Chapter Fifteen
Jason and I bolted into the living room to see Barb looking like an enraged clown with her orange hair, purple power-suit, and reddening face. Dad stood right behind her carrying giant suitcases and wearing his concerned frown.
I stopped too abruptly, my swinging leg creating momentum but my crutches creating drag. Jason caught me before I face-planted.
I could see how the house must look through our parents’ eyes. Blaring music. The rest of the pizza mess still covering the dining table. Piles of gold jumpsuits, fifty glitter-paper stars, and bottles of fabric glue strewn across the entire dining room and living room area. The couches, coffee table, and end tables overflowing with our bags, books, and snack remnants.
Barb’s nostrils flared. “Craig Jordan Kowalski, I thought I could trust you. There’s no excuse for trashing my house and having parties without permission.”
He stood up to his full height. “What are you even talking about? This isn’t a party. We’re working on a project. Also, you didn’t ask my opinion when you decided to abandon me in this house and barely come back, did you?”
Barb recoiled, then recovered. “No excuses. This is unacceptable. Unacceptable!”
“In case you haven’t noticed, there are some intense things that have been going on in our lives, mostly—um, wait, let me think—oh yeah: Ellie having cancer. And what have you two been doing for her? Nothing. Lounging by the ocean while she fears for her life.” Craig’s voice cracked. “We’re all just here, hanging out, trying to get through this together.”
My eyes and nose prickled.
“Don’t speak to your mother that way, son,” Dad said.
“You don’t tell me what to do, and don’t call me son. How can you stand yourself? You’ve barely even checked in on her. You haven’t shown up.”
Dad’s face tensed. Instinctively, I almost defended him, but then I realized I had nothing to say. It was true. He didn’t come home early, because it was inconvenient. Barb and Dad hadn’t even come back every weekend from Wisconsin like they’d promised.
“Can we talk about this outside, Mother?” Craig asked, pulling out a low but scathing tone on the word “mother.” Barb marched past him, heading through the kitchen toward the backyard.
I tried to get a gauge on my dad. He hated conflict. Through a tense jaw he said, “You two are out of line to be inviting this many guests over without asking, and to speak to Barb that way—”
No way. I was having none of that. My crutches stabbed the floor with each step back to the kitchen. Through the large window to the backyard, I saw Barb and Craig, and I gathered from their wild gesturing that their conversation wasn’t going well, either.
We cleaned up in speedy silence—me ignoring Dad when he tried to speak to me again—gathered all our stuff, and walked out to the driveway.
“We need to talk some more. Call me later?” Jason asked. I nodded. I craved for him to hug me, but he gave me the quickest kiss on the cheek and headed to his car to wait for Owen, who was finishing up a drawn-out good-bye with Quinn.
Hana huffed up to my side, crossing her arms and narrowing her eyelids at the house. “I’d tell that Barb off if it would help.”
“I’d torpedo kick her to the moon if it would help. My dad, too.” I couldn’t believe him. “Maybe I should ask if a bionic leg is an option? That would be handy right now.”
“Now you’re talking,” Hana said as we walked over to Quinn’s car. When she finished her good-bye with Owen, she got in the car and pulled out of the driveway fast, in a fleeing-the-scene-of-a-crime way.
“I feel for Craig,” I said. “How did he turn out so well with her for a mom?”
“Do you think he’ll be okay?” Hana asked. “He always seemed tough, but the more I get to know him, he’s pretty sensitive, huh?”
“He really is.” I nodded.
Quinn poked Hana on the thigh. “I think he just needs some lurrrvin’ from you. It’ll make everything better.”
Hana shoved her and, flustered, turned again to where I sat in the back. “I don’t want to talk about this. Too weird.”
“You know I’m happy for you two,” I said. “So, talk away. Especially because I’m looking forward to the height-challenges of your relationship.”
Quinn laughed.
“Shut up, you guys.” Hana glared at me and slapped Quinn on the leg.
Quinn dropped Hana and me off at our adjacent apartment complexes, and we said our good-byes.
When I got inside, Mom was in her bedroom with the light on. “I’m home,” I said in passing, heading straight to my room and flopping down on my bed, though I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep.
