The People We Keep(14)

I peek in the window, but it’s not Mrs. Ivory. It’s Irene, sitting in the driver’s seat with her seat belt off, clutching a plastic baggie of what looks like dirt. “I thought you were Mrs. Ivory,” I say, backing away.

Irene opens the door. “I was just giving her a ride.”

Irene has come to claim her ring. My dad must have told her he was going to propose and now she’s here and she’s pissed. I want to turn tail and run, but I don’t even have real shoes on. Irene’s not like a marathon runner or anything, but I’m sure she could catch up with a kid running in flip-flops. I start toward the motorhome to barricade myself inside. But then Irene gets out of the car and spills the baggie of dirt on the ground.

“Shit,” she says.

I’ve never heard her curse. She looks like she might cry. I hadn’t noticed it before, but Irene kind of looks like my mom. At least like the one picture I have of my mom. That’s probably what my dad sees in Irene. I think about telling her this, but I don’t want to deal with her crying in my driveway. I’m not in the mood.

“It’s okay to spill dirt in the dirt,” I say, crossing my arms over my chest. “It’s not like it can get any dirtier than dirt.” I wish I could make myself shut up, but the words keep tumbling. “I mean, it’s already dirt, right? There’s nothing—”

“It was coffee,” she says, walking up to the motorhome like the fact that I’m talking to her means she’s invited. “Your dad said you ran out.”

I walk in front of her and up the steps. I don’t slam the door in her face, but I figure if I don’t talk to her she’ll realize she’s not wanted.

“Could we make some tea?” Irene says, climbing in with her head down low, like she’s not sure the ceiling will accommodate her five-foot-two frame. “I was hoping we could sit down and have a talk.” She looks around, lingering on the dirty laundry piled on the passenger’s seat, my muddy boots on the floor, the pile of guitar pieces on the table, and I can feel her judging all of it. “Because you and me”—she eyes me like I’m dirty boots—“we’ve never really had a talk, you know?”

I hate the way she says “a talk.” Like it’s a cookie or a pet or a new pair of shoes, something more than words falling out of our mouths.

I sit at the table and pull my feet up on the seat, flip-flops and all. In Irene’s apartment, you have to take your shoes off before you get past the welcome mat.

“You and me,” Irene says, “we haven’t exactly gotten off to the best start.”

I picture the words coming out of her mouth like hard pieces of plastic. Like those magnets kids have sometimes so they can spell words on the fridge. Cat. Mom. Dog. Dad. I picture Irene’s words collected in a basket that she hands to me. There’s our talk, right there. All jumbled up until it makes no sense.

She pokes around, peeks in cupboards until she finds the teapot. I watch her when her back is turned. Her waist is really tiny, but her black dress pants sag at the butt and don’t do her any favors. She’d look better in a skirt.

When she glances back at me, I stare at my feet. Margo painted my toenails over the summer and there’s a sliver of pink left at the tips.

“Do you think you could say something?” Irene asks. “I mean, this is hard, April.” Her eyeliner is melty, pooled in the corners of her eyes. She doesn’t usually wear this much makeup. Her sweater looks new. I wonder if she came from something, or if she got all dressed up just to see me. “I’m talking to you and you’re acting like I’m not even here.”

I want to say Wishful thinking, but her hands are shaking and it’s making me nervous. I’m not sure what her angle is—why she hasn’t asked about the ring yet. “Use the water in the jug.” I say, holding my leg up just above the bench, using my toes to make my flip-flop flop against my foot. “The stuff from the tap looks like piss.”

“Okay.” She lifts the lid off the teapot, looks in the hole, and sniffs. She pours a tiny bit of water from the jug into the pot, swishes it around, and dumps it in the sink. Satisfied, she fills the pot and plays with the burner until she gets it to light. I don’t tell her there’s no tea. I’ll save that for after the whistle blows.

She looks at me, but when I make eye contact, she pulls a strand of hair in front of her eyes to check for split ends. When I look away, I can feel her watching me again.

“Your dad didn’t mean it,” she says, sitting across from me, pointing to the pile of splinters that used to be my guitar.

I collected all the pieces after he left. Every bit I could find. I mean, it’s not like I could glue them back into a guitar and have it work. I know that. I know. I just didn’t have the heart to throw them away.

“He doesn’t mean a lot of things, but that doesn’t put anything back together,” I blurt out before I remember that I’m trying not to talk to her.

Irene doesn’t say anything. She just stares at me like she’s measuring up everything about me to see if it’s good enough to even get close to her perfect self and her perfect son and her perfect church-going life. I was bored before, so I braided my hair into like eight or nine braids and I probably look like an idiot. Plus, I’m wearing my dad’s old plaid flannel, cinched at the waist with one of his cracked leather belts, and a pair of leopard-spotted leggings Margo gave me after she shrunk them in the wash. I wish I could excuse myself and change into something that doesn’t make me feel like a freak show, but I don’t want Irene to get it wrong and think I even care what she thinks.