The Music of What Happens(80)

“We should like take a vacation. Take off without the truck for a few days. We’ve earned it. Ever been to Rocky Point?”

He snorts. “That’s white people Mexico.”

“All I know is they have good shrimp there. Fresh right out of the ocean. Back when my mom was normal and my dad was breathing, he used to take us down there some weekends. All I remember is shrimp and tomato juice out of the can. That’s weird, right?”

Max rubs the middle of my back with his palms. “I still remember the first time I tried cream cheese. It was this time my dad and mom took me to Yuma, and we went to a bagel place, and Dad ordered me an everything bagel with cream cheese. I thought it was the best thing ever, and I thought it was only in Yuma.”

“That’s funny how we remember foods more than anything else.”

He squeezes my sides. “That’s why I love this. I mean, I love this for a lot of reasons, and I kinda saved your life and all.” I poke him in the ribs and he grins. “But I love that we make memories. Someone we’ve served in the last few weeks will remember what we made for them for the rest of their life. And we don’t know who or what, but I like knowing that.”

I think about how true it is, and how, before Max, I never gave two shits about strangers. Other people were kinda just there for me and Pam and Kayla to make fun of. Now I see people more. More clearly. Not all the time, maybe. But I’m gonna try. To remember that they’re basically like me, and I’m basically like them, and yeah. In a way I think Max taught me that.

“Me too,” I say. “I like how —”

“Is Lydia Edwards here?” asks a man in a green T-shirt, holding a clipboard. He’s standing at the order window. His shirt reads Tylers Towing. No apostrophe. Genius.

“No,” I say. “That’s my mom.”

“I gotta take the truck,” he says.

I laugh. “Um, no you don’t,” I say.

“But I do. There’s a title loan out on it and no one’s paid and we can’t reach her. It’s not yours anymore. Sorry.”

He walks over to the passenger side and attempts to board, and I lunge over and hold the handle so he can’t. “Wait. What?”

“I just told you. Not your truck no more. Tell you what. I’ll give you five minutes to grab your stuff and get out.”

“We’re not giving you anything until you show us proof,” Max says, and I nod my head, so glad he’s here with me.

The man shrugs, walks back over to the window, and hands the paper through to me.

I read it. Max looks over my shoulder and reads it too.

The amount listed is $27,500. My mom’s signature is at the bottom. The date is May twenty-seventh. Which would be the day after Max and I took over the truck. My stomach drops into my groin, and without even thinking, I crumple the piece of paper up and throw it at the guy.

He shrugs. “We have copies, so, yeah. Throw all you want, kid.”

I look at Max. My throat goes dry. In his eyes I see resignation, which is so not what I want to see. I want him to have the answers. I want him to point out to me that this is obviously a mistake, because it has to be. Why would Mom take a loan out and not tell me, and still make me work the truck and give her money to pay off the mortgage? If she took out a loan, she must have paid it already. Right? Right?

But his eyes look sad, and in them I understand something that is unfathomable to me, and I swallow, look around the truck, and say, “Let’s take the meat and cheese, at least. Can you call an Uber?”

He does.

As we watch Poultry in Motion get towed away, I feel almost nothing. I say nothing. Max reaches down and holds my hand, and he squeezes, but my hand remains limp. Everything feels numb.



We take the Uber back to my place. Mom is on the couch, eating Sweetos and watching an old cartoon. Tom and Jerry, I think. Tom is trying to bop Jerry over the head with a sledgehammer.

She doesn’t turn when I come in. She doesn’t stop chewing. She just yells, “Hey!”

I walk over and sit on the arm of the couch near her head.

“Mom,” I say softly.

The way I say it seems to impact her, kind of. Like she pretends to keep eating but she slows her pace, and I can tell I have her attention.

I repeat it. “Mom.”

“Jordan,” she says, a little edge in her voice.

“You took out a loan on the truck,” I say.

I see her throat constrict. She doesn’t answer. Her eyes stay on the television.

“You did, didn’t you?”

She closes her eyes and pauses the TV. “It’s complicated, Jordan.”

“Mom,” I say. “Mom. What did you do? What’s happening?”

She turns off the TV, but she doesn’t sit up. She just stays staring at the set even though it’s off. “It’s bad,” she says. “It’s really, really, really bad.”

“Mom,” I whisper. “Tell me what’s up. Tell me what you did.”

She closes her eyes. “It’s worse than you think,” she says.



I sit, motionless, as she explains. I know Max is behind me, and I’m half-glad he’s there, and half wish he weren’t because someone else hearing it makes it more true, and I don’t want it to be true.