My So-Called Family (6 page)

“Mommy! Daddy!” he called. I waited to hear Mom or Simon running down the hall, but the only sound was Charlie. Maybe they couldn't hear him because their room is too far away. They should have installed that monitor they had when he was a baby, back in the pink house when all the rooms were on top of one another and they didn't really need it to hear him. Now we were in a bigger house. Charlie and I had rooms right next to each other, but Mom and Simon's room was all the way down at the end of the hall. We could really have used that monitor now. Charlie kept crying. I heard his cries get loud and then go soft as he gathered his breath, and then get loud again, like an ocean that ebbs and flows. I pulled the pillow over my head again. It muffled the sound, but didn't drown it out completely. Any second they would hear him, or he would go running down the hall to their room. Any second he would get tired and stop crying. From under the pillow I heard him call out, “Leah!” Because he was crying, it came out like “We-ah,” just like when he was a baby. I swung my legs out of bed and headed to Charlie.

I flicked on the light switch by Charlie's door, and we both squinted from it being suddenly bright. Charlie was panting from crying so hard. His face was as red as a tomato, and his hair was flattened down onto his head from sweating. “Leah.” He gulped. “I thought everyone was gone. I thought you'd all left me alone.”

“Oh, Charlie,” I said. “We wouldn't ever leave without you.”

“What if the house was burning down and you had to leave really fast?” he asked.

“Then I would come in here and scoop you up and take you outside with me,” I told him. I went to sit down on the bed with him. He climbed into my arms, all sticky and wet. At first I thought it was just sweat, but then I realized he'd also wet the bed. “Did you have an accident?” I asked him.

“I didn't think anyone was here!” he wailed. “It's not my fault. I thought you'd gone and I was all alone.”

Like I could have gone anywhere. I was grounded, after all. But I knew exactly what he meant about feeling all alone. “It's okay,” I told him. “I'll go get Mom.”

“No, no,” Charlie sobbed. “Don't leave me.” He clung to me. I didn't push him off right away even though he was all wet and it was starting to smell. I rested my chin on his sweaty head and waited until his breaths had slowed and they were almost normal. How could I ever love any other siblings as much as I loved Charlie? He twisted in my arms and I thought maybe he was ready for me to leave him.

“Charlie?” I said.

“Yeah?”

“Can you count to twenty?”

“Yeah,” Charlie said.

“Okay, start counting,” I said. It was a trick Mom used to use on me when I woke up sick. I would want her to stay with me, and she would tell me to count while she went to get medicine. “I'll be back before you get to twenty,” I told Charlie. “I'm just going to get Mom.”

I ran down the hall. It was dark except for the thin line of light coming from Charlie's room. I thought I could hear him counting, but maybe it was just in my head. I pushed open the door to Mom and Simon's room and went over to Mom's side of the bed. “Mom,” I said. “Mom, wake up.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“Charlie's crying,” I said. “He wet the bed.”

Mom jumped out of bed as if she'd been awake all along. She always moved fast when Charlie needed her. She took off down the hall, and I walked behind her. I got to his door but I didn't go in again. Mom was with him, pulling his shirt over his head. I heard Charlie say, “You weren't there, and Daddy wasn't there.”

“I know,” Mom said. “I'm sorry.”

“But then Leah was there,” Charlie said. He looked up and saw me in the doorway. “You got me,” he said.

“Yeah,” I said.

Mom turned around. “Thanks, Leah,” she said. She didn't even correct me and say “
yes
” like she usually does when I say “yeah.” Then she turned back to finish cleaning Charlie up.

I
had been grounded for almost a whole week. Even though I was sort of back on speaking terms with Mom and Simon, they hadn't said anything about my grounding being over. On my way to pick up Charlie from school on Friday, I called Mom to see if I could take him for ice cream, and she said yes. I guess having Charlie out of the house so she could keep writing mattered more than punishing me. I didn't tell her that Avery and Callie would be there too. If Charlie told her, I decided I could make it sound like it was just a coincidence that we had bumped into them, and then it would have been rude not to hang out with them. After all, it wasn't their fault that my parents were insanely strict and spiteful.

Avery and Callie had gone straight to the ice-cream parlor after school instead of coming with me to pick up Charlie. It's this little old-fashioned place on the main street in town. It gets kind of crowded when school lets out, so it was better for them to go early and save a table. Avery wanted to make sure we had a table in the back because those are the ones with the mini-jukeboxes, and besides, I didn't want Charlie to blab that Avery and Callie had come with me to pick him up. Then Mom would know for sure that it wasn't just a coincidence that we ran into them. I ran over to Charlie's school and got there in time to see him shake Mrs. Trager's hand. He shaded his eyes with his other hand, and when he spotted me, he bounded over toward me.

Charlie handed me something made out of pipe cleaners and construction paper. It looked like a crumpled mess even though he said it was a caterpillar. “Cool,” I said. Charlie sighed. “What's the matter?” I asked.

