The Sweetness of Salt (13 page)

chapter

27

I could smell the Chinese food as soon as I walked into the house. My stomach growled. I’d been so immersed in Aiden’s pottery lesson that I hadn’t even realized how hungry I was—or how long I’d been gone. By the time I walked back, the sun was low in the sky. Not quite dusk, but still. I’d been gone for hours.

“Jules?” Sophie’s voice came out from one side of the house.

“Yeah, it’s me. Where are you?”

“Living room,” she said.

The living room was completely empty, except for the red and white checked tablecloth Sophie had spread out on the floor. Two stubby-looking candles, their flames soft and flickering, anchored opposite corners, and white cartons of food—some with chopsticks sticking out of the middle—had been placed in the middle.

“Oh, it’s so nice!” I squatted down, crossing my legs in front of me, and reached for a carton. It was filled to the brim with shrimp, snow peas, slivered carrots, and water chestnuts. I pulled a large pink shrimp out with my fingers and stuffed it into my mouth. “Mmmm. Spicy shrimp is my favorite. Thanks!”

“I never knew you liked Chinese food.” Sophie picked up a carton of brown rice and began eating it with chopsticks. “You should’ve said something. Mom and Dad and I would’ve taken you out to a Chinese place for your graduation.”

I shook my head, trying to form words around the wad of food in my mouth. “Mom’s allergic to MSG.”

“She is?” Sophie’s chopsticks paused by her lips. “Since when?”

I shrugged. “Since forever, I guess. I don’t know. We’ve never eaten Chinese at home.”

“Where do you eat it then?”

“Zoe and I get it a lot.”

Sophie sighed softly. “Thank God for Zoe.”

I stopped chewing. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m just glad you have a friend like that,” Sophie said.

“Like what?”

“Like…” I could tell Sophie was backtracking, choosing her words carefully. It made me even angrier.

“Like what?” I said again.

“Why are you getting all bent out of shape here?” Sophie put her chopsticks down. “What’d I say?”

“Nothing. But I can just tell you’re going to say some judgmental thing about how Zoe brings me out of my shell or how pitiful I would be without her.”

“Pitiful?” Sophie repeated. “Julia, the last word I would ever use with you is pitiful. Pitiful is some helpless little thing. An injured rabbit, maybe. Or a bird with a broken wing. Not you. Ever.”

I inhaled tightly through my nostrils. The spiciness of the shrimp had cleared them considerably. “Okay then, what were you going to say?”

“All I meant,” Sophie said, “is that I’m glad you have someone who exposes you to different things.” She leaned forward a little, put her hand on my knee. “I mean, you have to know by now that Mom and Dad have kind of raised you in a bubble all these years. They’ve protected you from a lot of different things.” She shrugged. “I’m just glad Zoe’s there to remind you that life isn’t a bubble. That’s all.”

I plopped the shrimp carton down. “Just because I didn’t know about Maggie doesn’t mean I was raised in a bubble, Sophie. I’ve had a totally normal childhood, just like every other kid out there.”

Sophie cocked her head. “I’m not saying your childhood wasn’t normal. I’m just saying it was the one Mom and Dad planned out for you.”

“Of course they planned it out for me! All parents plan their kids’ lives.” But even as I said it, I could feel something sinking inside.

“Up to a point,” Sophie finished. “You’re eighteen now, Julia. Or you will be, at the end of the summer. And you’re still going along, step by step, exactly by the rule book Mom and Dad made up for you the day you were born. The one that said we couldn’t talk about Maggie. The one that said I was too messed up to fix. The one that said you—under no uncertain terms—had to be perfect.”

I stared at her, realizing suddenly that I was crying, which made me more furious. I brushed my tears away impatiently. “They never said that. They never once used the word ‘perfect’ when it came to me, Sophie. Never.”

Sophie looked at me. Shadows from the candles flickered across her face, illuminating her right eye. It was a light green color, made even paler by the light. “Jules,” she said softly. “After everything that happened with Maggie, and then how screwed up I got…” She shook her head. “I’m not saying it was their fault. But you were all they had left. And they wanted to make damn sure that after the mess with the first two kids, their last kid came out great. Perfect, even.”

