by Anne Dayton
David Copperfield dangles above my head, balanced on the balls of my feet. Not David Copperfield the magician, but the horrible, snoozerific book by Charles Dickens. Mrs. Dietrich is really ramping up her torture techniques, and I’m not even at school. As of today, I wish I were.
Sometimes being punished helps you feel better. It makes you feel like you’re doing something to right your wrong. But this week hasn’t done a whole lot for me. I’m not exactly sorry about what I did, so my suspension is more like an annoying, imposed break from school. And the world, really. The worst part of this whole thing is that I’m on house arrest, which means Dreamy won’t let me use my phone or the computer or go outside except to help with the horses and go to work. I have no idea what’s going on with the Miracle Girls.
The only good thing is our story made the paper. In a town like Half Moon Bay, what we did is big pretty news, and every day there’ve been more articles and editorials about Ms. Moore’s case.
I roll my head to the side and see that it’s almost three, meaning that another day of school is officially over. Whew. I only have to live through Thursday and Friday, and then I’ll be allowed to go back to class next week. I’m actually looking forward to our community service so I can talk to the Miracle Girls.
With just a little more concentration I can pass the book . . . from . . . one foot to . . .
The doorbell sounds from downstairs, and I launch David Copperfield across the room. “I got it,” I yell over the upstairs railing and pound down the steps. Someone from the outside world! Yesterday when the UPS guy came to our house I opened the door with such gusto that he almost jumped out of his skin.
“Hello?” I yank open the door, but then stop short.
Dean laughs at me. I realize I’m wearing a T-shirt with a bank logo on it and old purple shorts that are now way too short. “Nice to see you too.”
I glance back inside my house, then shut the door behind me and take a few steps forward, forcing him off my porch.
“What are you doing here?!” A few months ago, I would have never spoken to anyone this way. I guess I’ve been hardened by my life of crime.
Dean gives me a lopsided grin. “Absence hasn’t made your heart grow fonder?”
I cross my arms over my chest. He is not going to charm his way out of this mess, not this time. Not ever again.
“No. What do you want?”
“That was pretty cool, what you guys did at school.”
I cock an eyebrow. “Is that what you came here to tell me?”
“No.” Dean takes a step closer. “Listen, Zoe, I’m sorry about what happened, but there is an explanation.”
“I’m listening.” I let my hands rest on the porch railing and trace my eyes along his cheekbone. Even now, even though he’s hurt me, I don’t want to look away.
“I guess I just wanted to say . . .” He clears his throat, as if to buy time, and I realize that he’s lost his train of thought. I suppress a smile. “I’ve been trying to break up with Grace for a while. We never should have been dating in the first place.”
Goose bumps raise on my legs. It’s March, but it’s still cool in the hazy afternoon sunshine. So far it’s only faintly drizzled twice this spring, and the drought rages on like an ugly curse.
“She liked me, and I tried to be into it too. Plus, the girl I actually liked was with someone else, so . . .” He peeks at me shyly, and I roll my eyes.
That night on the sailboat comes back to me. We were practically kissing. But he was dating another girl—a girl he intentionally led me to believe he was not with anymore. How can I trust him after a thing like that? If he did it to her, he’ll do it to me too. Maybe not today, but someday.
“You should have thought about that before you hurt both of us then.” I take a few steps backward and clutch the doorknob. I need to get out of here before my resolve wavers.
“Zoe,” he says, staring at me with desperation. “Grace’s grandmother has been sick. She had a stroke and slipped into a coma.” He rubs a hand over his face like he has a headache. “You don’t dump someone when all of that is going on.”
“You still let it go too far.” My cheeks burn when I realize how awful Grace would feel if she knew what had happened that night under the starry sky. “You should have said something earlier.”
But even as the words come out of my mouth, I hear the hypocrisy in them. Isn’t that exactly what I did to Marcus? I stayed with him for far longer than I should have, for so many reasons, but mostly because it’s very hard to hurt someone who has done nothing to deserve it. I feel a dull ache in the back of my throat and clench my jaw shut.
