0.5-Stone and Spark Page 8

  But I've apparently earned enough goodwill bringing up DeMott that he doesn't correct me. I sit down across from him and stare at the newspaper's front page. It tells me everything else that went wrong in Richmond last night. Two shootings in Creighton Court. One armed car-jacking on East Main Street. Robberies on Northside.

  Not one word about a fourteen-year-old girl so smart she got bumped up two grades at an elite private school and now disappeared, leaving her bike behind.

  But maybe there’s nothing in the paper, because she's home now?

  I want to run. Run all the way to the West End, run over the leaves in their driveway, run up the stairs to Drew's compulsively neat bedroom and find her snoozing in bed. But on a Saturday morning, when my mom's taking her meds and acting like Betty Crocker, no quick exits exist.

  I gulp my Coke.

  She turns on the exhaust fan over the stove and puts what appears to be bacon—but can't be—into a smoking pan. The sizzle smokes. She turns the fan on higher, louder. My dad had the powerful fan installed after she started burning those crazy notes.

  When he lowers the paper, he speaks to me in a voice so low she can't hear. "I found the carriage house unlocked this morning."

  "Sorry. I went bike riding."

  "Where to?"

  "Oh, you know, Drew's house."

  "What time?"

  "After school."

  I hold his gaze. Holding, holding, holding until suddenly my mom is here, slipping plates of food in front of us.

  "Let's eat!" she sings.

  Barring the cannibals in New Guinea, my mother could be the worst cook on Earth. It's probably her most un-Southern trait, and my dad doesn't seem to care.

  "Oh, sweetheart," he says, "you really outdid yourself."

  He folds his paper and she settles into the chair beside him, still wearing that stupid frilly pink apron. My parents always sit thisclose. Even in restaurants, they'll push their chairs together.

  I stare at the food, commanding myself to choke it down. When I look up, my mom is dabbing her eyes.

  "What's wrong?" he asks, sounding worried.

  She points, misty-eyed, at the empty chair beside me.

  Helen's empty chair. My sister.

  "It's simply not the same without her." My mom's voice quivers. "I miss her so much."

  I pick up my fork, disgusted.

  My dad kisses her cheek. "Let's dedicate this morning's grace to Helen."

  "Like she cares," I mutter.

  "Raleigh," my dad warns.

  Helen is an atheist. One of those people so passionate about God not existing that atheism turns into a religion. She also declared herself a vegetarian—at age eleven. Given the cuisine in this house, it's almost understandable. But by sixteen, she joined a bunch of freakish political groups, including one my dad said was probably too Communist for Stalin. The list of stupid things my sister does is a mile long. But my mom never sees any fault with her.

  Helen is just too smart.

  Helen needs room to grow.

  Helen's finding her way.

  Personally, I'm glad she found her way to Yale. Let her be somebody else's pain in the butt.

  "Raleigh, why don't you say grace for us?" My dad looks at me as if reading my mind.

  I stare back at him.

  But he's giving me a really weird look. Not just reminding me to love my sister but something more. Something that tells me, right there over a meal that will nauseate me, that he opened my window last night. He removed my pillows. Like he checked the carriage house. A sudden stab of panic hits my chest. I glance over at my mom. Her head is bowed, waiting for grace, her black hair hanging over her face, touching the silly pink apron.

  I look back at my dad. Another horrible pang hits my heart. My dad, he's holding us all together.

  I close my eyes. "God, I don't ask you for much."

  My dad clears his throat.

  "Okay, I ask you for a lot of things." My throat feels raw, like I swallowed nails. Not enough sleep, too much screaming at the river. Drew. Oh, Drew. "Please keep her safe, God. And please let her know how much she's loved, even if the people around her aren't good at showing love. And please—please bring her home safely. Thank you. Amen."

  Two “Amens” echo back.

  When I open my eyes, the scrambled eggs stare up at me like a dare. They are suspiciously pale, probably made from that powdered egg mix that makes me crave potato chips. They're scrambled with other things too—diced onions? Potatoes? I can't tell. The only things I recognize are green peppers. Suddenly I hear that TV chef from last night, saying there's nothing worse than overcooked peppers.

