The Summer Kitchen (20 page)

You always do this.
The voice in my head was unusually clear and strangely determined today.
You always knuckle under. You always give in to what everyone else thinks is right. . . .

Chris opened the car door, tossed his backpack onto the floor and slid in, his body folding into the seat in pieces, lean and agile, apparently not suffering much from yesterday’s trauma.

I kept my foot on the brake, but my mind was revving ahead, my thoughts burning. After situating his legs and his belongings, Christopher gave me an odd look. “Mom?”

“Chris, I want an honest answer about something.”

“Okay.” He flashed a worried look in my direction.

“Do you think the accident was your fault?”

His head tilted to one side, and he shifted in his seat, as if he were trying to get a better view of me. “What did Mrs. Riley say? Did you find out anything from the insurance company?”

“I haven’t been able to gather much information yet, but that’s not what I’m asking.” I steeled myself with the thought that I was doing what I believed was right. I was tired of letting other people tell me what I should do, what I should believe, who I should be—as if I didn’t have a brain of my own, as if I weren’t capable of anything beyond making sack lunches, picking out table arrangements for the football banquet, or comparing fabric samples for fund-raiser T-shirts. “Holly wasn’t there, and the police officer wasn’t there. You were. I want to know what you think, what you remember.”

“You mean, like, now? Right here?” Chris’s gaze darted around the car, out the windows. He watched several boys cross the practice area, heading toward the field house. One of them climbed an old set of monkey bars and hung upside down, goofing around. The corners of Chris’s lips twitched when the kid tumbled off in an ungraceful somersault.

“Yes, right here. I want to know what you have to say about it.”

He blinked, seeming surprised to be asked as he studied me for a long moment. “It wasn’t my fault, Mom.” His gaze flickered upward, then he looked away, afraid to invest himself in the idea that his word might actually count for something. “That guy wasn’t close when I turned my blinker on to change lanes. He wasn’t close when I looked in the mirror. He sped up after I started to move over. I think he wanted me to hit him. There’s no way he couldn’t have known I was changing lanes, and the only way he could have ended up there would be to gun it like crazy.”

I sat for a minute thinking about Chris’s description. It fit with what little I knew about the accident.

“Can we go home now?” Chris was probably afraid that his friends, still horsing around on the monkey bars, would see him, stuck in the car with his mom.

“No.” My heart fluttered in my neck, and my stomach filled with turbulence. An instinctive warning, one I’d known as long as I could remember, screamed in my head. In my mother’s house, conflict ended in punishment that was swift, decisive—usually a whipping with whatever weapon she could get her hands on. By the next morning, she couldn’t remember doing it, but I did learn a lesson. The less the waters ripple, the less painful things are. Walk softly and keep your voice low. “No, Christopher, we’re not going home. You head on to the field house, and then catch a ride home with Coach Powell when you’re done. I have some errands to do, and I’ll be back this evening. I’ll bring something for supper.”

Chris blinked at me, then blinked again, as if I’d spoken the words in a foreign language, and his mind couldn’t translate them into something that made sense. “But Dad . . .”

“Dad isn’t here.” I looked straight ahead, wrapping my fingers around the gearshift. “I’m not saying you’re off the hook. I’m just saying there’s no point doing anything until we find out more about the accident. For now, we should go with what you think and what Holly’s impressions were.”

Opening the door, Chris reached tentatively for the backpack, then pushed it farther into the floorboard. “Well, what if those other guys come back and say—”

“We’ll cross those bridges when we come to them,” I cut him off. In my mind, I was already heading across town, breaking free, doing something no one would have ever thought I’d do. “If it comes down to your word or theirs, we have no choice but to take yours.”

Chris straightened, his chin tipping upward.

“Be home for dinner, all right?”

“Awesome.” Unfolding one leg, he stepped onto the curb, then stopped halfway out of the seat. “Mom?” He waited until I looked at him before he added, “I’m telling the truth.”

“I know you are, Chris. No heavy lifting today, all right? Just help clean up the field house.”

Nodding, he climbed out, then closed the door and hurried down the sidewalk. I watched him jog away in an easy, long-legged trot, his shoulders back and his face turned upward as he hollered at his friends. For an instant, he looked like the old happy-go-lucky Christopher I remembered.

