Pearl

“His wife had a baby. That’s what you said.”

  She reaches out with her left hand to steady herself some more.

  “What does this mean?” she asks.

  “You tell me, Mom.”

  “We’re supposed to go to the mall.”

  Claire comes up behind her. “What’s going on?”

  I stay leaning against the kitchen sink. My mom stays braced in the doorway.

  “It’s impossible,” my mom says, shaking her head. But she looks scared.

  “Where did he live?” I ask quietly.

  “I don’t know!”

  “How could you not know? You were sleeping with him! Do you even know his last name?”

  “Don’t you dare! Don’t you dare!” she yells.

  “Dare what? Make you feel like a—”

  “Don’t you dare say that word!”

  “Is someone going to tell me what the hell is going on?” Claire asks.

  “Nothing!” My mom glares at me. “It’s a misunderstanding,” she says, letting go of the doorjamb. She slides her feet together and stands up straight to make room for Claire in the doorway. A barricade of crazy. “Of course it is,” she adds. Then she laughs in a maniacal way.

  “Then why was Sally so upset?” I ask. “Why was she so sure?”

  “I don’t know! But it has to be a misunderstanding. I mean, it has to. What did you tell her, anyway?”

  “Nothing! I told Henry what you told me last night. About why Bill left.” I eye Claire, unsure how much she knows about my mom’s past when it comes to Bill. “We were in Henry’s room, but Sally was listening behind the door and then she freaked out.”

  My mom tilts her head, like she’s trying to put all the pieces of the scene together in her mind.

  Claire just looks confused.

  “Okay,” my mom says. “I’m going over there right now to straighten this out.”

  “Mom!” I yell, finally pulling myself away from the sink. “You can’t!”

  “Oh yes I can!”

  “You’re going to upset her even more!” I’m crying again, imagining poor Sally being confronted by my crazed mom. “You don’t understand. She was devastated! You don’t know her like I do. Let me go instead.”

  “She’s my friend too,” my mom says, as if she’s ten. “I’m the one she’s upset with. I’m the one who needs to make it right.”

  “Will someone please tell me what the hell is going on?” Claire asks.

  But my mom is already padding down the hall and shoving her waitress shoes on.

  Claire glares at me as if it’s all my fault that my mom has completely lost her mind.

  “Honey!” she calls after my mom. “You can’t go outside in your nighty!”

  “I know that!” my mom snaps. She changes direction and heads up the stairs.

  I race to the phone to try to call Henry again. The machine clicks on. At the beep, I take a deep breath and try to steady my voice so they won’t know I’m crying.

  “Um,” I say, wondering if my voice is filling their tiny living room. “It’s me. Please pick up.” I wait, imagining Henry and Sally sitting on the couch together without me in my usual spot. I imagine them watching my empty space while they listen to me.

  “I think there’s been a misunderstanding,” I add. “About Bill.”

  I hate saying his name again. I can almost feel them cringe when I say it. “Please. I’m sure this is just a crazy coincidence. I’m sure! Please pick up.” I wait. “Okay. Well, I think my mom is going to try to come over there. I just thought you should know.”

  I wait a few more seconds, then hang up and stand alone in the kitchen.

  When my mom comes downstairs, Claire trailing behind, she looks unstoppable. But at least she’s not wearing her nightgown anymore.

  “You can’t go,” I say. “She doesn’t want to see you.”

  “That’s why I have to go,” she says back, brushing past me.

  I follow her onto the porch and down the front steps.

  “Maybe Beany’s right, Lex,” Claire says, following her down the walkway.

  “Mom!” I call. “You’re going to make things worse! You’re only going to hurt her more! She doesn’t want to see you!”

  She keeps walking. We chase after her. It feels very odd to be on Claire’s team.

  At Henry’s house, my mom begins to march up the walkway to their front door. I start to follow but Claire holds my arm.

  “Maybe we should let her go. When she’s determined, there’s really no stopping her.”

