The Most Dangerous Place on Earth(2)

If Cally did end up motherless, she thought, at least she’d never have to worry about her dad trolling the halls of her school.

“This isn’t you,” Ms. Flax insisted.

Cally shrugged. Of course she could do the homework herself, but there were more interesting things in the world. There was her best friend, Abigail, and their afternoons behind closed blinds. There was Ryan Harbinger’s body as he stretched to field a ball, and the current that jagged through her in English when he palmed her bare right thigh under the desk, then squeezed it hard enough to bruise, grinning when she screamed. There was sprawling sideways on her bed with her head dangled over the edge, picturing velvety blood as it seeped to the top of her brain. Everything was more interesting than algebra, but she couldn’t say that to Ms. Flax, who had probably done all her own school assignments before her teachers even thought of them. And look at where it had gotten her—stuck in middle school for the rest of her life, with Tristan Bloch.

Tristan’s silver paper had transformed into something tiny, sharp, and shining—a spear, a crown, Cally couldn’t tell. His eyes narrowed to slits and his tongue worked its way to his top lip, sucking at it, revealing the pink gloss underneath.

“Oh, honey,” Ms. Flax said. “Talk to me. How are things at home?”

“What?” Heat surged in Cally’s chest and face; she felt it making her ugly.

Ms. Flax shifted in her chair, began again. “Since your mother has been ill, I know it has been difficult. It’s all right to feel sad, even angry. I wish you would share your feelings, rather than acting out in this way.”

Cally thought, Abigail was right about Ms. Flax: she made you think she wanted to help, but underneath she was a total bitch. “Just because I don’t care about eighth-grade math doesn’t mean there’s a problem,” she said. “It’s not like it matters. None of this does.”

Ms. Flax’s eyes widened, and for a second it seemed she would cry. How awkward that would be. Unbearable. “Look,” she said, “I’m on your side here, Cally. But I can’t help if you refuse to be honest with me.”

Cally crossed her arms. Beside her, Tristan Bloch picked up his folded silver paper, pressed it to his lips, and blew. Then he set it on the desk—a tiny, perfect crane—and nudged it toward her.

This was when Cally made the mistake. She should have ignored him like most people did. But instead she reached forward and plucked the crane from the desk. She set it in her palm and raised her hand to her eyes. The bird had a sharp beak, a scissor neck and tail, two precise, glinting wings. It seemed to float in her palm. In that moment it seemed possible this tiny bird could fly—out of this stifling room, out of this school and this town and away. She smiled at Tristan then, and Tristan smiled back.

“What a lovely gift,” Ms. Flax said. “Calista, don’t you think you should say thank you?”

Mercifully, Cally’s iPhone buzzed in her pocket. Abigail always knew when she needed saving.

“Do I have detention or not?” she asked.

Ms. Flax sighed. “Three days. And you’ll make up the homework for Mr. Hoyt.”

“Fine.” Cally stood and turned to leave, the paper bird between her fingers.

—

That night, Cally curled on her narrow bed to text with Abigail.

Abigail never came over to Cally’s house. It was an unspoken agreement between them. It was partly because Cally’s room was small and plain, with a west-facing window that admitted scant light. Directly outside the window was her mother’s rose garden, which permeated the walls; no matter how emphatically Cally spritzed her own fruity perfumes, she could never quite cover the room’s damp soil smell. Beyond the garden, the view swept across to Mount Tamalpais. Under the window was a small wooden desk that Cally rarely used. She preferred to do her homework on her bed, which she’d piled with pillows and pushed against the wall. The wall itself was papered in a pattern chosen for the child who had had the room before her: faded yellow balloons floating upward to the ceiling. In places, she had outlined the balloons with marker, had drawn on faces and hairstyles, torsos and hands. At the seam she’d scratched the paper back, exposing strips of ancient glue.

The walls of Cally’s house were thin, and the sounds were layered: as she lay there clutching her phone, she heard her dad shouting at the TV, her brothers fighting in the bedroom next door, the steady silence from her mom’s room on the other side. Since Cally’s mom had gotten sick, her dad had stayed home to care for her and fight with the insurance people, and now he camped out in the living room every day, his paperwork spread over the couch. He slept there too, TV blaring into the night. Cally barricaded herself with pillows but could not drown out the noise of the stupid late-night show, or her dad when he yelled at the commercials: “Oh right, sure, whose house looks like that? Assholes.”

Cally was hungry, but to get to the kitchen she’d have to pass her mother’s room. Her mother would be shrouded in bleached blankets, sleeping. A slight form sinking in the center of the bed. Cally’s dad would tell her, “Go on in, just sit with her, spend some time.” But whenever her mother woke, her eyes weren’t right and Cally didn’t want to see them. Her mother’s eyes were once a bright, unclouded hazel—like Cally’s own, but kinder—and this was the memory she wanted.