“Why do you keep talking about yourself like you’re some kind of freak?” I was pleading with her now, begging her to take it back. Didn’t she know what it did to me that she saw herself as just a screwup? We came from the same parents, had the same blood. If she was a screwup, then what did that make me? “You’re not screwed up. You’re not too messed up to fix.”

Sophie shrugged. “I know what I am,” she said. “And I’m working on it. You, though, you need to figure out who you are. For yourself.”

I shook my head to block out the sound of her voice. This was way too much for me. Figure out who I am? What did that even mean? Was that just some statement to make me feel better? To sidestep the real issues—whatever they were? I couldn’t be sure anymore. I wiped my hands on a napkin and stood up. “You know what? I can’t do this any more. I’m going to bed.”

Sophie stood up too. “Jules, come on. Don’t.”

“You need time for your stuff.” I gritted my teeth. “And I need time for mine. So back off, okay?”

She dropped her eyes.

I left her there, the candles still burning in the empty room, and went upstairs.

I lay in bed for a long time, listening to Sophie move around downstairs, trying not to revisit the things she had said to me. But they were there, rolling around inside my head, hitting and clicking off each other like so many marbles in a game. It was like I could actually feel my life, a large, perfectly stitched leather bag, splitting apart at the seams. Rip. Rip. Rip. Any minute now, everything inside was going to come spilling out until it all lay in a pile at my feet. Then what would I do?

chapter

28

Once, when I was ten, I’d come home from fifth grade with all A’s. The only blip on the screen was a B in gym, which I’d gotten because I couldn’t climb the long, dangling rope hanging from the ceiling. Mom’s face lit up when she saw my report card and then dimmed again as she spied the B. “What happened in gym?” she asked. I told her about the rope. Two days later, Dad installed a thick length of rope from the garage ceiling. Every night after dinner he took me out to the garage and helped me work on my climbing skills. He even started me on a push-up and pull-up routine to improve my upper-body strength.

I rolled over impatiently in bed. Lots of parents did stuff like that, didn’t they?

There was another incident—this one outside of school. I was in eighth grade and had been invited to the movies by a girl named Rachel Terwilliger. She was shy and quiet like me and I was thrilled that she had asked me to go. Mom insisted on picking up Rachel so that she could meet her mother, and then drove us to the movies. We had explicit instructions to call her as soon as the credits started rolling so she could come back for us.

But when the movie was over, Rachel wanted to walk home. I hesitated. I wasn’t allowed to walk anywhere alone after eight p.m. I wouldn’t be alone, Rachel argued. And it was only seven thirty. I gave in quickly, afraid that if I didn’t she would never ask me to hang out again. We laughed and talked all the way back. Rachel’s house came first and I waved good-bye and set off for home. Mom cut me off at the end of our street, swerving the car into the curb so sharply I thought she was going to hit it.

“Get in this car!” she said. “Right now!”

The lecture I received when I got home has yet to be matched, both in intensity and length. Mom and Dad were beside themselves. Didn’t I know, Dad asked over and over again, the things that could happen to me? Out there? Alone? It went on and on. I wasn’t allowed to speak to Rachel and I was grounded for three weeks. They needn’t have bothered. I never walked anywhere alone again—not that year, or all the ones after. Especially after dark.

Parents did that sort of thing too, I thought, shifting again in the bed. Besides, even if they didn’t, Mom and Dad deserved a break. They’d lost one daughter and had all but waved good-bye to Sophie. Of course they would be overly protective with me.

I got up out of bed and walked over to the window. Through the sheer curtain I could make out the lights across the street at Stewart’s. There were still a few trucks parked in front; someone was pumping gas into the back of a pickup. Down a little ways, a boy and girl about my age were sitting on the small stoop in front of Perry’s.

This wasn’t about Mom and Dad, I realized suddenly.

It was about me.

What kind of person had I become after all these years of coddling and sheltering?

And more important, what kind of person might I have become without it?

I walked over to the dresser and took out my phone. My fingers quivered a little as I dialed Milo’s number.

He picked up on the third ring. “Julia?”

“Hi.”

“Are you back?”

