A Friend at Midnight

by Caroline B. Cooney

  Michael was always astonished when people claimed to love school. Michael’s crowd—not Jamie, of course; the Mahannas were perfect—were always getting tutored or remediated. They had to be “brought up to speed” or given some “one-on-one.” You never loved that kind of school. You showed up and eventually it ended.

  Jamie wanted to motor up to Plum Island, where scientists studied infectious animal diseases. Jamie had heard that if you landed on the island, they had to shoot you because you were now a carrier of death. Jamie wanted to penetrate the island’s defenses or at least find out whether the scientists shot blanks or real bullets.

  “You guys are lucky enough you’ve got a Teacher Work Day, whatever that is,” said Mr. Mahanna. “Even luckier that I can take the day off. And now you also want the joys of being shot at? Forget it.”

  Trey opened a bag of Cheez Doodles for himself and tossed Michael the Fluff and peanut butter sandwich Mrs. Mahanna had made just for him.

  My own father doesn’t know I love Fluff, thought Michael. Doesn’t know I’m pretty much okay in fourth. That I read almost at grade level. That I can drive a boat.

  Michael had largely unmemorized the two and a half weeks spent with his father. But now and then a piece of the visit would spew forth, getting him in the eyes like chlorinated water from a pool. He remembered the testing at that new school where Dad had put him. How scornfully the principal had considered Michael’s scores. “Your son needs a special class,” he had said, and Dad had shot a look of shame and anger at the son who was stupid.

  Michael was as smart as anybody else. But he could not scrape knowledge up off the page the way all the girls and most of the boys could. It just lay there, stuck in little black shapes on white paper, and he couldn’t get hold of it.

  Michael held the uneaten Fluff sandwich and stared out to sea.

  Then he unmemorized his father. It was too bad school didn’t require unlearning. He was a whiz.

  Lily opened the high, difficult latch of the gate that protected Amanda’s swimming pool from marauding toddlers. Amanda lay flat on her chaise, her bare back facing the sun, her eyes closed.

  What a contrast their lives were. Amanda’s so slow and leisurely; Lily’s so frantic and full. What if Amanda continued to be comfortable in the sun, doing nothing much, while Lily joined the footrace that was city life? What if their friendship dwindled away, like Lily’s friendship with her very own sister—and only one of them noticed?

  “Hi, Amanda!” shrieked Nathaniel, attacking.

  Amanda rolled over and swept him up, hugging and kissing. “Hello, most perfect short person in the universe.”

  “Can I put the rubber duckies in the water?”

  “You can. They’re in their net bag. See it hanging over there?”

  Nathaniel hurried to the fence where the rubber duckies hung. The hook was too high for him. It never occurred to him to ask for help. He dragged over a chair to stand on.

  “Great news,” said Lily, rubbing sunscreen into a forgotten spot on Amanda’s back. “Reb is coming home tonight to plan her wedding to Freddie!”

  As always, Amanda reacted perfectly. “Do I get to go to the bridal showers and the parties? I want to be part of all the shopping. When is the wedding? Next June?”

  “Who knows? Who cares? I’m just glad they’re not eloping. It would be just like Reb to hop in a canoe and meet a justice of the peace at some bend in the river.”

  “Remember the first time we saw a photograph of Freddie,” said Amanda, “and I wanted to steal him? The guy is movie-star quality. What did Reb ever do to deserve him?”

  Lily didn’t care whether anybody deserved anything. Love was beautiful, Reb was beautiful, the wedding would be beautiful.

  “Doesn’t Freddie have a brother?” asked Amanda. “I’m sure I remember an e-mail from Reb discussing the brother of Freddie. He’ll be best man, and I totally bet it turns out he’s really the best man—for you.”

  They giggled. “I cannot marry Freddie’s brother. I refuse to be Mrs. Crumb.”

  “His last name is Crumb?”

  “Yup. Reb’s kids will be the little Crumbs.”

  “A good case for keeping your own name,” agreed Amanda. “Why don’t you leave Nathaniel with me for dinner as well? It might be easier than hauling him to the airport and dealing with him when you’re trying to have a reunion with Reb.”

