The Summer of Broken Things

by Margaret Peterson Haddix

  “Dad, if you were a farmer again, you’d be covered in dirt and manure all the time,” I say. “You’d stink. You’d have blisters on your hands. Remember all the stories you’ve told me?”

  “Maybe I’d be happier,” he says. “Maybe that’s who I really am. Standing on my own, working for myself, not kissing up to people I don’t like . . .”

  This has to stop.

  “If you hadn’t met Mom, you wouldn’t have me,” I say.

  Even in the near-total dark, I can tell that his face softens in just the right way.

  “You’re right,” he says. “That makes everything else worthwhile.”

  “And you and Mom can . . .” I want to say, work things out. Or go back to normal. But there’s still that whole thing about Kayla’s mom giving birth to me. That’s still between us, between me and ever feeling normal again.

  “Sweetheart, your mother’s not talking to me either right now,” Dad says. “There’s a lot she blames me for.”

  “I could quit soccer,” I say, and even I’m not sure where this comes from. “I could take dance lessons again, the way she always wanted.”

  “No,” Dad says, and for a minute it’s like my real father is back, the forceful, decisive one. But then he seems to be blinking back tears. “That is exactly the type of thing I don’t want to have happen. I don’t want the problems your mom and I are having to ruin your life. . . . You love soccer.”

  I do. And I always hated dance. I took tap, jazz, ballet. . . . Mom finally let me quit last year, when my soccer schedule got too intense. The only reason I’d let her force me to stick with dance classes that long was because Dad said it’d help with my soccer footwork.

  And, okay, because Mom really wanted me to grow up to be a ballerina. When I was younger, I did try to make her happy, even when it wasn’t what I wanted.

  Why did I do that? When did I stop?

  Was it always because of Dad? And . . . because I saw Dad stop trying to keep her happy too?

  I step out onto the balcony and sit down beside Dad.

  “We used to be a happy family, didn’t we?” I ask, as if I really don’t know. I don’t trust my own memory anymore. “Didn’t it used to be, when you and Mom talked about her teaching you which fork to use, it was like the two of you were a team, like you were proud of each other, proud of how you were together, proud . . .”

  Proud of me, I want to say. But there’s no way I can push those words out.

  Dad stares over at the darkened dance club without answering. But I’ve unleashed a torrent of images in my own head, like a video of my entire childhood: Mom and Dad taking turns reading me bedtime stories, all three of us snuggled together until the very last page; Mom and Dad and me on happy Caribbean vacations, where all we did was play on the beach, all week long; Mom and Dad in the audience for every one of my school plays and dance recitals and soccer games, both of them applauding as if I was the biggest star, no matter how I actually performed; Mom and me going for manicures and pedicures together when I was only five or six, and coming home to show Dad as if we were grand society ladies; Dad taking me out into the countryside to show me where he grew up, and to make sure I learned the difference between corn and soybeans and wheat—and Mom just laughing when I came home covered in mud. . . .

  For most of my life, I never doubted that my parents loved me, or that they loved each other. Not until, until . . .

  “What changed?” I whisper. “When did everything change?”

  Dad’s gaze darts back to me, and even in the dark I can feel the misery in it.

  “Whose version do you want?” he asks with a harsh laugh. “Maybe I got sick of hearing your mother take credit for my success. As if knowing which fork to use mattered the most! Or maybe I started feeling I wasn’t being true to myself, being her puppet. Trusting her opinion on everything that wasn’t business. Or maybe I was too cruel, too quick to make fun of things she cared about. Art. Music. Culture. Beauty. Maybe I was too cheap, and she was too quick to indulge in retail therapy, shopping to heal her every wound. . . .”

  Something falls into place in my mind.

  “That problem with the credit card, back in Columbus,” I say. “It wasn’t the company’s fault. Mom had just maxed it out, right? To deal with . . . to deal with . . .”

  “The pain of watching you and me leave,” Dad finishes for me, and it’s like those words are being carved out of his heart. He’s silent for a moment, then he adds, “In her defense, we hadn’t been communicating well for months. She says she’d told me she was putting some extra orders for her decorating business on that card, and I just forgot.”

