Inside, Hattie is sitting on the couch, telling Dad all about the shower, and I can tell that Mom showing up drunk is barely even a memory for her. That small thing gives me great satisfaction.
“There she is!” says Dad. He stands and gives me a tight hug and a kiss on the cheek. “I’m so lucky you two have each other.”
Hattie watches me carefully. I shake my head discreetly at her to let her know I don’t want to talk about it right now.
She pats the ground in front of her, and I sit down with my legs crossed. She pulls the hairbrush from her purse and gently loosens each one of my tangles. I close my eyes and listen as she rehashes the whole day for Dad.
Outside rain begins to splatter against the tin roof and the wind rattles the windows, but here in this little trailer of ours with my sister and my dad, I’m okay. We’re going to be okay.
The next morning, I call in sick for my paper route. Partly because I feel awful and partly because my bike is still at Freddie’s house. But it’s nice to finally have a day off from work, so missing one paper route is something I’m willing to pull a double for later in the week. Later that afternoon, Freddie drops my bike off and I force Hattie to answer the door while I hide inside.
I watch him through the blinds as he talks to Hattie. He makes a move to come inside, but Hattie says something and shakes her head. The bags under his eyes tell me he slept about as much as I did last night. Just twenty-four hours ago he held me in his arms in Agnes’s bathroom, and now this. I could run out there and make all of this go away, but it would only be a temporary fix.
After he’s gone, Hattie asks, “What’s the deal with you two?”
“We—it didn’t work out. I don’t really want to talk about it.”
She could say she told me so or that there will be others, but instead she only says, “Hey, let me touch up your hair today, okay?”
“Yeah,” I tell her. “That’d be good.”
On Monday, Ruth is waiting for me at the bike racks. “Hattie told us,” she says almost immediately.
I am simultaneously annoyed by how big of a gossip my sister is and grateful that she already broke the news so I don’t have to.
I nod. “There’s not much to talk about.”
Ruthie shrugs. “I don’t even like talking.”
And then I hug her. She hugs me back. Ruth is at least six or seven inches shorter than me, but she always feels bigger than me somehow. In this moment it’s easy to feel protected and safe, like I might actually survive the rest of the school year. In this moment I’m so grateful for her and how little effort is required for us to be friends.
The next night, Tommy cuts me loose a few hours early because work is so slow. At home I find Hattie sitting in my bed with piles of makeup in between her legs as she uses the mirror of an empty compact of foundation to apply a bright, wet-looking hot-pink lipstick.
I drop my backpack on the floor, and she’s startled by the clunk. “Where are you going?”
“Oh!” she says. “You’re here. Good! I need your help!”
“Okay,” I say wearily, and let my body sink down onto the one corner of the bed not covered in makeup.
“I need to take, like, a really good profile picture.”
“For what?”
“Don’t laugh,” she says. “I got a one-month free trial on OtherFishInTheSea.com.”
I feel my brow wrinkle in confusion. “What is that?”
“A dating website!”
“Hattie.” My voice reminds me of my dad’s when he would catch her coming home late during her freshman year. “You’re due in eight weeks.”
She balances herself on my bedside table as she stands. “Exactly. Which is why I’ve gotta get to steppin’.” She pats her belly. “Little baby ZoeRae is gonna need a man figure in her life.”
“ZoeRae?” I ask. Because there is so much she’s said that makes my brain hurt that I can only pick it apart one piece at a time.
“Yeah. You like it?”
I shake my head and laugh, because I have no other option. “No. Not even a little bit,” I tell her. “In fact, I don’t even think I can bring myself to call her that. It sounds like a country singer gone bad.”
She growls a little. “You know, I read online that parents oughta keep the baby name to themselves because friends and relatives have too many opinions and can be plain old hurtful.”
I inhale deeply through my nostrils. “Maybe we can talk about the name later, okay? I don’t mean to be rude, I swear. So what’s all this about a dating website?”
She perks up again. “Yes! I need you to take my picture. The member guide said selfies are discouraged and that you should ask a trusted friend for help with your profile picture.”
I look down at the little cheer shorts she’s squeezed herself into and the shiny red top that is a remnant from Hattie’s former party-girl life. “So do you want to finish getting dressed?” I ask.
She giggles. “I’m already dressed,” she explains. “The picture’s gotta be from boobs up. Remember, like how Auntie Luanne used to only take pictures? Boobs and up! It’s not like I’m going to be pregnant forever.”
“Yeah, but shouldn’t these guys at least know you’re pregnant right now?”
She puts the compact down. “I can see why you’d think that, but I feel like guys would make a bigger deal of it than it is.”
I nod despite myself. “All right. Okay. Let’s do this. It’s already dark, so we might have to take them inside.”
It takes a while and we have to fudge with the lighting some, but eventually we come up with one or two good pictures. I put a frozen pizza in the oven and we turn on a made-for-TV movie about a cheerleader with a crazy mom who decides she wants to kill the girl who is in direct competition with her daughter for captain of the cheer squad.
I help Hattie compose her profile for the dating website. I am fully aware of how foolish all of this is and know that I’m encouraging my sister’s behavior. Nothing good will come of this, I know.
But sometimes it’s easier to play along.