  The TV chef is wrong.

  The worst thing is staring at this food, knowing you have to eat it. Because if you don't, your mom will feel wounded, then scared, then start asking if you didn't eat the food because you think it's poisoned. And when someone's paranoid-crazy, that question doesn't have any good answer. "No" means "yes."

  I pick up my fork.

  But my mother is crying, dabbing her eyes with her napkin.

  "Nadine?" he asks.

  She doesn't say anything. He glances at me. I shrug.

  "Honey?"

  Maybe her meds need adjusting. Maybe ramping right into Homemaker Mode was too much, too fast.

  I stab the eggs.

  "That grace," she sobs.

  "What Raleigh said?"

  Oh, no.

  She sniffs, wipes her eyes. "I knew it was only a matter of time."

  He glances at me. I hold my breath.

  "Only a matter of time until . . . ?" he asks.

  “Until Raleigh would pray for Helen like that." She beams at me. "I'm so glad you're back, sweetheart!"

  I take a bite of the eggs.

  They turn to dust in my mouth.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  My mom's ballast-like meals make running feel impossible so I unlock the carriage house and haul out the bike. The rain starts to fall hard as I'm riding past the headquarters for the Daughters of the Confederacy, slashing leaves from the trees, pummeling them on the pavement until it all turns into a dull amber confetti.

  When I get to Drew's house, I leave my dripping jacket in the sunroom with Isaac Newton, who recoils, and find Jayne sitting in the kitchen. She clutches a large blue Reynolds coffee mug and stares into space.

  Her eyes are as red as last night's wine.

  "Is she here?" I ask.

  She barely shakes her head.

  There's an odd stillness to her, a blank expression that reminds me of something last week, when Drew came bounding down the hall to Lit class. That alone tipped me off, since Drew says purgatory does exist and it’s English Literature with Sandbag, so I asked her, "What's going on?"

  “We talked,” Drew said.

  “Who?"

  “Me and Jayne!”

  “Jayne and I,” I corrected, sounding like my dad.

  “The point is,” she said, laughing, “Jayne wanted to talk. I mean, really talk. I thought I was in trouble but she was asking about my experiments. She said we might get a dog.”

  “Was she drunk?”

  Drew didn't answer that question. “I kept thinking, who are you and where have you been all my life?”

  That whole day, Drew was giddy; floating with happiness I'd never seen in her before. Maybe because she finally had a normal mother.

  But the next day, her cynical self was back. And then some.

  “What happened now?” I asked.

  “I told Jayne how much that talk meant to me.”

  "Okay."

  “What do you think she said, after that? You get one guess.”

  “She said you can't name the dog Richard P. Feynman.”

  “Hardly. She said, 'When?'”

  “When—what?”

  “When did we have this talk?”

  “Oh.”

  “Raleigh, you don’t get it.” Drew’s eyes stormed with emotion. “She doesn't even remember. Any of it. Tha
t whole great talk? It got washed away by wine.”

  And now I see why Drew was so distressed.

  I stand there, watching Jayne as Isaac Newton saunters into the kitchen, jumps on the island and cat-walks down to her. But she doesn't seem to see him. Even when he yowls, her eyes look like the people with Alzheimer's, like they're made of glass. Suddenly, I wonder if Drew came home, would Jayne even know it?

  I take the stairs by twos. When I push open Drew's door, Feynman grins from the poster.

  The bed is still made. I open her closet, just in case. That empty hanger swings at me.On the floor, I see the empty space where she compulsively parks her Converse All Stars—purple All Stars, of course. But I know she brings those shoes to school, pulling them on as soon as the final bell rings, to match the purple jean jacket.

  Which she left in the Physics lab.

  I can hear footsteps on the stairs.

  It's Jayne. She steadies herself, holding the handrail. God forgive me, I feel a really strong temptation to push her.

  "Aren't you even worried?" I say.

