The Big Picture (18 page)

“Actually it’s crumbling around me.” Hello, girl with dangling leg here. Anybody care? Anybody care that I have roof parts sticking into places that are totally inappropriate and uncomfortable?

“Miss Vega does not believe she was given ample opportunity to obtain signatures.”

My neck aches from following the bouncing conversation and holding my weight up.

“Those kids were given a fair deadline!” The mayor’s cowboy hat bobbles as he shakes his head. “It is absolutely not my fault they couldn’t rally enough of the citizens to back them.”

“That’s not true!” Frances shouts. “Mr. Saldano, it’s not our fault it rained. Had we stayed out in the weather, someone probably would have gotten struck by lightning or hurt. I knew the mayor wouldn’t want that on his conscience.”

“Losing circulation here! Do you
want
amputation on your conscience?”

“Mr. Mayor, would you please tell our viewers what you plan to do with this property after you tear down Bubba’s Big Picture?”

The mayor opens and closes his mouth guppy-style a few times. “I . . . I plan to — ”

“Put in a strip mall.” Frances crosses her arms and glares down at the mayor.

Oh, don’t make her mad, mayor. One kick of her flip-flop, and you and that ladder are headed south like a big, fat Texas torpedo.
“He doesn’t care he’s destroying the livelihood of Buford Hollis and his family. Who cares if Buford’s kids have food on the table, right, Mayor Crowley?”

“Now just a minute there, you little — ” Rick’s cameraman moves in for a close-up, and the mayor recovers. “I am not the enemy here, Miss Vega!”

“Well, we’re not leaving this roof until you agree not to tear down the drive-in.”

“You are out of your mind!” The mayor stabs a finger toward Frances. “Get off this roof or I’ll — ”

Her dark eyes narrow. “You’ll what?” Rick Saldano follows their every word.

A siren whirrs in the distance, and the mayor’s face settles into a satisfied grin. “I won’t do anything, my dear. The police can take it from here. You are trespassing on private property — a condemned piece of property at that.”

Frances thrusts out both arms. “Arrest me if you must! I will not go without a fight! You will have to peel me from this rooftop!”

Yeah, um, if someone could just peel my pjs from that nail . . . I can’t feel my toes anymore.

Rick’s eyes widen. “Tom, he’s going to arrest these kids. Let’s get another camera out here quick.”

“Now hold on! I didn’t say I would have the girls
arrested
.”

“Yes, you did!” Frances growls.

“No, I did not!”

The rest of the conversation is lost on me as a new member is added to the roof.

Charlie. Crawling up from the opposite side.

“Charlie!” I gush, like he’s the water in my drought. “Help me. Please!” His eyes take in my condition, and he rushes to my side. “Be careful. The roof’s rotten here.”

“Nash brought a ladder. I thought I heard a weird noise earlier.”

“Oh, that was just Frances doing her ‘give me Bubba’s or give me death’ speech.”

He tugs on the particleboard around my leg. “No, I meant the splitting sound.”

“Oh.” I glance toward Frances, still embroiled in a fiery conversation with the mayor. “Took you long enough then. Hey!” I yip as his hands get too close to . . . well, too close to mention.

His hands fly away. “Sorry. What can I do to help?”

“That ain’t it,” I droll. “Look, I think my pants are hung on a nail in the concession stand. You have to get in there and get me loose.”

“I’ll be right back. If I have to bust down that door, I will.” He comes to his feet, his eyes intense on mine. “But don’t move a muscle until I get back up here. It’s not safe.”

My rescuer steps back down the ladder and disappears.

My gosh, we’ve got more plot lines here today than an episode of
Real World
.

“I’m an honors student! I’m a student council officer!” I tune in as Frances shouts her credentials to the reporter and mayor. The police sirens grow louder.

Below me I hear the pounding of what must be Charlie’s body meeting the door of the snack bar. Followed by grunting.

Then the building quakes as the force against the door grows heavier. Louder. Nash’s voice mixes with Charlie’s.

“We can’t get it yet, Katie, but we will. Just hold on and be patient!”

“Charlie!” I yell. “This place belongs to Buford Hollis, remember?”

“Yeah?” comes his breathless response.

“So did you think about trying the knob?”

Silence from below me. “Oh.” And then the blessed sound of a door opening. “We’re in!”

Amen. Hallelujah. Praise and glory. And a woo-hoo on top of that.

