Harmonic Feedback

by Tara Kelly

  HARMONIC

  FEEDBACK

  TARA KELLY

  HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY

  NEW YORK

  Henry Holt and Company, LLC

  Publishers since 1866

  175 Fifth Avenue

  New York, New York 10010

  www.HenryHoltKids.com

  Henry Holt® is a registered trademark of Henry Holt and Company, LLC.

  Copyright © 2010 by Tara Kelly

  All rights reserved.

  Distributed in Canada by H. B. Fenn and Company Ltd.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Kelly, Tara.

  Harmonic feedback / Tara Kelly.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: When Drea and her mother move in with her grandmother in Bellingham, Washington, the sixteen-year-old finds that she can have real friends, in spite of her Asperger’s, and that even when you love someone it does not make life perfect.

  ISBN 978-0-8050-9010-9

  [1. Interpersonal relations—Fiction. 2. Emotional problems—Fiction. 3. Self-perception—Fiction. 4. Asperger’s syndrome—Fiction. 5. Drug abuse—Fiction. 6. Rock music—Fiction. 7. Bellingham (Wash.)—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.K2984Har 2010

  [Fic]—dc22

  2009024150

  First Edition—2010

  Printed in the United States of America

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  ONE IN THIRTY-EIGHT. Bet on a single number in roulette, and those are the odds of winning. Getting struck by lightning is a little more difficult—one in seven hundred thousand. Winning the lottery? Forget it.

  But the odds of me ending up homeless were pretty good. Moving in with Grandma Horvath was Mom’s worst idea yet.

  “It’s beautiful here, don’t you think?” Mom asked, cutting the engine.

  I shrugged and looked out the passenger window at Grandma’s house, a turn-of-the-century shack the color of pea soup. My initial impression of Washington was simple—they had trees here. And as far as I could see, that was about it.

  I pushed open the squeaky door of Mom’s Toyota Corolla. It was late August, and we’d just driven the 896 miles from San Francisco to Bellingham with a broken air conditioner. Even my toes were sweaty.

  “It’s past six,” Grandma Horvath called out to Mom as she scurried out the front door. “You said you’d be here before five.” I hadn’t seen her for five years, but she looked exactly the same—frizzy gray hair, sharp eyes, and a pointy mouth smeared with her favorite pink lipstick.

  “I’m sorry. We got caught in rush-hour traffic.” Mom gave her a quick embrace.

  “And you couldn’t use that mobile phone you waste your money on?” Grandma pulled back, taking in Mom’s outfit. “You’re too old to be wearing such revealing shirts.”

  Mom ducked away and opened the back of the trailer we’d towed. “My battery died back in Portland.”

  “Andrea, give me a kiss.” Grandma’s wedding ring scratched my arm as she pecked my cheek, and I cringed because she smelled like perfume in a public bathroom.

  “My name is Drea.”

  “That’s not what your birth certificate says.” She reached for my blue lunch box. “What does someone your age need a lunch box for?”

  I shoved it behind my back. “It’s my purse. Don’t touch it.”

  Grandma made a clucking sound with her tongue and joined Mom at the back of the trailer. “My neighbor recommended a good doctor for Andrea’s behavior problems.”

  “What about your behavior problems, Grandma?”

  “Drea, please.” Mom rubbed her temples, which meant another migraine was coming on.

  Grandma’s lips formed a thin line. “You spoiled her, Juliana.” She turned on her heel and walked away. Her shoulders were nearly up to her ears by the time she got to the porch.

  I’d promised Mom I’d be good. Ignore her, she said. It will make our stay a lot more peaceful, and we’ve got nowhere else to go right now. Did we ever? We always found somewhere, though; Mom either moved in with a guy or managed to stay at a job longer than six months. Even living with her last boyfriend was a step up from Grandma Horvath. He stole my razors to shave his chest and obsessed over his twenty-nine-inch waist, but Mom dated all kinds of guys. The one thing they had in common was they went away—whether they left her or we left them.

