My So-Called Family (8 page)

“Maybe you and Charlie wouldn't match,” I said.

“Maybe,” Mom said.

“Parents don't think about how the things they decide affect their kids' lives forever,” I said.

“Of course I think about you,” Mom said.

“Whatever,” I said, which is one of the words on Mom's list of words she hates. It's not that it's grammatically incorrect, she just thinks it's obnoxious.

“Leah,” Mom said, shaking her head. “There are no guarantees that you would match with someone who was your ‘whole' sibling anyway.”

“But the chances would be better if it wasn't just a half sibling,” I said.

“Yes,” Mom said. “Okay. You're right. Can we end this conversation now?”

“Fine,” I said.

“Bring the garlic bread to the table,” Mom said.

Suddenly I felt like an outsider again, and I wasn't sure I still wanted to have dinner with all of them. I picked up the plate of bread and walked out to the table, thinking that maybe I would just leave it there and continue going up the stairs to my room. “Hey, Leah,” Charlie called. I looked up, and he was sitting in my seat.

“That's my chair,” I said.

“We traded,” Charlie said.

“You can't do that,” I told him. “You can only trade with someone if they agree to a trade.”

“But you weren't eating with us, and I like this seat better,” Charlie said.

Mom came up behind me. “Let him have the seat,” she said. “He likes to be able to see the television from the table.”

“You never let
me
watch television at dinner,” I said. Mom had made a really big deal about dinner when I was younger. It was the time she would ask me about school and tell me about what she was writing. Sometimes she let me play music in the background, but I was never allowed to watch television.

“I guess I've learned to pick my battles in my old age,” Mom said.

“That's not fair,” I said, even though Mom hates when I say that. She says life isn't fair in general. There are a lot of people out there who are much worse off, and we have to be grateful for what we have and work with what we've got. I hate when she gets all philosophical about life being unfair. It's just a way for her to avoid the fact that she's being nicer to Charlie than she is to me.

“Oh, Leah—,” Mom started.

“Forget it,” I said, cutting her off. “I'm not hungry anyway.”

“I really wish you would sit with us,” Mom said. “You know how I feel about family dinners.”

“Right,” I said. “That's why you're letting Charlie watch TV.”

“But it's my favorite show,” Charlie said. He sounded scared, and Mom put down the plate she was carrying and patted his shoulder.

I rolled my eyes. “Here,” I said, thrusting the garlic bread at Mom. I headed up to my room even though I really was hungry. My stomach was even growling a little.

Later that night I lay in bed thinking about everything. It was late and the house was still. I hated fighting with my family. I wished Charlie would wake up again. It's not like I wanted him to have a bad dream or anything, I just didn't want to feel lonely anymore. But kids forget things so easily. I hadn't slept well in over a week, and Charlie didn't have any trouble sleeping anymore, just like nothing had ever happened to wake him up and make him feel scared. I turned over in my bed and stared at the phone on my desk. If it weren't so late, maybe I would have called Samantha again. I couldn't think of anything else to do, and there were so many things to ask her—thirteen years to catch up on. I said her name out loud, “Samantha Holland.” It echoed over and over again in my head. She was my sister, and I didn't even know her middle name. I didn't know if she even had one. Some people don't. Maybe her mom thought middle names were silly. You never really use them anyway. Or maybe she was named after someone, just like I was, so her middle name was important. I wanted to find out. Sometimes I think of things at night and in the morning I can't remember what they were. I rolled out of bed and sat down at my desk to write a list of questions for Samantha, so I wouldn't forget what I wanted to ask her.

A
ll of a sudden it was October. I wasn't grounded anymore, but I still felt different, like all the things that had happened to me had turned me into a different person. Things with my parents were still strange. I looked the same as before, but sometimes I caught them looking at me funny, like they didn't quite recognize me anymore. I wondered how they could tell what I'd been doing, and I worried about what would happen when the credit card bill came and Lyon's Sibling Registry was on the statement.

But mostly things were crazy at our house because Mom's book deadline was getting closer and closer. “This month is so short!” she said to me one day. I had just come home from school with Charlie. He said he was hungry, and even though it was barely four o'clock, I was getting hungry too. I hadn't eaten much all day. Avery and Callie had had some special meal with their Spanish class, so it was just Brenna and me at lunch. Brenna had brought some tofu and brown rice concoction that she wanted me to share, but it tasted strange. I didn't want to hurt Brenna's feelings, so I pushed it around on my plate and tried to make it look like I was eating it. I went in to ask Mom what time Simon would be home and if we could eat dinner early.

“What do you mean, the month is so short?” I asked her. “It's thirty-one days—that's the longest a month can be.”

“February is the shortest month,” Charlie said from behind me. “Sometimes it's twenty-eight days and sometimes it's twenty-nine days, but it's always the shortest.”

“This month
feels
like the shortest,” Mom said. “It feels even shorter than February.”

