The Summer Kitchen (19 page)

It was cool right up until Opal finished her book for the second time, and those kids got bored and the middle one—I’d figured out his name was Ronnie from listening to his sister saying
Sit still, Ronnie
—saw the cereal bag on the table.

“I-unt-some.” Ronnie had a weird way of talking that made him sound like he had a wad of gum in his mouth. His teeth stuck out in front so that his lips didn’t close all the way, which might of been why.

The littler one caught sight of the cereal then, and he was off the sofa lickety-split. He scaled a chair, knocked it over, and was hanging off the table when I caught up to him and grabbed a big wad of his T-shirt. “No!” I hollered.

“Let go my li’l brother!” the girl—Angel, I’d figured out her name was—said, but she didn’t get off the sofa, because Opal was about to give her a turn with the book.

“Tell him to leave the food alone then.” I didn’t like that girl. She was only a punky second or third grader, but she acted like the queen of the world.

“He’s just hon-gry. He didn’t have no breakfast,” she said, then she flipped a hand at him. “Ged down, Boo.”

Boo didn’t listen very well. He kept trying to squiggle onto the table and get the cereal.

“I’m hon-gree,” Ronnie said, and instead of looking at the book, he sat there staring at me. He had big brown eyes with long, long lashes, and round chubby cheeks that would have been cute on a teddy bear—without the stick-out teeth, anyway.

Of all things, I thought of the lady with the three dollars in Wal-Mart, and the big circle in my dream, and the Jesus hands and the dots of strawberry-colored blood. Down there at Jesus’s feet, at the bottom of the next window over, there were all these kids—little kids and big kids, black kids and white kids, Mexican kids and Chinese kids, standing in a circle like the people in my dream.

“Oh, flip,” I said, and thought,
Cass Sally Blue, you have lost your mind. Yesterday it was the free sandwiches, and now they want the cereal that was supposed to last three more days. Next thing, they’ll be drivin’ off in Rusty’s truck.
I lifted Boo off the table and set him down, then grabbed the bag. “Easy come, easy go,” I said. The cereal was free, after all.

I unfolded three napkins and laid them out, then put two big handfuls of cereal on each one. By the time I finished, all three kids were standing at the table, watching. After I’d folded up the napkins, I handed one to each of them. “Here,” I said, “but you guys better go, okay? Your mom might wonder where you’re at.” Not likely, but I figured if they stayed any longer,
all
the cereal would be gone.

Even though it was hard to see those handfuls of cereal going out the door with them, I felt good—like I did last night in my dream, when all the people were walking in the same circle, reaching across to each other. Ronnie and Boo looked happy, and the girl, Angel, kind of almost smiled.

Once they got down the steps, they took off. I think they headed around back somewhere to eat, because I didn’t hear them outside. Later on, me and Opal went out and sat on the steps. The kids from next door came back, and they had a little Mexican girl with them. They wanted sandwiches, and I told them I didn’t have any—that a lady in a car brought them yesterday. They hung around anyway, and we all sat there together looking out at the road and hoping the sandwich lady would come back today.

Chapter 11

SandraKaye

In the morning when I woke up, I heard Christopher down the hall as I rolled over and looked at the clock. After nine thirty? He was an hour late for school.

I’d gotten up and started toward Chris’s room before I remembered the accident and its aftermath. Rob had chosen to sleep on the sofa downstairs again, and I hadn’t argued. No doubt, he was already gone this morning—up and quietly out of the house, no time for the cup of coffee we used to share before the boys awakened. Lately, it seemed so much easier this way.

The door was ajar, and Chris was just pulling a shirt over the slim, straight waist that had led more than once to embarrassing low-rider moments with soccer and basketball shorts. Jake had some shape, but with Chris, clothes hung like samples on a wire rack. He was all bones and sinew, like a marionette slowly metamorphosing into a new creation. Still growing. Still becoming real.

“Hey,” he said when he saw me there. “I’ve gotta get to school. Finals review today. Can you drive me?” The last sentence was clearly painful. It’s never fun to be driven to school by your mom, at sixteen.

“Sure. Let me slip on some clothes. Why didn’t you wake me earlier? You’re late.”