  “No!” I wrench my arm away. “She’s hurt Sally enough. She’s going to make it even worse!”

  “How has she hurt them? She hasn’t done anything! Your mom is the best thing that ever happened to Sally!”

  “What!? God, Claire, are you serious? Sally was happy before you two started forcing her out of the house. Getting her drunk. Dying her hair so she looks like a circus freak. You think that’s helped her?”

  Claire steps back. “Circus freak? How can you say that!”

  “You and my mom have made her into some sort of project. But you don’t even know her! I’ve been going to Sally’s almost every day since I was seven. We were happy until you two interfered.”

  “Maybe you were happy. But Sally wasn’t.”

  “How would you know?” I’m so mad I want to hit her.

  Claire’s face changes. “She told us.”

  “What?”

  Claire looks at her feet. “She hasn’t been happy for a long time, Bean.”

  I glance at the run-down house. My mom knocking at the door and pushing the doorbell.

  “But—” I start to say, but my voice cracks. Because Sally has always been sad. And I’ve always known it. And even though she looks a little ridiculous now, she also looks happy. Well, she did.

  I shake my head. “Everything is so messed up,” I say.

  “We’ll fix it,” Claire says. And for the first time, I can actually hear sincerity in her voice.

  “But not like this,” I say.

  She surprises me by nodding. “You’re probably right.”

  I leave her standing on the sidewalk and run up to the house. I hear the ding-dong inside as my mom presses the button over and over, but no footsteps come to the door.

  “Mom, let’s go! Please!”

  She presses again. And again.

  “I’m not leaving until we straighten this out,” she says. “This is all just a huge misunderstanding and we’re going to get to the bottom of it right now.”

  But at least five minutes go by and nothing happens. Claire paces nervously at the curb.

  Finally, I turn around and walk back toward the sidewalk.

  “Well?” Claire asks.

  “They’re not home,” I lie.

  “Huh?”

  I ignore her and walk away. I don’t know where I’m going, but I can’t watch any more of this train wreck.

  At the next corner, I come to the MiniMart. It makes me sad to see the storefront. To see the bike rack Henry and I like to lean against while we eat our treats. I cross the street and lean on the rack. It’s warm from the sun. There are never any bikes fastened to it. No one around here rides bikes. I sit down and lean against it just like Henry and I have done a thousand times. I close my eyes and let the sun warm my face while I concentrate on not letting any tears leak out. I want Gus back. I want Henry back. I want so much for everything to be like it was. But then I think of my mom sneaking around with Claire. Too afraid to tell Gus the truth. Too ashamed. And Sally, stuck on the couch with her fake Days friends feeding her heart with lies about life and love and living. There are no good times to go back to. And now there are none ahead, either. A tear escapes and slowly runs down my cheek.

  “Hey,” a voice says.

  I open my eyes and see his white tennis shoes. I quickly wipe my face with my hand.

  “Your mom’s still ringing our doorbell,” he says, sitting next to me.

  When his arm
brushes against mine, I want to lean into him and hold on. But he shifts away so we aren’t touching.

  “I’m so sorry, Hen. For everything. I—”

  “Don’t,” he says. “You don’t have to say anything.”

  “But my mom. She’s nuts. I tried to stop her but she wouldn’t listen.”

  He moves his hand as if he’s going to put it on my knee, but midway he pulls it back and tries to rub out a dark mark on his sneaker, as if that was the plan all along.

  “Sally’s gone a little nuts, too. She won’t come out of her room.”

  I shake my head. “This is awful.”

  “Yeah.”

  We sit there for a while, watching the usuals go in and out of the store.

  “You don’t really think it’s possible, do you?” Henry finally asks.

  I don’t dare look at him, for fear I’ll see some family resemblance that’s been there all along.

  “It can’t be,” I say. But I feel how desperate those words are.

  “Yeah.”

  We’re quiet again, but every second seems to linger.

  “My mom doesn’t believe it,” I say, still too afraid to look at him. “Either that or she’s determined not to.”