“No. That’s why I’m calling, actually. I just wanted to let you know that I’ll probably be here for a while. Maybe even the rest of the summer.”

“Oh.” The disappointment in his voice was palpable. “Wow. I didn’t think you’d really stay that long.”

“I didn’t either,” I said. “I mean, that wasn’t the plan. Everything just sort of changed though, after I got up here. It’s weird, you know?”

“Yeah.”

“Milo? Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“If you didn’t take me to the prom as a favor, then why did you ask me? I mean, was it just because you and Cheryl broke up and you needed someone to go with?”

Milo cleared his throat. “Sort of.”

I bit my lip. “You could’ve gone with anyone. Melissa Binsko, or Carrie James, or even Samantha Evans. Any of them would’ve gone with you.”

“They’re all idiots,” Milo said. “I wouldn’t have had any fun with them.”

“Did you have fun with me?”

“Well, yeah!” He paused. “Did you have fun with me?”

“Yes,” I said softly. “Until…well, you know, the ride home.”

There was a brief silence. “I guess it didn’t ruin everything,” Milo said finally. “I mean, we’re still talking.”

I smiled. “Still?”

Milo laughed softly. “Okay, so maybe we’ve just started talking.”

“I’m glad we’ve started talking,” I said. “It’s kind of funny, really.”

“What is?”

“I mean, you and I have exchanged all of about ten words since you moved here. Most of the time I wasn’t even sure you knew who I was.”

“What are you talking about?” Milo sounded insulted. “I asked you to the prom!”

“I know. But that doesn’t mean you know me.”

Milo paused. “No,” he said slowly. “I guess not. Jules? Will you call me again? Soon?”

“Yes,” I said. “I will.”

chapter

29

Although one of the bedrooms upstairs still needed work, Sophie was intent on getting the front room on the first floor in shape first. It had a rectangular front window and wooden floors. A large chandelier, delicate as a jellyfish, hung suspended from the ceiling. Sophie and Lloyd had already prepped the floors and sanded the walls. She still needed to apply primer and a fresh coat of paint, build and install shelves, and put down some kind of new flooring.

“Here,” she said the next morning, sticking a paint roller in my hand as we walked back from Perry’s. “The primer’s over there. You start on the back wall, and I’ll work on the front.” Breakfast had been a somber event; neither of us had said much or even made eye contact, and Sophie joked around with the weirdos from the Table of Knowledge, which annoyed me and made me feel left out at the same time.

Working inside the house, though, was definitely an improvement from working outside. Not only were we out of the sun’s glare, but a roller proved to be a much easier tool to wield than a scraper. Sophie set up a radio, propping it on four old milk crates in the corner, and cranked the volume.

I made a face as a strange-sounding country song came on, but Sophie started slapping the sides of her legs and singing along.

“I shot a man in Reno,

Just to watch him die…”

“Who
is
that?” I asked.

Sophie stopped swinging her hips from side to side. “Who is that?” she repeated. “You’ve never heard of Johnny Cash?”

“No.”

In response, Sophie walked over to the radio and turned it up even louder. The man’s throaty voice surged within the four walls.

I moved my arm all the way up and then all the way back down again, just like Sophie had showed me. Straight, clean lines. No back and forth. No shortcuts. Lloyd and Walt were probably peering through binoculars over at Perry’s, just so they could tell me tomorrow what I was doing wrong. I wouldn’t put it past them.

Sophie sang every word of the song right to the end, and then turned the radio back down.

“I can’t believe you’ve never heard of Johnny Cash,” she said again, picking up her paintbrush. “The man is a legend. Plus, Dad listens to him all the time.”

“I’ve never heard him in my life,” I said.

Sophie stopped painting. “What’re you talk…?” Her voice drifted off. “Wow, I guess that was back in Milford. He used to listen to country music all the time. Constantly, almost. That’s how I got into it. He played Johnny Cash so much I memorized the whole album.” She scratched her head. “Yeah, now that I think about it, I don’t remember him listening to it at all once we moved to Silver Springs. Not even once.”

I kept painting. More before-and-after information that still didn’t add up.

“So what kind of music do you listen to?” Sophie asked.

I shrugged. “Just stuff on the radio.”

