Saint Anything (28 page)

CHAPTER
23

IT WAS
Saturday morning, and I was just getting out of the shower. The first voice I heard when I opened the bathroom door was Ames’s.

“Julie? Got a minute?”

He stepped out into the hallway, his phone in his hand. Instinctively, I pulled my towel more tightly around me.

“Not really,” my mom called back from the War Room. “I’m kind of in the middle of something.”

“I have a feeling you’re not going to mind this particular interruption.” He smiled at me, broadly, as he walked to her open doorway. Then he held the phone out to her.

I had to give the guy credit. Presented with the possibility of being evicted from our house and daily life, he’d worked the only miracle he was capable of. I knew it the minute she said hello.

Peyton,
he mouthed at me anyway, still smiling.

Suddenly, my mom was breathless, laughing, her words coming quickly and close together. Even from another room, I could feel her mood brighten, picture her face, flushed and happy. Just like that, everything changes.

But not completely. Despite the fact that they talked for a full half hour—my mom not budging once from the War Room, as if taking a single step might break this spell—Peyton wanted to take things slowly. When she asked if she could visit, he told her no, not yet; the phone was all he was ready for. Later, I wondered how Ames had talked him around, what he’d said to break this stalemate. If mothers could lift cars off their babies when necessary, it made sense that a person could go even further for their own self-preservation.

I’d gotten so used to Peyton’s not calling that I was actually surprised when the phone rang one afternoon a couple of days later. After the recorded voice finished, I took a breath.

“Hey,” I said. “Long time.”

There was a pause; I heard voices in the background. “Yeah. Things got kind of . . . tense. It had nothing to do with you.”

Now I was quiet for a moment. Then I said, “It’s been tense here, too. Mom busted me with my friends over, and I was drinking. She freaked and has had me on lockdown since.”

“What? You were
drinking
?”

He sounded so surprised, outright shocked, that I wondered if he’d actually forgotten where he was calling from. “It was a sip,” I told him. “And—”

“Sydney, don’t get caught up in that stuff. You’re way too smart.”

“It was a
sip
,” I said again. “And she basically took everything away from me. It’s not fair.”

In the silence that followed, I realized that this was the closest I’d come to telling Peyton how I felt about what he’d done and how it affected all of us. Immediately, I felt I should backtrack, cover my steps. Like it was too much, too soon, but at the same time long overdue. I opened my mouth, but then he was talking.

“You’re right,” he said. A pause. “It’s not fair. It sucks. I’m so sorry.”

I was not prepared for what I would feel, hearing these three words. All this time I’d wanted something just like this from Peyton. But now that I had it, it kind of broke my heart.

“It’s all right,” I told him. And that was how we left it. All right, or the closest we could get. Still, I’d replay this conversation in my head again and again, trying to get used to how it made me feel. Like my Saint Anything, it was a comfort I hadn’t known I needed until it was finally in my grasp.

As the days passed and my mom’s mood steadily improved, I let myself get a little hopeful. The showcase was so close, and her being again distracted by Peyton could only work in my favor. I was biding my time before I mentioned it again: I went to school, to Kiger, and to my room, hoping my good behavior was noticed. The times I did have with Mac, plus the promise of more to come, were the only thing that got me through. From the minute I saw him before the first bell to the last kiss as I got into my car to leave for Kiger, the day was just better.

A couple times he called me up when the band gathered in the outbuilding behind his house so I could listen in while Brilliant or Catastrophic—the official name, for now anyway—practiced. I’d put my phone on speaker next to me as I sat at Kiger or in my room at my desk. Listening, I’d imagine the scene: Eric posturing at the microphone, Ford in his typical daze, Mac keeping the beat behind them. There were the sudden stops and starts, occasional blasts of feedback, and routine disagreements. Each time Layla sang, though, I got chills. I could only imagine what it would be like to hear her at Bendo in person. If I got to go.

When he wasn’t at practice, Mac was working. If he had deliveries near my neighborhood, he’d swing by Kiger just long enough for me to catch a glimpse and say hello. More often, though, we were texting. That Tuesday, I was shutting down my computer at Kiger when he wrote this:

Just had a weird delivery.

This was different, as he normally started with the order, daring me to guess who’d placed it.

What was it?

Large pepperoni. Garlic knots.

Even I knew this was the most generic of tickets; it could be anyone. Or everyone. I was about to text back that I needed more details when the phone pinged again.

I think it was that kid.

I raised my eyebrows, confused.
What kid?