That night at dinner Mom said she needed us all out of the house as much as possible, even on the weekends, because having us around made it harder for her to work.

“What if we stay home and don't bother you?” Charlie asked.

“Even if you guys were hanging out in another part of the house and didn't talk to me at all, it would distract me,” Mom told him. I knew what she meant. Whenever I'm working on something I don't want to do, I'll make excuses not to do it. Like when I had to study for my math quiz, I kept asking Charlie if he wanted to play Monopoly. “I only have this one little month left,” Mom said. “If you're here, I'll want to be with you instead of writing.” Simon offered to take Charlie and me into Manhattan on Saturday to show us his new office. Charlie loves offices because he gets to make copies of his hands and arms on the Xerox machines. The last time we went to Simon's office, back when we helped Simon clean out his old office in Baltimore, Charlie wanted to make a Xerox copy of his face. I thought it would be kind of cool to see, but Simon said no. The Xerox machine had a really bright light that flashed whenever a copy was made, and Simon was afraid it would hurt Charlie's eyes.

I used to like going to Simon's office too, but suddenly it seemed boring. I really didn't want to help Charlie make Xerox copies of his hands, or smile and shake hands with anyone who happened to be in Simon's office on a Saturday.

“I'm not really in the mood to go to Manhattan,” I told Simon. “Besides, I have plans already.” The part about having plans was true. Avery had invited me to go apple picking with her and Chase. Apparently Chase and Lizzie had made a tradition of going apple picking every fall, but Chase and Lizzie were fighting again so Chase was taking Avery this year. “That way he can pick apples and think about Lizzie and be miserable, instead of sitting at home and thinking about Lizzie and being miserable,” Avery had explained. “You have to come with me, or else I'll be alone with my miserable brother all day.” I knew from the way she said it that she was actually glad that Chase had invited her, but I still wanted to go.

“What kind of plans?” Simon asked.

“Avery asked me if I wanted to go apple picking with her and Chase on Saturday,” I said. “They're going to this orchard upstate. I could bring a bunch of apples home with me.”

“You sure you don't want to come to the office?” Simon asked. “I'd love to show you and Chuck around, and we could go to Serendipity for lunch. They have frozen hot chocolate, you know.”

“Oh, I love that,” Charlie said.

“You've never even had it,” Simon told him. “How do you know?”

“I just know,” Charlie insisted. “That's how.”

“Is that right, Chuck?” Simon said. He leaned over and messed up Charlie's hair. Charlie batted Simon's hand away and combed his hair back down with his fingers. I tried not to think about how he was sitting in my seat.

I turned to Mom. “So,” I said, “can I go with Avery? She said they're leaving around eleven in the morning, and we'd probably be gone most of the day so I wouldn't bother you at all. But we won't be home too late. I mean, I'll definitely be back in Riverdale before nine thirty. Way before nine thirty.” I could feel Simon looking at me from across the table, but I didn't look over at him. I knew Mom would say yes. I had already said that I didn't want to go to the city. If she didn't say yes, I would be home all day on Saturday, and then she wouldn't be able to get all her work done.

“Sure, that's fine,” she said. Simon cleared his throat. I looked over and saw him raise his eyebrows at Mom from across the table, but she didn't seem to notice.

“Thanks, Mom,” I said.

On Saturday morning, just after eleven o'clock, Avery called me from the car and said she and Chase were turning onto our street. “We'll be in front of your house in two minutes,” she said. Simon and Charlie had already left for the city. I ran into Mom's office to say good-bye to her. Actually, it's not really an office. It's just a little alcove off the kitchen, but it's where she put her computer and desk when we moved in, so that's usually where she writes. She had printed out her manuscript so she wouldn't have to read it off the computer screen, since staring at the screen hurts her eyes, and she was bent over her manuscript, one pen behind her ear and another in her hand.

“Mom,” I said. She looked up, but her eyes were kind of glazed over like she was thinking about something else even though she was looking at me. “Avery's here,” I said. “I gotta go.” Mom nodded and waved with the hand that wasn't holding a pen. It was so different from the last time Chase and Avery had picked me up, when Mom practically wanted to carry me out to the car. I was glad Simon was already gone, because he might have decided to walk me out and make sure Avery and Chase knew exactly what time I was supposed to be home.

This time Chase was driving a white sedan. Charlie says he likes white cars best because they're like blank pieces of paper. He says he wants a white car because then he could paint things on it. He hates that our car is dark blue.

“No sports car today?” I asked as I climbed into the backseat.

“Like my dad would ever let me take that,” Chase said. “I can only take that car when he's not around. But at least we have Trixie.”

“That's right,” Avery said. “Good ole Trixie.”

“Is Trixie what you call the car?” I asked.

“No, it's what we call the navigation system,” Avery said. “You program an address in, and then a woman's voice tells you what roads to take to get there.”

