Miles from Ordinary Read online

  The lady cop glanced at them then handed it all back to Momma. “You can’t be here, ma’am,” she said. Her voice was gentle. Her face kind.

  “But I love her,” I said. The words came out like they were sorry.

  Momma’s grip tightened. “You love me, too,” she said.

  “I love you both,” I said.

  “Off my property, Linda,” Momma said.

  “Angela, please.”

  “Momma!”

  The policeman came forward. “Tell her good-bye. Get permission to come back.”

  Aunt Linda was motionless. Her face grew pale and I saw her grit her teeth.

  I ran to her. Threw my arms around her neck. Kissed her face. She tucked herself close.

  And then she was escorted to her car.

  But Aunt Linda and me, how could we know all that when she was driving off the first night Momma made her leave?

  “Give me your word you’ll call me, Lacey,” she had said.

  “I will,” I had said.

  Then I watched her go. I didn’t grab at the car. Didn’t run after her. ’Cause I knew it didn’t matter. That it wouldn’t matter what I did.

  Aunt Linda wouldn’t stay with me.

  Funny thing happened right after the police left all that time later, and I remembered it now as I cleared the last of the cart off and started shelving the Clementine books in the juvenile fiction section.

  Soon as she was escorted away from our home, soon as she drove away from me not looking back even once, I got all mad at my aunt. Walking into the house that afternoon, the police done talking to Momma, I went up to my room, fell on my bed and didn’t leak one tear, not one, though the effort made my head hurt and my nose go stuffy.

  Aunt Linda gone.

  Gone.

  Now it was just Momma and me. All alone here in Peace. All alone in this house. Granddaddy peering in at us—Momma was sure. Me feeling so achy inside. Not a bit of peace in my heart. Hating everyone, including my watchful, dead grandfather. And my aunt. And Momma, too. I hated them all.

  “We made him happy,” Momma said, coming in to pat my head. “Granddaddy is sure we’ve done the right thing.”

  I didn’t answer. The police were long gone. Aunt Linda, too. Momma had put on more makeup, two red circles of blush high on her cheekbones, so much mascara her eyelashes looked spidery. She wore three sweaters though it was hot in the house. Tight and closed up.

  “He told me so, Lacey,” Momma said through purple-painted lips.

  I wouldn’t even look my mother in the face as she walked away, stood thin near my bedroom door. Pale light falling in on her from the hall. Teetering on her high heels. There was a run in her panty hose. Had it been there all along?

  “You’d hear him too, if you’d just listen.”

  “I don’t want to listen,” I wanted to say. But I kept my lips glued shut. I waited for her to leave—the two of us standing there. Momma turned away first, went to her room.

  When I heard Momma settle into bed, I stood in front of my dresser mirror. I whispered, “We don’t need you, Linda Mills. We don’t. We don’t.” I said the words over and over. Saying them would make them real. And I swore to myself, right then, I would never call her. Never.

  Momma, all peaceful now, like nothing had happened, called from her room, “You okay, Lacey?”

  And I lied to her. “Yes, Momma. I’m okay.”

  Momma didn’t get out of bed for three days, except to drink sips of water and go to the bathroom. But we were okay.

  VII

  I worked hard trying to forget while I shelved all those books. But I couldn’t. It was almost like Aunt Linda was a part of the books. Made of pages or something. Bits of words. And she had made me a part too, by reading to me. By holding me on her lap while she read. By kissing my cheek when she ended a chapter and closed a novel and tucked me in at night. It was like now she was some fairy from another world, trapped between the covers. And if I worked hard enough, or put the books away in just the right order, I might release her.

  “Lacey Mills,” I said. All these things, all these thoughts? Pure stupidity. “You are crazier than Momma.”

  You are! You are!

  I held tight to the novels in my hands. I sighed, all the way from my toes.

  Straight up I have to say, it’s not Momma’s fault she is the way she is. She’s just scared. I blame Granddaddy and so did Aunt Linda, though Momma is the first to defend him. But who can help being afraid? Who can help missing her father, even if he wasn’t perfect? Who isn’t afraid of death?

