Hummingbird Heart (18 page)

“Fine.”

“Karma, Dylan and I need to leave before you this morning, so make sure you lock up. Okay?”

Karma didn't answer, and I turned to look at her. Her eyes were red-rimmed, and she was poking at her cereal with the tip of her spoon.

“What's the matter with you?” I asked.

She shrugged and kept poking.

“Karma is a little upset that Scott and I…that we're not together right now.” Mom's voice was tight.

Karma stood up. She looked at Mom, and without a word she dropped her spoon into her bowl. Milk splashed all over the table and dripped onto the floor.

“Karma!” Mom stood up too and raised her voice. “What the hell is wrong with you? You think I need this right now?”

Karma slammed out of the room.

“Well.” Mom stood there uncertainly for a moment before slowly lowering herself back into her seat. “Goddamn it.” She glared at me. “You're awfully quiet this morning. I hope you aren't going to be difficult too, because I don't have the energy for that right now.”

“I'm always quiet in the morning.” I sat down at the table and dragged a finger through Karma's milk puddles, tracing a pattern of lines on the smooth surface. Poor kid. She just wanted things to stay the same, and they never did. For a moment I wondered if I should go and talk to her, but Karma was like me—she'd rather be left alone when she was upset. Anyway, there was nothing I could say that would help.

Mom sighed. “Are you worried about the appointment?”

I wiped my milky finger on my jeans. “No. What happens next, after this?”

“They'll run tests on the blood to see if you could be a potential donor for Casey. The results will go to Casey's doctor back in Ontario, and he'll let Mark and Lisa know.”

So they'd know before I would. “And they'll call us?”

“That's right. In a couple of weeks.” She hesitated. “Dylan…Don't get your hopes up about being able to help.”

“What do you mean?”

“It isn't likely you'll be a match. When I spoke with Casey's doctor in Ontario about getting you tested, she said that even a full sibling has less than a thirty-percent chance of being a match. They don't usually even test half siblings.”

“They don't? So why…?”

She lifted one bare shoulder and let it drop again. “Because Mark was desperate. Casey doesn't have any full siblings, which would be her best chance of a donor, and so far none of the people on the bone marrow donor registry has been a good match for her.”

“But they wouldn't test me if there was no chance I'd be a match.”

Mom eyed me closely. “Just don't get your heart set on this. Apparently Casey's doctor isn't hopeful.”

That felt all wrong. “Isn't it her job to be hopeful? She can't just give up on Casey.”

“It's her job to be realistic.”

I swallowed. It sounded like I was in the same no-hope category as Casey's quack doctor in Vancouver. “So it's… a long shot.”

“Yes. A very long shot.” She reached across the table and put her hand on mine. Her elbow was sitting right in the middle of all that spilt milk.

I didn't say anything.

“You are helping, you know. Whatever happens.” Mom's eyes were suddenly full of tears. “If Casey doesn't make it, Mark has to know he's done everything he could possibly do.”

I pulled my hand away. It made me furious, her acting as if she was concerned for Mark's feelings after what she had done to him.

She stood up, turned away from me, dried her hands on a dish towel without bothering to wash them first. “Get your coat on. We have to go.”

n
I
ne
T
een

The appointment wasn't even at a doctor's office—just a hospital lab. We sat in the waiting room for a while: plastic chairs lining the walls, people sitting around avoiding eye contact by reading magazines or staring at their hands folded in their laps. Mostly older people, although one young woman was there with a baby sleeping on her lap. Mom read a magazine, and I pretended to do the same.

Finally someone called my name and I stood up. Mom looked at me, and I shook my head to tell her I didn't need her to come with me. I followed a slim, longhaired woman into a small room and sat down in the single chair.

“Any trouble with needles?” she asked.

I shook my head. “No. I passed out once after giving blood at school, but I think it was just because I just hadn't eaten that day.” Come to think of it, I hadn't eaten today either. I decided not to mention that.

She took my hand, palm up, stretched my arm out and tapped two fingers against the inside of my elbow. “Nice veins.”

I looked down at the tracing of fine blue lines under my skin. “Uh, thanks, I guess.”

“Just a quick pinch.” The needle slid into my vein, and my blood, surprisingly dark, streamed into the vial. Her hand was steady and competent, matter-of-fact, and there were a scattering of tiny brown moles on her forearm. I wondered what her name was. Maybe she'd told me and I hadn't been listening.

“There. All done. That wasn't so bad, was it?” She stuck a cotton ball to my arm with a piece of tape.