“Fridays are my worst days,” he told me. He hunched his shoulders over and looked suddenly old.

“How come?” I asked.

“No school for two days,” he said.

Isn't it funny how the worst thing for one person can be the best thing for another? It made me feel grown-up. “Would it make you feel better if I told you we were getting ice cream?” I asked him.

“Oh, yeah,” Charlie said.

“Come on,” I told him. I pulled him along a little faster. Charlie is a really slow walker.

It felt strange to be back out in the world after being grounded. I imagined it was sort of like the feeling a prisoner gets when he's let out of jail. Maybe being grounded wasn't quite that bad, but for the past few days I hadn't gone anywhere except to school and back home. The air was cooler now than it had been a week ago. Indian summer was ending. The leaves were already starting to change colors. They weren't falling off the trees yet, but if you looked closely, you could see the edges starting to turn, from green to yellow.

Back in Maryland, when I was little, Mom used to help me collect leaves when they fell off the trees. We pressed them between phone books to make them really flat, and then I'd glue them onto construction paper and make collages.

Charlie stopped and bent down to retie a shoelace that had come undone. He mumbled to himself as he tied: “Two loops, put one under, and pull.” I breathed in deeply. I know it sounds dumb, but after being cooped up at home for a week, the air seemed so much fresher.

A couple minutes later we rounded the corner of Riverdale Avenue. Once the ice-cream parlor was in sight, Charlie started walking so fast that he was pulling me. We walked in and I spotted Avery and Callie sitting at the back. “Hey, look,” I said to Charlie. “Avery's here.”

“Where?” he asked. I bent down to him and pointed to the back table. “I like Avery,” Charlie announced. “Every time I see her I get to eat dessert!”

I wanted to say hello to Avery and Callie, but Charlie couldn't wait to get his ice cream. I gave him money to order for both of us and went over to the table in the back. Charlie likes to order by himself, but I didn't let him out of my sight. His head was barely higher than the counter. I watched the guy behind the counter hand Charlie his change, and then Charlie headed over to us. He walked extra slowly because he was carrying ice cream for both him and me—a scoop of chocolate in a cone with rainbow sprinkles for himself, and a plain scoop of chocolate in a cup for me. I don't really like cones. They're okay in the beginning, but I like to eat my ice cream slowly, so that it gets kind of soupy, and the cone gets too soggy and messy that way. I stood up to help Charlie, and Avery got up and sat in the booth next to Callie so that Charlie could sit next to me.

“Oooh, it's a music box,” he said.

“A jukebox,” I corrected him.

“Here,” Avery said, fishing a quarter out of her pocket. “Why don't you pick a song?”

“Cool,” Charlie said. “Hey, Leah, what's that song Daddy always sings that Mommy doesn't like?”

“‘You Give Love a Bad Name,'” I told him.

“Yeah, that's it,” he said. “I love that song.”

“Bon Jovi,” Avery said. “That's very old school. Awesome choice. How come your mom doesn't like it?”

“She doesn't like that Charlie points his fingers like a gun whenever he sings about being shot through the heart,” I told her.

“Help me find it, Leah,” Charlie said.

“What do you say?” I asked, the way Mom sometimes does.

“Please,” Charlie said automatically. I reached over him and turned the dials on the jukebox.

“They might not have it,” I warned him. Charlie clasped his hands together like he was praying. I heard him mutter “please, please” to himself. “You're in luck,” I said after a few seconds. “Here it is.” Charlie dropped the quarter in, and I showed him what button to press.

“How come it's not coming on?” Charlie asked.

“You have to wait,” Avery explained. “All the little jukeboxes are hooked up to the same system, so you pay for a song, and then when it's your turn, it will come out of the big jukebox in the front and everyone will hear it.”

“How long will it take?” he asked.

Avery shrugged. “It depends on how many people bought songs before you did.”

“What if we have to leave before it comes on?” Charlie asked.

Charlie has a habit of sometimes asking too many questions. I hoped Avery and Callie didn't think he was being too annoying. I was still the new kid in school. They could still decide not to be my friends, so I wanted Charlie to act as adorable as possible. “Finish your ice cream,” I told Charlie. “It will come on soon.” I stirred the ice cream in my cup to make it more soupy and hoped Charlie would be quiet for at least a few minutes.

“Hey, did you guys hear from Brenna last night?” Callie asked.

“Who's Brenna?” Charlie asked. His mouth was full of ice cream so it came out kind of muffled, but I knew what he was saying.

“She's another friend of ours,” I said. “She's on a trip with her parents.” Brenna's father had had a business trip to New Mexico, which is where her mother's aunt lived. The aunt was really old. Brenna had never met her, and Brenna's mom decided it was a good time to take Brenna to visit her, in case she died before they got another chance to see her. So Brenna got to miss school, even though it was just the second week. Our English teacher said she should keep a journal about the trip. Brenna had shrugged. She didn't really want to go to New Mexico to meet some ancient aunt she had barely ever heard of before.

