“You can go hang out with Drew if you want,” Ivy said.
“I said hey to him. He seemed pretty out of it. I think he’s on some painkillers, and they’re making him loopy,” Taryn said, pushing her dark blond hair over her shoulder. Her straight bangs cut a perfect line across her forehead. Ivy wished she could get away with bangs.
“Besides,” Taryn said, “I need to stay with you. That’s why I came by.” She snuggled into Ivy’s side, and Ivy couldn’t help but smile.
Taryn and Ivy had been best friends since the summer before kindergarten, when they met during swimming lessons at the rec center. Taryn flounced over in her bright yellow bathing suit to where Ivy’s mom was trying to fit a pair of goggles over Ivy’s head of thick hair. Taryn told her she wanted to swim the butterfly. Ivy thought that sounded magical—swimming the butterfly—like something out of a fairy tale. It wasn’t until years later that Ivy realized Taryn’s dad had been a swimmer in college and had taught her the names of all the swimming strokes. That was decidedly less fantastical, but by then, Ivy was hooked on Taryn’s bubbly laugh and the way she wrinkled her nose at anyone who made fun of Ivy’s poofy hair and freckles.
“So what are you going to do?” Taryn asked now, waving at Ivy’s mom, who barely managed a weary smile. Of course Taryn would ask this. She was all action. She was a windup toy zooming over a hardwood floor.
“I don’t know,” Ivy said.
“Where are you going to live?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you still going to be able to do soccer camp with me this summer?”
“I—” I hope not nearly fell out of Ivy’s mouth. Just last week, she’d agreed to go with Taryn to the camp, and really, soccer was fine. It was almost, kind of, sort of, what Ivy would call fun. And she didn’t suck at it. But to do the camp, she had to miss this young artists’ workshop her art teacher had told her about at Thoman-Brown College in town, which was definitely, absolutely something Ivy would call fun. But it was fine. The soccer camp was for girls thirteen and under only, which meant Taryn and Ivy could do it together, away from stupid sisters and the doe-eyed look Taryn got every time she saw Drew.
“I don’t know,” Ivy finally said after a deep breath.
“But what about—”
“I don’t think she knows anything right now.” June’s voice was soft and even, but firm. She sat down on Ivy’s other side and adjusted the ice pack on her ankle, which had slipped and was sweating all over the floor.
Taryn’s cheeks turned pink, and she fiddled with the strap of her red tank top. She glanced at Ivy, like she was waiting for her to give a different answer, but Ivy certainly didn’t have one.
“Right,” Taryn said softly. “Sorry. Duh.”
“It’s all right,” Ivy said, though nothing felt all right.
“I’m sure it’ll all work out,” Taryn said. Then her blue eyes widened, and she clapped her hands together. “Maybe you could live with me for a while!”
Taryn’s mom was an interior decorator. Their house was very big and very stylish, full of squashy couches and beautiful throw pillows, silk curtains lining every window.
“I don’t think your mom wants my whole messy family in her house,” Ivy said.
Taryn laughed. “Oh gosh, no. I just meant you.”
“Oh.” Ivy looked over to where Mom had Evan propped on her shoulder. She patted his back, her head leaning against his smaller one, her eyes closed. For the past few months, Ivy had daydreamed once or twice—okay, maybe three times—of getting away from her family. Just up and running away. Would they notice? Would they even care?
“I’ll have my mom talk to yours,” Taryn said. “It might help things.”
“Help what?”
Taryn shrugged. “Just… things. Your parents have a lot going on with the twins and now this. I mean, wow, right? It might be easier if they didn’t have to worry about you for a while.”
Ivy blinked at her. “Right. Easier.” She tried to swallow the huge knot in her throat, but it just kept getting bigger and bigger, a balloon swelling on a helium tank. It was one thing for Ivy to wonder about being without her family. It was another thing for Taryn to say out loud that Ivy’s absence would probably be a good thing.
