Sway (18 page)

“Come on, Cass!” M. B. McClean shouted, as he made a dash for The Roast with the suitcase balanced on his head and his jacket on top of that.

I ran as fast as I could with the banner coiled around one arm and the wagon dragging behind me, going airborne with every bump. Looking back over my shoulder, I expected to see the Belfuss family taking cover and moving in huddles toward their own cars. But instead, there they remained, drenched and muddied, still singing and laughing. The old man had hooked his cane on a low tree branch and was leading them all around in a line, waving his hands and kicking up dirt. With the wind gusting in its branches, the biggest of the pecan trees masterfully conducted their symphony of joy.

D
ad and I boarded The Roast and shook our wetness off like a couple of dogs. He peeled the photo from my shirt and tried to pat it dry without smearing the details out. Then he clipped the picture to the passenger's-side visor and took off his top hat, revealing a smush-ring in his thick brown hair. The air around him smelled like honeysuckle and hot sauce.

“Not too shabby for crashing a party.” Dad laid out a layer of napkins to sit his damp self on before navigating us back to the closest on-ramp. The streetlights were just beginning to flicker on, and the rain looked like a million contact lenses on the windshield. Dad leaned to one side and reached under his leg for a napkin to wipe a circle into the foggy glass in front of him.

“It was a lot more of a party when we left than when we got there,” I said.

“Thanks to you,” said Dad.

For the first time, being his Cassistant gave me kind of a warmish gushy feeling inside.

“And thanks to you too,” I said.

From a doggie bag that a kind Belfuss had packed for us, I ate a mini cob of corn and some potatoes while my dad fumbled the same crawfish three times, trying to pinch it open and drive at the same time.

“That was amazing,” I said.

“Oh, you like my crawfish juggling, huh?”

“No, I mean back there. The Belfuss thing. That was really something.”

“Agreed,” said Dad, trying not to touch the steering wheel with his spicy fingertips. “I'd say we just witnessed us some mighty fine Sway.”

Dad popped a whole potato into his cheek. By the time he got it totally chewed, he'd found us an Arkansas truck stop to park for the night, and squeezed us in so tight between two trucks, I thought The Roast might scrape along the sides and make sparks.

“Really,” he said, unbuckling and swiveling toward me. “Thanks for the help out there today.”

“But I was pretty shaky,” I said.

“I know. Like fodder, like dodder.” Dad did some fake trembling with his red-peppered hands.

“So what are you considering?” he said. “Is there any special request you might have for your own first dip into the Sway? You know, we've still got a Pablo Picasso in there,” he said. “And even a Georgia O'Keeffe, I think.”

“I have an idea,” I said. “But I just need some more time to think.”

“Take all the time you need,” Dad said, unbuttoning his jacket. “I'm going to shower this cayenne off me before my skin catches fire.”

By the time Dad pulled the bathroom door closed, before he'd even turned on the water, I'd already gotten settled in my room and closed the curtain tightly shut.
Now's my chance to call Mom
, a little voice inside me said, again and again. But the bathroom was right next to my space, and I knew there was a good chance Dad would hear me talking through the thin wall. Besides, the little voice inside me was near drowned out by a single, much louder word that was fast filling my whole self.
Sway
. The word itself had stars and paisleys bursting off of it in my brain. So many sparks and colors that I couldn't even contain. It felt noodle-worthy. But bigger than could be noodled on some old journal page. And bigger than colored pencils. Sway felt
permanent
-noodle-worthy.

Assuring myself that there would be plenty of time to call Mom later when Dad was asleep, I went to work. Despite feeling certain that Dad wouldn't be thrilled with the idea of permanent marker on the RV wall, I simply
had
to do something with the fullness I felt inside. So, before the courage could escape me, I pulled the brand-new pack of Sharpies from my backpack, lit my cantern, and hung it from the window latch with my red string. Then, while lifting the Eiffel Tower poster with my left hand, I began to noodle with my right. First, and across the top, went the outline of the word
SWAY
in black, and then came all manner of colored squiggles and stars and lightnings bursting off of it. Then I filled in the
S
, the
W
, the
A
, and the
Y
with stripes and dots and jagged patterns of red, pink, yellow, turquoise, and orange.

When the Sharpie fumes started to give me a little headache, I leaned back and checked out my work, thrilled that it was a perfect mirror of the bright, wiggly way I felt inside. Sway had just become my first permanent noodle ever, and Sway was a really good perm. In fact, it was so good, I made plans for what would go underneath the word on the wall. I could almost see it there already.…A field of soap bubbles with a magnificent Castanea dentata tree in the middle. One with great reaching branches and a fat tire swing. Of course, with me dangling off it and dragging my wavy hair through the suds.

That's as far as I'd gotten when Dad spoke up and near scared me to death.

“Hey, Cass,” he said, his voice alarmingly close to me and my secret project.

I capped up my marker and pressed the Eiffel Tower poster down over my noodling fast as I could, just in time for my shiny clean dad to pull back my curtain. I expected him to ask me what in the world put such a look of being busted across my face, but instead he reached in and handed something over that only kept the excitement flowing. It was the brown suitcase.

“I thought spending some time with the collection might help you make your decision.” He handed the case so close, the gold MBM glowed in the flicker of my can-tern. “Here. Take all the time you need,” he said. “I left the key in the lock for you.”

I couldn't have felt more trusted than I did at that moment. It was like he'd just asked me to drive.

“For real?” I said.

“For real,” said Dad. “Just so long as you handle with care.”

