Driver's Ed (14 page)

“I'm not good enough.”

This was true, and yet because Mac knew either everything
about his sister or nothing, and in this case it was everything, he knew that she was lying. She had not quit because she was lousy at it. So she had quit her basketball team, after all these years of effort and practice, in order to hang out and stare at Morgan!

“Sue her,” Mac told his mother helpfully.

R
emy could not figure out why nobody from Driver's Ed had called in to get the reward Mr. Thompson was offering. Money motivated people. Look at Mac, so eager to sue, to hop on that good old American bandwagon, grab his share in the lawsuit. Any lawsuit.

Last night she had stood in front of the mirror staring at her hair: the short quick gold hair she usually approved of. A single strand had grown too long. She cut it off with embroidery scissors and suddenly wanted to cut it all off, hack it off, scrape it off, look hideous and ridiculous and guilty. She had stood trembling, a hank of hair in her left hand, scissors held open in her right.

She had not done it. The thing was to blend in, to be one of the crowd, as invisible to the world as she and her classmates were to Mr. Fielding.

“I don't want Henry being Jesus this year, Mom. Let them use a doll. Or the Van Holland baby. You know Henry won't behave. You know he's more like a difficult pet than a person.”

“Remy!”

“Well, he is! Stop pretending he's different from anybody else's one-year-old. He's all mess and noise and smell.”

Mom parked at the church back door. The church was pure white, reassuringly symmetrical whether you came in at the back, side, or front.

Somebody would call Mr. Thompson. Somebody would want money enough to do it. Remy didn't want it on TV that the Marland family was so screwed up, one kid was out there killing while the other was playing Jesus.

S
tarr had been an angel for years. At last she'd get the scarlet cape, which would fill the aisle behind her like a princess's wedding train. “Ugh, you two are the other kings?” said Starr, gagging at the sight of Roger and Kyle.

“I'm only kinging because my mother's making me,” said Kyle.

“And I get the red one, Starr, so keep your mitts off it,” said Roger.

“Morgan!” screamed Starr. “I get the red cape.”

The sheep got down on their hands and knees and the shepherds herded them with resounding whacks on exposed limbs.

Mrs. Marland set the baby down. Henry took off at full speed, which was a lot faster than Morgan expected. Henry crashed into a pew, picked himself up, climbed onto the pew, clambered along it, fell off, opened a hymnbook, tore out pages, crawled out of reach, laughed joyfully, crawled under the next pew, and found another hymnbook to deface.

This is Jesus, thought Morgan. Wonderful. Maybe we could sedate him prior to the pageant. Jesus the tranquilized.

“R
emy,” said Mrs. Willit affectionately, “I can always count on you. Who else would agree to do this?”

Remy had propped the kitchen door, the hall door, and the sanctuary door open so she could watch Morgan
as she polished. When Morgan saw her, they waved Royal Family waves back and forth.

Her heart turned over.

Going out with Morgan. I wonder if we actually will. Go out, that is. Or if we'll just say so to other people, and lie, and lie, and lie some more.

O
ur wave, thought Morgan. Our joke. Our stop sign.

The stop sign had moved. It was not hidden in the basement. It was between him and Remy. He wanted to steal it a second time—destroy it—set fire to it. Anything to go on with life.

And every time he thought that, he remembered that Denise Thompson could not go on with her life.

G
enerations ago somebody had given the church Christmas silver: plates and chalices heavily embossed with stars. It had been lying around for decades getting black with tarnish. Mrs. Willit wanted to use the stuff this year. She and Remy struggled with polish, old toothbrushes, paper towels, soap and water.

“I love how tarnish disappears,” said Mrs. Willit, admiring the sparkle. “Isn't it a great metaphor? From tarnish to treasure. I'll use that in my next sermon. Polish takes away sin.”

Remy, whose hand was full of filthy paper towels, stared at Mrs. Willit and knew something.

Mrs. Willit had never done anything wrong. Oh, she'd probably been mean to somebody once, or even shoplifted a lipstick. But if she had done anything truly wrong, she'd know polish didn't take anything away. It just moved it around. And saying you're sorry—that didn't take anything away. Didn't even move it around.

