“Never mind.”
My mom screwed the lid on the mayonnaise and rinsed the knife. After everything was put away, she sat next to me at the counter and dug into the chips. “When I was a kid we were all afraid of the Hillhurst Demon,” she said crunching. “He stalked the triangle of woods between the park and the hospital. You know where I mean?”
My temples throbbed. The kitchen started spinning. I nodded for her to go on.
“My friends used to say that if you ever saw the creature—even just a quick glimpse—your eyes would melt like wax.” My mother elbowed me and then offered me a chip. “Kinda scary, huh? What’s your monster do?”
nine
The last time we went to Action Adventure, my family was happy. At least we seemed happy. I guess if I put it on a timeline, my dad was already cheating, Scott was sorting through some crazy emotions, and my mom was getting all kinds of grief over her promotion to supervisor. And I was plotting the death of my tormentor, a mean girl who nicknamed me Melon Head after a really horrible failed attempt to dye my hair.
A lot has changed since then. The security checkpoint at the gate was new. Plus the rule about no coolers. Then there were these special bracelets they were selling that let you cut to the front of the lines. But we didn’t need them. We had my mom. It’s her job to know all about traffic and how to deal with it. She snatched a guide from a friendly dinosaur and steered us through the crush of families clogging the winding streets of Ye Olde Village. Her strategy—go directly to the farthest point on the map—worked. Ghost Town was a ghost town.
“What’s first?” my mom asked, surveying the massive metal monsters crouched between the false front buildings and wooden sidewalks. Katie oo-ooed for the swings. Lisa, the free-fall tower. Everybody rolled their eyes at my pick: Tornado Alley, a dark ride through a wind tunnel, with flying Day-Glo cows and hypnotic spirals and air horns. My favorite ride ever, even if it was the cheesiest. My mom’s eyes drifted to the giant corkscrew rising up behind the saloon and dance hall. The Gold Rush. My mom is the Roller-Coaster Queen. She’ll ride anything: sketchy wooden deathtraps; neck-snapping figure eights—the suspended kind, where the cart dangles from a track above your head.
My mom pulled rank. We ducked under the switchback of ropes and claimed the first two cars.
It’s amazing what a jolt of adrenaline can do. My mom was rowdy and giddy, throwing her arms over her head while I gripped the safety bar like a chicken. Maybe this would remind her who she was before my dad left and turned her world upside down. Maybe she’d try dating again. Just because she hadn’t hit it off with Chip didn’t mean there wasn’t someone out there for her. She should add “thrill seeker” to her profile.
“That was sick!” Lisa shouted.
Katie and I bumped fists.
“Who wants to go again?” my mom asked.
After the fourth run, lines had formed behind the chains. We moved on. Log Jam. Tornado Alley. The Tumbleweed. My mom and Katie sat out the Thunderbird because Katie’s stomach felt weird. Warm and woozy, we showed our wristbands at the saloon for free soda and hiked down the hill to Jungle Land, which was a rip-off—the one big ride was closed for repairs—but Katie wanted to see the animals.
That was always Scott’s least favorite part. Even when we were little, he hated seeing them in their sad, lonely cages. I hated the rope bridge, with its animatronic alligators lurking in the muddy waters below. Once, the bridge bounced so hard I started crying. Clinging to the net, I was sure I’d tumble over and die, impaled on those long sharp teeth. But my dad saved me. Rushing out, he snatched me up and carried me to solid ground.
My mother asked if I remembered the time he won me an enormous pink panda. But I didn’t. “You were only two. That thing was bigger than you,” she said. “He must have spent fifty bucks trying.”
“Hey guys, there’s no line there,” Katie said, pointing to an oblong wheel ringed with cages—a Ferris wheel on steroids. The Zipper. I’m not afraid of anything, but that ride freaks me out. It’s Scott’s fault. He used to torture me when we were kids, pointing out rust spots, making me think the bolts were bad. Since Scott wasn’t there to torture me, I tortured Katie.
“That doesn’t sound safe,” I said, furrowing my brow at the creaking noise above our heads.
Lisa buckled us in, and then she got the cart rocking. “You know this thing’s gonna flip, right?”
“You guys,” Katie whined. “Why are you always mean to me?”
