Big Fat Disaster (15 page)

Mom grimaces. “I’m not sure where you’re going with this.”

Leah murmurs, “I think it’s a legitimate question, given what was said to us on the Fourth of July, Sonya.”

Mom squares her shoulders and sounds more than a little defensive. “It’s just…the rest of us never saw Mark behave like that, so it wasn’t…real to us.” She shrugs. “It made it hard to believe, since there were no witnesses. And Mark is such a good guy, he—”

Ryan steps up to Mom and looks her in the eye. “
I
was the witness, remember? And sometimes I was his punching bag, too, depending on how quickly I retrieved another beer for him. It’s bad enough that you guys ditched her when she needed you the most, but even when my mom showed you proof, you
still
didn’t believe it.” He takes another step in, and Mom backs into a thorny vine. “Why is reality such a
problem
for you people?”

Mom looks down and crosses her arms. “Romans 3:23:
‘For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.’
”

Ryan reaches down and yanks out a handful of tall grass. “What the hell is
that
supposed to mean?”

Mom sighs. “The only thing I know for sure at this point in my life is that
everybody’s
broken.” She takes the box of glass shards from me and disappears around the corner.

I watch her go, then turn to my aunt and cousin. “I get it: You don’t want us here.”

Leah puts her hand on my shoulder, “Yes, we do, Colby. We’re glad you—”

Ryan cuts her off. “Don’t lie, Mom. You told me there was
no way
they’d take you up on your offer, because they’d never
lower
themselves to living with us.” He snorts. “Well, this really worked out the way you thought it would!”

Leah shrugs. “Okay, Ryan, you’re right.” She looks me in the eye. “I never thought your mom would actually want to live here.”

I feel like I’ve been punched in the chest. I nod at Ryan. “I get that
he
hates us, but
you
don’t like us, either? I mean…at all?”

Her face softens and she shakes her head. “It’s not a matter of
liking
you. It’s a matter of helping a family in need. I would have done the same thing for
anyone
. I took in my last tenant because his house burned down and he had no insurance. He stayed in the trailer and paid what he could until he got back on his feet.”

She drapes an arm over Ryan’s shoulders. “My whole life, my family had this public image of being so giving and kind, but when it came down to it, if helping others wasn’t convenient at the time, they looked the other way. ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,’ my dad always said…but if the ‘doing unto’ had any sort of inconvenient sacrifice attached to it, you could forget it.”

The sun shifts in the sky. She and Ryan move out of the squint-inducing rays into the shade of the trailer, and she pulls me over to them. “Your family is welcome to stay here as long as you need. What Reese did to everyone who trusted him is awful, and I reached out to your mom because it was the compassionate thing to do. But make no mistake: I will
not
be judged on my turf the way we were at that picnic. I’m not stupid, Colby; I can imagine the things that were said about us after we left. Remember: I used to be one of them, until I broke the cardinal rule of not airing dirty laundry. I know what kinds of catty things are said behind people’s backs. And as for what they said was a ‘mistake’ on Ryan’s part: I completely support his decision to report the rape of that girl, because it was the right thing to do. Yes, there were sacrifices involved, but we actually do try to ‘do unto others,’ even when it’s messy.”

I look at my feet and nod. “I get it.”

Ryan gives me a long, hard stare. “Somehow, I doubt that you do.”

Monday morning, Mom drops me off at Sugar’s, then heads to the school administration building to ask about open teaching positions. I haven’t told her about my conversation with Leah and Ryan behind the trailer. What good would it do for her to know that Leah’s not really thrilled about us moving to Piney Creek?

Leah shows me around the kitchen. “Ryan and I came in at 4:30 to stock the cases with doughnuts and muffins for the breakfast rush. Once the crowd thins, we’ll clean up, then bake rolls, prep salads, and assemble sandwich fillings. Your job will be to help in all areas, but, like I told you before, I’m hoping you have an artistic side and can pitch in with cake decorating. For now, I’d like you to work the front counter. Oh—you’ll need to pull your hair back in a ponytail. Pop these on, too.” She hands me a hair net and an apron, then heads for the front counter. “Come on.”

I stop in my tracks and laugh uneasily. “How do you keep from eating all this stuff?”

Leah spins around. “Are you asking me that because I’m fat?”

My stomach drops to my feet. “N-n-no, I just—”

She puts her hands on her hips and gives me the stink-eye.

I remember what Grandma said to me about my weight. “I didn’t mean…uh, look at me, I’m a…‘Big Girl,’ too…”

Leah arches an eyebrow. “I don’t see cookies on those trays. I see
dollar signs
. Do you have a problem controlling yourself around food like this? Your dad always did. Anytime my mother made cookies, the rest of us were lucky to score a few before Reese ate them all.”

I shake my head slowly and fiddle with my hair net.

Ryan calls, “Mom, I could use some help up here.”

“As long as we understand each other: this business is my livelihood. We are artists, and cakes are our canvas. Don’t eat up my profits, okay?”

I nod.

Leah smiles, and she looks like the same person who welcomed Mom with a big hug when we moved to Piney Creek. “Coming, hon.”

The ice machine freezes up around 10:30, and Leah leaves to buy bags of ice. Her car’s barely out of the parking lot when three guys—one white, one black, and one Latino, all wearing gray
MCHS ATHLETICS
T-shirts—come in. They’re drenched with sweat and talking loudly.

The African-American boy wrestles the Latino boy into a headlock. “What’d you say about my mama, José? Huh? You want to say that again?”

José tries to speak but can only choke out, “Let me go, Fredrick! Let…me—”

Fredrick shoves him into a table.