“Like what? Pop? Rock? Classic rock? What?”

“I don’t know. All of it, I guess. Whatever’s playing. I don’t really have a genre of music I listen to.”

There was a pause. Then, “Did you just say
genre
of music?” Sophie had stopped painting and was looking at me from across the room.

“Yeah, so?”

She blinked a few times and then turned back to her wall. “Nothing, I guess. Never mind.”

Now I stopped painting. “No, what is it?”

Sophie shrugged but didn’t turn around. “Sometimes I forget how smart you are.”

“Because I used the word ‘genre’?” I paused. “Don’t you know what that word means?”

Sophie turned around slowly. “Yes, I know what it means. It means a type of something. A specific subset or genus, if you will.”

I was confused. “Well, if you know what it means, then why does my saying it make me the smart one?”

“Because I don’t use that word in everyday conversation,” Sophie said. “You do.”

“Whatever.” I turned back around. “You’re weird.”

“Yeah,” Sophie said. “I am definitely a specific genre of weird.” She laughed. It was the first time I had heard her laugh since I’d arrived. It was a nice sound.

I kept my face to the wall so she didn’t see me smile.

We worked in silence for a while, the only sound the slurp of the rollers against the walls.

“Okay, I have something,” Sophie said quietly about ten minutes later. “About Maggie. You said to just say things when they come, so here it is.”

“Okay.” I could feel my breath catching in the back of my throat. “Go ahead.”

Sophie was still facing her wall, painting with wide, steady strokes. “I don’t know if Dad still does this or not, but back then, he used to go into the office on Saturday mornings.”

“He still does,” I said. “He likes to practice his closing arguments when there’s no one around.”

“Yeah, right,” Sophie said. “Exactly. Okay, so it was a Saturday. Mom wasn’t feeling well or something, and he wanted to let her sleep in. But he had to go into the office. So he bundled Maggie and me up and took us with him.” She turned around finally, gesturing with the paintbrush as she talked. “He got us all set up with paper and pens, and even let me sit at his secretary’s desk so I could play with the phone and pretend I was grown up. I was thrilled. More than thrilled. I just remember being so happy that Dad had given me something that didn’t include Maggie. Something for me. Even if it was just pretend.” She paused, and settled her hand against her hip. “Maggie, though—she was about three at the time—caught on pretty fast that I’d gotten the better end of the deal. She ditched the pen and paper Dad had given her and started bugging me. She was hanging on my legs and whining to get up in the chair and play with the phone.” Sophie shook her head. “I remember being so aggravated. God, she just friggin’ annoyed the hell out of me. Always whining and needing and crying and begging.” She paused. “Fuck.”

I had stopped painting, turning away from the wall to listen. Sophie’s head was low between her shoulders. “You were just a kid,” I offered. “Kids get aggravated by stuff like that.”

“Yeah, but I smacked her.” Sophie said. “
Hard
.” Her voice shook. “Right across the face. Right against her little cheek.” Her lips trembled, and she bit the bottom one with her teeth. “I’ll never forget the look on her face. It was just a split second, right before she started screaming, but it was like everything inside of her sort of crumpled. Like I’d stepped on her or something. Crushed her.” Sophie looked down at the floor. “It was the first time I realized that she really loved me. I mean, to make her crumble like that.”

I didn’t like what Sophie was saying. I listened with one ear as she described Dad charging out of his office, demanding to know what the fighting was all about, and then sequestering both girls on opposite sides of the room. For the first time, I wondered if I really wanted to know what had happened to Maggie all those years ago.

“Were you ever mean to her like that again?” I asked.

“I never hit her again,” Sophie said slowly. “But I could’ve been a lot nicer to her too. There were other times…” She stopped, her voice drifting off. “More times, I mean, when I just acted like a jerk. You know, not playing with her, ignoring her when she tried to get my attention.” She winced, remembering. “God, she was always trying to get my attention. Sophie! Sophie! Sophie!” She turned around suddenly, ashamed, and dipped her brush back into the can of paint.

I watched her arm move up and down the wall with a new kind of force, the muscles in her shoulders straining as she applied another coat of paint to an already finished section.

I turned around then, and did the same thing.