  Lily shook her head. “He sees so little of Reb and Reb so little of him. And he’s perfect these days, so I’ll bring him.”

  Amanda raised her eyebrows.

  “Well, perfect with lapses,” Lily admitted.

  “Hourly lapses,” Amanda pointed out.

  Nathaniel had gotten the bag down. Amanda strapped a swim vest around his waist and over his shoulders and lifted him in her arms. She walked out on the diving board over the deep end and bounced hard. On the second bounce, they cannonballed.

  Nathaniel came up sputtering and shouting, “Again! Again!”

  He had already forgotten Lily, who slipped out the gate and headed for work. She knew perfectly well that it was a bad plan to take Nathaniel to the airport. He’d be so exhausted by an afternoon playing hard with Amanda that he’d have tantrums.

  But a person in charge of somebody else had to be brave, and that person was braver with somebody holding her hand, and a person going to the airport for the first time in almost fifty-two weeks—that person might need a hand to hold.

  “Doctors Bence, Alzina and Gladwin,” said Lily over and over. It was extra busy since kids didn’t have school, so emergencies and problems had been wedged in left and right. Lily normally worked only three to five-thirty. Today she was working ten to four, and the place was insane.

  “Don’t worry about missing Kelsey’s appointment, Mrs. Smith,” she would say. “Schedules are so busy these days.” Although everybody’s day was busy and they got here, so what was Kelsey’s mother’s problem? Then she would yell across the room. “Conor, brushing your teeth for six seconds doesn’t count. It has to be the full two minutes.

  “No, Conor. You won’t die of toothpaste poisoning if you keep the toothpaste in your mouth the full two minutes.”

  And then, because it was Conor, who reminded her of Michael once and Nathaniel now, she’d yell, “Fine! Drop dead! But you’ll never get your braces checked and you’ll never be able to leave the office and they’ll lock up and you’ll be rotting on the floor in here while other people are enjoying their Thursday off from school!”

  When Lily got back to Amanda’s, Nathaniel was sound asleep on an air mattress in the shade. Amanda was standing against the pool enclosure, backlit by the sun. Shimmering light framed her fair hair. She wore a long silky robe and gleamed like some ancient seer or oracle. And then, almost regally, almost ceremonially, Amanda took Lily’s hand.

  How strange it felt: escorted to a seat by the cool hand of her friend.

  Amanda arranged herself on the seat across from Lily. She was clearly also arranging her thoughts. “Lily,” she said carefully. “You’ll be your sister’s maid of honor. I’ve been thinking all day what that means. I want to withdraw our prayer.”

  There was only one prayer to which Lily had eagerly cried Amen.

  No matter how many times you said or sang Amen, the word never felt English. It came from Latin, which took it from Greek, which took it from Hebrew. It meant “truly” or, in the King James Version, “verily.” A word for when you agreed. But the Lord evidently hadn’t agreed, because denrose was still alive and kicking. (Actually, Lily had no first-hand knowledge of this, but his address still occupied its place in Reb’s e-mail list. Surely if Reb had gone to denrose’s funeral, she would have mentioned it.)

  I bet we’re dead for denrose, thought Lily. I bet at parties when other people refer to their children, he says, “I never had kids myself.”

  Amanda looked away from Lily and stared up into the sky, first from one angle, then from another, frowning slightly.

  “Loo
king for God?” said Lily.

  “I’d love a glimpse,” agreed Amanda. “God!” she yelled in her demanding way. “I’m sorry!” she shouted at Him. She flopped back down on her chaise while Lily continued to study the sky for results.

  “Toss me the sunscreen,” said Amanda.

  Lily handed it over.

  “Because the thing is,” said Amanda, “your father will be at Reb’s wedding.”

  chapter

  11

  That man—whose name Lily wouldn’t even say out loud—at the wedding? That man walking Reb down the aisle—as if he deserved the title “father”?

  It was unthinkable that he would saunter back into their lives, walk his elder daughter down the aisle, shake hands with every guest as if he were an actual father. He would upstage Kells, because anybody could, and here it was Kells who had been the good guy. Michael would be forced to stand next to denrose.

