“Okay. Thanks.”
Steve’s friend at the Victoria Times Colonist wrote reviews of teen novels and he gave them to Steve for Amanda, but she only liked sports memoirs, so I got them. Fine with me. I’d found some really good stuff in the piles he’d handed over.
“About time,” Leigh yelled when I came down the steps into the sunken family room. Steve dropped my stuff and made his exit. “We thought Amanda’s dad had dragged you off to talk baseball or read books!”
“Hey, Suze,” Jessica said. She looked a little nervous, and I was sorry I’d left her here for hours on her own. One thing she probably hadn’t been expecting was how loud those two got at sleepovers. I hoped they’d at least tried to include her.
“Hi, Jess.”
“Finally, you’re here,” Amanda said. “How long was your dinner, anyway? Is there food in that basket?”
“Yeah,” I said. “All kinds of cool stuff.”
I hadn’t actually unwrapped the cellophane yet, because…well, the whole idea of Caroline sending me a gift basket seemed kind of weird. I had checked it out through the wrapping, and it was full of things like smoked almonds and chocolate espresso beans.
“Let’s make the bed,” Leigh said, “and then we can break it open.”
Amanda’s couch is this huge sectional and if you arrange it with the two ottomans in the middle and all the couches surrounding them, you can turn it into a giant, and I mean giant, bed. We’ve been doing it for years.
“Like this,” I told Jessica, showing her where to push the loveseat.
Once we’d spread our sleeping bags and pillows out on it, we ripped open the gift basket. “Where’d you get it?” Amanda asked, tearing into a bag of gourmet gummy bears.
I felt myself blushing for some weird reason. “Caroline sent it to me.”
“Why?” Amanda asked.
“Yeah, why?” Leigh wanted to know.
I popped some smoked almonds into my mouth and chewed them slowly, not sure what to say. I hadn’t told anyone except Jess that she’d stood me up last weekend, so I just shrugged. “I don’t know. Just to be nice?”
“It looks like something you’d send a client,” Leigh said. “Not that I’m complaining. These chocolate-covered blueberries are delish.”
I was kind of glad to hear Leigh say that, because I thought it was a weird thing to send to your kid too. I mean, what was I? Forty years old? Or someone she worked with? I crunched on caramel corn and tried not to hold it against Caroline. It was the thought that counted, right?
Sort of.
I guess.
“Oh, my God!” Amanda said. “There’s a bottle of wine in here.”
“No way.”
“Yes way.” She held up a small dark bottle with a gold foil top.
“It must be fake,” Jess said. “Sparkling grape juice or something.”
We all crowded around Amanda to see better. “It’s real,” she said. “It’s Prosecco. My parents had that on New Year’s.”
“It’s our lucky night,” Leigh said.
I rolled my eyes at her. None of us had ever had a drink, except maybe a sip of beer from our parents. “I still don’t think it’s real,” I said.
“Only one way to find out. Let’s get glasses.” Leigh grabbed the bottle from Amanda and leapfrogged over the back of the couch. We ran after her, stumbling on the stairs, bumping into each other, laughing. Leigh had just managed to peel the foil off when Steve and Heather came into the kitchen.
“Whatcha got there?” Amanda’s dad asked.
“Nothing,” all four of us said at once.
He raised his eyebrows.
“Hand it over,” Heather told Leigh, and she did. She held the bottle up to the light. “I can’t see it without my glasses.” She gave it to Steve, who read the label to her.
“Where’d you get this?” he asked.
“It was in Suze’s gift basket,” Amanda explained. “Her mom gave it to her.”
“I don’t think she knew there was alcohol in it,” I said. “It was kind of buried under the snacks.”
Steve popped the cork as if he’d done it a thousand times. He probably had. He and Heather belonged to a wine club and went to vineyards in the Okanagan for their holidays sometimes. “Perfect for two,” he said, pouring it into a couple of crystal glasses.