“Are you in your
pajamas
?” Charlie’s voice travels from beneath me.

“You’re just now noticing?” I speak toward the hole my leg occupies. “I know my Tweety Bird pants are hot, but try to focus.”

He laughs. And as freedom is seconds away, I realize we’ve both forgotten we’re mad at each other.

There’s a pull on my leg, then a small tug. “Nash has to cut you out of here.”

“Don’t take any more than you have to.” Nash carries a knife? Good to know.

I feel Charlie’s arm on my calf. Or somebody’s. Who cares whose it is. Whoever breaks me loose can touch my leg all he wants.

“Gotcha!”

And my leg is free. I inhale a cleansing breath and pull up on my leg.

“Don’t move, Katie. I’ll be right up.”

Charlie’s shoes are quick and loud on Nash’s ladder. “Hey.” He smiles as he throws a leg over.

“Hey, what’s up? Just hanging out, myself.”

He steps near me, carefully, as if I’m on ice that could break at any time. “I’m going to pick you up, okay?”

“What? Charlie, no. This is ridiculous. We’ll both fall through. I’m getting up myself.”

“Don’t move, I mean it.” His breath is warm on my cheek as he squats down. One hand weaves under my arms and the other cradles my left leg, then slowly, inch by inch, my right. Oh, right leg. At last we are reunited. How I’ve missed you. I shall never crash through a building and part with you again.

“Are you okay?” Charlie’s face, so full of concern, quickens my heart.

“Yes, I’m fine. Seriously, just put me down.” Did that sound
convincing? Hope it wasn’t too strong. Because right here next to his chest is a fine place to be. Yes, I know. So very weak.

“All right, I’m going to lower you to the ground slowly.”

Drat. After all I endured, is a little cuddle time with my off-limits hero too much to ask for?

I feel the granite-hard contours of his fab abs as he slowly slides me down. My left leg lands solidly on the surface of the roof. I lower my stiff right leg, stretching it beneath me, just a bit more, and — “Ow!”

“What’s wrong?” Charlie clutches me as I lean into him.

I shake my head and sweat beads at my temple. “I don’t know. Probably just sore from being in the same position so long.” Unused to the movement, my right leg tingles as I touch my toe down, then my heel, and lower all my body weight. “Owwww!” I yelp and hop back into Charlie’s waiting arms. “Something’s not right!”

“You’re telling me. Hold it right there, son.”

With a worried glance, Charlie takes one big step backward away from the hole in the roof and swivels around. My arms tighten on his neck, and I suck in a breath.

Gone is the mayor. But in his place stands the In Between police chief. “I’m going to have to ask you kids to come with me. We have some talking to do.” He spits to the ground below. “Downtown.”

“SO CHARLIE
CARRIED
YOU IN HIS arms?” Maxine clutches her heart and slumps into her seat at the kitchen table. “Why didn’t the news crew get
that
?”

I lift a bite of meatless spaghetti to my mouth and readjust my foot propped on the chair across from me. “They were too busy zooming in on the mayor siccing the police chief on Frances.” And Frances played it for all it was worth.

“Katie, are you ready for some more Advil?” Millie moves my crutches and settles into the seat next to me, her face tight with concern. “You’re lucky you got by with a sprain and not a broken ankle.”

“Well,” Maxine harrumphs. “Even though your actions today got
you a reprieve on the demolition, I still wish that Rick Saldano would’ve showed footage of you in the clutches of your hero.”

I swallow my meds and try not to look at my ugly Aircast. “Why?”

“Maybe Sam would’ve been watching and could’ve seen what a
real
act of romance looks like.”

I shift in my seat, my left cheek already asleep. “How do you think Channel Five News got there so quickly? How could they have known we were on the roof before the mayor?”

Millie shakes her head, her wigged tresses swaying. “Just another crazy element to the day, I guess.”

“I don’t know about
crazy
.” Maxine lifts a perfectly shaped brow. “I prefer the word
strategic
.”

My mouth drops. “
You!
You called them!”

She shrugs. “Who, me? I don’t know what you’re talking about. That would be a betrayal of my sweet admirer, the good mayor.” She stands up, pushes her chair in, and glides out of the room, her hips swaying like a southern belle’s. And her throaty laugh lingering behind.

Chapter twenty - one

HOW DO YOU MAKE DAYS and weeks pass slowly?