I pushed the heels of my hands against my eyes to stop the images of me breaking the news to Jason in the kitchen when Barb started screaming her orangutan face off.
Mom knocked on my door. “Sweetie, your dad’s here to see you.” I widened my eyes and shook my head at her, but she wasn’t going to have it and widened her eyes right back at me, a look that made it clear I had to go see him.
Dad was standing in the living room, and I peered around suspiciously for Barb, but she wasn’t there. I wondered if she and Craig were still at it, or if she was waiting, or rather, fuming, in the car. Dad’s face was constricted. I glared at him.
“Craig is right,” he said.
I narrowed my glare even more. “What do you mean by that?”
“Back at the house, I was getting to it, but I should have said that first. Craig is right. I haven’t been there for you, and I’m sorry.”
My eyes welled up. Those were the words I hadn’t known I needed to hear so badly. I took a deep breath and tried my best to suppress any tears. After Barb’s freak-out, the way he and Barb had abandoned Craig, and him not coming to see me sooner, I wasn’t going to just let it go. That was some pretty unforgiveable stuff.
Mom gestured to the couch. “I’ll give you two some time.” Dad and I shuffled over silently and sat down as she retreated to her room.
There was a long pause before Dad said, “I’m also sorry for what happened earlier at the house. Barb is, too.”
I nodded.
“You look great, by the way. I’d never suspect you were a cancer patient.” He tried to sound upbeat, but the tear that escaped gave him away. My father never cried. Did he actually care? Then why the silence over the past weeks? I was pretty sure cell phones worked in Hawaii.
He rubbed his face and said, “I have a lot of excuses, none of them acceptable. All to do with my own inability to deal with these emotions.” A second tear dropped. “Remember that time when you were choking on a string of pizza cheese at your birthday party, and I pulled it out of your throat?
“Or that time you skidded out into the street on your bike, and I reacted in an instant and picked up you and the bike and all before you got hit? This time…” His shoulders drooped. “This…I don’t know. I was in shock. And I didn’t handle it the right way. I didn’t handle it at all. I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you from this.”
He hugged me tightly, and my chin trembled against his shoulder. I wished he could save me from this, too.
We ended up talking for over an hour. He told me how it had been a stressful time for him and Barb with the move and job transitions. How he missed me. How he had regrets about the timing of their move, but how the slower pace of life in Wisconsin was a welcomed change.
I filled him in on the tumor stuff and told him about some of my favorite moments of our Spontaneous Combustion shows, trying my best not to directly point out he’d missed my performances.
It was getting late when Dad stood up. “I should get back to Craig and Barb. We’ve got some things to work out, too.” He cleared his throat. “I know I haven’t handled things well between us, Ellie-bee. I’m going to do better.” He looked me in the eyes but stayed quiet. I nodded and waited until I understood he was done with his big speech. We hugged good-bye, and I closed the door behind him, feeling at least a little better about us.
Jason on the other hand… My stomach coiled at the thought of telling him the details. I took out my phone and saw I had a missed call and a text from him.
This was something I had to do in person. I needed to see his face to know how he really felt. I texted back.
Hey, sorry. Just got done talking with my dad for forever. Emotions are hard. Sorry Barb’s wrath cut us off. I’m about to fall over from exhaustion. Can we talk tomorrow? Your house sometime after school?
He texted right back,
Anytime. Glad you and your dad got to talk.
Thanks.
I watched the bubble of dots as he typed more, picking at the cuticle of my thumb in anticipation.
Ellie, I’m so sorry it’s cancer. I wish I could take your cancer, put it in a beach bag…and throw it into a fiery volcano.
:) I’ll research that option, I texted back.
For real, I’m sorry, and I’m here. Talk tomorrow.
How was he so nice? Especially when he’d so recently lost his mom. Maybe that was it—he was trained in all the things you say and don’t say when someone drops the C-bomb. He knew what to say to me. What he really thought was probably “Run away.”
You’re the sweetest, Jason. Goodnight.
Goodnight.
Despite feeling like I’d been up for eighty hours, I slept fitfully with nightmares of volcanic tumors exploding and killing everyone around me, of Jason being carried away in a lava flow, and me, arms outstretched, unable to save him.