Exactly, I think, but I don’t have to say it out loud. Maureen gets me that way.
I finish on the dachshund dog, return it to the corner, and help Maureen hook up another swing. This one is an upside-down lollipop cushion. I sit on it and Maureen winds me tight and then lets go, sending me spinning in circles. She always makes me promise to let her know if I’m getting dizzy but so far that hasn’t happened.
On my second time unwinding, I’m holding tight to the swing, whizzing so fast that the colors of the gym are blurry, like a rainbow pinwheel spinning into gray.
“You know, Willa,” Maureen says, “sometimes you feel terrible and there’s nothing to do but accept that it’s happening and let yourself be in it.”
At first I think she means the blurry spinning, but then I realize she’s talking about the stuff with my dad and Ruby’s mom.
“I guess,” I say quietly.
At the end of our session, as I dig through the treasure bin for a stretchy bracelet, I don’t feel as lousy as before. Somehow having permission to feel bad makes me feel a little bit better.
Maureen gives me a stick of wintergreen gum and I chew it for the whole walk home. When I get into the apartment, I’m surprised to discover Benji and our sitter, Joshua, on the couch playing Minecraft. Totally not fair! We’re not allowed to have screen time on weeknights unless Dad is out for the evening. And if Dad is out for the evening, he always tells us the plan in the morning. This morning he just told us to pack our backpacks and hurry to the elevator.
I kick off my sneakers, drop my backpack on the floor, and flop onto the couch next to Benji.
“How many minutes have you had?” I ask. “And why are you getting Minecraft today? It’s not a weekend.”
Joshua is sitting on my brother’s other side. I can see that they are working on Machu Picchu. Benji has been building it for a few weekends now. I usually build animal rescue centers but sometimes I help with Benji’s temple. It took me two days to build a hundred stairs—and that’s only on one side!
“He’s had twenty-five minutes.” Joshua glances at his phone on the coffee table. “I have the timer set. He has five more minutes.”
I nod. I’m glad Joshua isn’t letting Benji have unlimited screen time. Usually with Minecraft, we get thirty minutes each on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. My parents talked about it and that’s what they decided on. It’s not a lot—like I know a ton of kids whose parents don’t even know what games they’re playing. But it’s better than nothing.
“Can I go next?” I ask, watching as Benji puts walls around a secret chamber inside the temple.
“Definitely,” Joshua says, touching his goatee. “Did you wash your hands yet? And unpack your backpack?”
I shake my head. On the bulletin board inside the front door my dad has made a checklist for my afternoon routine. I don’t look at it much anymore. Usually I remember most things on my own.
“Do everything on your checklist,” Joshua says, “and then you can have your turn.”
“Why are we getting Minecraft?” I push off the couch and hop onto the trampoline. I jump with both legs together and then one leg at a time. “Where’s my dad going tonight?”
Joshua shrugs. “Don’t know. He texted me a few hours ago and asked if I could stay late.”
“Is he having dinner with someone?” I ask. Of course I’m thinking about Ruby’s mom, but I don’t say that because I don’t know if Joshua knows they’re together and I don’t feel like being the one to tell him.
“I’m not sure,” Joshua says.
I glance at Benji, wondering if he’s going to blurt it out or do more of the kissing song, but Benji is fixated on the screen, sucking every bit of Minecraft out of his final few seconds.
Joshua glances at his phone again. “Willa, go ahead and do your checklist now.”
He’s using his warning tone. It’s the same tone that my mom and dad use when I’m not listening. It’s the tone that leads to strikes, and three strikes lead to consequences. Sometimes I don’t care about consequences, but I’m not in the mood to go down the strike road right now.
“Fine.” I jump off the trampoline and stomp into the kitchen, pounding my heels into the ground.
It’s not that I’m mad at Joshua. We’ve had him as our sitter for two years, and Benji and I both like him. It’s just that my dad always tells me ahead of time when he’ll be out late, and now he’s pulled a change on me without any warning.
I tug my lunch box and books out of my backpack and then dig around for my water bottle, but it’s missing. Great. Just great. Now I’ll have to ask my dad to order another one, and he’ll sigh like he’s disappointed. Well, fine. Let him be. I’ll tell him I’m disappointed right back.