“You girls stick to pop,” Heather told us as they left, carrying my bottle.
“Well, at least we didn’t get in trouble,” Amanda said.
No, but only because Heather and Steve are cool.
We grabbed pop and went back to the family room to watch movies. I was glad it was dark, because my face burned with embarrassment. What was Caroline thinking?
^^^
“Are you awake?” I whispered to Jessica hours later.
“Barely,” she said.
I told myself I should shut up and let her sleep, but she’d answered me, so I said, “Do you think the gift basket was weird?” For some reason, it was still on my mind even though all the snacks were history.
She propped herself up on her elbows. The light from the TV flickered across her face. I’d muted the sound once I was sure Amanda and Leigh were finally asleep, so it was totally quiet except for their deep breathing. “Weird how?” she asked.
“I don’t know…I mean, isn’t it a little strange to send your daughter a gift basket of food?”
Jess shrugged. “A little. Did she send it because of last weekend?”
“Yeah.”
“So, she meant well.”
“I guess.”
“And it was kind of awesome,” Jessica said, her eyes closing.
True.
I lay back on my pillow and stared up at the shadows on the ceiling. Yeah, maybe it was a weird gift to send your kid, but Jess was right. She meant well. And it was definitely yummy. Maybe when Caroline got to know me better, she’d send me baskets of books as apologies.
Or maybe, eventually, she wouldn’t even have a reason to apologize.
Chapter 19
On Monday morning, Dad’s voice crawled through a thick fog of sleep. “Suze, get up.”
“Huh?”
“Get up.”
I snuggled down under the covers. The mattress spring poked me in the shoulder and I shifted. “It’s the middle of the night.”
“It’s five o’clock,” he said, not going away. “Get up.”
What was wrong with him? Why was he torturing me like this? One eye popped open and I spotted his shadowy figure hunched over my bed. “I got suspended, remember?”
“You’re going fishing,” he said, as if this news would excite me.
Fishing? Was he kidding me? Did he really have some half-baked idea about me spending my day off from school on the ocean? Well, he could forget it. I turned back over. He whipped the covers off and the cold air hit me like a wave cresting the side of the boat.
“Get up,” he said. “Uncle Bill will be here in twenty minutes.”
“Dad, I don’t want to go fishing.”
“Too bad. Twenty minutes.” I clawed at the covers, but he disappeared with them into the night. Morning. Whatever. “Don’t make me come back for you,” he called.
I hunted around blindly for a blanket. If I could get warm I could go back to sleep and maybe they’d leave without me. No blanket to be found. Dang.
There was only one option.
“Shove over,” I said to Tracie.
Apparently she didn’t like the feeling of my frosty feet against her warm legs. “What are you doing?” she screeched.
“Dad took my covers.”
“What? Get out of my bed. DAD!”
I’m not sure if he pulled me out or she kicked me off the mattress, but thirty seconds later I found myself in the kitchen with a cup of coffee in my ha
nd and Dad standing over me. “Why can’t I stay home?” I begged.
“You used to love fishing.”
“Yeah, when I was a kid,” I grumbled.
He ignored me. This was crazy. The last thing I wanted was to go out on some boat at the crack of dawn in freezing cold weather and fish for phantom salmon.
“I don’t have a fishing license,” I tried.
“Got you one at work on Saturday.”
“My rain gear is way too small.”
“Bill’s bringing Jenny’s stuff.”
“Her coat will be huge on me.”
“We’ll roll up the sleeves.”
“I’ve got my period.”
“That was last week.”
How did he know that? Boy, my trump card was shot down like a stationary target. Not that you couldn’t fish with your period, but usually just talking about anything girlie caused Dad to back down in embarrassment.
Now what?
There was nothing to do but get ready to go fishing. Fine. I’d go on the stupid boat, but he couldn’t make me fish. I would keel over and die before I’d have any fun. And if he told anyone I went, I’d deny it. There was no way I was going to get all smelly and fishy. Forget it.