  It strikes me what a decent guy my dad is, that he’s telling her side of things. That he didn’t tell me it was her fault from the very beginning.

  Or maybe it just means he still believed back then that they could stay together. Maybe it means he still believes that.

  If only . . .

  My heart sinks, as I realize what he’s not saying. What he’s still hiding.

  “None of that has anything to do with me finding out Kayla’s mom gave birth to me,” I say. “And that’s what had just happened that night when . . . when . . .”

  That night Mom told you she wanted a divorce. The night she stopped talking to me.

  Dad’s quiet so long I don’t think he’s going to answer.

  “Your mother says . . . ,” he begins. He swallows hard, and tries again. “She says I could never understand how much it hurt her, not being able to get pregnant or give birth. I said, ‘Hey, I can’t get pregnant or give birth either!’ She never appreciated . . . me joking about it. She said, being a man, I couldn’t understand. Do you understand?”

  His question sounds desperate. Maybe I’m too much like my dad. I want to answer with a joke too: Eighth-grade health class didn’t make pregnancy or childbirth look like much fun! Who wouldn’t want to outsource that?

  But then I think about Kayla’s mother’s e-mail, the one I wasn’t supposed to read. She loved being pregnant. It made her feel like she was glowing.

  It made her feel connected to me, even though . . . even though . . .

  I can’t answer Dad. After a moment, he goes on.

  “Starting, I don’t know—maybe a year ago?—your mother and I talked about going to marriage counseling,” he says. “We needed it. But every time we got close to making an appointment, she backed out. She’d heard you had to tell everything; she thought she’d have to talk about her feelings about being infertile and needing another woman to give birth to you. And . . . she thought the counselor would say we had to tell you.”

  A small nuclear explosion takes place inside me. I’m so mad I can’t even speak. But I wish Mom were here right now so I could yell at her.

  You thought it was more important to keep me in the dark than to stay married? You were so ashamed of me you wouldn’t even go to a marriage counselor? I hate you! You ruined my life!

  Dad is still talking.

  “But . . . maybe I’m just like your mom,” he says.

  “What?” The word jerks out of me.

  Dad bows his head as if he can’t even look at me.

  “I haven’t been much of a father to you this summer,” he says. “I’m holding it together at work, but . . . just barely. I’ve thought about going to a counselor or a therapist or . . . something. Here. On my own. But if I did, I would have to tell—”

  “You’re that ashamed of me too?” I explode. “Oh, because we’re in Spain, and they think paying a woman to have a baby is, is—”

  I start to scrape my chair back from the table—I want to flee. But Dad puts his hand on my arm, to hold me in place.

  “No,” he says. “That is not the reason. You have to believe me. If it had been up to me, I would have shouted it from the rooftops from the very beginning, how everything worked out. We thought we weren’t going to be able to have children, but look—now we have Avery! It’s a miracle! We’re so lucky! But . . . I also tho
ught we should have done more for Stacy. We owed it to her. Especially after her husband’s accident.”

  Kayla’s mom, I think. Just the way he says her name sends my thoughts veering in wild directions. Did he and Kayla’s mom end up having an affair, after all? I am not sitting here listening to Dad confess that. No way. Not—

  Dad’s grip on my arm tightens. Now I’m trapped.

  “Just listen,” he says. He raises his head for only a moment. “Stacy gave birth to you. I thought that made it like she was family, and family helps family when they’re going through tough times. She was most concerned about Kayla, and I thought you and Kayla should grow up like, I don’t know, cousins—sure, fine, you wouldn’t know your real connection if it bothered your mother so much, but it would be good for both of you to spend time together. You would see that not every kid gets—or needs—thousand-dollar birthday parties, and Kayla would see more of the world outside her little town. All the things I wished I’d seen as a kid.”

  “Yeah, yeah, so that’s why you wanted Kayla to come to Spain with us,” I say. It’s infuriating, but I almost understand—if I try to think like Dad. But I don’t understand why he’s acting so ashamed.

