Here Where the Sunbeams Are Green (8 page)

Oh yeah. The Spanish tutor. I’d almost forgotten.

When Mom stands up after Roo falls asleep, the metal bunk bed creaks. The mattresses are thin and covered in plastic, and I can feel the bed swaying. I look down at Mom standing there barefoot in her tulip dress. She bought that dress for this trip. She said she thought Dad would like it. She seemed to have forgotten that Dad never notices what anyone is wearing. He’d let us wear our Halloween costumes to the pizza parlor in June. And he thought she was terrifically smashing no matter what she wore. Sometimes he would even say she looked smashing when she looked
awful
, like right after Roo was born. Even though I was only three I remember how scary-ugly Mom looked then. The tulip dress swirls around Mom’s feet. It seems wonderful to me again, not shabby, the way it seemed this afternoon. It must be made of silk.

“Hey, Mom.”

“Hey, Mad.”

“Is that a silk dress?”

“Nope. It’s rayon.”

Even in the not-very-nice light of the single bulb hanging from the ceiling, Mom looks nice. Her reddish hair all wild from the humidity. The freckles on her face and her arms too. I wish we could sleep with her tonight like we used to when The Weirdness began. We’d curl up, me and Mom and Roo, like three squirrels. But Mom says she has a hard time sleeping with Roo kicking her every thirty seconds.

Mom stretches up to kiss my forehead and then my nose. Before The Weirdness, she smelled fresh, like grapefruit and grass, but lately she smells different to me, and older, like dust, or black pepper. At first this creeped me out, but now it’s just the way Mom smells. She smiles at me innocently, as though she doesn’t know what I’ve been thinking, which of course she doesn’t. Then she gives me a final kiss, which is what Roo and I call The Bad Kiss. See, there’s this one kind of kiss Mom gives that we can’t stand: she gets high up on your cheek, really close to your ear, and makes this loud kissing sound that makes you go deaf for a few seconds. I
hate
The Bad Kiss, but I’ve never in my whole life said anything because it is very, very mean to criticize the way someone kisses you. I’m still recovering from The Bad Kiss when Mom reaches up to pull on the chain attached to the lightbulb, and then we’re in darkness.

I hear all sorts of noises I didn’t hear before, grumblings and hoots and groans. I think about asking Mom to turn the light back on and leave it on, but when I open my mouth, what comes out is, “Everything will be normal again someday, right?” Even though it’s dark I can tell that Mom becomes very still, her bare feet no longer making the sticky sound of footsteps.

“Madpie,” she says, her voice terribly gentle, “good night, little one. I love you.”

She’s silhouetted for a second by the blue light of the pool and the pink fluorescent light of the
SELV L DGE
sign before the metal door slams shut.

After just a few seconds I start to feel like the sounds of the jungle are inside my head. Shrieking, moaning, flapping, yipping. The darkness more scary than velvety, the jungle noises more freaky than friendly. And the faucet of the little sink in the bathroom. It drips. I try to calm myself down by picturing all the things in the room. The foggy mirror that makes our faces look like blobs with blobs of hair on top, mine brown like Dad’s and Roo’s reddish like Mom’s. The metal closet. The bare lightbulb. The window with no curtain. Our red rolly suitcase on the floor. Roo asleep below me. The orange metal door through which Mom disappeared. Will those little neon-green lizards stay on the door all night? Am I scared of them or do they seem like cute sidekicks? Not to complain or anything, but the Selva Lodge is kind of a weird place. Outside, and inside, growlings and scrapings.

And that’s when I realize it: The Creepies have followed us here. They aren’t just in Denver, surrounding our house, making us feel like we’re being spied on, forcing Mom to call Ken/Neth and invite him to dinner and ask if he’s heard anything from Dad. They’re also here. Scaring me in the night. As though there are eyes everywhere. Wouldn’t you think that by coming all the way down here, to a whole other country, we might get away from The Creepies?

“Mom!” I yell. “MOM!” I’m sure she’s already in her room, reading a book in bed, and even if she were right outside, the metal door is so thick she probably couldn’t hear anyway.