  “Did you take your meds?” I knew Mom’s eyes were narrow behind her shades. She did this squinty thing when she asked a question I didn’t like.

  “Nope. I don’t feel like being a zombie today.”

  “Yeah, well.” Mom set my acoustic guitar case on the ground. “You’d feel a lot better if you took them every day like you’re supposed to.”

  I opened my lunch box and grabbed one of three orange bottles. “This is speed in a bottle.”

  “It gets you to think before you speak. I call that a miracle in a bottle.” She tied her wavy blond hair into a ponytail, but strands stuck to her neck.

  “You can’t fix everything with pills.”

  Mom held her hand up, fingers spread wide. Her stop sign. “I’m not getting into this right now, Drea.”

  “You never want to get into it.”

  Mom sighed and put her hand on my cheek. “I know you’re mad, baby. But we’re stuck until I find a job.” She nodded toward Grandma’s house. “And Grandma is helping us out a lot. Medi-Cal won’t cover us up here. She’s offered to pay for your doctor visits and meds for now. So, please, please don’t antagonize her, okay?”

  “She talks to you like you’re five.”

  Mom rubbed her temples. “She’s difficult—yes—but she means well.”

  “Living out of your old pickup truck was better than this.”

  Mom smirked and handed me a box of effect pedals for my guitar. “Oh, yeah? Do you miss Cheetos that much?”

  My stomach turned at just the thought. Mom decided to go to some campground in California once where the only sign of life was a dirty gas station. I lived on cherry cola and ninety-nine-cent bags of Cheetos because I didn’t trust anything there that didn’t come in a sealed bag or bottle.

  “I’m going to take these in,” I said, right before colliding with a strange girl standing behind me.

  She looked about my age but stood a couple inches taller. Judging from the band on her T-shirt, she had horrible taste in music. “Hi, you’re Andrea, right?”

  “It’s Drea.”

  Mom heaved a sigh behind me. She thought I was being rude when I didn’t offer a bubbly hello and plaster a big smile on my face. Strangers made me nervous; I always ended up saying too much or too little.

  The girl grinned even wider, and her blue eyes sparkled despite the dark eye shadow around them. “I’m Naomi. I live in that light blue matchbox across the street.” She nodded to an aging house with an overgrown yard. “My dad sent me over to ask if you needed any help.”

  “Definitely. Thanks for offering.” Mom smiled and held out her hand to Naomi. “I’m Juli. It’s nice to meet you.”

  Naomi tucked a lock of tangled purple hair behind her ear, revealing a skull stud. “You too.” She glanced back at me, her eyes falling on my guitar case. “Dude, you play guitar?”

  “Yes.” I played a mean rhythm, but processing and manipulating sound through my computer was my passion. Unfortunately, most people didn’t understand the concept of sound design. Mom told me not to bring it up unless someone asked.

  Naomi grabbed a box and followed me into the house. I caught a whiff of something that smelled like boiled cabbage and potpourri. “Don’t ask me what that smell is because I have no clue,” I said over my shoulder, heading downstairs to the basement.

  Naomi giggled. “It’s cool. You should see it when my dad tr
ies to make egg salad. He burns the eggs every time, and our house smells like a sewer for a week.”

  I yanked the lightbulb cord so we didn’t trip over anything. The basement reeked of mildew, but it was roomy and dark. Just the way I liked it. “My grandma thinks liver and mustard sandwiches with boiled milk make a tasty dinner.”

  Naomi wrinkled her nose at me. “Boiled milk, for real?”

  I set my guitar case and box of effect pedals on the floor. “Yeah, it gets this layer on top that looks like crusty skin and—”

  “Stop!” She winced. “Where do I put this?”

  I motioned for her to put it next to the stuff I set down and tried to imagine how the basement would look once I made it mine. Lime-green walls, purple Christmas lights strung around like ivy, and my small collection of instruments circling the bed. Sure, Grandma would have a fit—but it would be after the fact. Sometimes it paid off to be a night owl.