  Is this just going to lead to another lecture about how I should be nicer to Kayla?

  I kind of want to yell at him, Are you blind? Can’t you see how much Kayla hates me? How we have nothing in common except who gave birth to us—and the fact that we’ve been stuck together all summer?

  But it’s hard to yell at someone who’s already so slumped over.

  “Was that my reason?” Dad asks. He sounds dazed. “I always wanted you and Kayla to have more contact, but I never fought for it until your mom and I were already . . . alienated. And I had to bargain so hard with your mom to get her to agree for this summer. In the end, I just kind of . . . made the arrangements. Even though I knew it’d make her go ballistic. Would a therapist tell me I had—what’s it called?—subliminal reasons? A purpose even I didn’t understand? Underneath it all, was I just desperate to get the secret out, and did I think forcing you and Kayla together would reveal everything? Did I want to force your mother to choose between me and keeping her secret?”

  I stare at him.

  “You didn’t know I’d lose my passport,” I finally mutter. “And, what, are you trying to tell me you forged that messed-up birth certificate?”

  “No, of course not,” Dad says. “But . . . was it all just a power play on my part? Am I that much of a jerk?”

  Were both my parents just thinking about themselves, not me? I’ve seen how it works for other kids, how they just become pawns in their parents’ divorce. Is that what’s waiting for me?

  Will I end up like Lauren—a rag doll caught in a constant tug-of-war?

  I’m too sad now even to get angry again. Dad’s watching me like he’ll accept whatever I tell him. I can’t take this. I’m fourteen. I’m not even sure I can handle high school, and Dad wants me to act like a marriage counselor for him and Mom.

  Who won’t even talk to me.

  “Of course you’re not a jerk,” I say, but it comes out sounding too dutiful, too rote. “I don’t think you need a therapist. Maybe . . . maybe you just need to get away. We both do.” For the moment, I let myself forget that Kayla would be involved too. “Maybe this should be the weekend we go to Paris. . . .”

  As soon as I say “Paris,” I know I’ve made a mistake. Dad’s whole body goes stiff.

  Paris is where my parents went on their honeymoon. It’s where they took their last trip without me.

  Their last romantic trip.

  Is there anything I can say that isn’t poison?

  “Or London or Lisbon,” I say quickly. “Or Barcelona or Seville or Granada . . .”

  But he’s stopped listening to me. And I can tell: None of those trips are going to happen.

  I don’t even want them to.

  Kayla, the Spanish Inquisition, and Dying Saints

  Just when I get to the point where I can understand about half of what Señora Gomez says in Spanish class, the class part ends, and we have a bunch of field trips instead. We traipse around Madrid in the crazy heat, following a guide who tells us in too-rapid Spanish what happened on this or that spot hundreds of years ago.

  Plaza Mayor, the square I thought looked straight out of a movie, is where people were executed during the Spanish Inquisition.

  In my history classes back in Crawfordsville, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella sounded like good guys, the people smart enough to give Christopher Columbus money to sail to America.

  But I guess mostly what they did was try to kill all the Jewish people. And the Muslims, too.

  While the guide talks, I sidle over to Avery.

  “It’s like they thought of the Holocaust five hundred years before the Nazis,” I whisper.

  “Yeah . . . ,” Avery says, and I realize she wasn’t even listening.

  “But Ferdinand and Isabella helped Christopher Columbus!” I say.

  “Columbus? He was a murderer too,” Avery says, like I was supposed to know that.

  When it gets too hot for any living thing outdoors, Señora Gomez takes us to art museums. We begin with the Prado, which is full of paintings of Jesus being crucified and Saint Sebastian being shot to death by arrows. Oh, and St. Agnes having her head chopped off.

  “Why did people want pictures of such awful things?” I ask Avery, because I’m too overwhelmed to try to put that thought into Spanish and say it to Dragomir or Andrei, who would probably just make a joke.

  But Avery is standing in front of the worst painting yet: a naked old man with wild eyes and wild hair holding a headless, bloody corpse. I glance at the English label for the painting: Saturn Devouring His Son.

