An Honest Lie(14)

“I’m Appy,” she said, folding her hands at her waist. “That’s ‘Appy’ with an A—not ‘Happy’—a common mistake. Though I am very happy.” She grinned. “Everyone signed it—even the babies,” she said, pointing to the card. “We are all so happy you’ve come to live with us. You can’t even imagine how excited we’ve been to meet you.”

It all felt so overwhelming and good, like syrup on pancakes. And then there was a feast, the food unusually colorful compared to what she was used to: pistachio salad, gelatin molds with the fruit floating inside like bugs in amber and a popcorn machine they said they only used on special occasions. They grilled hamburgers and hot dogs and chicken legs outside by the playground, and a tall girl with blond pigtails came to take her hand and offered to show her the animals.

That night, Summer sat in a bath with a blue bath bomb—her favorite color—and watched in fascination as the foam built and then fizzled away to nothing. The bath was in the guesthouse, where they were staying until the paint fumes left their smaller room. Taured had told them that the guesthouse had been used for visitors to the prison, and occasionally the warden when he spent the night, so it was special. Despite her comments in the car, Summer didn’t think it was creepy at all to be in a prison; it was an adventure. Her dad always talked about taking her to Alcatraz, but then he’d died. To her, it was the perfect setting: corridors and secret rooms, an animal farm with tiny piglets and chicks, and, very best of all, a large family. For the first months at the compound, Summer was radiant.

“Look at her, Lorraine!” Taured would point to her on the playground, smiling at her in pure delight. “She’s so happy.” Summer shone brighter and brighter to meet their comments, while her mother watched her, guarded. She smiled less and less, Summer noticed, and she wasn’t very friendly to the other women when they tried to include her in things.

They had moved into their new space exactly four days later.

Two twin beds sat on either side of the small room, with a wardrobe between them. Up near the ceiling were two shoebox-size windows; Summer would have to stand on her tiptoes on the bed to see out of them. It was kind of dark, even with the lights on. The room had a metal sink for water, but Taured explained that refrigerators weren’t allowed in the rooms. “We want everyone to eat together and not have an excuse to hide away,” he said, winking at Summer.

“Who wants to eat alone?” She spun around the room, arms stretched wide. There wasn’t really space, and her mama told her to stop.

“Exactly,” Taured said. “But adults get weird sometimes and want to hide instead of fixing the problem.” He looked at her mother then. It was a strange look that she didn’t understand. Her mother had loosened her braid and was shaking out her hair, something she only did when she wanted to hide her face.

“Right. No hiding,” Summer announced, drawing his attention back to her.

“So...what do you think, Summertime?”

She grinned at the nickname. The room was small and weird, but she felt happy.

“It’s good. I like it.”

She turned to her mother as soon as Taured left, hands on hips. Just as she expected, Lorraine was sour-faced and pensive. She hated when her mother got like this: her lips folded, the seam between them a bright white. Too much in her own head, her dad used to say.

“You hate it,” she said accusingly. “You made me come here and now you hate it!” Summer wanted a fight; sometimes it was the only way to draw the truth out of her mother.

“I never said that.” Lorraine was digging around in her purse, murmuring something to herself that Summer couldn’t hear.

“I want to stay.” She almost stomped her foot but thought better of it.

Her mother’s head snapped up.

“Why, because they gave you cake and a basket of T-shirts?” Lorraine slapped her forehead once, twice, and then she got up and strode across the small room. She opened the door, looked out and closed it again.

“Well, you’re going to get your wish for a little while yet, Summer.” Her voice wasn’t nice. Summer didn’t like it.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Lorraine dropped her voice. “Look, we don’t have another option right now, so we have to stay...but not for long, okay? Just to get on our feet.” She was talking to herself now, pacing the small space between the beds. Summer sat down cross-legged on her own bed to listen and to get out of her way.

“Why don’t you like it?”

Her mama stopped abruptly and looked at Summer like she had a thousand things to say. Summer braced herself for a lecture, but instead she got only a handful of words.

“This place isn’t right. He’s different than I remember. I don’t trust anyone here and you aren’t to, either, do you hear me?”

Summer nodded, her eyebrows lifting on their own. “But they paid all of your credit cards. I thought you said—”

“We’re going to be foreigners in their land—do you know what that means?”

“Um, no,” Summer said.

“We live here, we eat their food, we heal up and wait, but we are not to think like them. Their ways are not our ways.”

Summer smiled. She only cared about the food, anyway.

“How long can we stay?”