Strider (6 page)

I still feel so cross with old Wounded-hair (today her scarf was white with pink dots, which made it look as if it had been peppered with bird shot) that I feel cross with other people, too, even Barry, because he has gone out for football, a sport that doesn't interest me. I mean playing. I enjoy watching. After school I collect Strider alone and go watch the frosh-soph team practice. Barry feels so tired and sore he doesn't feel like running anymore. He leaves Strider to me.

Today, when Strider and I came to the apartment house in front of our shack, I began, as usual, to look around to see where Mrs. Smerling was so we could sneak in without her seeing us. Wouldn't you know? There she was, with her hair hanging down in a braid, going
through the trash, trying to jam it all down into two cans so she won't have to pay for three cans, one for each of the two apartments and one for our cottage.

“Hello there, Leigh,” she said as she stomped on a carton.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Smerling,” I said. Politeness often pays. Strider lifted his leg on a dusty geranium.

“How's school?” she asked. Adults always ask that. They don't really care.

“About three on a scale of one to ten.” I tried to smile, even though my stomach was tied in a knot.

She looked at Strider, who was putting on his good-dog act: ears up, eyes bright, a doggy smile on his face. I hurried him into the shack before she could say anything.

Sometimes I wish she would raise our rent, end our suspense, and put us out of our misery.

October and November were so boring I didn't have anything to write in my diary. My attitude isn't great. I am haunted by Dad, who lives close enough to come to see me but doesn't. Maybe he is too ashamed because he lost his rig.

One day Mom said, “Leigh, you really get on my nerves when you call this place a shack. This is our home. I am doing the best I can. It isn't my fault rents are so high and your father can't keep up his support payments.”

I know I looked sulky, but I was really ashamed. She was right. Everything I do seems wrong. I worry a lot, mostly about Dad washing windshields after being a trucker.

Things were better yesterday because the Brinkerhoffs invited Mom and me to Thanks
giving dinner. Mr. Brinkerhoff cooked the turkey, his specialty, and carved it with a flourish. The grandmother was there, knitting a wild red, purple, and orange sweater out of fluffy yarn, which Mom admired and Barry says will sell for several hundred dollars. The little girls were all flapping around in the monarch butterfly costumes they wore in P.G.'s annual butterfly parade in October. We had all the things that go with turkey, and two kinds of pie. Everyone laughed a lot. Mom laughed, too, and admired the spaghetti wall. It was good to hear her laugh.

After that dinner, our
cottage
seemed small and cold. I fed Strider the scraps Mrs. Brinkerhoff had sent him and wondered where Dad ate his Thanksgiving dinner.

I wish Mom would laugh more often.

Running with Strider is cold, damp work. I overheard one of the gas station attendants next door say, “Doesn't that kid ever walk?” He ought to try substituting for a herd of cattle to exercise a Queensland heeler.

Old Wounded-hair now gives me A's on my compositions and says my attitude has improved. Ha-ha. That's what she thinks. I hand in the most boring papers I can think of, but I am careful to make them correct. Writing “My Summer at Camp” was especially interesting to write because I have never gone to camp. My topic sentence was “I made many friends at camp.” Boring!

I worry about Dad, I worry about Mom, I worry about me. Wiping up Strider's muddy paw prints so Mrs. Smerling won't see them is an ongoing job.

Christmas! Friday Barry left for Los Smogland with his two real sisters to spend vacation with Real Mom. I now have Strider all to myself for ten days.

This morning Dad turned up in his old pickup truck to bring me a quilted jacket for Christmas. He gave me quilted jackets the last two Christmases, but he forgets. Or maybe he doesn't know what else to get. I gave him a warm shirt to wear under his uniform to keep him warm when he has to go out in the cold to check oil and wash windshields.

Because Mom had Thanksgiving off, she had to work today. She cooked us a nice midday dinner with roast chicken, so she invited Dad to stay. Nobody objected when I slipped a bite to Strider. Dad left right after we ate because
he had to work, too. He was pretty quiet the whole time.

“Buck up, Leigh.” Mom kissed me as she left for work. I washed the dishes to keep hordes of beady-eyed, antennae-waving cockroaches from invading.

Today is not exactly a Joyeux Noël, as they say on Christmas cards. The good part is I am free of old Wounded-hair for the holidays, and I have Strider all to myself.

The day before Christmas vacation ended, serious rain came pounding down. Our cottage didn't leak, but the windows steamed, and mildew drew a map on the bathroom wall. One morning I woke up feeling awful and said, “Mom, I have a sore throat and I think I have a temperature.”

Mom laid her hand on my forehead and said, “Everybody has a temperature. You have a
fever
.” That's what working in the hospital has done to her—made her sound like my English teacher. Being Mom, she began to worry full-time and said she'd better phone the hospital and say she couldn't work that day.

“Mom,” I croaked. “I'm not dying. I'm old enough to stay alone. I'm not a baby, and I have Strider to keep me company.”

Because the hospital was shorthanded, Mom finally agreed to let me stay alone if I promised to stay in bed, drink lots of fluids, etc., etc. She made me a bed on the living room couch because my room is unheated, took Strider jogging in the rain, and dried him on an old towel so the shack wouldn't smell too doggy; and before she left, she set water, juice, books, and a thermos of hot soup on a chair by the couch.

The rest of the day stretched ahead like a long, dark tunnel. I didn't even feel up to watching TV. Strider and I dozed until he began to act restless. I forced myself to get up and open the door for him. “Hurry up,” I ordered because rain was blowing in, and I felt weak. He obliged. Good dog, Strider.

