Shucked (4 page)

“I’m sorry,” I said, mortified. He’d
never like me now. One day around a bunch of teenagers and I’d turned into one
of the crazy ones. I wanted my old life back, along with the old me. “That was
uncalled for.”

“Yes, it was, Tabitha,” Illinois Jon
said. He placed his hands under Alex’s arms and helped him to his feet. “Don’t
let me catch you doing it again.”

“I’ve gotta catch the bus.” I turned
on my heel and ran out of the classroom, shaking from the confused feelings engaged
in a death match inside my chest.

Chapter Five

Were buses invented as a form of
torture? Maybe the U.S. government would have been in a lot less trouble if
they’d driven the Gitmo detainees around in school buses with obnoxious
teenagers until they cracked. It would have worked on me.

In the morning, I was going to be lucky
– the last one on the bus with the shortest ride to school.

But in the afternoon I was the last
one off.

After an agonizing forty-five minute
ride where I saw every last inch of farmland southwest of the school, the bus
finally pulled up in front of the driveway to Mimi and Gramps’ house. I trudged
the quarter mile up the lane, kicking up gravel that bit at my ankles.

The screen door was locked, just like
the deadbolt, the doorknob, and the door between the indoor porch and house. The
keys on my key ring jingled louder than the wind chimes hanging from the post
nailed into the side of the house. How many damn keys did I need to get in this
house?

Before I could even get past the
screen door, the interior door swung open. Mimi stood in the doorway, nearly
taking up the entire frame. She wasn’t a fat woman, but she was wide. Like a
Mack truck. Like an elephant. I threw myself in her arms, tears streaming down
my cheeks.

“Is Gramps home?” I didn’t want him
to see me crying. It made both of us uncomfortable.

“No. He’s working outside. I doubt
we’ll see him until dusk.” She patted me on the back and ran her other hand
over my hair.

“You really shouldn’t use your taekwondo
on fellow students,” she said. How did she know already? Oh yes, the famous
rumor mill, cranking out information faster than Perez Hilton.

“He deserved it.” I sniffled into her
flowered dress. Who wears a dress to stay home and do housework? Mimi, that’s
who. Better than my mom who wears khakis twenty-four hours a day while ignoring
me.

“He probably did,” she conceded. She
guided me through the porch and into the kitchen. I sat down at the ancient
wooden table, dropping my bag on the scratched hardwood floor. Mimi told me
every year that when I came back the kitchen would be remodeled. No more tin
cabinets or ancient stoves needing a light from a match. Every year I came back
it was the same. Except for five years ago when a microwave appeared on the
counter.

“I don’t think I can do this,” I
said. “High school sucks.”

“Language.” Mimi didn’t like cursing
of any kind. I would have to be careful. I didn’t trust her with a bar of soap.

“Sorry,” I corrected myself. “High
school stinks.”

“Did you make friends with anyone?” Mimi
asked, pulling a batch of cookies out of the oven. It was warm in there. She
never used the air conditioning unless the temperature was over ninety degrees
and the humidity stifling, but still hotter than it should have been.

I jumped out of the chair and stole a
cookie from the cookie sheet. Chocolate chip, my favorite. I couldn’t get
cookies like Mimi’s overseas. I poured myself a glass of milk and dropped the
cookie in. Nothing like a soggy cookie drink. Smoothies for kids.

I saw Mimi shake her head out of the
corner of my eye. I also swore I saw a smile creep out the side of her cheek.

“I did make a friend,” I said. “I’m
surprised you hadn’t heard.”

“Who?”

“Becky something-or-the-other. I
didn’t catch her last name. She said our moms were friends when they were kids.”

“Ah, Becky O’Connor.” She slid the
spatula under each cookie, loosening them from the sheet, and setting them down
on the cooling rack. I sucked on my two fingers, burnt by the cookie I’d stolen
too soon.