I shook my head. “No.” I stood up. Nothing tilted or slid away like it had that time at school, and I guessed I wasn't going to pass out. I felt slightly disappointed. Not that I exactly wanted to pass out—it'd be embarrassing, and Mom would freak out—but it felt odd to just go to school after this. It felt odd that I had to go on like everything was normal while we waited to find out if my bone marrow was any good.

Mom drove me to school, chattering nonstop the whole way. I shifted in my seat and loosened the seat belt where it was tugging across my shoulder.

“This weekend, hon? You remember? Me and Julia are going to that concert in Seattle?”

“Is that this weekend?”

She nodded. “We thought we'd catch a ferry Friday evening, go clubbing in Vancouver, and drive down to Seattle for the concert on Saturday. I need you to keep an eye on Karma.”

“So you'll be gone for two nights? You'll be home Sunday?”

“Yeah. Sorry, Pickle. I feel kind of bad leaving right now, with everything that's going on. It's just that this concert is going to be so awesome. And we've had this planned for ages. They're Julia's absolute all-time-favorite band, you know?”

Through the layers of my jacket and sweatshirt I could feel the cotton-ball bump at the crook of my elbow. “Yeah. Well, we won't have heard anything by then anyway.”

“No.” Mom turned into the school parking lot and glanced at me. “You sure you don't want to meet Casey while they're here?”

I wanted to see Mark again, but I wanted it to be his idea. I wasn't going to be the one to ask. And as for Casey…“I'm sure.”

Mom sat there for a moment, just looking at me.

“I gotta go.” I opened my door, nodded goodbye to Mom and walked quickly into the school, breathing in the cold damp air.

Toni was standing by her locker. She had hung a small mirror on the inside of her locker door and she was looking at her reflection, pulling on her bangs and frowning.

“Hey, Toni. Your hair looks fine.”

She made a face. “I wish it was straight like yours. Look at this.” She pointed. “It keeps curling up.
Flipping
up. It looks stupid.”

“It looks fine. Really.” I wished all I had to worry about was my hair. “Want to hang out at lunch?”

“Um, maybe. I'm not sure what Finn is doing.”

Finn, Toni and I all had third-period lunch. Jax had fourth. I didn't know if he'd want to spend lunch hours with me anyway, but I was glad it was a non-issue. “Well, let me know,” I said, trying to keep my voice light.

“Got any plans for the weekend?”

I shook my head. “Mom's going to Seattle, so I guess I can do what I want.”

Toni's eyes widened. “Have a party.”

“Not a chance. Karma would tell Mom. Anyway, the downstairs neighbors complain if we make too much noise.”

“So just have a few people over. Like me.” She grinned.

It turned out that Finn had a lunch-hour meeting for some project, so Toni was free to hang out. Part of me wanted to tell her that I'd made other plans, but I swallowed my resentment. I wanted to talk to her, and besides, she probably wouldn't believe me.

The morning clouds had cleared, and the dampness had blown from the air. A blue-sky day, as cold and clear and sharp as glass. We walked down the sidewalk. Toni kicked at a carefully raked pile of leaves on the edge of the road, scattering them wildly, and I tried not to worry that someone would see and yell at us for messing up all their work.

“Toni? Can I ask you something personal?”

“Sure.”

I looked down at the sidewalk and slowed my steps. I couldn't think what words to use. Toni waited patiently, matching her steps to mine. Finally I just blurted it out. “Do you think it's weird that I don't know if I really want to go out with Jax?”

She looked startled. “Course not.”

“It's…I feel like he expects me to, you know, have sex with him. Like if I go out with him, it'll just happen, sooner or later.”

“Do you want to?”

I didn't know how to answer that. “Not really. I don't know.”

Toni wrinkled her nose. “If you're not sure, don't.”

“But what if he thinks I should? I mean, I can't just keep saying no.”

“Sure you can. If he cares about you, he'll understand. And if not, you're better off without him.”

I didn't know if Jax cared about me. I didn't really feel like I knew him all that well. “Do you think if a guy tells you something about himself, like something personal, that means he likes you?”

She tilted her head and looked at me quizzically. “Whether he likes you isn't really the point. I mean, you shouldn't do anything you don't want to do. Is he, you know, pressuring you?”

“I don't know,” I said again. I thought about lying on the beach with Jax. My cheeks were hot, but I asked anyway. “When you, you know, with Finn…um, do you really like it?”