Ten minutes later Dad’s phone beeped. “Uncle Bill’s in the parking lot.”
“I can’t believe you’re making me do this.”
“It’ll be fun,” he said, marching me to the door. “Have a good time.”
“Wait! What? Aren’t you coming?”
“Not today. I’ve got stuff to do.” He shoved me out the door and shut it behind me.
“This is so unfair!”
Uncle Bill sat in his car in the parking lot, the motor running. “BC is idle-free,” I reminded him as climbed in.
“I didn’t think I’d have to wait so long.”
He backed out and headed for Sooke where he kept his boat. We didn’t talk the whole way. In fact, I think I might’ve fallen asleep, because the drive seemed really short. It was no time at all before I was standing next to the car, pulling AJ’s massive raincoat over my life jacket because it was too bulky to go underneath it. I didn’t bother with the pants since I had on gumboots and the coat hung down almost to the tops of them.
“I look stupid,” I told Uncle Bill.
“Yep,” he said.
“Thanks a lot.”
“No problem.”
I’d been going out on boats my whole life, and Uncle Bill put me to work stowing our stuff in the little cabin, while he set up the downrigger. When it was time to go, I leaned over the edge and pulled in the bumpers after we were clear of the dock. The water was choppy, and a stiff wind bit at the exposed skin on my face. It had started to drizzle too. Yep. This was tons of fun. I kind of wished Farbinger had given me in-house suspension. I’d be at school stuck in the office, but at least it’d be warm and dry.
Once we were out far enough to fish, Uncle Bill killed the engine and turned on the trolling motor so we’d move really slowly and drag our line out behind us. I watched as he put a ten-pound weight on the downrigger line. “You want to do it, Suze?” he asked.
I looked away. It’s not like I was interested. “No, thanks.” Dad could make me go on the boat, but I wasn’t casting out a line. The thrill I used to get as a kid was long gone. Uncle Bill wrapped his line around his hand, twisting it five times, and then snapped it into the release clip. After he’d put the rod in the holder and tightened up the tension, he sat down to wait, the waves thumping against the side of the boat, sloshing my breakfast coffee around in my stomach.
“Couldn’t you have told me whatever it is you want to say at the White Spot over blueberry pancakes?” I asked.
“Who says I have anything to say?”
“Why else would you trap me here?”
“I thought it’d be fun, actually.”
I couldn’t help shaking my head and laughing at that. Fun? Seriously?
“What?” he asked.
“When is everyone going to remember I’m not a little kid anymore?”
“Probably never if you keep getting in trouble at school.”
We sat there in silence, while the rain methodically drenched everything around us. At least AJ’s raingear was top quality, and I was dry underneath.
“We’ve been having lunch once a month. For a while now,” Uncle Bill said, totally out of the blue.
“Who has?”
“Caroline and I.”
“What?” I was so shocked that I literally rocked the boat as I turned to face him.
“I ran into her on my monthly business trip to Vancouver last June. We had lunch. And the next time I was there…well, we met again.”
“Does AJ know?”
“She does now. But I didn’t tell her at first, because I knew what she’d say.”
“What would she have said?” I asked.
“Oh, probably something about how I was opening old wounds.”
I stared at Uncle Bill through my soggy eyelashes, trying to process what he was saying. Had he cheated on AJ with Caroline? Did they have an affair back when I was little, and that’s why she left? And now they were back at it? My stomach lurched with the motion of the boat and I thought I might throw up. “So you’re the reason she’s back?” I asked.
He frowned. “No. You’re the reason she’s back. You and Tracie. I just encouraged her to give it a try.”
“So you’re not having an affair?”
Uncle Bill had just taken a sip of coffee from his Thermos bottle, and he spit it out with a spluttering cough. “An affair with Caroline? Hell no! Why would you even think that?”
“Well, sorry, but that’s how you made it sound. Old wounds and all that.”
