Now, I’m sure it’s kids. It has to be. I was at a sleepover once, the only one I’ve ever been to-the girl’s mother made her invite every girl in her class-and they spent most of the night dialing numbers out of the phone book and saying stuff like “I saw what you did,” “I know what you’re up to,” and “I’m watching you.”
But no matter what I tell myself, I keep imagining men in black hoodies surrounding the house, peering into the windows, hiding in the bathroom, the kitchen, the bedroom.
I’m calling T.J. I don’t care if it is late.
T.J. answers on the third ring, and I tell him about the calls.
“Okay,” he says, like he’s the officer in charge. “Don’t answer the phone. Lock the doors, and we’ll be right over.”
“We?”
“Chase and me.”
“Wait… what’s Chase doing-?”
T.J.’s already on the move. I hear something thud to the floor and imagine him dropping his shoe. “Chase forgot his wallet. He came back for it. He’s right here.”
“Aren’t you mad at him, T.J.? You sure acted mad before.”
“Nah. We’re cool. Can you run over to Hope’s with me?” T.J. says this last part away from the phone.
“Wait! T.J.?” I don’t understand what’s going on.
“I was talking to Chase,” T.J. says, sounding out of breath. “We’ll be right there.” He hangs up.
Chase Wells is coming here? Into this house? Jogging by is one thing. Coming inside is another.
I glance at the kitchen wall clock and try to guess how long it will take them to drive over. Not that long. I race around the house, picking up after Rita-the lacy bra strung over the easy chair, an empty beer bottle on the coffee table, one black heel in the kitchen, another in the hallway, shot glasses on the counter.
Before I get a chance to change out of the skirt and blouse I wore to court, there’s a knock at the door. I sniff under each armpit. Nothing bad. Then I open the door.
T.J. looks like he just woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Chase, still in jeans and a gray shirt, could step directly onto the cover of one of Rita’s celebrity magazines.
“I’ll have a look around,” T.J. says, pushing past me. He’s only been here a few times, but he acts like he owns the place, or maybe like he’s got a warrant to search it.
Chase, of course, has never been here, and I wonder if he’s ever seen a house like ours close-up. The confetti carpet is worn to the paper-thin padding in spots, and furniture is arranged to hide the worst rug stains, most of which were here before we were. Furniture too. Except the TV. Rita always has a great television.
Suddenly I realize Chase is waiting for me to invite him in. I step back so he can enter. He ducks, as if our doorway is too low for him. “You didn’t have to come over here. I didn’t know… I mean, I thought just T.J. would…”
“T.J. said you sounded pretty strung on the phone. What did they say? Was it kids? Could you tell?”
I try to call up the voice in my head. “I don’t know. It could have been anybody. Mostly, they just breathed.” I try to laugh it off, but even I can hear how fake my laugh sounds.
“And you don’t have caller ID?” he asks, taking a couple more steps in.
I’m embarrassed to admit that we don’t. We’re probably the last people in America not to have it.
I’ll kill T.J. for bringing Chase here. What was he thinking?
T.J. reappears. “Clear! Nobody’s hiding in the kitchen or the bathroom. I didn’t hit the bedrooms, though.”
“I didn’t say somebody was hiding,” I snap. Chase must think I’m an idiot. “I’m sorry you guys had to drive all the way over here for nothing. I really don’t need a babysitter.”
“Babysitter, huh?” Chase perches on the arm of the couch and crosses his long legs at the ankles. “I always wanted to be a babysitter.”
“You did not,” I say.
“Seriously. I did. I didn’t have little brothers or sisters. I always thought it might be cool to hang out with somebody else’s. But nobody ever wanted a guy babysitter where I came from.”
“So what did you do instead?” T.J. asks this like he’s not really mad at Chase anymore.
“What did I do? Instead of babysitting, you mean?” Chase says. “Nothing.”
“What are you saying? You’ve never had a job? Even an after-school job?” T.J. frowns like he can’t believe this.
Chase shrugs. “Sad, but true.”
I’m coming down on T.J.’s side on this one. I’ve had so many jobs the child labor people should have arrested Rita.
Chase turns to me. “You’re a workingwoman, aren’t you? I’ve seen you at that cafe on Main Street, the Colonial.”
