Only Child(77)

“Did they hound you, too, when you came in?” Mimi asked Daddy.

“It’s ridiculous, the whole damn thing,” Daddy said. “Totally getting blown out of proportion.”

Then Daddy made his voice quiet and said to Mimi, “Has he been out there yet?”

“Not yet,” Mimi said.

“Jeez. OK,” Daddy said.

He came over to me and said, “You know what, Zach? I think maybe it’s best if we skip the diner today, OK?”

I didn’t know why Daddy didn’t want to go get breakfast all of a sudden. I didn’t get to see him this whole week except for at the memory ceremony. Why did he even come to the house if he didn’t want to go with me? I could feel the mad feeling starting out in my belly and tears came in my eyes.

“Here, let me show you something,” Daddy said, and he went to the front window and moved the curtain to the side a little. I saw the news vans that were still parked there in front of our house, and now some people were there, too, one with a camera and one with a microphone. They were standing next to one of the vans and were looking at our house. I recognized the man with the microphone, it was the man that I saw on the news, the one that was talking to Charlie at the cemetery.

Daddy let go of the curtain and turned around to me. “See those guys out there?” he asked. “They’re trying to get us to talk to them and they’re being a little pushy about it. That’s why I thought you should probably stay here today. Do you understand?” Daddy asked.

“OK,” I said, and I thought about how Charlie was blinking his eyes in the light that got pointed at him at the cemetery and how his face looked—old and sad and scared.





[ 45 ]


    Do Something


AFTER DADDY LEFT, I went upstairs, and when I walked down the hallway I heard sounds coming from inside Andy’s room, crying sounds, but they sounded like they were far away or like underwater. I stopped walking and listened to the sounds and I didn’t know what they were. “Uhuu, uhuhuhu,” like ghost sounds, they gave me goose bumps.

Then it was quiet for a while and I went closer to the door of Andy’s room and peeked inside. No one was there. I thought maybe it was just my imagination that I heard the sounds, but right when I was thinking that, they started again. My eyes followed where they were coming from. It was Andy’s top bunk.

I could see the back of Mommy’s head—her hair was spread out all over Andy’s pillow. I tiptoed inside the room and closer to the bed to see what Mommy was doing up there, but I couldn’t really see her, she was up too high, so I climbed up the first couple steps of the ladder very quiet.

Mommy was lying under Andy’s blanket, and her whole self was shaking a lot. She was holding Andy’s pillow with her hands and pressing it against her face. She was making crying sounds inside the pillow—that’s why they sounded far away before. I watched Mommy, how she was lying there crying, and it made a big lump come in my throat.

Then I climbed all the way up the ladder and onto Andy’s bed and I lay down next to Mommy. Mommy let go of the pillow and she looked at me. Her face was red and wet all over, and the insides of her eyes were red, too. I put my hand out and touched her face. It was very hot and sweaty. Her hair was wet and sticking to her face from sweat, or from tears, I didn’t know which.

“Are you OK, Mommy?” I said, and my words came out like a whisper.

A lot of wrinkles came on Mommy’s face. She lifted up Andy’s blanket and I lay down under it next to her. Mommy put her arm around me and pulled me close, and we put our foreheads together.

It was very hot under the blanket because I could feel all the hotness coming off of Mommy’s body. She had her eyes shut tight and was breathing in and out fast. Her breath came right in my face, but I didn’t move away. Tears kept running down Mommy’s face, and she just let them run over her nose and drip into Andy’s pillow.

“Mommy?” I whispered.

“Yes?” Mommy said, but she kept her eyes closed.

“Are you crying because of the news?” I asked. “Because of how Miss Wanda and the other lady were talking about you?”

Mommy opened her eyes and did a little sad smile. “No, sweetie, that doesn’t matter. I’m…I miss your brother so much, you know? I miss him so so much.” She hugged me tighter and we didn’t say anything. I listened to Mommy making quiet crying sounds and I thought about Charlie on the news again.

“Are you still going to be mad about Charlie?” I asked.

Mommy let a breath come long and slow out her nose. “Ugh, Zach,” she said, and her voice didn’t sound mad, just very tired. “I don’t want to be…but it’s his fault that Andy isn’t here with us anymore.”

“But I think he feels really bad about that,” I told Mommy.

“Maybe, “Mommy said.

“He does. I know that. And he feels sad, too, like us.”

“Yeah?” Mommy said. She moved her head back on the pillow a little bit and then our foreheads weren’t touching anymore. “How?”

“He’s my friend. I’m his best buddy. And you’re his friend, too, aren’t you? He did the sack race with you,” I said.

“That was a long, long time ago,” Mommy said.