  That fall terrorists flew airplanes into the World Trade Center? I was at school. A little ol’ thing. Aunt Linda was out of town at a librarian’s meeting. Momma at home.

  I knew, though. I knew, little as I was. If Momma was watching at home, we were in trouble. Big, big trouble. Why, I was watching the most horrible thing I’d ever seen in my life. If Momma was watching TV too, this would not be good for her.

  The school wouldn’t let me get home. Told me I had to stay right where I was. Just in case Florida got attacked, I guess. Made us practice getting under desks and everything.

  I ran home from the bus stop that afternoon. My feet hitting the pavement like hands on a drum. My stomach sick from what I had seen. My heart all twisted up. Tears coming down my face.

  And oh! was I right about Momma.

  The house was silent when I opened the front door. All the lights on. I couldn’t seem to find her anywhere. Not anywhere. Not on the first floor. Or near the washer and dryer on the back porch. Not in her room or Aunt Linda’s.

  At last, at last, I heard voices when I went into my bedroom. Saw my closet door opened just a crack. Could see the light was on. Shadows of people?

  “Momma,” I said, whispering. All day I’d sat with a lump the size of a grapefruit in my chest.

  I opened the door wide. There she was on the floor in front of me, curled up on my shoes, Granddaddy’s pictures pulled out around her. Even the portrait from the wall, the one where she was with him, his arm around her, it was there in the closet. In the photo Granddaddy and a younger Momma, side by side, looking almost like twins, their hair and eyes that same dark color. And that skin that won’t tan, not even a bit. Smiling. The two of them smiling. That portrait leaned against her knee. Seeing her like that made me think, Momma is okay. She is.

  “I seen Granddaddy,” she said to me then. Didn’t look at me. Just said those words. “Seen him right after the buildings fell. First he was in the smoke and glass from the buildings. Then standing in the living room.”

  Momma’s been talking about her dead father ever since I can remember. You know—about hearing his voice. And seeing him. Saying sometimes how the two of them talk late into the night so Momma has a hard time getting up in the morning. It used to scare me, but after a while I got used to it. I’ve never seen him, so why be afraid of a memory? Even if the memory talks to your mother?

  “Momma,” I had said. “Come on out of there.” I reached in, my hand so small. I remember that, my hand being so small. I touched her dirty hair. My stomach twisted with the awful things I’d seen at school. The smell coming from the closet. The burning buildings. The sparkling glass. The smoke. The way Momma would be so upset about it. She’d been having a hard time for a few days anyway. Worrying, pulling at her hair, whispering to Granddaddy.

  “He said,” Momma said from the floor, “it’s the end of the world. Said we should wait for the destruction. And save water. I ran the tub full, Lacey. And all the sinks, too.” She spoke into her chest. Not looking up.

  I was petrified anyway and for some reason Momma’s words scared me even more that day. The picture—all the family pictures around her—were no longer soothing.

  “Now, now,” I said. Something Aunt Linda always said to her sister. But she was at that meeting. It was just me and Momma on September eleventh. Just the two of us. And my heart was broken from it all.

  “Come on.” I reached for M
omma again and noticed my hands shaking.

  “Can’t.”

  “Come on now.”

  I reached for her and Momma glanced at me.

  At first I thought maybe that wasn’t my mother sitting there cross-legged near my shoes. That maybe someone had stolen her voice or something. Her face was so shiny in the sunlight that swept in from my bedroom window. And dark. I jerked away from her. And she made this smile. Like a carved pumpkin smile. With not a bit of happiness in it.

  I realized then all the dark was blood. Her whole face covered in blood.

  “What?” I said. “What?” For a moment I couldn’t even move. I was a statue, poised in my bedroom closet. Then I stumbled backward, hitting my nightstand. Something fell to the floor and broke. And the sun kept shining and shining.

  Momma cocked her head at me like a bird does when it gazes at you. “Oh, this?” She touched her cheek and shrugged. “I don’t know.” Her voice was light, almost floaty.