The next night, Dad comes home in time for Taco Tuesday. But after he’s done with the dishes, he closes himself in his bedroom for almost an hour. I can hear him talking on the phone in there. Dad often has work calls at night, but he always takes them on the couch with his laptop open on the coffee table. I usually lie on the couch reading with my feet in his lap, half listening to his boring conversations about building permits and zoning laws.
Tonight when Dad peeks into my room to tell me to brush my teeth, I ask, “Who were you on the phone with?”
“Sandhya,” he says. Then he holds up a silver water bottle with the label still on. “I bought you a new bottle at Whole Foods today. I’ll put your name sticker on it and fill it up for tomorrow.”
“Thanks,” I say.
“Can you try to keep track of this one until the end of the year?”
“It’s not like I want to lose them. They just fall out of my backpack.” I run my hands over the LEGOs on my floor, pushing my palms into the sharp edges. “What were you and Ruby’s mom talking about?”
“A lot of things,” Dad says. “We’ll talk more about it soon. Now it’s time to brush your teeth. And we didn’t trim your toenails last night.”
I ignore the part about my toenails. “When will we talk about it?”
“Dad!” Benji calls from the living room. “Can I read you this thing about the Archbishop of Canterbury? Did you know that he was killed by followers of the king in 1170 but the king didn’t actually want him dead? It was an accidental assassination!”
“We’ll talk about it all soon,” Dad says to me.
“When?” I ask. This is getting really annoying.
“Dad!” Benji calls across the apartment. “Did you hear what I said about the Archbishop of—”
“Yes, I heard and I’m coming!” Dad calls back, laughing. Before he leaves he says to me, “Waggy, it’s going to be okay. I promise.”
As I stomp into the bathroom, I think about how Dad is hardly one to be making promises right now. And why does Benji care so much about the Archbishop of Canterbury’s death from almost a thousand years ago when our life is falling apart right here in the present? I spit into the sink, watching the foamy toothpaste swirl in circles and disappear down the drain.
“We need to talk,” I hiss-whisper to Ruby during quiet reading the next morning. “Can you get a bathroom pass? I’ll get one first, and you wait a little bit and then meet me there.”
“Okay.” She glances quickly at Ms. Lacey, who is busy conferencing with Elijah and Haley. Elijah is sucking at his knuckles. No doubt they’re talking about middle school letters. The tension in the air is so thick that no one can say the words middle school without someone starting to whimper. I can’t believe that a week ago that was my biggest worry!
I grab a pass and hurry to the bathroom. A few seconds later, Ruby comes in. She glances behind her, making sure she didn’t get followed. Ruby never gets in trouble at school, so she’s nervous about breaking the rules. I’m more used to it from back when I couldn’t control my body in school and frequently talked without raising my hand.
“What’s up?” Ruby whispers. “You know we’re not supposed to do meet-ups in the bathroom. Also I sort of have to pee, so we shouldn’t
talk long.”
“I think something weird is going on,” I tell her. “Was your mom out on Monday night?”
Ruby nods. “Yeah, I had a sitter.”
“Me too … and they were on the phone forever last night.”
“I guess so. My mom was in her bedroom and said she needed privacy.”
“Exactly.” I cross my arms over my chest. “Same with my dad.”
Ruby flips the bathroom pass over in her hands. “So what’s the problem? They were talking on the phone. Boyfriends and girlfriends do that. No big deal.”
I hook two fingers around the collar of my shirt and pull hard, stretching it outward. “I think something else is going on with them,” I say, deliberately ignoring the boyfriend and girlfriend part, “and I don’t think it’s good.”
Ruby shakes her head. “Nothing else is going on. And you have to stop thinking this is so bad. My mom and Greg are cute together. You should have seen them last weekend. My mom was saying that maybe this Friday night we could all go to—”
“Stop!” I say, holding up my palm like a crossing guard. “I don’t want to all do anything on Friday night! And he’s not Greg, Ruby. He’s not a boyfriend. He’s my dad! Also, have you ever thought about what would happen if they broke up? What would that do to our friendship? Or, worse, what if they don’t ever break up? Honestly, I think something else is going on and I’m going to get to the bottom of it.”