“I couldn’t.” He reaches out a hand to touch mine. “I wanted to, but you’re too hard to resist.” His cool blue eyes are pleading with me. I make myself look away so I can think straight.
“You . . .” I try to make my words make sense. “It wasn’t right.” I feel tears welling up. I’m not even sure I’m talking about Dean anymore.
“I broke up with her last night.”
I take a step back toward the door.
“Zoe, wait.”
I reach for the knob and step inside, slamming the door behind me. He just . . . I did . . . I run upstairs, my footsteps shaking the narrow staircase, tears streaming down my face.
40
My eyes are almost swollen shut. I force them open, one lid at a time. My room is dark as I sit up. What am I doing here? What time is it? It takes me a minute, but the familiar shapes in my room begin to emerge from the shadows. My alarm clock reads 10:20. It must mean p.m. And then it all comes rushing back.
I close my eyes again, hoping to lose myself in the blessed amnesia of sleep, but my stomach grumbles, and I realize I haven’t eaten anything since lunch. Stupid, annoying basic needs of the body. I flip on the light and push myself out of bed. I’ll just run down to the kitchen, cram something into my mouth, and then go back to bed. Sleep is the best way to put off the pain.
I hear low voices coming from the kitchen as I make my way down the stairs. I make out Dreamy’s raspy tones right away, but I don’t recognize the second voice as Ed’s until I’m almost there.
I freeze, then duck into the living room. If they’re talking about legal stuff, I’ll turn around and go back up. I’d rather starve to death than listen to my parents work out the details of their divorce on top of everything else today. I hold my breath and try to stay silent, but Dreamy’s next comment catches me off guard.
“I don’t know.” Her voice is low and soothing, the voice she often uses to comfort me. It sounds like honey oozing. “Maybe that’s too harsh. All they did was hang up a few posters. It’s not like anybody got hurt, and the school is punishing her plenty already.”
“But she needs to learn. Civil disobedience is one thing. Breaking and entering is another.” Ed sighs and shifts around in his favorite chair, making a familiar squeaking noise. “We have to teach her the difference between good protests and bad protests. And bad protests come with repercussions.”
I pause and take a step toward the wall that separates the living room from the kitchen. The lights are on, casting a yellow glow over the kitchen, but Dreamy and Ed must be sitting at the table, just out of my view.
“But a whole year?” I inch forward. This can’t be good. “She’s been working so hard to save up for that car.”
Uh-oh. I feel my heart sink. They’re not going to let me get a car for a whole year? I’ll practically be graduating by then.
“Maybe six months,” Ed says, and I silently let out a breath. He always was a softie. I don’t think I’ll be able to afford a car before then anyway.
“That sounds better,” Dreamy says. I hear ice cubes clink against the edge of a glass. “I’m afraid she hasn’t been able to save much anyway. I’ve been cashing her checks, and she’s insisted I keep a big chunk each time. She’s been helping with the groceries and gas for months now, more than she probably lets on to you.”
“I susp
ected,” Ed says quietly. “And I’m sorry about that, but the maintenance work really is picking up. If it ever rains and the landscaping gets going again, I’ll have more work than I know what to do with.” He chuckles, but it’s a sad sound.
I wait, but all I hear is a faint rustling. I take another step and lean forward so that I can barely see around the wall now. Dreamy and Ed are sitting across from each other at the table, staring into each other’s eyes. I watch as Ed moves his hand, slowly, and lays it on top of hers, and Dreamy jumps but doesn’t pull it away.
“Do you remember that old Volkswagen van we had in ’75? I found a picture of it in one of my books the other day.” Ed laughs under his breath. “Now that was a car.”
“The cheese mobile.” Dreamy shakes her head. “That hideous yellow, and those awful squeaky brakes. You rigged it with that 8-track and played ‘Yellow Submarine’ over and over.”
