Operation Oleander (9780547534213) Read online

  Cara stops pouting and slips off the bed, running after Mrs. Johnson, who heads back to the kitchen, where she makes sandwiches.

  Just after the lunch that no one eats, a horn honks outside.

  The cab’s here.

  Mom rolls the bag into the living room. “I want to check my purse first. Passport, boarding pass. Wallet.” The military support unit had arranged Mom’s flights. “I’m going to tell Cara.”

  While Mom’s in the kitchen, I run into my bedroom and dig for the envelope containing the letter I wrote to her in Ms. Rivera’s class before deployment. The one I hadn’t given her. Because it seemed so silly then to write a letter to someone who wasn’t going anywhere, not like Dad. I’d told her how much I missed Dad’s whistling reveille. How Dad had told me he bought her perfume he spent half a day’s pay on when they were just married. I grab a chocolate bar, too, from my drawer that’s too high for Cara to reach. I slip them both into Mom’s carry-on just as she’s heading for the door.

  “They don’t have American chocolate over there.” I make an excuse for why I’m slipping something into her bag.

  “Of course they do,” Mrs. Johnson says. “You can even get Hershey’s. Though who wants milk chocolate when you can get the best dark chocolate in the world?”

  Mom’s holding Cara in her arms.

  “It’s okay. Jess knows I prefer milk chocolate.” Mom winks at me, and I hug her hard, my arms around both her and Cara.

  Mom nods at Mrs. Johnson and passes Cara to her without making a big production. Cara hasn’t figured it all out yet. I see the tears in Mom’s eyes, though, as she leaves.

  The rollaway bag clatters over the seams in the driveway as Mom makes her way toward the waiting cab and climbs in.

  I watch the car until it turns at the end of the street and disappears.

  Only then do I notice Mom’s gardenia blooming white by the steps, the blossoms like ghosts. The sweet scent too strong to bear.

  Eight

  AFTER MOM leaves, we wander around like we’re in a stranger’s house. Eventually, we gather in the kitchen, even Mrs. Johnson. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s because that was where we heard the official news. When we’d all been together.

  I wash out the coffee cups from earlier. Mom’s, Mrs. Johnson’s, and Mrs. Butler’s. I scrub the counter, too, where the cups have left faint brown rings. I bear down hard with the sponge.

  “I’m just going over to grab a few things from my house,” Mrs. Johnson says. “I’ll be right back. Keep an eye on Cara.”

  I squint at her. Does she think I need her to tell me to take care of Cara? I’ve been taking care of Cara since she was just a baby. No one except Mom and Dad has ever been as careful about Cara as I am.

  Cara nibbles peanut butter cookies at the kitchen table. Mrs. Johnson told her she could have two before dinner. She eats both of them around the edge like a bunny chewing a carrot, making them last as long as possible. If Mom were here, she’d tell Cara to cut it out and eat them like a little girl should. But I don’t say anything. I let her eat them the way she wants.

  The door to the carport clicks shut behind Mrs. Johnson. I dry the cups and put them away. I take in a deep breath and let it out. I count to ten, to make sure she’s gone. Then I wipe my hands on the dishtowel and dial Meriwether’s number on the phone.

  The spaces between the rings stretch out longer than usual. Four rings, and still no answer. The machine message comes on. Will Meriwether pick up as soon as I say my name?

  The answering-machine voice comes over the phone. It’s Meriwether’s mother’s voice asking the caller to leave a message and a number at the tone. I almost drop the receiver. When the machine beeps, for a moment nothing comes out of my mouth. Then, in a rush, “Meriwether, it’s me, Jess. I’m so sorry. Please call me.”

  I hang up.

  The door to the carport opens.

  Mrs. Johnson pushes inside. Her carpetbag purse bounces against her rib cage, and she hauls a box of frozen pizza.

  Mrs. Johnson speaks to Cara in a tempting voice like a villainess in a Disney movie. “Piz-za!”

  Cara grins. “Pizza!” Peanut butter cookie crumbs rim her mouth.

  Traitor. Somehow Mrs. Johnson knows the only food group Cara likes besides Popsicles and cookies is pizza.

