Trauma Queen (7 page)

So that's how I knew that she was really, really mad. Not just at Mom, but amazingly,
at me.
Even though I hadn't known anything about Mom's performance ahead of time. Even though, as soon as I'd figured it out, I'd begged Emma to leave.

So I started to cry. Which is not something I did very often. But this was a special occasion.

I thought about calling Dad right then. He'd be the perfect person to talk to, I thought, because he totally understood about Mom. But it was a Saturday night. He was probably out somewhere with The Horrible Mona Woman, if he happened to be in town. And anyway, even if he was around to answer, he was a picture person, not a word person, and especially not a words-on-the-telephone person. So I stopped dialing his cell mid-number, and called Gram instead.

“Oh, cookie,” she said as soon as she heard my voice. “What
happened
?”

“Your daughter just ruined my life,” I said, bursting into tears all over again. Finally I stopped crying and told her about the Two Beez Café.

She listened, making little
tsk, tsk
sounds every once in a while, so I could tell she was still there. Then she
said, “Well, Becca is a very difficult person sometimes. This is not news, Mari.”

“I know!”

“She put you in a terrible spot with your friend. And there's never any excuse for humiliating anybody. Especially in public.”

“I know.” Gram was great.

“But it sounds to me as if your friend's mom dealt a low blow. And struck first.”

“What?” I sniffled. “Anyway, so what if she did?”

“Well, nobody insults your mom's art. We may not always care for it, honey, but it's who she is.”

I didn't answer.

“And nobody, I mean
nobody,
insults her as a mother. That's what she cares about more than
anything
.”

I wiped my nose. “Well, if she cares about being a mother so much, why did she just wreck the best friendship I ever had?”

“Oh, Marigold. If Emma is really your best friend, she'll calm down. And she'll realize you had nothing to do with Becca's performance.”

“Okay,” I said doubtfully. “But what if she doesn't?”

“She will. Just give your friend some time.”

“Okay.” It wasn't like I had much of a choice, anyway.

“And Mari?” She paused. “Will you do something for me, cookie? Try sometimes to understand your mom's point of view.”

“
Her
point of view?”

Gram laughed. “She has one, strangely enough.”

By the time Mom and Kennedy got home from the Two Beez about a half hour later, Gram had called Mom on her cell, so she had some microscopic clue about what I was feeling.

“Oh, Mari, try not to overreact,” she said as she scrubbed off her makeup in the bathroom. “Everyone thought Nu-Trisha was hilarious. Beau and Bobbi said it was maybe my best performance ever.”

“Yeah?” I said. “Well,
Mrs. Hartley
didn't think it was funny.”

“She will when she has a chance to think about it.”

“You're sure about that? Positive?”

“Of course,” Mom said confidently. “And she'll realize that I wasn't portraying her as a
person.
I was just creating a
character.
”

I snorted.

“A type,” Mom continued. “A symbol. Of smug, judgmental, narrow-minded—”

Whatever. Despite what Gram had said, I was so
not
in the mood to hear Mom's point of view that night. Because really, that was just about all I ever heard, it seemed.

I walked out of the bathroom and pretty much didn't talk to her for a solid week.

It took Emma just about that long—a solid week—to stop freaking out. She talked to me at school, of course, but she was serious and quiet, and she kept sighing a lot and saying things like, “I hate it when people are angry,” and “I wish things were back to normal.”

“You don't think this was my fault, right?” I asked for maybe the tenth time in five days. We were walking home from school, but this time we didn't stop at Rite Aid.

“Of course not,” she answered, avoiding my eyes. “I just wish your mom—”

My throat tightened. “My mom what?”

“I don't know. Knew my mom better. She's really not so bad. When she's not incredibly upset, I mean.”

I was so shocked by this I almost laughed. “You're serious, Emma? Because you always said your mom was crazy.”

She blinked. “Um, I don't think you should be saying that, actually.”

“I didn't say it. You did.”

“Yeah, well, I'm
supposed
to complain about my mom, aren't I? And you know Becca really hurt her, Mari.”

I almost said
Well, she started it
. But something in Emma's eyes told me there was no point arguing. And anyway, all I wanted too was for things to be “back to normal” between us, and it seemed like the more we talked about our moms, the more they were taking over.

And the thing is, they really were. That week word about Mom's performance had spread all over town, thanks mainly to Trisha Hartley, who was not only the vice president of the middle school PTA but also assistant head of the Youth Soccer League. I never understood how Mrs. Hartley managed to tell the story without making herself look at least a little bit responsible; after all, even if Mom had some sort of vendetta against her, you'd think there'd have to be some reason
why
. But it didn't seem as if anybody ever asked what started the whole thing. It was just like people assumed that because Mom was unicycling on the soccer fields and reciting her “LICE” poem at the Two Beez, she was
nuts enough to pick on Trisha Hartley for absolutely no good reason.

So then things got ugly. We started getting crank phone calls, not just loud-breathing hang-ups in the middle of the night, but also kids shouting, “HI, CAN WE TALK TO NU-TRISHA?” Once somebody left a paper bag full of rotten tomatoes at our door. Smashed-up vegetables appeared every other day in our mailbox. Moms I didn't know frowned at me at the bus stop. And one time Sarah Wong and Ally Ferrara (who by now were back to being BFFs again) actually sat with me on the bus.