Remy was sorry, and Denise Thompson was still dead.

Remy hadn't even read the single word on that sign, had done nothing by intent, and Denise Thompson was still dead.

“Come on, Remy, let's go,” said her mother. “I'm still provoked with you for quitting basketball. It ruined the whole rehearsal for me.”

Henry had reached the toddler stage of exhaustion in which nothing was left but whining. Only sleep could solve his problems but he was too hungry and too wired. They'd have to endure his screams and sobs and hitting until he collapsed.

Remy rubbed his little back, which sometimes calmed him.

I could baby-sit for Bobby Thompson, she thought. I have lots of experience. I could work off guilt that way. Kind of like going to a gym and working off flab.

How obscene. She would snuggle a little boy whose mother lay in a grave because of her?

She held Henry before putting him in the car seat, and pressed her face against his, so their tears blended.
Oh, God!
she thought, and it was no prayer to a little local deity, it was to the real one. The big one. But there was no answer.

C
ar pools consumed the children in batches. Shepherds returned their crooks by hurling them across the church like javelins. The bales had been torn open, and hay was strewn around as if camels had been put up for the night.

Christmas! Morgan thought, swearing. He wondered who had given Starr a ride home and why they
hadn't waited for him. Life had broken down into installments, payment after payment.

Tonight was the first of several Campbell Christmas parties. Tonight was lawyers. Lawyers under the tree, lawyers by the punch bowl, lawyers singing carols, lawyers opposed to carols.

Morgan thought of presidential hopefuls and the secrets they had thought hidden, or had forgotten about, or hadn't known were important. TV found out, and the candidates were ruined. From New York to Los Angeles, from Chicago to New Orleans, America said, “Ugh, kick him out.”

I have to know, thought Morgan, if my parents would kick me out.

He had a dim sense of no longer knowing what the Campbell family was, or why it existed. No longer knowing what love was, or whether it existed.

In the church kitchen, between the stretch of ovens and dishwashers, was a telephone,
LOCAL CALLS ONLY
, it said, which ensured that everybody in Sunday school would make long-distance calls.

Morgan's was local.

He called Nicholas. “I have to tell.”

N
icholas stood very still.

His family was not religious, and for them Christmas was stockings, poinsettias, and lots of shopping.

His mother was Frisbee-ing junk mail across the kitchen into the open trash can and his father was circling Christmas-tree ads in the paper. They always cut their own tree. Dad liked to pick a tree farm at a pretty big distance, so getting it would be an event.

Nicholas scoffed at this. You could drive to the corner,
point to a tree, and have them deliver. Even when he was eight or ten, Nickie was too old for such nonsense. Now he was seventeen and he thought, I'm too young. I can't have this happening to me. Morgan is going to tell? Does he have any idea what will happen to us?

He held the phone loosely, trying to be casual. What could he say with his mother and father in the room while he talked?

Tell, and I'll kill you, Morgan. No, wait, I'm coming over. I'm going to kill you first, before you tell. Anyway, I won't admit I was there. Me? Drive that jerk Morgan around? Give me a break. I'll lie, Morgan. It'll be all you. And what about Remy, huh? You going to haul Remy into this? Going to ruin her life?

But the room was full of parents. There was nothing Nicholas could say, not a word.

His mother handed him a Christmas card to read while he talked on the phone: old neighbors who had moved to Kansas and said the schools were better.

Nicholas said to Morgan, “Not yet. Let's talk about it first.”

I'll kill him. I have to get rid of him. He can't tell. It would kill my parents.

R
emy extricated Henry from the car seat. Of course, when Henry was in such a bad mood, he would not be carried, but also refused to walk. When she finally got Henry in and set him on the floor, she had to barricade him with her knees till she got the door locked behind them.

She loved that moment of safety when the door closed tight against the dark and the chill. She had not
even had time to feel warm, to know that houses were good, and furnaces were best, when Mac yelled, “Call Nicholas. He says it's important. He says Morgan is going to tell.”

