See You at Harry's (11 page)

Charlie pushes Doll into my lap. Her dress is soggy from him sucking on the hem.

“Um. Ew?” I say, pushing her back.

“Doll needs wuv!” Charlie says, shoving her back.

“Then give it to her!” I say. I block her from getting any closer.

“You do it!” Charlie says.

“No!”

“Fern, for God’s sake just humor him,” my mom says from the front seat.

“Make Holden do it!”

“Doll wants Fern!” Charlie whines, but he pushes Doll toward Holden, who finally comes back to earth.

“Ick,” he says. “I don’t want her.”

“Doll’s not icky!” Charlie says. He starts to cry.

“You two are awful,” Sara says. “Humor the kid, Fern. You should be flattered.”

“Fine.” I take the stupid doll from Charlie and put her on my lap.

“Sing!” Charlie says, magically not crying anymore.

I groan and lean my head back in the seat. Luckily, we pull into the driveway before Charlie can start fake-crying again.

Inside, my mom, Sara, and Charlie go straight to the kitchen, so I follow Holden into the living room. He has an instruction booklet open on his knee, and he’s pushing buttons on a cell phone.

“Hey! Where’d you get that?” I ask.

He shrugs. “Gray gave it to me.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah. Now he can text me and stuff. It’s cool.”

“So does this mean he’s like, you know, officially your boyfriend or something?”

“Or something? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I dunno. I mean. Is that what you’d call him?”

Holden sighs. “Well, yeah, I guess so. I mean, I’m kind of new to all this. Gray’s the first guy I’ve met who . . . you know. Is like me.”

“But you’re not just friends.”

“No.” He smiles, as if it just sank in that he has someone special. “Anyway. What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Any hot guys in middle school you’re crushing on?”

I blush. “Right.”

“Fern, you’re cute. You need to realize that.”

I look away. “No, I’m not.”

“Sure you are! But you’re always hiding behind your hair and baggy clothes. It’s like you try to blend in so you’re invisible. Why do you do that?”

I shrug. I never thought that’s what makes me invisible. I never thought the fact that I’m invisible is my fault.

He reaches over and pushes my hair back, then studies my face. “You could be really pretty, Fern. Too bad the only one who knows it is Ran.”

“Ran?”

“I’ve seen him look at you.”

My cheeks get even hotter. Ran?

“He thinks you’re hot,” he says, grinning.

“I’m twelve! I’m not supposed to be hot yet. You’re just saying that to embarrass me.”

“Fern the hottie!” he says, laughing.

“Shut up!” But I’m laughing, too.

Charlie comes dashing out to the living room with Doll tucked under his arm. “Hi!” he says, beaming. Something that I hope is chocolate pudding is all over the corners of his mouth. There’s also a spot on his forehead. My mom must feel pretty bad if she gave him chocolate before dinner, even if it is that gross carob stuff and not the real thing.

“Dude, go wash your face,” Holden says.

Charlie leans forward as if he’s going to wipe his face on Holden’s shirt.

“Hey!” Holden puts his hand on Charlie’s head and pushes him back. “Yuck. Tell Mom you need a bath. Your hair is sticky.”

Holden wipes his hand on his jeans.

“You mean.” Charlie sulks back to the kitchen.

“That kid is disgusting,” Holden says.

“I know.” Everything about Charlie is dismissed as cute. Even his dirtiness. I really wish my mom would take better care of him.

Music comes from Holden’s cell. He smiles at me and opens it. “Guess who?” he says.

I make a face like I can’t imagine.

“He-ey,” he says into the phone. He gets up and heads toward the stairs while he talks. “I know! I know! Check it out! Thanks so much!”

I stay on the couch and listen to my mom’s and Sara’s voices coming from the kitchen. They’re singing to UB40 at the top of their lungs. Charlie must have climbed into his high chair because I can hear his legs banging to the music. Normally I would roll my eyes and feel all annoyed, but I have to admit that I’m so glad he’s OK, he can bang all he wants.

