by Halli Gomez
“I’m glad our parents met. Your parents are nice. Hopefully this means I’ll be able to come to your house.”
“That would give us more time for tutoring, even if you don’t need it anymore.”
“I said parents, but Terri’s your stepmom, right? You never talk about your real mom.”
I studied our hands, fingers intertwined. It was nice having someone to talk to. I trusted her and knew she would understand. The guilt of losing someone was a special kind of pain.
“She left a long time ago. But I’m going to see her.” Another secret revealed. I felt lighter. “My dad doesn’t know. And I don’t want him to. Not yet.”
“He doesn’t want you to see her? Did she, uh, how do I say this, did she do something bad?”
“It depends on how you look at it. She left us, but it was because of me.” I let her hands go and clenched mine. “She couldn’t deal with me and everything. The thing is, she has all this stuff, too. She doesn’t understand. . . .” My voice started to shake. Some boyfriend. A blubbering idiot.
Khory rubbed my arm. “What doesn’t she understand?”
“That I need her to explain all this to me. Tell me how to live like this. The pain, it’s . . .” Everything was rising to the top. The pain in my hands and neck, the pain in my heart for being the one who drove her away. They were rising up to one hundred, the top of the scale. I got up from the couch and paced the yard. Khory followed me.
“I can’t begin to understand what you go through. I watch you, and I’m amazed at how you keep going. Happy, funny, really cute.” She grabbed my hand and turned me toward her. “But I know about the guilt. I told you that. What I didn’t say was that when I jumped out of the guy’s car, Krista didn’t. I should have gone back to get her. Or stayed with her. But I ran away. See, it really is my fault.”
I wrapped my arms around her. We stood in the middle of the yard, the patio light too far away to light our faces, but I knew hers was filled with torment just as mine was.
“If there’s anything I can do to help you get to your mom, let me know. I can’t have a reunion, but you can.”
A razor-sharp sword stabbed me through the heart and not because I sent Mom away. It was because once I found her, it would be the end. Khory could not be a part of that.
I hugged her, then led her behind a tree where the patio light couldn’t find any part of us. I kissed her. The softness of her lips and the coconut smell of her hair made me weak. Our lips moved and my tongue found hers. It was warm, moist, and eager. And it took all my pain away.
MARCH 7
The sun was annoyingly bright for a Sunday morning, and it forced me to keep my eyes closed as I shuffled from my bedroom to the kitchen. I slammed into the doorway, collapsed into a chair, then made a pillow with my arms and put my head on the table.
“Good morning,” Terri said. “Sleep in a little late? It’s almost eleven o’clock.”
“Yeah, long week.”
“Your dad and I are going to take Jude to the park. Do you want to go?”
I peeked out the window. Royal-blue sky. I couldn’t deny the beauty, even though I wasn’t into nature. But I had work to do in my search for Mom, which required a house to myself since Terri was clear I should give up my search.
“Thanks, but I have homework. And then I thought I’d go to Khory’s.”
“Okay. Girlfriend over brother. You don’t have to explain. Just make sure you get your homework done first.”
“I will.”
After Mom left, Dad packed up everything she left behind and put it in the basement’s storage closet. A tingle ran through my body at the thought of finding a buried treasure. It woke me up a little more. I ate breakfast, then played on my phone until they finally left.
Our basement wasn’t creepy like the ones in movies where cobwebs hung from the ceiling or the furnace was alive, but it wasn’t the entertainment Mecca like Rainn’s either. It had finished walls like hers, but the couches were older, the ping-pong table had a layer of dust, and the bookcase was filled with outdated magazines and trophies from Dad’s college baseball days. Our basement was the perfect place for a life that didn’t exist anymore.
I went to the closet at the far end of the room and opened the door. My neck twitched faster, and my heart beat harder.
“We’ll send them to her when she gets settled,” Dad told me when he first brought the boxes down here.
“I can bring them when I visit,” I said.
