by C. L. Stone
I made my way downstairs while still stuck inside my head, wondering about the best way to help. I’d had Kota and the others to help me. Maybe she needed someone, too. She wasn’t fond of the guys, but maybe Danielle would help if she knew?
Maybe that’s what she needed. Maybe she just needed to know that someone else out there still cared for her, too. She didn’t trust me or didn’t want to, for whatever reason. I couldn’t imagine how alone she must have been feeling.
Downstairs, Luke was sprawled out on the family room floor in front of the television. Nathan was on one end of the couch, fiddling with the remote, surfing channels. Kota was on the other end of the sofa, shifting through the mail, opening up bills and organizing.
Luke sat up when I came into the room. “How’d it go?”
“Terrible,” I said. I dropped to my knees, and fell sideways until I was lying on the carpet next to Luke, glancing over at them. “I think she’s depressed.”
“Her mother is in the hospital,” Kota said without looking up from a piece of mail. “And her father’s disappeared to live with another family. I can sympathize. She still needs to get up and go to school.”
“I think she needs a friend,” I said.
Kota put the bill down, looking at me on the floor. “Did you ask her to go to school? Did you try to talk to her?”
“Yes, but I don’t think she likes me.”
“Do you want me to talk to her?”
Luke laughed. “That’s not going to work.”
Kota’s head ducked back. “Why won’t it?”
“She doesn't like us, either,” Nathan said, stopping on a music channel but turning the volume down so we could talk. He put the remote in his lap. “She probably doesn’t trust us. I mean, she’s right to do that. She doesn’t know us and we’ve been kind of invading her space.”
I sighed, rolling onto my back and staring up at the ceiling. “I was wondering if we should talk to Danielle.”
“Nope,” Nathan said quickly. “Not happening.”
I turned my head to look at him. “But Marie likes her. Maybe Danielle could motivate her into getting up.”
Nathan scooted closer to the edge of the couch, putting his elbows on his knees to lean forward as he gazed down at me on the floor. “Peanut, you’re talking about letting a fox into the hen house. I’m guessing Danielle doesn’t know what happened here, or she’d be here already trying to take advantage of the situation.”
“But Marie thinks she’s all alone right now.”
Nathan’s lips parted to say something but he stopped, frowning. “I don’t know what to do,” he said. He turned to Kota. “There’s got to be a better way.”
I let out a large sigh, stretching on the carpet. “I don’t suppose the Academy has friends for her.”
Nathan and Luke laughed. Kota’s lips broke into a sympathetic smile. He pushed aside the bills, and slid down onto the floor on his knees. He knee-walked over until he sprawled out on his side next to me, his head propped up in his hand. “Sang?”
“Yes, Kota.”
“Would you feel better if you knew Marie wasn’t as depressed as you thought?”
I propped myself up on my elbows. “She seemed depressed.”
“Since your parents left, she’s been staying up all night on the computer downstairs and watching movies she bought off of cable.”
My mouth popped open. “What?”
“Check the internet history.”
I rarely touched the computer downstairs. It belonged to our father, and he’d told us since we were young not to touch it because it had important work files. I’d grown accustomed to thinking of it as his work computer. My eyes widened and I tilted my head. “Do I want to see what she’s been up to?”
“Probably not.”
I blushed. “You knew?”
“I didn’t know she was staying home,” he said. “But I’ve used the computer a couple of times and noticed video games and music downloaded and I knew it wasn’t you.”
I wondered if I should have felt weird about Kota going on my dad’s computer. I think the only reason it felt like that was because to me it still seemed like the forbidden zone. It was too hard to get used to. My dad was gone to another life. Nothing here was his anymore.
“I sometimes see her in the hallways at school,” Nathan said, sitting back on the sofa. “I thought she was avoiding me this week. I didn’t realize she wasn’t there.”
Luke scooted closer on the floor. “She knows she’s been noticed, now. So it’s up to her to get up and go.”
