Cleaning under the refrigerator was just a ruse my mom concocted to get Paul to leave, but I went along with it because I didn’t want to push my luck. I closed the front door and leaned against it, eyes closed. A helium balloon floated in my chest. Soon I would pull out my pin and burst it by thinking through all the reasons I was delusional to wonder if Paul could be interested in me, but not yet. I’d let it float there for a little while, knocking against my ribs.
I opened my eyes and pushed off the door. I found Mom in the dining room, leaning close to the window to see toward the front of the house. “What are you doing?”
“He’s walking north. That’s not the way to his house, is it?” She flattened the side of her face against the glass, keeping tabs on Paul as he walked away.
I knit my brow, considering it. “North, west, these things mean nothing to me. What does it matter where he’s going?”
“Really, Celia. You have to start paying attention to basic directions. How will you ever get your driver’s license?” She pulled away from the window and went to the kitchen, and I followed. “And it matters because I want him long gone before your father gets home. Do you think he’ll stop by again today?”
“Don’t worry about it, Mom. I doubt Paul will be back.” Why would he? I’d absolutely embarrassed myself. Heat rushed to my face, and I tried not to think of all the things I’d said, not to mention that I’d almost cried in front of him. “But why would it matter if he did? Does Dad hate the Martins now, too?”
She scolded me with a glower.
I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from rolling my eyes. “I don’t understand why you’re even worrying about it. Dad won’t be home for hours. Everything’s fine.” He didn’t usually get home until seven or eight in the evening. He got lots of overtime at the plastics factory in the summer.
“This morning he hinted he might be leaving work before lunch.”
I sucked in my lips as nausea rolled through my stomach. I couldn’t think of any good reasons why Dad would come home early.
Mom must have read the worry on my face, because she lifted her apron over her head and hung it on the nail by the back door, and then came over and sat down at the kitchen table. “He’s just owed a little time off, that’s all. Something about not getting too many hours of overtime this pay period. He’s about maxed out.”
I released a breath and sat down in the chair opposite her, trying to settle my stomach. “Well, that’s good, right? That means he got all the hours possible, plus an afternoon off.”
“Yes, and I got all my chores done early today so he can come home to a clean house.”
She was trying to make sure nothing displeased him—doing what she could to ensure he was in a good mood. I sighed. This again. What a waste of time.
We were still raw and unsteady from Dad’s drunken rage two days ago. They hadn’t had such a big fight, or such a physical one, in months. We weren’t sure how it was going to play out. Unfortunately, Dad was the one who determined what happened next, and he was not a predictable person. I hated the way everyone, myself included, flitted around him, wrapping every spoken word in bubble wrap. I glanced at the scratches on my mom’s forearm, scratches my dad put there. They had scabbed over, and she wasn’t hiding them with long sleeves since she was at home and it was too hot of a day to bother.
I still thought reality was going to slam into my dad, and he’d blow up over the fact that someone had called the police again. Fay was the one who called, but my parents didn’t know that, and I didn’t intend to tell them. Mom asked me again this morning if I’d heard who it was. I hoped she would let it go eventually.
Mom stood and wiped imaginary crumbs off the spotless counters, keeping her hands busy. “I can’t seem to sit still, so I’ll go finish the bushes. Will you check and make sure Abe’s room is clean?”
I went down the hall and peeked into my twelve-year-old brother’s room. It was spotless, as always, and devoid of any life. I hated that he felt like he needed to avoid his home, even as I knew it was probably best for him right now. I wouldn’t say it to his face, but I missed him when he was gone.
I went to my room and shut the door, flopping onto my bed. My mind spun. Nothing was the way it had been just three days ago. I had no idea how anything would be three days from now.
Fay was leaving in two weeks. She knew about my parents’ fighting. Esta did, too. And also Malcolm, and with the way information traveled in this town, that meant Paul probably knew too. Which could only mean today had been a pity visit. It wouldn’t surprise me if Malcolm or Fay had sent him to check up on me.
