The Lit Report (18 page)

Gary? Who was Gary, and why was my mom blushing? I was speechless, and believe me, that doesn't happen very often. A career change is one thing, but a lawyer boyfriend? Maybe Texas wasn't such a bad idea.

“Julia?” my mom said. “Say something, honey. I know it's a bit of a shock, but I'm not getting any younger. And let's face it, I probably already know more law than most of the lawyers in my firm.” She laughed and got up from the table, kissing the top of my head on her way to the living room.

I sat for a few minutes and tried to digest everything she'd told me: new career, possibly a new boyfriend—Mom was getting on with her life. So were Jonah and Ruth and Dad and Miki. I sat down beside her on the couch and laid my head on her shoulder.

“So, this Gary guy—is he hot?” I said.

All this happened, more or less.

—Kurt Vonnegut,
Slaughterhouse-Five

I didn't scribble an outline in crayon on some wallpaper before I started writing this book, as Vonnegut says he did. I didn't actually write an outline at all. I just sat down and wrote. As you've probably noticed, there are no aliens (unless you count Ruth's parents) in my book, and the only wars I've ever witnessed are domestic ones, which don't have quite the narrative punch of the firebombing of Dresden. Even so, when I was writing I often felt like Billy Pilgrim, Vonnegut's hero, looping around in time, dropping in on my own life. Nobody can top Vonnegut when it comes to mixing up tragedy, fantasy, memoir and comedy. He makes it all seem perfectly reasonable. Which it is. Nobody's life is all one way—tragic, comic, fantastic—it's all just a big spicy jambalaya of absurdity, even without visitors from the planet Tralfamadore.

My mom and I both went back to school the week after she told me about Gary. It feels weird, being at school without Ruth, as if I'd forgotten one of my legs at home. Very destabilizing. We've been going to the first day of school together forever, clutching new
HB
pencils and pristine notebooks, our hair held in place by matching Strawberry Shortcake barrettes. I'm in a new homeroom, with Stewart sitting to my right and Brandy right behind him. Marshall's in another classroom, which is just as well. Over the summer, Stewart and Brandy hooked up, and Dino and Jerry are no more. Marshall's pretty pissed. He's even dropped out of the Classics Club, so we let Mark Grange join. Turns out he's a total movie freak. He even has this thing that he calls Hollywood 9-1-1, which is a list of 555 phone numbers from movies and television shows. So you can call, say, Mr. Burns from
The Simpsons
or the Christian Broadcasting Channel from
South Park
.

For the first couple of weeks of school I answered so many questions about Ruth and Jane that I thought my head was going to explode. I finally did up a
FAQ
sheet and handed it out to anyone who approached me with a question.
Who's the father?
was the question on most girls' glossy lips; a lot of guys asked,
What does it feel like to have your hand up your best friend's, uh, you know?
Neither concern was addressed on my
FAQ
sheet. A simple
Mind your own effing business
sufficed. Then Ruth brought Jane to school
one afternoon. She was immediately surrounded by a gaggle of cooing girls (including that bitch Rachel Greaves, who had started the rumor about the steak-knife caeserean), and a bunch of guys who muttered things like
Look at her tits
and
She's hot, man
, as they gave each other high fives. Rick Greenway was nowhere to be seen. After Ruth's visit my celebrity status decreased dramatically, especially when a rumor started going around about the home ec teacher's passionate affair with a German shepherd. It turned out she'd fallen in love with a man of German descent who owns a sheep farm in New Zealand, but even so, I wasn't in the spotlight anymore, which suited me fine.

“SO, IS RUTH
, like, Boone's live-in nanny now?” Mark asked me as we were walking over to my dad's house after school one day. Mark came over a lot. He was a genius with the babies when he could drag himself away from staring at Ruth's boobs. When Mark was around, everybody laughed a lot, especially Miki. He was like a long-lost second cousin from a branch of the family that had been disowned because of unwise marriages to unreliable Spaniards. Not that Maria was unreliable—quite the opposite. Mark's dad, whereabouts unknown, was definitely the unreliable one.

