I hope we didn’t lose them, Amelia said. Sometimes it’s a problem when the spirits get interrupted.
They closed their eyes and put their hands back on the game piece. Are you there? Amelia asked.
They heard a knock at the door. Trick or treat, the voice called out. She wasn’t expecting anyone, but the voice sounded familiar in a way, though she couldn’t place it.
Even though Josh had told them never to do this, they opened the door. Her father stood there. Garrett.
Eleven
They offered him hot chocolate. He said he’d been traveling all day from California. Major flight delays on account of all the airport security. I wanted to get here way earlier and take you out to dinner, he said.
That’s okay, she told him. We were out trick-or-treating before anyway. Taking my little brother.
Oh, right, Garrett said. What’s his name again?
Louie. Like Armstrong. This is Amelia.
I’ve heard a lot about you, Amelia said. She sounded like her mother.
So where’s the guy? Josh.
He’s working tonight. We’re baby-sitting.
Good for you, he said. I remember when you were little how tough it was coming up with a good sitter. Your mother and I would want to go out to a party or something, but we never found anyone, besides her friend Kate, she felt she could trust you with. So I’d end up going alone. That probably wasn’t a very smart idea, looking back.
How are things in California? Amelia said. I always wanted to go there. She sounded like Rosie O’Donnell interviewing some celebrity sitting on the couch next to her.
Well, maybe you will, he said. Now that you’ll have a girlfriend living there.
Wendy didn’t know what he meant. Every time we make this, I always burn my tongue, she said, setting down her hot chocolate. I always want a sip before it cools down. When Josh fixes it for us, he puts real whipped cream in.
She had started to say my dad instead of Josh, but she stopped herself. Just saying his name, though, gave her a strange tugging sense of missing him. She pictured him off at the party in the city in his rumpled performing suit, bent over his instrument, plucking out the bass line of “I Get a Kick out of You” that nobody knew was so important unless the notes weren’t there anymore. When he said good-bye that afternoon, he looked worried. I shouldn’t have said yes to this gig, he said.
What I meant is, I want to take Wendy home with me, Garrett said. To California. Strangely enough, he was talking to Amelia, rather than to her.
I’ve given it a lot of thought. Still to Amelia. As if she was in charge. For a second, Wendy wondered who this person was—with her name—that her father was telling Amelia about.
What do you mean? she asked.
I’ve been thinking it would be good if you came to live with me now. Under the circumstances.
I live here, Wendy told him.
You have up till now. Hardly anybody stays in the same state their whole life anymore. When I was a kid, we moved all over with my dad’s company. We didn’t move up to the Greenwich house till after the divorce.
I have school, she said. My friends are here. My little brother.
We’d think of it as a trial period, he said. You could see how you like it.
He reached over to touch her arm, just barely.
I know it’s a shock, he said. You’ve been through a lot. You’re holding up better than a lot of people would; I can see that. But this is the kind of time when it’s good to have your dad around.
He ran a hand through his hair, but differently from how Josh would. Garrett’s hair was longer and fine-textured, not the brushy kind that stood up all over the place. It was mostly gray and tied in a ponytail. Even with his lined face, he was still handsome.
I’m sure that’s what your mother would have done if you’d been living with me and something happened where I wasn’t around anymore.
Wendy knew she never would have been living with him in the first place. Not if her mother was there.
I have Josh, she said. We’re managing all right.
Or maybe they weren’t, but she couldn’t see how moving to California would make it better.
Amelia was twisting her hair while they were talking. This is intense, she said. Maybe I shouldn’t be here.
I can see why you and Wendy are such good friends, he told her. You’re a really perceptive person.
I can just go home, said Amelia. When it’s late like this, my parents like me to take a cab. She dug into her pocket and took out a ten-dollar bill.
We were having a sleepover, said Wendy. We were going to watch a movie.
Amelia could come out too, to visit, he said. We could go camping at Yo-semite.
Listen, Wendy told him after Amelia had left the room. I might like to come visit sometime. But I can’t move away anyplace. I live here. Not to mention the fact that Josh would never let me.
Don’t get me wrong, Garrett said. I’m sure he’s a great guy, and it was probably really good for you having the kind of stable setup you get when there’s two parents and a little half brother. But the situation’s different now.
He’s just a plain brother, she said. Not half anything.
He looked around the room. She wondered if he was looking for the painting of her mother naked that he made when they were young, but nothing would be familiar to him here. Louie’s bike with the training wheels, that Josh had just started teaching him to ride Labor Day weekend, and then stopped. The electric bass he sometimes fooled around on. The art table with Wendy’s colored pencils and the wooden mannequin Josh and her mother gave her for her birthday the year before to help her with her action drawings, and the mannequin legs she and her mother had gotten out of the trash, still holding a plant, and dressed in bright green patterned tights. Her clarinet and the music stand. Louie’s trucks.
Your grandmother talked to a lawyer, he said. The air in the room seemed to change when he said it.