  "She'll come home when she gets hungry."

  "She's probably already hungry—she's been gone since yesterday."

  Jayne waves me off, walks down the hallway to her bedroom.

  "Did you call Rusty?" I call to her back.

  "You call him." She closes her door.

  I go back into Drew's room, grab the purple Princess phone, and push #2 on the speed dial.

  Rusty picks up on the first ring. "Drew, is that you?"

  "No, it's Raleigh."

  "You found her?"

  "No."

  "Well where the hell is she?"

  I pause, because, seriously, these people are about as mature as toddlers. "Jayne thinks she took off because of the move."

  "What move?"

  I pause. "You don't know?"

  "No."

  Oh, boy.

  "Jayne got a promotion. She didn't tell you?"

  He lets out a couple curses, then says, "Why am I the last to know everything?"

  Like he's the victim here.

  And just for that, I say, "The police came by last night."

  "What!"

  Rusty, according to Drew, smokes pot around the clock. Literally. She told me he will actually wake himself up to light a joint, then go back to bed. So of course he's not thrilled about law enforcement.

  "You called the police?" he demands.

  "Yes."

  "What for!"

  "If she really ran away, she would tell me. And how do you explain all her stuff left at school, including her bike?"

  "But how's calling the cops going to help?"

  Sometimes I wonder if the Fifth Amendment was created because you can't answer stupid. I take the Fifth, and wait.

  "Okay, so," he says, finally, "what'd the police say?"

  “They can't do anything unless her parents file a report." I wait for that fact to sink in.

  But turns out, I'm stupid for expecting him to get it.

  "Oh, that's just great," he says. "Just great."

  He hangs up.

  Again.

  ***

  I bike through the rain to St. Catherine's. Drew’s purple Schwinn is still locked—incorrectly—to the bike rack. It sits under the eaves, dry despite all this rain, and somehow that only makes it look lonelier, like an orphan afraid to get wet.

  I lock my bike next to hers then walk around all three buildings. I tug on each door handle, peek through the windows, and stare into every classroom. They're all empty, the desks back in orderly rows.

  I ride down Granite Avenue, blink against the slanting rain, then coast to the end of the street, to the homely house with a wooden ramp tilted over its front steps. I leave my bike under the big maple and walk up the ramp. My All Stars slip on the wet leaves.

  I knock on the front door, but nobody answers.

  So I ring the doorbell.

  Then I ring it again before pounding my fist.

  When the door finally opens, the red-headed man sitting in a wheelchair says: "Anyone ever call you a pest?"

  "Yes. You."

  "This doesn't exactly change my mind."

  Teddy Chastain is my geology teacher at St. Catherine's. Next to my dad, he's the adult I'm closest to. Teddy never takes anything seriously—sometimes it's like he doesn't even realize he's paralyzed.

  But right now he sees something serious written on my face.

  He frowns. "You okay?"

  "No."

  "Good."

  "What?"

  "You Southern girls. Y'all got a bad habit of lying about your feelings. Speak the truth. You can start with why you're pounding on my door on a Saturday morning."

  "I can't find Drew."

  "Took off again, did she?"

  "Why is everyone assuming she ran away?"

  "Because the girl's rough as pig leather," he says. "Brilliant. But rough."

  "Drew did not run away. This time."

  "You're sure?"

  "Positive."

  "How many times do I have to tell you: leave room for examiner error."

  "Teddy, I found her notebook in the Physics lab. You know, the one with all her experiments? Drew would never leave her notes behind."

  "Not unless she wanted to throw you off-track."

  "For what reason?"

  "She likes to experiment. Maybe you're part of one right now."

  "I'm not!”

  "Okay." He hikes his shoulders. "Go call the cops."

  "I already did." I explain what Officer Lande said about her parents, and about needing twenty-four hours before Drew can even be called officially missing. As I talk, Teddy keeps his hands on the wheels of his chair, rolling forward two inches, back two inches, forward and back, like a paralyzed person's version of pacing the floor. "The only way the police will look for her is if there are signs of foul play."

