Believing

by Wendy Corsi Staub

  “Are you going out with him again?”

  “Saturday night.”

  “Oh . . . I have a message circle that night down in Sinclairville.”

  “It’s okay. I don’t think he was planning on inviting you to come along like Dad did,” Calla says lightly, and grins at her.

  Odelia laughs. “Very funny. Do you need his phone number, or do you have it memorized already?”

  “I need it.”

  “555-4782,” recites Odelia, who was a close friend of Blue’s father, David Slayton—“before he went Hollywood,” as she put it.

  She starts to leave the room as Calla dials, though she seems to be taking her sweet old time, stopping to straighten a couple of picture frames and plump sofa pillows along the way.

  Ha, that’s what Mom used to do when she wanted to eavesdrop on Calla’s calls to Kevin, back when their relationship was in full swing . . . back when Mom was alive.

  Suddenly, Calla finds herself overwhelmed by grief that hits hard, seemingly out of nowhere.

  Oh, Mom. Her eyes are swimming with hot tears, her gut aching so that she’s almost doubled over.

  Why does it happen this way? It’s not that she ever really forgets about her loss. There’s a baseline of sadness every day, but then out of the blue, something triggers a fierce tide of sorrow and longing that sweeps her right over the edge.

  What she wouldn’t give to be in her own living room back in Tampa right now, talking to Kevin, with Mom annoying her by trying to listen—

  “Hello?”

  Calla jumps at the unexpected voice in her ear, having forgotten, for a split second, just whom she’d dialed or that she was even on the phone.

  “Um . . . Blue?” Her voice comes out sounding a little strangled.

  “Yeah. Calla?”

  “Yeah. Hi.” She wipes a sleeve across her wet eyes.

  “Hang on for a second, will you? I’m on the other line.”

  With Willow? Calla wonders as he clicks off. Or some other girl?

  She glumly throws the yarn across the floor again, expecting a long wait, but he’s back on the line before Gert has even skidded to a stop at the fuzzy yellow ball.

  “Sorry about that. So, remember how we changed our date to this Saturday night?” he asks, and her heart sinks. He’s not going to ask her to homecoming. He’s going to blow her off entirely.

  “My dad gave me these tickets,” he tells her, “to this concert in Buffalo, and I thought we could go. But only if you like jazz.”

  She knows nothing about jazz. She’s surprised that he does. And boy, is she relieved that he isn’t canceling on her.

  “Sure,” she says. “That sounds great.”

  “I’ll pick you up at six. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Good. See you at lunch tomorrow?”

  “Yup.” Calla smiles as she hangs up the phone. “Guess what, Gert? I think he likes me.”

  The cat stops pawing at the ball and looks up solemnly.

  “Yeah,” Calla tells her, “I do like him, too. But don’t worry. I won’t let myself get hurt. Not this time.”

  Again, she thinks of Kevin, and wishes she had never answered his e-mail.

  FOURTEEN

  Wednesday, September 12

  3:40 p.m.

  Okay, Calla probably shouldn’t have postponed her homework last night, though romping around on the floor with Gert and a ball of yarn was the best time she’s had in ages.

  Unfortunately, she rushed through her homework, and it showed. She wasn’t doing as poorly in her other subjects as she has been in math, but thanks to pure carelessness, she has to rewrite her social studies essay on top of reading both last night and tonight’s Hamlet assignments for English. She had to fake her way through the class discussion today.

  But that was better than math, where Mr. Bombeck handed back her homework covered in red ink slashes and grimly told her to redo it by tomorrow, in addition to the new assignment. Luckily she’s working with Willow tonight.

  Another glitch, though: she’s going to need the Internet in order to research a science project that will be assigned in the next few weeks. That will mean staying after school to use it there, and skipping a couple of days working at Paula’s, or asking to use Ramona’s after she gets home. Knowing Mason and Evangeline hog it nightly as it is, she hates to ask.

  Then again, she does have that glimmer of an idea she back-burnered earlier.

  One that might give her access to more than just the Internet.

  But does she dare pursue it with her father?