“Yup,” I replied. “That's the deal. She helps Miki with Boone and she gets free room and board. And get
this—Miki's homeschooling her. And she's getting good grades. Better than she ever did at school.”

“Wow. That means she'll graduate at the same time as you, right?”

“I guess so. I'm hoping the school will let her come to our grad, but you know what tight-asses they can be.”

“Yeah. I can't wait to get out of there.”

“What are you going to do after you graduate?” I asked him. Mark was smart, straight-A smart. He could go to any university he wanted to, probably with a full scholarship. So could I, for that matter, if only I could decide where I wanted to go and what I wanted to do. I wasn't used to feeling so indecisive. The grand plan was undergoing a serious renovation. Who knew what would be left standing.

“Not sure yet. My mom wants me to be a doctor.” He rolled his eyes. “It's such a cliché—my son the doctor.”

I laughed. “Everyone thinks I should be a doctor too, but I don't know. I'm thinking midwife school. But don't tell anyone. I might still want to do creative writing. Or run a bookstore.”

“My mom could help you with the midwife thing,” Mark said.

“I know,” I said. “But I'm not ready to commit to anything. It's all anyone wants to talk about. The school counselor, my parents, kids at school. Everyone acts like it's make or break in grade twelve. One wrong decision and
you're wearing a dorky hat and asking ‘Do you want fries with that?' for the rest of your life.”

“I know,” Mark said glumly. “I'm getting it already and I'm only in grade eleven.”

We walked in silence for a few minutes. Just as we turned in to my dad's driveway, Mark asked, “Does your dad like his job?”

“Are you nuts? He looooves it,” I said. “He used to be an
ER
nurse, but he burned out so he went back to school and took courses in neonatal nursing. He says it's the best thing he ever did. Career-wise, anyway. Why?”

“Just curious,” Mark said as we walked in the front door.

When we got inside, Ruth greeted us wearing a red T-shirt emblazoned with the words
Get a Taste of Religion— Lick a Witch
.

“Like it?” she asked. “Miki gave it to me.”

“Awesome,” Mark said. “Where are the little dudes?”

“Sleeping in the playpen in the living room, so we gotta be quiet. And Jane's not a dude,” said Ruth. “Miki's napping. Man, that chick sleeps a lot. Guess middle-aged motherhood has its downside.”

She cackled softly and led us into the kitchen, where a huge cardboard box sat on the kitchen table.

“What's in the box?” I asked.

“I'm not sure. It was on the doorstep this morning when Miki went to get the paper,” she said. “The box is
from
www.christislord.com
, so I guess it's from my folks. It's probably all the junk from my old room. Installation One.” She grimaced and absentmindedly massaged her right breast. Mark blushed, but he didn't look away. “I'm debating whether to unpack it or just store it and give it to Jane when she's older. What do you think?”

“Store,” I said. “Definitely store.”

“Open,” Mark said.

“Thanks, guys. You're a lot of help.”

I glared at Mark. “You don't know her parents. They probably burnt her stuff and shoveled the ashes into a box and pissed on it.”

“Or maybe not,” Mark said. “Maybe it's a...you know... peace offering.

I snorted and raised an eyebrow at Ruth. She shrugged and picked up a knife off the counter and started hacking at the packing tape. As she lifted the flaps of the box, I could see an envelope sitting on top of what looked like a blanket. Ruth lifted the letter out as if she expected it to explode. Letter-bombing your own daughter. That would be harsh even for Pastor Pete.

Her hands trembled as she tore the envelope open; it only took her a minute to read the enclosed letter. Whatever it said made her eyes fill with tears. She handed me the letter as she reached into the box and pulled out the blanket, which was pink and fluffy. “Read it,” she said as she buried
her face in the blanket. “Aloud.” She was sobbing now, her shoulders heaving. Mark rubbed her back while I read the letter.

My dear Ruth
,

      Your father does not want me to contact you. He took everything out of your room and he was going to burn it but I managed to pack it up while he was at the Wednesday night prayer and pizza group. I have included some of your baby clothes and the baby blanket I crocheted when you were born. I think of you every day and I pray that you and Jane are well. I also pray that someday you will be able to forgive me. Then I will be able to forgive myself. Miracles can happen, you know
.

