A Fistful of God (9 page)

“It’s all right.”

Jackson came up behind her, and I braced myself.

“Aidyn, you coming? We’ve got to get started.”

I shrugged and watched Elaine turn to Jackson. “Come home as soon as the meeting ends. Dad wants an early start this afternoon.”

“OK, yeah. I’ll hurry.” He grabbed my wrist. “Come on.”

Who was he to be forever telling me to go somewhere?

As he dragged me toward the hall I looked back. Mom and Elaine stood close. Mom would reek later, and I wouldn’t care. It was
not
a disguise, after all, not something to put me off the track of booze.

I stopped so fast that Jackson’s hold on me nearly pulled my shoulder out of its socket. “Elaine is your mother.”

“I know.” He frowned. “You just now figured that out?”

“I’ve never met her before.”

“Oh. I thought you had. Your mom spends a lot of time with her.”

“She’s Mom’s sponsor. How’d she get to be a sponsor?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know how they do those things in AA. I go to Alateen, but I think it’s different.”

I stared.
Jackson’s
mother, too?

He tugged again, and I stumbled. As I righted myself I saw Shannon and Miguel in front of the hall, and I remembered my unreturned phone call. “Wait. Just a minute, OK? You knew about my mom and—and her—stuff.” The Sunday before, when he’d first invited me to the youth group, flashed through my mind. “You even knew her before last week.”

“I know.” He wouldn’t look at me.

I twisted my arm but his fingers tightened around my wrist. I pulled my hand up so all the strength of my arm pushed against his thumb and broke his hold, and I bolted.

“Aidyn, come back here.” I heard him behind me, but I didn’t stop until I got to Mom’s car. Though I knew she’d locked it, I jerked on the door handle, and when he reached for me I turned on him.

“You lied to me!”

“I didn’t. I thought you knew—”

“How could I?” I pressed against the car as though I could melt into it.

“It wasn’t up to me to tell you about it. I’m not even supposed to know the people Mom sponsors.”

“But you do.”

“I can’t help it. Your Mom is over at our house a lot. She was there—” He looked away and back. I never thought I’d see Jackson embarrassed. “She was there right after she first quit, and she was so worried about you, you know? I said I knew you from school, and she asked me—” He hesitated. “Look, Aidyn, it wasn’t like we set you up to hurt you. It was my mom’s idea. She figured if you know what was going on you wouldn’t have anything to do with me.”

“She was right.” But the truth was, she’d been wrong.
Now
I knew, and that was why I didn’t want anything to do with him.

His fingers brushed my arm.

I jerked away.

“So you’re gonna dump all your friends just because your mom was too scared to tell you she was worried about you?”

“What friends?”

“That’s not fair.” He hadn’t yelled, but I could tell he was ticked. “What about Miguel? He’s going through a really hard time, Aidyn. He needs friends.”

I shrugged. Miguel didn’t want me; I knew that much. “So go be his friend, why don’t you?”

I stared at the black asphalt and didn’t see his face, only his shoes in front of me.

“Maybe, just once, you could stop thinking about poor, poor Aidyn and think about someone else.”

So now Jackson hated me as much as his mother did. I was so good at earning hatred.

“At least your mom’s sober right now. You heard what Miguel said about his dad. He’s been hanging out at my house since the party, but he has to go home sometime.”

The shoes left.

I huddled against the side of Mom’s car, shaking, and watched the last few kids hurry into the hall. I’d gotten my wish. I wasn’t a part of that group anymore, if I ever had been.

But—Miguel. Jackson had been right about Miguel.

He sat in the last row with Jackson and Shannon, next to an empty seat. I wondered if he’d saved it for me. I slid in. Miguel turned to me, and his face lit up. I wondered if we’d get a chance to hold hands during another prayer. I wondered if Miguel would want to hold mine. I stared at my shoes and Miguel sat next to me. I missed the beginning of Lucy’s talk, but it didn’t matter, because through all her prayers and praise, my heart sang with hope.

8

I’d forgiven Miguel, though he’d done nothing; I’d come close to forgiving Jackson. I’d gone to his meeting, hadn’t I? But not Mom. On the ride home I refused to talk to her and as soon as we got home I locked myself in the bathroom.

