Life as We Knew It (21 page)

I finally got out around 11 and went downstairs to get something to eat. It was 23 degrees outside, but there was no heat on in the house and the woodstove wasn't going. I heated a can of soup and ate that. Then I went back to bed.

That afternoon I heard Mom go up to her bedroom. She's been taking naps lately, which is something she never did. You'd think she'd be teaching Jonny or something, but I don't think she cares about his schoolwork any more than she cares about mine. Not that I blame her.

So I'm in bed, wearing my flannel pajamas and my robe and two pairs of socks and there are three blankets and a quilt over me, and I'm trying to decide which is worse, being cold or being hungry. Part of me says the worst thing is being bored and if I did some schoolwork I'd be distracted, but I tell that part of me to shut up.

I got out of bed and something made me go to the pantry. I've been choosing not to see how our supplies are holding out, because I don't want to know. I want to believe everything is just going to work out and food will magically appear. In some ways it already has, and I want to think it always will.

Mom's let us know she'd prefer us not to go to the pantry. Whatever food is available for us to eat, she leaves in the kitchen cabinets. I guess she doesn't want us to worry.

Matt and Jonny were outside, working on our wood supply. I told myself I should join them, I should go out to gather more kindling, but the truth is even the woods scare me these days.

The pantry actually kind of reassured me. It looked to me like there were lots of cans of food and boxes of pasta and rice. Horton's supplies were in one corner, and there seemed to be plenty of canned and boxed food for him and bags of kitty litter. Mom's a stockpiler under the best of circumstances, so the pantry is always pretty full. She probably had a near-full pantry back in May.

Seeing all those cans and boxes and bags of food made me mad, like why are we starving ourselves when we still have food? When the food runs out, we'll probably die, so what difference does it make if that's November or January or March? Why not eat while we can?

That's when I saw the bag of chocolate chips. I'd forgotten all about them, how I'd thrown them into my shopping cart on Crazy Shopping Day.

I went a little crazy. There was food in the pantry that Mom wasn't letting us eat and there was chocolate, real chocolate, in the house and Mom was hoarding it because it has no nutritional value and if we're only eating a little bit every day, we're better off with spinach.

And they were MY damn chocolate chips.

I ripped open the bag and I poured chocolate chips down my throat. I could hardly taste them, I was swallowing them so fast. I must have devoured a third of the bag before I could calm down enough to savor the taste. Chocolate. It tasted just the way I'd remembered only better. I couldn't stop eating them. I knew I was making myself sick. My stomach was already protesting but I kept flinging chocolate chips into my mouth. I didn't want to share the chocolate with anybody. It was mine.

"Miranda!"

It's funny. Somehow I knew I'd get caught. Maybe because I was prepared, I made the moment as dramatic as possible. I swallowed another mouthful of chips and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. I must have seen that in a movie somewhere.

It worked. Mom started screaming. I'm not even sure she was coherent.

I was, though. I screamed right back at her. She was hoarding food. We didn't have to starve. Why wasn't she letting us eat three meals a day? What difference did any of it make? I still had the bag of chocolate chips in my hand, and I made some kind of wild gesture because the chips went flying all over the pantry floor.

Mom froze. That was a lot scarier than her hysterics.

I froze too for a moment. Then I started picking the chocolate chips off the floor. I got a handful of them and didn't know whether I should put them back in the bag. I stood there like an idiot waiting for Mom to become human again.

"Eat them," she said.

"What?"

"Eat them. You wanted them. Eat them. Pick them up and eat them. They're yours. Eat them all. I don't want to see a single chocolate chip on the floor."

I bent down and started picking up all the chocolate chips from the floor. As I gathered them, I put them in my mouth. Whenever I missed one, Mom pointed it out to me. She actually kicked a couple of them toward me and told me to eat them.

I really felt sick by then.

Finally I got all the chocolate chips off the floor. There was still about a quarter of a bag left.

"Eat them," Mom said.

"Mom, I don't think I can," I said.

"Eat them," she said.