I’d never get into all that legal bullshit, but if we did, your stepfather wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. All that would happen is he’d spend a lot of money for nothing, because if I know your grandmother, she wouldn’t quit. You should have seen what she was like when she took my father to court, when I was your age.
It’s not like Josh would be stopping me from leaving, she said. I’d be stopping myself. I don’t want to move away. More than any other moment since the day everything changed, she wanted her mother there.
He must have seen the look on her face, because he got up from where he’d been sitting and sat next to her on the couch. If it was Josh, he’d have put his arms around her, but Garrett reached out his two hands, one on each side of her head, and held them there.
I know this is hard for you, he said. The thing is, you’re fourteen years old. You’re confused. The world looks crazy to you at the moment.
He still had her age wrong. But the rest, she could believe.
All my things are here, she said. I’m in the middle of a bunch of projects at school. I’m in band.
I bet Josh will ship out your things once we get back to California, he said. I’ve heard they have schools out west, too.
Amelia, she said. She’s my best friend.
He did put his arms around her then. He had long arms, and his chest was a lot thinner than Josh’s, so she could feel where his rib bones were. He smelled like the inside of a store she and Amelia went in sometimes where they sold crystals and dreamcatchers.
Josh sounds like a great guy, he said. But the fact is, he’s probably having a hard time managing to take care of things, with Louie and his job and everything. He’d never say it, but it’ll be a big load off him, too, if you come home with me.
She thought about what she’d heard Josh tell his sister on the phone the other day, and what he’d said that night when she came home from Billy Flynn’s funeral—the hollow, throwing-up feeling she’d gotten, listening to his words, and realizing he felt just as lost as she did. Maybe mor
e so.
I honestly don’t know how I’m going to take care of these kids, he’d told his sister. It’s just too much.
He’d told Wendy, that night, he wished he was the one who died. You keep on breathing, he told her. Whether you want to or not.
She was tired all of a sudden, and her head felt fuzzy. She knew she didn’t want to go away, but she was having a harder time remembering why it wouldn’t be a good idea. Sometimes, she knew from living with Louie, parents did know best what their child needed, more than the child did. She felt dizzy and a little sick. Mostly what she wanted was to go to bed.
You were probably too young to remember, he said softly. But your mother and I had a lot of really good times, too. Those first few years after we met. I wouldn’t trade them.
She just went off to work that day like a regular morning, Wendy said quietly. We kept thinking she’d call.
The waiting must’ve been hell, he said. I wish I’d been here.
I was late for school that morning. I didn’t even say good-bye.
Then she said the other part, that she hadn’t spoken out loud the whole time. How she’d said she wished her mother would drop dead. How they’d been arguing about her going to California to see him. That’s what she was telling her mother she wanted, and now she could do it, but she didn’t want to anymore.
It’s okay, he said. She knew you loved her. Kids say all kinds of terrible things to their parents. You should have heard some of the things I said to my mother as a kid. Not just as a kid, either. Last week, as a matter of fact.
I never thought anything could happen like this, Wendy said. Nothing can ever be okay again in my whole life.
He stroked her hair and pressed her head against him, and though she didn’t want to, she began to cry.
You think that now, he said. But it will get better. California will be good for you.
She thought about the photograph he’d sent her, that she kept tucked in her binder. The morning glories. The cactus plants. The puppy.
I know how hard everything is for you right now, he said. You’re going to have to trust me on this. I’ll do everything I can to make this work out.
It would just be a trial period, right? she said. I could always come home again if I wanted.
You could, he said. But you might also end up feeling like you were home, with me.
There’s Louie, she said.
He’s still got his dad, Garrett told her. His real dad. It’s different for him. Wendy looked at him squarely then. His blue eyes, which she saw for the first time resembled hers.
I’m your father, he said. I’m the one real parent you have left. You need to be with me now.
What’s your dog’s name? she asked him.
Shiva, he said.
She didn’t hear Josh come in, but in the morning when she got up he was already up and making breakfast. Waffles.
How did it go last night? she asked.
Fine. How did you and your brother make out trick-or-treating?
At the last minute, he didn’t want to wear the robot suit, she told him. He went as Spiderman. After all that talk, he wasn’t really into it. We were home by seven-fifteen.
Sometimes that’s what happens. Too much buildup.
Amelia brought over movies, but we didn’t get to them after all. She decided to take a taxi home.
He looked surprised. You two have a falling-out?
It wasn’t that, she said. She had been trying to think of how to tell him. She had this idea maybe she should write it on a piece of paper and hand it to him. But she got the words out.
My father came over.
From California? Just showed up?
His flight was delayed. He wanted to get here earlier.
You knew about this before?
It was a surprise.
He turned his back and dipped the measuring scoop into the flour bin. Two cups. Slowly, he reached into the fridge for the maple syrup and set it on the table. Until they met Josh, her mother always bought Aunt Jemima. I have so much to teach you, he told her. This could take years.