  So many parents got surprised by their own children: by their size or the lack of it; by their brains or the lack of them; by their hobbies and interests and passions or the lack of them. Parents who thought sports were stupid had children who were athletic stars. Parents who despised technology had children who solved the school’s computer problems in third grade. Parents who listened only to hard rock had children who practiced Mozart.

  But only Dad, surprised by Michael, threw his child away.

  When Dad looked in a mirror, he must see that handsome tanned man, blue eyes like a husky dog, the half smile that captivated strangers, those trendy clothes and fine wristwatch. But he would never see what Michael had seen: his back.

  Lily had never been able to imagine the actual thinking of the actual parent as he actually drove to an airport, actually opened his own car door, actually left his eight-year-old on the sidewalk and actually departed.

  She had not been to LaGuardia since that day. How amazing that only Lily (possibly Michael, but eight-year-olds had little grasp of the calendar) knew that the anniversary was at hand. Early September had two anniversaries for the rest of America: Labor Day and September 11. Only Lily had her very own date burned inside her. She believed she had become stronger and deeper from that terrible event, but not strong and deep enough for this.

  I’m not praying to you, she informed God. You never come through. I’m working this out for myself. So there! (As if God would be threatened by the loss of Lily’s prayers.) And then, because there was nowhere else to turn, she said anyway, God. Don’t let me be this angry. It’s my sister. Let me love Reb the way I love Nathaniel. The way families are supposed to love. Let me not go crazy with rage at Reb just because she wants her father in her wedding. But don’t let him come. Don’t you let my father hurt Michael again!

  “Sunscreen?” asked Amanda.

  “No, thanks,” said Lily, “I’d better wake Nathaniel up and head for LaGuardia.” She was nervous.

  It was one thing to be a new driver locally, on plain old roads and intersections she’d known all her life as a passenger. It was quite another to conquer the complex circles and merges, short-term and long-term parking entrances and exits, departure lanes and security blockades of LaGuardia Airport.

  Carefully Amanda lifted the little hot body under his towel-blanket and kissed Nathaniel’s sweaty little forehead. Together the girls tilted him into his car seat without waking him. “Thanks,” said Lily.

  “My pleasure,” said Amanda, and Lily thought: It really is her pleasure. Why, why, wasn’t Michael a pleasure to Dad?

  But surely this was the question Michael had asked himself a thousand times.

  Rage swelled in Lily again, making her fingers so stiff she could hardly close them around the steering wheel. When she made a right turn, her arms were unyielding, as if she were holding off an attack. I’m having an anger seizure, she thought. I should stop driving.

  Naturally she accelerated instead.

  Speed was a wonderful thing. Going straight through the red light would be so satisfying. Lily shoved her foot to the floor. She didn’t care what happened. It would serve everybody right if—

  “Wiwwy,” called Nathaniel from the backseat, “I see Dunkin’ Donuts! Can I have a jewwy doughnut?”

  She had forgotten Nathaniel. The thing she most held against her father—forgetting his children—and she herself had done it. Lily braked mentally and physically and turned into Dunkin’ Donuts.

  “Not the drive-in,” pleaded Nathaniel, who always wanted to go indoors and be part of the action. So they got out of the car and at the counter she lifted him up so he could take in all the exciting doughnut sights. “Two doughnuts?” begged Nathaniel, his brown eyes wide with anxiety. It was a lot to ask.

  She nodded and gave him the money to pay. Nathaniel loved to pay. “Two jewwy doughnuts, pwease,” he said proudly. “Are we weaving a tip, Wiwwy?” he whispered. Nathaniel loved tipping. She handed him a quarter, but Nathaniel was a big tipper. He wanted to leave two quarters. “Can I have coffee, Wiwwy?”

  “You’re too little.”

  “Sometimes,” said the counter girl, “we give kids a half inch of coffee and fill the cup up with milk.”

  Lily relented. Nathaniel held his coffee like treasure, proud to sip from the hole in the lid like a grown-up. In the car, he protected his doughnuts and coffee from seat belt damage and they headed to LaGuardia.