At dinner, Charlie is delirious, shoving orange cheesy noodles in his mouth. My mom made what we call the “bad” mac and cheese. It’s the bright orange kind from a box instead of her homemade organic. My dad came home to eat with us as a special treat, and everyone seems pretty happy for the first time in a long time. My dad tells us that he decided to go with just Charlie on the label for the ice cream. We all prod him until he finally admits that some of the ad designers thought it was more appealing than our family photo. We all think this is pretty funny. And it feels great to laugh with my dad and not hurt his feelings.

About halfway through dinner, though, Holden’s new phone rings. He pulls it out and opens it to see who’s calling. As if he doesn’t know.

“Where did you get that?” my dad asks before Holden can answer the phone.

“A friend,” he says, starting to put the phone to his ear.

My dad reaches across the table and grabs Holden’s arm to stop him from answering. “Oh, no, you don’t,” he says. “Turn that thing off. It’s dinnertime.”

“But —”

“Off.”

Holden frowns and closes the phone.

“Now. I’m asking again. Where did that come from?” my dad asks.

“A friend,” Holden says.

“That’s an awfully expensive gift, honey,” my mom says.

Holden shrugs. I can see where this is headed, and I know it’s not good.

“What friend?” my dad asks.

Holden looks at me as if I can help him with this one. “A school friend. Gray.”

“Gray?”
my dad asks.

“He’s nice,” I say.

“And old,” Charlie adds.

“What the —?” Holden starts.

“Now, Charlie,” my mom says at the same time.

“How old?”

No one answers.

“Would someone please tell me what’s going on?” my dad asks.

No one will.

“You know what? This wouldn’t even be an issue if Gray were a girl.”

“Holden, that’s not true,” my mom says.

“Just forget it.” Holden gets up and storms out of the room. A few seconds later, the front door slams.

We all sit quietly for a minute.

I watch my dad chew, mulling over everything that just happened. I swear I can hear the cogs in his brain working, putting the pieces together.

“So, this is it,” he says. “It’s really true?”

My mom and Sara look at each other.

“Try not to freak out, Dad,” Sara says.

“But he’s so
young.
How can he know?”

“Honey,” my mom says. “We’ve all known for ages.”

My dad sighs. “I don’t like this. How old is this kid, anyway?”

Sara, my mom, and I all look at each other. Finally, my mom tells him. “Don’t overreact, honey. But he’s a senior at the Academy. Fern says he’s very nice.”

“A
senior
? Good God. That’s not right. He could be taking advantage of — He could — Well, I don’t like this. No. This isn’t —”

My dad keeps sputtering.

“Are you OK, Daddy?” Charlie asks.

“This is hard for Holden, too,” I say. They all look at me. “I mean, it’s a big step for him. I think we should all try to be supportive.”

My dad just shakes his head. “No. No dating. He’s too young.”

“You let me date when I was fourteen,” Sara says.

“That’s different. I didn’t let you date a senior! And you weren’t . . . confused.”

“Holden isn’t confused,” I say.

“No. No, no,” my dad says. He takes a long drink from his wineglass.

“Let’s talk about this later,” my mom says, standing up to clear the table. “Fern, go find your brother.”

Outside, the late September air is cold. Leaves crumble under my feet as I walk down the path to the road. I look down each way, but I don’t see any sign of Holden.

I wander over to our neighbor’s yard and our old tree. Inside, Holden is sending a text on his new cell. He stops when he sees me.

“What are you doing here?”

I shrug and sit down.

“I’m not staying. You should go home.”

“Why do you keep leaving?”

“Why shouldn’t I?”

I lean against the tree, even though I know I’ll probably get pine pitch on my shirt. “Because we love you. No one cares if you like boys. You know that, right? It just seems like sometimes you look for an excuse to leave — that’s all. Like you don’t want to have anything to do with us.”

“Whatever.”

“Why are you mad at
me
? I didn’t do anything.”

“I’m not mad at you. It’s just . . . No one gets it.”

