Fire & Flood
Authors: Victoria Scott
CONTENTS
If my hair gets any frizzier, I’ll shave it to the scalp.
Or light it on fire.
Whichever is easier.
I stare at my reflection in the pond and run my hands through the bane of my existence. For a moment, I seem victorious, my chestnut curls wrangled into submission. But when I drop my arms, the curls spring out, worse for the wear. I point an unmanicured finger at the water. “I hate your face.”
“Tella,” my mother yells from behind me, “what are you looking at?”
I spin around and grab a handful of my hair. Exhibit A.
“It’s beautiful,” she says.
“You did this to me,” I tell her.
“No, your father gave you curly hair.”
“But you dragged me to Middle of Nowhere, Montana, as a sick experiment to see just how hideous I could become.”
Mom leans against the door frame of our craptastic house and nearly grins. “We’ve been here almost a year. When are you going to accept that this is our home?”
I walk toward her and punch a closed fist into the air. “I’ll fight to the death.”
A shadow crosses the deep lines of her face, and I instantly regret bringing up The Subject. “Sorry,” I tell her. “You know I didn’t mean —”
“I know,” she says.
I rise up on tiptoes and kiss her cheek, then brush past her to go inside. My dad sits in the front room, rocking in a wooden chair like he’s two hundred and fifty-six years old. In actuality, I think he’s a couple of years shy.
“Hey, Pa,” I say.
“Hey, Daugh,” he says.
Ever since my mom insisted we move out of Boston and into no-man’s-land, I’ve insisted on calling my dad Pa. It reminds me of those old black-and-white movies in which the daughters wear horrendous dresses and braid one another’s hair. He wasn’t a fan of my new name for him, but he accepted his fate over time. Guess he thought I could’ve rebelled a lot more following our relocation to purgatory, all things considered.
“What are we doing tonight?” I ask, dropping down onto the floor. “Dinner at a glam restaurant? Theater in the city?”
Dad’s mouth pulls down at the corner. He’s disappointed.
That makes two of us.
“Humor me and pretend you’re happy,” he answers. “That’d be entertaining as hell.”
“Language,” I tsk.
He waves me off, pretending he’s the man of this house and can say whatever he damn well pleases. I laugh when seconds later he glances over to see if Mom heard.
“I’m going to my room,” I announce.
Dad continues to stare outside like he’s comatose. I know that’s exactly what I’ll do when I get to my room, but at least I can do it in private.
The floorboards creak as I head down the narrow hallway toward my personal dungeon. A few feet from my room, I pause outside an open bedroom door that isn’t mine. I can’t help moving closer to the bed inside. Leaning over his sleeping frame, I check to see if he’s still breathing. It’s my twisted ritual.
“I’m not dead.”
I jump back, startled by my big brother’s voice.
“Shame,” I say. “I was hoping you’d kick off so I could have the bigger bedroom. You take up way more than your fair share of space, you know.”
He rolls to face me and grins. “I weigh, like, a hundred pounds.”
“Exactly.”
It kills me to see Cody sick. And it doesn’t feel great ripping on him when what I want to do is ugly cry and beg him not to die. But he likes our back-and-forth. Says it makes him feel normal. So that’s what we do.
“You look old,” Cody tells me.
“I’m sixteen.”
“Going on eighty.” He points to my face. “You have wrinkles.”
I dash toward the mirror over his dresser and look. From the bed, I hear Cody laughing, then coughing. “You’re so vain,” he says into his fist, his chest convulsing.
“Jerk face.” I move to his side and pull the heavy blanket to his chin. “Mom wants to know how you feel today,” I lie.
“Better,” he says, returning the favor.
I nod and turn to leave.
“Tell her to stop worrying,” he finishes.
“I doubt she seriously cares.”
I can still hear him laughing when I get to my bedroom, shut the door, and sink to my knees. My breath whooshes out. He’s getting worse. I can hear it in the way his words quiver. Like speaking takes everything he has. In the beginning, it was just the weight loss. Then it was night sweats and shaking hands. Then the fun really started. Seizures. Thinning hair. Slurred speech that started one Wednesday and ended with a coma on Friday. He came around three days later. Mom said it was because he didn’t want to miss a football game. Not that he played anymore. That died a long time ago.
Now he’s down to this: pretending. Pretending to be the brother who swung a right hook in my honor. Pretending to be the son who danced a jig in the end zone that his dad taught him. He’s still the guy who isn’t afraid to write more than his name in a greeting
card. Still the guy who loves redbrick buildings and cars that growl and Cheez Whiz sprayed straight from the can into his open mouth.
