Finding Someplace (2 page)

“I've got dinner going, so I'm going to take a shower. You can make the salad and—” Her mother stopped in the middle of her directions as she noticed Reesie's skirt.

“Oooh!” Her tone changed. “You've finished? Turn around! Let me see!”

Reesie spun on her toes.

“She finished it?” Junior yelled from the family room. Reesie had to admit to herself that it was actually kind of cool to have a brother who was genuinely interested in her life. She smiled.

Mama folded her arms and nodded. “Ma Maw would be proud of you,” she said. “You'll look sharp on your birthday. I've already called Miss Martine to order your cake.”

“Let me get a picture with my phone!” Junior crowded their mother out of the doorway.

Reesie made a face at him.

“Tell her to make nice, Mom!” he said.

“Reesie, Boo, make nice. I'm going into the shower.”

Reesie faked an attitude after her mother left the room. “Junior, do
not
take any pictures. I still have to hem it. Can't you wait?” She slammed her door.

“
Project Runway
can't wait!” Junior sang to her from the other side. “You're gonna be the first designer from New Orleans to take the prize, girl!”

Reesie changed back into shorts and carefully hung up her skirt. For a minute she imagined that Ma Maw would be there next Saturday at her party. Ma Maw, alive again to see Reesie's first design. Alive again to see her turn thirteen. Reesie flicked the light off on the sewing machine before going out to the kitchen.

From the counter she had a view of her brother draped across the sofa in the family room. He was shoving handfuls of potato chips into his mouth and watching TV.

“You eat too much junk,” she said.

Junior looked over his shoulder and mumbled, “What?”

Reesie dug into the fridge for cucumbers. “I said, ‘Don't you miss my famous salad when you're up at Tech?'”

“Yeah, right.” Junior laughed. Then he said, “Yo, Reesie, you know I'm leaving tomorrow to go back to school. I might not be able to come home next weekend, okay?”

Reesie pouted and ripped a head of lettuce apart.

“So you'll miss my birthday? Oh, I see.” She sounded playful, but she was a little hurt. Junior could make a party
live
!

“Hold up! I have swim drills. Not my fault!” He was trying to apologize, but he'd picked the wrong way to do it.

“You're dropping me for that
swim team
?” Reesie furiously tore lettuce. She absolutely hated swimming and swimming pools, because when she was five, she'd slipped and fallen into a public pool. Her mother dove in right away to get her, but Reesie had been terrified of that kind of water ever since. She took showers, not baths.

“Sorry! Sorry!” Junior threw his hands up.

Reesie changed the subject. “Okay, fine. So how come you keep going into my room, switching my TV channels?”

“Because I'm trying to see what's up with this latest storm. As usual nobody around here is paying attention. Remember last year? When the mayor told folks to be ready to evacuate with some cash in their pockets?”

Reesie stopped slicing tomatoes, remembering the tourists' conversation at Caf
é
Du Monde. It
was
hurricane season, and this
was
New Orleans. Every summer they had to live with the threats of these wild storms churning themselves up into monsters full of wind and rain. The weather people gave them friendly sounding names like Andrew or Betsy. What real friend would come through and destroy your home the way a hurricane did?

“Not too many people left town,” she said, thinking of how Ayanna's family had packed their car and driven north to Shreveport for a few days while the Boone family stayed put.

“That's what I'm talking about!” Junior said. “And you know the Weather Channel is saying—”

“A bunch of malarkey is what they're saying!” All at once their father came stomping into the kitchen, his policeman's handcuffs clinking at his side.

Reesie rolled her eyes at Junior, and together they mouthed along with his next words.

“No storm is gonna run
me
out! I'm New Orleans, born and bred!” He raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. “Y'all are laughing at your daddy?”

They both were.

“Our children have no respect for their elders, Lloyd!” their mother joked, coming to kiss their father hello.

“No respect.” Their father laughed, slipping around their mother to take a peek into one of the pots on the stove. Reesie grinned as she picked up her knife again.

