Better Than Weird (13 page)

“I just took off.” He looked up. “Aaron. I'm sorry. I've been…I'm sorry.”

Aaron stared at his father's face as he replayed the words in his mind.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

Karen had said, “It never hurts to say I'm sorry,” but his father's face was twisted with pain. Did the words hurt him? Did they make him sad? Aaron felt a stab of fear. What if his heart breaks all over again? With that thought, something closed in Aaron's throat and he couldn't swallow; he couldn't breathe. He coughed, then coughed again. He began making ugly retching sounds. His father leaned forward and whacked Aaron firmly in the middle of his back until he managed to take a breath.

“You okay?” his dad asked.

Aaron nodded.

“You sounded like a cougar trying to cough up a hairball.”

Laughter erupted from Aaron. He couldn't help himself. He laughed so hard his eyes grew wet. Then he saw his dad laughing too, and he laughed in relief. When he finally stopped, his father said, “I'm sorry. I hope I didn't hurt you. I had to whack you pretty hard.”

“That's okay,” Aaron said.

“What's okay?” Gran asked from the doorway. “What are you two up to?”

“Everything's okay,” Aaron's father said. He stood and walked to her side. “And everything will be all right,” he said more softly as he wrapped his arms around her.

TWENTY

That evening they ate dinner in the dining room. Aaron couldn't remember ever having company or eating in the dining room before. All this time, it had been just him and Gran. She always set the table in the kitchen, and they ate from the kitchen dishes. Today Gran and Sophie pulled out the fancy plates stored in the sideboard.

“They're not mine,” Gran explained stiffly when he asked why they'd never used those dishes before. “I didn't feel entitled to use your mother's best china, not without a really good reason.”

“Now we have a good reason,” Aaron said, bopping his head from side to side. “My dad came back. That's a really, really good reason.”

“Yes, it is,” Gran said. “And he brought Sophie,” she added, smiling at Sophie.

“Yeah. And Sophie…she's the surprise that came with a surprise,” Aaron said, pointing at Sophie's belly.

That made everybody laugh, and Aaron's head kept bopping.

When dinner was ready, Gran lit candles and they sat down.
Like a family. Just like a family,
Aaron thought.

“You won't believe how many questions I have,” Gran said once everybody was served. “Why don't you start by telling us how you met?”

“I can answer that,” Aaron's father jumped in. “The first time I saw Sophie, she was wearing a mask and threatening me with a spear.”

“I was not,” Sophie sputtered.

“Ha! Were you, or were you not, wearing a mask?” Aaron's dad asked.

“You know I was.” She laughed. “I was wearing a surgical mask,” she said, turning to Gran, “and the spear was a needle that I was going to use to stitch up the cut in his leg.”

“Needle! That needle was this long!” He held his hands an impossible distance apart. Everybody groaned and laughed.

“The needle was this long,” Sophie said, measuring out a much shorter length with her thumb and first finger. “And that cut wasn't all that bad. He didn't need more than a dozen stitches. I've seen much worse. Besides, I don't think he even remembers how bad it was, because as soon as he saw the needle, he passed out!”

“I did not. I only stretched out on the gurney because I didn't want you to think I was looking over your shoulder. I didn't want to make you nervous.”

“Liam's always been sensitive to needles,” Gran said. “When he was small, we had to hold him down every time he needed a shot. You never heard a boy make such a fuss.”

Aaron grinned. He loved hearing all this stuff about his dad and Sophie. He liked that they sounded happy, because if they were happy, they would stay and he would become a part of their happiness.

“How did you hurt your leg?” he asked.

“My leg? Oh, back then I was working on a placer mine just outside of Dawson for a fellow name Herb. I was the odd-job man, running the backhoe and the pumps and the generators.”

“Dawson? You mean in the Yukon? Was it a gold mine? Were you mining for gold?”

“That's right. Dawson City. And we
were
mining for gold. Herb had a claim for a small operation. It was just him and me. Anyway, one day we were shut down for repairs. I was working on this long pipe when I heard a snuffling sound behind me. I turned, and there was this grizzly bear coming right at me. He was walking slow, like this—” and here his dad used his hands to demonstrate the bear's pigeon-toed walk. “I'm pretty sure he was eyeing me for dinner. Either that, or he was blind as a bat and couldn't see where he was going, because he walked headfirst into one of the sluice runs. That's like a long metal pipe that's usually filled with water and rocks.

“Anyway, the bear walked right into the pipe, and he hit his head right here,” he said, tapping his fist to the middle of his forehead. “It must have hurt, because the bear grunted and lowered his head. Then he whipped it back up, and didn't he whack himself right on the nose! I swear I saw his eyes cross with the pain of it.”

“Did the bear attack you? Did it? Is that how you got the cut on your leg?”

“Nah. That bear whacked his head so hard, he scared himself and ran away.”

“Then how did you get hurt?”

“I was laughing, slapping my knees and staggering around in relief, and like a fool, I didn't look where I was going either, and I stepped right into the cutting edge of a piece of scrap metal. It sliced through my pants and cut open my leg. So then Herb, he drove me to the nursing station in Dawson, and there was Sophie. Once she put the needle down and took off her mask, I thought she looked pretty good. Still do,” he added with a grin.

Aaron turned to Sophie. “Some of that story's true, Aaron,” she said. “The rest of it? Well, that's what we'd call a tall tale. There's a lot of those told up north.”

“Tall tale! That's no tall tale. I told the whole thing just like it happened, without a word of a lie!” his father insisted.

“Did you find any gold?” Aaron wanted to know.