I cross my arms. The tree digs into my back, but I don’t move.

“I get it,” I say quietly. “I understand.”

“What do you get? You think you understand what it’s like? I don’t think so, Fern.”

“Then, tell me!”

A car beeps and Holden jumps up, hitting his head on a branch. Suddenly, he no longer fits in our cave.

“I have to go,” he says.

“Whatever,” I say, using his favorite word.

He stoops under the branches and lopes across our neighbor’s lawn, leaving me alone. I sit forward and brush the loose pine needles on the ground into a pile like a campfire. I pick a small handful up and smell the orange needles.

There’s nowhere for me to go now, and there won’t be later, either. I wait as long as I can, but the night air is so cold, I finally go back home.

Charlie is upstairs in the bathtub, singing. The door is open, and when I walk by, I can see my mom sitting on the floor next to the tub, her feet propped up on the toilet. She’s reading a vegetarian cooking magazine and tearing out recipes. There’s a small pile on the toilet seat. At least she’s sort of paying attention to Charlie while he’s in the tub. Half the time she just leaves the door open while he plays in there, and I feel the need to check every two minutes to make sure he hasn’t drowned. Maybe today’s big scare in the parking lot has changed her.

I go to my room and check my e-mail. No new messages. How shocking. I think about calling Ran or even Cassie, but realize I don’t really feel like talking to anyone. So I do my homework and read myself to sleep instead.

W
HEN
I
WAKE UP
, I’m covered in sweat. It’s 5:14. My whole body is prickling with heat. I kick off my blankets to cool off. I stare at the ceiling and think about school and what I should wear today. I try to remember what I have that’s clean. The more I think, the more awake I become, and I know I am never going to fall back to sleep. I roll over on my back and stare at the ceiling with the quiet of the house humming in my ears. For a long time, I had to share a room with Charlie. I was so upset when my parents started assembling the old crib in the corner of my room. When I asked why he couldn’t sleep with my parents, they gave a lame excuse about my dad coming home late from work and not wanting to wake the baby.

Every night, Charlie would wake up crying. There was a baby monitor in the room, so my mom could hear when he woke up. She’d come in like a shadow and scoop him out of the crib. She’d nurse him while she held him in the rocking chair that took up a huge space in the corner. She’d hum quiet songs to him that helped me go back to sleep, too. I always wished she’d stop and pat my head or check on me on her way back to her room, but I always fell asleep before she finished, so I don’t know if she ever did.

When Charlie stopped nursing, my mom got rid of the monitor. But Charlie still never slept through the night. I would get up when he woke and rub his back until he went back to sleep. He was a loud breather, and at first it kept me up. But after a while, I got used to it and relied on that steady rhythm to help me get to sleep at night.

Last year my parents finally agreed that I needed my privacy, and my dad moved his desk into my parents’ room and gave Charlie his old office. I never admitted it to anyone, but for weeks I had trouble falling asleep in the quiet of my room. I wouldn’t say I missed him, but I missed his breathing.

I close my eyes in the quiet and try to fall back to sleep, but it’s no use. I finally drag myself up and take a shower. One good thing about being the first one up is a long shower with no worry about running out of hot water. By the time I’m done, it’s almost six thirty. Charlie, our family alarm clock, is usually awake by now. He runs down the hallway and bangs on everyone’s bedroom door as he makes his way to my parents’ room. I don’t like to shut my door, so usually when he gets to mine, he knocks on the door frame and calls, “Up, up, up, Ferny!” Sometimes he comes in and pokes Doll close to my face. I always know she’s there before I open my eyes because I can smell her odd Doll smell. A mixture of rubber and peanut-butter crackers.

As I walk down the hallway, I pause at his room and look inside. His curly hair is sticking out from under his blankets. I think about knocking on his door and whispering,
Up, up, up, Char-Char!
but I know he’ll tell my parents I woke him up and they’ll be upset about missing a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to sleep in, even if it’s only an extra fifteen minutes.