“I've got tons of respect for you, Dad, but I kinda respect hurricanes a lot more!” Junior said. He leaned across the counter to snatch a chunk of cucumber.

“How did we get on the subject of the hurricane?” Mama asked.

“Junior's obsessed,” Reesie said, frowning as her mother threw another handful of sprouts into the salad bowl.

“Everybody is getting worked up for nothing,” Daddy said.

“Lloyd, it's not nothing. We still have to prepare for what might happen!”

“We'll put plywood over the windows so they won't get blown in, pull all the outdoor stuff inside. That's just common sense.” Daddy nodded. “A storm is no reason to get hysterical.” He looked at Junior.

Reesie smiled, but her mother shook her head. Jean Parker had never gotten used to hurricanes. She'd come from New Jersey to go to nursing school, and she met Lloyd Boone at a football game. She always told her kids that she fell in love with him and with New Orleans in that order.

“Mama, you know you're just freaked out because there aren't any hurricanes in Newark!” Reesie said.

“That's not entirely true, Reesie,” Mama said. “And, Junior, set the table!”

“Jeannie, this Katrina is still just a tropical storm,” Daddy said. “It hasn't even been upgraded to hurricane status.” He lifted the salad bowl. “And y'all don't forget—hurricanes change direction in a heartbeat. It could go off into the ocean somewhere.”

Junior clanked knives and forks onto the table. “So I guess no evacuation for Sarge Boone. You don't believe in the
e
word, do you, Dad?”

“Right now the only place I'm going is to the dinner table.”

“Good idea,” Mama said. “Let's let this subject rest.”

They sat down together. Reesie thought that was a great idea; she'd rather talk about getting ready for her birthday instead of some old storm.

“Daddy! I finished my skirt—”

“Reesie—” her mother interrupted. “Say grace, please.”

“Bless this food, and bless the sun so it shines hard on my birthday this weekend! And I hope that Sergeant ‘Superman' Boone is right about
this
storm!”

Reesie's father winked at her.

“Amen!” her mother said firmly. She smiled at Reesie and squeezed her hand.

Daddy nodded his approval and reached for the platter.

“You might be a teenager next week,” Junior said, “but you'll be my little sister
forever
! Come on now, Reesie Girl. Pass the rice. I'm starving!”

 

Chapter Three

A
UGUST 27, 2005

“Ladies and gentlemen, the designer of the year, Teresa Arielle Boone!”

The crowd went wild. Reesie was on the runway, and it was her own fashion show. Her shiny black hair was bone-straight and swinging, just like the short red skirt of her glittery spaghetti-strap dress. News cameras were flashing and digital cams were clicking. She was surrounded by models wearing the clothes she'd designed; Ayanna and Orlando were going crazy in the front row; and all the folks in the house were chanting her name.

“Reeee-see! Reee-see!” She was grinning and loving the excitement. The audience got louder. She blew them kisses.

“Reesie!” She looked out and saw her parents. She waved but then felt a funny sensation around her ankles. Water was lapping over her toes. She looked out at the people, and they were all gone. She was alone, and she was surrounded by water.

*   *   *

Reesie woke up shaking. It was always water in her dreams. She tossed and turned but couldn't fall back to sleep. The sun hadn't even started to glow behind the vertical blinds, but she was now wide-awake. She heard her parents' voices.

Usually, when both of her parents left for work so early, they drank coffee and whispered while Reesie peacefully slept. Not this time. They were arguing, something that almost never happened. She pulled her knees up in the dark and sat against her pillows.

“And in every storm scare,” her mother said, “you get called in to work overtime, triple time.… What if
we
need you?”

In just four days the tropical storm that Junior had been so obsessed with had turned into a bona fide hurricane. Already Katrina had hit Florida like a monster, and the weather reports were screaming that she was headed right for the Gulf Coast, possibly New Orleans.

“Jeannie, be fair. I'm a police officer. It's my job!”

“It doesn't have to be.” Her mother lowered her voice.

Reesie leaned forward, straining to hear more. The kitchen cabinet doors and fridge slammed open and closed.