Slinging his backpack over his shoulder, he crossed the room, then looked in the mirror, checked his hair, and brushed it down to hide the cut on his forehead. “Forgot to set the alarm. I fell asleep studying last night.” He stopped the sentence short. I had a feeling he’d been about to say something else, but Chris was so much like me, an emotional cotton ball. His response to conflict was to take it in, pad it as much as possible, wrap it up, silence it, and quietly tuck it away. “Is Dad here?”

Chris’s need to sleep late suddenly made sense. He’d been making sure the coast was clear before coming downstairs. “Dad’s at work, I’m sure.”

“Good.” A look of relief flashed in the mirror.

“Christopher,” I admonished. “That’s not fair. Your dad has a right to be upset. He’s worried about you.”

Chris’s lip curled on one side. “Yeah, right. He doesn’t even listen. He just yells. He thinks we should be perfect.” Turning away from the mirror, he blinked hard and pretended to be busy cramming study sheets into a textbook.

It was hard to argue with him. Rob did maintain an idealized version of the boys in his mind. He pushed them hard, wanted them to be successful at whatever they did—sports, academics, hobbies. I’d convinced myself that since those things were intended to build the boys up, to broaden their possibilities in life, it was okay, but maybe the reality was that pressure to perform, even when it’s directed toward beneficial activities, is still pressure. Maybe Rob had pushed too hard, and maybe I’d let him. Maybe I’d wanted the boys to be perfect, too—a sort of living proof that despite my mother’s predictions for me, I had succeeded in this one, very important area. I had created a normal, healthy family, made a home that was calm, and happy, and steady. I’d achieved something my mother never could. I’d put an end to the family curse.

“Christopher, your father loves you.”

A sardonic puff of air passed Chris’s lips. “He doesn’t even know me.” He zipped up his backpack with quick, impatient movements.

Anything I said next would have seemed ludicrous and manufactured, so I left off the conversation. “Let me get dressed, and I’ll drive you to school.”

“Thanks,” he answered, then began looking for something. Considering the layer of clothes, schoolwork, and electronic devices on the floor, he wasn’t likely to find it. Finally, he gave up and finished tucking pencils and a calculator into his bag. “Is the cleaning lady coming today?” It was an off-the-wall question.

“Not until next Monday, why?”

He shrugged. “No reason.”

I turned and headed down the hall, thinking that if I was still working at Poppy’s next Monday, I’d have to leave the key out for the cleaning service.

Chris was waiting in my car when I came downstairs. I was halfway around the vehicle before I realized that he hadn’t gotten behind the wheel. Perhaps he thought I wouldn’t let him. I slid in on the driver’s side and backed out of the garage as if it were normal for me to drive him.

“I’ll see what I can find out today,” I said as we headed down the street. “About the accident.”

“Okay,” he answered, his gaze fixed out the window, his knee jittering by the door, his body ready for a quick exit the minute we rolled to a stop. “Dad’s probably right.” His voice was heavy with defeat.

“Holly was the one who was there.” I wanted to grab Christopher and shake him, tell him not to accept the role of family screwup just because it was an open slot. Jake was the superachiever, the perfect kid, the one we’d chosen from a handful of pictures. Christopher was the one who couldn’t quite measure up, the one who’d been born too early, underweight and pale, a little behind in development, with a lisp that made him cute and funny when he was little, but that Rob worried about even though the pediatrician assured us he’d grow out of it.

Now, here he was, past the lisp and the developmental worries, yet still, in some ways, willing to accept that he wasn’t good enough.

Your brother isn’t perfect,
I wanted to say.
He isn’t perfect, either. He left, didn’t he?

We arrived at the school and Christopher climbed from the car. His body was hunched under the weight of the backpack as I watched him walk away.
What if he leaves, too? What if he finally decides it isn’t worth staying?

More than anything, I wanted to look into the car wreck and find out it wasn’t Christopher’s fault. If he wasn’t at fault, then this latest crisis would dissipate like a storm that threatened, then faded while still on the horizon. Chris needed absolution. We all needed it. We were drowning. We couldn’t handle one more drop of rain. . . .