  Meanwhile, she’ll probably be up until midnight, catching up on everything after she gets back from Willow’s later. Unless I can get something done here, she tells herself as she climbs the steps to Paula’s porch after school.

  Maybe she can settle the boys in front of a video and—

  Nah. That wouldn’t be fair. Paula can do that herself. She’s paying Calla to entertain the boys, and that’s what she needs to do.

  “Come on in,” Paula calls in response to her knock.

  Calla finds her in the living room, reading a book called Love You Forever to the boys, who are curled up on either side of her.

  “We’ve been to the library, and we’re reading our way through the stack. I’ll finish this one,” Paula says, looking up from the book. “Have a seat.”

  Calla does, and finds herself drawn into the whimsical story, which is about a mother who continues to rock her child to sleep with a lullaby through every stage of his life. Calla is teary eyed when it concludes with the grown son cradling his elderly mother in his arms, rocking her to sleep with the same lullaby.

  As she sneaks a hand up to wipe her moist cheeks, she catches Paula doing the same thing. Maybe she, too, lost her mom. Or maybe it’s just because she is a mom. Whatever . . . when she looks up, her eyes are shiny, and she smiles at Calla.

  “That one gets me every time,” she tells her.

  “Can you read it to us, Calla?” Dylan asks. “I want to hear it again.”

  “Oh, let Calla read a different one. How about a silly one?” Paula speaks up quickly, as if she knows that anything that tugs on the heartstrings—especially anything involving a mother and child—is especially emotional for her right now.

  “You can read Walter the Farting Dog, then,” Dylan decides.

  “Fart!” Ethan echoes.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake. They’re all yours, Calla.” With a laugh, Paula pulls herself to standing and hobbles toward the kitchen. In the doorway, she turns back. “Oh, I almost forgot to tell you . . . someone was asking about you down at the café this morning.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “My husband was on his way out, and he overheard a man who wanted to know if there was a new girl in town, about seventeen, a medium who was living with her grandmother. You’re the only one around here who fits the bill.”

  “Who was the man?” Calla asks, remembering the AP reporter who called. And Kaitlyn’s killer.

  Please let it have been the reporter. Please.

  “Marty had never seen him before. And he said he had sunglasses on, so he couldn’t really see his face.”

  “Did the guy get my name?”

  “I don’t know. Unlike me, my husband is the type of person who doesn’t like to get involved, so he left.” She rolls her eyes. “You know, if I were there, I would have gone over and asked who he was and why he was asking about you. When Marty told me . . . I don’t know. It made me nervous and—” Paula glances at Dylan and breaks off abruptly.

  Calla looks over to see that the little boy’s eyes are round.

  “That was the bad man,” he says suddenly. “Right?”

  “What are you talking about, honey?” Paula asks.

  “The man. The one with the raccoon eye. Kelly told me he’s looking for Calla.”

  “Dylan was with your husband when he was in the café?” Calla asks Paula, shaken.

  “No. He was here with
me.” Paula looks at her son. “You didn’t see the man today, Dylan. You weren’t with Daddy.”

  “No, Kelly told me about him last night, Mommy. When I was in my bed.”

  Paula smiles tightly. “Maybe you just had a bad dream.”

  Calla can’t seem to find her voice at all. Her pulse is racing.

  “He’s a real bad guy, not a bad dream guy,” Dylan insists, “and he’s here, and Kelly says he’s going to get Calla.”

  Paula looks helplessly at her. “Sorry. He must have heard me talking to Marty.”

  Calla nods, not buying that for a second.

  Dylan’s father is a medium. It’s hereditary.

  He knows, she thinks, watching the child, who is scowling now and flipping the pages of a library book. He knows things, like I do. Maybe Kelly is his spirit guide and—

  “Calla?” Ethan cuts into her thoughts, thrusting a book at her. “Walter?”

  She forces a smile. “Sure, Ethan. I’ll read the Walter book.”

