Out of the Blue (4 page)

TUESDAY MORNING BEFORE
school Megan phoned Erin to book her for recess. Erin wasn't sure. “I wanted to play volleyball.”

“Forget volleyball. I need to talk to you.”

“What's happening?”

“Tutankhamen's tomb.” Tutankhamen's tomb was a code reserved for serious occasions. It meant, “Can't talk now. Parents might be listening.”

“Okay, see you later.”

Erin was so amazed by Megan's news that she stopped eating her cookie in midchew. Erin never forgot about food. “Wow. You're so lucky.”

Lucky? “I don't see what's lucky about it.”

“Getting to have an older sister. You know Tyler in Mrs. Frame's class? He has this older sister, from when his dad was married once before, and she lives in California and he got to go there for the whole of spring break.”

“That's completely different. He's known about her for his whole life, right? Not like some surprise. This Natalie could be a space alien, for all I know.”

“So when do you get to meet her?”

“She's coming for dinner a week from Sunday, and Mum spent the whole weekend talking about it. Like the queen is coming or something.”

“Aren't you just dying to see what she looks like?”

“No, not really. Why would I be?”

“To see if she looks like
you
, space case.”

“I hadn't thought of it. She's not going to look like me. She's old. After all, she's about to get married.”

“Will you get to go to the wedding?”

“Mum said we were invited.”

“Oh! Weddings are so great.”

“Have you been to one?”

“Yeah, my uncle Dave's. The summer after fourth grade. We drove to Saskatchewan. It was the best time. We stayed in this big motel and all the adults got really silly. On the day of the wedding we were walking up the street toward the church, and Mum was walking with Uncle Barry, and we passed this lawn sprinkler. And Uncle Barry said, ‘I dare you to run through the sprinkler,' and Mum just gave him this look and put her purse down on the sidewalk and ran right through it. I couldn't believe it. She sat all through the wedding with water polka dots all over her. Uncle Barry told me that when they were kids they had to be careful what they dared Mum to do because she would
always
do it.

“And after the wedding in the church there was this big party and Uncle Dave polkaed me so fast he lifted me right off the floor. Even after Uncle Dave and Monique left, in their honeymoon clothes, people kept eating and drinking and dancing. Everyone forgot about us. Nobody made us go to bed. Some little kids just fell asleep under the tables. I'd love to go to another wedding.”

“You can go to this wedding disguised as me. I don't want to go.”

“You're crazy. Weddings have great food.”

“Can we talk about something else?”

“Okay. What's Natalie going to call your mum — ‘Mum'?”

“No way! She already has a mother. You can't just go calling somebody ‘Mum.' Besides, didn't I just say could we talk about something else?”

“I thought you meant something else other than weddings. I didn't know you meant something else other than the whole subject. Anyway, don't get mad.
You're
the one who Tutankhamened
me
, remember?”

Erin was right. Why get mad? It was just that . . . All she knew was that she didn't want congratulations. “You're right. I'm sorry. Hey, I almost forgot to tell you. I get to have my ears pierced. Want to come?”

“Sure.”

Megan pulled out her apple. “Are you mad?”

“No. I just don't get it.” Erin noticed the forgotten cookie in her hand and took a big bite.

That was it. That was the problem. Erin didn't get it. Betsy didn't get it. Mum didn't get it. Nobody got it. She hardly got it herself.

After Erin's reaction Megan didn't feel like telling anyone else the news. Not that she needed to. Mum was doing a good job spreading the word. She was always on the phone, talking about Natalie. She said the same things over and over. She might as well have put it on the answering machine.

“Yes, a great surprise but such a happy one.”

“Studying for a PhD in astronomy at the university — sure didn't get those brains from me.”

“No, it is like we've known each other for years, right from the first moment.”

It was better to be out of the house. Saturday morning Megan woke up to the sound of Mum already on the phone. She could tell by Mum's voice that this time it was to Natalie, not about her. That was the worst. During these conversations Mum's face sort of melted and her voice went all soft and mushy. She laughed a lot, as though Natalie was some sort of comedy star. But when she repeated her remarks later, and she always did repeat them later, it was just ordinary boring stuff. When she hung up she would sit and sigh. It was revolting.

