Home and Away

by Candice Montgomery

  Slim says, “I think you need to talk to your mom.”

  “I guess.”

  “No.” She sits up and looks at me. Looks down. “She’s, like, not doing well, Teez.”

  I jackknife up. “What do you mean? Like, she’s sick? Like, a cold? Or like a—”

  “No. Just, like, I don’t know. You should see her. Or talk to Tristan.”

  “He hasn’t said anything.”

  “Why would he? There’s nothing he or you can do.”

  “Then why should I go see her?”

  “It would be good for you to do that. That’s why.”

  I lean back, slouch deep into the couch. “I’m probably gonna have to see her soon enough, for whatever reason. We’ll talk then.”

  Slim exhales. “God, you’re so difficult.”

  “Okay, Slim. Whatever.”

  “I’m gonna get going. I need to do a little homework, and I will seriously punch you in the shin if you keep being a douche.”

  I press my hands into my eyes. “Okay. Okay okay okay. Sorry, I love you. Text me when you get home. What’s the homework?”

  “AP Chem.”

  “FaceTime me if you need help?”

  She nods.

  I nod. “I will talk to her. Or, like, if I’m too much of a pride monster, I’ll talk to Trist.”

  And that seems to be good enough. At least for her, it’s good enough.

  But then, that’s how it is when Slim Lim is your best friend.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  GAME 5 – EL CAMINO REAL VS. VACAVILLE WILDCATS

  We lose our game Friday night. I don’t know why I expected anything different. Cole comes down with mono earlier in the week and he still tries to play. I don’t think he’s actively trying to play well. I think he’s just trying not to die on the field, and he’s managed that, at least. A nasty rumor has been going around school all week that Cole has the kissing curse and that he got it from Kai, but I know that’s not true because I’ve had my mouth all over Kai’s and all over him all week and I feel like I could dead lift an ox.

  Still, I play like shit. I very seriously screw up three attempts at a forced fumble, I’m flagged for pass interference, can’t bust up any running routes on time, and I’m pretty sure I’m walking away from this game with a concussion right now.

  So we amble into the away team locker room, heads hanging, only to get reamed through the ass by Coach. I’m not in the mood for it today, and it’s got nothing to do with how I played the shittiest I ever have.

  I’m mad that Mamma was there to witness the game. I’ve resolved that I do want to see her, but I feel like this should get to be on my terms.

  Ordinarily, after a rough game, Mamma would cart me home, unbraid my hair, and we’d stop at the sporting goods store and buy me a new pair of gloves, or a new pair of practice cleats or running shorts or a set of really cute sports bras. Because we were sure—we were sure—that it was the reason for my shitty game; bad gear.

  That doesn’t happen now. Instead, now, I leave the locker room and get in Merrick’s back seat with Kai in lieu of taking the school’s bus with the rest of the team. As Merrick drives home, he talks on the phone to some girl—woman—girl, named Stephanie. He calls her “Stephy.”

  I mumble from the back seat, “I swear to God.” I can’t believe I’m going to be stuck listening to this for the duration of the drive home.

  “Hang on, Stephy,” he says into the phone. “What’s that, kiddo?”

  “Nothing,” Kai says for me.

  I laugh. Because screw that. “I said ‘I swear to God’—as in, ‘I swear to God, if you invite some girl-child over tonight—’”

  “Let me call you back, Stephanie.”

  I scoff. “Oh, now she’s Stephanie.”

  Kai faces me, shakes his head. Be smart, the look says. Shut up now, it says.

  But I’m not and I don’t.

  “What is your problem right now, Tasia Lynn? I’m sorry you’re having a bad night because of the game. You can’t win every one—”

  Kai clears his throat. “I can catch the bus the rest of the way home.”

  “How about, for once, Merrick, you don’t assume you’ve got everything right—”

  “You wanna let me out the car right here?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Merrick says.

  “It means, you don’t need to stick your dick in a different chick every night, Dad.”

  He doesn’t say anything.

  Kai says, “Fuck.” And he’s not quiet about it.

