Catalyst (22 page)

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

13.1 Covalent Bonding

If I could run all the time, life would be fine. As long as I keep moving, I’m in control. She wasn’t in the parking lot. I haven’t passed her walking on the road, either. There’s no way she’s running, too. Not Teri. She could have hot-wired a car, I guess, but it’s more likely she hitchhiked. Somebody must have picked her up. No matter. I know where she’s headed. East. Home. She doesn’t have anywhere else to go.

Stepstepstepstep . . . breathe, breathe. Stepstepstepstep . . . breathe, breathe. Jeans and a sweatshirt are not exactly recommended running gear. No matter. It feels good to run in the sun. I’m warming up. Teri’s watch swirls around my wrist, my heart bounces against the wet skin between my breasts.

From the road, the Litch house looks abandoned. Some of the windows are open, others closed. The shutters that had been taken down for sanding and painting are still stacked against the maple tree. There is trash scattered in the yard. Pink and yellow tufts of insulation are tangled in the bushes. They look like clown wigs.

My heart is pounding as I walk up the driveway. How many miles was that? A thousand, maybe. More. In a sweatshirt and jeans, imagine that.

The dirty bulb in the porch light is broken. The thin glass shards litter the floor of the porch. The side door is open, but the house is silent. I cross the threshold.

“Teri?”

The living room is packed again, jammed with all the furniture from the other rooms. The wood floor is covered in dust and footprints. Mikey’s corner is empty.

“Teri?”

All that’s left of the kitchen is a shell. She even took out the sink. She ripped out the wall between the kitchen and the playroom. The holes that used to be playroom windows gape open. Tools are lined up in a neat row on the floor. Her tool belt, too. The wall with Mikey’s handprints and our feeble cave art is untouched.

I walk back down the hall and climb the stairs. The new railing is still in place. The walls in the upstairs hall have fist-sized holes in them.

“Teri?”

I find her sitting in the middle of the floor in Mikey’s room, her head leaning against her knees, her arms wrapped around her head. There’s a pile of blankets in the corner, a couple of bottles of soda, potato chip and pretzel bags, two apples.

“I’d like to talk to you,” I say. “Please.”

She lifts her right hand and gives me the finger.

I sit down, cross-legged, three feet in front of her. “I don’t blame you. But I’m not leaving.”

She lifts her left hand and gives me another finger.

“I can wait,” I say.

She lowers her hands and wraps them around her head again.

I take off my watch and set it on the floor between us. The ticking fills the room, swaying the curtains back and forth. The tidal wave builds again. I don’t flinch. I don’t even hold my breath. I let it wash over me.

Teri reaches out and pulls the watch to her side. Another minute passes, then she lifts her head and tucks her hair behind her ears. Her face is tearstained, her eyes swollen and red. She leaves the watch on the ground.

“What’s wrong with your face?” she asks. “It looks like a fat zit ready to pop.”

“Thanks.”

The watch keeps ticking. Can’t she hear it?

“And you’re crying,” she says. “You never cry.”

“Imagine that,” I whisper. I sniff and clear my throat. “I’m sorry for what Mitch did, what he said. That was wrong, worse than wrong, it was disrespectful and you didn’t deserve it.”

“He’s your boyfriend.”

“Not really. But I don’t want to talk about him anymore. We need to talk about Mikey, about what happened.”

“No, we don’t.” Teri leans back, puts her arms behind her, and stretches out her legs until her boots are right in front of me. “I heard you looking around downstairs. I haven’t gotten much done.”

“Kitchen looks nice.”

She manages a chuckle. “Yeah. I wanted to get that out of the way first.”

I wipe my eyes on my sleeve. “I like the way you made the kitchen open to the playroom.”

She rocks her boots from side to side. “I had it all planned, you know. I could be cooking and he could be in the playroom, and that way we could see each other. Lots of houses are built that way these days.”

“It’s a really good idea.”

“Waste of time.” Her boots are like a metronome, back and forth, back and forth.

“No, it’s not. You still need a place to live; so does your mom.”

Back and forth, back and forth. “You said you were sorry. You can go now.”

I grab her boots and hold them still. “Will you stop that?”

She stands up, rises above me, puts her fists on her hips. “You got something to say to me?”

Her movement sends a thousand motes of dust spinning in the sunlight coming through the window. Our essence is in this room, the atomic products of breaking down two girls to their elemental selves; frightened, defiant, lonely. I can hear the glass breaking over and over again, piercing the frozen tissue around my heart.

I look up at her. “Do you think it was your fault that he died? Or my fault? Dad’s fault?”

She turns her face quickly, but not fast enough. The tidal wave caught her, too, and we’re both crying. She sniffs hard and wipes her nose on her shirt.

“No,” she whispers.