I thought I'd throw up. But Mom terrified me. I don't know why. She wasn't even yelling at that point. It was like talking to an icicle. She stood there absolutely still and watched me eat each and every last chocolate chip. I thought, This isn't my mom. This is some strange creature that's taken over her body.

Then I thought it would serve her right if I threw up all over her, but I managed not to.

"Give me the bag," she said when I'd finally gotten the last chocolate chip down.

I did as she told me.

"Fine," she said. "That was your food for today and tomorrow. You can join us for supper on Thursday."

"Mom!" I yelled. "It was just some chocolate chips."

"I was saving them for Matt's birthday," she said. "I'm not going to tell him why he isn't getting any dessert on his birthday. I don't expect you to tell him, either. But you've eaten enough for four people, so you're going to skip your next four meals. Maybe then you'll understand how important food really is."

"I'm sorry," I said. I hadn't been thinking about Matt. His birthday is in a couple of weeks, but what are birthdays nowadays? "Can't you make him something else for his birthday?"

"What you did was wrong," Mom said. She sounded more Momlike by then, or at least the Mom I've gotten to know over the past few months. "I can't have you or your brothers walking in here and eating whatever you feel like. This food has to last all of us for as long a time as possible. Why can't you understand that?

What if you stroll in here and help yourself to a can of peaches? Or string beans? I know you're hungry. I'm hungry, too. But the only chance we have is if we're very, very careful. Maybe things will get better in a couple of months. Maybe it'll take longer. If we don't look toward the future, we have nothing to live for and I won't have that."

"I'm sorry," I said. "I'll never do it again. I promise."

Mom nodded. "I know you're not a bad girl, Miranda," she said. "I know it was just thoughtlessness on your part. And punishing you doesn't make me feel any better. But I meant it about the meals. You can eat again Thursday night. It won't kill you to go without food that long. You have enough calories in you right now to last for a week. Now just go to your room. I really don't want to deal with you anymore."

My stomach aches like it used to when I'd pig out on Halloween candy. Only worse, because then I'd have a full stomach. And I wouldn't hate myself so much.

I hurt Mom. Without even knowing it, I hurt Matt. Jonny, too, since he would have loved a dessert. Mrs.

Nesbitt. Maybe even Peter.

I'm a selfish, selfish pig. I don't deserve to live.

September 7

Jonny came into my room this morning.

"Mom said you ate something from the pantry yesterday," he told me. "And you're not allowed to eat again until tomorrow night. And if she ever finds out that Matt or I did that we'll get the exact same punishment."

For some reason that made me feel better. I get it into my head sometimes that Mom loves me less than Matt or Jonny.

"That's pretty much what happened," I said.

Jonny looked kind of excited. "What did you eat?" he asked. "A can of string beans," I said.

"Is that all?" he asked. "You can't eat today because of a can of string beans?"

I told him to get the hell out of my room and stay out. And that was the only conversation I had all day.

September 8

Mom fried two potatoes from the garden. She also heated up a can of string beans. For dessert we had a can of fruit salad. The prodigal son would have been jealous.

September 12

Monday.

I should be doing schoolwork.

September 14

Matt's birthday. He's 19.

For supper we had artichoke hearts, almost like a salad, and then linguini with white clam sauce. Mrs.

Nesbitt brought her home-baked oatmeal raisin cookies, which Matt likes but not nearly as much as he likes chocolate. Thinking about that made me feel sick all over again. I ate one cookie (I knew Mom would be furious if I didn't), but it tasted like dust.

Megan's right about my being a sinner. But she's wrong about hell. You don't have to wait until you're dead to get there.

September 16

Matt went to the post office today and brought home two letters from Dad.

The first was from a day or two after he left. It said how wonderful it was to see all of us and how he was so proud of us and he knew we'd be okay and we'd see each other again soon.

The second letter was dated August 16. He and Lisa had made it to the Kansas border, but Kansas wasn't letting anyone in unless they could prove they had parents or children who owned property there. Which of course he and Lisa don't. The border guards didn't care that all they wanted to do was drive through Kansas to get to Colorado. He said that they had some options. There were rumors of officials who could be persuaded to look the other way.