  “Put the oven on, Jess. Four hundred fifty degrees.” I turn back to the stove and jerk the dial over to the right setting. Mom’s not even been gone an hour, and it feels like forever.

  When will Meriwether call me back?

  The telephone rings, and my feet hit the bedroom floor. Pale light glows around the blinds. Not as bright as yesterday. I run for the phone in the living room and catch it before it rings a second time.

  I squint at the clock. Seven in the morning.

  “Mom?”

  “Jess?”

  “Hi, Mom,” I say. Her voice sounds slow, but maybe she’s tired. Or maybe it’s just the long-distance satellite phone distorting her voice. I press my hand over my other ear to hear her better. “How’s Dad?”

  There’s a delay in the line. My voice echoes across the miles, as if each syllable has to cross the Atlantic Ocean separately.

  Mrs. Johnson staggers into the room—she is sleeping in my parents’ bed—her hair unbrushed. Her eyebrows form questions I want to ignore, but I nod before I look away.

  “It’s hard to hear you,” Mom says. “I saw your dad for a few minutes when I got in. He’s still unconscious, though. He hasn’t been awake since the attacks.”

  Dad doesn’t know he’s in Germany; he doesn’t know they flew him from Afghanistan on a medevac plane. Maybe he doesn’t even know that Meriwether’s mother and Private Davis are dead. I blink and wonder whether inside his head he’s trapped in a whiteout that blots out everything.

  “Why can’t they wake him up?” I wind the cord in my hand.

  “They’re keeping him sedated. On purpose. He’s going back into surgery today.”

  “For what?”

  “Some shrapnel in his left eye. They’re concerned about both of his eyes. He has a concussion, too. And neck injuries. Because of where he was standing, most of his injuries are upper body. Is Libby there?”

  “Yes,” I say, but I don’t let go of the phone. “When will they know something?”

  “I don’t know, Jess. It could be another day or two,” Mom says. She pauses. “I found your note, Jess. Thank you. You don’t know how much that means to me.”

  I press my eyelids together hard. But I’m not going to cry. Not here. Not in front of Mrs. Johnson. Not where Mom can hear me. Be strong for me, Jess. That’s what Dad would say.

  “Here’s Mrs. Johnson.” I pass the phone over.

  Mrs. Johnson says “Hello” and then waits, listening. “Oh, we’re doing fine. Had a little pizza last night.” This time she’s the one who doesn’t meet my eyes. Mrs. Johnson doesn’t tell Mom what a pain Cara became last night. Maybe it was all the sugar from the Popsicle and the cookies. Maybe it was Mom going away and Cara not really understanding. But when we finally got her to sleep—after I read her the caribou story again—Mrs. Johnson and I had also collapsed, exhausted. Mrs. Johnson doesn’t tell Mom any of this.

  Is Mom doing the same thing on the other end of the phone? Telling us only part of the story so we won’t worry?

  The morning light comes through the kitchen window. Patchy fog drapes over the backyard and our neighbor’s bamboo fence.

  “Sure, I’ll make sure she does,” Mrs. Johnson says, nodding toward me.

  What? What’s Mom telling her?

  “What’s that?” Mrs. Johnson’s voice rises, as if there’s some background noise. She covers her other ear the way I did. “Let us know. And get some rest, you hear?”

  “Wait.” I grab for the phone as Mrs. Johnson hangs up the receiver. “Hello?”

  But the line’s dead.

  “I wasn’t finished talking to Mom.”

  “I’m sorry, your mother had to go. O
ne of the doctors came in to talk to her. You don’t keep them waiting. Your dad’s going in for more surgery.”

  “What did you mean—‘make sure she does’?” I ask.

  “Your mother said that I need to make sure you get out of the house and don’t stay stuck here like some tick on a dog. Worrying about things. I can handle Cara.”

  I fold my arms. Handling Cara had taken both of us last night.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Mrs. Johnson says. “I’m figuring that child out. She’s like my old cat, Horace. I could open five cans of cat food before His Highness would eat one. Drat it all if that cat sometimes didn’t go back and pick the very first can I’d opened. After all that.”

  “What’d you do?” I ask, despite everything.

  “I got smarter, that’s what. I opened two at once and gave him a little of both. Put the rest away and left the room. That was that. The old cat just wanted me crooning over him. Sometimes you have to step back.”

