With You and Without You

  That was our first major fight. We didn’t make up until after school the next day. Carrie had gone to an art club meeting, so Denise came with me to pick up Hopie.

  “I still think what you did was mean,” she said, “but I don’t want us to be mad at each other.”

  “Me neither,” I said.

  “I had thought it would be so much fun if you and I started sort of hanging out with Justin and Marc. I thought we could go to the movies together and stuff. Does this mean you don’t want to see Marc? You don’t want to go to movies or school games with him or anything?”

  “Oh—” I had started to say, “Oh, no!” and then realized I wasn’t sure. Was I going to hang around with Marc? Could I figure out something interesting for us to do that wouldn’t be much fun?

  We reached the elementary school and walked down the hall to Hopie’s kindergarten room. The hall was lined with paper turkeys and crayon drawings of the Pilgrims and Indians. So was Hope’s classroom. But something else was there, too. Christmas. It had started creeping in.

  Hope was waiting for us with a grin on her face and a Christmas bell made from a section of an egg carton in her hand.

  “Look! Look what we made today!” she cried, running over to us with the bell extended. “A Christmas bell! Just like with Mrs. Harper.”

  Miss Donnelly smiled at me from her desk. “A great day,” she said, meaning that Hopie hadn’t cried and had played with the other kids and stuff.

  “Good,” I said. At least somebody was having a great day.

  Hope put her coat and mittens on, and Miss Donnelly handed me a big paper bag full of stuff. “We cleaned out our cubbies today,” she explained.

  “There was a spider in mine,” added Hope. “In the corner. We put him in a jar and watched him, and then we let him go.”

  “Have a nice Thanksgiving, Hope,” Miss Donnelly said as we walked toward the door. “Eat lots of turkey.”

  Hope giggled. When we were out in the hall she said, “Miss Donnelly is funny.”

  I glanced at Denise and she smiled. This seemed to be our old Hopie. I was glad she was coming back.

  Halfway home, Hope suddenly stopped in her tracks.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Mommy said we could buy decorations for Christmas cookies today, remember?”

  I did, vaguely. But I was cold and tired and hungry, and I didn’t feel like walking back to the little grocery store near the elementary school. Particularly not for something connected with Christmas.

  “We’ll get them on Monday, Hope,” I told her. “We’re not going to make cookies yet anyway. It’s not close enough to Christmas.”

  Hope pouted. “But Mommy promised.”

  “We won’t be using the stuff for weeks. We’ll get the decorations on Monday, okay?”

  “No.”

  “Liza, it’ll only take ten minutes to walk back there,” Denise pointed out.

  I shot her a look usually reserved for Carrie. “Monday, Hope,” I said.

  Hope began to cry, and Denise stopped talking to me. But when we reached Bayberry, Denise said, “Have a good Thanksgiving, you guys.”

  “Thanks. You, too. … Have fun at the party.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Will you call me on Sunday and tell me all about it?”

  “You really want me to?”

  I nodded.

  “Okay. Sure.”

  I knew we weren’t mad at each other, but something was different between us.

  When we got home, Hopie wouldn’t shut up about her stupid cookie decorations. She talked about them until bedtime. She told Carrie I was a meanie, she told Mom I was a wicked witch, and she told Brent I was a bullfrog, which was her new word for people she didn’t like. (Her doctor was a bullfrog, the cafeteria monitor was a bullfrog … )

  Nobody seemed to mind. Even though the next day would be Thanksgiving, they were all talking about Christmas. I felt surrounded by it. Mom and Carrie were planning to go shopping on Saturday. Brent was trying to figure out a budget that would allow enough money for a one-day trip to New York City during December. And Hope began babbling about Santa’s Village—in between remarks about people who were bullfrogs.

  That night, I went to bed angry. I woke up angry the next morning, I was angry during Thanksgiving at the Werners’, and I was angry all weekend, particularly when everybody went off Christmas shopping bright and early on Saturday.