Megan nearly turned over and went back to sleep when she remembered Art Experience. Today was the first day of the latest class that Mum and Aunt Marie had cooked up for her and John. Well, mostly Aunt Marie. Mum and Dad weren't that big on classes and lessons. But Aunt Marie wanted John to widen his horizons, explore new areas and be well-rounded. Aunt Marie wanted John to be exposed to the many facets of our rich world. That's the way Aunt Marie talked. Trouble was, John refused to go to anything by himself. So Megan usually got roped in.

She didn't really mind expanding her horizons. Some of the classes had been good, like group guitar and Slugs and Bugs. And if Art Experience would get her out of the house for the morning, she was grateful.

She met John in the lobby of the art school. They were early. There was a whiteboard sign with all the classes listed. John found their listing: “Art Experience, Rm. 210, J. Evans.”

“I wonder what J. Evans is like?”

“Probably wears a beret,” said Megan, “and a big beard.”

“And a long shirt not tucked in,” said John.

“As long as he's not like Mr. Daynard.”

“Aagh,” said John strangling. “Remember ‘Deeper! Richer! Wider'!”

“He was a nut,” said Megan. Mr. Daynard had taught Creative Drama, and he always wanted them to be deeper, richer, and wider when they were just trying to remember their lines.

John looked at his watch. “I think we can go now.”

J. Evans turned out to be a she, with plain brown hair and a regular dress. She looked like somebody's mother. She told them they should just wander around and look at things for a few minutes. The room was like a treasure house. There was so much of everything — rolls of paper and big tins of paint, jars of colored pencils, blocks of clay, rolls of wire, big brushes. Megan took a deep whiff of the dusty smell of paper and the sharp smell of paint.

The project for the day was to create an imaginary garden, with flowers and animals and insects that you just made up. Megan started with a pencil and drew a huge flower with every petal different. Then she switched to pencil crayons. They were the good kind that spread their colors like butter. As she concentrated on filling the shapes with scarlet lake and burnt umber, her fingers remembered the pleasure of coloring in the pictures of her second grade workbook. She wasn't like Betsy. She liked staying inside the lines.

The rhythm and concentration of coloring made Megan feel as though she were living inside her space-alien flower and as though everything else had disappeared. She was startled when J. Evans came around to collect the pictures.

“Look at this wonderful variety of styles.” J. Evans tacked the pictures to the corkboard. Two girls called Anna and Su-Lin had worked in pastels and their gardens were beautiful. They were obviously going to be the stars of Art Experience.

John had concentrated on a pencil drawing of one insect. He had erased so many times that his paper had holes in it.

“Tell us about this,” said J. Evans.

“It's a Venus peopletrap,” said John. “It traps people and then digests them with its special human-dissolving saliva.”

Anna and Su-Lin broke into “eeeeoooo” noises and “Oh, gross.” But J. Evans just smiled. “I like the way you've made the mechanics very clear.”

Then, oddly enough, it was Megan's picture that J. Evans decided to concentrate on. “See how Megan has outlined all her shapes, like a coloring book?”

Megan started to get nervous. She knew you weren't supposed to like coloring books, in case they stifled your creativity. But J. Evans didn't seem to care about that. “Many artists have been fascinated with the idea of blocks of contained color.” She pulled out some art books and showed them pictures of paintings like quilts and checkerboards. Megan liked them. They were very tidy.

“Try to imagine this one huge,” said J. Evans, pointing to a picture of a single red square, “as big as that wall.” She turned to the front. “Oh, no, is it noon already? Time is a tyrant. Okay, here's your thought for the week. Lines are just pretend. There aren't any lines in nature, just edges, the edge of one color and the beginning of another. So next week we're going to forget all about line and color and get out the clay. See you then. Remember to look around you.”

It had begun to pour while they were in their class, and John phoned his dad to see if he could come and get them. They waited in the lobby and looked out the window. The blossoms lay soggy in the gutter.

“Okay,” said John, “what's this about a sister?”

Megan's stomach tensed up. For a whole morning she had forgotten about Natalie. “Half sister.”

“Whatever. Mum told me a little bit. When do you get to see her? Is she really an astronomer?”

“She's an astronomer student. And she's coming for dinner a week from tomorrow.”