  Paula’s comment—and Dylan’s ominous warning—cast a major pall over Calla’s afternoon. As she trudges up the path toward her grandmother’s front steps, her legs brushing against an overgrown hodgepodge of late summer flowers in full bloom, she’s still not quite sure what to make of any of it.

  “Calla!”

  She turns, startled, and spots Evangeline waving from the porch next door, where she’s curled up with a textbook.

  “Hey, got a minute? Or are you busy?”

  “Supposedly.” Evangeline snaps the book closed. “But anything’s better than conjugating French verbs. What’s up?”

  Calla makes a beeline for the porch, needing to get an expert opinion on what happened at Paula’s. She quickly explains, and Evangeline tilts her head as she digests the information for a long, thoughtful moment.

  “The thing is, Calla, little boys have active imaginations. Especially Dylan.”

  “I know. He has an imaginary friend.” Or so he says. “And, I mean, the other day, he decided he was a superhero and wore a dish towel tucked into the back of his T-shirt all afternoon. He wouldn’t talk to me unless I called him Captain the Brave.”

  Evangeline smiles. “See? The kid definitely lives in a fantasy world. He probably overheard his parents talking about some guy who was snooping around here looking for you, and turned him into a bad guy.”

  “Yeah. That’s what I keep trying to tell myself.” Calla hesitates. “The only thing is, Paula said Marty just overheard that comment today, but Dylan said Kelly told him about it last night.”

  “So what? He’s a little kid. They don’t keep track of time. He’s just confused.”

  “I guess.” She shrugs. “What really matters is that someone was looking for me. Right? Which is freaking me out a little. Okay . . . a lot.”

  “It was probably just another reporter.”

  “But what if Dylan really did have some kind of premonition?”

  “Come on, Calla.” Evangeline touches her arm reassuringly. “Even then, so what? What are the odds that it’s not just some snooping reporter?”

  “Why would Dylan call a reporter a bad guy, though?”

  Evangeline snorts at that. “Because not everyone likes reporters. Look at the paparazzi. They’re really nosy, and brazen, and—”

  “And Dylan is five,” Calla points out. “What does he know about the paparazzi? You’re really stretching it, Evangeline.”

  “I know. I’m trying to make you feel better. Guess it’s not working?”

  “Guess not,” she says flatly, wishing she could snap out of this dark anxiety.

  “Just hang in there until Saturday morning. You’ll come to my class with me, and you’ll learn how to meditate and—”

  “Meditate? Evangeline, how’s that really going to help me? Dylan said the man is dangerous. That he wants to hurt me, and—”

  The front door creaks open. She promptly clamps her mouth shut and looks up to see Evangeline’s aunt framed in the doorway.

  “Dinner’s read— Oh . . . Hi, Calla.” Ramona peers more closely at her. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. Why?”

  “You’re not fine.”

  Calla and Evangeline exchange a glance.

  “What makes you say that?” Calla asks Ramona, who shrugs.

  Okay, stupid question. Duh. She’s a psychic, remember?

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “No thanks,” Calla says quickly. “I’m good. Really.”

  Not really.

  But Ramona and Paula are friends. Calla doesn’t want Ramona to let Paula know how rattled Calla is by what Paula, and Dylan, said. Because, really, it’s probably no big deal. Her overactive imagination is just trying to make it into one.

  Or maybe your own sixth sense is telling you something is wrong, a little voice whispers.

  “Well if you change your mind . . .”

  “Yeah. Thanks, Ramona.” Turning to Evangeline and wishing they could have finished their conversation, Calla says, “See you in the morning.”

  “Oh, wait, Calla?” Ramona stops her as she turns to leave. “Before I forget, I talked to your grandmother earlier about taking you with Evangeline and me when we go to the mall one day next week. I was thinking you might want to shop for some new outfits, maybe stop in at the salon for a haircut, my treat. Want to come?”

  “Do you really have to ask? Of course she does!” Evangeline answers for her. “Right, Calla?”

  Actually, shopping and salons are the last thing on her mind right now.

  Then again, she does have babysitting money to spend, and she really does need warmer clothes and a haircut.

