Don't Fail Me Now(63)

I swallow hard. “Yes.”

“Oh my God.” The receiver drops, and a sharp, metallic clang rings in my ear. Fumbling, then whimpers. “Oh my God, is she okay? What happened?”

“She was hypoglycemic,” I say. “She had a seizure.”

“Are you skipping meals?” The hyperventilating gives way to irritation again. Mom’s temperature rises faster than mercury. “Tell me you’re not letting my baby skip meals!”

“No!” I cry, more defensive than I have to be, probably because I know I’m guilty. “No. She . . . gave herself too much insulin.” I don’t want to have to say what that means out loud, but I don’t have to—Mom knows as well as I do that Cass would never slip up by accident. There’s a long pause, and when she speaks again, her voice is husky and raw with anger and pain.

“How could you let this happen?”

It’s a question I’ve been asking myself for the past nine hours, raking myself across the coals over and over until it burns, but for some reason now that Mom is asking it I’m filled with rage. How could I let this happen? None of it ever would have happened if she hadn’t let us all down. I’m not supposed to be in charge, I’m not supposed to have to make these kinds of decisions.

“Excuse me?” I say stonily.

“She’s your little sister,” Mom says, her voice breaking. “You’re supposed to take care of her.”

“No, you’re supposed to take care of her,” I spit. “They’re your kids. I’m your kid. You’re supposed to be here for us.”

“You’re almost eighteen years old, don’t act like a child,” she says, and I bristle.

“You’re almost thirty-four,” I shoot back. “Act like a mother.”

“You’re lucky we’re on the phone so I can’t smack you. I didn’t raise you to talk to me that way.”

You hardly raised me at all, I think. Out loud I say, “Right.”

“And another thing,” she snaps. “We haven’t even talked about the fact that you’re in Arizona. Why the hell are you way out there? What about school?”

“It’s Saturday,” I say.

“Don’t be a smartass, you know what I mean.”

“What does it matter?” I lean my forehead on the bars of the window just as the moon emerges from behind a cluster of clouds. It’s waning now. Like everything else.

“It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter if I graduate, I’m not going anywhere. Oh, they’re kicking Denny out of his school, too, by the way.”

“What?”

“And Cass,” I say, a lump forming in my throat. “Cass is getting called all kinds of ugly names. She hates it. She cried when I tried to take her to school last week.”

“This is all news to me,” Mom says.

“Well, it shouldn’t be.”

“No.” She softens a little. “I guess it shouldn’t. But what about your aunt? Didn’t you go with her like I told you?”

“Yeah, that didn’t work out so well.”

Mom sighs heavily. “Michelle, I know she can be hard to take, but she’s family.”

“She doesn’t act like it,” I say. “She basically extorted me and threatened to ship us off to CPS!” Mom mumbles some choice curses under her breath. “And guess what?” I cry, gathering steam. “We’ve been gone since Wednesday, and she hasn’t even called me once to see what happened. She doesn’t care. When are you gonna learn she doesn’t care about us?”

A pause. “Why didn’t you come to me then?”

“What could you do? From in there? Seriously, Mom.” I kick the wall, and paint chips off, scattering on the floor.

“You could’ve got me out,” she says. “We could have gone home, picked up where we left off.”

“With you still using?” I ask bitterly. “No thanks.”

“That’s over,” she says. “I’m off it now, Michy. For good this time.”

Yeah, right. It’s on the tip of my tongue, but I clench my teeth to keep it from slipping out. I might not believe it, but she does. It’s all she’s got. And I can’t take that away, no matter how much I want to hurt her right now.

“Hello?” She sounds annoyed.

“I’m still here.”

“So when are you coming back?”

“I don’t know.”

“When does Cass get out?”

“Depends on when they release her,” I say. “They need your consent to give her psychological treatment. For, you know . . .” We mutually and silently acknowledge the ellipsis.

“Our insurance cover that?” she asks.

“I don’t know. They haven’t kicked us out yet.” I attempt a laugh.

“That’s not funny. Those heartless sons of bitches will take me to the mat just to avoid paying for a prescription, let alone therapy.”

“It’s okay, Mom,” I say.

“Oh, what, you got the money?” Now she’s laughing, the quick rat-a-tat-tat giggle that makes her sound like Sweet Sixteen Maddie Means instead of inmate 2247 or whatever her number is this time.