Crutches. Sore armpits. Time spent immovable and the captive audience of one Maxine Simmons. And some super fun summer school classes.

And yet, before I know it, D-Day is here. My departure day is tomorrow, when the Scotts will load me and my crippled carcass into James’s truck and drive me to Middleton, Texas, to reunite with my mom.

The last three weeks have been like a school year — it goes so slowly, yet on the other hand, it’s hard to believe the time has passed.

But it has. My time in In Between is over.

And I tear up every time I think about it, every time someone mentions it. Every time Millie gets that look in her eyes, like she’s committing my face to memory. Or maybe she’s worried I’ll fall off the wagon of success, and she’s learning my face in case she’s expecting to see it on a wanted poster some day.

“Katie?” Millie’s voice draws my head up. She opens my door and pokes her head in. Her brown eyes assess my bedroom and the packing progress. “Are you sure you don’t want any help?”

This is the same question she’s been asking all week. Yes, the only thing on my to-do list besides sit around and look pitiful with my propped-up leg was to pack my belongings. And here it is, the night before I leave this room forever, and all I’ve managed to throw in a suitcase is my In Between High yearbook and a bottle of Midol.

Millie crosses the room to sit on the bed next to me. She pats Rocky on the head as he rolls over and snores beside us. “Honey, are you doing okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Of course, I’m good.” Perfect. Wonderful.

“You don’t seem yourself today.”

“What makes you say that?”

She points. “The dog is drooling on your bed, and not only are you letting him, but you haven’t started yelling.”

My tired eyes travel to Rocky.

And it crashes in on me — all of it. The sadness, the confusion, the hurt. The dueling need to stay and to go. The fear. But mostly just this unnamable ache that’s been lodged in my chest ever since my mom showed up in In Between. I thought it would go away. But it hasn’t.

Pressure builds behind my eyes, and I turn my head and sniff, then cover my mouth and pretend to cough as I choke with tears.

“Katie?”

I shake my head. All I can do is shake my head. There are no words. Hallmark doesn’t make a card that addresses what I’m going through, what I feel.

Millie scoots closer, and I inhale her light perfume as her fragile arms loop around me with strength and pull me to her.

And the floodgates open.

We sit that way for what seems like hours, but could only be minutes as Millie strokes my hair and gently rocks the two of us. She then begins to pray over me, bathing me in her words of love, hope, and encouragement. And though I didn’t think it was possible, understanding.

“And God, we know this is tearing Katie apart. It’s tearing all of us apart.”

I’m soaking Millie’s shirt.

“But we know this is part of your plan, that you are at work here. And though we may not comprehend it now, your plan is unfolding, and you have Katie under your wing.”

I have a Kleenex-box-worth of snot going on right now.

“Though it’s one of the hardest things we’ve ever had to do, this family surrenders Katie to you, God. We know she is cloaked in your protection, and she has the strength and your guidance to see her through.”

I can’t see anything right now; my eyes are filled to the brim.

“God, we love Katie, and know you do too. We pray you continue to grow her faith and reveal yourself to her daily as she returns to her mother.” Millie closes the prayer, then presses a kiss to my forehead. “Love you, kid.”

“I love you too.” More tears.
Aw, stop it, stop it,
stop
it
. Millie and James are taking me out to eat tonight, and I don’t want to hit the town with swollen eyes and a Rudolph nose.

“Sure you don’t want me to help you pack? I know it can’t be easy on your crutches.”

“You mean my sticks of Satan?” Seriously, I hate these things. They’re evil. The doctor said if I had a hard time with crutches, I could get a walker with wheels on it. Um, yeah, even better. Maxine said she had plenty of friends who’d loan me theirs.

I can’t believe I finally get my driver’s license and I can’t even drive! Add that to the list of things unfair in my life.

“I want to pack, Millie.” I just need some alone time in my room, with my things. Decide what to leave, what to take with me.

“Where’s the new suitcase I got you?”

“Um . . . in the closet.” Where you left it a few weeks ago.

“And the packing boxes?”

“Closet.” Millie arches a brow at this. “I’ll get to it tonight when we get back. It shouldn’t take long. I’m mostly just taking my clothes. Mom said she doesn’t have a lot of room in the trailer.” Plus she needs the extra space for her coffee mug collection. Totally not kidding — my
mom collects coffee cups. Mugs and drugs — that’s what Bobbie Ann Parker was into about this time last year.