  Plus, shopping with Ramona and Evangeline will definitely be more fun—and more productive—than shopping with Dad.

  Still, it won’t be the same as shopping with her mother.

  I miss you, Mom. I miss you so much.

  Aloud, she tells Ramona halfheartedly, “Thanks. That would be fun.”

  “Good.”

  Looking at her, Calla has another flash of some inexplicable link to her father.

  Come on. Dad and Ramona?

  No way, she tells herself again, and heads back toward her grandmother’s house.

  Strolling to Willow’s after one of Odelia’s creative stir-fry dinners—this time, a surprisingly good mixture of pork, peanut butter, rice, and bean sprouts—Calla’s feeling much better.

  She just spoke to her father and mentioned to him that she’ll need computer access for a school project.

  “Cal, I can’t afford to buy—”

  “No, Dad, I know,” she cut in. “I have an idea, though. What about Mom’s laptop?”

  He was silent for a minute.

  She held her breath, willing him to agree.

  “It’s back in Florida,” he said slowly. “Even if you wanted to—”

  “Lisa wants me to visit her. She even sent me an airline voucher. I can go down, and get the computer while I’m there,” she pointed out. “You left the keys to the house with the Wilsons.”

  He didn’t argue. He just said he’d think about it, and she left it at that, not wanting to push too hard.

  But something tells her she’s going to get her hands on her mother’s computer files in the near future . . . and that somewhere among them, she might find a clue.

  For the time being, though, there’s nothing to do but to roll up her sleeves and tackle the math worksheets with Willow. It’ll almost be a relief to think about the kind of problems that can actually be solved—and in specific steps, no less. So different from the other kinds of problems she’s dealing with lately.

  Her father’s comment about college last weekend really made her think about next year—about whether she’ll be able to get into the schools that topped the list she and her parents had always discussed.

  Is that even what she wants, though?

  Now that Mom isn’t here to motivate her and Dad is a continent away, Calla isn’t sure. She does know wh
at Mom would have wanted for her. She’d have been so proud if Calla went to an Ivy League school.

  Do I want that? Can I possibly get in?

  And can we even afford it if I did?

  It doesn’t seem likely that she’ll be accepted into a top school with a failing math grade, so she’d really better get her butt in gear now. It might already be too late.

  As she climbs the steps to Willow’s front porch, her train of thought continues to bounce around: Ivy League,Cornell . . .

  Kevin. Why did he decide to get in touch out of the blue?

  Blue. So he’s still interested in her? Is he going to ask her to homecoming? What about Jacy?

  Jacy. He was so sweet, bringing her a lunch.

  The door opens and her train of thought slams into a brick wall.

  An unfamiliar woman is looking out at her. Oops.

  “Oh, I’m sorry . . . wrong house.” Calla backs away from the door, wondering how she managed to make that mistake. Well, that’s what she gets for daydreaming about guys: Kevin, Blue, Jacy.

  Wait a minute.

  This is the right house, she realizes, seeing the street number on the porch pillar.

  “Are you looking for Willow?” the stranger asks. “I’m Althea.” At Calla’s blank look, she clarifies, “Her mother.”

  What? How is that possible?

  The woman in the doorway is the polar opposite of Willow York. Physically, anyway. Her gray hair is short and frizzy, and her face, propped on several chins, is plain. She’s morbidly obese, her tremendous arms, legs, and torso crammed into a snug-fitting navy velour sweat suit.

  “I . . . um . . . it’s nice to, uh, meet you,” Calla stammers. She would have expected Willow’s mother to be as drop-dead gorgeous as she is—and remembers her earlier assumption that she’d be a doctor or lawyer or banker, like the parents of her schoolmates back in Florida, instead of a medium.

  Yeah, just as she originally expected Willow to be snobby and standoffish. Remembering that first day in the cafeteria, when she was surprised to see Willow rescue Donald Reamer and his dropped lunch tray, she feels a stab of guilt.

  Come on, Calla. If being in Lily Dale has taught her anything, it’s that she should never, ever, EVER subscribe to preconceived notions. Her own or anyone else’s.