“Just relax,” the driver said. “The car was reported stolen, and that’s all we know.”
He drove off. I looked back at the Lexus and then slumped in the seat.
What was going on?
At the police station, they brought me to the desk and had me booked as a car thief. I was placed in a cell, and no matter how much I protested, no one stopped or seemed to care. Finally, because I remembered from watching movies, I asked to make my one phone call and I was led to a phone.
I dialed home. It rang and rang. I was calling Daddy’s direct line. He always picked up when that line rang, but instead, I got his answering machine.
“Daddy!” I screamed. “I’ve been arrested for stealing our own car. I’m in jail. Come and get me.”
The policewoman hung up the phone and led me back to the cell where I sat waiting. Hours went by and no one came. Finally, tired from screaming and protesting, I sprawled out on the hard wooden bench and fell asleep. I woke when I heard the door of the cell rattle. The policeman said my father had come to get me.
“Finally,” I moaned, and walked out.
“Just get in the car,” Daddy said when I saw him at the front desk. “Go out and get into the car. It’s right in front.”
“Why didn’t you come earlier? Why didn’t you call to tell them I didn’t steal the car?” I asked.
He looked at the police dispatcher and then at me and said, “But you did steal the car, Teal. I told you that you couldn’t have it and you took it. That’s stealing. You don’t own that car. I do. Now you’re known as a car thief. Happy?” he asked. “Get in the car,” he ordered before I could respond.
I went out and got into his sedan. When he got in, he said nothing until we had driven away from the police station and I asked him why he had let this happen.
“You let it happen, Teal. I am not going to coddle you any longer, young lady,” he said “From now on, whatever you do, you will pay the consequences that result, no matter what those consequences are, understand?”
I didn’t say anything. I turned away and pressed my forehead to the window. Right now, I thought, I’d trade places with Del in a heartbeat.
Mother was waiting in the hallway when we arrived. She stood there with her arms crossed and her lips pursed.
“Well, what do you think of yourself now?” she asked as soon as I entered. Before I could respond, she cried, “Look at yourself, your hair, your expensive jeans. You’re absolutely filthy. How could you want to be seen in public like this?”
“She wasn’t in public, Amanda,” Daddy reminded her. “She was in a jail cell.”
“Oh, dear me, dear me,” she wailed. “Will it get out, Henderson? Will it be in the newspapers?”
“No, she’s still a minor,” he said, and looked at me. “I’m afraid she will be a minor for a long, long time, the way she is going.”
“Well, we can be grateful for that, I suppose,” my mother said, and sighed. “Go up to your room, Teal, and sit and contemplate what you have done and what you are becoming. I have to get to an important luncheon,” she added. She made it sound as if, otherwise, she would sit and talk with me.
“Get upstairs, young lady,” Daddy ordered. “Don’t even think of leaving this house.”
I walked up the stairs slowly and just collapsed on my bed. All I wanted to do was sleep, sleep forever. Hours later, I woke, groaned, and stretched. I did feel terribly dirty and decided to take a bath. How would I contact Del? I wondered after remembering his phone had been turned off. I had to let him know what had happened to me. I thought he was the one person who would have any sympathy.
After I had gone down to get something to eat, it occurred to me that Del would be at work. I flipped through the yellow pages and found the number for his pizza parlor in the mall and then called. He answered the phone.
“It’s me,” I said. “Can you talk?”
“Yeah, there’s a lull.”
“You won’t believe what happened to me,” I began, and described it all without taking a breath.
“Your own father had you arrested and left you there?”
“You heard it,” I replied.
“Well, you weren’t actually convicted of anything,” he said, sounding like an attorney, “so he wasn’t right that you’re labeled now as a car thief. Besides, you’re still a minor in the eyes of the law, so no one can hold what happened against you or use it as evidence in any other court proceeding.”
“I’m not in the least bit concerned about any of that, Del.”
“You should be,” he said.
“How are things at your house?”
“My mother was still sleeping when I left the house. I made her some coffee. She sipped it and passed out again. I got the kids up and dressed and came to work,” he recited, “just like I do almost every day. I hope she will get up and give them lunch at least. I can’t call the house to check on it, thanks to her.”
“We should both just run off,” I suggested. I was more than half serious, and he heard it in my voice because he was silent for a long moment.
“I wish I could,” he said. “I’d hate to think what would happen to Shawn and Patty Girl if I left them with dear old Mom.”
“I shouldn’t have given away that diamond bracelet yesterday. You could have pawned it and used the money.”
“No, I wouldn’t have taken it, Teal. My brother and sister and me are in trouble enough. I go to jail, and they go to foster homes in a heartbeat.”
“It’s not fair,” I said.
“I stopped thinking about what’s fair and what isn’t a long time ago. I got to get back to work. We just got a crowd of teenagers, and they all look hungry.”
“I’ll try to see you later,” I promised. I had no idea how I would, but I felt I had to hold on to the hope.
“Good,” he said, and hung up.