“We named her Trixie because her voice is so sexy,” Chase added.

“I don't think her voice is so sexy,” Avery said. “I think she sounds like a frog.”

“Trust me,” Chase said. “It's sexy. Just listen.”

He punched something into a screen on the dashboard. “Right turn in approximately point two miles,” a woman's voice said.

“Her voice is really deep,” I said. “She almost sounds like a man.”

“She does not,” Chase said. “Don't listen to a word they say, Trixie.”

“It sounds like Chase has a new girlfriend already,” Avery said.

Chase rolled his head from side to side so his neck cracked. “Let's make this a Lizzie-free day.”

“I didn't even say Lizzie's name,” Avery protested.

“You just did,” Chase told her. He reached over and pushed a button to turn the radio on.

“Sorry,” Avery said over the music.

We got onto the highway, but this time we were headed north—away from Manhattan. Chase accelerated and I felt myself moving farther and farther away from Mom, Simon, and Charlie. I turned to look out the window and saw a silver Volkswagen Beetle go by. “Punch buggy silver,” I started to say. Then I stopped myself, realizing I was probably too old for that game. When did I get too old to play punch buggy? I turned away from the window and listened to the music.

We were on the highway for over an hour, so I was startled when I heard Trixie say, “Highway exit in point five miles.”

“It's about time,” Avery said.

Trixie lead us off the highway and onto a twisty road with more trees and fewer cars. “It's so pretty,” I said.

“Yeah, but can you imagine living up here?” Avery asked. There are hardly any people around. You'd be so lonely.”

“I guess,” I said.

“I don't know,” Chase said. He was driving slower now because the road was so twisty, and I noticed little walking paths between the trees. “I think it might be nice to have this kind of privacy sometimes. Anyway, you can feel lonely even if you're in Manhattan.”

“But if you're in Manhattan, you could just go outside and meet people,” Avery said. “There are always things to do and people to meet.”

“That's not what I meant,” Chase said.

Suddenly it started to smell. “Oh, gross,” Avery said. “What is that?”

“Skunk,” Chase said. “Haven't you ever smelled one before?”

“No,” Avery said. “But I heard the only way to make the smell go away is to take a bath in tomato juice.”

“I heard that too,” I said. “I've always wondered how they figured that out. Like, who was the first person to take a bath in tomato juice?”

“Maybe a long time ago some tomato farmer was sprayed by a skunk. He took a regular bath to try and wash the smell off but it didn't work, so he went to work on his tomato farm, still stinking from the skunk, and accidentally fell into a pile of tomato juice,” Avery suggested.

“That seems pretty far-fetched,” Chase said.

“Well, how else would you discover something like that?” Avery asked.

“I don't know,” Chase said. “Maybe someone realized that the acid from tomatoes would neutralize the smell or something more scientific like that.”

“Whatever,” Avery said.

“Left turn in point two miles,” Trixie said.

“Thanks, Trixie,” Chase said. He slowed down to make a left turn. “Here we are,” Chase told us.

“You have arrived,” Trixie said.

Chase showed us where to get baskets to collect the apples we'd pick. He took a little map that showed what kinds of apple trees were where and led us into the orchard. “I think the McIntosh apples are straight back,” Chase said. “Those are the ones Mom asked us to get.”

“Is she going to make a pie or something?” I asked.

“What, are you kidding?” Avery said. “I don't think my mom remembers where the kitchen is half the time. Does your mom cook?”

“Sometimes,” I said. “Right now all she does is write her book. She has to get it to her editor by the end of the month.”

“It's so awesome that your mom writes books,” Avery said. “Does she always dedicate them to you and Charlie?”

“No,” I said. “She doesn't believe in dedicating books to her kids.”

“How come?”

“I don't know exactly,” I said. “Something about privacy and not putting our names in print. Besides, she says if she had a regular job in an office, it's not like she would thank her kids every time she gave a presentation.”

“What's she writing about?” Chase asked.

“I'm not supposed to say. She doesn't like talking about her books until after they're done,” I said.

“I wasn't about to steal her ideas,” Chase said.

“It's not that,” I said. “She's just superstitious. Like, if someone besides the family knows what the book is about, then she won't be able to finish it.”

“Oh,” Chase said.

“So, is this the same place you come to every year?” I asked. Chase nodded. I had been trying to change the subject but I realized I had made a mistake and brought up Lizzie.

“Yeah,” Chase said. He shaded his eyes with his hands and looked out toward the McIntosh. I knew he was probably thinking about Lizzie. “It's this way,” he said, walking faster. Avery and I followed him. Chase reached up as he walked and pulled an apple off a low-hanging branch. I watched him rub the apple against his shirt to clean it off, and then he took a bite.

“Do we have to keep track of all the apples we eat so we can pay for them later?” I asked.

“I don't think so,” Avery said. “I think we only pay for the apples we take home with us. They weigh them before we go.”