“Aidyn, it wasn’t my idea to keep it from you,” Mom hollered. I felt her weight on the other side of the door, felt her listening for any sound. “It’s not so bad, is it? Nobody wanted to hurt you—”

“Go away! I’m just this dumb little sucker nobody wants around. I finally think
I’m
making friends, and I find out my
mommy
had to set it up.” I sniffled and scrubbed my cheeks with the back of my hand. “I liked it better when I didn’t know how stupid I am.”

After that I ran the shower to drown her out, plunked on the cold toilet lid and smoldered. Why on earth should she worry about my trust, anyway? She’d never cared before. And why would Jackson care if I was mad at him? Why would anyone?

I picked at the chipped paint on the cabinet and wondered what Jackson would think if he knew how I was treating Mom. He and Elaine could just hate me more. But what about Shannon, or Lucy, or Miguel? What would they think and why should I care? But I did.

And they’d find out, because Mom was sure to call Elaine, and once again the whole bunch of them would discuss stupid little Aidyn, and Aidyn would be the only one left out.

I was so sick of being left out of my own life, most of the time.

I turned off the shower and wondered how I could make up with Mom without making it look like I thought she was right. I wondered if I should.

I thought of the scorn in Jackson’s voice when he’d talked about Miguel. Did he really think I was that selfish? I didn’t always think of myself!

Mom banged on the door. “Are you coming out, or do I have to drive myself to the gas station?”

I unlocked the door, and she brushed past me. “I’m going to a meeting this afternoon,” she told me a few minutes later. “Elaine said something about going out for dinner afterward. I don’t suppose you’d want to come?”

“I don’t want to see Elaine.”

After Mom left I wandered around the tiny apartment, as restless as she had been the week before. After all those years of spending time with myself I ought to be used to it, but the empty rooms shredded my soul. Raw and jumpy, I slammed out of the apartment and down the stairs. The Donaldsons were gone for the weekend, or I’d have offered to take the boys to the park. I decided I’d take myself there, anyway. Jackson and Miguel went there, after all.

But the weather had gotten blustery and only a few people braved the cold equipment. I kicked the end of the slide, gave a swing a push, and wished I were still young enough to get lost in dizziness. I might as well go home.

As bad as being with the youth group felt, I craved it. Craved their approval. And if they knew what kind of person I really was, I’d never get it. But how did I stop
not
talking to somebody, when I’d never had much practice?

Mom came home after I’d crawled in bed, and she didn’t come to tell me good night. I missed it. I missed her. I got up and stood outside her bedroom door for what seemed like hours, but I couldn’t make myself wake her. What excuse could I give?

The next day I ended up asking Miguel what he thought. He was different, like me, and he understood. He wouldn’t blame me, would he? Or say everything was my fault?

I waited until he finished his lunch and headed toward the sports fields. Usually he joined the ongoing basketball game, but I got in his way and stammered, “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.” He studied me for a second before he jerked his head toward the garden area bedside the cafeteria. “What’s up?”

I kept my head down. “I wanted to ask you…” I stopped. Why couldn’t I get the question out? “My mom—she thinks I’m still mad at her.”

“Have you tried talking to her?”

“Not exactly.”

We reached the edge of the grass, and he stopped, studying the sky. “So, let’s see. She thinks you’re mad, and you haven’t said you’re not. That it?”

When he said it like that, I sounded a lot dumber than even I thought I was.

“And you’re not sure how to talk to her, right?”

I was right. He
did
understand. I beamed at him. “Yeah.”

He shrugged. “What can I tell you, Aidyn? I know what it’s like. I was so scared of my mom for a long time but not nearly as scared of her as I was of my dad.”

“I’m not really scared of her.”

“Why not?”

“I—because!”

“So, you forgave her but you haven’t told her yet.”

“I guess.”

“Well, here’s the way I see it. You gotta tell her. Quick. Because you have other stuff you have to tell her. More important stuff.”

“I do?”

“Well, yeah! You gotta tell her about me.” He laughed, looked at me, and stopped. “Really. I mean that.”

I stared up at him. So this thing I felt when I saw him, when he talked to me, was more than just recognition of a fellow hurting soul. We were more than that.