  Merrick doesn’t hit the brakes or pull over or anything like that. He just keeps driving. And the roads are relatively clear. And the radio isn’t on because Merrick had Stephy on the phone and I had Kai.

  When Merrick pulls into his driveway, he turns the car off, gets out, and shuts the door. Not a slam. He doesn’t storm up the stairs to the apartment or anything.

  And I burst into tears in the back seat. The most physically painful tears I’ve ever experienced, and I hunch forward to protect myself from them, hands over my eyes. The inside of the car is dark, and in a moment Kai has his arms around me and his body shielding my back, and at first I think he’s rocking us, but really it’s me rocking back and forth and him holding on to me tight as he can.

  Kai seems distraught, his mouth opening and then closing without a single word. Like he doesn’t know what to do with me or how to help. He begs me like a broken record to tell him what to do, how to make it better, and I have a weak moment, crying, “Please, please make it stop, please,” because every tear that comes feels like it’s being wrenched out of me.

  “What do you need?” he says.

  “I need my mom.”

  Kai and I get in my Jeep and he drives us to the westside. I’m North again for the first time in a while, and I’m more content about it than I figured I would be.

  She’s already made it back. I see Mamma’s car in the driveway and Kai parks my Jeep right next to it, cutting the engine. Propping his feet on the dash, he pulls a tiny, wrinkled notebook out of his back pocket and begins to write in it, ignoring me as I work up whatever nerve needs to settle in.

  Nine times out of ten, Mamma is in her home office, so I head there first when I finally get out of the car.

  The house is quiet aside from Tammy clanging around in the kitchen. Probably getting prepared for dinner. It’s late, so I’m surprised no one else is home. This feels illicit. Like I shouldn’t be here.

  Mamma is not in her office. The space is a mess. There are floor plans and contracts everywhere, a pair of Jimmy Choos in every corner, an untouched cup of tea on her desk. It’s been there a while.

  I walk into the kitchen to find Tammy.

  “Hey, Tam?”

  “It’s that my little duck?”

  I smile. Tammy’s known me since before I could walk. When I first learned to, I waddled, as she tells it. I’ve been “duck” ever since.

  “It’s me.” I squeeze her. She smells like flour and I inhale deeper.

  “What are you doing home? I’m happy you’re here—don’t get me wrong. But … well, we didn’t expect you.”

  “I know. Where’s my mamma?”

  “Oh, honey. She’s upstairs. In bed. Went straight there after your game.”

  I nod.

  “Sorry about the rough loss, duckie.”

  “Thanks. So … bed, huh?”

  I glance at the clock above the oven. Tammy catches me do it. “Want me to go up there with you?”

  “It’s fine,” and I make my way up the stairs toward Mamma. I wonder if she’s worse than Slim made her seem. I wonder if I’m supposed to be affected by it. I wonder if I’m capable of a downward spiral like that too. The kind that sticks in your chest like old gum, with no real remedy.

  As I push open her door, I notice how the hinge no longer squeaks the way it did. It smells like penicillin. No more rose water hanging heavy in the air. More contracts in here, all on Mamma’s side
of the bed. Her side of the room is ordered chaos. Because, even at the end of her rope, I think Mamma would still have a handle on things better than most people.

  I don’t say anything. Because I’m not here to apologize, I’m not here to condemn her or fix her or question what this is.

  I just crawl into bed with her.

  She’s not asleep. But she doesn’t open her eyes. I put my hands in her silk-wrapped dreadlocks. A smile crawls up her face. “I prayed for you,” she whispers. “I prayed that God would give me a baby that looked just like you.”

  My back to her front, I doze and doze until I hear voices, muted, but carrying, through the house downstairs. This house is like that. I’ve always thought it was a sign that it’s too big and too new for our family.

  Mamma sleeps still, but I pull out of her arms and kiss her cheek before I escape downstairs like I’ve stolen something precious—and I have: her time—only to be caught by Daddy and Tammy. Tammy smiles. Daddy doesn’t. I shake my head and then I’m sliding into the passenger seat in my car. Kai has moved from his position in the front seat to the back seat, but as I buckle in, he maneuvers again to his driver’s seat post, cranks the engine, and pulls out of the circular drive.