“Becky’s a good girl and I like her
parents. I think she’s a good match for you. Maybe she’ll teach you to control
yourself a bit better instead of hurting boys like Alex.”

“What’s the deal with my math
teacher?” I asked, changing the subject. I wasn’t ready to talk about Alex. Not
to Mimi.

“What do you want to know about him?”

“Why did he and my mom break up?”

Mimi sighed. We’d never discussed
this before, but now that he was my teacher I felt I needed to know. Like my
life wouldn’t be complete without knowing.

“You’ll have to ask your mom.” Her
spatula scratched a little harder at the cookie sheet, breaking the cookie in
two. Her shoulders fell. Even though no one but the three of us would be eating
the cookies, she took pride in her baking.

“Why can’t you tell me?” I pushed.

“You’ll have to ask your mom that
too,” she said, breaking another cookie.

“What’s the big secret?”

Mimi broke a third, the last cookie,
and tossed the spatula and cookie sheet into the sink.

“No one said there is a secret.” She
wiped her hands on her apron. Mimi avoiding my questions. Now that was an
interesting development. Nothing was more important to her than directness,
even if it hurt. She told the truth whether people liked it or not.

“But,” I started.

“No, buts.” She pointed to a box on
the table I hadn’t noticed yet. “That came from your mom today. I suggest you
open it. It had the same postmark date as the postcard. Sometimes packages take
longer.”

“I’m going to ask you again about the
big, dark secret,” I teased.

“You won’t if you know what’s good
for you. You’re not the only one who can bring someone to their knees. Where do
you think you got your fighting skills?”

I rolled my eyes. If sweeping with
the vacuum cleaner was considered deadly then I’d be afraid. Until then, my
fingers itched to open the package from my mom.

I grabbed the box cutter from the
junk drawer and slid out the blade.

“Be careful,” Mimi warned.

Stabbing the packing tape with the box
cutter, I slid it toward me. I know, I know, I’m supposed to slide it away from
my stomach, not toward. I just couldn’t do it, don’t know why.

I pulled the cardboard flaps apart
and dug into the packing peanuts. I wiggled my fingers, careful not to let any
peanuts fall outside the box.

My fingers explored the inside until
they hit something solid. Wrapping my fingers around the object, I carefully
pulled it out.

“Oooh,” I whispered, holding it in my
palm. I’d never had one of these for my collection before.

“What in tarnation is that?” Mimi
asked. She eyed the tiny clay figurine. Its flat, horned head showed an evil
expression. Drooping breasts hung down to its knees and it ended on stumps, no
feet.

“Tarnation, Mimi? No one uses that
word anymore.” I sighed.

“I use it,” she said, “and I don’t
really care whether or not anyone else does. Now stop avoiding my question and
tell me what that horrid thing is.”

“It’s a doll from Neolithic Japan. A
dogu,” I said. “Well, a reproduction of one, at least. Mom would never send me
an original. They belong in museums.”

“It looks old,” Mimi said, peering
over my shoulder.

“Yeah, it does.” I wished it was
authentic. I had quite a little collection going from items I’d been given on
various digs. But this was different. Around 20,000 of these little dolls had
been uncovered in digs across Japan, but nearly all of them were in museums or
universities being studied.

I wondered which company had been
approved to make copies? Were they selling them in museum shops now? I turned
it over and didn’t see a mark on the bottom. Made it look more realistic. I
gave kudos to the toy company.

“Is it an alien?” Mimi asked,
pointing at the horns.

Aliens? My God-fearing grandmother
asking about alien dolls.

“No, Mimi, they’re horns.”

“How do you know?” she asked. She
grabbed the dogu out of my palm. She held it up not far from her face,
squinting at it. “Definitely an alien.”

“Mimi.” I stood on the chair, my eyes
to hers. “There are no such things as aliens.”

“Didn’t say there were, girl,” she
replied, placing the dogu in my open palm. “But who’s to say those ancient
people didn’t believe in aliens just like people today?”