Henry screamed to be picked up, lifting his arms and jumping against her. He tried to hook his little fingers in a tear in her jeans to yank her down to his level.

“What'll Nickie tell?” said Mac.

“Gossip.”

“Tell me first.”

“No.” Remy ran to her room. Shivering and trembling, she stared at the extension.

Oh, God!
she thought again, and then he was in the room with her—God was—suffocating and horrifying—somebody she did not want around at all—some grim, vengeful God from some ancient time, who would use a scythe and cut off her hands.

Remy picked up the phone, but called Morgan, not Nicholas.

Mrs. Campbell answered. “Hello, Remy, dear. Morgan just got in. Won't it be wonderful when you two have your licenses? And you don't have to arrange chauffeurs or miss rides? I understand your test is next week.”

Small talk. Please. “Yes, it is.”

“Are you excited?” said Mrs. Campbell, excited.

“Oh, yes.”

“I'll be thinking about you, Remy. I know you'll pass.”

“Thank you.”

Phones were exchanged.

“Hello, Remy,” said Morgan.

She leaped into it feet first. “Morgan, don't. Don't tell. You can't. Please. There's nothing we can make better by telling.”

“It's just that I'm having a hard time thinking about anything else.”

“Me too—but, Morgan, I keep looking at my family. You're letting Henry be Jesus again and my mother is so happy and here her darling daughter goes out and kills people.”

There was a weird sound, not out of the phone, but behind Remy. A sort of sucking, like a small vacuum cleaner. She whipped around, and there stood Mac, who had breathed in so fast, he had choked himself.

She looked into her brother's eyes and saw that she had just achieved a childhood dream: she had shocked Mac.

“You took the stop sign?” said Mac. “
You
?”

Now someone knew.

And not just any someone. A someone who loved to make trouble on purpose. Her own worthless, rotten brother.

“It's my fault, Remy,” said Morgan. His voice was so tired, it didn't seem to take up the whole line. “You didn't actually take the stop sign. You didn't actually take any of them. I won't bring you into it.”

She was weirdly angry with him. “Don't you free me from blame, Morgan Campbell. Don't you carry this all by yourself!” Her tears rushed down as if they had places to go, people to see. “Mac, don't you tell!”

Her brother was stunned. “You and Nicholas and Morgan took it?” said Mac.

“Listen,” said Morgan. “I'll leave you out of it. I promise. It's just that … ah, Remy … I have to tell.”

“You don't have to, Morgan!” She was twisting back and forth, keeping her eyes on Mac, so he wouldn't run and find Mom, and concentrating on Morgan, so she'd win the argument. “They can't find out, Morgan. Let it lie there.”

Let it lie there
. Remy was piling sin upon sin, like blankets on beds. She would be the princess in the fairy tale, the little green pea of her terrible deed always at the bottom of her sleep. She would never again get through a night.

Morgan was still silent, and she knew that he would tell. He had to tell. It was going to come out of him like vomit purging itself from a sick stomach. “At least wait until you and I can talk it over, Morgan. Not on the phone. Holding hands.”

Maybe holding hands with her was the last thing on earth he wanted, but if she could hang on to him, maybe they would make it.

After a long silence he said that he couldn't tell his parents tonight anyway because of an important Christmas party. So, okay, he would wait until tomorrow. Tomorrow they would meet and talk about it. “My father will drive us to the mall. I'll tell him I'm taking you to the movies. Eight screens, there's got to be a movie we'd want to see. First we'll talk.”

A
n important Christmas party, thought Remy, hanging up slowly to postpone dealing with Mac.

Lovely sweet crystal-clear Christmas. Why couldn't this have happened before some stupid holiday, like Arbor Day or something? Why did it have to touch Christmas?

She stared at her brother. He was so short and thin. So achingly little for an eighth grader. If knowledge gave him power, she couldn't see it. “Just tell me if you're going to tell,” she said fiercely.

He shook his head.

Remy sank onto her bed, and her brother sank down beside her. Clumsily, Mac patted her back. More
clumsily, he put his arm around her and tried to hug. They were definitely amateurs at showing affection.