“Are you sure?”

She nods, and wipes her eyes. “That’s the worst part. It was nobody’s fault really, or it was everyone’s fault. It was an accident, just one damn accident after another.”

“Your father. What he did wasn’t an accident. It was a crime.”

She nods again. “He paid.”

I start to stand. Teri reaches down a hand and helps me up. I dig a tissue out of my purse and give it to her.

“You’re always prepared, aren’t you? What were you, a freaking Brownie?”

“Girl Scout.”

“That’s right. You had that stupid hat.” She blows her nose.

“You filled that hat with yellow snow.”

“Did I? Sorry.”

We’re standing eye to eye. I never think of Teri as my height. In my mind, she’s at least six foot five. But in real life, we’re the same size, except for her fifty pounds of muscle. I can’t hear the watch ticking anymore. I pick it up. It’s running fine, it’s just back to telling time quietly.

“Here.” I hand it to her. “I want you to have this. It fits you better. But I’m keeping the necklace.”

“You should sell it, get some cash.”

“I might.”

“Thanks.” She buckles it on her wrist and checks the time.

The dust between us has settled and the light is coming through the window at a higher angle.

“You promised that you would would teach me how to hammer,” I say.

“You’re a spaz; it’s impossible.”

“I’d like to try again. I’d like to help you put the house back together.”

She adjusts the band on her wrist. “What, you mean this summer, before you go off to be Einstein?”

I look around the room. “I was thinking of staying until the job is finished.”

“For real?”

I nod.

“You’re full of it. You’re going to college.”

“Not right away. I’m taking some time off. I’ve been running too much. My legs need a rest.”

She studies me for a minute, then walks out of the room. I follow her down the stairs and across the porch. I follow her all the way to the bottom of the hill. She looks at my house and then at hers.

“You can’t slack if you’re going to work with me.”

“I won’t. I promise.”

She brings her face close to mine, closer than she has ever been. Magnified by her glasses, her eyes are impossibly large, taking in every detail.

Finally she leans back and pushes up her sleeves. “When do you want to start?”

“Now.”

Acknowledgments

The idea that authors write alone is bogus. I sure don’t. Here are the people and things that served as catalysts for the writing of this book:

The family: My daughters, Meredith and Stephanie, get all the credit in the world for giving me the time and mental space I needed for this one. (And no, this story is not about either one of them.) Thank you for your patience and for loving me enough to let me journey after my heart, even when the path was bumpy. Thanks also to Greg for friendship, freedom, and comma editing. I promise to join a support group for Semicolon Addicts; any day now. And Mom and Dad—you were right. I did finish it, after all. How come you’re always right?

The editors: Sharyn November, who was my sister in another life, and Regina Hayes, who was our aunt. I don’t have enough words to thank you for your amazing support and encouragement. Thanks to Catherine Frank, whose comments brought Kate to life.

The friends: The Bucks County Children’s Writers Group sparks my imagination and determination every month. Special thanks to Deb Heiligman for our writing mornings, and Joyce McDonald and Martha Hewson for e-encouragement. I face the West Coast and bow deeply in gratitude to Betsy Partridge, who allowed me to spend an intense week of writing at the Partridge Family Coop with a handful of other writers. Thank you to all for not talking to me when I had that glazed look in my eyes. Betsy gets a second shout-out along with Susan Campbell Bartoletti for helping me with the concept of long-term planning. Elizabeth Mikesell told me I wasn’t crazy when I most needed to hear it (always a valuable ability in a friend). Dan Darigan was my favorite cheerleader. And Scot Larrabee . . . Scot was the surprise element at the end of a long and complicated reaction. Chemistry, indeed . . .

The experts: Alvin C. Lavoie, Ph.D. and Serious Chemistry Guy, read the manuscript in draft and kept me from falling on my face. I came perilously close to flunking chemistry in high school, so if there are any science mistakes in the book, they are my fault, not his. Always wear your safety goggles, class. Also, many thanks to Janine Ricci for saving my butt with some much-needed cross-country information.

The agent: Amy Berkower of Writers House, who also belongs in the paragraph about friends. Thank you so much for taking care of business.

The rest of the world: Thanks to my eighth-grade English teacher for introducing me to Greek mythology, many thanks to Beethoven, Y100 in Philadelphia, Incubus, Dave Matthews, Tori Amos, Staind, Count Basie Orchestra, Santana, Linkin Park, the Doobie Brothers, Sting, Mozart, and the baristas at the Maple Glen Starbucks. Make mine a venti.

Laurie Halse Anderson
, herself a minister’s daughter and runner, is the author of the award-winning novels
Speak
and
Fever 1793
, as well as five picture books. She has two teenage daughters and lives just outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Visit her Web site at
www.writerlady.com