  Lily concentrated on every difficult turn and confusing road arrangement, reading the signs that came and went so quickly, grateful that Nathaniel was preoccupied balancing his coffee. He seemed not to notice the planes landing and taking off until they were right inside the airport complex, jammed between a construction site and a parking garage. A plane skimmed over their heads and Nathaniel shouted, “Wiwwy! We went onna pane that time!”

  That Nathaniel should remember an event that took place one-third of his life ago! She saw him again, little legs churning, as he rushed to his big brother and proved to Michael that love still lived. He had saved Michael from two things: hopelessness and a shoplifting charge.

  “We went onna pane,” said Nathaniel to himself, because Michael and Lily had never backed him up and his daddy and mommy had never listened.

  Through her tears Lily saw Reb on the sidewalk, tall and slim and beautiful and soon to be a bride! When Lily pulled up next to the curb, Reb said, “Lily, I didn’t know you missed me enough to cry! I should have come home more.”

  Yes, thought Lily, you should.

  She vaulted out of the car, ran around and hugged Reb hard, convinced that everything would be all right. “Pop the trunk,” ordered Reb, lifting her suitcases.

  It didn’t take much to jumpstart the old nightmare. The moment her fingertips encountered the handle of a suitcase, Lily knew she was doomed to dream it again tonight.

  It was absurd, since she and Michael and Nathaniel had not had a piece of luggage among them. But in the dream, security guards and police and flight attendants and passing strangers screamed, “Where’s your luggage? Where’s Michael?” and Lily had no answer, because she never found Michael. She would look for Nathaniel and see that he was gone too; she held only an arm.

  Reb slid into the passenger seat and leaned between the front seats to kiss Nathaniel. “Aaaaaaaah! I forgot little boys are sticky and disgusting!”

  “Jewwy doughnut, Reb,” said Nathaniel, beaming. Generously, he held out a mangled well-licked handful.

  Reb looked at Lily. “He hasn’t changed.”

  “No,” agreed Lily. “He’s still perfect.” She and Reb would stay up all night talking weddings and Lily would avoid having the nightmare by never going to sleep to start with.

  When Mom had admired every single thing about Reb and finished singing for joy at this unexpected visit, she went into a flurry of self-improvement, madly picking up mail-order catalogs that had slid to the floor and sticking sweaters on hangers and rushing into the kitchen for a cooking spree. While she waltzed around measuring and dicing and stirring and beaming at Reb, Lily set the table. “W
hat can I do?” asked Reb.

  “You just sit there and be home,” said Mom, dancing. “I am so so so so happy to see you, darling!”

  “I fix supper too, Reb,” Nathaniel told her. “I do water!” He never tired of pushing a glass against the automatic ice crusher in the refrigerator door, but as usual he got excited and pushed too long. Ice shot everywhere. Reb mopped up the floor with paper towels and said, “Nathaniel? Want to be a ring bearer?”

  Nathaniel was the only kid in history who never went through a “No!” stage. “Yes!” he shouted, because Nathaniel agreed to anything anytime suggested by anybody. Lily figured he was a good candidate for kidnapping because he’d be so eager for the excursion.

  Mom paused mid–tomato slice. Ring bearer was a position that didn’t come up often. “Does Nathaniel want what?”

  “Ring bearer. Freddie and I are getting married. I’m home to plan our wedding.”

  Joy drained out of Mom’s face. Shock took over. “What? You’re nineteen! You’re far too young.”

  “Mom, be grateful there’s going to be a marriage at all. Freddie and I could just live together. That’s what everybody else does.”

  Mom was frantic. She dropped the knife and the tomato and held her hands out, making a stop sign. “I don’t want you getting married young! I want you to live in exciting cities and stake out a great career and establish yourself! I want you to create a space on earth that’s yours and yours alone.”

  Reb shook her head. “I don’t want a space for me, Mom. I want a space for us. You know that Freddie is three years older than I am. You know he graduated last June. Well, the company we worked for in Labrador gave him a permanent job. Petroleum engineers go everywhere, Mom. I’ll see the world following Freddie.”

  “Following!” Mom approved of band members following a conductor, but she did not approve of women following their men. “You’re a language major, Rebbie. I want you to get a graduate degree or go into diplomacy, or—or—or at least import Italian shoes.”