In Jesus' blessed name,
Mom

“You were both right,” Ruth said. “It's an almost-burnt offering.” She giggled and put the blanket aside to rummage around in the box. Everything was packed carefully, lovingly even, between layers of pink tissue paper. All the baby clothes were pink, which made Ruth wince and laugh. “Now you know why I hate pink,” she said as she held up a pair of OshKosh overalls. “But these are pretty darn cute, don't you think?”

“Not as cute as these,” I said, unearthing a pair of tiny pink patent leather Mary Janes.

“What's up with this?” Mark asked. He was dangling the lacy orange thong from his index finger. Ruth grabbed it away from him and threw it back into the box.

“Wouldn't you like to know,” she said. “It was another life, right, Julia?”

I nodded as she sealed the box and wrote on the side in black felt pen
Installation One: Childhood
. “I've already started
Installation Two
,” she said. “Wanna see it? It's called
Motherhood
and it's gonna be wicked. Way better than number one.”

She dragged us upstairs to her room, which was twice as big as her room at Pete and Peggy's. Big bay windows looked out over the backyard; Jane's crib was tucked into the bay, and the wall opposite the queen-size bed was covered by a giant corkboard. Stuck to the corkboard were a cord clamp, a photo of Ruth holding Boone and Jane, a letter from Jonah, a picture of Jonah in his white chef‘s outfit, a picture of Miki and Dad with Boone, a picture of my mom taken at my twelfth birthday (I could tell from the candles on the cake she was holding), two Ziploc bags—one holding microscopically small nail clippings, one containing wisps of hair—and a picture of me that was “framed” with feathers, glitter, a LifeSavers necklace and a red ribbon rosette that said
World Champion Best Friend
in gold script.

“Your dad put up the corkboard for me,” she said as she stuck her mother's letter onto the board with a safety pin. “That way I won't ruin the walls. It's just a start, but it's pretty cool, huh?”

“Very cool,” I said. The three of us sprawled on the bed and gazed at the wall in silence. I might have fallen asleep, but the babies started to whimper and Mark was up like a shot.

“I'll heat Boone's bottle,” he said as he went out the door.

“Feeding time on the farm,” Ruth sighed as she sat up. “You coming?”

“Is it okay if I stay up here for a bit?” I asked. “I'm kinda tired and you and Mark have the babies covered.”

“Mark just wants to stare at my boobs,” Ruth said, “but that's okay. No one else is gonna look at them for a while. Wanna go for a walk later?”

“Sure,” I said. “I won't be long.”

After she left, I got up and looked more closely at Installation Two. I reread Peggy's letter. I'd been wrong to tell Ruth not to open it, but then, she's used to me playing it safe. She always does what she wants, no matter what I say. I should be used to it by now. I'd been wrong about so many things in the last year, though. Wrong about Ruth, whom I never thought would take motherhood seriously. Wrong about my mom, who isn't naïve or ignorant or stupid.
Wrong about Miki, who finds motherhood way more challenging than med school. Wrong about my parents' relationship. I was even wrong about Peggy, I guess, although I still think we'll be doing double axels in hell before she breaks away from Pete. I'm not going to say that to Ruth, though.

I still don't think teenagers should be mothers. I really don't. Ruth just happens to be an exception to that rule. For a start, most teen moms don't get taken in by a singing nurse and a baby doctor who insists that homeschooling be taken very seriously. Most teen moms don't have a brother who phones every night, names cakes after his niece and looks yummy in a hat shaped like a giant mushroom. Most teen moms don't have friends like me and Mark and Brandy, who will babysit at the drop of a hat. I know that there are times when Ruth is tired and discouraged and fed up with endless diaper changing and vegetable pureeing, but it's not in her nature to brood about it. She's more likely to whip up a smoothie with leftover mashed bananas and call me up and beg me to come over and play
Pictionary
or watch crap
TV
. She always turns the
TV
off when the babies are in the room, though, even if we're in the middle of
Top Model
. No
TV
for the babies. That's one of Ruth's rules. She has almost as many rules as I used to have lists. It's like living in a parallel universe. A much happier parallel universe.