“I meant Caroline’s and your dad’s old wounds. And you girls. And AJ, too.”
“What’s AJ got to do with it?”
“She and Caroline were roommates at university. That’s how we all met. I was dating Jenny, and she fixed up Caroline with your dad.”
“Oh.” I’d never known that. But I didn’t really know anything. Still, I was glad there weren’t any affairs in their past. That would’ve made it a whole lot harder to want to be around Caroline.
Something tugged on Uncle Bill’s line, and he jumped up just as the release clip snapped and his rod bounced up and down. He grabbed it, but before he could start to reel it in, the line went slack. Whatever it was had gotten away.
“So why’d you have lunch?” I asked while he reset the downrigger.
“She wanted to hear about you girls.”
“And you told her?” I really didn’t like the idea of him talking about me to a complete stranger, even if she was technically my mother.
“I didn’t tell her anything personal,” he said. “Mostly I encouraged her to come back.”
“So this is all your fault?” It came out angrier than I meant it to, and Uncle Bill’s face sort of crumpled.
“Yeah. I guess it is.”
We sat in silence some more, the wind whipping my hair out from under AJ’s hood and the rain making it stick to my face. Finally, I asked him the same question I’d asked AJ and she hadn’t really answered. “Why does everyone hate Caroline so much?”
He shrugged again. “I guess because she just walked away without an explanation. She hurt a lot of people—your dad, AJ, you girls…me.”
“But now you think she’s changed? Or regrets it or something?”
“I don’t know how much she’s changed, but I know she regrets not being around for you and Tracie.”
I thought about that. All this time, I’d kind of figured I’d been the one who got cheated because I didn’t have a mother around. But maybe Caroline actually missed her daughters. “What do you think I should do?” I asked Uncle Bill.
He sat down n
ext to me and reached out, moving the sodden hair away from my eyes, and said, “I think you should give her a chance.”
“Even if it tears me and Tracie apart?”
He closed his eyes like this was all too painful to talk about. “Can I change my answer?”
“To what?”
“To—I have no idea what you should do?”
I bumped him with my shoulder in frustration. “No,” I said. “You can’t. Because you’re the grown-up, and I need help here.”
“The thing about being the grown-up,” he said, “is that it really sucks sometimes.”
“Yeah? Well, welcome to my world.”
Chapter 20
When I’d gotten up to go fishing, Dad had made me pack an overnight bag, along with my homework, to take back to AJ and Uncle Bill’s. I wasn’t sure why I couldn’t be at home because it was his day off, so it’s not like I could have gotten into trouble, but he’d said it wasn’t up for discussion.
Uncle Bill did end up taking me to the White Spot for breakfast, but we didn’t talk about anything important. Mostly he told me why the Canucks would definitely win the Stanley Cup this year, and I pretended to be interested. Between Dad and Tracie’s fanaticism, I knew enough to make intelligent comments that satisfied Uncle Bill. But mostly I let my mind wander to school and what I might be missing in Honors.
Part of the deal with being suspended is you are expected to do the homework, but you get zeroes for any tests you miss. I really hoped Baker didn’t give a pop quiz on Death of a Salesman.
“Earth to Suze,” Uncle Bill said. He was standing next to our table, putting his jacket on, holding the bill.
I jumped up. “Oh, sorry.”
“You ready to go?”
“Yep.”
Uncle Bill dropped me off at his house on his way to work, and AJ met me at the door. I followed her directions to leave the raingear outside and take a shower before lunch without question. When you got an order from AJ you didn’t wait around to see if she meant it. This time, I made sure I locked the bathroom door, so I didn’t have any visitors.
AJ and I get along fine, and she’s cool most of the time, but unlike every other adult I know she does have expectations for me. Not just in school either, but in life. When she warns me about my grades she’s not messing around. She was just as serious when she taught me how to bake cookies. She made me learn how to make seventeen different kinds before she decided I was well enough educated in the art of cookie dough.
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