He is still my brother.
He is not my brother at all.
I don’t know why Mom thought this place
would help. A dozen doctors couldn’t figure out what was wrong with him, yet she thinks Montana’s “fresh air” will do the trick. The look in her eyes while we packed the moving truck still haunts me. Like she was waiting for something.
Or running from something.
I pull myself up and walk to the window. Outside, I can hear yellow-headed blackbirds calling. I rarely noticed stuff like birds in Boston. In Boston, we lived in a brownstone that wasn’t brown, and I had friends two doors down. Our family owned three floors of sparkling space, and we could walk to restaurants.
Here there are rocks. And a stream that runs near our home that’s free of fish. The sky is empty of rooflines and overstuffed with cotton-ball clouds. There are no neighbors. No girls my age to discuss the joys of colored tights with. A single, lonely road leads from our house into town. When I look at it, I want to strap a bag to a stick and limp down it hobo style.
Tall pine trees surround our house, like their job is to hide us from the world. I imagine running toward them wearing a hockey mask, swinging a chain saw over my head. They’d probably uproot themselves and squash me like a bug. Bury me beneath their twisted roots.
That’s how I want to go when it’s my time.
With a bang.
I slide the window open and stick my head outside. What I wouldn’t do to see my friends again. To get a mani-pedi or a blowout. Or a Greek salad. Oh my friggin’ God, Feta cheese and
kalamata olives. I wallow in self-pity for another moment before remembering my brother. Then I spend exactly three minutes feeling like the World’s Biggest Ass.
We’re here for him. And I’d give anything to see my brother get out of bed and dance in the street like he did on Halloween two years ago. Or even just sit up for a few minutes without coughing.
I motorboat my lips and spin in a circle like a ballerina. I spin and spin until everything becomes a blur. When I stop, my room continues to rush past me, and I lunatic laugh that this is what I do for fun now.
My vision finally returns to normal, and my eyes land on the bed.
Sitting on my white comforter is a small blue box.
I snap my head from side to side, searching for someone in my room. But of course no one’s there. Then I realize what’s going on. Mom and Dad know how hard this relocation has been on me, and now they’re trying to buy my happiness. Or at least a break from my complaining.
Am I really this easy?
Please. They could have tied little blue boxes to the back of the moving truck and I would have chased after them until my feet bled.
I fly across my room and leap onto the bed, a smile spread across my face. I’ve spent these last nine months with no Internet or cell phone, and right now I feel like a wild dog eyeing its prey.
Holding the box to my lips, I tell it, “You’re mine, precious. All mine.”
I’m about to tear in when I stop myself. This moment of wondering what’s inside will be over so quickly. And once it’s finished, I’ll have nothing to anticipate. Perhaps I should postpone gratification, hold off until I can’t stand it any longer. I could be happy for days just knowing I have something to look forward to.
I pull the box away from my lips and give it a small shake.
Put the box down, Tella,
I tell myself.
“Screw that,” I say out loud.
I close my hand around the lid and pull it off. Inside is a tiny pillow. I imagine all sorts of miniature animals using it in their miniature beds. But that’s dumb, because how would they ever find a pillowcase to fit?
My fingers pinch the pillow, and when I lift it up, I’m surprised by what I see sleeping beneath it. Flicking the pillow onto my bed,
I reach into the box and grab the small, stark white device. It’s no longer than a nickel and curves in all sorts of funky ways. It looks … it looks like a hearing aid.
My nose scrunches up as I turn the device over in my hand. Then I nearly squeal with excitement when I see a raised red blinking light on the other side. Blinking lights are cool, I decide. They indicate technology and advancement and maybe a connection to the outside world — to my friends. Or maybe it’s music. Who knows what wild stuff they’ve come out with in the last year? I bet this baby holds, like, a billion songs. And I’m going to listen to them. Every. Single. One.
Vowing to give a solid, halfhearted apology to my parents and hoping I’m about to hear Lady Gaga’s latest, I stick the device into my ear. Hallelujah, it fits! I couldn’t be happier if my Boston boy toy just gave me diamonds.
I fumble for a second before my fingers land on the red blinking button. Annnnnd … give it to me, baby.
Once I’ve pushed the button, I hear a clicking noise. The sound goes on for several seconds. Long enough that I start to feel all kinds of devastated. But then the clicking turns to static, like someone on the other side of a radio is tuning in.