  I nod.

  “Okay, breakfast, and then I want you out of the house,” Mrs. Johnson says. She opens the refrigerator door and retrieves eggs. “You can help by scrambling these.”

  I press my lips together. She’s ordering me around again, and we haven’t even survived twenty-four hours together yet. How many more days before Mom and Dad come home?

  “Do we wake Cara up?” she asks me.

  “Let her sleep,” I say, not ready to deal with my sister.

  “My thoughts exactly,” Mrs. Johnson says, getting out two plates and silverware and setting the table.

  I crack the eggs into a bowl and whisk in some milk the way Dad does. Then I beat the mixture until it’s golden yellow.

  As soon as breakfast’s over, I know what I have to do. Where I have to go.

  Nine

  I STAND IN front of Meriwether’s house, trying to convince myself to walk up the sidewalk and knock. The sun has pushed the fog out, leaving every surface covered in a thin layer of dampness, as if the world is waking up sweaty from a bad dream. Small American flags line the driveway. A wreath of red, white, and blue ribbons hangs from the door. Curtains on windows flanking the door remain closed.

  The house looks as if no one’s home. Maybe Meriwether and her dad are sleeping in. Maybe they went away.

  From the back of their house, though, I hear a sound. At first I can’t tell what it is. But it’s not like someone breaking in or anything. In fact, it sounds more like yard work.

  Yard work?

  I tiptoe down the driveway. The gate of the carport is unlocked, and the gate hangs open. I walk through and into the backyard.

  For a moment seeing the backyard takes away my breath. Meriwether’s mother had turned the far corner of the yard into a magical area, with tiny white lights strung into dwarf trees. Last summer I helped them dig a hole large enough for a plastic pond, complete with fountain and some goldfish they’d bought on sale. Last time I was over, though, only two flickers of orange could be seen hiding in the dark green watercress. A heron had eaten the rest of the fish, but Meriwether’s mother, from her base in Afghanistan, made us promise her we wouldn’t do anything to scare away the heron.

  And so we hadn’t.

  Now I can hear a faint gurgle of water from the fountain.

  That, and digging.

  In the sunny part of the yard, Meriwether and I had helped Mrs. Scott plant day lilies in every color and variety. Bright yellow, scarlet with lemon stripes down their centers, salmon pink ones with petals dusted in diamonds. Single and double petals, straight-edged and fringed ones. Like she had, I loved them all—not for their scent, because these didn’t have much. But for the way the flowers opened in the morning when the sun came out and then closed up at night. I told Mrs. Scott it was so they could dream. I’d turned red when I said that, when we stood out in the yard, hot and sweaty after planting a new grouping, because it had seemed silly when I said it out loud. But Mrs. Scott said she’d always think of day lilies that way. That they dream like we do.

  This past year the day lilies have filled in. They’ve grown tall and thick. Flowered stalks reach for the sky.

  In the middle of them, Meriwether kneels.

  With a shovel in her hand.

  “Meriwether?”

  She jerks around. Her T-shirt’s soaked through, and tendrils of her hair have escaped her ponytail clip. They curl against her damp neck and upper arms, like swirls of grass after a heavy rain.

  “Go away,” she says.

  The shovel is caked with dirt. Clumps of day lilies, wilting, lie on their sides on the lawn. Ripped like weeds from the earth.

  “Stop!” She’s tearing them up. Destroying her mother’s garden. “What are you doing? Don’t kill them.”

  When I say the word “kill,” Meriwether drops the clump from her hands. She puts a dirty hand to her forehead as if she has a headache.

  The word “kill” echoes back and forth between us.

  I cover my mouth, not trusting the right words to come out.

  “I’m not killing them. I’m transplanting them.” Meriwether says each word with force, as if I’m an idiot.

  “Oh,” I say. “Sorry, it just looked . . .”

  Meriwether sits back. She sprays some water from the hose onto the exposed roots.

  “Where?” I ask.

  “South Carolina. Maybe. Whenever we leave, I’m not abandoning these flowers. Mom loved them.”

  “What’s in South Carolina?” I should know, but I can’t remember.

  “My grandparents.” Meriwether’s almost yelling at me. “They live in Charleston. Remember?”