Ruby shifts her weight from one foot to the other and then back again. I wonder if she finally gets what I’ve been trying to say since last week, that this is all bad, all terrible, no two ways about it.
But instead of agreeing, Ruby sniffs briskly and says, “I think you’re being paranoid. Also, I actually have to pee. I should do that and then go back to the classroom.”
“Paranoid?” I shoot back, letting go of my shirt. It droops limply from my neck but at least it’s not choking me anymore. “No, I’m not! Remember last week when we were walking to I Scream and I said something was going on and you were like, No … everything is fine? Look who was right!”
Ruby bites her bottom lip. “I didn’t mean it that way.”
“Well, it sounded like you did!”
Just then, a teacher’s assistant pokes her head into the bathroom. “Girls? Everything okay?”
“Yes,” Ruby and I say in unison.
“Well, it’s time to settle down and get back to your classrooms,” she says in a snippy voice. “You know there’s no socializing in the bathrooms.”
Ruby glares at me like thanks a lot for getting us busted and then stomps into a stall, locking the door with a loud click. I spin in a half circle and walk angrily back to class, dragging my fingers along the wall the whole way.
At lunch, Ruby and I sit near each other but we barely talk. She eats her almond butter sandwich, which I can smell from across the table, and she talks to Haley about soccer. I listen in on their conversation while also chatting with the Robbins twins. Norie and Zoe gossip about their crushes, like who has long eyelashes and who has a zigzag buzzed into his hair. Even as I’m nodding along with them, I keep glancing over at Ruby, but she’s not looking at me. She doesn’t even roll her eyes in my direction when Avery shows off her mood-changing nail polish to everyone at our table. Even though I sort of think it’s cool, like a mood ring you can paint, I won’t give Avery the satisfaction of admiring it.
Right after lunch, as we’re being herded into the recess yard, I don’t see Ruby anywhere.
“Where’s Ruby?” I ask Haley. She’s kicking a soccer ball hard against the wall.
“She left after lunch to go to the orthodontist.”
“Oh, right,” I say, like I already knew and just forgot.
As I half-heartedly join a game of gaga, smacking the ball but not hitting anyone’s shins, all I can think about is that I don’t want to be in a fight with Ruby. It feels like we are though. It feels like everything with her mom and my dad is pulling us apart whether we like it or not.
That evening, Dad gets home from work early. He’s carrying two Whole Foods bags and a bottle of wine. I’m at the kitchen table doing homework. Benji and Joshua aren’t home yet. I think they’re in Central Park. Usually that’s where Joshua brings Benji on sunny days to climb rocks and practice his ninja moves.
“What’s going on?” I ask, eying the grocery bags and the wine.
“Sandhya and Ruby are coming for dinner!” he says excitedly.
I lean over the back of a chair, letting the wooden points press hard into my armpits. “When?”
Dad sets the paper bags on the counter and unpacks cheeses and olives and brown takeout cartons. “They’re getting here around seven. Sandhya has to finish writing a brief at work. We’ll eat a little late but I can cut up some veggies now if you’re hungry.”
“What about taco bowls?” I ask. That’s what we always have on Wednesday nights. We put the leftovers from Taco Tuesday into a bowl, sprinkle them with grated cheese, and heat them in the microwave. I love Taco Bowl Wednesday almost as much as Taco Tuesday.
My dad sets a baguette on the counter. “We’ll have taco bowls tomorrow. Did you know that Ruby is lactose intolerant? Sandhya says that dairy bothers her a bit too.”
“Of course I know that,” I say. “Ruby is my best friend.” I push my fingertips hard into my palms, because even as the words are coming out of my mouth I wonder if they’re still true. Since Ruby and I have never had a fight before, I’m not sure where we stand now.
Just then, the front door unlocks, and Benji and Joshua walk into the kitchen.
“What’s going on?” Benji asks when he sees my dad. He’s holding a stack of library books in his hands. I can see that the top book is Who Was Frida Kahlo? and underneath that there’s a world atlas. “Why’re you home already?”
“Ruby and her mom are coming for dinner,” I explain flatly.
“Ooooohhhhh!” Benji makes a wet, smoochy sound into his palm.
Joshua looks at my dad and my dad nods his head. I wonder if that means that Joshua knows, or if he’s just realizing that we know. I also wonder if Joshua’s new goatee is scratchy. When I asked him that the other day, he shook his head and said it felt fine, but I don’t believe it. I’m glad I’m not going to have to deal with a beard someday, because I think they would itch like crazy.
“That’s wonderful about you and Sandhya,” Joshua says to my dad.
Dad smiles and starts to say something, but I quickly push back my chair and hurry out of the kitchen, except I’m not paying attention, so I slam into the doorframe, knocking my shoulder.
“Ow!” I yelp.
“Willa!” Dad says, rushing over. “Are you okay?”
“No,” I say as I continue on to my room. “Definitely not.”
For the next half hour, I play Old Yeller on audio book and chew gum and build LEGOs. The Old Yeller audio book is my top choice for when I’m feeling down. I always stop before the ending. When I first got it I listened to the whole book and got so upset I was flinging myself all over my bed, and my mom had to lie on top of me to settle me down. After that I learned to pause Old Yeller before chapter fifteen.
I’m at the part where Travis and Old Yeller are hunting squirrels when Dad comes in to check on my shoulder. I tell him it still hurts even though it’s mostly better. Whatever. Let him feel bad.
Before he leaves my bedroom I remind him to put away my unfinished sticker chart and my checklists. We always hide those before friends come over. I don’t need people seeing that I use checklists to remember to brush my teeth and pack my water bottle. That’s personal.
A little while later I hear the doorbell ring. I hear Ruby’s mom and my dad saying hello and I hear Benji launching into some fact about Frida Kahlo’s paintings. I listen hard but I can’t hear Ruby’s voice. I wonder if she’s as annoyed as I am about this last-minute dinner party and decided to stay home with a sitter.
A minute later there’s a knock on my door.
I pause Old Yeller. “Come in!”
“Hey,” Ruby says, stepping into my room.
“You came,” I say.
Ruby gives me a funny look. “Of course I came.” Then she pushes aside some LEGOs and books and sits cross-legged on my floor. “Notice anything different about me?”
I spit my gum into a wrapper, crumple it in my palm, and study Ruby. She has on the same Adidas shirt and slippery soccer shorts that she was wearing at school this morning. But then she opens her mouth wide, tilts her head up, and says, “Aaaaaaaah!”
“You got your palate expander off!” I say, rolling onto my knees and looking into her mouth. I’ve only known Ruby with a mouthful of metal but it’s all gone now. “Did it hurt?”
“Not really.” Ruby snaps a few red bricks together and pulls them apart again. “It hurt going on but then I got used to it. Now it feels strange not to have a palate expander in. I keep running my tongue over the top and bottom of my mouth looking for it.”
I’m glad I don’t have to get a palate expander because I’d probably tear it off my teeth on the first day. I don’t even like tags or seams so I can’t imagine metal poking my mouth. I’m hoping I don’t need braces either. My dentist says it’s too soon to be sure.
As I return to building, Ruby begins organizing my LEGOs into piles of greens, blues, yellows, and reds. That’s so Ruby, to make things neat and tidy. I have to resist the urge to take my hands and swirl her ordered piles into a kaleidoscope of color. After a few minutes, I forget that she called me paranoid in the school bathroom this morning and I forget that I snapped at her and I forget that her mom and my dad could quite possibly be exchanging wet smooches in the kitchen at this very moment. When I forget all that it feels like we could just be hanging out like usual, nothing to do with our parents. Ruby lies back on my floor and holds her phone above her head. She often watches soccer clips or looks at videos that people are talking about at school. My parents won’t let me click on a video without their permission, but Ruby’s mom is more laid-back about that.
“Eeeewwww!” Ruby shouts.
Not If I Can Help It Page 7
