The Perfect Place (23 page)

“I'm sorry,” I say, my voice muffled by the mouthpiece.

The nurse consults her clipboard. “What triggered this attack?” she asks me.

“Running.”

She looks puzzled. “Why?”

I shake my head. The nurse asks me about my inhaler and how often I use it. “The doctor will be in shortly,” she says before disappearing through the curtain.

I look up at Mom. Her eyes are puffy and red. She reaches over and takes my hand. The doctor comes in then. He's young, white, and blonder than anyone I've ever seen. He looks like he should be a plastic surgeon somewhere with white-sand beaches, not an emergency-room doctor down here in the sticks.

“Dr. Carr,” he says, shaking Mom's free hand. “Treasure,” he says, looking at my chart. “That's a fun name.”

The nebulizer sputters, indicating the treatment is finished. Dr. Carr lifts the mask gently from my face and places it on the table next to me.

“I go by Jeanie.”

“It's a shame to waste such a pretty name,” he says, and smiles, flashing me two rows of perfect square teeth. “It seems that you've suffered what is known as an acute asthma attack.”

Next to me, Tiffany sits up. “What do you mean, ‘cute'? Her lips were blue!”

Now Dr. Carr blinds Tiffany with his smile. “A-cute. It means really, really bad. Now, it seems the breathing treatment was effective, but we're still going to send you home with five days' worth of oral medication. Steroids. Nurse Packer will give you the first dose here, and for the next four nights, you will take a decreasing dose at home, until all the medication is finished. Understood?”

At home? Where's that?

We all nod.

“Good.” He folds up my paperwork. “You take care now, Treasure,” the doctor says, and then he is gone.

I turn to Mom. “Did that lady say she knew where Dad went?” I ask.

“No. Your father has no intention of being found,” Mom replies bitterly.

I wait for the weight of the truth to sink in: Dad really is running away from us. It stings, though not as much as I would've thought. Maybe I knew it all along. Maybe we all did.

“I almost forgot,” Mom says, sitting up suddenly. “I bought this for you on the road.” She reaches into the small leather backpack she sometimes uses as a purse and pulls out a pocket dictionary. She hands it to me. “It's not all fancy and leather-bound like your dad's, but—”

“I can carry words with me everywhere. It's perfect.” I run my hands over the dictionary's cover. “So now what?” I ask.

Mom looks away. “Grace's,” she says, and then quickly adds, “I'm sorry. We have nowhere else to go. I already called her.”

I smile big, and so does Tiffany.

“Did I miss something?” Mom asks, just as the nurse returns with my medication and discharge papers. Mom helps me put my shorts and T-shirt back on, and then it's time for us to drive back to Auntie's. We've never gone back to a place before. I never knew it would feel so good.

Mom drives without the radio on, leaning against the door. I think about Dad's letter.
I'm sorry. I love you all.
My father knows tens of thousands of words, and for us he had only six.

“Where do you think he went?” Tiffany asks. She is stretched out in the back seat with Mr. Teddy Daniels.

“I don't know,” Mom says in a flat voice. She lets the window down. A sweet, humid breeze sweeps through the car.

“Do you think we'll ever see him again?” Tiffany asks.

“Would we want to?” Mom replies.

Tiffany takes a long time to answer. “I don't know,” she says at last, and she goes quiet after that.

I lean back in my seat, close my eyes, and picture it one last time. That perfect place I've been dreaming of since Dad left, the one he promised us he'd find. I see it like it's real, the sky-blue walls, sunlight pooled on the floors like melted butter, and the four of us together in it. I let the image dance before my eyes, and when the next breeze swoops through the car, I open my hands and let it go.

 

It's dark by the time Mom pulls onto Auntie's lawn. Auntie stands there, bathed in the glow of her porch light, and I wonder if she's been waiting in that spot since Mom called her from the hospital hours ago. She opens her front door and lets us in with all of our baggage. We collapse on her couch, worn out and, in my case, drugged up.

“I let y'all out of my sight for a minute and you're callin' me from the dang hospital.” Auntie shakes her head.

She sits down in her brown armchair across from us. “I reckon now that you're back, we should get Miss Jaguar down to Goodies to start cleanin' shelves. What do you say to tomorrow?”

“Who's Miss Jaguar?” Mom asks.

We fill her all the way in, and by the time we come to the end of the story and Auntie's blank security tape, Mom is laughing so hard she's crying. I try to remember the last time she really laughed—the last time she threw her head back and opened her mouth so wide I could see her silver fillings—but I can't. Her laugh isn't pretty. It's half hiccup, half cackle, and it's the most beautiful sound I've ever heard.

We sit together in Auntie's living room until well after midnight, talking and laughing until Mom says, “I guess we'll stay here for a bit. Do you mind the extra company, Grace?”

“Not at all, but you'll be bunkin' in here with Mr. Shuffle, and y'all better follow my rules.”

Tiffany and I groan.

“And you'll be needin' a job, Miss Lisa,” Auntie says. Mom nods. “You can work in my store. Lord knows I'm gettin' too old to run that place by myself.”

“Ohhhh. Okay,” Mom says slowly.

“You can't handle the register,” Tiffany tells her. “That's my job.”

“You can supervise Jaguar with Treasure,” Auntie says. “I reckon that'll be a hoot and a half.”

I open my mouth to remind her that I'm going by Jeanie now, but I snap it shut. Maybe it's not so bad to go by Treasure again. Nestled on the couch between Mom and Tiffany, I look around Auntie's living room, with its clutter and junk and old, grimy figurines. Mr. Shuffle waddles in and joins Auntie in the armchair.

This is nothing like the perfect place I imagined we'd live in with Dad. Not at all. Auntie catches my eye and smiles.

It's better.

 

T
ERESA
H
ARRIS
earned her bachelor's degree in English from Columbia University and an MFA in Writing for Children from the Vermont College of Fine Arts, where she won numerous awards. She has worked with books for young people in several capacities—as an author, as a librarian, and on the editorial side at a publishing house. Now, Teresa is a sixth-grade English teacher. She was born and raised in Teaneck, New Jersey, where she still resides and which she considers the perfect place. This is her first book for Clarion.