  That’s right. Mrs. Scott had talked about the salt marshes and the herons of the low country, the red-winged blackbirds that nested in the marshes.

  “I’m sorry, Meriwether.” I stand a few feet from her, and I don’t know what to do. Best friends hug each other, don’t they? Best friends know without saying anything what to do. “You’re coming back, right?”

  My question hangs there. Meriwether looks away. She digs out another clump of day lilies and lays them in the shade. She sprays them with water.

  “I can help you,” I say.

  “I don’t want your help.”

  She says it like she’s mad at me.

  “Are you moving?” I ask. “Is that why?”

  “Yes, we’re moving. Dad says he can’t stay here.”

  “When?”

  “A few weeks. As soon as they can schedule the movers. But tomorrow night we’re flying to Dover. We’ll be back. For the funeral.” Meriwether stabs the shovel into the soft ground where the hose has dripped.

  I reach for the hose. “I can help. Really. Please.” I need to help. I need to do something. Please.

  Meriwether pushes it away from me. “No, Jess. I don’t want your help.”

  “Why?”

  Meriwether doesn’t answer. Wiping her hands on the lawn, she stands and gathers plants into her arms, moving toward the garage.

  I follow her.

  “Why?”

  Meriwether wraps the roots in burlap and stashes them in a bucket. She stomps into the house, leaving a track of muddy footprints. Mrs. Scott would make her take off her dirty shoes by the back door and use the hose to rinse them off.

  “Meriwether.”

  It’s as if she’s gone deaf.

  She steps into the kitchen. The light comes in the window and makes the azure tiles glow like the gulf. “Not blue,” Mrs. Scott said. “Azure.” It’s a word that conjures up Greek islands and tropical drinks. “Virgin drinks, of course,” she’d say, and laugh, as if it were a joke. A joke that she told when they had company. Whenever her mother would say “virgin,” Meriwether exhaled in a puff of embarrassment.

  Meriwether washes her hands in the sink. Trickles of dirty water drip along the counter. I ache to wipe them away like the rings from yesterday’s coffee cups at home.

  Everything in the house reminds me of Mrs. Scott, and I don’t know how Meriwe
ther stands it. I’d be half-crazy.

  Maybe that’s what’s wrong.

  Meriwether’s shut everything out. Become like a zombie because it’s too hard otherwise. She brushes past me, moving her shoulder in an exaggerated way, as if to show she won’t touch me. Her room is down the hall.

  “Meriwether—” I reach for her.

  “Don’t.” Meriwether jerks back. She retreats into her room. On the bed, her back against the wall, she barricades herself with pillows. I stand at the door. That’s another thing I always loved about Meriwether’s house—enough throw pillows to stack to the ceiling. In all colors. Some striped, some polka dotted. A riot of color, as if Mrs. Scott’s day lily garden had been transplanted indoors.

  “I called as soon as—I mean, I called. Last night. I wanted to tell you in person. I’m so sorry,” I say. “What can I do to help?”

  “Do?” Meriwether’s red-rimmed eyes squint. “You can’t do anything.”

  “Why don’t we go outside? Walk to the beach?” I can’t stand it in the house anymore. Everything reminds me of Mrs. Scott, and I can’t breathe. Because I love her too.

  On the beach, I can breathe, and I can cry and taste the salt on my cheeks as though it’s just ocean spray.

  “The beach?” Meriwether’s voice accuses me, as if I’ve suggested we put on bikinis and go to a party.

  “I’m really sorry.”

  “You should be.” Meriwether grabs another pillow, pressing it against her stomach as if to hold herself together.

  I touch the door to steady myself. The floor moves underneath me like the deck of a boat.

  “If it weren’t for you, my mom wouldn’t have been at that stupid orphanage in the first place. I didn’t even want to help you. Remember?” Meriwether flings words at me like acid spray.

  I nod the way a marionette does when a puppeteer yanks a string. The orphanage. The way she says it stabs me. Meriwether’s face is blotchy.

  “Every day since school’s been out, I’ve gotten up to sit at that stupid booth with you and ask people for money for school supplies. I don’t even like mornings. My mom couldn’t believe I was getting up. She told me she thought it was great. That maybe I was finally an army brat after all.”