  Naomi chewed on her thumbnail. Bits of turquoise nail polish flaked off into her mouth. “My brother left me his old drum set when he took off last year. I’ve been dying for someone to jam with. We should start a band or something.” She pulled a strip of polish from her tongue.

  “Do they have edible nail polish now?” I asked. The thought of playing with other people terrified me. It was hard enough collaborating with other people online where we just sent files back and forth.

  Naomi peered down at her frayed shoes, cramming her hands in the pockets of her gray cords. “I kinda forgot I had it on, but it’s no biggie. I’ve ingested worse.”

  “Like what? Paint thinner?”

  She let out a laugh and looked up at me. “You don’t screw around, do you? Most girls are all fake and shady.”

  “People are fake in general.” I headed back up the stairs and Naomi followed.

  “I guess you’d know better than me. I’ve never lived anywhere but Bellingham. Did you grow up in San Francisco?”

  I held open the front door and waved her outside. “No, we just lived there for the last two years—which is a record. We’ve covered every major city in California, plus Vegas, Denver, Salt Lake City, and—”

  “Bellingham must be a big change.” She nibbled on her ring fingernail this time.

  “You have no idea.”

  In my sixteen years on earth, we’d never lived more than a thirty-minute drive from a big city. Urban chaos was intense stimulation for a mind that didn’t have an off switch—jarring sirens, drunk people fighting with their lovers on cell phones, six-inch robo-heels chasing the bus, and the scent of piss on newspaper. Watching humans on any downtown street corner was no different than watching a group of sea lions fight over that perfect spot at SeaWorld.

  Naomi stuck around and helped us with the rest of the furniture and boxes. Luckily, we had learned early on that the less we kept, the easier the moves got. Mom sold her bed back in San Francisco because she knew Grandma would insist she use the bed in the guest room.

  After we shoved my mattress down the stairs, Naomi leaned against a wooden beam and watched as I opened my guitar cases and put the guitars on their rightful stands.

  “So you never answered my question about starting a band.…”

  “Music is something I’ve always done alone. And we don’t even know each other.”

  “What—you don’t think I can play anything?”

  I turned to face her. “If I thought that, I’d say that.”

  “You just look at me like I’m stupid or something. But it’s fine. Whatever.” She grinned, making it impossible to tell if she was serious or not.

  What was with people and their obsession with looks? Sometimes I was in a bad mood. It wasn’t personal.

  I unpacked my didgeridoo and laid it across the mattress.

  She came up behind me. “What the hell is that? It looks like a funky telescope.”

  “A didgeridoo. My mom brought it back for me when she went to Australia with her last boyfriend.”

  Naomi picked it up and stroked the tribal etchings. “How do I play it?”

  “Just blow into it, but keep your lips relaxed.”

  She pulled it to her mouth and snickered. “This would make a great bong.”

  “Okay.” Being a loner most of my life, I wasn’t too up on the party scene. Sure, there were drugs on every campus and the girls who got stoned and popped little pills in the bathroom, but I never talked to them. The last real friend I had was a boy named Adam in the fourth grade. We’d reenact our favorite movie, The Terminator, on the monkey bars every morning at recess. He wanted to be Sarah Connor, and I preferred being the Terminator, so it worked out.

  “I bet you got the good shit in California.” She blew into the mouthpiece, but the only sound was her breath.

  “Pretend you’re doing a raspberry.”

  Her second attempt was even worse. “Oh, man, I think more spit than air came out that time.” She shoved the didgeridoo at me. “Show me how it’s done.”

  “I think I’ll wait till it dries first.” I put it back on the mattress, taking note to clean it later. I was the messiest person on earth, but saliva, snot, and other bodily fluids made me want to bathe in sanitizer.

  “Drea!” Mom called from upstairs. “Dinner’s ready.”

  Naomi looked in the direction of Mom’s voice and smiled. “Your mom is really pretty. You look a lot like her.”

  This was news to me. We were both about five-two, but that was where our physical likeness ended. My curly hair was the color of a penny—too orange in my opinion, and my freckles were a little too dark on my pale skin. Nothing like Mom’s golden complexion. With oversized green eyes, I got called names like frog girl and leprechaun. Nobody ever called Mom that.