“Oh, maybe I should read your cards!” Taryn said. She dived into her big bag and pulled out her beloved tarot deck. When they were in fifth grade, Taryn got really into tarot cards. Even though she didn’t know how to read them, Taryn loved to shuffle, shuffle, shuffle and then make Ivy draw one, proclaiming whatever card Ivy held in her hand was her destiny.
Ivy was pretty sure tarot didn’t work like that.
June cleared her throat. “So, Taryn, are you going to ask Drew to the Spring Dance?”
Taryn squealed a little and kept shuffling. She launched into all the reasons why she should ask Drew and all the reasons why she shouldn’t, all of which Ivy had heard before. She never dealt the tarot cards, just kept on shuffling, Ivy’s fresh tragedy forgotten for a while. Ivy used the time to get her breath back.
June nodded along with her, excited about everything Taryn was saying, although Ivy had no idea how June even knew that Taryn liked Drew. June was funny like that, talkative and loud in class, but at lunch and during gym, she got quiet. She ate her weird lunch at the other end of the long rectangular table where Taryn and Ivy sat, and she just… watched. Not in a creepy way. Just like she was taking everything in. Ivy had never seen her hang out with anyone in particular. Not really.
Right now, Ivy felt June glance at her a few times while she listened to Taryn. When Ivy finally met her eyes, June gave her a small smile. Ivy gave her a grateful smile back.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Sisters
Taryn didn’t stay long. Before she left, she told Ivy, “It’ll all be okay,” but Ivy nearly growled at her. Ivy didn’t want to hear that right now because when anyone said it, she had to smile and nod and pretend like what they were saying was true. She felt a weird sort of relief when Taryn bounced away with a promise to ask her mom about Ivy staying with them.
June’s mom called her away too, and after a few hours of doing nothing—Ivy stared at all the dirt-colored water spots on the gym ceiling for she didn’t know how long—the room eventually quieted down.
Dad came back with a million numbers scribbled all over a pad of paper. He and Mom sat for a long time, whispering with their heads bent together so Ivy and Layla couldn’t hear. The twins were asleep in a nest of borrowed blankets next to Mom. Once or twice, Ivy saw her father wipe at his eyes and Mom lean her forehead against his. The whole thing made Ivy squirm. She’d seen her dad cry before, but at sappy stuff, like when Layla won MVP for her lacrosse team last year or when he held Aaron and Evan for the first time in the hospital room. Ivy had never seen him sad-cry until today. But his great-grandparents had built their house. He’d been born there. Of course he was going to sad-cry.
The sun started to set, its rays beaming through the high windows in the gym, turning the wheat-colored floor into a deep gold. Ivy and her family ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches out of brown paper bags. Again. It tasted like school. Pretty soon after that, everyone started falling asleep under scratchy blankets and musty-smelling pillows.
Ivy lay down, arranging her own pillow under her head so that her notebook was against the floor and turning this way and that to get comfortable. Her eyelids felt heavy, like someone was yanking on them, but she couldn’t sleep. The gym smelled like rain and stale bread and what she imagined a boys’ locker room might smell like. Every few seconds, someone coughed or whispered or flicked on a flashlight. Ivy couldn’t stop fidgeting, her legs all jumpy and her fingers twitchy. She sat up and looked around the dim room at the red glow from the EXIT signs and the lumpy shapes sprawled all over the floor.
And it hit her. Pow. Boom. Crack.
She was homeless.
She didn’t have a home anymore.
She didn’t have her bed or that sil
ly-looking headlamp her dad had bought for her when they went camping or any of her clothes or her little attic room where she could stay up late and draw pictures that she loved with her stupid brush pens.
She didn’t even have brush pens.
Sobs crawled up her throat, and she finally let them out. Turning on her side, she curled into a ball and buried her face in her pillow, soaking the cotton. When she felt nice and empty, she opened her eyes and saw Layla a few feet away from her.
She was doing the exact same thing as Ivy.
Her back was to Ivy, but she was tucked into herself and her shoulders were shaking. Every now and then, she lifted her hand and swiped at her eyes. Ivy wanted to get up and go to her. She wanted to snuggle into her sister’s side, let Layla smooth her tangly hair, and ask her to tell a story. Ask her to let Ivy tell one too.
