who was more shocked to hear me say those words out loud.
“Oh, dear. That’s too bad. I thought it would solve everything if you could live in the apartment.”
“Yeah, we all did. I’m not sure what went wrong with that. It’s like she knows Rigby is with me, so she thinks she should be allowed to be with us all the time. I’ve had to be in the apartment with Rigby, or leave her in the apartment with them, until Sophie goes to school in the morning, and from after our walk till she goes to sleep. And in the morning, Sophie opens the apartment door and comes up the back stairs and lets herself in through the doggie door. I don’t let her stay, of course. I walk her right back out again. But she was in your house twice, for about a minute each time. No, not even that long. Seconds. But still. Sooner or later, I had to tell you.”
“Even though I never would have known.”
“Even though you never would have known.”
“Maybe when I get back, it’ll be more like it was when we were on the other side of the fence.”
“Maybe. That’s what we’re hoping for, of course. But my mom’s already made up her mind that she doesn’t want to leave this place. Which I sort of don’t blame her for. Whatever place we found, we’d probably just get thrown out of it again. That being homeless thing was scary.”
“Maybe it really would be the best thing for all. Including Sophie.”
“I don’t know. Wouldn’t it be hard for any seven-year-old kid to get taken away from everything they’ve ever known?”
“I guess it would.”
“And Sophie’s even worse with change than most kids.”
“I guess I’m sorry I ever said that.”
“You don’t have to be. Maybe it is the best thing. Not because it’s good, but maybe because all the other things are even worse. I don’t know. I just know I was hoping we could wait until she was old enough that it would be more like a normal time to leave your family. And I keep getting this feeling that without her, there’s no fami
ly. Just me and my mom. That doesn’t feel like a family, exactly. That just feels like two people.”
Long silence. I realized I was done. I’d said all I had in me to say. The same feeling I got when he was done talking, earlier. I watched shadows on the wall and wondered how to wrap this up.
“Well, if nothing else,” he said, “you reminded me that I’m not the only one who’s got it hard right now.”
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t know what to say.
“You know I’ll work with you as best I can when I get back.”
“I do. I do know that. But I also know it’s your life. It’s your retirement. And you worked hard for it, for a long time. And you have a right to it. You have a right to have it the way you want it.”
First nothing.
Then he said, “I might have been wrong about the alone thing. It’s not what I had it made out to be.”
“I still like it, myself. Besides, you also wanted uncomplicated. You still want uncomplicated, don’t you?”
“I’m on the fence about that. Other people always bring complications. That’s just the nature of human relationships. You can’t separate people from their complications. Uncomplicated and alone are more or less the same thing. I don’t know. I’m still thinking about that. And my thinking is probably skewed right now, anyway. I should let you get some sleep. We should both get some sleep. Maybe things will look a little better in the morning.”
“Maybe,” I said.
But I didn’t think they would.
“I’m sorry you’re having a hard time,” he said.
“I’m sorry you’re having a hard time,” I said.
“Sleep well,” he said.
“Goodnight,” I said.
Then I hung up the phone and hardly slept at all.
After a couple of hours of not sleeping, I dragged my little trunk out from under Paul’s bed and opened it with the key, which, by that time, I was keeping on the ring with Paul’s house keys. I was careful not to look at the note from Nellie, or The Tibetan Book of the Dead, or the hundred-dollar bill. Or at my dad’s watch and wallet and ring. I couldn’t exactly not see those things, but I was careful not to let my eyes rest there long.
Where We Belong Page 21