Jumping from the bed, I walk around the room, tilting my head like I’m searching for a signal. I feel like a moron, and it’s the most fun I’ve had in forever. I shoot straight up when I hear a woman’s voice. It’s a clear, crisp sound. Like this lady has never mispronounced a word in her entire life. My eyes fall to the floor in concentration. And I listen.
“If you’re hearing this message, you are invited to be a Contender in the Brimstone Bleed. All Contenders must report within forty-eight hours to select their Pandora companions. If you do not —”
“Tella?” my dad asks. “What are you doing?”
I spin around and do a little happy dance. “What is this thing?”
I point to the device in my ear. “Where did you guys get it? Because it’s fan-friggin’-tastic.”
“Get what?” My dad’s face goes from confused … to alarmed. For a moment, I feel like a little kid. Like, any second, I’m going to be placed in the time-out chair and fume while Cody flaunts his freedom like back when we were four and seven. “What’s in your ear?” My dad sounds strange. His words are calculated, slow to leave his mouth. “Give it to me.”
“What? Why?” I say.
Dad holds out his hand. “Now.”
There’s no room for argument. My dad’s a fairly small guy, but right now he seems enormous. I pull the device from my ear and drop it into his palm. As he closes his fist, I’m certain my new toy has been permanently confiscated.
“Why’d you give it to me if you were just going to take it away?” I ask.
Dad looks at me like he’s going to say something profound, but then he mutters, “Your mom needs help in the kitchen.” He walks out of the room, my only source of excitement for the next eon tucked in his pocket.
I grab the sides of my door frame and hang my head. My dad’s freak-out tells me he’s not the one who left the talking hearing aid in my room, which makes me wonder who did. Then it dawns on me. Passing Cody’s room, I yell, “Nice joke, ass hat.” Even as I say it, I imagine what it would be like if it
wasn’t
him. Nothing exciting happens to me. Ever. But that doesn’t stop me from daydreaming.
I’ve got a world of possibilities ticking away in this noggin. And right now I’ve all but decided the leader of an underground cult has recruited me to be a part of the Brimstone Blood. Or Bleed. Or whatever Cody named it. Either way, it sounds kind of gruesome. He’s apparently gotten more twisted in his sibling brutality. And I do count getting my hopes up as brutality.
The real question is how he recorded that woman’s voice. Apparently, the kid’s been holding out on me. Mom insisted Cody relax once we moved here, hence the Technology Prohibition, but he must have stashed something away. A laptop. A smartphone. Something.
Just thinking about it makes me foam at the mouth.
I briefly wonder if I might be coming down with rabies.
Mom isn’t in the kitchen, but I do spot her standing in her bedroom, talking in a hushed voice with Dad.
“You promised!” my dad hisses. “You promised that they wouldn’t find her here.”
“I’m sorry. It’s too late now.”
“Not yet, it’s not —”
When my mom sees me, she holds a hand up to shush him.
“Tella,” she says, “I want you to finish making dinner and meet us in Cody’s room.” Then she closes the door.
“Jeez, rude much?” I say, mostly to myself. For a moment, I wonder what my parents were talking about. I can’t say what I heard didn’t unnerve me, but when you live with a chronically sick sibling you get used to overhearing your parents say weird crap behind closed doors. So I dismiss their crankiness and turn my attention to my marching orders.
Tonight is Sunday Funday, which my dad made up, and which equates to eating spaghetti in Cody’s room. We all sit around his bed and dine off paper plates, and no one’s allowed to say anything negative. All it really means is that everyone saves everything terrible they have to say for Monday, which kicks off the week real positivelike.
I drain the spaghetti and pour in a can of marinara. Then I do that finger-kiss thing that Italian chefs do on TV. Tipping the oversized chrome pot, I cover four plates with pasta and top them with packaged Parmesan cheese and a slice of freezer-stored garlic bread.
Everything we eat is made with love and kindness, and packed with as many preservatives as humanly possible. Living thirty
miles from the nearest grocery store pretty much guarantees we’ll never eat fresh again, unless we grow something ourselves, and that so isn’t happening. My parents have always chosen their wallets over manual labor; another reason why we shouldn’t have left the city.
Walking toward Cody’s room, I carry a tray covered with plates and glasses like a well-tipped waitress. I even keep one hand cocked on my hip so I can sashay past our too-expensive-for-this-house furniture. When I get to the hallway, I overhear Mom and Dad whispering hurriedly to Cody. I make a point to stop and eavesdrop, but the floorboards choose this exact moment to creak beneath my shoes.