But she couldn’t, not since the conversation she overheard between Layla and her best friend, Gigi, two weeks ago. Now Ivy wasn’t sure who Layla was anymore.
Ivy wasn’t sure who Ivy was either.
And she definitely wasn’t sure about what her sister would think if Layla really knew all Ivy’s secrets.
One thing Ivy was sure about—she was way too scared to find out.
That night two weeks ago, Gigi was in Layla’s room. At least three times a week, Gigi ate dinner at the Aberdeen house. Her mom was a nurse and worked nights, and even after the twins were born and they ate frozen casseroles brought by neighbors and church members for weeks on end, Gigi still came over to eat with them.
Ivy loved Gigi. She was tall and curvy and had hair that looked like fresh honey and always, always, always had her nails painted some wild color. Neon yellow. Electric blue. Aubergine purple. She reminded Ivy of an elf. Gigi and Layla had been best friends since preschool, and Gigi was great about including Ivy. Ivy totally got how rare that was, for a teenager to be cool with a kid bursting into her best friend’s room and bouncing on the bed, begging them to straighten her hair or paint her nails or just let her listen to the latest high school gossip. But that was Gigi, even when Layla tried to kick Ivy out.
Taryn loved Gigi too, and during the summer, the four of them would go to the rec center pool and lie in the sun and cannonball into the water. It always felt like they were actually friends instead of two kids Ivy’s mom had begged Layla and Gigi to take with them.
That night, Ivy had just finished a bit more detail on a stormy treehouse drawing. Their house was total chaos, babies screaming all the time, diapers everywhere, dirty burp cloths thrown over the backs of couches and chairs. Ivy didn’t even know Gigi had come over. She just knew that she was ready to show Layla her drawing, because every time she worked on it, she ended up crying or her chest would tighten and she couldn’t get enough breath. She felt like she was going to explode, and she knew she couldn’t talk to her mom right now, but she had to talk to someone.
Layla was almost as exhausted as their parents, helping out in the middle of the night when the twins woke up for feedings. But she and Ivy had gotten even closer lately, bonding while the family changed into something new and also kind of scary. Layla seemed to know when Ivy was feeling left out or invisible, and she always made her feel better, whether it was just inviting Ivy into her room to listen to music or making her famous hot chocolate with steamed half-and-half, one giant marshmallow floating in the middle. Yes, it was time to tell Layla. Ivy wanted to tell Layla and only Layla.
Ivy descended from the attic and walked down the old wood floors to Layla’s room. Her door was open a crack, and Ivy was just about to knock when she heard Gigi’s voice, which sounded weirdly watery and clogged.
“…not sorry I didn’t tell you. I wasn’t ready. You have to understand that.”
“I’m trying to, but…” Layla sniffed, and her voice broke a little as though she was trying to talk through tears. Everything in Ivy locked up, and her heart felt like a brassy gong in her chest.
“But I guess I really don’t get it,” Layla went on. “This is me. I’m your best friend, and I had to hear it from Jesse Ryder, who said he saw you two kissing in your car. How do you think that made me feel?”
“Lay, this isn’t about you.”
“I’m not saying that it is. But you have a girlfriend, Gigi. A girlfriend.”
Ivy’s notebook almost slipped out of her fingers. She gripped it tighter at the last minute, but she was almost positive Layla and Gigi heard the crinkling of the paper. For a few seconds, no one said anything. Ivy couldn’t even breathe. That word—girlfriend—kept exploding in her head like fireworks.
“I don’t know what to think about this, Geej,” Layla said. “I can’t process this. I can’t—”
Gigi made a frustrated sound. “By all means, ignore what I’m saying and make this about you. Again. How do you think I feel? I didn’t want you to find out like that. I’ve wanted to talk to you about it for years. Years, Lay. But I was still figuring it out. I haven’t even told my parents. Bryn’s only told her mom. Her dad is still clueless.”
Ivy didn’t exactly understand everything they were saying, but the gist was pretty clear.