  And then it dawns on me that Sally seems almost too eager to believe it. “Oh,” I say out loud by mistake.

  “What?” Henry asks, sitting up more.

  “Uh, nothing.”

  “Come on.”

  “It’s just that—” I bite my lip.

  “What?”

  “What if Sally wants to believe it?”

  “What? Are you crazy, too?” He stands up like he’s going to walk away from me.

  “No!” I say, getting up after him. “I don’t mean it in a bad way! It’s just—”

  He turns to me. “Just what?”

  “What if she needs to know why he left so badly, she’ll believe this, even if it’s awful? What if she needs to know it’s not her fault that he left? Or yours?”

  He keeps his eyes locked with mine. I feel the hurt pass between us.

  “I don’t know,” he says. “I just don’t know.”

  He starts walking back in the direction of our houses.

  “Wait for me,” I say.

  He slows down and we walk side by side without talking.

  When we get near his house, we see Claire and my mom sitting on the steps.

  “Great,” I say. We stop and watch them.

  “Why are they still here?” he asks.

  “They’re waiting.” I roll my eyes.

  Henry shakes his head. “They don’t know my mom. She won’t come to the door. It’s not like she isn’t practiced at staying in the house.”

  I hate hearing him say that.

  I imagine Sally lying in her big red bed with the rose-covered bedspread and pink and red pillows, fretting quietly and hoping they’ll leave. She’s probably crying. It makes me want to scream at my mom and Claire to leave her alone.

  “I guess it’s good that your mom wants to try to help,” Henry says.

  “No it’s not! She’s not doing this for Sally. She’s doing it for herself. She’s trying to clear her conscience, that’s all.”

  I’m sure of it now. For the same reason Sally seems to need to have this craziness be true, my mom maybe even more desperately needs it not to be. I don’t think she can bear the thought of having ruined one more person’s life. I know how it feels.

  “We have to find out the truth,” I say.

  “How?”

  “I don’t know. But we have to. How much do you know about your dad? Do you have any pictures? Or letters? Anything?” He starts to shake his head, but then he stops.

  “Wait. The box!”

  “What box?”

  “My mom keeps a box under her bed. One time I caught her sitting in bed crying and I saw it sticking out from under the sheets. I asked her what was wrong, but she covered up the box and said she was fine. I didn’t dare ask her what she was hiding, but I remember the box because it was red. And one time when I was vacuuming her room, I lifted the dust ruffle on her bed and saw the same red box hidden under there.”

  “Maybe she has a picture of him in there!”

  Henry looks back toward the house. Claire and my mom still haven’t noticed us. We step back out of sight.

  “Do you think you could sneak into her room and get the box?”

  “I don’t know. I mean, maybe if she was talking to your mom again and they went out—”

  “That seems unlikely at the moment.”

  “Yeah.”

  “What about when she goes to use the bathroom or something?”

  Henry wrinkles his nose.

  “Sorry, but when else would she leave her room?”

  “Maybe when she’s taking a shower? Then she wouldn’t hear me with the water running.”

  “Perfect!”

  “Okay.”

  “And I’ll try to get more out of my mom, if she ever stops stalking your front door.”

  “Right.”

  He starts to go, but I grab his arm. “Hen, it’s not going to be true. It’s not.”

  He steps out of my reach. “I’ll call you later,” he says quietly.

  I nod, lifting my discarded hand to put a nonexistent strand of hair behind my ear. “I’ll try to get them to come home.”

  We start forward again.

  “How did you get past them, anyway?” I ask.

  “Back door.”

  “Ah.”

  When we get close to the house, he ducks into the neighbor’s yard and makes for the back of the house. My mom looks up and sees him. Thankfully, she doesn’t follow.

  Henry pauses before disappearing around the corner. I wait to see if he’ll turn back to face me. But instead he looks at his feet, then slowly steps behind the house.

  I take a deep breath and join my mom and Claire.

  “You have to leave now,” I say.

  Claire stands up.