A pause. Jenn came out of the conference room, shutting the hallway light off behind her. “You ready to get out of here?”

“Yeah,” I said. “One second.”

Ibarra?

I stared at this word, the letters at first not coming together. Like when you’ve looked at something so much, it starts to feel like a different language. Jenn was by the door now, pulling her backpack over one shoulder. I came from behind the counter, following her out, then stood there as she typed in the security code and locked the door behind us.

“See you tomorrow?” she asked me. I nodded, and she started across the lot toward her car. As I walked to mine, I pulled up Mac’s name from the top of my Favorites and hit
CALL
.

“How did you know it was him?” I asked as soon as he picked up.

“I didn’t, not at first,” he replied. Clearly, he was not surprised I’d skipped a hello. “I’ve actually delivered there before. It’s a ranch, over off—”

“Pike Avenue.” Of course I knew.

“Yeah.” He was driving: I could hear his turn signal clicking. “For some reason, today, I put it together. He’s a nice kid.”

Of course he was. And now, even though I’d seen him at SuperThrift with my own eyes not too long ago, he was more real to me than ever before. That’s what a random connection can do, that moment when separate things suddenly come together. Like fate tapping you on the shoulder so you’ll pay attention.

“I should go,” I said. “The last thing I need right now is to be late.”

A pause. Then: “You okay, Sydney?”

Was I? I couldn’t say for sure. After so long just paddling along, trying to keep my head above water, I felt like the tide was turning, sweeping me along with it. The showcase was in three days. David Ibarra was now not only a face, or a Ume.com page, but a place, one I could get to if I chose. For so long, I’d been waiting for something to happen, a change to come. Now that I could sense it getting ever closer, however, it was all I could do not to step back.

* * * 

It was time.

“Mom?”

My mother looked up from her desk in the War Room. “Yes?”

“Can we talk for a second?”

Instead of responding, she shut the open folder in front of her. It was Wednesday evening, a time I’d chosen after deciding it was not
too
far ahead of Friday, while at the same time not the last minute. I’d also waited until after the nightly call from Peyton, when I knew I had the best chance of catching her in a good mood. Clinching the deal, both my dad and Ames were out. It was now or never.

“I wanted to talk to you about Friday,” I began, “and the showcase I told you about.”

The crease appeared between her eyebrows: not a good sign. “Showcase?”

“Mac and Layla’s band?”
Don’t panic,
I told myself.
This might work in your favor.
“It’s an all-ages show? You said you’d think about it?”

It was not good to be speaking only in questions; confidence was key. Time to regroup.

“It starts at seven,” I told her, as if she’d already agreed and we were just hashing out details. “They’re second on the bill. So I’d be home by ten at the latest.”

The crease deepened. I wished I hadn’t noticed. “I thought we said we’d start a bit more slowly than a night at a club, Sydney.”

“I haven’t done anything or been anywhere for weeks, Mom.”

She sighed, already tired of this conversation. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea. Why don’t you call Jenn and Meredith, see if they want to do something?”

“It’s not the same,” I replied, although I knew that was exactly why she’d suggested it. “Mom.
Please
say I can go. Please?”

Already I’d arrived at the last resort of the truly desperate: begging. Next time, I thought, no planning, no strategy. Just the fact I was already thinking of next time only confirmed the obvious: I was done here. Still, I stood there and made her say it to my face.

“Honey, no,” she told me. Then she gave me a sad smile, which just made it worse. “I’m sorry.”

And that was that. My Hail Mary, the field goal kick that could win the game but instead went so wide you felt stupid for expecting anything different. I could have stood there and pleaded more, circled back to all the bullet points and arguments I’d compiled. But there was no use. My mom was a lot of things, but a waffler wasn’t one of them. Once a no, it stayed that way.

“It’s okay,” Mac said to me the next morning, when I told him about this at my locker before the first bell. I’d actually started crying, which was so humiliating, not to mention unattractive. “It’s one show. There will be others.”

“What did you
do
?”

I turned, and there was Layla, glaring at him.

“Nothing,” Mac said.

“The girl is crying, Macaulay.” She dug in her purse, pulling out a pack of Kleenex and holding it out to me. “You guys better not be breaking up right now. If I can’t be in a happy couple, I at least need proximity to one.”

“It’s not him,” I told her, taking a couple of tissues. “It’s my mom.”

Just saying this set me off again, so I busied myself trying to get cleaned up. Mac said, “She said no about the showcase.”