You’re doing the right thing,
I told myself.
For now, he needs to know you believe in him.

All the same, as I went home, grabbed a loaf of bread and the last of the peanut butter and jelly, then started across town, my mind cycled over and over the potential arguments with Rob. I role-played them as if we were already there, descending into a disagreement that would eventually end up with a rehashing of what had happened to Poppy, and then who was to blame for Jake’s disappearance. The litany would play like a tape we knew by heart.

I considered turning around and going home, maybe calling the insurance company again. Driving all the way across town to deliver sandwiches was an unnecessary complication. By the time I got to Poppy’s, it would be after two o’clock. If I stayed long, I’d be stuck in the quagmire of afternoon commuters heading back to Plano. On the opposite side of the highway, all three lanes were still moving at top speed right now.
I could get off at the next exit and go back the way I came. . . .

I pictured the kids in the Dumpster, and then Cass with Opal clinging to her leg. I remembered Cass tucking the bag of sandwiches close to her body, holding it carefully so as not to smash what was inside. I saw the look on her face when I said I’d be back tomorrow.

She didn’t believe I would. Maybe I didn’t believe it myself.

You have ongoing issues of your own, Sandra. It isn’t smart to take on more than you can handle right now. . . .

More than you can handle . . .
The mollifying voice whispered a limitation to which I should surrender. It was echoed by my eighth-grade teacher’s voice.
Sandra is a lovely girl, but I’m afraid she’ll never be a star in school. She’s going to need some extra help this year in prealgebra. It’s harder for some children than others.

Certainly,
my mother agreed, putting a hand on my shoulder in an outward gesture of affection that felt foreign.
Now, Maryanne. Maryanne’s another matter. She’s always done well. . . .

To her credit, Mother hired a tutor to help me after school, and the tutor was good. I still wasn’t Maryanne, but at least I didn’t flunk out of middle school, and Mother didn’t get
dragged out
to any more parent-teacher conferences.

The tutor and hard work carried me through high school and into Baylor, albeit not with accolades or academic stardom. Dyslexia, undiagnosed, isn’t easy to overcome.

A girl like you should be looking for a good match, SandraKaye. What’s the point in a teaching degree anyway? If this boy, Robert, wants you, of course you should say yes. My goodness, you’re lucky he’s asked, considering . . . A doctor’s wife . . . Who ever thought you’d be a doctor’s wife . . . ?

The voices in my head droned on, and I realized an exit was coming up. One way toward home, the other toward Poppy’s. A habitual surrender or a bold step toward something new?

It was now or never. . . .

Chapter 12

Cass

Probably, free sandwiches two days in a row was too much to expect. By two o’clock, I kinda figured no freebies were gonna show up. Maybe the lady didn’t mean it in the first place, or maybe she got to thinking about how the gangbanger wannabes hassled her yesterday, and she was scared to come back.

The only people that showed up all morning were a couple of Mexican guys in a truck. They picked up the pretty girl with the baby and the little Mexican kid who was sitting on the steps with us. They checked me out real good when they left. After they were gone, the Dial-a-Ride came for the crippled lady. She didn’t look at us kids at all. She came out of her apartment and got in the van, acting like we weren’t there.

Angel, Boo, and Ronnie gave up on sandwiches and wandered off, so I took Opal inside, and we ate a piece of bread and some cereal, dry. I sat there, thinking,
Maybe the sandwich lady forgot.
It went through my head that if she saw Opal and me, she’d probably remember about the sandwiches. Since Red Bird Lane was right past the Book Basket and the old church, we could go get Opal a new book and then walk on down Red Bird a little, and see if there was a house with her car out front. Could be she had the sandwiches all ready, and she’d just got busy, and didn’t have a chance to bring them by.

I tucked a few Fruity O’s in my pocket so Opal and me could feed the tadpoles, and we headed out. The only problem with going down the street was getting rid of Ronnie, Boo, and their snotty sister. As soon as we went outside, they were right on our tails.

“Y’all go on back,” I told them when they started following us out of the parking lot. They stood looking at me, like all of a sudden they didn’t know English. “I mean it. Your mama’s gonna whip your butts if you don’t get back home.”