So, was it good to see him? I assume he’s coming back to see you some more while he’s out here? You two getting together after school? There was a tightness to his voice.
He said he wants to take me back to California, she said. My grandmother talked to a lawyer.
And how do you feel about that?
She was quiet. She thought about what Garrett had said, that Josh had more going on than he could handle right now.
I don’t know, she said. I told him I’d miss you and Louie.
And don’t you imagine we’d miss you? His voice caught. We’ve still got a family here. Even if one person’s missing.
I don’t know what to do, she said. I don’t want to go, but he said he knew what was best for me. He said he’s the one parent I have left.
The one parent, huh? What do you call me?
He had sifted the flour so it formed a mountain in the familiar Fiesta Ware bowl. Now he was measuring the baking powder. Now he was sprinkling in the salt. He opened the refrigerator and took out two eggs and the carton of milk, that he set on the counter. He turned around and faced her.
He stood there, looking at the eggs—one in each hand—as if he couldn’t remember how they got there or what he was supposed to do with them. The way he looked at the eggs, they might have been meteorites that fell out of the sky, or the ball of dirt and fur and microscopic crumbs of bone he’d dug out of one of Louie’s pockets that time, after one of their hikes in the country, that turned out to be owl droppings. He looked that bewildered.
What do you call me? he asked again.
I call you Josh.
Twelve
Amelia was waiting for her at her locker. I can’t believe he just showed up like that, she said. Just when we were asking the Ouija board for a message. Your dad is the coolest person.
Josh said he should have called first. He said a considerate person doesn’t just knock at your door at nine-thirty, after you haven’t seen him for three years, and say, Hello, I’m taking you to California now.
California, said Amelia. You are so lucky.
What am I supposed to do without you? Wendy said. You’re my one real friend.
It’s not like I’m exactly thrilled, either, Amelia said. I’m just trying to think what’s best for you. My mom said it might be a good thing for you to get a change of scene.
What about school? I’d have to start in at a whole new place in the middle of the term. I wouldn’t know anyone.
You could create a whole new identity, Amelia said. You might even be popular.
The other thing is my brother, she said. He’s having a hard enough time dealing with our mom.
You know little kids, Amelia said. One minute they’re crying because their truck broke, and the next thing you know they’re eating a Popsicle.
It’s not like this would have to be forever, either, Amelia said. You could go out there and see how you like it. You could think of it as a getaway. Like when my mom goes to a spa.
Wendy could use a getaway. She could be anyone she wanted in California. Nobody would have to know anything. Not even that she came from New York, or what happened to her mother. She wouldn’t have to go through every day with people giving her their sympathetic looks. As far as they were concerned, her mother could be off on a business trip. On tour with Madonna, one of the dancers on the Drowned World Tour. And then there was the other part she had been thinking about. How much easier it would be for Josh without her. It was different for Louie. Josh was Louie’s real father. Same way Garrett was hers.
I’d probably come back at Christmas, she said. If not before.
And we’d talk on the phone. I’d make my parents give me a ticket out there to see you, February vacation. If you’re still there.
I might look totally different by then, Wendy said. She was thinking that in California she’d probably get very thin, like Sissy Spacek in Carrie, ea
ting all the organic vegetables in Garrett’s garden. She might streak her hair.
So when would you leave? Amelia asked.
Two days, she said. Longer than that and she might change her mind.
Louie, she said. He was curled up under the blue afghan with his wings strapped over his shoulders. Mister Rogers was on—one of the few programs they still let him watch. He was holding Pablo and sucking his thumb, with the ribbon in his ear, like always. Nobody was trying to get him to stop these days.
I need to talk to you, Louie, she said. Maybe we should turn off your show.
I got to see how it turns out, he said.
It’s kind of important, she said. But I guess you can keep the TV on.
She wrapped one arm around his back so he could snuggle in closer. He leaned against her shoulder, still sucking hard on the thumb. She bent down and smelled the top of his head, the way she had when he was younger. It was fainter now, but he still had that sweet baby smell that had nothing to do with any brand of shampoo.
I’m going away for a while, Louie, she said. I’m taking a trip on an airplane.
No, he said. You’ll crash.
They don’t let that happen anymore. They’re much more careful now. They only let good people get on the planes.
When are you coming home?
I’m not sure. I might have to be gone awhile.
Will you bring me a treat?
Sure. She should have been happy that he seemed to be taking it okay, but his not minding that much made her sad.
So it’s just going to be you and Poppy here for a while, she said. But I’ll call you up, okay?
Maybe she was imagining, but she thought she could feel his body stiffen. His head shifted toward the screen, where Mister Rogers was explaining how to sharpen pencils. Louie hadn’t taken his eyes off the TV set the whole time she’d been talking with him, but now more than ever his gaze stayed locked to the screen.
Okay, he said, not really listening.
The Usual Rules Page 13