“You have?” I don’t get it. I’d have remembered if he’d ever been my customer. He hasn’t been. Panic strikes when I imagine Rita waiting on him, hitting on him.
“Driving by,” he explains. “I’ve seen you through that front window?”
I didn’t think Chase Wells even knew who I was. I try to picture him cruising Main Street, turning his head to see me.
Behind us, paying no attention to us, T.J. plops onto the couch. A tiny puff of dust billows up.
“Haven’t seen you there lately, though,” Chase says. “Did you quit?”
I’m still standing just inside the door, not sure what to do with myself. “What? No. I haven’t quit working at the Colonial. Bob-the owner-has been pretty cool about the trial and Jer and everything. But customers stare and whisper. Some of them ask questions about Jeremy. Rita can handle them, but I can’t. So I work in back most of the time.”
I can’t keep standing here, arms folded across my chest, like I used to do in fifth grade to hide my “early development.”
“Want something to drink?” I shoot past them to the kitchen and inhale the scent of leather and Ivory soap Chase brought in.
He follows me. “Water would be great.”
“Got any Coke?” T.J. hollers in from the living room.
I open the fridge and find three brands of beer on the top shelf, but no Coke. No juice. No bottled water. No ice cubes in the freezer, just an empty plastic ice cube tray.
I run the tap water and get down two glasses. Chase pulls back a chair and sits at the kitchen table. The chair legs squeal on the linoleum. I call out to T.J. to come in for his water.
Setting down the two glasses, I spot a Snickers wrapper and Rita’s overflowing ashtray on the plastic checkered tablecloth. I sweep both items off the table and dump them into the garbage. Tiny flecks of ash float up, along with the stench of stale cigarettes.
“Sorry, T.J.,” I tell him as he takes a seat across from Chase. “No Coke.”
“That’s okay,” he answers. “Hate to ask, but I’m starving.”
I watched him eat two bologna sandwiches an hour ago. He eats more than anybody I’ve ever met, but you wouldn’t know it to look at him. “Sure. Chase?” My brain cycles through the slim possibilities for food in this house.
“Maybe. If it wouldn’t be too much trouble,” Chase answers.
“No trouble,” I lie. I ferret through the fridge, then the cupboard. No lunch meat. Crackers? No cheese. No cookies. “I make a killer peanut butter sandwich.”
“Prove it,” Chase challenges.
“Yeah,” T.J. agrees.
I laugh… until I picture my brother sitting at this table taking a giant bite of a peanut butter sandwich. “That’s the one thing I make sure we never run out of-peanut butter. Jeremy would live on the stuff if I let him.”
Before I can get the bread out, Chase is up and searching through our gross fridge. He comes out with the grape jelly, Jer’s favorite.
“Know your way around the kitchen, I see,” T.J. observes.
“I’ve had lots of practice finding my way around strange kitchens. Every time Mom remarries, it’s off to a new house.” He finds our silverware drawer on the second try, takes out a knife, and spreads jelly after I do the peanut butter. “Is this really all your brother likes?” Chase asks. “Peanut butter sandwiches? And bologna. How about hot dogs?”
“He loves hot dogs too.” In my head, I can see Jeremy at a baseball game. He’s wearing a White Sox cap and biting into a ballpark frank. “We got to go to a White Sox game once. Rita was dating some guy who’d just gotten out of prison. Anyway, he took Jeremy and me to a game, and Jer ate six hot dogs and got so sick that he threw them all up… and all over the ex-con.”
Chase laughs.
“You never told me that,” T.J. says.
“I haven’t thought about it in years,” I say, sounding too defensive. T.J. hasn’t told me much about his past either, but I don’t bring that up. It’s nice having the three of us get along like this. Still, it feels a little like we’re balancing on a seesaw. One shift could send the whole thing crashing down.
“Dad and I love going into Cleveland for Indians games,” T.J. says. “We’ve made it to the home opener every year for as long as I can remember.”
“My dad’s never taken me to a major-league game,” Chase admits, picking up his sandwich and slapping on more peanut butter. “He keeps promising to, but he never does. He and Mom used to fight all the time about Dad’s promises. They fought about a lot of things. I guess they fought over me a lot. Never for me, just over me.”