Nathan nodded. “At least we won’t have to tell Danielle.”
“That might still be a problem,” Luke said. “Marie could still tell her.”
“We’ll worry about it when we get there,” Kota said.
Luke fell back onto the carpet again, gazing up at the ceiling. “Well, we’ve got other things to do. Like grocery shopping.”
I blinked. “Huh?”
“You’re out of food, cupcake,” he said. “I think there’s a moldy loaf of bread left.”
At the mention of food, my stomach growled. I hadn’t eaten breakfast or lunch. “I forgot to call my dad,” I said.
“Call him now,” Kota said.
I grumbled a little, getting up. “I don’t wanna,” I said, trying to be funny.
“Call,” Kota said.
“I am,” I said, stumbling toward the kitchen. “I just want to complain about it.”
I heard the guys chuckling. I found the phone number on the counter. I started to pull out my cell phone but stopped. I wondered if he would answer if he didn’t recognize the phone number. Did I want him to know this number?
I picked up the house phone, hit the button and waited for a dial tone.
And waited.
I blinked, hung up, check the phone line. The phone was plugged in. I wriggled the wires and tried it again.
Dead line.
“Kota?” I called.
Kota carried the stack of bills from the living room. “Sang?”
I held the phone out to him. “The landline is down.”
His eyebrows shot up. He crossed the room, taking the phone from me. He listened to it, and then did the same song and dance I did checking the line. “Is there another phone?”
“Just the one in my mom’s room.”
He took the cordless with him, following the hallway to my parents’ bedroom. I trailed behind him, and hovered in the doorway. The air was still. I didn’t like the feeling in the bedroom.
Kota found the corded phone on the nightstand. He picked up the receiver, holding it to his ear. He shook his head and then bent over to unplug the phone from the wall.
“What are we doing?” I asked.
“We’ll check the outside line,” he said. He nudged me back through the hallway and guided the way back to the family room.
Luke sat up from the carpet. “What’s going on?”
“The landline is down,” Kota said, heading toward the back door.
Nathan and Luke jumped up, following. I smothered a sigh. Academy training.
Outside, Kota circled the house until he found the phone box. There was a padlock on the outside. “Luke?” he said.
Luke pulled out what looked like a wallet from his back pocket. Inside was a collection of tiny tools. He plucked a couple out and within a minute, he had the padlock open.
“Are we supposed to be doing this?” I asked.
“It’s fine,” Kota said. “We’re just checking to see if it’s the wiring inside the house or if the lines are down.” There was a phone jack amid the other wiring inside, and he plugged the corded phone. He picked up the receiver and frowned. “Dead.”
“Want me to run to my house and check the line?” Nathan asked.
Kota shook his head, passing the corded phone to me. Luke locked the box back up.
Kota pulled his cell phone out and pressed a button. “Mom? Yeah, sorry, no just checking in.” He sighed, rolling his e
yes. “I’m at Sang’s house. I might be staying a little late. I know I don’t have to call.” He rolled his eyes again, longer this time. “We’re already going out Friday. Yeah … Okay, I have to go.” He stabbed his thumb at the phone. “Our lines are fine.”
Nathan turned to me. “You’ll have to get your dad to call.”
The others followed me inside. I found the index card again with the number and dialed my cell phone.
There were five rings and then the mechanical voice announcing no one was home. “I’m getting the answering machine.”
“Leave a message,” Kota said, picking through the mail again. He pulled out an envelope and shoved his finger into the top, ripping it open. He unfolded the letter and opened it. “Uh oh,” he said, blinking at the page.
“Uh oh what?” Nathan asked, balling up his fists and shoving them at his thighs. “What’s uh oh?”
“This is a final bill,” Kota said. He turned to me. “He’s shut off the phone.”
“Why would he do that?” I asked. “Don’t we need the phone? He’d said he would take care of it as long as we stayed.”
Kota held up the page. “He had it turned off. I don’t see another phone bill, so he’s not replacing it.”