“Mean to you?” I said, bumping Katie’s shoulder.
Lisa winked. “Maybe she’s talking about the time we read her diary.”
“‘My hamster died today,’” I quoted from memory. “‘It is the saddest day ever.’”
When the guy came around and rattled the cage door, Katie wanted off. She crawled over my lap and flew down the ramp and joined my mother on the bench next to the snow cone stand.
“Is she mad?” I asked. “We were just joking.”
“That was kind of cruel, making her think that pin is coming loose.”
It was just like Lisa to turn things around and make me the bad guy. She was the reason her sister was having nightmares. Last night Katie woke the whole house because she thought she heard tapping at the window. But I wasn’t going to let Lisa’s dumb comment ruin my day. Besides, she smacked her head on the cage. Hard. She got off dizzy and queasy.
My mom went for water and came back with sunscreen. “You’re looking a little red,” she said. Cupping Lisa’s chin, she dabbed her forehead and nose and cheeks. She did Katie’s face, too, and then mine. Her fingers felt good—cool and soft.
“I think I’m hungry,” Katie said.
My mom checked her watch. “One more ride and we’ll head over to the pavilion.”
One more ride took thirty-five minutes. The line for the Raging Rapids snaked past the Alpine Slide, with its heavy metal pounding, lights throbbing, the riders a blur of color. Lisa posted a picture of us with a gorilla in sunglasses on her feed. We had eight likes by the time we reached the dock.
I don’t know how it happened, but my mom—the one person who didn’t want to get soaked—ended up under the waterfall. Lisa and Katie couldn’t stop laughing. The shock on her face was priceless. Hair plastered to her head. Eye makeup streaking down.
“You look like a drowned cat!” I shouted over the water slapping against the raft.
“You’re a real sweetheart!” she shouted back.
Sluicing through the troughs, the giant rubber doughnut started spinning. My mother cringed at the water sheeting off another fake cliff. “This is ridiculous,” she yelled out. Katie tried steering, but she only made it worse. My mom got swamped again.
The rest of us survived—our makeup and hair, anyway. But my mom caught her reflection in a shop window and frowned. I dug through my bag for a tissue. “A lot of good that’ll do me,” she said, searching the map for a restroom. “I hope my Prince Charming isn’t roaming the park.”
Judging from the prizes coming out of the men’s room, it was safe to say my mother wasn’t in danger of meeting the man of her dreams. Ditto for the ones filling their plates under the pavilion. All the guys my mom works with are married or have girlfriends or both. Lisa and Katie got in line while my mom and I made the rounds. A lot of the drivers hadn’t seen me since the company Christmas party. There was the mechanic who always brought horseshoes to the picnic, and the driver with the rockabilly hair and too-strong cologne, and the one with the biker beard who played Santa. I waved to Reese, my driver when I used to take the bus to Troy to visit Jerk Face, and totally snubbed Davis for getting me in trouble with my mother. He’s the reason I’ll never smoke on a bus route again.
Everybody wanted to know what I was doing all summer. Did I have a job? No. Was my mother teaching me to drive? Yeah, right. No one was stupid enough to ask about my dad, but they all wanted to know where Scott was hiding. I wanted to joke, Not in the closet! But I knew my mom hadn’t told them. She likes t
o keep her private life private.
Lunch was a buffet of steam trays loaded with hamburgers, hot dogs, and corn on the cob. We had to wait for the salads to be refilled, but I didn’t mind. I have this thing about mayonnaise. Flies, too. The pavilion was crawling with them. I covered my plate with a plate and plunked down between Katie and Lisa.
“This is way better than the old picnics,” I whispered. My mom agreed. She’s not big into company functions. The way she sees it, she spends enough time with her coworkers without socializing on her days off.
“Is that all you’re eating?” my mom asked Katie. Katie rubbed her belly at the pile of corn cobs and ice cream sandwich wrappers and said she felt funny. I took one look at the shriveled brown puck masquerading as a hamburger and ate the salads instead—at least they were fresh.
“Oh my God!” Lisa shrieked, shoving the park guide in my face. “They’ve got one of those skydive thingies! It’s right out there!”