I’m not sure what to say. Even though I knew his parents were divorced, I’ve always pictured Chase Wells as having the perfect life, in Boston or in Grain.
“Voila!” he says, lifting his four-inch-thick peanut butter masterpiece like it’s a baseball trophy.
T.J. applauds. “I want his sandwich.”
“Don’t worry. I made you two.” I pull the stepping stool up to the table and sit on it. Although I made myself a sandwich too, I’m not hungry. I let it sit in front of me while Chase and T.J. eat.
T.J. wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, smudging peanut butter to his chin. Then he nods at Chase. “Go ahead and ask her.”
Chase almost chokes on his sandwich.
I glance from one to the other. “What? Ask me what?”
Chase shakes his head and won’t look at me.
T.J. takes over. “Chase wanted to know what’s really wrong with Jeremy. I told him I didn’t know anything he didn’t and he should ask you.”
Chase’s cheeks have turned pink. “You don’t need to answer that if you don’t want to. I wasn’t being nosy, but I didn’t understand much of the expert testimony in court. And I wondered, when you said it would be a terrible thing if they put Jeremy in a mental hospital, why you said that. Why would it be so hard on him if he has something wrong with him that they could fix, or help? You’d be able to visit him, right?” He stops. “I’m sorry. It’s none of my business. I didn’t mean to bother you with it, Hope. I just thought T.J. could help me understand.”
T.J. and I never talk about Jeremy. Usually, I hate it when people ask me what’s wrong with my brother. But I don’t know now. I want Chase to understand, and T.J. too. I don’t want to be the only one who understands Jeremy well enough to believe he didn’t do what they say he did.
“Jeremy was born with a neurological disorder. Probably Asperger’s syndrome, although he’s had all the standard labels pasted on him at one time or another: learning disabled, ADHD, autistic. One counselor at a school in Chicago was sure Jer had epilepsy because of his tantrum fits. And, yeah, selective mutism, which is a no-brainer since we know Jeremy selected to be mute.”
“So he’s been tested before all this, like in a hospital?” Chase sets down his sandwich and leans in, catching every word.
“Jeremy’s been tested and retested. Every time he got a new teacher, they’d call Rita in and ask her about him. Then they’d send him to the school psychologist-those people have some big problems of their own, if you ask me. Then they’d give up and send Jer on to some doctor, or hospital, or specialist.”
“And nobody knows why he won’t talk?” Chase asks, almost like he can’t quite believe this.
I understand where he’s coming from. “At first, Rita thought he was just being stubborn. She’d get so mad at Jeremy.” I stop talking because I’m remembering times when I had to get between Rita and my brother. I remember one time when I shoved a drunk Rita out of the way so Jeremy could escape to the bathroom and lock himself in until she got over it, or fell asleep.
But if I’m honest, there are other pictures stored inside my mind too. Rita sitting on the floor with Jeremy, holding up word cards the speech therapist gave her. Rita all excited over a new “herbologist” or “naturalist” she heard about, who could cure what didn’t come out of Jeremy’s mouth by being more picky about what went into his mouth.
I get up and run myself a glass of water. It tastes as cloudy as it looks and smells like iron. Then I sit back down.
“I don’t remember any of that stuff going on when you and Jeremy moved to Grain,” T.J. says.
“By the time we moved here, Rita was so tired of the whole rigmarole that she’d started telling new schools Jeremy had been in an accident and couldn’t talk. She just didn’t want to go through all those tests again. I guess Jer’s language arts teacher, Ms. Graham, tried to teach him sign language our first year here. It didn’t take, though. Jeremy likes to write notes. You should see his handwriting.”
“So that’s it?” Chase asks. He hasn’t taken another bite of his sandwich since we’ve been talking about Jeremy. T.J. has finished both of his. “There’s really nothing else wrong with him?”
“Nope. Not with Jer,” I answer. “Nothing except the fact that people have a hard time understanding unique.”
“Unique.” Chase mutters this, so I can’t tell if it’s a question or not.
I know he doesn’t get what I’m saying, and I’m not sure how to say it any better. I want him-them-to get Jeremy. I struggle for a minute over how to explain the Jeremy I love, what makes him who he is. And then I know.
Leaving our dirty dishes, I get up from the table. “Come with me.”