  Sunday made me even angrier. Denise called to tell me about Justin’s party. She had had a wonderful time and was in love with Justin Sommerville. But she accidentally let slip that Marc had spent almost the entire party talking to Cathryn Lynn.

  On Monday I was awakened by Hope. She was standing next to my bed with a look on her face that could only be described as devilish.

  “What?” I mumbled.

  “Today we’re buying cookie decorations. You said so.”

  What a pill she could be.

  “You woke me up for that? What if I say no?” I asked her.

  For a moment, Hopie looked scared. Then she narrowed her eyes at me. “You won’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because Mommy told you to take me to the store.”

  “I know.”

  “Are you going to?”

  “Yes.”

  “I knew it! I knew it!”

  “Hope,” I said, “you’re being a bullfrog. Leave me alone.”

  That afternoon, Carrie had another art club meeting. I picked Hope up at school and walked her across the street to the little grocery store. Mom had given us five dollars, and Hope chose containers of colored sugar, jimmies, and silver balls, and three tubes of frosting—red, green, and white. I handed her the money and told her she could pay for the stuff herself, which she’d never done before. She looked rather proud as we left the store. We turned to head home and walked by the hardware store next door.

  “Oh!” cried Hopie, running to the window and pointing at something inside.

  “What is it, Tink?”

  “Look at those tools—the ones in that case.”

  I looked. There was a leather case full of screwdrivers, neatly lined up and arranged according to size.

  “If Daddy were here,” Hope went on, “I’d buy that for him for Christmas. He’d like that, wouldn’t he?”

  “Hopie! How can you say that?”

  She turned around to stare at me. “What?”

  “Dad can never enjoy another Christmas. He’ll never get any more presents.”

  “I know—”

  “Don’t you see? So nobody else should have presents either. It’s just not right. It’s unfair to Dad. We shouldn’t have presents or Christmas this year.”

  I started to walk away, leaving Hope by the hardware store. After a few seconds, she ran to catch up with me. She reached for my hand and held it all the way home. Neither of us said a word.

  The next day, Carrie picked Hope up, and I got to go home by myself for once. I was sitting in the kitchen enjoying the peace and quiet of a late afternoon in winter when the front door opened and closed. I listened. No voices.

  “Carrie?” I called. “Hope? Is that you?”

  Carrie came into the kitchen alone. “It’s us,” she said.

  “Where’s Hope?”

  “Going up to Mom’s room. I’m really worried, Liza. Something’s wrong. Miss Donnelly gave me a note—a sealed one—to give to Mom tonight. She said there was a little problem at school today. And Hopie wouldn’t talk all the way home, except to say she wanted to go to her room.”

  “Oh, no.”

  Carrie looked longingly at the note. “I wonder if we could steam—”

  I cut her off, shaking my head. “No. Mom would know. We’ll just have to wait.”

  Hope was still upstairs when Mom got home. Carrie didn’t even give Mom a chance to take off her coat. She thrust the note at her while she was still standing in front of the closet.

  “It’s from Miss Donnelly,” Carrie
informed her. “There’s a problem.”

  Mom looked as if she needed a problem about as much as she needed dandruff. She sighed, hung up her coat, and opened the note right there in the front hall.

  “What’s it say? What’s it say?” Carrie asked.

  I hovered behind her. “It must be pretty bad. Hopie’s been in your room all afternoon.”

  “Well,” said Mom, “it seems that Hope took the classroom tool kit out of Miss Donnelly’s desk today and hid it in her cubby. Apparently, she was going to take it home. Now, why would Hope take a tool kit, of all things?”

  Tool kit. I began to feel a little funny. Did it have anything to do with yesterday, with what I’d said to her? I shifted from one foot to the other. I couldn’t figure out the connection, though. Hopie had wanted the tools for Dad, but she knew very well she couldn’t give them to him. She’d said so herself. I decided to keep quiet about the incident at the hardware store. After all, Hope hadn’t taken the tools. Mom would talk to her about stealing, and everything would be okay.