  "Proof," he says. "You need proof."

  "I have proof."

  "What you have is circumstantial."

  "But you said everything's circumstantial."

  "Raleigh, I was talking about geology."

  "You also said geology is the best metaphor for life."

  "I take it back."

  "You can't, it's on the record."

  He hangs his head, as if exhausted, and sighs. "Man, I hate talking to a judge's daughter." He rolls back, opening the door all the way. "Alright, c'mon, get outta the rain."

  My geology teacher's house smells like minerals, like rock dust is floating in the air, rising off all the stones scattered around his living room. Schists and limestones and granites, sands and feldspars and silts. But I smell something else—hot, earthy—which turns out to be in the kitchen, where a cast-iron pan smokes on the stove like it's going to explode.

  Ignoring the fire hazard, Teddy rolls over to his refrigerator and tugs on a knotted rope, wrapped around the handle. He's never said how he wound up in a wheelchair—and swears he never will—but whatever injury snapped his spine also curled up his fingers. He can work his thumbs okay, but his fingers look like their sides were super-glued and stuck together.

  "How much bacon can you eat?" he asks.

  "None."

  "You don't want bacon? Man, something is wrong."

  I regret my choice as soon as he lays the thick slices in the smoking pan. The sizzle of grease forces Teddy to turn his head. He doesn't consider turning down the flame.

  He yells over the spattering, "You think something bad happened?"

  "Yes."

  "Drew ain't no shrinkin' violet."

  "I never said she was."

  He paws paper towels off the roll secured to the lower cabinet. As always, I feel an urge to help. But the one time I tried, he seemed insulted.

  "Let's say Drew didn't high-tail it out of town. What would be your first step?"

  "Identify the problem."

  "Which is . . . ?"

  "Drew is missing."

  "Then?"
<
br />   "Gather all the information."

  "Then?"

  "Form my hypothesis—Teddy, I know the scientific theory."

  "You forgot the whole point of it."

  "Test the hypothesis."

  "Right." He looks over. The green in his eyes looks both wise and wicked. "Which part you expecting me to help you with?"

  "Gathering the information."

  Suddenly his mouth drops open, he looks down. "You see that?!"

  I hurry over. "What's wrong?"

  "I'm paralyzed!"

  I glare at him. "Everything's a joke to you."

  "Ain’t it? You want me—a man in a wheelchair—to gather information? Raleigh, that's what I hire you for."

  For the past two summers, I've been Teddy's research assistant, collecting those rock samples.

  "But you know things," I tell him. "Things I don't."

  "Why don't you ask your dad to help?"

  He waits. I don't reply.

  "What I thought," he says. "You ain't told him."

  "I told him Drew's missing. Last night."

  "But I'll bet you left out this whole part about rootin' around for information. What else you hiding from him?"

  "The point is: if her parents weren't retarded, I wouldn't even have to do this."

  He cuts the flame and tongs the brown-almost-burned strips onto the paper towels. As the grease spreads through the paper like a flood, my mouth waters.

  "Raleigh, do you know who pays my salary at St. Catherine's? Parents."

  "So?”

  "Parents pay my salary. Drew's parents, for instance."

  "I'm sorry. But I need help, and my dad's got his hands full dealing with my mom. Okay?"

  Teddy rolls over the sink, tosses the tongs into the stainless steel tub. Then looks at me. "Does it help, knowing you're part of a long Southern tradition?"

  "The Harmons?"

  "I don't give a flip about that landed-gentry stuff. I'm referring to your having a crazy mother. It's a Southern tradition."

  "No, that doesn't help."

  "Well, there's always bacon."

  He offers me a slice.

  I bite down, and my mom's horror-breakfast evaporates. This bacon tastes of smoke and maple and meat. I close my eyes, feeling a dance on my tongue, and when I open them, Teddy is smiling.

  "All right," he says. "What d'ya need from me?"

  I smile back, relieved.

  But my heart is some weird mixture of glad and sad.