Where We Belong (31 page)

I liked it, and I didn’t like it. Both at the same time.

When we got home, Rigby and I walked Sophie upstairs to the apartment. Opened the door.

“Sophie’s back,” I called to my mom. “So you might want to keep an eye on the door for a while. Sophie,” I said, looking down at her. She didn’t look back, of course. “You’ll see Rigby tomorrow, okay? Just like always.”

I handed her off to my mom, and Rigby and I turned and walked down the stairs. Without looking back.

We were halfway across the gravel driveway to the house when I heard it. The famous Sophie shriek. I stopped. Squeezed my eyes closed. Opened them again and looked down at Rigby, who looked back at me for instructions.

“Come on,” I said.

We turned around and walked back to the apartment.

“Don’t look at me like that, Rigby. We don’t have any other choice.”

But, really, she wasn’t looking at me any special way at all. I was the one watching myself from the outside, criticizing. But if there was a better way to handle things, I couldn’t reach it. I couldn’t even see anything better from where I stood.

“So, this is not working out at all,” I said to my mom. “And I really thought it would.”

We were on the back patio of the apartment, looking out at the mountains. Most of their peaks still had snow, in June. Sophie was inside with Rigby. It was really just an excuse to have a hard talk.

“I’m thinking it’s because the dog is with you,” she said. “So she thinks she should get to go along. You know. All the time. When the dog was with a stranger, she didn’t feel that way.”

“What do you think’ll happen when Paul gets back?”

“No idea.”

“What if she goes right in through the doggie door after Paul gets home?”

“We could always lock the apartment door from the inside or something.”

“And then she’ll shriek.”

She didn’t say anything. Neither one of us said anything. For quite a long time.

After a while, I sat down on one of the wooden chairs. My mom called them Adirondack chairs, but I wasn’t sure why. She stood at the railing for a couple minutes more. Then she came and sat down, too.

She looked back, through the glass of the door. So I did the same. But nothing had changed. Just Sophie and Rigby, lying on the rug.

“I’m going to say some things,” she said. “And I’d really appreciate it if you wouldn’t yell at me while I’m saying them. At least let me get the whole thing out before you start to yell.”

I pulled in a long breath. Let it out again. My way of getting prepared, I guess.

“I don’t think I have enough energy to yell, anyway.”

“Good.”

Too long a pause.

So I said, “Please just go ahead and get this over with.”

“I think we’re trying to do something that can’t reasonably be done.”

I sat a moment, letting that roll through me. It didn’t make me want to yell. I hated it, but there was nothing in me that wanted to fight with it. In fact, I felt around and found this place that would be incredibly relieved to admit it was true. Not happy. Just relieved. When something is true, it takes a lot of energy to pretend it’s not. It pretty much uses up the life energy a person’s got and doesn’t leave much energy for anything else. After years of that, you just get so exhausted. Almost everything sounds okay if it comes with a rest.

“You’re not saying anything,” she said.

“I was just thinking.”

“This feels like progress for us.”

“I still don’t want it to end like that.”

“It wouldn’t be the end, Angie. We could go see her all the time. Whenever we wanted to.”

I just sighed. Didn’t answer.

“I don’t want to leave this place,” she said. “I need rest. And peace. Need. Not want. Need. I can’t go through getting thrown out on the street again with two daughters, one with special needs. This place feels like a home, and we need a home. Sophie needs a home, too. It’s not good for her to be living in a tent. Running off into the woods.”

I didn’t say anything for a long time.

We looked over our shoulders again. Nothing had changed inside the apartment. Just Sophie and Rigby, lying on the rug together. Sophie was a perfect angel, so long as I gave her something that wasn’t mine to give.

“Penny for your thoughts,” she said.

“I was thinking you’re talking like you’re the one in charge.”

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

“Well, it’s both. Since I don’t like what you’re saying much. But it’s sort of a relief for me when you act like the mom. Then I get to step down and be the kid and have no idea what I’m doing.”

A long silence. Maybe three or four minutes. Or more. It was still only about seven, but the sun was on a long slant, nearly ready to go behind the mountains. Even though it was one of the longest days of the year. The sun sets behind the mountains quite awhile before it sets on the horizon. Especially when the mountains are tall. And close.

“If we placed her somewhere, could we ever get her back? You know. If we stayed here and saved up money for a place? Maybe someplace a long way from the closest neighbors? I could even get a weekend job and help.”