  “She’s right, Lexie. Just give it up for today.” She reaches for my mom’s hand and pulls her to her feet.

  My mom looks defeated.

  “If you’re so sure it’s not true, help me prove it,” I say.

  Her eyes meet mine and a look of surprise floods over her. “Of course!” she says, slapping herself on the head. “I have something! I can prove it! Why didn’t I think of it before?”

  The first answer that comes to mind is Because you’re afraid you can’t, so I keep my mouth shut and lead the way home.

  chapter twenty-three

  Back home, Claire and my mom are fighting. My mom’s bedroom door is shut, but I don’t have to press my ear against my own bedroom wall to hear them.

  “Why would you have a picture?” Claire yells. “Why on earth would you save a picture?”

  “It’s not a photograph, it’s … something else. Something I drew.”

  “You drew his face? Why? And why would you keep it? My God, Lexie, do I know you?”

  “It’s not what you think. It’s private,” my mom cries. “But I need to show Beany.”

  “Why would you want her to see his face?” I think Claire is crying too. “Why would you ever want her to have anything to do with him? How could you!”

  “Stop it!” my mom cries.

  “No! I can’t stop it! I don’t understand you!”

  “She’s my daughter! I make the decisions!”

  “I’m not trying to make decisions for you!”

  “You’re judging me!”

  I put my hands over my ears, but I can’t drown out their voices.

  Stupid Claire. Who does she think she is, my stepmom?

  “You know I drew everything when I was younger. I thought I might find him in my old diary, okay?”

  “I would have ripped out those pages!” Claire yells.

  “Well, I’m not you!”

  I leave my room so I don’t have to hear them anymore. In the hallway, I put my hand on the white porcelain door
knob to Gus’s room and turn. Inside, the sun shines through the curtains and casts a lacy shadow on the white bedspread. I shut the door and step carefully toward the bed. Instead of lying on it, I crawl under again.

  I slowly breathe in the still air. The old wood of the box- spring mattress. The wood polish mixed with dust. I close my eyes and try to block out the fighting, try to focus on the familiar outside noises through the window screen. But I can still hear the muffled noises of my mom and Claire fighting. I can still feel the weight of Henry’s sad face, of Sally’s tears, pressing against my heart. I close my eyes and breathe in the quiet.

  After a while, their voices finally stop. The back of my head aches from being so heavy against the wood floor. I roll over and out from under the bed. Before I open the door, I listen for my mom and Claire. Then, I slowly turn the knob and step into the hallway.

  “Hi.”

  I jump about a mile.

  My mom is standing in my bedroom doorway, clutching a familiar-looking notebook in her arms.

  “I was just—” I start to say.

  “I don’t want to know,” she interrupts. “Can we talk?”

  I nod.

  We go into my room and sit on my bed.

  “I want you to read this,” she says, handing me the notebook. It’s a composition notebook, just like the one she gave me for my thirteenth birthday. I look at the cover.

  “Is this your diary?”

  She nods.

  “But that’s private,” I say, trying to hand it back to her.

  She pushes it into my lap. “I know. But I want you to read it anyway.”

  “Why can’t you just tell me what’s in it?” I’m so tired of us not being straight with each other. Of hiding. I think of Claire and realize she’s the only one who’s been brave enough to tell it like it is.

  My mom touches the worn cover of the notebook in my lap. “There are some words—some feelings—that are too hard to speak out loud,” she says. “Lots of old ghosts in here I don’t want to revisit. But I think it’ll answer your questions for good this time. It holds all the truths I have, Bean.”

  “But—”

  “I want you to read it. Please. I think it’s the only way you’ll really be able to understand what happened back then.” She pulls her hand away and rubs it on her thigh, as if she’s wiping away any memories that might have seeped out.

  “Read it,” she says again. “For me.” She stands and heads for the door. “Claire, hon, you cleaning up the room?” she calls as she leaves me. “I totally trashed it looking for that thing,” she says to me over her shoulder as she walks away.