“Garreth? Would you like to ask him to dinner? I haven’t seen him in over a week, I’m starting to miss him.”
At that point my composure must have given me away because my mother looked at me as if she knew the whole story. Which was impossible.
“Boy trouble?”
I could only nod.
“Want to talk about it?”
“No,” I whispered, hoping she would let it rest. She nodded and picked her suitcase up and headed for the laundry room, leaving me alone with my thoughts.
It was seven o’clock by the time the second bottle of wine was opened. My mother was nestled in Nate’s arms on the sofa, deciding which pictures to delete from the digital camera. Brynn was sitting lazily in the wing-backed chair, looking bored as hell. I swore time was purposefully torturing me, creeping along like this. I stood up and began searching for a means to occupy myself, like picking up the napkins that had drifted in from the kitchen, and fortune cookies, and crumbs …
I heard my mother get up behind me and then in a flash, I turned to see her lose her balance, nearly whacking her head on the bookcase nearest the sofa. Before I could barely blink, Brynn was up out of her seat, grabbing her by the arm and gently helping her back down to the sofa.
“Brynn, thank you. I guess I’ve had a little too much wine.” My mother’s face was pink and flushed. It was odd to see her so careless. No, make that embarrassing. I bit down on the inside of my cheek as the overwhelming urge to reprimand her swelled inside me. She was the adult, but she sure wasn’t acting like it.
“You’re just a little woozy,” Brynn replied with a voice so gentle, I ended up doing a double-take. It was entirely out of character for her, and I half expected her to look up at me, smirking as she vied for brownie points. But her attention was one hundred percent aimed toward my mother, and in all honesty, it appeared genuine.
“Brynn’s right, Diane. Just sit here for a moment.” Nate began arranging throw pillows, placing the firmer ones on the bottom of the pile, the fluffiest near her head.
“I’ll go get a cool, wet cloth for her forehead,” Brynn chimed and headed for the powder room without even asking where we kept towels, or where the linen closet was. I was beginning to notice she was entirely too comfortable in the space I called my own.
In the midst of it all, I stood like a spaced-out idiot. I should have been the one to come immediately to my mom’s aid. To speak softly to her with concern, to run for a cool towel for her head. But instead, I felt angry, even awkward in my own home, as if these people had come in and taken over things. Things that used to be mine.
“Mom, are you alright?” I asked, but my voice sounded strained, the question contrived.
What was wrong with me?
“I’m fine, honey. My head is spinning a little. Nate, I’m so sorry. I feel like a fool. I … I’m not feeling so well.”
With that she pulled herself to her feet, pushing past the hand Nate offered her and staggered down the hallway to the bathroom. I met Nate’s eyes. My own guilt and shame was overshadowing everything else I should be concerned with, like my mom’s well being. She and I took care of one another. We always had. Always will. It was ridiculous that I should feel so humiliated when she was the one not feeling well, and I should be respectful and show my appreciation toward Brynn for helping my mom. Sure, Brynn wouldn’t care if I was the one suddenly on the verge of losing my cookies, but she never had any concern for me. Yet, instead of rolling her eyes and using tonight’s circumstances against me, she became the biggest help. Bigger than I was.
Brynn came back into the living room, washcloth in hand. The evening was over.
“Well,” I projected into the stagnant revelry. “I’m sure my mom will end up calling it a night. She really should get some rest.” Finally! I was taking charge. Or so I thought.
“Maybe we should stick around just a little while longer to make sure she’s okay?” Nate suggested.
I bit the inside of my cheek. This was the first time the three of us had ever been in the same room without my mother. It was two against one, but remarkably, I felt okay. I felt strong. My mother was sick and I could handle this. I just had to feign politeness and get them to leave, then I could put my mom in her bed or on the sofa and escape to my room.
Sensing my discomfort, Nate walked over to me, placing his hand on my shoulder. “If you need anything, you can call my cell. It sends an automatic page to the hospital, in the event I get called in. You’ll do that if she gets worse or if you need anything, won’t you?”
I nodded, not promising anything. Brynn’s moment of sincerity appeared to have worn off now that she was no longer needed. She stared at me—as if boring her way right through me. I couldn’t tell if she was jealous or what. All I knew was that I wanted her out of my house. Now.
As Brynn left to go wait in the car, Nate grabbed his jacket from the coat tree in the foyer. It seemed like he was moving in slow motion. He seemed reluctant, hesitant.