  But Mom didn’t talk to her. Instead, she talked to a friend of hers who was a child psychologist. I overheard her on the phone that evening. Mom told her friend she’d decided Hope needed help. She described Hope’s behavior lately, ending with the tool-kit incident. Then she asked how much it would cost for Hope to see a doctor once or twice a week. When I heard her repeat “Seventy-five dollars an hour?” I was shocked. I knew I had to talk to her. We couldn’t afford that much money. Besides, Hope needed to talk to me, not to some doctor.

  As soon as she hung up the phone, I told Mom how Hope had seen some tools she would have wanted to give Dad for Christmas if he were still alive. “You know,” said Mom, “I never bothered to ask Hope why she took the tools. I think we better do that now.”

  Hope was upstairs with Brent and Carrie. They were telling her stories before she went to bed. Mom shooed them out, then sat me on the bed with Hope.

  “Okay,” said Mom, pacing the room. “Hope, Liza told me you saw a tool kit in the hardware store yesterday. She said you wanted to buy it for Daddy. Is that right?” Hope nodded.

  “Does that have anything to do with why you tried to take Miss Donnelly’s tools today? Why did you want Miss Donnelly’s tools?”

  “Liza said if Daddy couldn’t have presents, no one could.”

  Mom frowned. “But what were you going to do with the tools?”

  “Give them to Daddy—at his grave. Liza doesn’t know that we really can give him presents. She never comes to the graveyard.” She turned to me. “See, Liza, we give Daddy flowers all the time. The flowers are presents … aren’t they, Mommy?”

  “Well, in a way,” replied Mom. “So you were going to give Daddy the tools?”

  “Yes. And then it would be okay for us to get presents. Liza said.”

  I sighed.

  “Oh,” said Mom. “I think I see. Liza, would you leave us alone for awhile, please? I want to talk to your sister. Then I want to talk to you.”

  I went to my room and kicked Carrie out.

  “More privacy?” she asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Boy, I can’t wait until Brent goes to college. Then you can have all the privacy you want.”

  When Mom came in a few minutes later, she sat on my bed looking annoyed. “What did I tell you?” she said.

  “I don’t—”

  “I said you didn’t have to participate in Christmas, but that you were not to spoil anything for the others. And I don’t ever want you saying things like this to Hope again. Is that clear?”

  I nodded.

  “She’s confused enough as it is. She doesn’t need guilt or anything else piled on top of her. Tomorrow I’ll have to call Miss Donnelly and explain this to her. And the next time you pick Hope up at school, I want you to apologize to Miss Donnelly.”

  “Aw, Mom.”

  “I mean it, Liza. I’m not sure what’s going on with you and Christmas and Dad’s death, but the rest of us are getting a bit tired of your martyred sensitivity. You’re not the only one who lost someone you loved. Your sisters and brother lost their father, too. And I lost my husband. I want you to think about that. And if you feel you’d like to talk to a counselor, let me know. I can arrange it. It might be a good idea for you.”

  “Okay.”

  Mom left the room then, and I sat on my bed. I looked at Carrie’s messy half of the room and wished again for my old bedroom at 25 Bayberry. I wished for Dad. I wished for life the way it had been a year earlier.

  I cried for awhile, and then I tried to do my homework.

  Chapter Seven

  AFTER DENISE TOLD ME about Marc and Cathryn Lynn, I was positive I had lost him for good. And sure enough, Marc barely spoke to me during the entire week after Thanksgiving. However, I didn’t see him with Cathryn Lynn either. She ate lunch with Denise and Margie and me every day, and she never said a word about either Marc or the party.

  “Did they have a good time?” I asked Denise as we walked home from school one day.

  “I don’t know. I guess so.”

  “Has Cathryn Lynn mentioned him at all?”

  “No.”

  “Denise?” I said. I felt a rather personal conversation coming on. Denise and I hadn’t had one of those since our fight. “I have to talk to you.”

  “Okay.” She smiled at me. “Now? Or do you want to go to my house?”

  “Oh, now is fine. It’s this thing with Marc,” I began.

  “I thought so,” said Denise.