Angel huffed and poked her hips out to one side. “She don’ care. We can go wherever we want.”

“No, you can’t. Go home.”

The little brat cussed at me, and then Ronnie poked out his tongue.

“You stick that thing out at me again, I’m gonna yank it off,” I told him, and his sister cussed me out again. “Go home,” I said, but I really wanted to smack her one. Man, did she have a mouth on her. If my mama’d ever heard Rusty or me talk like that, we’d of been in soap city from now till next Christmas.

Right about then, an old tore-up car came pulling into the apartments. I could see the crippled lady riding shotgun. She’d probably caught a ride home with somebody, like usual.

“Hey, look, there’s the sandwiches, I bet,” I said, and all three kids looked, then next thing they lit out back to the apartments. I grabbed Opal, and we took off down the sidewalk with Opal’s book bouncing between us. I crossed the street and hurried all the way to Red Bird Lane, which wasn’t easy because I had on the green shoes, so I was running mostly on my toes. We made it though, and when we turned onto Red Bird, I peeked back around the bushes. There was Angel coming out of the apartment complex and looking down the street for us.

Maybe that’d teach her who she shouldn’t cuss at.

I took my shoes off and carried them while Opal and me started down Red Bird. There wasn’t any glass on the sidewalk there, just lots of cracks with grass growing up. Opal took her shoes off, too, and she walked beside me, carrying hers like I was carrying mine. Every once in a while she’d look over at me and make sure I hadn’t put my shoes back on.

“You can wear your shoes if you want,” I said, and she shook her head.

We walked on down the street, looking over the houses and watching for the sandwich lady’s car. After a few houses, we passed what used to be a park with a creek running beside it. What was left of a slide, a merry-go-round, and some monkey bars were all grown up in weeds. The gate was locked, but kind of broke at the hinges, so it was just hanging there. Opal wanted to go in, but I wouldn’t let her, even though we could of squeezed through the crack. When we got to the bridge, we looked down at the creek for a minute. There were little perch in the water, so I told Opal, “Watch this,” and I threw in the Fruity O’s, and the fish came up to push them around like soccer balls, then nibbled them up when they got soft.

“Tap-po,” Opal said, and tried to pull me toward the water. “Tsee tap-po?”

“There’s probably tadpoles in this part of the creek, too,” I told her. “But those are little fishies.”

“Go tsee!” She pulled my hand harder and leaned over the cement curb.

“No, we can’t go see.” It was a mess down there. The part of the creek by the apartments was cemented, but this bridge had muddy banks under it. “It’s yucky down there.”

“No nuck-ee,” Opal complained.

“Yes, it’s yucky, and we’re not climbing down. C’mon. Let’s go.”

Opal made a mad face with a pout lip, pulled out of my hand, and plunked her butt down on the curb. Then she threw her book on the ground and crossed her arms. It reminded me of Angel, so I was annoyed right away.

“Don’t you throw a fit.” I pointed a finger at her. “If you throw a fit, I’m gonna take you home and put you back in the room with your mama. You can just sit there until
she
wakes up and takes care of you.”

Opal didn’t move.

“I mean it, Opal. You get up and come on.” I could of picked her up and carried her off, but then she’d probably scream and cry, and everybody’d think I was kidnapping someone’s kid.

Opal poked her lip out so far it was making its own patch of shade.

“Right now!” I sounded just like my mom. She didn’t put up with any kid throwing any fits.

Opal figured out I meant business. She put her pink shoes back on, then stood up with her arms crossed and her face turned the other way. I guessed she didn’t want to be like me anymore.

“Pick up your book,” I said, but she wouldn’t. I told her again, and she stomped her foot, so finally I picked it up myself. “You’re not getting it back.”

Of course, then she started whining and trying to get the book.

“When I grow up, I’m not ever gonna have any kids,” I promised myself and her.
Ever, ever, ever.

I gave Opal the book, and we started walking again, and sure enough, when we cleared all the trees along the creek, there was a pink house, and in the driveway was the white SUV. I felt real glad, because I could see me and Opal getting another bag of sandwiches, and that would help out a lot. Then I thought,
Well, what if the lady really never planned to bring the sandwiches at all? You’ll look really dumb showing up at her door.