Everyone stops talking.
“You got the spaghetti?” my dad asks. The way he says it sounds like he’s digging for information beyond dinner.
I turn the corner and do my best sashay yet. It’s so good, I almost lose the tray altogether. Still, if it’s between sashaying and keeping spaghetti off the floor — I choose the former. “Dinner is served, my fine patrons.” I steady the tray and pass the grub out to my family. When I hand my dad his pasta, I pause and search his face. I know it was Cody who planted the box in my room, but it bothers me that my dad got so weird about it. He hates when Cody and I play-fight, and I guess he just wasn’t in the mood. Still, I want to know he’s not mad anymore. Even more, I want to steal back that talking device in his pocket. Prank or no prank, it’s a lifeline to fighting boredom and isolation.
While we eat, Mom talks ad nauseam about what’s on the agenda for tomorrow’s classes. I want to remind her that Sunday Funday outlaws talking about anything negative, but I hold my tongue. It’s August, which means exactly two things: A) It’s a new semester in the Holloway household, and B) Mom’s on a steady diet of overeagerness. And maybe crack.
Mom started homeschooling Cody and me once we moved here. It was a huge blow to my social calendar, second only to
Guess what? We’re moving to Montana.
I never thought my mom was the relocate-to-the-wilderness-and-homeschool-my-kids kind of person, but turns out she’s full of pleasant surprises. I’ll admit that, as far as teachers go, she’s the best I’ve had. Maybe because she glows every time I get an answer right, or that she dances when we ace our tests.
Cody sits up in bed and nods as Mom talks about lesson plans. Something about her voice is too eager tonight, like she’s trying too hard to get the rest of us to smile. I glance at my dad and realize she’s failed to amuse at least one of us. My dad’s fork twirls in an endless circle, turning my spaghetti masterpiece into reddish-orange mush.
I can’t stand the look on his face any longer. “Dad, you okay?”
His head snaps up, but it takes a while for his mouth to form a smile. “Yeah, everything’s great.”
Great?
Now I know something’s up. Without meaning to, I eye the pocket where I know he stashed the device. He places a hand over it, and our eyes meet.
“Let’s do the dishes, Andrea.” Dad looks away from me and to my mom. They couldn’t be more different tonight: Dad with his somber twitchiness and Mom with her pageant smile.
My mom nods and collects our paper plates. Then she leaves, giving my dad a final look. These trippy vibes are killing me, so I open my mouth to say something, anything. “Nice prank, Cody. Too bad Dad killed your punch line.” It’s not the best I’ve got, but I feel like my dad’s bad mood started with the blue box. Why not lay it on the table while he’s still in the room?
Cody is in the middle of pulling himself farther up in bed but stops when he hears what I’ve said. He looks down and bunches the blanket into his fist. His face looks almost pained. A shiver works its way down my spine. What if Cody didn’t put that box in
my room? But if he didn’t, then who did? Dad’s too pissed to have done it, and Mom would never do something like that. At least, I don’t think she would. She’s surprised me too much this last year to know for sure.
The shiver sneaking down my back starts to morph into goose bumps. But right then Cody raises his head and grins. “Took a lot of brainpower, baby sister,” he says, tapping his temple. Then he shakes his head as if I’ve been a huge disappointment. “Would have been so great.”
I sigh with relief. Adventure sounds a whole lot more enticing when it’s safe inside my head. For a minute there, I was thinking he might be like, “What are you talking about?” And then I’d have to decide if I really did want something exciting to happen, or if I just liked to dream.
Rolling my eyes, I say, “More like lame. It would have been so
lame
.”
I head toward the door, surprised Dad hasn’t spoken. If this is what he’s mad about, why hasn’t he piped in? As I’m heading out to help Mom in the kitchen, I look back over my shoulder. I catch Dad giving Cody a nod. It’s just a nod, nothing special. But something passes between the two of them during the exchange. They both look relieved, and it’s the most unsettling feeling — not knowing what they were so worried about.
Walking down the hallway and toward the sound of my mom humming, I can’t stop thinking about the device. What it really is. How Cody got his hands on it.
If it even
was
Cody.
The look on his face when Dad nodded makes me question everything. I set my glass down on the kitchen counter, and though I know my mom is talking to me, I don’t hear a single word. Because all I’m thinking is that I’ve got to get that little white device back. Tonight.