  For a minute I was sure I was gonna throw up. I mean, all those people dead that morning. All those people gone. All that fear. The way I felt. And Momma looking up at me. The blood. I gagged. Turned my back. Gagged again.

  “Get out of the closet.” Now, looking back, I’m not sure how I even got those words out.

  “Lacey.” Momma’s voice was a whine.

  “Now.” Then I threw up. All over the wooden floor. Vomit splashing up on the wall. And on the small rug where I knelt to say my prayers. And I cried, too. For everything that had happened that awful, awful day. Tell me who wasn’t upset that day? Or afraid?

  “Lacey?” John’s voice pulled me back into the library. “How’s Linda doing?”

  For a minute I couldn’t figure what John was talking about, I was so back there on September eleventh.

  I stood up, blinking. “Oh, she’s doing good.” Not a lie, really, but I had no idea what was going on with my aunt. I hadn’t seen her since she left, except those times from the window. And with the police. There was the letter, too. But nothing else. I hadn’t tried to call her at all. Okay, I did twice, but the phone went to voice mail. Probably because I had called at like two in the morning, both times after Granddaddy had awakened Momma. “Yes, she’s good.”

  “She seems to be,” John said. “The whole library loves it when she stops in.”

  “What?” My face went flat. The floor tilted. “She visits here?” For some reason my hands shook. I clutched the handle of the book cart.

  “She used to come a couple times a month hoping that Mr. Dewey would be returned,” John said. “We’ve haven’t seen her in a while.” He peered over my shoulder at the almost-empty third cart. “Looks like you’re about finished here. We’ve got new DVDs and CDs that need to be unwrapped when you’re done.”

  “All right, John,” I said. But in my head the words came out slow and fat, like bold print might sound.

  He smiled big at me. “Lacey, it’s nice to have you here. You look a lot like your aunt.”

  “Thank you.” I nodded. “That’s nice. I’m glad to be here.”

  Mr. Dewey returned? What did that mean?

  After the videos and CDs were unwrapped. After I’d dusted things. After I’d helped a little girl find her older brother, I stood at the back of the children’s section. Here, two large windows, floor to ceiling, looked out at the Peace River, which was nearly a mile across at this point. In the distance was a dark line of green, the other shore. Past that, the ocean. South down the coast a ways, St. Augustine.

  “You’ve been in town and not stopped to see me,” I said at the river. I was too shocked to feel pain, though I knew it was in there somewhere. Trying to find a place to hide in the memories, maybe.

  I stood at the window a long time. Thought of Aunt Linda’s reaction when she came home a few minutes after I got Momma out of the closet. Her finding us in the kitchen, me dabbing at the blood with a damp dish towel. Aunt Linda freaking out. Us finally getting it out of Momma that she had scratched most of the skin from her face because Granddaddy had said it would keep her safe.

  Now I hugged myself and looked at the water, the way the sun made bright little chips of light on the surface.

  “Momma,” I said under my breath, “I hope this Winn-Dixie job is good for you. You got to get better.”

  “She needs help,” Aunt Linda had said, bandaging Momma up. “You need help, Angela.”

  But Momma had just smiled. Both Aunt Linda and me, we tucked Momma into bed, kissing the side of her head.

  None of us ever talked about that incident again. Momma didn’t go for help. But she did kick Aunt Linda out.

  Momma and me alone at the house in the city of Peace. With Granddaddy telling her what to do. And me cleaning up after it all.

  You need help, Angela. Lacey—you need help.

  And I did. I did. I squeezed my eyes shut.

  “Hey.”

  I almost jumped out of my skin at the voice. Turning, I saw Aaron.

  “You scared me,” I said.

  “Isn’t it time for you to go home?” he said.

  For a moment I stood at the edge of the library, tucked full into the memory of my family and their craziness.

  I glanced at the clock. “Yeah, it looks like it. Have to pick my momma up at the Winn-Dixie pretty soon.”

  Aaron showed his crooked teeth in a small smile. His forehead was sweaty.

  “I’ll go with you then. We’re headed the same way.”

  With me, I thought. With me sounded good. Me not alone if he went with me.

  You need help.