I followed her finger to the two towers sticking up behind the pavilion next to ours. “No way,” I mumbled through a mouthful of coleslaw. “They charge for that ride.”
“I’ve got money!” Lisa pulled a fifty from her pocket. “I’ll pay! Please say yes!”
Before I could say no, a burly guy with a yellow mustache and red nose clapped my mom on the back. “Trish, sweetie! You look like you went through the bus wash!” Al Minty. My mother hates Al Minty. He’s one of the drivers who make her life miserable, filing bullshit grievances against her.
My mom smiled tightly. He was lucky the fork in her hand was plastic.
“Where’s Teddy?” Al asked. “I thought I saw you two together.” Teddy is my dad. Al smelled like he’d been boozing it up at the Bavarian Village.
“Wasn’t Ted,” my mother answered sharply. “Better clean your beer goggles.”
Al’s nose turned redder. Lisa kicked me under the table. I bit back a wicked grin. It sounds sappy, but I’m sort of proud of my mom, the way she can shut down someone like Al. No one knows she hates her job or that she used to come home crying and make herself ill thinking about work the next day. She’s a no-nonsense boss, but she takes a lot of crap being the only woman in a garage full of guys. Not all of them are jerks, just a few. The rest of them treat her like the Snow White in some twisted fairy tale.
“Who are these lovely ladies?” Al asked, changing the subject.
Lisa and I exchanged glances.
“You remember Tracy,” my mom said. “This is her friend Lisa. And Lisa’s sister, Katie.”
“You girls having fun?” he asked.
We all nodded, and then Lisa and I pulled out our phones to ignore him. I texted Adam to see what he was up to. He was helping his dad with the yard. I’d rather be hanging with you, he said.
“Take it easy,” Al said, raising his hand. “Good seeing you, Tracy.”
My mom rolled her eyes and then gathered our plates and dumped them in a big orange barrel swarming with bees.
“What was that all about?” I asked, pushing through the turnstile.
“Al just likes to be difficult,” she said. “Anything to make me uncomfortable.”
He made me uncomfortable, too.
“Rip Cord?” Lisa said. She linked her arm through mine and dragged me to the fence. “It’s not so bad. Look. We’ll get the DVD to show Adam and Gabe.”
“There’s no net,” Katie said.
“That’s what the pool’s for,” Lisa said. “If something snaps, we’ll end up in the water.”
I locked eyes with my mom, hoping she’d rescue me.
“It’s up to you,” she said. “If you’re afraid…”
Katie just stood there with her arms folded, shaking her head.
“Fine,” I huffed. “Let’s do it. Before I change my mind.”
Lisa squealed and then flung her phone and sunglasses and jewelry at my mom and then raced to the ticket booth. She had enough for the ride, but not the DVD. My eyes traveled up the lift tower. I wondered what the girl pushing me toward the platform had done with my best friend. There was the death wish thing—that was new—but scarier than that, we had an audience. Lisa hates being the center of attention. It’s what keeps her backstage doing makeup and hair. It’s what keeps her from auditions year after year. Everybody’s eyes were on us as the guy cinched us together in an oversized apron and made us lock arms.
“Has anyone ever died on this ride?” I asked.
The guy tugged on the harness straps, said “Not today,” and signaled the control booth.
My mom and Katie cheered as our feet left the platform. Lisa kissed my cheek. “Wave to the people,” she said.
The cable winched us higher and higher. Suddenly, I had to pee. My fear needed an out. The pool below didn’t help. Shallow and filled with concrete blocks and floodlights, the image of serenity was an illusion. The water wouldn’t break my fall, and the crap at the bottom would break my face.
“We’ve all got to go someday,” Lisa said.
I wanted to punch her, but I was afraid to move.
“That’s so not what I want to hear right now,” I choked.
The riders stuck at the top of the Ferris wheel looked up and waved. Lisa waved back. Her hip bone rubbed against mine. A jerk in the cable made me pinch my eyes shut. We’d stopped moving. A grainy voice came from somewhere above. One of us had to pull the rip cord.
“Look at all those people down there wishing they had the guts to be up here,” Lisa said. “If we can do this, we can do anything.”
“All those people are waiting for us to die so they can put it on the Internet,” I said.