“You could retire right now. You and Reesie and I could go together, just for a few days, to get out of harm's way.”

“It's Reesie that I'm doing this for, Jeannie. You know that!”

“Shhh!” Mama hushed him.

There was a long pause. All Reesie could hear was the hum of the central air-conditioning unit outside her window. How was
she
in the middle of the drama? She wanted to know, but at the same time she didn't.

This was supposed to be the perfect birthday weekend. She'd had it all planned: later this morning was her hair appointment, then Ayanna was coming over for a preview of the birthday outfit. Sunday would be her special dinner. And there would be her neighbor Miss Martine's lip-smacking coconut cake. But now it seemed like the universe just wasn't going to cooperate.

She heard chair legs scrape against the kitchen floor.

“Jeannie, baby, I know you worry over me and the job. I promise, soon as I bank a little bit more for Reesie's college—”

“Lloyd, we're okay with that!” her mother said.

So that was it. Reesie felt a little guilty, as if she were making trouble for her folks. Her mother went on, sounding calmer. “I'm just anxious. It's everything they're predicting about
this
storm.”

“Listen,” Daddy said, “if it eases your mind, I'll call Pete on my way to the station and have him take Reesie back to Baton Rouge with them tomorrow. She can stay over with them a few days. Missin' some school in the first weeks won't set her back at all.”

“I guess…” Her mother's voice trailed off.

Reesie settled back onto her sheets. Uncle Pete was her father's brother. He was also her
parraine
—her godfather. He was really cool and really laid-back. So was his wife, Tee Charmaine. Staying with them would make it feel like her birthday lasted extra long.

“I'm just not convinced it's gonna be that kind of dangerous, Jeannie. But I promise I'll call Pete … and next week we'll seriously talk retirement.” The front door clicked open. “Everything will be all right.”

“If you say so, Superman. Be safe out there,” Mama said.

“Yeah, I will. See ya, baby.” Daddy left.

Reesie pulled the covers up around her neck. “No more drama! No more drama!” she whispered to her pillow. Soon she was snoring.

When she woke up again, she blinked at the green numbers on her alarm clock. It was noon already, and she had a one-o'clock appointment at Bernice's Beauty Nest and Nail Salon! There was no time to eat. No time for TV. She jumped out of bed and tossed on a white T and denim shorts.

A trip to Bernice's could mean a couple of hours under the hair dryer, so she grabbed the backpack with her sketch pad and pencils in it and hurried out.

On the way, she thought about calling to tell Ayanna about her parents' fight. Ayanna would say that parents never agreed on anything—relax. And it would take Ayanna an hour to say all that. Instead Reesie texted,
HAIR@1. TALK L8R.

The street was calm and quiet, and the air was already muggy and uncomfortable. She walked faster, looking up. The sun was out, no clouds in sight. No sign of any storm of doom. It seemed like a perfectly normal summer day. But then she remembered the crazy dream she'd had—
that
scene had started out perfectly normal too.

“Don't try and kick up on
my
birthday, Katrina!” she shouted out loud to the sky, not noticing until too late that Miss M, the same Miss Martine who was baking her birthday cake, was half hidden between the leaves of her giant tomato plants three houses away. She was frowning.

“Child, you better watch what you say!” Miss Martine bellowed, raising her bushy white eyebrows over her gold cat-eye glasses. She was wearing pink eye shadow and black eyeliner, and her ruby red lips were puckered with disapproval.

Reesie had nowhere to hide, so she waved.

Miss Martine had on her afternoon wig, a short and curly silver 'do with streaks of black. She wore store-bought hair and makeup like she was performing on a stage every night, but it was her desserts that were practically world famous. Peach cobblers, banana puddings, pies … and her cakes! Anybody in the Ninth Ward would tell you that Miss Martine Simon could just
look
at food and it would taste good. Her coconut cakes made it to every birthday, wedding, or picnic in the neighborhood.

Miss Martine shook a gardening spade as Reesie came closer to the edge of her yard.