Here in My Heart: A Novella (Echoes of the Heart) (4 page)

Joe, a rock-solid center in every storm, had calmly observed the altercation. Lisa gazed up at him. She wiped at her eyes with the sleeve of a lovingly worn holiday sweatshirt Dru had seen on at least two of the older Dixon girls. It sported a grinning turkey sitting in front of an overflowing Thanksgiving banquet, wielding a knife and fork and ready to dive in.

Joe brushed Lisa’s bangs back and smiled down at her. He winked, understanding without a word, accepting and promising that nothing was too big for Lisa to handle, because she now had a family to handle it with her. Lisa threw herself against him. Her tiny shoulders began to shake.

“She’s been doing better the last few weeks,” Dru said to Marsha. The students and the other parents had returned their attention to the demonstrations. “She’s been keeping her cool with the other kids, even when we practice moves and things get out of control and loud.”

“She likes you very much.” Marsha patted Dru’s arm. “She wants to do well here. On the drive home, she keeps saying how pretty and strong and fun you are. She’s starting to see you as a real sister, I think, more than the girls in the house. You’re more than her teacher, honey. She wants you to be proud of her.”

Dru swallowed past the gratitude trying to gum up her words. It could still sneak up on her, the shocking rightness of this life she’d been given.

“Sisters, huh?” She smiled. “I like the sound of that.”

“You’re working wonders for her self-esteem.”

“I try to make a little extra time for her before class starts, just the two of us working together on whatever I’m teaching each week.”

Except she hadn’t tonight. She’d been too preoccupied with Brad to notice the Dixons slipping in with the crush of other families arriving at the last minute. And then she’d gotten caught up talking with Dan.

“We came from having her tested right after school,” Marsha said.

“Is she sick?”

“We were with a psychologist Family Services recommended. Her caseworker and teachers think ADHD is part of what’s keeping Lisa from settling in anywhere else she’s been placed.”

“Why didn’t someone catch it before now?” Dru checked on Lisa. She was watching the demonstrations, leaning back against Joe and ignoring everything but what Brad was doing.

“The disorder’s harder to detect in young girls than boys. Girls are better at hiding what they’re going through and how much it hurts to not feel like they fit in. Sometimes until it’s too late.”

“Too late?”

“From what I’ve been reading and what the social worker at county said, ADHD girls with Lisa’s displaced background can develop disorders that lead them to harm themselves.”

“Like eating disorders?”

“And cutting. The suicide rate is higher, too.”

“Suicide?” Dru remembered the pain that had shadowed Lisa’s expression as Simon pushed her away and the other kids laughed.

“Overactive boys will get physical with other kids. Girls seem to turn the pain on themselves when they can’t stop doing things other people don’t like. If the meds don’t work, if everyone’s thinking you’re messing up on purpose or because you don’t care, and no one’s helping you . . .” Marsha shook her head, worried and fighting with everything she had to understand—as she and Joe did with all their kids. “What would you do if that was your life?”

“Especially if what you can’t change on your own got you dumped from one home after another.”

Dru had heard her foster siblings talk about starting to like new parents and friends in a house, only to have it all ripped away overnight when someone thought they’d be better off somewhere else. Lisa seemed to be compensating by either trying way too hard to get everyone around her to like her, or spending all her time alone, as if she didn’t care.

“She hated the testing,” Marsha said. “The therapist couldn’t get her to sit still long enough to complete several of the evaluations. Lisa was still upset when we left. But she wanted to see you and to graduate with the other kids. You’ve made her feel like part of the group here.”

“She
is
part of the group.”

With Sally’s help each week as the students got busy and distracted and overly wired during two hours of class, Dru had made sure Lisa fit in.

“Lisa will graduate tonight.” Dru would make sure of it. “Simon’s with Brad now. Let me talk with her. We’ll fix this. Piece of cake.”

Brad had said the same thing earlier.

Dru’s insides jumbled. More unwanted memories of them became all she could see.

Dru hadn’t been much older than Lisa, and Brad and Oliver had made it their mission in life to tease her about always saying
piece of cake
when she’d wanted to do something they’d thought she couldn’t. She’d tagged along anyway: fort building, dirt bike racing, watching their horror movies, and learning to play their sports. And there’d been the time Oliver had stolen Joe’s car and taken them on a joyride, wrapping the thing around a light pole. Brad had landed in the emergency room, Oliver in the Chandlerville jail overnight, and Dru had been left the lovely task of explaining things to Marsha and Joe.

They’d grounded her for a month. She’d done the chores of every other kid in the house, plus her own. But her foster parents had been more worried than angry about Oliver. He’d been hurting in ways no one but his girlfriend, Selena, had seemed able to ease. He’d started drinking too much and doing crazy things to outrun how alone he’d felt. And he’d had a built-in drinking buddy to enable him—his best friend, Brad.

Just after Oliver’s eighteenth birthday, he’d left Chandlerville for good. Not a full week later, Brad had been gone, too.

Dru never wanted Lisa to think that things were so bad that leaving town was her only option.

“Piece of cake,” she repeated to Marsha.

Of course, to pull off what Dru had in mind, she’d need Brad’s help—after she’d tried to bounce him out of the Y an hour ago, on top of pretending he didn’t exist for the last seven years.

Perfect.

The other kids were staring. Lisa could feel it. She hated that. Just like she’d hated that doctor staring at her, asking stupid questions and then talking to Mr. and Mrs. Dixon about her. And now Dru was talking about her to Mrs. Dixon.

