What She Left Behind (21 page)

Mom, how could you leave me?

S
ara?”

I look up from the book I’m not reading. Mrs. Monroe is standing by the door. She waves me over. “You need to go down to the assistant principal’s office.”

Me? I’m never in trouble. It has to be—

My heart starts to pound.
Please, please let it be!
If I think it hard enough, maybe it will be true.

All of that imagining that my dad has somehow killed my mom is just that, just my imagination—the end result of reading too much horror and watching too much of
The Winds of Change
. Mom is here, almost like we planned.

Altman’s calling you down because you’ve been missing classes, Sara. That’s it. Classes. Your mom isn’t here. It’s just the classes. All anyone around here cares about are classes.

“No! It’s her!” From the way everyone is looking at me, I might have said that out loud. I throw down my English book and pick up my backpack. It
is
my mom. It has to be. I grind my teeth together.

Mrs. Monroe tries to pat me on the shoulder as I whisk by her. “I’m sure it’s nothing.”

I walk quickly down the hall, past the new yellow lockers installed just this year and assigned to seniors only. Then I turn the corner to the gray-locker hallway. There’s Alex, bent over the drinking fountain, sucking down half of Scottsfield’s water supply. He isn’t in class. What a surprise. I wonder what proportion of time Alex is in class versus the time he spends in the halls.

I hesitate, like when a squirrel runs out in front of your car and you know you’re going to hit it. If my mom is here, I have to hurry! I can’t stop to talk in the hallway. But also, if my mom is here, I’ll never see Alex again.

It turns out I don’t have to make a decision. As soon as Alex looks at me, all my resolve melts.

“Hey, Sara,” he says.

“Hi.”
Breathe!

He examines his shoes.

Before I can think, I run to him. If I’m going, I can’t just leave things the way they are. I reach up and put my hands on top of his two adorable ears and tug his face down to mine.
God, I love you, Alex Maloy. Too bad I can’t stay.
Then I kiss him. I mean I
really
kiss him.

“Wow.” He wears a happy, goofy grin.

“So when are you going to start going to class?”

His smile fades.

Way to spoil the moment, Sara.

“The truth?”

“Yeah, the truth would be good.”

“I don’t know. Ever since Jimmy got sent to Afghanistan—”

“Wait—your brother’s in Afghanistan?” Jimmy graduated from Scottsfield two years ago.

Alex kicks a corner of one of the lockers. “School, classes, grades—it all kind of seems unimportant—when your brother might be—” He shakes his head.

“You know your brother would want you to be successful, even if he—”
And your brother, Sara, would want you to stop pretending his best friend is really him. He’d want you to stop blaming yourself for what
he
did.

“Shit, it’s Altman.” Alex grabs my arm and pulls me around the corner. “Go to class. I’ll run interference.”

“No, it’s okay. I got called down to his office.
You
go to class and
I’ll
run interference.”

Alex frowns. “I hadn’t really planned on going back to class.” He leans down and places another soft kiss on my lips. “But for you, I’ll go.” He smiles again and waves as he jogs backward down the hall.

I smile and wave back. “Good-bye, Alex,” I whisper. As much as I’m praying to get my mom back, I wish I could stay so I could see his face every day. I touch my fingers to my lips, remembering kissing and being kissed. As Alex disappears around one corner, Altman rounds the other.

“There you are, Sara. Hurry up; I’ve been waiting for you.” He spins back around and heads toward his office.

I’ve
been waiting for you? Not, Your
mom’s
been waiting for you?

I freeze and all my happiness escapes out the tips of my toes. Then I shake my head.
Pull yourself together, Sara. She’s there. She has to be there.

I jog the rest of the way to Altman’s office. I’m out of breath when I arrive—I’m not sure if it’s from the jogging, from kissing Alex, or from the fear Mom won’t be there. I scan the office: Altman sits at his desk with a pile of magazines, sipping coffee from a mug that says
SHOW YOU CARE
. He gestures toward a wooden chair. No Mom. She must be getting a copy of my records from the guidance office for our move.

I don’t have time to sit, but I do anyhow, perched on the end of the seat like we’re supposed to do in band. “Yes?” I ask, wondering what story my mom made up to explain why I’m leaving.

“How are your classes going, Sara?”

“My classes? Fine.”
What is this shit? Who cares about my classes?

“How about math?”

Is he going to tell me that I should try an easier math class at my next school?
“Okay, I guess.”

“It has come to my attention that you’ve missed three math classes in the past week. Chemistry, too.”

She isn’t here.
I slump down into the chair.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“You guess so?” He lifts his eyebrows.

“Yeah, I missed them. I had a dentist appointment.”

“All three days?”

“Orthodontist, actually. I’m getting braces.”

“Really? Your teeth don’t look crooked to me.”

“Thanks.”

“As of right now, those absences are listed as unexcused.”

“Really? My mom didn’t call? She said she was going to.”

“No. No, she didn’t.” Altman grits his teeth. “And there is also the matter of your not signing out before you left.”

“Signing out? Did I forget to do that? It’s been ages since I’ve had an appointment. Sorry about that.” I look around the office. Football calendar. Potted tree—what guy has a potted tree in his office? I wonder if it’s fake.

“This is a very serious matter, young lady.”

“I’ll have my mom call you right away.”
If I can find her. Of course, if I do, I’m never coming back here so it won’t really matter.
My jaw shakes a little as I speak. I go back to examining the room to keep myself from crying. There’s a picture of a sailboat above the potted plant. Lots of light blue and pastel colors. I stare at it and imagine I’m on the boat, drifting.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to have one of your parents come in.”