By noon, my head was pounding and I felt like I was losing my mind. I’d spent hours navigating automated answering systems and playing voice-mail tag between the Plano Police Department, a towing service whose driver couldn’t pick up the car until after lunch, and the insurance company. I still wasn’t close to getting an accurate picture of Chris’s accident. The other parties involved had contacted our insurance company, complaining of injuries. I told the agent of Holly’s suspicions, and he seemed interested, but would only promise that the company would open an investigation. I asked him if he thought we should contact our lawyer, and he said that if Christopher were his son he probably would.

My cell phone started ringing as I was standing in the parking lot of the steak house, watching the tow truck driver load Chris’s car. “Wheeew! That’s messed up,” the driver had said when he looked at the front wheel, hanging at a forty-five-degree angle like a broken arm. “Insurance company’ll probably total this thing.”

I didn’t want to think about that possibility.
That was Jake’s first car.
Rob had insisted on getting Jake a new one for college and passing the older car down to Chris, at least until Chris’s tendency toward fender benders decreased.

When I answered the phone, Chris was on the other end. “We’re out early today because of finals and teacher training,” he informed me.

I checked my watch. How could it possibly be twelve thirty already? “Hang around school for a little while, all right?” I said. “The driver is just putting the car on his tow truck.”

There was a pause during which I sensed Chris working up to something. “A few of the guys are going over to the weight room to lift, and then Coach Powell needs help cleaning up the field house.” I clued into the fact that this was what he’d had in mind all along. He wasn’t calling for a ride; he was calling to test the waters—to see if he could get away with going somewhere other than home. “Coach can drop me off after. He goes right by our house.”

“Christopher . . .” I could imagine what Rob would say if I let Chris hang out with his friends the day after he’d been in a car accident.

“I know,” he muttered, saving me the trouble of composing the remainder of my reasons for
no
. “I’ll wait out front. How long am I grounded?”

“I’m not sure, Chris. We’ll have to see what we find out about the wreck. Let’s just go home and relax. You don’t need to be lifting weights or moving stuff out of the field house today anyway.”

“Yeah, I guess so.” He sighed, as if I’d handed out a prison sentence in making him come home. Not so long ago, our house was the place all the kids hung out. The rec room was always full of Jake’s and Chris’s friends. Now Chris never brought anyone over, but chose to go somewhere else. “Can we pick up a sandwich on the way? I’m starved. I didn’t get lunch because I had to go do some extra credit to bring up my physics grade, and . . .”

I barely heard the rest of Chris’s remark about a failed test and extra credit to get a passing semester grade. My mind was stuck on . . .
pick up a sandwich? I didn’t get lunch. . . .

The sandwiches.
I’d promised to bring another bag of sandwiches to the apartment complex today. . . .

“Chris, just wait out front. I’m on my way.” Exchanging a check for the towing bill, I waved good-bye to the driver and hurried back to my car.

When I turned the corner in front of the school, Christopher was sitting on the retaining wall with his backpack at his feet. His elbows were braced on his knees, and he was staring at the ground, his body sagging forward. From a distance, he looked like the first-grade boy who’d had his color changed on the teacher’s behavior chart and was dreading having to come home. I wanted to do now what I occasionally did back then—just forget to check the behavior chart. If Rob mentioned it later, I’d say, “Oh, I imagine he did okay today. I didn’t think to ask him, but I can usually tell.”

Maybe I’d made the wrong decision, all those times, but it seemed that Rob set the bar so high; I didn’t want Chris to give up, thinking that, no matter how hard he tried, he’d never make it over.

Seeing Chris now, I felt his despair. I wanted to ignore the behavior chart and take him out for an ice cream cone, then smooth things over with his father later.

Chris looked up when I pulled to the curb. His chest rose and lowered with resignation as he slid to his feet, then snagged his backpack. The body language said he’d given up the fight. He was ready to go home, sit in his room, and take whatever punishment came, because he probably deserved it.

I remembered how it was to be a teenager mired in that sense of defeat, to feel as if, no matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t do anything right. Everything bad was your fault. Everything you did was substandard and idiotic. Really, at the core of the matter, you were nothing but trouble, and you always had been. I’d tried so hard not to pass that trait on to the boys, yet somehow, here Chris was, surrendering to his own inadequacy, admitting guilt when, in all reality, we didn’t know whether or not he was at fault in the accident. I was only making him come home because Rob would expect it.