“Too bad we don’t still have that thing. Zoe would look real cool driving to high school in that old heap.”
“Thank goodness for small mercies.” Dreamy tilts her head to the left and then the right, stretching her neck, but carefully keeps her hand in Ed’s. “The poor girl has been through enough.”
Suddenly it hits me how much of their marriage, of their lives really, happened before I came along. Somehow I always imagined my parents’ lives as two long chains of events leading up to me. I guess I thought of my birth as the point they were building toward the whole time. And I never thought about what it will be like for them after I move out and move on, when it’s just the two of them again.
Ed rubs his thumb across the back of Dreamy’s hand and smiles at her. The dishwasher shuts off, and for a minute neither one of them says anything. I lean into the wall, resting my shoulder against the smooth white plaster.
“Our little radical.”
“You would have been disappointed if she’d been anything but,” Ed says, laughing quietly.
“Nah.” Dreamy smiles. “I would have loved her no matter what.” She lifts her eyes to Ed’s, and I shrink back. “But I am glad to see she inherited some of my genes after all.”
“She did at that.” Ed runs his free hand through his hair. “Breaking into the school to put up flyers. That’s a signature Danielle Horowitz move if I ever saw one.”
My eyes go wide at Dreamy’s real name. I mean, yeah, I knew that she legally changed it from Danielle a long time ago, but I haven’t heard that name in so long. Dreamy flips her palm over and gives Ed’s hand a squeeze.
“She turned out good, didn’t she?”
“Yeah.” Dreamy nods. “Better than good. She’s a . . . a miracle.”
I feel my cheeks flush, but I can’t help but think maybe this whole stupid thing has done some good after all.
41
For once I’m almost dreading getting off work. I’m bored out of my mind at home so being at El Bueno Burrito is almost fun. Plus, it’s payday, which is always a good thing.
Gus waves as I step out into the night and head toward my bike, but I freeze when I see a shadowy figure sitting on the rack. I squint. It wouldn’t be . . . and it’s too small to be him anyway. I wait a second as my eyes adjust to the dark.
“It’s just me, Zo.” Riley. I walk toward her, my heart quickening. “It takes you guys forever to close up, you know that?” She snorts, but it sounds kind of forced.
“You were waiting for me?”
She nods and pushes herself off the metal rack. “Let’s go somewhere else.”
I follow behind her on the sidewalk. “Your parents let you out?”
She points to her mom’s minivan in the parking lot. Christine lovingly dubbed it the RealMobile because magnetic real estate ads featuring Mrs. McGee’s smiling face are plastered on the sides.
“We ran out of milk, and Michael only eats cereal for breakfast.” She passes the RealMobile and keeps going. “They were desperate. And I had to talk to someone.” She shakes her head. “I knew you’d be here.”
We walk in silence away from the harsh lights of the parking lot toward the shadowy corner of the strip mall, where there’s an opening to the back of the stores. Riley plops down on the edge of the loading dock behind the supermarket.
“So what’s up?” I sit on the edge of the slab of concrete and let my feet dangle over the side.
“Tom’s being so weird.” Riley sighs.
I close my eyes for a second. I know the long-distance thing has been hard on them, but if they break up too, I don’t know what I’ll do. There’s too much sorrow in my world lately.
“Did he break up with you?” I ask quietly, barely able to get the words out.
“It’s . . . I don’t know.” Riley pulls her feet up and sits cross-legged on the slab. “Maybe he will. I just think college is really different. I know he still cares about me, but things have been weird.” She waits for a second. “It’s not only the distance, though that doesn’t help. It’s that all his friends are older and interested in other things, and I don’t know them, and . . . I don’t know. I don’t really fit into his world anymore.”
I try to put myself inside Tom’s head. College seems like a foreign universe. What would it be like to live in a dorm hundreds of miles from your family and have to make completely new friends? What’s it like to have to start all over again? I can’t even picture it or see how a long-distance girlfriend in high school would factor into it.