Lisa reached up and wrapped her fingers around the grip. I couldn’t do it. I would’ve left us hanging there forever. The voice started counting: three, two, one …
I’ve dreamed of falling. Usually it’s off a cliff or a bridge, but I’m always startled awake after those first few seconds of weightlessness. I opened my eyes and screamed. Lisa screamed, too. Gravity tugged at my insides. We were gaining speed. My cheeks rippled. Down, down, faster and faster, like a giant bird, wings pulled tight, swooping in on its prey, and then we were soaring up, up. We were floating again. Rising gently. My fear rose, too, and fell away. Lisa and I stuck our arms out like superheroes and screamed just to scream.
“I love you!” Lisa hollered over the wind.
“I love you, too!” I hollered back.
The arc got shorter and shorter, and then the guy on the platform chased us with a hook to pull us in. We landed to clapping. My mom and Katie rushed the gate. “That was the most amazing thing ever!” I shouted. Katie and Lisa bumped fists, my mom dispensed the jewelry and sunglasses, and then we huddled around the map. The sun was brutal. Everybody looked boiled. “How about something gentle?” my mother suggested. “There’s that ski lift ride over in Tiny Town.”
“Too high,” Katie said. She wanted to do the Scrambler—her favorite. We stopped for sodas on the way. One minute Katie was happily guzzling root beer and then she was crying because someone ran over her foot with a stroller. When we got to the Bavarian Village, her stomach hurt again. I was starting to wish we hadn’t brought her.
“Maybe no more soda today,” my mom advised. “Okay?”
Katie tossed her cup in the trash and plunked down on a bench. Lisa plunked down with her. My mom and I got in line for the ride.
“Something’s up with her,” my mom said, frowning. “While you and Lisa were on the Rip Cord, she went on and on about some monster that’s stalking her and Lisa. She’s a little old for that kind of talk, isn’t she?”
“Sixth graders can be weird,” I said. “Remember when I thought the hall closet was haunted?”
My mother rolled her eyes. The dude running the Scrambler told us to take one of the cars around back. I waved good-bye to Lisa, who was braiding Katie’s hair, and climbed in first, which was a mistake. When I was little my mom always sat on the outside, against the padding, so she wouldn’t squash me, but I’m not
little anymore. I’m bigger than my mom. Taller, anyway. The ride started and I flew across the seat, my bones sinking into the softness of her flesh. I tried to keep from putting all my weight on her, but I was powerless against the forces pulling.
Katie and Lisa sprawled on the bench.
The arcade with its flashing lights and buzzers.
My father buying a bag of cotton candy.
My brains rattled in my skull. Everything blurred as our car punched toward Lisa and Katie again. My mother was screaming and laughing, tugging me closer. I tensed, waiting for that brief lag when everything snapped into focus. A man in gold jackknifed from the high dive. A balloon raced for the clouds. He’d moved, but I found him, aiming a water pistol at a clown’s mouth. Turn around, I thought. My mother laughed in my ear. Don’t turn around, I thought.
I waited for the ride to loop back again, praying it wasn’t him. It couldn’t be. Not unless he’d grown a beard. Not unless he’d left us for an ugly troll with a preschooler.
When we got off, he was gone. So were Lisa and Katie. My mother waited by the Moon Walk while I checked the bathroom. Lisa was at the sink, rinsing Katie’s shorts. It looked like she’d sat in something.
“She’s part of the club now,” she whispered. “You don’t have anything in your bag, do you?”
I didn’t, but I had two quarters for the dispenser on the wall. I remember the first time I got mine. I was mortified. I didn’t want to grow up. Maybe it would’ve been different if I’d had a big sister. In some ways it was like what happened with Jerk Face: I thought everyone would know. They didn’t. It’s funny how some of the most traumatic events in your life go unnoticed.
“Now my shorts are all wet,” Katie complained behind the stall door.
“No one will care,” Lisa said. “You look like you rode the Log Flume.”
Outside, my mother was slumped on a bench. She needed coffee. Sometimes I forget that she’s almost fifty. Katie told her her news.
“No wonder your belly hurts,” she said, giving her a sympathetic squeeze. “Maybe we should take it easy for a while.”
What We Knew Page 7