I sat in the kitchen, moping. I was still in a bit of a daze from the night before. I heard the vacuum cleaner go on in Daddy’s office. The maid was permitted in there on Sundays only, which meant he wasn’t home either. I was glad of that. I didn’t want to have another lecture. Lately, that was the sole sum of all our onesided conversations: sermons on behavior.
Moving like a sleepwalker, I went back upstairs and moped about my room. I had a pile of homework to do, but just starting it seemed like a monumental task. I flipped through some pages and then fell back on my bed and stared up at the ceiling. Prohibited from leaving the house, I felt just as trapped as I had the night before in the jail cell. I kept thinking about Del and our time together.
Suddenly, I heard the door slam downstairs and then heavy footsteps on the stairway. Moments later, there was a knock on my door.
“Who is it?” I called.
The door opened and Carson stepped in. He was wearing a sweater and sweat pants and looked like he had just come from his gym.
“Dad told me what you did last night and what happened,” he began.
I sat up.
“He left me there all night.”
“You’re lucky he came to take you home at all,” Carson said. “What is wrong with you, Teal? Why do you keep doing these things? What do you want?”
“I want to be left alone,” I snapped back at him.
“You don’t want to go to school? You don’t want to achieve anything with your life? You just want to party, get drunk, screw around? What?” he shouted at me, his face red, his arms out.
For a moment Del’s relationship to his siblings flashed across my mind. He was the older brother and he showed them so much love and affection. Carson and I rarely ever kissed each other, rarely held each other’s hands, and rarely hugged each other, even on birthdays. He was so much older than I was in every way that it turned him into a stranger, not a brother. It wasn’t hard to see that he really wasn’t here this morning for me; he was here because he was upset for our father and mother.
“Just leave me alone,” I said, falling back on the bed.
“Daddy thinks you might need some sort of military school, Teal.”
“You mean prison, don’t you?”
“The last step before it, yes,” he said.
Out of the corner of my eye, I watched him wander over to the windows and stare out.
“I guess I should have done more with you,” he said in a tone of voice that was softer than ever. It widened my eyes. “Your birth was quite a surprise.”
“For me, too,” I muttered. He nearly smiled when he turned to look at me.
“I used to resent you,” he confessed. I looked up at him. “You came when I was a teenager, and for nearly fifteen years, I had been the center of all the attention.”
“As it turned out, you had nothing to worry about, Carson. You still were and you still are,” I fired back at him.
“That’s not true, Teal.”
“What do you know? You were out of this house by the time I was five.”
“So that’s why you’re doing all these things? Just for spite?”
“I’m not doing anything. I needed the car yesterday and he wouldn’t let me have it. He was doing that just for spite.”
“You were sent home drunk from school! What was he supposed to do, reward you?”
“He loves punishing me. It helps him forget his mistake.”
“What mistake?”
“Having me!”
“They’re not sending you to the right therapist,” Carson decided after a moment. “You do need real help.”
“Right. You can go now, Carson. You did your duty. Go make your report to Daddy and tell him I haven’t set the house on fire again.”
He stared at me.
“I came to offer you help, Teal. I’m willing to listen to you and to give you advice.”
“If you want to help me, tell him to stop punishing me so much and treating me like a common thief.”
“Give him reason to have faith in you, and he will. You’ll see,” he promised.
I thought for a moment. There was a line I remembered from a story we had to read for English class. A grandmother told her granddaughter, “You can get more with honey than with vinegar.”
“Thanks,” I said, and looked up at him. “I really don’t have anyone to talk to, Carson. Mother is so involved with her social events and Daddy’s always so busy and you’re hardly here. None of the friends I have at the new school are nice. They’re all so snobby. They hold it against me because I was in public school all this time.”
“Really? What creeps.”
“Yes, I agree, so I don’t try to make friends with them. I’m not happy in the private school. Maybe you can get Daddy to put me back in the public school. He’ll save money.”
“Um,” Carson said, thinking.
“It’s not any better. The teachers aren’t so great. I heard they don’t get paid as well, so the school doesn’t get the best possible teachers.”
“That’s true. I attended a preparatory school, you’ll remember, and that wasn’t so terrific.”
“You know, then.”
“I’ll talk with him,” Carson said. “Obviously, some changes have to be made.”
“Thank you, Carson. I feel so helpless sometimes.”
He nodded. Honey was working, I thought.
“They took away my allowance. You know what it’s like being around those snob birds and not having a cent in your pocket? They don’t let me forget it. They flash their fifties and hundred-dollar bills in my face.”
He grimaced.
“They do?”
“Oh, every chance they get. They don’t buy things. They just carry it to show off or drive the cafeteria cashier crazy by handing her big bills. She doesn’t have that sort of change, so their charges get put on a bill and sent to their parents anyway.”
He nodded again. I felt like a fisherman pulling in a catch that nibbled, bit, and now was easing onto the hook.
“Can you imagine what it’s like for me? And Daddy thinks I’m better off there.”
“Okay, okay, I’ll talk to him about it all.”
“Could you do one more thing for me?”