The white boy says, “Let’s see how our friendly neighborhood narc is today.” He marches right up to where Ryan’s counting out cash for a deposit and pounds the bell by the cash register.

Ryan turns his body slightly and continues counting. He sets his jaw and lowers his eyebrows.

I self-consciously tug at my hair net and step up to the glass display case. “May I help you?” I pluck a square of waxed paper from the box as if I’m ready to fill an order.

The boy continues pounding the bell until Ryan snatches it away. The kid swipes at Ryan’s head and laughs when he flinches. I notice a name written in marker on the back of his shirt: M. Taylor. He saunters over to the refrigerated case, pulls out three bottles of water, calls to his friends, “Heads up!” then throws two of the bottles like they’re footballs.

The other guys aren’t watching. One bottle bounces off the display case, and the other rolls under it and bumps up against my foot. I retrieve the bottle and hold it up to the boys, but they ignore me. I clear my throat and ask, “Would—would you like something to eat?”

I glance over my shoulder, hoping that Aunt Leah’s miraculously appeared in the kitchen, but of course she hasn’t. Ryan shoves the money back into the register, closes the drawer, and mutters, “Assholes.”

José slaps his palms on the glass and yells, “What did you say?”

Ryan rolls his eyes and sighs loudly.

“Hey, homes, Ryan just called us ‘assholes,’” José announces. Fredrick and M. Taylor join him in a staring contest with Ryan. “You want to say that again,
cabrón
?”

I choke out, “Um, if you want something to eat, I can—”

José snaps, “
Cállate, puta gorda!
You look like you already ate it all!” They high-five each other.

“That’ll be three bucks for the waters,” Ryan says flatly. “Anything else, Michael?”

M. Taylor—Michael—steps back and studies the chalkboard menu. “Yeah, I’ll take a chili cheese dog with fries.”

I glance at Ryan. “We—don’t have that…do we?” Ryan gives me a disgusted look and shakes his head.

“
We don’t have that, do we
?” Michael mocks.

I’m thrown off by the way they’re talking to me, and my mouth goes dry. I choke, “I’m…new. It’s my first day.”

The front door swings open and Drew hurries in, followed by Mom. José elbows Michael. “Check it out!” The three thugs eyeball my mother from head to toe. Sometimes I forget how beautiful my mom still is, even though she’s in her forties.

“Mommy got a job!” Drew squeals. Mom shakes her head and holds up her hand. “It’s not for sure just yet—but I think I’ve got a good shot at it.”

José works his eyebrows up and down and leers. “
Mamacita
!” My mother gives him a strange look.

“That’s great, Mom. Congratulations.”

Fredrick looks from my mother to me and back again. “You two
family
?” He shakes his head and snorts. “No way.”

Drew pipes up, “Colby looks like my daddy, and I look like my mommy.” She smiles and tosses her hair from side to side.
Ugh.

“Lucky Daddy,” Michael croons.

Mom’s eyes get big. “Oookaaay…” She shifts her purse from one shoulder to the other and looks uncomfortable.

“Don’t you guys need to go back to practice so you can run around and tackle each other?” Ryan asks flatly.

“Yeah, you miss it, don’t you? But you don’t have what it takes. Never did.” Michael crumples his empty water bottle and throws it at Ryan. It misses by a long shot.

Ryan crosses his arms and leans against the wall behind the register. “I’d rather stab myself in the eye with a fork than be part of your team, now that I know what you’re all about.”

Michael grabs a fork from the silverware bin. “That can be arranged.” He bolts toward Ryan.

The teacher side of Mom comes out and she barks, “Stop that!”

Fredrick glances at her and pulls Michael back. “Come on, man, we’ve got to go. Coach will make us run suicides if we’re late getting back from break, and it’s way too hot to run sprints up and down that field until we puke.” They head for the door.

“You owe me for the water,” Ryan calls as they leave. Michael flips him off.

It feels like my heart just now starts beating again. “Are those the guys who…?”

Ryan shakes his head and resumes counting out the deposit. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Your mother should talk to their parents,” Mom says. “If they steal from you again, you should report them to the police for theft.”

Ryan snorts. “Michael’s dad
is
the chief of police. When those three beat me up on the last day of school and Mom told him, Chief Taylor called up the county health inspector and said that he found rat shit in his sandwich. We got shut down for two days.”

Mom’s voice is high. “So…nothing at all happened to those boys for what they did?”

“Why do
you
care? You weren’t there, anyway, so it may as well not have happened, right?” He slides the cash into the zippered bag, slams the cash register closed, and stares at Mom until she looks away.

Later that week, money that Mom borrowed from her friend Brenda arrives in the mail, so we go to the Walmart in Cedar Points to buy groceries. Drew keeps putting name-brand foods in the basket, and Mom tells her to choose store brands instead. I place a box of knockoff Ding Dongs atop the multipack of Great Value mac and cheese.

“We’re not getting those.” Mom places the cupcakes back on the shelf.

“But they’re store brand. See? Choco-Treats. They’re fifty cents cheaper than the Ding Dongs.”

Mom gives me a look. “Don’t you think you should lose some weight before school starts? Have you tried on your jeans from last year yet?”

An old lady on a motorized scooter gives me a judgy look as she putt-putts by us. I make a face at her.

Mom’s waiting. She says loudly, “Well? At first I thought you weren’t eating enough, but I saw you from the side yesterday, and you’ve packed on the pounds. I don’t know when you’re eating, but it’s obvious that you’re not missing any meals.”