I took the case from him slow and easy, to keep it from jiggling, and laid it gently on my bed.

“You can refer to the soap list in there and look up some of the names in the encyclopedias if you need to,” Dad said, pulling an armload of volumes down for me. “And just imagine all the possibilities those slivers hold for me and you.”

And that I did. In fact, the thoughts of those possibilities piled high as I unpacked the soaps from the suitcase one by one. First, I laid the little pastel ovals across my bed, from biggest to smallest. Then I arranged them by colors: greens, blues, pale yellows, goldens, swirlies, creamish-whites, and white-whites. Then alphabetically. After all, this was not a task to be taken lightly. If there was one thing that watching McClean in action had taught me about Sway, it was that it required some skill and thought to unleash. So, looking back and forth from soap to list to encyclopedia, I set my mind on finding the one most likely to get my family back together, and back together fast. Tough as the decision was, just thinking about its potential made me feel like I'd just landed on the middle of a trampoline and bounced the up-est of ups, like an up that might never be changed back into a down.

I
t took me two hours to find just what I needed, but once it was decided, I couldn't wait to tell Dad. I jerked my curtain back quick, shaking a million more pieces of glitter onto the floor. Dad sat squished down into the couch, grinning at me like he'd been expecting my entrance.

“Guess what,” I said, holding my closed fist out toward him.

“You chose a sliver,” he said.

“I chose a couple.”

I sat next to him and set the two soaps side by side on the coffee table.

“I've made you a believer,” Dad said, looking all like his gladness might spring a leak. “So I'm dying to know. What'd you pick?”

“Well first, I've chosen this
M T
one. That stands for Mother Teresa.”

“Mother Teresa!” Dad said. “Helper of thousands of poor and sick people. What an honorable choice, Cass.

“Now, tell me about this
J P
one,” he said.

“That one is Juan Ponce de León.”

“Oooh, a fine Spanish explorer,” said Dad. “So which one will you use first?”

“Well, the thing is…”

My words circled around and around in my head like a dog looking for a comfy spot. And then I finally just came out with it.

“They're not for me.”

“Really?” said Dad. “Then who are they for?”

“Well, I read that when Mother Teresa won the Nobel Peace Prize, someone asked her what people could do to make world peace, and she answered, ‘Go home and love your family.'

“So I thought we could give that one to Mom,” I said. “You know, to help her do the right thing.”

“Cass—”

I didn't even give him the chance to argue. “And then that leaves the Juan Ponce de León one for you,” I said super quick.

“And why is that?” Dad asked.

“Because he discovered Florida.”

After that, there was a silence dead as beef jerky in The Roast. Dad grabbed a
Popular Mechanics
from the top of the magazine stack and flipped through it so fast, he would have to be the speed-reading champion of the world to even catch a word.

I felt a little burgle in my belly. “I was just thinking that maybe we could use the power of Sway to fix
us
,” I said.

I pulled hard at both my eyebrows while Dad just flipped and flipped and flipped more pages. Despite the fanned air coming off that magazine, my ears got so hot and itchy I could hardly stand it. How in the world could he be willing to share Sway with a bunch of strangers, but not with his own wife?

“Why can't we talk to her?” I said, glaring holes through him. “I mean
really
why.”

“Plain and simple.” Dad rolled his magazine tighter and tighter. “Even if we did, she wouldn't listen.”

“But I think you're wrong,” I said. “I think she
would
listen because we've got good stuff to say. I think she would think Sway is the neatest thing ever.”

“If only that were so, Cass.”

“Why can't it be so? Maybe she'd even be so excited about it she'd come right on home just to be a part of this summer. A part of
us
, together. Just like you wanted…or at least like you
said
you wanted.”

Dad looked at me like I'd spit on him.

“Cass, your mom is going to have to decide to come back on her own, okay?” he said. “End of discussion.”

“Okay,” I said. “Then let's just call her and give her a reason to. Let's tell her all this. Let's tell her about Sway.”

I thought of admitting we had refill minutes just waiting to be freed from the beauty box, but he instantly made me glad I didn't.

“There are things you don't understand,” Dad said. “Things that have nothing to do with me and you.”

“Things you don't even
want
to fix,” I said bitterly.

Dad slowly shook his head. “Cass, some words have been said and some things have been done that make it very hard for me to want to share this summer with your mom. And besides, didn't I say end of discussion?”

Even more burgle inside.

“I heard all that,” I said. “But I guess I thought that maybe, just maybe, your M. B. could stand for
Mercy Bo-koops
.”

Dad stopped mid-sigh.

“You know,” I said. “As in lots of forgiveness.”

“Okay, enough.” He dug a packet of headache powder from his duffel. “I'll think about it.”

My burgle calmed a bit. At least thinking about it was a start. “Good,” I said. “Then tomorrow we can—”

“Cass, please. Enough, okay?”

Suddenly, it felt like there was this imaginary long, stretchy accordion part of The Roast, fast pulling Dad and me apart. Then he flopped down on the couch and rolled over to face the back of it, leaving me just standing there like a doofus, like I'd been hung up on, but in a worse way—in an in-person way. Banishing me and my disappointment to hang out together on our end of the RV.

“Fine,” I said to the back of his head. “I'm going to bed.”

I'd had just about enough of his stubbornness, and besides, I had a certain refill card and phone to introduce to each other. If Dad wasn't going to tell Mom about Sway right away, then I would definitely have to take matters into my own hands.

End of discussion.