As long as it’s not my dad.
“Sure. I’ll have my mom stop in tomorrow.” During the last week I’ve told so many lies, I don’t even bother trying to keep track of them anymore.

“I’ll call and set it up with her.”

Whatever you do, don’t call my dad.
I start to twirl my ponytail.

“Would you like me to give you her cell phone number?” I try to calm myself by pretending that maybe when Mom sees the school
calling, she’ll know something is seriously wrong and she’ll answer. Then she’ll come pick me up and take me away with her.

“That’s okay. It’s here on your emergency contact form.” He taps a manila folder on his desk. It looks pretty thin. That’s good, I guess. I’ve never had any progress reports sent home, detentions for tardies, or referrals for “inappropriate behavior.”

“Sara, is anything wrong?”

Twist, twist.
I’m twirling my hair with such force that I yank out a few strands.

I think about my mom not answering her phone. My dad and his driving. Alex and piano benches, Nick Russell’s basement, and lying about the Chicken Broil. Zach and me breaking into my dad’s store, trekking through the muck in the woods, and the hot breath of a truck.

“Wrong?” I try to look perky and carefree. “No, nothing’s wrong.” I stand up, like this is a business meeting with a client and I need to get back to the office. “Well, then, I guess I’ll be getting back to class. If we’re done here, that is.”

Altman stays seated. His hands are poised in a triangular shape in front of his lips, as if he is trying to think of something good and counselor-like to say.

“Yes, we’re done here,” he says, picking up a pad of yellow passes and scrawling my name and something that I assume is supposed to pass for his signature. He holds the pen over the blank for “time,” looks directly at me for several seconds, and then fills it in. Then he rips the pass off the pack, hands it to me, and leans back in his seat.

I wonder if Altman is going to call Zach in next, since we’ve
both missed those periods. I don’t know what Zach will tell his mom about the classes he’s missed, but I’m sure that he won’t mention me unless he has to. Funny that Altman didn’t say anything about Zach. Surely he realized that we were gone at most of the same times. Or maybe not. Altman never struck me as the observant type. Besides, I’ve missed more classes than Zach. And Alex? Alex has missed so many classes that there’s no way Altman would be connecting those dots.

The bell rings just as I’m leaving, so I head to history. As I walk through the door everything goes dark.

“Get your hands off my eyes, Alex,” I say.
If we weren’t in the middle of history class I’d tell you a better place to put them.

“How’d you know it was me? I guess I’ll have to give you your surprise with your eyes open.”

“Surprise?”

Alex unzips his backpack and tosses a package of Ritz Bits at me.

“Thanks,” I say, smiling.
Where have you been my whole life, Alex Maloy?
“Now it’s my turn to ask—how did you know?”

“Oh, I have my sources. Okay, one source. Name of Zach.”

I pop open the bag. “Want some?”

“Does Robertson hate my guts? Of course I want some.”

Instead of taking the Ritz Bits out of my hand, Alex simply holds my hand, with the Ritz Bits snuggled between us.

“Maloy!” Robertson shouts.

Alex drops my hand. The Ritz Bits fall to the ground.

“Go see Mr. Altman.”

“For hand-holding?”

“Not for hand-holding.” Robertson rolls his eyes and sighs. “For whatever other trouble you’ve gotten yourself into.”

“Oh, that. Well, as long as I’m already in trouble—” Alex leans over and kisses me. And again. And—

The class goes wild.

“Out!”

I take my seat, completely but happily embarrassed, and Robertson tries to start his lecture. You can barely hear him over all the giggling and catcalling still going on. I don’t even bother trying. I’m too busy thinking of Alex, of kissing him, and him being worried about his brother. Kicking the locker. The
locker
. I finally remember where I’ve seen the name “Carter”—Carter Mini Storage. We’d passed it a few times when Dad was teaching Matt how to drive a stick shift on some backroads by the hardware store. Dad had said, “What the hell do people need storage units for? If you don’t need the shit, throw it out!”

Did Dad rent a storage unit? He even throws out things he doesn’t think other people need (such as my stuffed dog). The only unused stuff he keeps around is in Matt’s room, and lately it seems that’s because he thinks Matt still uses it.

I take my purse out of my backpack and start digging around for that scrap of paper. First I check the little inner zipper compartment used to hide things you don’t want people to see when you open your purse. As far as I can tell, without pulling everything out of the pocket, it isn’t there. Next I flip through a mess of old receipts and hall passes stuffed in the main part of my purse.
Where is that
piece of paper?
I do not want to have to break into the hardware store again. I mean, I guess it’s not really breaking in when you have the key, but all the same, the idea scares the hell out of me. Finally I pull out my wallet and check by the dollar bills.

“Sara, this is not personal-organization time,” says Mr. Robertson. “Pay attention please.”

It never ceases to amaze me how teachers manage to say “please” when what they really mean is “or I’ll break your neck.”

“Okay,” I say, pulling out the stack of random things I had filed in my wallet where you’re supposed to keep credit cards, if you have any.

I find the sticky note about halfway through the stack. Carter. Three, six, two, nine, four, seven. I put the other cards back in my wallet and shove it back in my purse. I pick up my pencil and write random numbers on my worksheet while I silently count to ten. Keeping the pencil as a prop in my right hand and my eyes on the textbook, I slide my cell phone out of my jeans pocket and send a text message to Zach: