The Benefits of Being an Octopus

by Ann Braden

  When I arrive and push open the door, it’s Connor who’s holding Hector. They’re standing just behind the pink neon Open sign that’s flashing on and off. Hector is giggling every time it turns on.

  Ricky, the boss, has said it’s okay if Hector’s around a bit—says he makes it feel like a real family restaurant—just as long as he doesn’t cry or make a mess, and only if it’s during the half hour that my mom’s and Connor’s shifts overlap. And even though everything would be easier if my mom’s shift started half an hour later so she wouldn’t have to schlep him there until I could take over, I’d miss getting to see Hector and Connor together.

  “Hey, Zoey,” Connor says as soon as he sees me. “How was school today?” He’s smiling his regular, giant smile. No one in the world could have a smile as great as Connor’s.

  “Where’s my mom?” I ask, reaching to take Hector from him. “Do you need to take care of that table?”

  Connor glances over at the booth of people. “Oh, they’re fine. They’ve been here for hours, and they’ve got their check already … they don’t need me.” Connor reaches out and tickles Hector who’s now squirming in my arms trying to get back to Connor. “But your mom needed me, didn’t she, Mr. Cutiepie, because someone went and spit up all over her uniform and she had to go change.”

  “Was that you?” I say to Hector. My voice sounds awkward mimicking Connor’s happy bubbliness, but Hector’s eyes are wide and he keeps giggling. I’m pretty sure I usually talk to him like my mom does—mostly tired.

  “Here.” Connor gestures over to one of the booths. “Take a load off. I’ll get you a water with lemon.”

  I settle onto the padded seat of the booth with Hector on my lap. He reaches for the rolled-up napkin of silverware and instantly throws it on the floor.

  “I’m sorry,” I say to Connor when he comes back over.

  “No worries,” he says, pocketing the silverware roll in the small black apron around his waist. “There are more where that came from.” He sets down one ice water with a slice of lemon perfectly placed on the top of the glass—far enough away so it’s out of Hector’s reach—and one spoon close by. “That’s for you, Mr. Cutiepie,” he says, pointing to the spoon. “And the water is for your awesome older sister.”

  “Thank you,” I say. I take a drink of the water while Hector is distracted by the spoon. I try to sneak a peek at Connor’s tattoos. Ricky makes him wear a long-sleeve shirt under the standard black polo uniform, but you can still see the edges of them peeking out from the sleeve. He showed them to me once. There was one that looked like a cross with another cross inside it that he said he’d gotten when he was hiking around Peru. Like the country Peru. Not Peru the tiny town where our car wouldn’t start. Connor made it all the way to a place where January is summertime.

  “So, now,” Connor says, sliding into the seat across from me, “let’s get down to business. Which is better: an igloo with a marshmallow-roasting fire pit or a tree house in the jungle but you can only eat nuts?”

  I lean back against the booth and bite back a smile. “The tree house in the jungle.”

  Connor raises his eyebrows. “Just nuts?”

  “I like nuts.”

  He grins. “Okay. What have you got for me?”

  “Let’s see … ” I close my eyes. “You have to walk across town when everything is black ice but you get to eat warm chocolate chip cookies the whole time? Or it’s a beautiful day, but you have to spend it being chased by angry squirrels?”

  Connor laughs out loud. “Oh, what a choice, Zoey.” He considers for a minute. “Squirrels are fast. I’ll take the cookies instead, and I’ll ice skate the whole way.”

  Best five minutes of the day.

  My mom comes out of the bathroom a few minutes later. She’s kind of frazzled, still fixing her hair and stuff, but it’s clear she’s already switched over to work-mode mom. I like getting to sneak peeks at her waitressing, the way she can fly out of the kitchen carrying multiple plates of steaming pasta, the way she pushes buttons on the cash register like a boss, the way she writes down customers’ orders in this cool, magical code and can do it without ever looking away from the customer. It’s like waitressing is the one time when the competent mom I remember comes back and says hello.

  She hands me the diaper bag. “At least there was an extra uniform shirt in there. You can’t see the spot on my pants, right?”

  Her black pants look the same as ever. I shake my head.

  “Good.” She turns to Connor. “Okay, what other prep work do I need to get done before the dinner rush?”

  “I was able to mix up two of the salad dressings, but I didn’t have time to get to the ranch yet … ” Connor says as they push past the doors into the kitchen.

  I look over at the table where Matt Hubbard’s family always sits on their Saturday night dinners. Matt and his mom and his dad and his little sister—just like in a commercial. His sister is a few grades younger than us. She has some fancy name like Emmeline or Eleanor—or maybe it was just Emily, but she looked fancy and smart because she was always winning things, just like Matt, in elementary school—the spelling bee, the art contest for Earth Day, all that stuff. I bet they make up new contests just so the Hubbards can win them.

  Like last week in homeroom when Mr. Bontaff made this whole big deal about how Matt had done such an amazing job for his trumpet solo in the jazz band concert. About how it was “magnificent” and “amazing.” I can’t even imagine having a teacher say things like that about me.

  But even though I don’t do after-school activities like he does and even though I’m grimy, he still talked to me this morning. And he still gave me Swedish Fish even though I didn’t have my debate packet like everyone else.

  And he has really nice brown eyes.

  “Zoey! What are you still doing here?” My mom bursts back through the kitchen doors. “Bryce and Aurora will be getting off the bus any second!”

  I look at the clock on the wall. “Shoot!” I scoot out of the seat, swing Hector onto one hip, and sling his diaper bag onto my opposite shoulder on top of my backpack. “I’m going!”

  The door jingles on my way out, and I’m soon huffing it across the parking lot and along Route 3. Up ahead, on the opposite side of the street, I can see the people waiting for their kids. They’re at the corner where Pratt Street comes in, where the bus is about to stop, where I should be standing right now. I pick up the pace, and Hector giggles as if a horseback ride from a horse that’s hyperventilating is the best kind ever.

  The bus comes around the corner and slows down to a stop. The cars that usually zip down this stretch of road come to a halt as the bus switches to its flashing red lights. I watch as Bryce and Aurora emerge from the bus door in the midst of the other kids, just like they always do. On the opposite side of the street from me.

  The school bus’s flashing lights have stopped, its stop sign is tucked back in, and traffic starts to move again.

  The other kids are heading off with their grown-ups down Pratt Street toward the houses in that neighborhood—but Bryce and Aurora are still standing there, looking around.

  I’m always right there, waiting for them. Always. Maybe we don’t have dinner at a table every night. Maybe they have to get free lunch tickets and deal with all the same shame I had to deal with when I was first in school.

  But at the end of the day, I’m always there to pick them up.

  “Bryce! Aurora!” I call as I run. “I’m right here!” But as soon as the words leave my mouth, I regret it.

  Because Aurora yells, “Zoey!” and starts running toward me.

  Directly across the street.

  As though all the cars around her are just bubbles that will pop if they touch her.

  A car slams on its brakes and lays on the horn.

  In the closest lane, another car skids to a stop, and the car behind it narrowly misses rear-ending it.

  The blare of the horns is so loud that Aurora comes to an
abrupt stop halfway across the road and covers her ears.

  But when you’re at bumper level in a sea of honking, it doesn’t matter how much you cover your ears. Those bubbles are still way louder than they should be.

  Aurora bursts into tears.

  On the far side of the street Bryce is screaming and stamping his feet. He’s not even looking at Aurora anymore—it’s like he’s gone rabid.

  One of the drivers rolls down his window and yells, “What do you kids think you’re doing?” He starts to roll his window back up but pauses when he looks at me. “And for God sakes, put a coat on that baby!”

  I glance down to see Hector just in his pajamas. Hector, of course, has started crying, too, and it might just be because he’s about to lose all of his fingers to frostbite. Where’s my layer of protective octopus slime? Where are my eight tentacles to pull all three kids close to me and wrap them up so they can cry their eyes out?

  “Aurora! You’ve got to get out of the street!” I yell.

  But she just keeps crying.

  “Aurora!” I yell again.

  A new car starts beeping its horn.

  I grit my teeth, heft Hector the Neglected higher onto my hip, and walk into the middle of the road.

  But Aurora won’t let me take her by the hand. “Up!” she says through her sobs, her arms raised up to me. “Up!”

  So, I heave her up onto my opposite hip along with the diaper bag and—with all of those drivers watching impatiently—stagger across the rest of the road to where Bryce is still screaming and jumping about like his feet are on fire.

  I quickly set Aurora and the diaper bag down on a snowbank. “Don’t you dare move,” I say to her. “Not an inch!” My voice is shaking.

  I turn back to rabid Bryce, flailing around on the shoulder of the road. I grab a rock off the ground with my Hector-free hand and close my fist around it. Then, I drop to my knees right next to Bryce and wrap him up with my arm. “Bryce, I have a rock for you that I need you to hold.”

  “AHHHH!!” he keeps screaming. “AH! AH! AH! AAAHHH!!” He keeps trying to squirrel out from under my arm, but I squeeze tighter.

  “Bryce,” I say again. “I have a rock for you that I need you to hold.”

  I glance at Aurora, and she’s thankfully still sitting next to the diaper bag.

  Bryce keeps squirming and keeps screaming, but it’s weaker now than it was.

  “Bryce, I have a rock for you that I need you to hold.”

  Bryce sinks against me. I open my hand so he can see the rock. He takes it in his right hand.

  When things went south between my mom and Nate at the boat launch that day, I swear giving Bryce one rock after another was the only way I kept him with me. Sometimes you just need something solid that fits entirely in your hand.

  I quickly grab another rock off the ground. “I have another rock that I need you to hold.”

  As he takes it in his other hand, the last bit of frenzy seems to leave him. He crawls up the black-tinged snowdrift to where Aurora is perched, curls up with his head in her little lap, and sobs.

  I reposition Hector to be inside my jacket, zip it partly around him, and sit down next to Aurora and Bryce. I wrap the two of them up as best I can and give them kisses and kisses and more kisses.

  Some people can do their homework. Some people get to have crushes on boys.

  Some people have other things they’ve got to do.

  CHAPTER 7

  I look up when a car pulls up next to us.

  Just please don’t be that get-that-baby-a-coat guy. Can DCF take kids away from their big sister?

  It’s not him, but as soon as I see the driver’s face I realize it’s not much better. Because when you’ve just been humiliated and exposed as a totally incompetent person in front of a whole bunch of people, the next logical thing is to have your constantly-nagging-you-about-homework social studies teacher pull up next to you.

  Ms. Rochambeau rolls down her window. “Zoey, I saw what just happened. Are you all okay?”

  Bryce still has his face buried against my side, his chest heaving as I rub his back.

  “Yeah, we’re fine.”

  She eyes me. “Are you sure?”

  I look down as Bryce wipes his nose on my jeans. “Yeah.”

  “I was hoping I could talk to you after class today, but you left before I had the chance,” she says. “Did you really leave your packet at home?”

  Is she kidding? She thinks I want to talk about homework right now? I manage to nod.

  Aurora looks up. “Is she your teacher?” she asks between sniffles. “Does she give you graham qwackers and apple juice?”

  Ms. Rochambeau doesn’t take her eyes off me. “Is your packet really completed?”

  “I told you it was. I was telling the truth.”

  “Bring it tomorrow. You can give your opening statement and then participate in the Q&A.”

  I freeze. Maybe I should have lied and said I hadn’t done it.

  At least I can always forget it a second time.

  Ms. Rochambeau leans closer. “I want you to know that you remind me of me when I was your age.”

  I stare at her fancy turtleneck sweater and big jangly earrings. No way did she start out like me.

  “And back then, there was one thing I needed more than anything else,” she says.

  “I told you. We’re fine,” I say.

  Her eyes don’t waver. “I needed to learn how to get people to take me seriously.”

  I stare at her. Every single day there’s more and more proof that people will treat me how they treat me, and I don’t have a shred of say in it.

  “And I had to start with myself,” she says. “Bring in that packet and don’t sell yourself short.”

  She pulls into traffic before I can say anything in response.

  If I do bring in my packet, it sure won’t be because she told me to.

  The only victory of the day is that somehow the power has come back on at home. Which is good timing because tonight is one of Lenny’s guys’ nights. I’m feeding the kids dinner in our bedroom because those guys get annoyed with us quick if we’re out there with them, but I didn’t get enough chicken nuggets on my first trip to the kitchen, so I pick up Hector and slip back out of the bedroom.

  Lenny still has his jacket on because his second job at the nursing home goes until 6 p.m., but he’s already holding a soda. “And then I’ve got this new young supervisor who’s on my back all the time,” he’s saying. “You gotta wear these stupid plastic gloves—which makes sense most of the time because of how much disgusting stuff gets thrown out at old-fogey homes—but this new guy says we have to be wearing them ALL the time, and do you know how long it takes to get a trash bag open with those gloves on? And then he’s telling me to pick up the pace? He doesn’t have a clue.” He takes a big swig of the soda, and then comes over to me and gestures for me to hand him Hector.

  “How long have you been there now?” Slider asks as I pass Hector off.

  “Four years next month. They hardly pay enough for it to be worth it, though. Talk about nasty.” Lenny flies Hector up into the air to make him cackle a few times, and then hands him back to me.

  With Hector back on my hip, I go into the kitchen and pull the freezer door open.

  “Whatcha getting, Zoey?” Lenny calls.

  “Just some more chicken nuggets for Bryce and Aurora.” I grab the bag out of the freezer.

  “You guys can never have enough, can you?” he says. “Just kidding. Here … ” He starts coming over. “You won’t be able to get the toaster to work without my help.”

  “That’s okay.” I pop the last four chicken nuggets into the toaster and jiggle the broken lever until it stays in the down position. “I got it.”

  “Because that toaster’s fickle. It won’t let just anyone get it to work.”

  “I know, but I—”

  Lenny fiddles with the lever and finally gets it back to how I had it. “There,” he say
s. “Your mother can’t do it either.”

  I am not my mother, I think. But I don’t say that out loud.

  “Are you at the middle school?” one of the guys calls over.

  “Yeah,” I say. I try to make the “Yeah” come out like “Well, of course I am.”

  “Is that Ms. Rochambeau still there?”

  At the mention of her name, I feel myself stiffen.

  He leans over the back of the couch toward Slider. “Do you remember all that stuff we used to pull? Anything to try to make her cry.”

  “You were horrible,” another guy says from his spot in front of the TV.

  The first guy laughs. “What was I supposed to do? She called home when all I did was skip a detention. I got my beating, so she had to get hers.”

  “She’s my social studies teacher,” I say. I don’t mention that she just pulled over on the side of the road to tell me to bring my homework to school.

  “No way!” he says, slamming the back of the couch. “How is she still teaching? Do you remember those notes I hid all over her classroom that said, ‘You’re an ugly hag, and you’ll die alone.’?” He’s laughing so hard he can hardly talk. “She kept finding them for the rest of the school year!”

  I keep my head down. I might not like her, but I wouldn’t leave her horrible notes.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I see Bryce come into the kitchen.

  “Out of ketchup,” he mumbles to me.

  Lenny is at the fridge, pulling out another can of soda. Bryce silently hovers behind Lenny, waiting. But Bryce is so quiet that Lenny backs right into him as he shuts the fridge.

  “Watch it, kid,” Lenny says as he catches himself. Lenny never calls Bryce by his name. Says it’s a sissy name. Somehow he thought the name Hector was way better.

  Once Bryce recovers his footing, though, he just stands there not saying anything. It’s like he’s still on the side of the road watching Aurora about to get flattened.

  Lenny looks closer at Bryce. “Your eyes look weird. You weren’t crying earlier, were you?”