"What does that mean?" Jonny asked.

"Bribed," Matt explained. "Give them what they want and they let you in."

The problem with that was first you had to find the official, Dad went on, and then you had to have something he wanted. In addition, there were restrictions against letting pregnant women in, and Lisa's pregnancy was showing.

They could try to get in by a back road, but there were reports of vigilantes keeping strangers out.

They could drive down to Oklahoma and get to Colorado that way. They didn't have enough gas, and rumors were things were as bad or worse in Oklahoma, but they were still thinking about it. Lisa was determined to get to her parents.

The temperature was about 40 and he and Lisa were staying at a refugee camp. No heat, no food, limited plumbing. They were only allowed one more day there and then they had to get back on the road. If they had to, they could go back to Missouri. Because of the earthquakes there, the state was pretty much unpoliced.

That was pretty much how the letter ended and it scared all of us. Dad never wants us to worry. Three years ago when he lost his job, he made it sound like it was his life's dream to be out of work. Life is full of unexpected opportunities. When a window closes a door opens.

And of course for him the door did open. He got the job in Springfield, met Lisa, and the next thing we all knew he was married with a baby on the way.

Only now Dad wasn't talking about windows and doors and unexpected opportunities.

It was the first report we've had in a long time about what's going on outside of Pennsylvania. Travel restrictions. Vigilantes. Refugee camps. And that's in the part of the country where things are supposed to be better.

"I'm sure we'll get another letter from him soon," Mom said. "Saying he and Lisa have made it to her parents and that everything is all right."

We all knew she was saying that because she had to.

If we never hear from Dad again, we'll never know what became of him. It's possible he and Lisa will make it to Colorado, and things there aren't horrible, and they'll be okay and the baby will be okay and we'll never know.

At least that's what I'm telling myself. Because I don't want to tell myself anything else.

September 17

I went out to get kindling (I've been such a baby afraid of the big bad forest) and when I came back, I found Mom sobbing at the kitchen table.

I dropped the bags of kindling and went over and hugged her. Then I asked what had happened.

"Nothing," she said. "I was thinking about that man. The one the day we bought the groceries, with the baby on the way. The baby should be born by now, and I started thinking about if it is okay, if he and his wife and their other child are okay, and I don't know. It just got to me."

"I know," I said, because I did know. Sometimes it's safer to cry about people you don't know than to think about people you really love.

Chapter Thirteen

September 18

Matt and Jonny were at Mrs. Nesbitt's this morning getting her house ready for winter (she refuses to move in with us) when I came in for brunch. I'd just taken out the can of peas and carrots when I heard a thud and Mom cry out.

I ran to the living room and there was Mom sprawled out on the floor.

"I tripped," she said. "I am such an idiot. I tripped."

"Are you okay?" I asked.

She shook her head. "My ankle," she said. "I don't think I can stand on it."

"Stay where you are," I said, like she had a choice. "I'll get Peter."

I ran to the garage and got my bike. I've never hiked as fast as I did to the hospital.

But when I got there, they wouldn't let me in, even when I explained there'd been an accident and we were friends with Peter. All the guard would do was take my message.

I stood outside waiting. The house is so cold we all wear extra layers and jackets, but I'd been in such a hurry I hadn't thought to put on my winter coat or gloves or a scarf I'd worked up a sweat biking so fast and that didn't help any.

The guard didn't seem to be in any hurry to take my message to Peter. First he made me write it out, and then he read it, and then he demanded I show him some ID. Which, of course, I didn't have on me. I begged him to take the message to Peter. He grinned. I could tell he was used to people begging him for things and he liked it.

I felt the same kind of nauseous sick I'd felt from the chocolate chips.

I stood there begging and crying and wanting to kill him So help me, if I could have gotten my hands on his gun I would have shot him and anybody else who tried to keep me from getting help for Mom. The guard stood there and laughed.