“Oh, now you want to make money and help.”

“If it would get Sophie back.”

“She’s not gone yet, kiddo.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Because I don’t know. I would think so. But I really don’t know. I could look into some options. How ‘bout if we just take this one step at a time? First thing is to see what happens when he gets back.”

“Right,” I said.

“When do you think that’ll be?”

“Probably soon. He said things are falling apart really fast.”

“You talked to him?”

“Yeah. He calls.” Then the silence felt a little strange, so I said, “You know. To see how Rigby is. And to keep me posted on when he’ll be back. I mean, as much as he can know a thing like that.”

“So… best guess.”

“I don’t know. A couple or three weeks, maybe.”

“
Weeks
? You said he’d be gone
months
!”

Then we both looked again to see if either Sophie or the dog had caught the upset. But they both looked asleep on the rug.

“I said he’d be gone till his brother died. Which the doctors thought would be two to four months. But Paul always thought it would be more like two and less like four. And now he says it’s going really fast.”

“I’d better start doing some research into places.”

All of a sudden, I didn’t feel like I could be there anymore. I got up and went inside. Didn’t say goodbye to my mom. Didn’t say anything.

Sophie was indeed asleep on the rug next to Rigby. But not actually touching any part of the dog. I put my hand on Rigby’s head, and she woke up and looked into my face to see what would come next.

“Let’s go back to the house,” I told her.

So that’s what we did.

For the second night in a row, I had a hard time sleeping. So I was pretty groggy when Sophie flapped through the doggie door in the morning.

I raised my head, and Rigby raised her head. But this time, we both knew exactly who to expect.

When I saw her face in the doorway, I said, “Game over, Sophie. And we all lose.”

I don’t know why I said a thing like that to her. I just did.

Then I got up and walked Sophie and Rigby out the back door and up to the apartment. And asked Rigby to stay there while I went back to the house. Not that she had much choice. The door was about to be closed again. But the least I could do was talk to her. Tell her what was expected of her. What was about to happen.

Then I went back to bed.

I never got back to sleep.

I just lay there, nursing this strange feeling that we wouldn’t be a family anymore. Just my mom and me didn’t feel like a family at all. I thought about what it would be like with just us. It pretty much felt like two people who sometimes almost got along but mostly didn’t. Two people who didn’t feel all that related, considering they were. It was Sophie who tied it all together into something that felt like a family.

At least, for a couple more weeks, she did.

Paul called later that night. Nearly midnight.

I’d been asleep for a change, and it was hard to pull myself awake. But I was still glad to hear from him.

“I just had to tell you this,” he said. “Dan and I had that moment. The one you were talking about.”

“What one was I talking about?”

“The one you wished for us. You said when someone is near the end, sometimes you can be close to them in a different way.”

“Oh. Right. That. I remember that. What happened?”

“He had this moment. He’s been nearly unconscious. Most of the time. Almost all day and night. But all of a sudden, a few minutes ago, he had this lucid moment. Just out of nowhere, he opened his eyes and looked right into my face. And he said…” An awkward pause. “He said… ‘I’m sorry we broke your heart.’”

“Whoa.”

“That’s what
I
thought. He never would have said anything like that to me before this. Ever. He never acknowledged that. I wasn’t even sure if he knew.”

“How long have you felt this way? You know. I mean… about her?”

Then I immediately thought I’d been wrong to ask. And that he’d say something sharp. Like “Hey. I didn’t say I was up for Twenty Questions.”

He didn’t.

He said, “Forty-nine years. Since I was seventeen.”

“You’ve known her since you were seventeen?”

“Yes. Since before she met Dan. She was an exchange student studying over here. But the thing is, she was nineteen and a half. She’s two and a half years older than I am. I know it doesn’t sound like much now. But she was in college. She was a sophomore in college, and I was a junior in high school. At the time, it felt huge. Like she was a grown woman, and I was a kid. I was friends with her before she even met Dan. Turns out she was hoping for an introduction to him. And I was hoping she’d see beyond the difference in our ages.”

Silence for a moment, filled with shadows moving on the bedroom wall. I was stunned that he would tell me so much. But I was afraid if I pointed it out, he might stop.

So all I said was, “Ouch.”

“I don’t mean to give you the wrong impression. It’s not like she was just using me to get to him. She’s not like that. She was a good friend. Always has been. It’s just that he was the one she had the romantic feelings for.”