She
really
hated it when people did that. Teachers. Other kids and parents. They were always saying and thinking things about her: how she couldn’t stop messing up, how something had to be done about her. Like there was any way to fix her.

She’s never going to live up to her potential
, her first-grade teacher had told Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez at a parent-teacher conference. The Sanchezes had laid into Lisa that night, saying they couldn’t spend all their time dealing with her getting into trouble.

The other six foster kids they kept had known the score. No problems with the school or in the neighborhood. That had been the rule in the Sanchez house—a run-down place miles away from Chandlerville. The Sanchezes didn’t have jobs. They fostered for the money. After they cashed their county checks, they were pretty much done being parents. The kids were supposed to stay out of the way, do their chores, and mostly take care of themselves.

Lisa had been history after that parent-teacher conference, moved from the Sanchezes’ to another home and more parents with more rules. After that place somewhere in Douglasville, she’d been dumped with the Dixons.

And now Mrs. Dixon and Dru were looking at Lisa like she’d never be right. It made her feel sick, just like fighting with Simon had. Even more than missing the Dixons’ pretty, clean house and the sort-of okay kids there, Lisa would miss Dru the most when Family Services took her away again.

Dru was walking across the gym toward her. Lisa just knew Dru would tell her to leave before the radKIDS graduation party. Lisa tried to run but couldn’t. Mr. Dixon had his hands on her shoulders. He winked at her again when she looked up to see if he saw Dru, too.

“It’s going to be okay,” he said. He was always saying that. And when he wasn’t, Mrs. Dixon was. “You’ll see.”

Dru smiled when she reached them. Not her normal smile. Her eyes weren’t squinty the way they got when she laughed and smiled for real. They hadn’t been squinty the whole class, no matter how much she’d said she was happy everyone was there. She looked even worse after what Lisa had done. Like she thought something bad was going to happen but didn’t want anyone else to know she was scared. It was how Lisa felt most of the time.

Dru knelt in front of her. “Feeling better?”

Lisa nodded. She wanted to be better for her friend—her older sister, the Dixons had said.

“Better enough to practice with Officer Douglas?” Dru asked. “Simon’s almost done, and I think you’re the perfect student for us to wrap things up with.”

“No . . .” Lisa shrank against her foster father. She’d never be the perfect anything. Other kids like Sally Beaumont were perfect. Not Lisa.

“But you’re our most improved radKID,” Dru said.

“I . . . I am?”

That sounded like something even Lisa couldn’t mess up.

Mr. Dixon squeezed her shoulder. “Ready?”

Lisa shook her head. She wouldn’t do it right. She never had, when they’d practiced.

Paying attention long enough was too hard. And there were tons more people in the gym now. No way would she remember to do all the things radKIDS were supposed to do if someone were bullying them at school or around the neighborhood, or if a stranger tried to grab them or hurt them.

“I don’t want to.” She’d end up being the
worst
improved, and everyone would see.

Mr. Dixon got down on one knee. “I think you do, Lisa. I think it scares you how much you want to show everyone what you’ve learned.”

She did. She wanted to so much. She wanted everyone to see how hard she was trying. She wanted the Dixons and Dru and the other kids to see she could do something right.

“And what have we learned about being afraid?” Dru asked. “I know you, Lisa. You’re super smart. You had all the handouts I’ve given out memorized the first night you took them home. Mr. and Mrs. Dixon tell me you’re one of the brightest kids they’ve ever fostered. Your teachers at Chandler Elementary think so. Most of the kids do, too, and that’s probably part of why they give you such a hard time sometimes when you make mistakes. You understand everything, but understanding isn’t always enough, is it? And that’s scary. But what do radKIDS do when they’re scared?”

“We . . .” Lisa could feel people looking at her again. They weren’t talking as much. She realized it was because Simon had stopped working with Officer Douglas. She would be the last kid to pretend to defend herself against the police officer covered all over in big red pads. “We tell whoever’s making us afraid ‘No.’”

“That’s right.” Dru smiled for real, her eyes all squinty and happy. “And if the person keeps doing what’s making you afraid? What do you do next?”

“I say it louder. ‘No!’”

“Good girl.”

Dru looked around them. Parents were nodding and smiling, Mrs. Dixon especially. The other kids weren’t laughing, and Lisa had yelled really loud.

“So,” Dru said, “can you show us all how to face your fear and fight back? Because a radKID is never powerless. A radKID knows how to fight until they can run away and get the help they need to be safe again, right? You’d be doing me a big favor, making sure everyone sees just how important all of this is. We need a big finale. Help me kick things up a notch for our last demonstration.”

Lisa could see Officer Douglas listening, too. Even Simon was staring at her and Dru while he took off his pads.

“What do I have to do?”

“If Officer Douglas is up for it”—Dru looked over her shoulder—“I want to try something we were taught in our training, but I haven’t done it with one of my classes yet. I haven’t had the right student before. They told us we had to be sure we had someone who wouldn’t give up when they were afraid, didn’t they, Officer Douglas?” Dru took Lisa’s hand and turned toward the rest of the room, leading Lisa through the crowd toward the police officer. “Brad, I’d like you to meet Lisa Burns. I’m hoping she’ll help us out with a more realistic demonstration.”

“Hello, Lisa,” the tall man said.

His voice was deep, but he didn’t sound mean. His eyes were pretty and blue, even prettier than Dru’s. And his smile was so real. Lisa smiled back.

He looked at Dru for a long time, almost as if he were saying something to her without any words, and then he smiled some more at Lisa.

“You ready to show your stuff?” he asked.