His face changed. I could still see it. The smile with lips parted but teeth clenched together. Back then I read it as “sure, that’s a great idea,” but now I knew it meant, “Oh, you poor sucker. You keep telling yourself that lie.”
I lied to myself for the first year or so. Until the cards stopped coming. Then I begged Dad to take me to her.
“I can’t,” he said. No explanation. Just “I can’t.”
I stomped my feet and kicked and pounded the walls. At eleven I had regressed to toddler temper tantrums. How could Dad keep us apart? But after what Terri said, I understood he was too busy managing a special-needs son, working, and convincing everyone, mostly himself, that things were still great. He didn’t have the time to worry about a woman who didn’t want to be worried about.
I flicked on the light. The closet was filled with boxes. The ones in front were marked “Toys.” I peeked in and found my old Legos, Matchbox cars, random trucks, and action figures. All of them saved for Jude when he stopped putting everything into his mouth. I pulled those boxes out and looked at the ones farther back. There had to be fifteen more marked “Halloween,” “Christmas,” and “Financials.” The stuff you keep for the IRS in case they pick your name from the Triwizard Cup for your spot in the audit process.
I dragged those out and found what I was searching for stuffed in the back corner. The ones marked “Jennifer.” My neck twitched for ten rounds of ten. I crossed my fingers and hoped for pictures of a favorite city, letters, or information on her parents. I was pretty sure her mom was still alive. Maybe she went there. Did my grandmother know about me? Wouldn’t she want to see me? I thought about finding her too, but I didn’t have any more room on my list.
I sighed and ripped open the first box. Jeans, flowery dresses, and lots of black shoes. Stuff only good for Halloween costumes or donations to Goodwill. I pushed the box to the side and tore open the next.
“Yes!”
This was what I needed. I pulled a photo album off the top and flipped through it. There were a few pictures of Mom when she was young, like in middle school and high school, but it was mostly filled with pictures of other kids and what adults called memorabilia. Ribbons. Cards. Tickets.
I put the album to the side, dug deeper into the box, and pulled out birthday, anniversary, and condolence cards. I read through a few and realized they were about my granddad. My body tingled. One step closer. I carried the box out of the closet, dropped it on the floor, then shoved everything else back in. Hopefully I got the order right, but I doubted anyone would go in here until it was time to stick the lawn scarecrow into the ground.
I carried the box upstairs, put it on my bed, and took everything out. Photo albums. Cards. Yearbooks. Letters. I opened another album. There weren’t many pictures of her in this one either, but it did show a side of her I didn’t know. Besides a few pictures of other people, it was filled with awards. Math. Writing. Honor society. I smiled. She had the same idea I had—hyperfocus on studying to keep the mind and body from going crazy. I flipped through the pages. She had awards in just about everything.
I went through the cards next. Most were from Dad. I tossed those aside, afraid I’d read something that would add to the disgusting condom visual already cemented in my mind from the exploration of the night table. And why torture myself when they wouldn’t give any clue to where she was now? They lived together, and supposedly were happy, until their twelfth anniversary. By the thirteenth, I had been diagnosed.
I finally got
to the condolence cards. There weren’t many. A few from neighbors, Dad’s coworkers, and names I didn’t recognize. Then I came across the clue that was better than finding plans to the Death Star. My grandfather’s obituary.
Steven James Montgomery, of Schenectady, New York, died in 1998. He was an Air Force veteran, then had a thirty-two-year career as an accountant. He was survived by his wife, Margaret, and their daughter, Jennifer Montgomery Hayes.
Mom. I squeezed my hands ten times, dropped the paper before my hand crumpled it up, then opened my laptop and searched for Jennifer Montgomery in Schenectady, New York.
. . . . . . . . . .
I scrolled through eight pages of Jennifer Montgomerys. A huge difference from the eighty-five thousand results I got before. The basic information told me nothing, but for the bargain price of $5.99, I could find out anything. No wonder this world had such issues. Any criminal with a credit card could find out a person’s entire life history, but for someone like me, a law-abiding citizen who just wanted to find his mom, it was as out of reach as a $599.00 report. It sucked to be sixteen without a credit card.