  “Ready?”

  “Yeah,” I say, like it’s a surprise.

  “Tristan gave me this,” Kai says. He holds out a folded piece of paper.

  It’s a list. Of course it is. Across the top it reads, 6 WAYS TO REACH FORGIVENESS! T-DOTVERSION.

  1. Have an honest conversation with Mamma. Ask her how she’s doing. Expect her to tell you the truth—no matter what that means.

  2. Tell Mamma one way you’ve changed since you moved out.

  3. Think of her as “just another adult.” Not “my adult parent.” Trust me—this works.

  4. Swear at her. Tell her how angry you are and use as much colorful vocabulary as you can. There’s a huge chance she will kill you after this—but if she doesn’t, it’ll probably be effective.

  5. Ask Mamma what she loved about Merrick.

  6. Talk to Mamma about Kai.

  “You read this?” I hold up the note.

  His eyes don’t leave the road. “Nope.”

  “Really?” I say.

  “Nope.”

  I flick his shoulder. “So what do you think?”

  “I think Tristan is kind of brilliant.”

  Well, yeah. I almost say, Of course Trist is brilliant. He’s my blood. But Trist is only half my blood. Maybe that’s why he’s so smart. Or maybe it just has nothing to do with me and everything to do with Tristan just being who he is.

  I nod. “You trying to start a bromance with my brother?”

  “I don’t know. You guys don’t look much alike, but he’s kind of—”

  “OH MY GOD, DON’T TALK ABOUT TRISTAN LIKE THAT, STOP.”

  “Why? You forgot about that whole bisexual thing? It doesn’t go away, Taze. Ever. Even when my lips are all over yours and I’m all up inside your—”

  “Kai!”

  “Heart! Your heart, you sick little twist.”

  Jesus, he’s something else. “No, I didn’t forget about the bisexuality thing. I mean, are you nuts? My only goal in life is to watch you make out with Jason Momoa someday. I’m trying to see if Merrick can use one of his celebrity connections.”

  I really couldn’t forget about Kai being bisexual even if I wanted to. And I don’t. It’s a piece of Kai as much as his eyes, as much as his style, as much as the way he laughs that silent chuckle of his. All of Kai’s pieces matter to me. Together and separate.

  “I think Tristan and I could be good friends, though. He has a good point.” Kai merges and switches freeways. He looks so comfortable here in my driver’s seat. His right foot on the accelerator, his left leg bent at the knee, both limbs spread wide and long. He rubs his left hand at his mouth as he talks.

  “You want some honesty?”

  “From you?” I take his hand. “Always. I want all of you.”

  I watch his lips spread, the corners kicking up, his teeth glinting as he continues to drive. The lights along the shoulder of the freeway whoosh by us.

  “I’m jealous of you,” he says quietly.

  “Jealous? Of what part?” I hope he’s not talking about the house. The McMansion is gross and extravagant but I’ve never lived any other way, not before Merrick.

  I think for a second about how I now live in an entirely different tax bracket. At ElCo, a lot of the Black kids are from families that are working middle class. And I think that’s where Merrick might be too. I wonder, had I grown up with Merrick, had I lived with him, had he and Mamma never split, maybe I’d feel differently about the McMansion and Mamma’s charity events and Daddy’s weekly country club breakfasts.

  Kai says, “Of the fact that you’re getting so in-depth with your family. You’re getting raw with them and thinking about how much or how little to include them in your life, and you have that option.”

  I nod. “I am your family.”

  “You are.” And we don’t even make that joke about him being my “uncle.”

  “But I wonder about my brother, you know? And my birth parents, and even a few of my foster families.”

  “That’s fair. And maybe we should do something about that?”

  Kai shakes his head, slows down a little to take a long curve. “Not everything needs a solution. Not everyone needs a whole family just because it’s mildly available.” He lets go of my head to shift gears.