“Do you think you're going to like her?”

“What's to like? She's a perfect stranger.”

“But she's your sister. Okay, half sister. I mean, aren't you curious? Like, bam! all of a sudden there are three kids in your family.”

“She's not a kid. She's twenty-four.”

“You know what I mean. Are you excited?”

“I don't need to be. Mum and Betsy are excited enough for our house.”

John stood in the doorway and tried to push the frame apart. “This means I have another cousin. She won't be my oldest cousin, though. That's Murray the Mountie from Manitoba.”

“She's only your half cousin.”

“Whatever. Do you know what she drives?

“I don't even know if she has a car. I don't really care.”

John got a thoughtful look on his face. “You know, she's not my half cousin. She's my whole cousin.”

“She is not. She's my half sister, so she's your half cousin.”

“No, look.” John started to draw a diagram on the misty window. Across the top were Marie and Judy and Josh. Three little lines came down from Judy, one from Marie, and none from Josh. “Okay. Now, the reason we're cousins is because your mum and my mum are sisters. It doesn't matter who your dad is, or mine. Therefore, Natalie is just as much a cousin to me as you are.”

Megan reached up with her jacket sleeve and wiped out her family. John was right. Right and totally wrong. Add him to the list of those who didn't get it. Oh good, there was Uncle Howie. “Look, there's your dad. He's stopped in the bus zone. Hurry!” They pulled their jackets up over their heads and ran out into the teeming rain.

MUM EMERGED FROM HER
Natalie daze long enough to remember about Megan's ear piercing. She made an appointment for Thursday after school. All week long Megan obeyed J. Evans's instructions and looked around her, at ears. At first she just surveyed pierced and nonpierced. But then she started noticing the variety of ears. By Wednesday everyone's ears were starting to look extremely strange. It was like saying a word over and over again until it sounds like nonsense. After five days of observation all ears looked like tide pool creatures glued to the sides of people's heads.

Erin was very happy to go with Megan. “Any chance they'll give you a general anesthetic?” she asked hopefully.

“Erin! This is ear piercing, not surgery.”

“I know,” said Erin sadly. “I'll never get to see surgery. It's not fair. If you want to be a librarian, you can join the Future Librarians Club and you get to go downtown and visit behind the scenes at the central library. But if you want to be a doctor, there's no Future Doctors Club and no way to get into an operating room.”

Mum picked Megan and Erin up at school the following Thursday and drove them to the mall. “I really can't come into the beauty shop with you,” she said. “You know me. Will you be okay with Erin?”

“Sure,” said Megan.

“It's good premedical experience,” said Erin.

“Yes,” said Mum. “I remember when you wanted that plastic woman model for your birthday when you were, what was it, six? Have you still got it?”

“The amazing transparent woman? No,” said Erin, “she broke after I operated on her to remove her appendix. I wish you could buy one made with some kind of soft plastic that you could cut into. . . .”

“Enough!” said Mum with a shudder. “We're a bit early. Do you want to have a snack before the deed is done?”

“Yes, please,” said Erin. “They have a great cinnamon bun place in this mall.”

They were licking their buttery, cinnamon-syrupy fingers when a man came up to Mum and said shyly, “Judy Schlegel?”

Mum turned her head to the side. “Ye-es.” Then she grinned. “It can't be. Randy Fuller? Mrs. Ironsides's fifth grade, right?”

Megan rolled her eyes at Erin. Mum had lived in the same neighborhood her whole life and was always meeting people from the olden days. It was boring. Any minute now Mr. Fuller would say, “You haven't changed a bit.” She concentrated on unrolling her last spiral of bun.

“. . . so I just have the one boy and he lives with his mother. Do you have any other children besides Megan?”

“Yes, I have . . .” There was a pause. Then Mum continued, “two other girls. Three wonderful daughters.”

Megan put down her remnant of bun. It was too sweet. The cinnamon smell was thick around her. What did they do, pump cinnamon perfume into the air?

“Here's my card,” said Mr. Fuller. “We should get together sometime. Bring the family over for a barbecue or something.”

“Yes, let's do that. Nice to see you, Randy. You look just the same as in fifth grade.” Mum stood up. “Okay, girls, we'd better go.”