“We found a fair bit. Most of the gold from a placer mine comes in tiny grains, smaller than a grain of rice. Sometimes they're as fine as sugar crystals. You have to wash away a lot of sand and gravel to find them. That reminds me.” He reached into his pants pocket. “I brought you a souvenir.”

The souvenir was a key chain attached to a small, sparkly stone.

“Is that real gold?” Aaron asked.

“Not gold,” Sophie explained. “It's iron pyrite, fool's gold. A real nugget with that much gold would cost a fortune, and you probably wouldn't use it for a key chain.”

“Fool's gold,” Aaron echoed. “It could sure fool me.” He held the key chain by the ring and watched the nugget swing and flash in the candlelight.

That evening they sat at the dinner table talking for a long time. When Gran said it was past Aaron's bedtime, he didn't want to go. He opened his mouth to object, but Gran shook her head in warning and he stopped. He didn't want to make a fuss. Not now. Not on the first day his dad was back. But it was hard to leave the room.

Lying in bed was hard too. His room was right above the dining room, so he couldn't help hearing the drone of voices as the adults talked. He wondered what they were talking about. He wondered if maybe, now that he wasn't there to hear, his father was explaining why he'd waited eight years to come home.

* * *

Aaron wasn't sure what woke him. He was going to roll over and go back to sleep when he heard a stifled squeak outside his door, then Gran's voice calling, “Sophie? Is that you? What's wrong?”

The squeak was followed by a heavy
THUD
from the room beside his own, where Sophie and his father were sleeping. “For crying out loud!” his father said.

“What's going on?” Gran called again. Aaron heard her climb out of bed.

“It's all right, Mom,” his father called back. “I just tripped over my suitcase.” Then: “Sophie? Where are you, Sophie?”

“I'm in the hallway,” Sophie called. A light flashed on. “Would you look at that!” she said.

“What on earth!” his father said.

Then Gran called, “AARON!”

“Uh-oh,” Aaron said. He sat up. He didn't know what was wrong, but whatever it was, it wasn't good and it was his fault.

He shoved his glasses on his nose and slid out of bed. When his bare feet hit the floor, they mushed into something squishy and wet. It wasn't watery wet. It was cold and squirmy and slimy wet. “Ewww!” he squealed and leaped back into bed just as his door opened. His light was switched on, and when he stopped blinking, everybody was in his doorway, looking in.

“Look at that,” his dad said.

“If I wasn't seeing it, I wouldn't believe it,” Sophie said.

“Believe it,” Gran said. “This is a typical Aaron mess.”

Aaron didn't know what to say.

“It's the Great Escape,” his father said with a laugh.

“Exodus,” said Sophie, and she laughed too.

“It's not funny,” Gran grumbled.

Aaron leaned to look down at his floor. “My room is full of worms,” he said.

“It certainly is,” Gran said.

He looked at the worm jar beside the vivarium. It was open. The lid lay on the dresser where he had left it when he was showing his father the toad. Crawling from the top came a waterfall of worms. Even as he watched, worms slid over the rim and dropped to lie pooled on the dresser. One worm was squirming out from under the wriggling mass, slithering its way to the dresser's edge. Others had dropped to the floor and were stretched full length, moving along as if they were in a cross-country race. Some had already crossed the room and slipped into the dark hallway, where Sophie's bare feet had mashed them on her way to the bathroom.

“Poor worms,” she said. “They're trying to go to ground and can't find any.”

“You have a list, Aaron,” Gran scolded. “You were supposed to follow it so we wouldn't have this problem.”

“I did. I did everything on the list,” he said. “It doesn't say anything about worms.”

Gran huffed, but his father came in and handed him the worm jar, and when Aaron climbed out of bed, they began scooping up the escaping worms.

“This is my fault too,” his father said. “I was here. I saw how hard it was for him to open the jar with one hand. I should have helped.”

When he heard his father's words, Aaron felt such a surge of happiness that his legs felt wobbly.
I knew it
, he thought.
I knew it. My dad likes toads.
And, for the first time, he was sure his father didn't think he was too weird and that everything was going to work out.

When the worms were back in the jar and the lid was fastened, Sophie went to the bathroom, and when she was done, Aaron and his dad went in to wash their hands and feet. Then they all went back to their beds, and for the rest of the night, Aaron slept well.

TWENTY - ONE

It was Sophie's voice Aaron heard as he came downstairs the next morning.

“This family keeps far too many secrets,” she was saying. “You have to tell him. He's old enough to know.”

“Can't we just—,” Gran started. She stopped when Aaron walked into the kitchen.

“What's the secret?” he asked. There was a smile on his face. He waited for Gran to say, “You're grinning from ear to ear,” as she always did when he looked happy, but she didn't. And when he looked around, his smile faded.

Sophie, Gran and his dad were sitting at the table, the breakfast dishes pushed aside. The room was filled with the smell of coffee and slightly burnt toast. Sophie was holding Gran's hand. They looked…sad? And Gran seemed somehow smaller than usual.

“What? What's the secret?” he asked again.

The grown-ups looked at each other.

“Aaron,” Gran said. “Aaron, you need to listen.” She motioned him to the empty chair next to hers. There was something in her voice, in her face; he didn't know exactly what, but it sucked away his happiness. “You know how I had all those tests. The medical tests? The ones the doctor sent me for?”

“Yeah?” He sat down.

“There's a problem. Probably it's nothing,” she said quickly. “Probably I'm worrying over nothing at all.”

“You're sick?”

Gran took a breath. A noisy breath, like a gasp.

He saw Sophie pat Gran's hand. “That's just it, Aaron,” Sophie said. “We won't know for sure how serious it is until after the operation.”