I have to get out of here. I can’t stand to be stuck alone in the dark with The Creepies. No way am I going to be able to fall asleep. I
climb down from the top bunk and glance at Roo. In the tiny bit of bluish light coming from outside, I can see her sucking her thumb. She never sucks her thumb anymore. I tug on her arm to pull her thumb out of her mouth but she’s fast asleep and her muscles are surprisingly tense. I can’t move her hand at all. Roo is the World’s Best Sleeper. Even The Creepies never kept her from sleeping well. I wish she’d wake up to keep me company. But she doesn’t, and I’m old enough to know I shouldn’t wake her. I don’t want her to have to be awake, thinking about everything the way I am. I’m jealous that she can sleep like that after a day like this, but I guess I’m glad for her too.

I don’t even try to find my flip-flops before grabbing the key and stumbling out of the room, barefoot. It’s nice to be outside. The air feels warm and humid and jungly inside my nose. I’m about to knock on Mom’s door when I spot two figures sitting on lawn chairs by the pool.

It’s Mom. And Ken/Neth. Talking quietly. My heart stutters.
Why
does he have to have such a big crush on her? If he could just see her with Dad for two seconds—with Dad the way he used to be, I mean—he’d understand that he’d never in a billion years have a chance with her.

Something stops me from calling out to Mom and Ken/Neth, from saying hi and waving and going over to sit with them and telling Mom about The Creepies. Instead, I walk very quietly into the flowering bushes alongside the pool fence behind them. At first they’re talking about boring stuff. Ken/Neth is telling Mom about all the different awards La Lava’s yoga program has won. Yawn. But anything beats being alone with The Creepies.

Then, out of the blue, Mom says, “I miss him so much.” She turns to face Ken/Neth and I can see the tendons in her neck (her
neck is so long and elegant but the tendons can be scary; they only come out sometimes but never used to come out at all, back before you-know-what).

Ken/Neth puts his hand on Mom’s shoulder. Gross.

“I just keep wondering what’s going on with him—what’s going on?” Mom murmurs. “It doesn’t make sense. Unless—is he in love with that woman? That gorgeous woman? It would explain so much. He kept looking over at her today, as though he was asking her permission for every single thing he did.”

Ken/Neth strokes Mom’s shoulder. Stomachache.

“But he’s not like that!” Mom says. “He’s never been like that!”

“He’s not like that,” Ken/Neth agrees. Ten points for Ken/Neth, finally saying the right thing for once in his life.

“He kept looking at her, though,” Mom says. “She
is
stunning. I’m just an old lady in comparison.”

“Oh, Sylvia, you’re lovely,” Ken/Neth sighs. Shut it, Ken/Neth.

“I miss him so much,” Mom says again. “I miss him so much. I miss him so much.” She’s crying now. Ken/Neth keeps stroking her shoulder.

I’ve never seen Mom like this. Not even when The Weirdness started. She always stayed very, very, very calm.

I really can’t handle hearing her say that over and over again. It’s just … too true. So I have to go, back into the night, alone.

I curl up later with Roo and she wets the bed.

It figures, I guess.

T
he next morning Roo and I are hanging out in Mom’s room, watching her get ready for the yoga retreat. Here’s the problem: She doesn’t have any yoga pants.

“I don’t even know what yoga pants are, really,” she says. “But they told Ken/Neth to tell me I need them. Maybe I’ll just wear my running shorts?”

Right then there’s a soft knock at the door and my stomach falls. Ugh. Please don’t let it be Ken/Neth, butting in again on the few little moments Mom and Roo and I get to be alone together.

“Did you hear a knock?” Mom says. “Go check, Mad.”

I drag my feet the whole way to the door, and when I open it I almost faint. It’s the guy from the Selva Shop. Golden as ever.

“Um, hello?” I say in an unfriendly way, but just because I’m nervous.

“
Hola,
” Mom says to him in her bad Spanish accent. “Come on in.”

I realize that I’m standing there blocking the doorway, my hands on my hips, so I move to the side and he steps into the room.

“Good morning,
señora
,” he says to Mom. “Señor Candy says he’s bringing the golf cart around for you.”

His English is
perfect
—no accent at all!

“Hey,” I say, shocked, “I thought you couldn’t speak English!”

“I went,” he says to me.

“What?”