They set off toward the ear-piercing store.

“Are you going to get together with that man again?” asked Megan.

“Probably not,” said Mum, “given how busy everyone is.”

“But you said you would.”

“I know, but that's just a way of ending the conversation.”

“So you were lying.”

“It's not lying, it's . . . well, it's a convention.”

Megan pressed her mouth shut. It was lying. Funny how she had just started to notice how grownups lie all the time. Like, if Mr. Fuller looked like that in Mrs. Ironsides's class, he must have been a pretty strange fifth-grade kid.

Mum left them at the receptionist's desk at La-Beaute Nails and Esthetics, and a young woman in a blue smock took them into the back room. There was a row of chairs and two other customers. One was a woman with a towel turban and a green face. Bright green, all over, except for an oval around her mouth and two eyeholes. She was leaning back and she looked asleep.

The other customer was a woman sitting on a couch with her bare feet propped on cushions. Her toenails were painted bright pink and the toes were spread apart with cotton balls. She was reading a book.

“Loretta will be with you in a minute,” the smock lady said. “You can sit right here.”

Megan looked at Erin, who looked back with a “yikes” look and then leaned over and whispered, “Those feet look like hands.”

Megan glanced over to the couch and saw it immediately. Two long skinny hands with little stubby fingers all spread out like someone saying “Stop!” Giggles bubbled up from the bottom of her stomach. She tried to turn them into coughing. The woman with the toes glared at them over her book. Erin, the brat face, just sat calmly looking into space.

Loretta appeared with a little wheeled table. “Hi, girls. Who's the one for ear piercing?”

Megan pushed the giggles back into her throat. “Me.”

“Great. Do you have your studs? Perfect. Oh, aren't they pretty? Big day, eh? I remember when I first had my ears done.”

Loretta talked on as she dabbed something cold onto Megan's earlobes, and then she took a towel off the table and under it was a gun. “. . . so we just fit these studs right in here. . . .”

Megan's giggles evaporated. The gun looked so serious and it felt heavy as Loretta fitted it around Megan's ear. “Ready to go?”

Megan glanced at Erin, who was staring hard. “Okay.”

There was a loud crack and a red-hot arrow shot through Megan's ear. It seemed to carry on right into the back of her throat. She grabbed the sides of her chair and screwed her eyes shut against the tears. Why had nobody told her how much this hurt?

“Oh, dear,” said Loretta, “you're as white as a sheet. Was it bad?”

Megan nodded her head, once.

Loretta dabbed Megan's ear with something that stung. “For most people it's just not that painful, but for some it is. Sorry, sweetie. Do you want to go ahead with the second ear or not? You don't have to.”

Megan knew that if she thought about it she would say no, so she quickly nodded. “Yes.”

“Just remember to keep breathing.”

The cold liquid on her second ear gave Megan goose bumps, like the gentle brush of a wasp's wings before it stings. And then another crack. She didn't remember to keep breathing.

“There we go,” said Loretta. “Now you've got holes in your head. Ha-ha, just a little ear-piercing joke.”

Megan glanced at the used cotton balls sitting on the table, each with its little smear of blood. Her fingers felt hollow. What was inside there, inside her earlobe? Little baggies of blood? Erin would know. Megan didn't think she would ask. It was better for the inside stuff to just stay inside, and for her not to think about it. She stared at the line of her arm against the chair and tried not to cry. Of course, it wasn't a line at all. Just an edge, the edge between Megan and not-Megan. Inside, outside, and edge. And unless you were the amazing transparent woman, all people saw of you was the edge.

“... turn them three times twice a day, and if you're careful, you shouldn't have any problems.” Loretta reached over and patted Megan's arm. “Feeling better now?”

Megan nodded. She hadn't heard one word of Loretta's instructions. What if she did something wrong and her ears got infected and fell off? She reached up to touch them, earlobes and earrings, hot and cold, Megan and not-Megan. It was okay. No doubt Erin had listened to the whole thing and would be able to offer paramedical advice. Megan stood up and thanked the outside edge of Loretta. The pain had dulled to a throb. Green Face and Glamour Feet sat unmoving. Time to go and exhibit her ears to the outside edge of Mum.