Would Dad and Terri notice a tiny little charge to Findanyone.com? Of course. They were cops. One phone call would incriminate me, and my technology would be taken away forever.
There had to be a way. I searched other websites and scrolled through the pages until my eyes crossed. I slumped over my desk and mindlessly clicked on the Page Next button. Again. Again. For ten rounds of ten easily.
Until a name caught my eye. Jennifer H. Montgomery. Did the H stand for Hayes? I crossed my fingers, clicked on her name, and hoped for something current and, more importantly, free.
The blue bar traveled from left to right.
A new screen popped up. Across the top was the name Jennifer Hayes Montgomery. Farther down, places she had lived. They included Schenectady, New York, and Richmond, Virginia.
My neck twitched. My face scrunched. Every nerve in my body came alive. I scrolled down further. A phone number and this year’s date. I clicked on the number. My leg bounced as the new page loaded.
There it was. The number and the name Margaret Montgomery. My grandmother. It had to be them. I didn’t believe in coincidences. Like when someone laughed in your direction, they were definitely laughing at you. I opened my phone and the sublist for Mom, then typed the number, date, and website.
Ten simple numbers. Of course, ten. All I had to do was call it. It sounded easy, but then what? Would I tell her everything? If I did that on the phone, she’d never agree to see me. And I needed to see her. One more time.
My stomach churned. My neck twitched. I squeezed my hands together. One simple call to see who answered, then hang up. No talking. No stories. Just to make sure the voice was hers.
I pulled up the phone keypad and put in the first few numbers: 518-875—Wait. Did she have caller ID? Everyone did today. She’d know it was me, or Dad, since the phone was in his name. Maybe she’d see that and not answer.
Khory said she would help. She would figure out what to do. I put Mom’s box in the closet, got dressed, and jumped on my bike. The houses and trees were a blur of red and green. A drop of sweat tickled my face as it ran down my cheek. I turned onto Khory’s driveway, dropped my bike, careful to not touch the grass, and wiped my face.
She opened the door. I raced up the driveway and stood in front of her panting and shaking.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
I shoved my phone at her opened to Mom’s number.
“Whose number is that?”
“My mom’s.”
She gasped. “You want me to call and see who answers?”
I nodded.
“Are you going to talk to her? Do you know what you want to say?”
I shook my head. “I can’t talk. Not yet.”
She rubbed my arm. “It’s okay. I’ll just ask if it’s her. Maybe pretend I’m a salesperson or something.”
“Good idea. Could you put it on speaker so I’ll know if it’s her voice?”
I grabbed the doorway. What if I didn’t recognize her voice? It had been six years, and I was just a kid when she left. But who doesn’t recognize their own mom’s voice?
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Khory asked.
“Yeah.”
She led me to her room for privacy but left the door open so her parents wouldn’t freak out. The furniture was all white, and except for a few bottles of perfume, the tops of her desk and dresser were clean. No distractions or urges to straighten. She was my dream girl. I sat on the bed and stroked the purple comforter that matched her pillow. On the wall above her headboard was a bulletin board with notes, cards, and pictures, including the one Rainn took of us last week. Khory looked beautiful, as usual, but I had a Tourette smirk. Random pictures with smart phones wasn’t something I thought about before I had a girlfriend. I leaned over, unpinned it, and put it facedown on the night table.
“Are you ready?” Khory put her phone on her dresser with mine next to it, and turned it on speaker.
I walked to the dresser, counted to ten, and nodded. She put the numbers in her phone. It rang. Once. Twice. I crossed my fingers and silently pleaded with Mom to pick up on an even number. Three.
“Hello?”
Odd. Shit.
The voice on the phone sounded almost childlike. A kid who had answered her mom’s phone. Everyone always questioned whether she was the Mrs. Jennifer Hayes and not her daughter.