Later, I poured soup but wasn't hungry. I must have dozed, because it was dark when I heard footsteps on the path. They were too heavy to be Mom's. She has light, quick steps. Strider stood up, pricked his ears, raised his hair, dropped his haunches, ready to spring.

I raised up on one elbow until I heard, “Leigh, it's Dad.”

“Down, boy,” I croaked and raised my voice as best I could. “Come on in, Dad.” My throat felt like sandpaper.

“How ya doing, son?” he asked.

“Mom phoned you.” I seemed to be accusing him of something.

“Sure she did.” Dad sounded determined to be cheerful. “She's worried about you. Don't forget, you're my kid, too.”

I hadn't forgotten, but I often feel as if he has. I turned my pillow to the cool side and tried to keep tears out of my eyes.

Dad felt my forehead. Then he went into the kitchen, just as if he lived here, and came back with ice cubes which he dropped into my juice. It tasted good. Then he found a washcloth, wrapped more ice in it, and laid it on my forehead. That felt good, too. “Your mother says the doctors tell her there's a lot of this going around,” he said as he turned on the TV with the volume low and sat down beside me. The sound and the comfort of Dad being near lulled me to sleep.

When I woke up, Dad was gone, and Mom was smoothing my sheets.

“Was Dad here?” I asked. She assured me he was. For a minute I thought I had dreamed the whole thing. I had never known Dad to act so much like a father before.

That's enough about my being sick, except to say that Barry came by with my books, which he shoved through the window we have to keep open because of the gas heater. By then I felt well enough to moan with my eyes rolled back and my tongue hanging out.

Barry held his nose so he wouldn't breathe my germs, and Strider poked his snout out the window. “Hi there, fellow,” said Barry, wiggling his fingers through the crack. “How's our dog?” Barry didn't mention reclaiming his custody rights.

I sit here thinking, Please don't, Barry. Let me keep him. I need him. I don't know why, but the thought crossed my mind that Barry was behind in his dog support payments.

I'm writing all this because I'm bored. As I read what I have written, I see I left out the most important part.

Dad came back another night when I was alone but beginning to feel that I might live after all. He seemed different, not just quiet. Defeated might be the word. I asked, “Something bothering you, Dad?”

He thought awhile before he said, “There's something about a trucker losing his rig that makes him think about a lot of things. Your mother is smarter than me. She's getting her education.”

I didn't know what to say to this. Then he asked, “What are your plans for the future?”

That question again, the question without an answer. I said, “Mom thinks I should go to
medical school, but I need to earn my own living and not be a burden for years while I go to school.”

“Leigh, listen to your mother.” Dad ignored my attitude, which wasn't exactly the best. “I'll help you somehow. I'm not lookin' to pump gas all my life. I don't want my kid to make the same mistakes I made.”

Dad means well, but I can't count on him. Besides, child support stops when I am eighteen. I just said, “Thanks, Dad.”

When Dad left, I felt good because he had come and was concerned about me. I was also a little annoyed because I don't like people telling me what I should do. How do I know I want to go to medical school? I'm pretty sure I don't. Mom is always so sad when a patient dies. On the other hand, she is happy when someone's life is saved. Maybe I just want to bum around the world with my backpack and my bad attitude.

I almost forgot. While I was sick, Barry brought me a box of dinosaur-shaped cookies his biggest little sisters had baked for me. They even frosted them and stuck chocolate chips in the frosting for eyes. Those cookies really pleased me. They also made me wish I had a sister or two of my own.

Today the weather was good for a change. Although I still feel weak, I have recovered from whatever it was I had. I left Strider at home with Mom, who was studying, and walked, not ran, to school on Jell-O knees and heavy feet. Barry caught up with me. “How come you didn't bring Strider to my house?” he asked.

“The hill was too steep, and I didn't feel that great.”

Barry accepted this explanation, which was mostly true. I didn't feel this was the moment to remind Barry he was behind in his dog support payments.

At school, wearing my best attitude, I turned in all my makeup work. My teachers said they were glad to see me back. In English, we worked on an exercise in hyphenated words,
which did not take long. Bored, I looked out the window at the pine trees across the playing field, but action on the field caught my attention. A girls' P.E. class was playing volleyball.

One girl, however, was not. Geneva was running hurdles alone. I watched her kneel in an imaginary starting block, take off at the imaginary sound of a starter's gun, and, with an arm and a leg extended, clear the first hurdle, break stride, and knock over the second hurdle. That did not stop her. She ran on, knocking over all but that first hurdle. Then she set them up again and started over. Her hair streamed behind her, and her legs, which I hadn't noticed before, were long and slender. I guess it's sexist to say so, but they are pretty.

I felt old Wounded-hair looking at me, so I pretended to be working. Sometimes I gazed out the window as if I were thinking, when I was really watching Geneva. She knocked down hurdles, set them up, and started over. I had to admire her. She didn't give up.

Watching Geneva, I began to feel better. I longed to be out running with Strider in the cool, washed air that smelled of pine trees, to stretch my legs and extend my stride.

Then old Wounded-hair spoiled my thought by saying, “Perhaps Leigh's next composition should be about the girls' P.E. class, since he finds it so interesting.” My attitude toward my
English teacher has gone from bad to worse to worst.

I couldn't help wondering if Geneva had scraped her knees on the hurdles as they fell.