  “Okay, that’d be real nice,” I said. We walked from the children’s section of the library, waving good-bye to John. One last time I looked around.

  Oh, Aunt Linda.

  VIII

  While we waited at the bus stop, Aaron let me try his skateboard. I was pretty bad. And thumping around in my head was the thought of Aunt Linda so close and never stopping to see me. It made me ache all over. Even my skin felt funny. Like I had the flu or something.

  “It’s okay, Lacey,” Aaron said. He touched me on the elbow with a finger. “I’ll teach you how if you want. We’ve got the summer.” He smiled. “I’m a pretty good teacher.”

  My mind was full of excuses. Full of Momma. Of responsibility. Of no Aunt Linda.

  “Not really,” I said.

  “Not really what?” In the sun and heat of the day, Aaron squinted at me.

  Clack, clack, clack, said his skateboard on the sidewalk.

  We stood near the concrete bench, waiting. I squinted too and stared off down the road. I could see the bus coming, just an ant of a thing. I shrugged at nothing.

  What should I say? I didn’t want this little bit of time to be over. Without meaning to, I liked Aaron. He was nice. Like a gift. He had appeared from nowhere, someone to be my friend after summers of no friends. After months of nothing but Momma.

  Still, I knew sure as beets that my time was twisted tight in Momma’s fists.

  “I have this job.” I motioned to the library behind us. “Five days a week. While my momma’s working at the Winn-Dixie.”

  I have Momma, I thought. I have to watch her. Care for her. Pat away her sadness.

  Aaron looked off to the bus that chugged closer, stopping off down the road from us. The afternoon sun played on the gold in his hair. He shrugged. “So you come a little earlier. Or we stay a little later. I mean, if you want.” He paused. “Do you want to?”

  A part of me did want to.

  A part of me was scared of skateboarding.

  Of being away from home too much.

  Still.

  “I’m not real sure. I think it’d be fun. Let’s talk to Momma when she gets on the bus.”

  “Okay.” He was quiet a moment.

  “Yeah,” I said, a bit of excitement coming up into my stomach. It burned out to my palms. “Yeah. That would be fun. Let’s see what she says.” I smiled, feeling almost what normal used to feel like.

&nb
sp; For that second, I was free.

  I shrugged again. So what, I had thought about Aunt Linda so much? So what? I didn’t need her. It was Momma and me. And on the side it could be me learning to skateboard. With Aaron.

  The thought was round and soft in my head. I couldn’t help but smile again.

  A dad with two small children hurried to the bench to wait with us.

  “Bus is coming,” said the littlest. She jumped up and down on one foot, her curls bouncing. “Bus is coming.”

  “You know, I could come to your house,” Aaron said. “You wouldn’t have to leave at all. We could skate out on the street.”

  “Maybe,” I said. Could it be true? Could someone—a guy even—want to do something with me?

  His face turned pink. He drummed on his knees like he heard a song I didn’t.

  The bus stopped in front of us. With a belch the doors opened. Several people stepped off and hurried away. The man and his two kids got on first.

  And Aaron? He started talking and didn’t stop. Even with that pink face, he didn’t stop talking. I was full of wonder at the way he kept going. I would have never been able to pursue a thing—whatever it might be—the way he did. Words would pile up on my tongue then get trapped back behind my teeth. But not him. He didn’t even need answers from me.

  “The road’s not bad down there. Pretty smooth. A pebble here and there, but mostly not. And with all the shade trees, well, there’s places to rest. I built a ramp. Have you seen it?” He looked at me.

  I nodded.

  “Yeah, my dad and me, we built that ramp out of scraps I found. That took us a good long time. He drives a truck and he’s not always home.”

  Glancing around the bus, I looked for Tattoo Guy. He wasn’t there. I sat down in the front seat and Aaron plopped right next to me, his skateboard making a slapping sound when he dropped it to the floor. He put his feet on it and they rolled this way and that with the bus’s movement.

  We were close enough to touch, Aaron and me. His arm, warm from the sun, kept brushing against mine. Three knuckles were skinned up, almost like Momma’s face that September day so long ago. I looked away.