A finger drifted to my lower lip. I felt embarrassed even though I didn’t know why. It just felt like a mistake. “Maybe he forgot to replace it.”
Nathan frowned, shaking his head. “He’s forgotten a lot, then,” he said. “Like food. I can’t imagine what he expected you and Marie to live on. He hasn’t been back to help with groceries or anything else.”
Kota sighed, rubbing a palm across his forehead. “Okay, you three run to the store. I’m going to stay here and call some of these companies. I’d like to know ahead of time before they shut off the water.”
Luke fished keys out of his pocket, picking out one of the car keys. “We need a list?”
“Just grab enough until we can make a proper trip this weekend,” Kota said. “I don’t want Sang out late.”
I lingered, unsure with what to do. They were helping, yes, but in the moment I felt helpless. It made me realize how dependent I’d been on others, and now I found out they weren’t reliable. I felt since I was almost left in charge, that I should have known about this and could have handled it myself.
Instead I was completely lost as to what I was supposed to do. If the boys hadn’t been here, would I ever have been able to take care of myself and my sister? We would have starved at the rate I was going. I wondered if that’s part of why my sister didn’t respond well to me. I couldn’t even help her get food when she asked. I couldn’t have done something as simple as call our father to figure out how to get more food.
Nathan caught my expression. He took my hand from my mouth, squeezing my fingers. “Stop it,” he said.
“I don’t know how to access the accounts,” I said. “I can’t pay…”
Nathan rolled his eyes. “We’ve got this,” he said.
“Yeah, Sang,” Luke said. “I think we can afford a box of Lucky Charms and a tub of ice cream.”
“Try not to buy just junk food,” Kota said, stabbing the number to the phone company into his cell phone.
SANG SHOPS
Thirty minutes later, I was at the store with Nathan and Luke. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been inside a grocery store. I remembered my mother taking me before she was ill. Maybe once when my father took my sister and me along when my mother was in the hospital and we were still too young to leave at home alone.
When the glass doors breezed open and the rush of cold air met my face, I felt my body wanting to tremble. It wasn’t so much that we were there, it was why. It was about as bad as when Gabriel wanted to take me clothes shopping. My mouth glued shut and I waited for the boys to figure out what to do.
It only took a second for them to take over. Nathan grabbed a cart while Luke walked ahead of us. Luke stopped in front of the bakery display case, staring in at the cakes and the desserts. “Let’s get a cheesecake,” Luke said. He turned to me. “You like cheesecake, right?”
“I liked the strawberry cheesecake Nathan had once. I don’t think I’ve had others.”
Luke checked the case, and found a large cheesecake that had multiple flavors mixed into the box. He put that down into the cart.
“Kota said no junk food,” Nathan said.
“He said don’t buy just junk food,” Luke said. “We’re not buying just this.”
Nathan pushed the cart around while I followed Luke down nearly every aisle. Luke tossed in some bananas and strawberries upon Nathan’s request. Most of the other stuff was sugary cereal, potato chips, and boxes of cookies.
“And coffee,” Nathan said. “Sang likes the bottled Starbucks stuff.”
“I don’t need it,” I said. There was already a large pile in the cart. I wondered who was going to eat it all. I looked at the shelves of so many different types of macaroni and cheese, overwhelmed by choices.
“Do you have a grill, Sang?” Luke asked, dropping a box of popcorn into the cart.
“Maybe in the garage,” I said. “I don’t know how good it is or what type.”
“Let’s get her a grill,” Luke said, walking off toward the end of the aisle and heading toward the meat department.
“Wait,” I said, stumbling forward until I could grab at his arm. “We don’t need a grill.”
Luke’s brown eyes blinked back at me. “How are we going to make steaks at your house without a grill?”
I floundered. I knew Mr. Blackbourne had told me the boys were simply used to buying whatever they felt the others needed. I knew I didn’t need pay them back, but I still felt obligated to tell them to not pay for things we didn’t absolutely need. I glanced at Nathan, silently pleading for help.