It was her. I grabbed the dresser.
“Hello, ma’am. I’m Janet from Democrats for a Better America. I’d like to send you information on our organization. Would you like to provide your address?”
“I’m sorry, but I’m not interested. Thank you.” She hung up.
Khory pressed the red button, and the call ended. She turned to me. “Was it her?”
“Yes,” I whispered. “Good idea to try and get her address.”
I cleared my throat and took a few breaths, but the invisible hand skipped the foreplay and went right into squeezing the air from my chest. I stumbled backward to the bed and collapsed. My stomach was in knots. I took a breath, just enough to get some air in and not die. I counted to ten. Out loud.
“One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.”
I was on round six when Khory sat next to me and put her hand on my leg. I took another breath, deep, faced her, then leaped up.
“I gotta go.” Freaking out was a trait I preferred to do on my own.
“Wait.” She grabbed my arm and pulled me back to the bed. “It’s okay. Hearing your mom’s voice after all this time is pretty weird.”
I nodded, but it wasn’t okay. My neck wouldn’t stop twitching and was already past an eighty on the pain scale. My brain couldn’t think of anything except numbers. Ten. Always ten. Calming techniques that didn’t work, ages with bad memories. I grabbed my hair and put my head down. Make it go away.
“I really have to go. Thanks for helping.” I bolted out of her bedroom, down the stairs, and out the front door.
Halfway home my phone beeped.
KHORY: I love you
Tears filled my eyes. I pulled over onto the grass and texted back.
ME: I love you too.
And I did, but that didn’t seem big enough to describe how I felt about her. I guess those words hadn’t been invented yet.
MARCH 7
I rode my bike into the garage, dropped it on the ground, and yanked open the door to the house.
“There you are. Dinner is in thirty minutes,” Terri said.
I gasped and jumped back. I was so lost in my own mind, I forgot they’d be back from the park. Terri opened the freezer, took out a bag, and put it in the microwave.
“You okay?” she asked.
“Yeah, fine,” I said.
She tilted her head and opened her mouth. Of course, she had more to ask, but I didn’t have time for twenty qu
estions. They could all be summed up in one answer anyway: life sucked.
I fell on my bed in a fit of neck twitches, hand clenches, and face scrunches. I pulled my hair and bent my fingers back. Break, damn it. Do it. Break. My head felt like exploding. I grabbed my hair again and buried my face in the pillow, but none of it would stop. I was definitely at one hundred.
I closed my eyes and focused on the softness of Khory’s hands. Her lips. I took a deep breath hoping for coconut, but all I got was the scent of sweat. Even like this she loved me. Why couldn’t Mom?
I’d recognized Mom’s voice right away. Too bad I wasn’t on that old game show about how many notes to name the song. My game was how many words to name the voice from your past. I got it in one. Did I win a prize?
The voice was the one that used to ask me about school and if I wanted to go out and play. Today it didn’t have the edginess she had when my tics invaded hers.
I swung my arm toward the night table and sent my clock flying. It landed with a thud on the floor. My shoulders relaxed. I opened the drawer, took out a hardcover book, and threw it against the wall. My neck twitch slowed down.
My door opened. “Troy, dinner,” Dad said.
I wiped my face and smiled. What was that dumb thing adults said? It’s hard to be mad if you have a smile on your face? That was bullshit. Just like everything else they said. I faced Dad. His eyebrows were scrunched up.
“Anything you want to talk about?” He gazed past me and scanned my room.
I followed his gaze to the clock and book on the floor. So my room was messy for the first time in my life, big deal.
“No.” It was the truth. He’d find out soon enough.
The smell of steak met me in the hallway. It smelled great, but I wasn’t hungry. Unfortunately, that was never an excuse to get out of family meals when we were all home. Jude sat in his high chair with a pouty face. Even at eleven months, he knew his mom was a good cook, and it sucked not to get any of the real food.
“How’s Khory?” Terri asked when we were all at the table.