“She called me last night,” Avery said. “But Chase was on the phone with Lizzie all night, and he didn't give me the message until this morning. They had a fight and then they were making up. I can't wait until he goes to college and I don't have to share the phone line with him anymore. Anyway, I was going to call Brenna back this morning, before school, but my mom said I couldn't because of the time change. It's, like, two hours earlier there.”

“Where?” Charlie asked. He had swallowed so it was easier to understand him.

“In New Mexico,” Avery said.

“I know Mexico,” he said.

“No, not Mexico,” I said. “
New
Mexico. It's another state.”

“New York is a state,” he said. I nodded. “And Maryland is a state too,” he continued. “I've lived in two states.”

Charlie hadn't managed to stay quiet for very long, but Avery just smiled. “I've only lived in one state,” she told him.

I looked across the table at Callie. “She didn't call me,” I said to change the subject.

“Leah's not allowed to talk on the phone,” Charlie said. I shoved him a little, but not so hard that it would hurt. Apparently he thought this was funny because he smiled and kept talking. “She's in trouble because she stayed out too late. And she's not allowed to watch TV, so I get to pick every time!”

I felt myself start to blush. I hadn't really told Avery and Callie about being grounded. I didn't want them to think I was a baby. I had just pretended to be extra busy over the last few days so they wouldn't think it was strange that I didn't want to hang out after school and couldn't talk on the phone. “Anyway,” I said extra loudly, so Charlie would know to shut up. “Did you hear from her?”

Callie nodded.

“Is she miserable?” Avery asked. “I'd hate it if my parents made me go across the country with them to meet some old relative I'd never heard of. It sounds even more boring than school.”

“And she doesn't get to eat ice cream with us,” Charlie said. Sometimes I'm impressed by how easily he can follow grown-up conversations. He's only five, after all. Mom and Simon think he's some kind of genius. They had his IQ tested right before we moved to Riverdale, and it turns out that Charlie has the highest IQ of all of us, even though he's the youngest. Sometimes I wish he weren't quite so smart, because then he'd probably be more quiet. I've never told anyone that, though. They'd probably just think I was jealous.

“She wouldn't have come here with us even if she was in Riverdale,” Avery said.

“How come?” I asked.

“She and her mom are on this total health kick. Her mom lost, like, a hundred pounds last year.”

“Seriously?” I asked.

“Yeah, really,” Avery said. “Now Brenna never eats dessert or anything. Haven't you noticed how she is at lunch? How she only eats things on whole grain bread and always asks for extra vegetables? I don't know how she does it.
I'd
never be able to skip dessert all the time, and I don't think food should be such a big deal. I mean, isn't the point to enjoy it?”

“Well, just so you know, she's at least enjoying New Mexico,” Callie said.

“You're kidding,” Avery said.

“No, I mean it,” Callie said. “She said her great-aunt is really amazing. She taught Brenna how to read palms and tell the future.”

“No way!” Avery said.

“I swear,” Callie told us. “Her great-aunt is passing down her calling, or something like that. Anyway, I totally know how to do it now.”

“Right,” Avery said. “You're not the one in New Mexico with a medium for an aunt.”

“She's not a medium,” Callie said. “She's a fortune-teller.”

“Same difference,” Avery said.

“No, there is a difference,” Callie insisted. “A medium can talk to the dead.” I shuddered when she said that and looked over at Charlie to make sure he was okay. He has a thing about ghosts. But he didn't seem upset about it. He was down to the end of his ice-cream cone, sticking his tongue into the last little crevice to try to lick the rest of the ice cream out. “Brenna told me everything about palm reading over the phone,” Callie continued.

“You can't just learn in one phone call,” Avery told her.

“Well, she told me about it, and then I looked it up on the Internet, so I really know how to do it. Give me your palm.”

“No way. I'm not giving you my palm.”

“Oh, come on. If you don't believe me, then what are you scared about?”

“I'm not scared,” Avery said defiantly. She narrowed her eyes at Callie. I think she was waiting for Callie to admit she didn't know what she was talking about, but Callie just stared back at Avery, waiting. “Fine,” Avery said, and stuck out her hand.

Callie pulled Avery's hand closer to her. “You know,” Callie began, “a life line doesn't only show how long you're gonna live—it also shows you how good your life is gonna be.”

“Which line is the life line?” Avery asked.

“This one,” Callie said, tracing the line that started between Avery's thumb and index finger and curved down to the base of her palm. “Yours isn't solid, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. See, it has branches. Sometimes branches can mean fortune.”

“Fortune is good,” Avery said.

“Uh-huh,” Callie said. Her shoulders were hunched and she was squinting her eyes, concentrating. “There are other lines too. Like, here's your love line. It's really strong.”

“It can't be that strong,” Avery said. “I haven't even been in love yet.”