Gigi liked girls.
Gigi had a girlfriend.
And Layla hadn’t known until today.
Ivy waited for Layla to tell Gigi that it was okay. That she got it. That she loved Gigi just the way she was.
But that didn’t happen. Instead, they sat there for a while, their sniffling the only sound. Finally, Ivy heard the bed creak as someone stood up.
“I guess I’ll see you at school,” Gigi said softly.
The door swung open, and Ivy backed into the bathroom’s dark doorway across the hall. The tile seeped cold through her socks, and it smelled like Layla’s ginger perfume and toothpaste. Gigi came out of the bedroom and wiped her eyes with both hands. She stood there for a minute, breathing in and out, in and out.
And then she left, and that was the last time Ivy saw her.
CHAPTER NINE
Letters to the World
Ivy waited until Layla’s shoulders were moving up and down with slow, even breaths. Then she kicked off the blanket that smelled like hot dogs and stood up. Ivy patted her pillow, feeling the edges of her notebook, and then pulled the blanket over it and bunched up the edges. It definitely didn’t look like a person was sleeping under there, but it would have to do.
Tomorrow was Tuesday and school had been canceled, but the principal had announced that they wanted everyone to stick to the bathrooms and the gym. But right now, Ivy was a homeless girl who didn’t care.
After she limped-tiptoed down the main hallway, she pushed open the double doors into the library. Ivy slipped inside and pressed her back against the door while gulping deep breaths. Then she gulped a bit more because she felt like she hadn’t breathed enough since the storm hit. This was the closest thing to her little attic room that she was going to get right now.
After her lungs felt good and full, she wandered up and down the shelf-lined aisles. Moonlight streamed through the windows, making the whole room look silvery. It was eerie and beautiful and quiet. Posters quoting Shakespeare and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Oliver Twist hung on the walls. Right above the little poetry section, there was a poster of a girl named Emily Dickinson in an old-fashioned dress with her hair coiled in a bun. Her poems were weird, all dashes and confusing words. Ivy read a few in her language arts class a few months ago during a poetry unit. Her teacher said that Emily hadn’t gone out in public a lot and that her poems were never read when she was alive. She hid them away, but now she was famous.
This is my letter to the world,
that never wrote to me…
That was what the poster said, in a handwriting font, as if Emily herself scribbled it one night by candlelight. Maybe on a night when she was feeling really lonely and just needed to get things out of her head, even though no one was listening. Ivy stared at the words now, and her throat ached. She wished she had brought her notebook to writ
e it down. Instead, she repeated the words, over and over, until she was sure she memorized them.
“What do you think that means?” a voice whispered.
It startled Ivy enough that she yelped and swung around.
“Oops, sorry,” the voice said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Ivy didn’t answer, her heart still halfway up her throat. Whoever was talking to her stood, but the light from a cell phone shined in Ivy’s eyes, and she couldn’t see anything except a blocky silhouette.
“Could you maybe…” Ivy squinted and shaded her eyes with her hands.
“Oh yeah, sorry.”
The light lowered and there was June Somerset, books puddled around her feet.
“What are you doing here?” Ivy asked.
“What are you doing here?” June asked.
“I’m… I’m…”
“Yeah. Me too.”
Ivy frowned. “It looks like you’re reading. I wasn’t reading.”
“You were reading that poster.”
Ivy sighed. This girl was exhausting. “But why are you here? At the school, I mean. Isn’t your house okay?”
“Yeah, but my mom wanted to stay the night in case someone needed her. Mrs. Lewis’s house got messed up, and she’s, like, six months pregnant or something. Pepper Hillson is diabetic, and they had to find some insulin for her. Then there’s your mom and the twins.”
“Right. The twins.” Ivy twisted her fingers into the hem of her borrowed shirt. Layla had grabbed it for her. It was about two sizes too big and smelled like sweaty socks. “Isn’t your dad at home?”
June went very still, toeing the edge of one of the books. “My dad lives in California.”
“Oh. Sorry. I didn’t know.”
Ivy Aberdeen's Letter to the World Page 4