“She’ll be fine,” my voice grew more convincing by the second. “And I promise to call if I need anything.”
An approving smile of thanks crept into his eyes, but yet he still wasn’t opening the door, and I imagined Brynn growing impatient, growling to herself in the car at his delay.
“Take care, Teagan,” Nate said quietly. It should have been a normal thing to say. A polite statement of departure when you don’t know someone too well. But to me, it seemed more than that, almost like a whisper of importance, carrying weight to his words. Take care. I heard it echo again in my head.
What should I be taking care of? My mother? Myself? Was he warning me of something, because paranoid flashes of breaking into his study were permeating my mind, sending off warning signals. Did he know? Was I supposed to feel threatened? And with that, he stepped out onto the porch and into the night.
My mother spent the entire day in bed, calling off work for the first time in years. Before and after school, I waited on her, hand and foot, as restitution for my behavior the night before. I was sure she wasn’t aware of the weight upon my conscience, for behaving and thinking so selfishly. I was silently punishing myself with each cup of tea I brought up to her, making her soup for lunch. Did she have enough pillows, an extra blanket? I threw a load of darks into the wash without being told. Nothing was enough.
I couldn’t help wondering why and when my life and all its meaning had taken a turn for the worse. Was it when Garreth showed me that stupid pink suspension slip in his car? Was it the second I convinced him to go to lunch with a bunch of jock-losers instead of keeping him all to myself? Or was it the moment when happiness surrounded me and I had both Garreth and the free will to fantasize about a dark angel lingering on the fringes of my world?
Regardless of when it happened, here I was…miserable.
“That’s it!” I said out loud to myself as I tossed the last of the wet, lumpy jeans into the dryer. “I’m not going to agonize over this anymore.”
I marched upstairs, peeked in on my mom, who was sleeping soundly in her room and fished my cell phone out of my bag. It was nearly eleven p.m. but I hit Ryan’s number on speed dial anyway.
“Are we still on for tomorrow?” I breathed into the receiver without even asking how he was feeling.
“Uh, yeah. I’m up for it.” He sounded as if he had been sleeping and suddenly I felt guilty for my impulsiveness. “You’re driving, right?”
“The dance starts at six o’clock, so I’ll pick you up at quarter to.”
“My date’s picking me up. I like it,” Ryan spoke with unabashed drama.
I smiled into the phone and hung up.
Grabbing my jammies from the drawer, I quickly changed and hopped onto my bed. There was one more person I wanted to call, but unfortunately, he didn’t carry a phone. At least to my knowledge. I thought of what Ryan said, about thinking about Claire and then seeing her. If I thought about Garreth, would he come to me? Did I dare try? I wasn’t going to allow myself to feel bad if he chose not to appear. The important thing was that I was reaching out and trying to put my life back into some sense of order.
I visualized him forming in the middle of my bedroom floor like he had done so many times in the early morning. I closed my eyes and wished.
Nothing.
But someone else did enter my dreamscape this time. Claire stood there with a worn, brown book in her pale hand. It was old and frail, and in my heart I knew it was the journal I was looking for.
“I kept him away for as long as I could, Teagan. I don’t have the strength anymore,” the wisp of her voice floated to me.
“Who, Claire? Who did you keep away?” I asked, but she was fading before my sleepy eyes.
“The names … the names are in the book.” I could no longer see her, but her voice punctured my heart.
“What names?” I pleaded, but she was gone.
When morning woke me, I didn’t feel so alone. I had seen Claire. Feeling the separation from her had weighed on me with such magnitude, but seeing her, even just for a matter of moments in a dream, helped. I truly believed that she was giving me a message—that the journal really held importance. I carried that thought with me while getting dressed and on the way to school.
There was a tangible excitement in the air at Carver. It was Friday. The Fall Harvest dance was just a few hours away and the school was already teeming with festivities. Girls chattered in the bathroom, talking about their dresses and shoes and hair. Even the boys seemed stoked. By the time the final bell rang, even I was admittedly feeling the effects of anticipation and found myself practically bouncing to my car. Both Garreth and Brynn were no-shows today. I didn’t have to witness their togetherness, which helped. Out of sight, out of mind, right?
At five forty-five my little white Cabrio pulled up to the house Ryan had described over the phone. I had never been there before but ventured to guess that it wasn’t the sort of place where someone would entertain. The pale blue siding had faded to a nice shade of dinge. The white trim was now visibly grimy, even from the street, and in need of a good power-washing. It was peeling profusely around the door frame and windows.