“I got this weird e-mail from him tonight, saying he’s going to study in Mexico for the summer, and, I don’t know, he didn’t even seem that sad about it. About not seeing me.” She takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “And I’m trying to figure out what to do about it.”
“What do you mean?” Heather Boyd flashes into my mind. “Are you going to make some crazy gesture to try to win him back? Like drive down to Santa Barbara tonight in the RealMobile?” I picture her racing down the freeway in the dark.
Riley shakes her head. “I don’t think that would really solve anything.”
It’s strangely quiet now. The parking lot is on the other side of the stores, and the road is just beyond that, but back here the only noise is from someone throwing boxes out the back of the video store.
“I don’t know if I should break it off or wait for him to do it himself.”
She says it so calmly, so matter-of-factly, that I almost don’t catch the pain in her voice, but Riley is practically my sister. I know this is killing her.
“You really think those are your only options?” I pull my knees up and wrap my arms around them. “What about fighting for him?”
Riley’s face is pale in the moonlight, and she’s biting her lip. “I think it’s too late for that.”
I watch her for a second and consider pulling her into a hug, but something in her face is cold and determined.
“Have you talked to Ana about this?” I let out a slow breath. “You know, because of Dave?”
Riley nods. “I think she was surprised by how hard it was to break up with Dave. She didn’t really expect that kind of pain, you know?” Riley runs the cuff of her sleeve under her nose. “She thought I should stay with him, to do anything to avoid that kind of pain.”
I sigh. I love Ana, and not long ago, I probably would have agreed, but now I’m not so sure. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned this year, it’s that you shouldn’t wait for him to do it.” I try to sound confident, but there’s something unnerving about giving guy advice to Riley. “If it’s over, the best thing to do is let him know, honestly and fairly.”
Riley nods, her eyes focused on the fence at the other side of the alleyway.
“That’s what I thought too.”
42
“Could they have made these things any more unflattering?” Ashley pulls at her fluorescent orange vest. They’re making us wear the hideous thing over our clothes so drivers can see us as they’re cruising down the highway, though how they could miss five girls picking up trash along the side of the road is beyon
d me.
“Don’t give them any ideas.” Ana nods toward our jailers, otherwise know as James and John from the county correctional office. They’re “supervising” our community service, which so far seems to include driving us out to this stretch of highway and relaxing inside the van. They’ve got the radio tuned to a country station, blaring the music out the open windows.
“I don’t know. I was thinking of wearing it to the prom.” Riley pulls the vest so it makes a sort of lopsided V-neck. “What do you think? Is it my color?” A truck zooms by, spewing out exhaust fumes, and she coughs and waves her hands in front of her face.
“Well, you wouldn’t have to worry about anyone else showing up in the same dress.” Christine rolls her eyes.
“The sick part is, it kind of does look good on you,” Ana says as she reaches down and shoves another piece of paper into her trash bag. “Maybe prisoner-orange will be showing up on the runways this fall.”
Riley throws a balled-up piece of paper toward Christine, who holds out her trash bag and catches it deftly.
“How many times do we have to do this?” Christine pretends to put a gun to her head, but she’s smiling, and I suspect she’s having more fun than she lets on.
“Every Saturday,” Ashley says, “for the rest of the school year.”
When I broke the news to Gus that I could no longer work Saturdays, he was none too happy about it, and more than a little shocked. He thinks of me as Comrade Zoe, his dependable, compliant worker who never, ever calls in sick and always remembers to mop under the tables. Now I have to close on Saturday nights, meaning that I’m doing manual labor from ten in the morning till ten at night, which gives me ample time to think about what I did wrong. But at least I’ll have less time to sit around and think about what a mess I’ve made of everything.
“This is going to be the cleanest stretch of highway known to man.” Christine yawns. Ashley picks up a six-pack ring and swings it around in the air on the end of her finger, then tosses it in Christine’s bag.