  I don’t know what else to say. I’m eighteen. My family problems are overwhelming enough.

  Kai laughs and reads my mind. “You don’t need people around who are this complicated.”

  When he smiles like that, I suspect I could sleep in it all day. Kai is a little bit irresistible when he’s like this. When he’s trying to save me from hardship. But Kai is no hardship. “You’re you.”

  “Brilliant observation, Tasia, bravo.”

  “No, I just mean, it’s you. You’re complicated with or without parental issues, and I love you anyway.”

  “You love me anyway?”

  “I love you anyway.”

  “I love you anyway.”

  “I know,” I say.

  I pick up Kai’s right hand from the gear shift and kiss the back of it six times, and he gets that attractive-guy partial smile going on.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  BYE WEEK

  October comes unexpectedly, though it’s not like it’s changed its place in the calendar. It’s the first Thursday of that month when another unexpected thing appears. This is the year that grandparents have learned to text, and I receive the world’s shakiest, grammatically incorrect message from V with an invite.

  U want 2,, come to hOuse for

  Tea,?

  And I agree, hesitantly at first, sure. I ask Kai to be there for some kind of weird support. But he more or less goes out of his way to not be there.

  I take my Jeep on Thursday after practice, arriving sweaty and smelly and dirty, much to V’s dismay. And she feeds me tarte Tatin and some chamomile tea that tastes like dry leaves when it hits the back of my throat. I don’t like it, but as soon as I get up and she notices my cup is full, she makes me down it.

  Most of this happens without a single word from me. I’m here for reasons I don’t quite understand, having agreed to come without thinking all of it through, and so I do my best to ease, gracefully, into each of the amber evening’s moments.

  V and I go out into her garden, illuminated by bell-shaped hanging lamps. There isn’t a single difference between autumn in Los Angeles and any other season. The running joke is a) Angelenos don’t know what seasons are and b) those two days during the year when we get some pretty heavy rain obligate us all to jump on the 405 southbound freeway. Both of those things are painfully accurate.

  Still, V’s garden is immaculate, a small piece of wilted, golden-hued poetry set in her suburban home’s backyard. She talks for a few awkward moments a
bout her garden needing to be a festival of colors, pointing out the fat, mustard-colored squash, wine-red roses, and the wet emerald vines that cling desperately to their gate.

  We work there in silence until she pulls a plant out of the ground and, holding it out, asks me what I smell.

  “Fire,” I say. Which technically is the right answer because a brush fire’s sprung up off the 210. It’s been going for nearly a week.

  V mutters something about my inability to appreciate the smell of raw rosemary, then, quietly, “Tell me about my Kai.”

  A smile pushes its way onto my face. “Tell me about my box.”

  She smiles tightly in return. “What do you want to know?”

  Wish I could say I hadn’t been holding on to these questions. I have. But I haven’t been thinking I’d get to ask them. I’m, like, I don’t know, 97 percent certain that it isn’t why I agreed to come here. Okay, ninety-four percent. “Why wouldn’t you tell Merrick?”

  She exhales. She had to know that one was coming. “He was … not ready. Your father, he’s never been the most responsible man. He was not a responsible boy growing up, either. It was the kind of thing we hoped he would grow out of. He did not.”

  This is my shocked face.

  “He didn’t hide his affair with your mother. Not well. There wasn’t much reason to hide it from us. We didn’t pry, though perhaps we should have. So when things ended and we noticed him making many changes, to attend school elsewhere and quitting his position there at the university, I—well, it wasn’t hard to ask around, you know …” She hesitates.

  “To spy.”

  “Well, yes. So, I spy. And I find your mother. And I keep track of her, because it’s what I do. Your father is my firstborn, and I’ve been protecting him in ways I never had to protect Emiline. And so, your mother, not long after all this, she is pregnant.”

  “With me.”

  “With you, cher. Yes. Later she marries your papa. And that is when I start keeping my box. Your box,” she amends.

  God, I’m a jackass. It was never my box. Never intended to be mine. It is a box of me, to be sure. But it’s not my box—it’s hers.