Still, I stammered, “What am I supposed to tell her?”

He tried to look offended, but he was grinning too hard for me to believe it. “What d’you think?”

“I think—I thought—we’re friends.”

“That’s right. We are.” And he reached out and took my hand. Though I only hoped I knew what he wanted me to tell Mom, I didn’t care. He hadn’t given me any advice I could chew up and turn into action, but that didn’t matter, either. He had taken my hand and made everything fine.

“Hey, Miguel!” Jackson pounded up beside us. He gave me a short nod before he turned to Miguel, and I was just as glad, because my face flamed. “Shannon’s getting everyone together to start the mural for the Autumn Dance. She says bring everybody.”

Miguel turned to me. “You want to help paint?”

I shrugged. I would much rather stay out on the field with him, the two of us alone and exploring what our relationship might become, rather than tagging after him and standing on the outside of whatever group that included him. But Jackson dragged him toward the quad, and since Miguel still held my hand, I couldn’t stay behind, even though I tried. “Miguel, I don’t think I better help.”

“Why not?”

I shook my head. “I don’t…”

He waited for a second before tugging me toward the quad. “You don’t what? Belong? Sure you do. We all do.”

“Shannon doesn’t want me to help.”

“Shannon isn’t the queen of the committee, you know.”

That made me laugh. “You’re wrong.”

Maybe no one noticed. Maybe Jackson dragged reluctant outcasts into public at such regular intervals that no one cared, except for the outcast. I felt a million eyes glare at me, felt them wonder who I thought I was, what they’d have to do to get me to wise up and back off.

They could pick Shannon, former friend, fabulous traitor, as their leader.

Maybe they already had. She held court over a banner stretched like a beauty queen runway across the dirty concrete, held a paper plate in one hand and paintbrushes in the other. My mind flashed a picture of her trying to scoop enchiladas, or maybe birthday cake, into her mouth with sable bristles, before I saw the plate brimmed with an autumn flavored rainbow of glistening paint.

Paint. Brushes. Shannon and paint and that banner and me. The panic that had folded its wings during my confusion flared into flight and my feet stopped. Miguel, who hadn’t halted, jerked my arm. Jackson jerked Miguel’s and turned to check on the status of his train.

Once he’d tugged us into moving again, he said, “Aidyn, Shannon says you’re an artist.”

Once upon a time, maybe I had been. I didn’t want to remember. I hadn’t painted anything since my life spiraled out of normal. Even the art teachers who exploded with enthusiasm had never persuaded me to pick up another brush. Shannon didn’t have a chance.

Still, she tried. “We need your help.” She looked right into my face when she said that.

Rich, rich, rich. And when I needed her help, no, merely her friendship, when my life depended on the only friend I had, what had she done? I can learn by example as well as anyone else. Shannon taught me betrayal and desertion.

Shaking my head, I turned away. Into Jackson.

“Hey.” He ringed my wrist with his fingers and pitched his voice so only I could hear. “That’s no way to treat an old friend.”

I stared into his ice-blue eyes, stricken. But he’d betrayed me, too.

“Aidyn.” The one person I didn’t resent whispered into my hair. “Come on. It’s not that bad.” The one person who could get to me when no one else had a chance. “We’ll both help.”

Next thing I knew I’d bowed to a pristine stretch of white banner, my own plate of traitorously beautiful paint in hand, my sable-bristled spoons ready to dish up humility for my soul.

I’d forgotten how I loved to paint. My fingers hadn’t.

Shannon squatted next to me. “The theme is Harvest Sunshine. My idea. So we’re doing all kinds of sun things. Sunflowers here in the middle. I remembered how your mom taught us how to paint them, but I was never any good at it, not like you. But as soon as we came up with this idea I told everyone about you, and I said you’d help.”

Something in her voice tried to gloss over all the unsaid hurt and trembled at the edge of a lie. Part of me wanted to stare her down. Part of me craved what I’d have if I gave in. I could have a friend again, or at least, a semblance of one—illusion enough to fool the rest of the world into thinking me normal enough to deserve one. Or did I only want to fool myself?

Indecision is a great impetus, that, and people who grab your hand, help you dunk a paintbrush into a pool of gold, and start you on a journey back into the real world.