Drenched in Light (3 page)

Squirming in her chair, Dell cast her gaze toward the door like an animal in a trap. “That was private stuff. It don’t mean-”—pausing, she gave a frustrated jerk of her chin and corrected—“doesn’t mean anything.”

“Sometimes the things we write for ourselves mean the most of all.” I handed the essay across the desk to her. “When we don’t think anybody’s going to read it, we can say what we really mean. We don’t have to be a certain way to make other people happy.”

Taking the paper with a sigh of relief, she folded it into the smallest possible cube and tucked it into her pocket. Clearly, it was headed for the nearest trash can.

“There’s nothing wrong with writing down what you feel, Dell,” I said. “It’s a good idea to get those things out on paper.”

“Yeah, unless you do it in Mrs. Morris’s class.” The observation made me chuckle, and her lips twitched upward.

“True enough. Sometimes it helps to talk about those issues with someone, though.” Her eyes met mine, and I again had the feeling I’d only skimmed the surface of a lake. There were things she didn’t share with anybody, and probably not even with herself. She had a sense of desperation, an obvious need to keep everything tamped down. “I’d like to know about the girl in the river. If you decide to write more of her story, I’d like to read it. . . . We could talk about her—the girl in the river, I mean—maybe understand what she’s feeling a little better. But it’s your choice. Nobody’s going to force you to do anything, all right?”

“ ’Kay,” she answered, blinking at me, first surprised, then doubtful. “Are you gonna call James and Karen?”

“No.” I folded my hands on the desk. “Did you want me to?”

Her expression said that I was nuts. “Huh-uh.” She started to get up, then sat down again, crossed and uncrossed her thin arms. “Are you gonna call anybody?”

“I wasn’t planning to. Do you think I need to call somebody?”

She eyed me narrowly again, trying to figure things out. Like most kids I’d met during my short stint with the foster care system, she was accustomed to being powerless in the world of adults—a pawn, a case study, a number and a file. Turning her head to one side, she watched me from the corner of her eye, trying to discern the catch.
There’s always a catch,
her look said. “If I don’t come back here, are you gonna call somebody?”

“If you don’t come back to my office, you mean?”

“Yeah, if I don’t write more of the story, are you gonna call somebody?”

“No.”

“If I write some more, are you gonna tell people what it says?”

“No, Dell. As long as no one is in imminent danger, what’s said in this office is between you and me. If we both decide, at some point, that there’s someone else we need to talk to—say, a teacher you’re having trouble with, or another student, or your foster parents—we’ll do that together. You and I together, all right?”

Considering it momentarily, she said, “All right,” then stood up, walked to the door, and hovered there with her fingers on the handle. “Can I go now?”

I checked my watch. “Yes, you may. You should be just in time to catch your ride home.”

“My foster mom picks me up.” She brightened with an affection that was obvious. Clearly, she looked forward to being out of school for the day and back with her foster family. “She runs the Jumpkids after-school arts program, so I have to help her with the little kids. We go to a different elementary school every day of the week.” Suddenly there was no sign of the girl who had been sulking about Mrs. Morris’s English class. This kid, the after-school arts helper, didn’t seem anything like the girl in the river.

“I’ve heard of Jumpkids,” I commented. “Sometime, I’d like to see how it works.”

Her mouth lifted into a wide smile that was dazzling in its contrast to her former gloom. “That’d be cool.” Then she bit her lip, losing the enthusiasm, worried, no doubt, because I’d learned things she didn’t want her foster parents to know.

“What’s said in this office stays in this office.”

Her posture relaxed. “ ’Kay.” Opening the door, she let in the sounds of the hallway—lockers slamming, kids talking, clothes rustling, shoes squealing on the old wooden floors. “Thanks,” she muttered, then disappeared into the fray, leaving the door ajar.

Watching her go, I took out her confidential file and started reading it. There was an unusual amount of information—as if quite a few people were invested in the fate of this one girl. Looking at her application forms, I could see why. She was musically talented to a degree that caused even the stodgy curmudgeons on the admissions committee to use words like “gifted” and “prodigy.”

Only one committee member expressed any reservations.

The door squeaked, and I looked up to find Mrs. Morris entering my office. Out of habit, I covered the papers on my desk, then reminded myself that I wasn’t a kid writing contraband notes in her English class anymore. “Yes, Mrs. Morris?” I felt fourteen again, despite my determination not to. Something about my former English teacher’s withering glare was ingrained in my psyche, like one of those horror movies you never forget. “May I help you?”

“The essay.” She fanned her fingers back and forth against her palm, as if she were confiscating chewing gum from a student. The disgusting thing was that my heart jumped into my throat. Her nasal voice scratched up and down my spine like one of her thick, yellow fingernails, leaving an itchy trail of chalk dust.

“I returned it to Dell.” The comment sounded amazingly calm and self-assured, considering that I was confronting my worst teenage nightmare.

Mrs. Morris’s face went pale, then flushed red again, her eyes widening and her mouth squeezing into a thin downward line. “You did
what
?”