  “This,” Avery says. “This is exactly what this whole summer feels like.”

  I guess that’s her answer.

  Avery, Guernica, and Churros

  Señora Gomez tells us about the Spanish Civil War the same day she takes us to see Guernica. From what I understand, the Spanish Civil War was like a preview of World War II, but all fought on Spanish soil, even though people came from other countries to take sides too. It went on and on and on in the 1930s, and something like a half million people died.

  It was a big deal, a really, really awful thing. Even though I’d never heard of it before this summer.

  “But it ended before World War II started, right?” I ask Señora Gomez. I even translate my question into Spanish quickly enough that she doesn’t scold me.

  “The civil war ended,” she says, in Spanish that’s so weighted down and deliberate that no one asks her to repeat it. “But Franco’s side won. He stayed as dictator until 1975. My country was not free. It was like we were all in prison for forty years.”

  My parents were alive in 1975.

  Señora Gomez was probably already alive in 1975.

  Probably half the people we pass on the street, walking around Madrid, were alive while Franco was in power. When Spain was a prison.

  Then we go see Guernica, a Picasso painting of a Spanish town being bombed during the war. We stand there in a group, the whole class, and everyone’s silent.

  The painting is kind of what you would expect from Picasso—blobby bodies and heads, and a thing hovering at the top that looks like an eye until you look at it closely, and then it’s a lightbulb, or maybe a bomb falling through the air. You feel like people are running and screaming, but they can’t escape. There’s a horse and a bull, and both of them look miserable, too.

  How did Picasso do that—capture misery with just blobs and shapes, and black and white and gray paint?

  If Mom were here, she would say to look at the beautiful paintings instead, I think. Whenever she’s redecorating a house, she always asks, “Why would anyone want to live with ugly things?”

  I don’t think Picasso was thinking about harmonious home décor.

  I also can’t stop looking at Guernica.

  Afte
rward, everyone files out of the art museum and seems to wilt in the afternoon heat. Still, I reach over to tap Dragomir’s shoulder.

  “¿Fútbol? ¿Ahora?” I ask, hoping for a soccer game right now, because I really, really want to kick something. It’s Friday afternoon, and I’m not sure how I can face two days straight of hanging out with no one but Kayla and my dad. And no soccer.

  I don’t know how it happened, but it’s like Dragomir is the one who organizes all the soccer games.

  But even Dragomir makes a face.

  “Damasiado caliente,” he says. Too hot.

  “Pero yo necesito . . . ,” I begin. But I need. . . .

  “Churros,” Andrei finishes for me. “Todos nosotros necesitamos churros.”

  Why would we all need churros? Churros are these really gross, tasteless things they sell at Taco Bell.

  “No quiero churros,” I say, making a face. Which is kind of funny, because I only remember the word “quiero” because of old Taco Bell commercials.

  “A todo el mundo le encantan los churros en España,” Dragomir insists. Everyone loves churros in Spain. “Churros con chocolate.”

  And then everybody else is agreeing, even Kayla.

  I don’t want to go back to the apartment where Dad might be acting strange. And where I would know that to talk to Shannon and Lauren, all I’d have to do is pick up my iPhone.

  And where I would find out once again that Mom hasn’t called or texted.

  “Lo que sea,” I mutter, which is “whatever” in Spanish, even though I don’t think they use it the same way.

  Maybe I’ll start a trend of teenagers saying that here. Maybe that will be something good that comes out of this summer.

  Dragomir and Andrei lead us all to a churros con chocolate shop that’s not far from Puerta del Sol. Kayla kind of jumps when we pass a church about a block away, and I say, “Do you know that place? Was it someplace else in Madrid where thousands of people died?”

  “No,” Kayla mutters. “Never mind.”

  Whatever.

  We take a bunch of tables at the churro shop, and Dragomir goes in and orders for us all, and then the food arrives and—it is nothing like Taco Bell. The churros are like the best doughnuts ever, and they come with huge cups of thick, pudding-like chocolate.