“They were more likely to believe in
demons than aliens,” I said. “Everyone knows that.”

I closed my hand around my new
treasure. Some kids’ parents might send them a stuffed animal or t-shirt. Nope,
I got artifacts. My mom knew what I liked to collect even if she didn’t seem to
know anything else about me.

“I just wish it was authentic,” I
said.

“Strange,” Mimi said, making her way
back to the cookies. Her hand hovered over them, checking for warmth. I knew
from years of watching her that she was checking for a specific temperature.
Too warm and the cookies would fall apart in the cookie jar. Too cool and they
would crumble. My Mimi was an expert cookie maker.

“What’s strange?” I asked, holding my
empty hand over the cookies too. My palm felt like I’d just stuck it in a
rainforest. Too damp, not cool enough yet, but close.

“Why would she send you a Japanese
artifact if she’s in South America?”

I paused. I’d assumed she was still
in South America, but had she moved on? I grabbed her postcard off the counter,
the one that cemented my exile in Nowhereville. Flipping it over, I noticed the
postmark. London. Why had I overlooked that little detail before?

My blood boiled and I felt the rage
coming on. For such a small girl, I sure had a lot of anger inside me. Mimi
moved closer, laying her arm across my shaking shoulders.

“She’s in London?” I screamed.
“What’s so flipping dangerous about London?”

Then I remembered. My dad.

“She’s with him, isn’t she?” I
refused to turn around and look at Mimi. She wasn’t talking. That in itself was
unusual. It was because she agreed with me. I was right.

It wasn’t unusual for archaeologists
and antiquities dealers to meet in dark corners of the world and shows how one
drunken night can change your life forever. My mom and dad had a love-hate
relationship. They loved each other, but they hated being together. They never
got married, just hooked up occasionally. Sets up a nice frame of reference for
me in regards to relationships. Until I lived with Mimi and Gramps that first
summer, I honestly believed my mom and dad’s relationship was normal.

If she was with him, I wanted to know
why the three of us couldn’t spend time together. Did she love him more than
me?

It’s pathetic how a girl as strong as
I am can’t fight the lightest and wimpiest thing on the planet – tears. They
poured out of my eyes, bathing my dogu in liquid salt. I wiped it dry with my
sleeve, dislodging little specks of dirt from between its bulbous breasts. Gross.
I slid it inside my sleeve because I couldn’t look at the poor, violated thing.

“You don’t know that,” Mimi
whispered. She never whispered. Not even when her hearing aid was on.

I turned around, shrugging her arm
off my shoulder.

“You’re right. I don’t. And I don’t
really give a shit what she’s doing or why she’s lying to me.”

I waited. For the reprimand for
cursing. For her to remind me that not only was I complaining about the woman
who gave birth to me but she gave birth to her. Nothing. It made me feel worse,
but I knew Mimi didn’t know what to say any more than I did.

She didn’t understand her daughter. She
never had. That’s why they never got along. That’s why Mom left and never came
back. I’d never heard any details, but I knew from piecing things together. No
one wanted to talk about it. No one wanted to say anything bad about anyone
else.

Except me. I was filled with bad
things to say.

“Pull yourself together, Tabitha.” Mimi
tapped her fingers on my shoulder before she turned back to her cookies. Her
hand hovered over them, but this time it shook. So she was upset too. It made
me feel better. But only a little. “There’s a note inside.” She pointed to a
piece of paper folded up in the bottom of the box.

I miss you and love you. Can’t wait to see you again soon!!!

Whatever. Just another bribe. “Becky
wanted to come over this afternoon,” I said, trying to move on. “Is that okay?”

“Of course,” she said, picking up
cookies and placing them inside the cookie jar. Normally she just let them
drop. I hovered my hand over the cookies. No warmth or dampness. It was too
late; my outburst made us miss the window. There was nothing Mimi hated more
than a crumbly cookie.