  “Well”—I looked away—“I guess I have to eat dinner now.” Grandma embarrassed me enough without an audience. I didn’t want the first potential friend I’d made in years to hear all about my “behavior problems” over whatever monstrosity Grandma had cooked up. And even if Grandma didn’t bring it up, Mom would. She loved to tell everyone about my issues.

  Naomi raised her eyebrows at me, smirking. “It’s cool. You don’t have to invite me. Your grandma kinda scares me anyway.” She headed up the stairs. “You should come by my house one of these days. I can show you my drum kit.”

  “Where can I get green paint?”

  Naomi stopped on the second to top step and spun around. “What?”

  “I want to paint the basement this weekend. Is there any place in town that—”

  “Drea,” she interrupted, “we might be close, but we aren’t in the North Pole. There are stores here, like Home Depot. Come by tomorrow and I’ll take you.” She waved and left.

  I stared at the empty doorway, wondering why this near stranger was being so helpful. Did she really want me to drop by tomorrow? Or was it like saying call me without meaning it? A therapist told me that people said these things to be polite but their invitation wasn’t always sincere, which made no sense. Why invite someone if you didn’t want that person to show up?

  Like the first day of seventh grade. I’d never forget that. These two girls asked me to eat lunch with them, and I felt this surge of excitement run through my body. I couldn’t stop laughing or smiling, even after they kept asking what was funny. But I’d calmed down after a few minutes, and we had what I thought was a good conversation. I started telling them all about my favorite car, the McLaren F1—how it was the fastest in the world. And they seemed interested enough.

  I sat with them every day that week, but they talked to me less and less. Finally, one girl rolled her eyes. “God, Drea, can’t you take a hint?” she asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  She exchanged this glance with her friend, and they giggled. “Why do you keep sitting here?”

  I remember my stomach tightening up in these knots. “You invited me.…”

  “Yeah, once. We didn’t know you’d be such a clingy freak.”

  My face felt hot, and my breat
h quickened. A response didn’t come to me, not words anyway. I just wanted to stop them—their shrill laughs and wide, amused eyes. I grabbed a handful of red Jell-O off my plate and hurled it at their laughing faces. This got me cleanup duty and a note sent home for Mom to sign.

  Mom didn’t yell, though—her eyes looked sad. She hugged me and said it was never good to seem too anxious for friends. Neediness scared people. That an invitation wasn’t always an offer for friendship, and I’d overstayed my welcome.

  I never wanted to feel that level of embarrassment again.

  Grandma eyeballed the forkful of boiled cabbage and onions I pushed around on my plate. The smell alone was setting off my gag reflex.

  “You need to put on some weight,” Grandma said.

  As if I could help the fact that I was lucky to break a hundred pounds in winter clothing. I never got why so many people prayed for a fast metabolism. It was annoying when everyone accused me of being anorexic.

  “Well, boiled vegetables aren’t going to help. Got any ice cream that isn’t sugar free and coffee flavored?” When Grandma was diagnosed with diabetes, her taste in food got exponentially worse.

  She nodded at Mom. “Juliana was picky too. I’d find pork chops and broccoli stuffed in the crevices under the table. Sometimes she’d try to leave the kitchen with lumpy socks.”

  Mom scrunched up her nose. “I had to vomit on my plate before she believed the pork chops actually made me sick.”

  Grandma shook her head and swallowed a bite of mushy carrots. “My father would’ve beat me black and blue if I did that. Nobody could afford to be picky during the Depression.” The only response heard was the scraping of our forks against the plates. Neither of us wanted to get Grandma started on her “When I was a little girl…” tangent.

  Grandma twirled noodles around her fork, her eyes growing softer. “George loved pork chops.” An image of Grandpa’s white hair and big smile flickered through my mind. He suffered brain damage from a massive heart attack the year before I was born. Even so, he always beat me at Old Maid.

  Mom patted her hand. “I know.”