And Ronan was history. I still couldn’t get enough air when I thought about that. Not because I was sad over it, but because if he wasn’t my boyfriend, what did my life look like? What did I do with all those hours? And mostly, who would be out there, thinking of me?
I stared at a fixed spot on my ceiling, a place where the paint was chipped in the shape of a tiny, crooked star. I pressed my finger into the bandage on my palm, eliciting a sting from my blister. My racing thoughts slowed.
I had some things I could count on, some things I did know. Fay loved me, loved my parents, in spite of everything. I had Esta, a best friend for life. I knew the song of the cardinal, and I knew the taste of lemonade from Paul’s cup.
Paul. I pulled out each thing he’d said and tried to remember the exact way he’d said it. He’d sort of said I was beautiful. If he could see into me, though, he wouldn’t think I was beautiful at all. There was too much blackness there, blotting out any loveliness.
Other thoughts pushed their way in. Paul flirted with every girl he saw. I was nothing special to him. I knew it. It was stupid to think about him like this. I squeezed my eyes shut.
The slam of the front door echoed down the hallway. I didn’t even flinch. I used to flinch. I used to either jump out of my skin or shrink down under my blankets. Now I just lay still as a stone, waiting to see what would happen.
My bedroom door flew open, and Abe ran over to stand by my bed. “Guess what!”
“You’re supposed to knock before you enter, that’s what,” I said.
“Sorry.”
“I could have been naked in here, Abe.”
“But you have clothes on.”
I gave him a look. “What is it, then?”
“Dad’s home. He saw me walking back from Jeremy’s house, and he gave me a ride the rest of the way. He says we can go fishing this afternoon!”
I pulled my body up and leaned against my headboard. “Really?”
“Yep. I’m going to change my clothes and start packing up the stuff. Get ready, Celia. Even Mom is coming.” He dashed out of the room, leaving the door wide open.
I got off my bed and went to shut it, chewing on the inside of my lip. How could Abe want to go fishing with him? I was glad Dad wasn’t hurt beyond a few stitches, and the bruise on his forehead—the one Mom applied defending herself with a meat tenderizer—made me sick to my stomach, but the sound of his shouting still echoed in my ears whenever it was quiet. I could still see him towering over Mom as I ran away. I still didn’t know how I had done that. Every time I looked at my dad, I thought about how I had run away and left her there with him.
I had run away, and the mail kept showing up in the mailbox each afternoon, I still had to peel potatoes for dinner, Mom swept the kitchen floor, and Dad was home early from work to take us all fishing.
Tears threatened again. Both he and Mom promised things were going to change. Maybe this time would be different. Maybe what happened had jolted some sense into him. I still stood behind my door, when I heard a soft knock. I opened it a few inches, and peered out to see my dad’s face. It was the face from when I was a little girl. It was the face I saw on Christmas mornings, and when we carried out his birthday cake glowing with candles. It was the face he showed when my uncle visited, and when Abe brought him a garter snake he caught, and when I told him I got a job.
“Get your shoes on, we’re going fishing.” He gave me a wide smile, big enough for me to see the two crooked teeth on the left side of his mouth.
I’d told Fay I was done pretending everything was fine, that I’d finally see things for what they were. I was trying to change, instead of waiting for everyone else around me to do it. But the six-year-old Celia who still lived inside me smiled back at her father, her cheeks a little wobbly. That little girl wanted to take what she could get, when she could get it.
I went to my closet and grabbed my tennis shoes. Dad’s shoulders dropped down and he blinked hard, relief evident in his expression. He never liked it when I was mad at him. He watched as I slipped my shoes on, and I stood up and walked to the doorway. “I’ll pack us lunch to take along,” I said, and he patted me on the arm.
Hope, that dreadful, pointless flame, flickered in my chest. I stomped on the tiny ember until it went clean out. I would not let it burn through me again.