“Uh, Marigold, maybe this is none of our business, but did your mom have some sort of public meltdown?” Ally asked.

I pretended to search for something in my backpack. “You mean at the coffeehouse?”

They looked at each other. “We're not sure where it happened,” Sarah admitted. “Just that it was a little . . . extreme.”

I could feel my eyebrows getting sweaty. “It wasn't a public meltdown, you guys. It's just what my mom does.”

I suddenly realized how wrong that sounded. Like:
My mom wasn't just crazy on that one special occasion. She's ALWAYS crazy.
“She's a performance artist,” I added quickly. “She was just doing one of her characters.”

Ally gave me a quick smile, like
Sure she was, Marigold.
And then without saying another word, they both got up and took a seat at the back of the bus.

A couple of days after that, Matt asked if it was true that my mother was “out to get Emma's mom.”

“Are you insane?” I demanded. Which I knew was a stupid way to talk to your crush, but by then I was kind of losing it.

“No,” Matt answered. His gorgeous blue eyes looked worried. “But Emma's mom is saying that your mom
is.
And she's telling everyone not to let their kids come to your house. I heard that from my little brother.”

“Your
brother
?” Matt's brother was in fourth grade. He'd never even met Mom. “That's just completely moronic,” I argued, then pinched myself for calling his brother a moron.

And the worst thing of all was when Kennedy came home from school in tears one day because some kid in her class had told her that Mom was “dangerous and would probably go to jail.”

“Mom's not going to jail,” I said, giving her a hug.

“But what if they arrest her?”

“No one's going to arrest her.”

“But what if Mrs. Hartley calls the cops?”

I shrugged. “The cops will say she started the whole thing.”

“But what if they arrest Mom anyway? Because she made it worse.”

“Then we'll go live with Dad.” And I immediately changed the subject before Kennedy could point out that Dad didn't really “live” anywhere specific, and was currently “on assignment” in New Zealand.

I got us through the next hour or so by working on my patchwork Thing while Kennedy made patterns with the scraps. Finally Mom came home from a new workshop she'd just started over at the community center. As soon as she heard what that kid had said to Kennedy, she crossed her arms like a genie. “Well, that settles it,” she announced. “We're moving.”

“What?”
I shouted.

“We're not sticking around this mean-spirited, gossip-mongering, nowheresville little town. We're outta here, baby.”

“You're serious? Because of some dumb thing a kid said in Kennie's class?”

“Words hurt,” Mom said, shaking her head. “Words are powerful, powerful weapons, Marigold.”

My jaw dropped. This was being said by the person who'd taken Mrs. Hartley's own words and put them in the mouth of Nu-Trisha?

“That's exactly what
you
do,” I sputtered. “Use words to hurt.”

“No,” she said firmly. “Sometimes I use strong words to provoke
.
Or to make a statement. But never merely to
hurt.
And I refuse to live in an environment where people are using negative, spiteful words about me to injure my children.”

My throat was starting to burn. “You know what, Mom? Leaving my best friend behind will injure me worse.”

“Mari.” She reached out to touch my shoulder, but I twitched it away. “Listen, baby, I know you girls are so close. I know how important Emma is to you, and I feel terrible about all this, believe me. But wherever we move, you can stay in touch with her, can't you? There's the phone, and e-mails and IMs—”

“Emma's mom is really strict about online. She says it's a big waste of time.”

“Seriously?”

“And Emma doesn't have a cell. She had one, but—” I shook my head. “This totally isn't fair!”

“No, baby, you're right, it isn't.” Her face puckered, and she was quiet. Then she pretended to smile. “Oh, Mari, everything will be okay. I
promise
you that. And I'm sure you'll make great new friends wherever we go.”

“What if I don't want to?”

“You never want to make new friends? Where's your spirit of adventure?”

“I don't have one,” I answered. “I
hate
all this moving. And anyhow maybe this whole thing will blow over.”

“Marigold,” Mom said, suddenly looking tired. “You know Emma's mother. Do you really think she'll ever let this blow over?”

I thought about the hair in Emma's hairbrush. And the look in Emma's eyes when she'd told me how her mom was “incredibly upset.”

“No,” I murmured. “Probably not.”

And three weeks later we were in Lawson, unpacking boxes.

Since the minute we left Aldentown, Mom's official line has been:
I'm convinced that Trisha Hartley is an evil, dangerous person and I hope never to cross paths with her again. But Emma is fantastic, and I want you to know, Mari, that I hope you two will stay best friends forever.

In reality, though, today is the second time Mom “forgot” to tell me that Emma had called. (The first time was the day we moved; I found out about it when Emma e-mailed me about a week later.) I wonder what's behind Mom's memory lapses: Does she think if I speak to Emma, Mrs. Hartley will snatch away the phone and say nasty things to me about My Crazy Mother?

Or: Is Mom finally feeling guilty about the Two Beez incident, and trying to pretend that the whole thing never happened?

Or: Is she “helping” me “adjust” to Life in Lawson by acting like,
Emma who? Just make a new BFF right here!

Or: Does she just “have a lot on her mind,” the way Kennie said? Of all the possible excuses, this one seems the lamest. I mean, Mom has a big brain crammed with miscellaneous stuff she's memorized, like
Hamlet
and the U.S. Constitution. She's hopeless about things like school calendars, but could she really “forget” a call she personally answered twenty minutes before I walked in the door?