“We’re getting weekend food,” Nathan said. “We can get steaks and stuff later. Besides, we can grill at my house.”
“Oh yeah,” Luke said. “What else do you want, Sang?”
“I think we’re good.” What else was there?
Luke threaded his fingers through the locks of blond hair hanging in his eyes. “Okay, coffee… oh and let’s get a box of those microwave sandwiches Kota always has at his house.”
This time I let Luke lead the way while I hung back with Nathan. I leaned into him a little as we walked. “We don’t need all this,” I said. “We could just get bread and something simple.”
“Just let him shop,” Nathan said. “If you thought Gabriel was bad about clothes, throw Luke in a grocery store without North or Kota.”
“Should we make him buy vegetables?”
Nathan laughed, shaking his head. “It’s fine. You’ve got to let him stretch out a little bit. Every once in a while I’ll take him with me and let him pick out whatever he wants for staying the weekend at my house. His uncle and North give him a hard enough time with what he eats. This is his way of letting loose.”
I was going to comment on something about Luke, but the way Nathan was talking made me stop. “You do the grocery shopping at your house?”
Nathan grinned. “Well, who else is going to do it? My dad’s gone all the time.”
“I … hadn’t thought about it,” I said, my fingers twitching at my side, but I held off pinching my lip for his sake. “I guess I just realized today how much I didn’t think about certain things. I hadn’t picked up the phone in so long that I never noticed. I may not have ever opened those bills. And the food…”
“Peanut,” Nathan said, stopping the cart. He caught my chin, tilting my head until I was looking at him. “Hey, we rely on other people a lot, too. And when they stop, it is awkward. You’ll figure it out, okay? You’ll find out what they were in charge of and pick up where they left off. This is just a crash course on what it’s like living away from your parents. Only, you’re not alone. You’ve got me and Kota and the others who can help.”
I blushed. “I guess I didn’t think through staying here when my dad asked me.”<
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“He didn’t think it through,” he said. “He’d told you he’d be back and you trusted him. This is his fault. But it’s okay. As long as he doesn’t forget to pay the mortgage. You, I can stand, but if your sister has to move in if the house forecloses, I may need to shoot someone.”
“Hey,” Luke called after us from down the frozen food aisle. “Sang, you’ve got a toaster, right? They’ve got chocolate chip waffles. We have to try these.”
I sighed, glancing at Nathan.
Nathan lifted my hand to his mouth, kissing the back. “Leave it to us, Peanut. We’ve got this.”
At check out, I half expected one of them to pull out a black credit card like Victor always did. Nathan pulled out his wallet, picking out a collection of twenty dollar bills. When the total was counted up, over two hundred dollars, Nathan tabbed out enough and passed it over.
I was having a heart attack. Two hundred dollars! For food! How was I going to pay for food in the future if my dad never returned? How would I pay for anything?
I wondered how long it would take to earn two hundred dollars if I worked with Luke and the others at the diner.
With the car loaded up, I slipped into the middle seat between Luke driving and Nathan riding shotgun.
I lifted my feet onto the seat, but Nathan snagged my knees drawing them over his. He sat back into the seat, closing his eyes. “I am so ready for a weekend.”
Luke flipped on a rock station and edged Kota’s sedan out of the parking space. “I am so ready for us to get Kota a new car. This old clunky thing feels like it’s about to die.”
I sat up a little. “You all got this car for Kota?”
Nathan dropped a hand on my knee. “Mr. Blackbourne gave orders to North to find a suitable car for Kota and I. So Kota helped him pick this one.”
I blinked after them. These guys disappeared for Academy work constantly. It seemed out of place that any of them shouldn’t have a car. “You didn’t want one?”
Nathan smiled. “It wouldn’t make sense for me to get one. If my dad came home and saw it, he’d wonder where I stole the money from.”