  “I can’t explain everything … exactly. It’s not that I don’t want to. It’s because I don’t understand all of it myself. But the thing is, I’m having a hard time with Christmas this year. You know how important Christmas was to my dad.”

  “Yeah,” said Denise.

  “It’s just so hard to have it this year without him.” I was leaving out a lot, but this was the only part of the problem I felt like discussing.

  “Our first Christmas without my dad was hard, too,” said Denise.

  “It was?”

  “Yeah, real hard. Holidays always are.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed glumly.

  “But why didn’t you want to go to Justin’s party? What does that have to do with Christmas?” asked Denise.

  “Oh, I don’t know. It’s all mixed up.”

  “I guess this whole season is tough,” said Denise thoughtfully. “But you know, there are probably going to be other parties and stuff. What if Marc asks you to something else? If you keep turning him down, you’ll lose him forever. It’s like cutting off your nose to spite your face.”

  “I think I’ve already lost him,” I said.

  “I wouldn’t be too sure.”

  “Really?” I said excitedly.

  “Really.”

  I felt a lot better.

  But what made me feel really terrific was when Marc smiled at me in math class the following day as if nothing had ever happened. Ms. Pressman turned her back to write an equation on the board, and I let my eyes drift toward the windows and the snow that was falling beyond them. But before they reached the windows, they ran into Marc’s eyes. And Marc’s eyes crinkled as he smiled at me.

  I managed to squeeze in a smile of my own before Ms. Pressman turned around again, and the next thing I knew, I was being passed another note.

  “Liza—I’m sorry I got mad,” this one said. “Meet me on the playground today. Same time, same place. Okay?—Marc.”

  I nodded at him, grinning, and just managed to wipe the smile off my face before Ms. Pressman turned back to us. Maybe Denise had been right!

  That day, I beat Marc to the cement yard. I had finished my lunch in a hurry and had run outdoors to wait for him. He showed up just a few moments later. My heart began to pound. Why did the sight of Marc always make that happen?

  “Hi,” he said. “If you’re cold, we could go back inside.”

  “No, that’s okay. Let’s stay out here. I like the snow.”
br />   “All right,” said Marc. And then, “Well … I’m not sure why you haven’t wanted to do anything with me yet. I mean, I’m not saying you’re lying, but, like, I have this feeling you could have gone to the movies or the party but you—you—I don’t know.”

  “Oh, Marc. I can’t explain—”

  “Look, I know your father died and all. Maybe that has something to do with it, but anyway, I want to ask you out one more time.”

  One more time. It sounded like a last chance.

  “Next weekend Carlo Giannelli is having a Christmas party. I want you to come with me. It’s Friday at six o’clock.”

  I drew in a deep breath. “I think I can come. I do have to check with Mom, but I think I can come.” The words just popped out of my mouth. I couldn’t believe I’d just said them. I hated parties, and I didn’t want anything to do with Christmas or having fun, yet there I was telling Marc I’d go to Carlo’s Christmas party.

  I didn’t want to lose Marc.

  That evening, I talked to Mom in private in her bedroom. I told her about the party and asked if I could go. “I don’t need any new clothes,” I told her.

  “Who asked you to this party?” said Mom.

  “Marc Radlay.”

  “Isn’t he the boy who broke your other date?”

  “Mom,” I said, “I lied. I didn’t want to go to the movies with him. It’s hard to explain. I was just afraid. But I’m going to go to this party. If I don’t, I’ll never get to do anything with Marc.”

  “Liza,” Mom said. She sat me next to her on Hope’s side of the double bed. “What were you afraid of?”

  “I can’t explain it, Mom.”

  “Are you afraid of boys?”

  “Oh, no. Not that. It’s completely different.”

  “Could you please try to explain? I’d really like to understand.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Does it have to do with Dad?” Mom asked.

  “Sort of.”

  “Well, I can’t force you to tell me what’s bothering you, but I also can’t help you if you don’t.”

  “I know.”

  Mom sighed. “If you ever do want to talk about it,” she said at last, “I’m here. I hope you know that.”