“
I went
,” he repeats.

“You went where?” For some reason my voice comes out sounding angry, and I’m blushing a ton.

“
Fui,
” he says, “it means
I went. I went to Volcán Pájaro de Lava
on the front, and on the back,
And you?
”

Oh yeah. That ugly T-shirt in the Selva Shop.

“Okay,” I say nastily. “I wonder why you couldn’t have told me that yesterday.” What is
wrong
with me? Why am I being this way?

He just smiles.

“I can’t believe you speak
English
,” I mutter.

“Mad!” Mom says. “Relax!” Then she turns to Mr. Perfect English, all smiles, and says, “So, I take it you’ve met?”

“Well, I’m from Ohio,” he tells me, “so, yes, I speak English.”

“O
hi
o?”

“Yeah, but we don’t know each other’s names,” Roo says to Mom.

“Well then,” Mom says, “let’s do our formal introductions.”

“Of course,
señora
,” he says, nodding politely, though there’s something in his nod that’s not quite polite, as though he’s rolling his eyes at us even though he’s not rolling his eyes.

“Please, call me Sylvia.” I can tell Mom already thinks he’s wonderful. She thinks he’s a
very intelligent young man
. “Girls, meet Kyle.”

“Hi, Kyle!” Roo practically shouts.

Kyle is
not
the right name for Kyle. Kyle is a name for one of the Popular Boys at school: Kyle is blond hair, blue eyes, good at sports,
and always throwing too hard during dodge ball in gym class. This Kyle should be called … Mars, or something like that.

“Kyle,” Mom continues, “meet Ruby and Madeline.”

“You can call me Mad,” I say, astonishing myself. Roo and Mom turn to stare at me. In the past I’ve only ever let Mom, Dad, and Roo call me Mad.

“Mad as in
mad
?” Kyle smiles as though he’s made a joke.

I hope I was right to say he could use my nickname.

“Well,” Mom says cheerily, “looks like everything should be fine around here, then.”

“What about the babysitter?” Roo asks. “And the Spanish tutor?”

Why
did she have to mention the babysitter in front of Kyle?

Mom looks puzzled and gestures at Kyle.

And my legs turn to total Jell-O while Mom informs Kyle that we have notebooks for the Spanish lesson, that we can order lunch at the Selva Café and charge it to the room, that we should get in the pool if we want, et cetera.

“Okay, girls, now you be good students today, okay?” Mom says, opening the door.

“Okay, Mom, now you be a good student today, okay?” Roo says right back at her.

Mom just smiles. From outside the gate Ken/Neth honks the golf cart horn twice. “All aboard, Sylvia!” he yells.

And I stand there quietly freaking out, because I just can’t believe this golden-eyed teenager is my babysitter.

Once Mom is gone, Kyle refuses to speak a word of English. He jibbers and jabbers in Spanish as he leads us toward the pool, and I can hardly believe he’s the same super-silent guy we saw in the Selva Shop yesterday. All this Spanish makes me tired. I can’t understand
anything
. Maybe he’s saying, “You’re two ugly little monkeys and you’ll never learn a word of Spanish. You’re so ugly and stupid I feel bad for you.” Or maybe he’s saying, “Mad, you are so amazing. I know you’re only twelve-almost-thirteen but please will you be my girlfriend?” Or maybe he’s saying, “This is the
pool
. This is the
table
. This is the
chair
. That is the
sky
.” Whatever it is, there’s no way for us to know.

“How do you say ‘Can we please go to the jungle, please?’ in Spanish?” Roo interrupts him.

“
¿Por favor, podemos ir a la selva, por favor?
” Kyle says.

Roo repeats the question with a perfect accent, and then adds, “I’m serious, Kyle, we really have to go there right away, it’s very important,” as though she’s known Kyle forever.

Oh great. She’s still stuck on this whole Poor-Dad-we-have-to-figure-out-what’s-going-on-it-must-have-something-to-do-with-the-jungle-his-hand-on-my-head-was-a-code thing. Man, I really do wish I was still young enough to believe this crazy stuff, like that Dad needs our help, that he hasn’t stopped caring about us, that the only thing standing between us and the way our life used to be is a march into the jungle.