“What?”
“Just loan me some money, just so I have it on me. I won’t spend it,” I said. “Daddy won’t let me have any, but I dread returning to school tomorrow and looking like a pauper one more day.”
He bit the inside of his cheek as he thought.
“It will be just between you and me, Carson. You and I have never had any brother-sister secrets between us. Can’t we?”
“Okay,” he said, “but you’ve got to promise not to spend it and not to let Daddy know what I’ve done, Teal.”
“I swear,” I said.
He reached into his back pocket and took out his wallet.
“If you have two fifties, it would be great,” I said.
He hesitated, and then he gave them to me.
“This is an act of trust on my part, Teal. Don’t disappoint me.”
“I won’t.”
“And I want to see you work harder at school until we figure out what’s best for you, okay?”
“Yes, I will,” I said. “There’s my homework waiting on the desk,” I added, nodding at the books. “I’m getting right to it.”
“Get your grades up. It will make it easier all around,” he urged. “That way we can take another look at the situation after the midterm period. Any change would be easier. I know what it’s like to be stuck somewhere you hate, believe me.”
“Thank you, Carson. This is the first time I’ve really felt like you were my brother.”
I got off the bed and stepped up to kiss him on the cheek. He turned a little red, but smiled.
“We’ll get you on the right track,” he said. “Dad will be glad we had this talk, too. I promised him I would try, and he was hoping it would help.”
I smiled at him, and he went to the door. He stood there a moment and then suddenly smiled gleefully.
“What?” I asked.
“Since we’re sharing secrets, I have one for you.”
“You do?”
“I’m going to marry Ellery Taylor. I’ve bought an engagement ring and will be giving it to her this week, probably Wednesday,” he said. “So, you will be a bridesmaid at a big wedding this June.”
“Congratulations,” I said. “I like Ellery.”
I didn’t. She always looked like she was constipated when she was around me, and she was such a good little audience for Mother, nodding and agreeing with every silly little pronouncement. I wanted to puke, and she saw it in my face and avoided me whenever she could. She would certainly hate the idea of my being one of her bridesmaids. She would be afraid I’d step on the train of her wedding dress or something. Maybe I would.
“I plan on telling Mother and Father on Sunday, so keep it locked up,” Carson said.
“My lips are sealed,” I told him.
The moment he left, I went downstairs to Daddy’s den and called the pizza parlor. There was a great deal of noise in the background, so I knew Del couldn’t stay on the phone long.
“I’m sending something over to you,” I told him. “A surprise. It’s for Shawn and Patty Girl.”
“What is it?”
“It’s a surprise. Just do what you have to with it,” I told him.
After I hung up, I called Daddy’s messenger service. Then I put the two fifties into an envelope and wrote “Del Grant” on the outside. The messenger arrived, and I gave him directions. By the time Daddy found out I had used his service, it would be too late anyway and I would have time to think of some excuse like I had to get homework from someone or something.
Then I went back to my room and started my homework.
Of course, I would do better in school, I thought.
Honey gets more than vinegar.
6
A Life of Rainbows
Del was angry about the money and called me from the mall before he left for home. Fortunately, Daddy wasn’t back from wherever he had gone
on business so I was able to take the phone call. I pleaded with Del to keep the money.
“It’s nothing, just pocket money for me. I’ll waste it on some new lipstick and such. Your brother and sister have real needs and it will help you keep the dogs off,” I reminded him. “If the social worker comes around and sees they have what they need, they won’t haunt you.”
“I don’t like charity,” he insisted.
“Okay, so consider it a loan. When you’re rich and famous, you’ll pay me back.”
“Right, me rich and famous. That’s a good laugh.”
“I’ll try to see you this week,” I said. Then I heard the front door open and told him I had to go. It was Mother bursting in with all the latest social gossip. She couldn’t wait to get to her phone to pass it on. In her world, whoever knew something someone else didn’t was the person to envy. She barely seemed to notice me and asked me nothing about how I had spent my day. I almost felt like telling her about Carson’s impending engagement just to see the shock on her face that I knew something so socially important before she did, but I didn’t want to lose Carson’s trust.
I went back to my room and returned to my homework instead.
The next day I discovered that despite the lesson Daddy tried to teach me by having me arrested and kept in jail overnight, no one at school knew anything about it. Del certainly wasn’t going to gossip, and I wasn’t about to tell anyone, either.
All that week I did as well as I could at school. I was even nice to Mr. Croft and stayed after class to apologize to him for my previous behavior. I knew he liked things that were dramatic, so I concocted a new story.
“Not that it makes what I did right,” I told him, “but I had a bad shock at home. A cousin of mine whom”— I made a point of using the correct form, practically humming the m—“I was very close to was killed in a terrible car accident. No one wants to talk about it.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” he said. “How horrible.”
“No, I’m sorry for what I did,” I repeated, and assured him I would behave in his class from now on. Then, I asked him about a grammar problem I really did understand, but I let him review it quickly, pretending to grasp it finally because of bis extra help, and thanked him.