“I returned her essay to her,” I repeated, struggling to appear pleasant. I was rapidly moving from intimidated to angry and insulted. “We talked about it, and she assured me that she never intended to hand in that essay, and she would write another one for you.”

Ramming her fists onto her coat-hanger hip bones, Mrs. Morris flared her nostrils. “How dare you!” she screeched, and three kids passing in the hallway stopped to look. “I intended for you to . . .”

Motioning for the teenage audience to move on, I waited until the coast was clear before standing up. Even at five foot six, I towered over my former nemesis. “Mrs. Morris,” I came around the desk to assert my territory. “I am the counselor here. You brought the matter to me, and I took care of it as I thought best.”

Incensed, she sucked in air through a tight, lipless “O,” flailing a hand toward the hallway. “That girl is
disturbed,
suicidal, on top of her
obvious
academic problems. She doesn’t
belong
here.” Her voice echoed through the open door, and I tried not to imagine who might be listening outside.

“Fortunately, Mrs. Morris”—my composure flew out the window, and I clenched the desktop behind me to keep from saying something I would later regret—“neither you nor I choose who belongs here. I will, however, do my level best to help the children who
are
here, and I hope you will, too.”

Lowering her chin, she delivered a disdainful glare over the top of her reading glasses. “We can best help Harrington kids by removing those”—she blinked in a pointed way that let me know we were now talking about me, not about Dell—“who don’t have
what it takes
to live up to this school’s
standard
of
excellence.
Our mission is to produce artists here, Ms. Costell, not middle school
guidance
counselors.”

I was momentarily stunned, at a loss as to how to respond. My nemesis looked pleased. She’d tapped into an old wound, and she knew it. Something inside me twisted and ached, and tears prickled in the back of my nose. Swallowing hard, I dug my fingernails into the desk and answered in the flattest tone I could muster, “Fortunately, Mrs. Morris, the world needs both.”

Hissing through her teeth, she spun around. “Not from this school, it doesn’t.” With a furious yank on the front of her sweater, she disappeared through the door.

I kicked it shut, listening as her squeaky grandma shoes stalked around the corner toward the principal’s office. Now there would be trouble. The evil queen of English was on a roll, and I was standing in the road.

Sinking into a chair by the wall, I let my head fall into my hand, the argument replaying in my mind.

Who was I trying to fool?

Oh, yes, the lifelong quest of professional ballet means nothing to me. I’m happy to have become a guidance counselor, serving up the next generation of Harrington hopes and dreams. . . .

What a crock.

M
y cell phone rang just as I was putting away files and preparing to leave the office. It was my father, of course. His daily four-forty-five p.m. call.

“Just called to check on you, Julia. See if you’d be home soon.” His voice sent me rocketing back to adolescence, and I pictured the stern-faced father of my childhood, sitting at his desk in his business suit, white shirt, conservative tie, brown hair cut short and neatly combed with a dash of greasy kid stuff. My stomach sank like a stone thrown into the ocean, then swayed back and forth on invisible currents of emotion.

“Sure, Dad. I was just packing up.” There’s something inherently pathetic about moving back in with your parents at twenty-seven years old. Even more so when they seem happy about it. All those years of struggling to break free and form my own identity, down the drain.

There was a pregnant pause on the other end of the line. “Good . . . Well, listen, Mom and I have a charity event tonight with Bethany and Jason. We’re going to meet Jason’s parents at this thing, so there’s not much chance of slipping out early. Probably be gone the whole evening.”

“Sounds like fun, Dad.” This, at least, was progress. “You two need to get out more. You haven’t been anywhere since”—
since I got out of the hospital and moved home—
“well, for a long time, anyway.” Guilt needled me for a dozen different reasons, not the least of which was that, for the last three months, my parents had surrendered their active social schedule to stay home and babysit me. “It’s good timing,” I added, to reassure him that I could be left home alone and the world would not come to an end. “I have a lot of work to do tonight.” Reaching into the file cabinet, I pulled out a federal grant application booklet and Dell Jordan’s file.

“But you are coming home?” Trepidation rose in his voice. “Mom and I were hoping you’d sit with Joujou. You know, her bladder isn’t good. She wets all over when she’s left by herself.”

Great. Just me and Mom’s neurotic Pekingese, spending Thursday night together in front of Dad’s new plasma TV.
“Yes, Dad. I’m on my way home.”

“Good. Great.” The words conveyed obvious relief. “Just a minute, sugar.” He paused while someone came into his office and asked a question about an upcoming Microsoft stock split. “So, you get some rest this evening,” he said finally. “Mom made dinner for you there at the house. Chicken Florentine, I think.”

Food. Of course, it always came down to food, and whether I was eating it, and how much I was eating, and when. “Dad.” The word ended in a sigh. “She didn’t have to—”

“It’s Joujou’s favorite,” he defended, clearly realizing that we’d slipped into the tenuous territory of my required daily intake.

Well, as long as she made it for the dog, OK.
“Tell Mom thanks,” I said meekly. How could I blame them for hovering? After finding your daughter passed out in a pool of blood, it’s probably hard to let go. “Joujou will enjoy the chicken Florentine, I’m sure.”