“You’re crying about
that
?” Layla sighed. “Please. I wish someone would tell me I couldn’t go. Eric’s already so bossy and insufferable. It’s only going to get worse. Did Mac tell you that he wants us all to meditate before the show now?”

I was touched: I knew she was humoring me. “What?”

“Apparently,” she said, leaning against the locker beside mine so we were shoulder to shoulder, “that’s what serious bands do before big gigs. Meditate and visualize. He claims it will get us on the same mental plane, ‘in spiritual harmony before we make actual harmony.’”

I sniffled. “That sounds like a direct quote.”

“Of course it is!” She put her head on my shoulder. “You’ll be missed. But it’s just one stupid night. Sadly, there will probably be others.”

The bell rang then: time for class. The clock was never in my favor. Mac slid his arm around me, pulling me closer to him. “You going to be okay?”

“Yeah,” I told him, reaching for his hand. He gave mine a squeeze, then held on for a beat longer before pulling away. As he walked down the hallway to his class, I started crying again.

“Young love,” Layla said, handing me another tissue. I wiped my eyes, embarrassed. They were right: it was just one night, one show. But I wasn’t a big crier; my emotions, so sudden and fierce, had surprised me. So much, in fact, that it wasn’t until later in the day that I realized the most shocking thing at all. It wasn’t that I’d broken down, but that I hadn’t been alone when I did so. You only really fall apart in front of the people you know can piece you back together. Mac and Layla were there for me. Even if, and especially when, I couldn’t do the same for them.

CHAPTER
24

“DID YOU
make plans with Jenn?”

My mom felt bad about saying no to the showcase. Not enough to change her mind, of course. But if I’d asked for just about anything else, I had a feeling my chances were good. Too bad it was the only thing I’d wanted.

“No,” I replied, shutting the dishwasher.

I could feel her watching me as I picked up a dish sponge and wiped down the counters. In the dining room, my father and Ames were still at the table, continuing a discussion that had begun over dinner about movement on the job/housing front. When this came up, it was obvious Ames was surprised. Clearly, he’d assumed that reconnecting my mom and Peyton had bought him more than just a few days. I could have told him that my parents never forgot anything. Once they brought something up, it was always still on the table, even if you chose not to see it.

“Well,” he’d said to them, reaching for another piece of bread, “my lead at the Valley Inn didn’t pan out. But I’ve got applications in at a few other places.”

“And apartments?”

Ames looked at my mom. “Is it a problem, my being here?”

“We’ve talked about this,” my dad told him. “This stay was meant to be temporary, as well as dependent on you actively seeking alternative arrangements.”

“There’s nothing out there,” Ames told him, buttering his bread. He had a lot to learn. At the very least, he should stop eating. “The job market . . . it’s tough right now.”

My dad looked at my mom, who reached down to the empty chair beside her and pulled out a folder, putting it on the table. Uh-oh.

“I took the liberty of examining the classifieds today. I found six positions you’re qualified for. And too many roommate want ads to count.”

Ames was chewing, staring at her, as she slid the folder across to him. Finally, he swallowed. “If you guys want me out, I’m out,” he said.

Silence. This was
his
Hail Mary. “I think that’s best,” my mom told him. “Peyton?”

“I agree.” My dad picked up his napkin and wiped his mouth. “We appreciate all you’ve done for us. But this is better for everyone.”

I was in shock. Funny how the world works. You don’t get the something you really covet, but then the universe provides unexpected compensation. Here I thought you had to make a wish for it to come true.

Ames, true to form, was not going down easy. First, he tried to negotiate for another month. Then a week, followed by the rest of this one. As his offers got lower and lower, it became that much harder to watch, which was why my mom and I had gone into the kitchen. My dad, however, was in his element. He could go all night, and I had a feeling he might have to.

They were still there when I went up to my room at seven thirty. The showcase had started at seven, and Irv had promised me he’d message me on HiThere! when they went on at seven forty-five so I could watch on my phone. In the meantime, I was with them in spirit, via dueling text message exchanges with Mac and Layla.

Layla:
Eric just informed me that my outfit isn’t meta enough. What the hell does that mean?

Not enough black?
I wrote her back.

Mac:
Our sound check sucked and everyone’s fighting about clothes. Kill me now.

You’ll be great,
I replied to him.

There was a sound out in the hallway, past my half-open door. I paused, listening. A moment later, I heard my mom moving around the War Room and went back to my phone.

Lot of people here,
Layla had written in the interim.

Nervous?

No.
A pause. Then:
Yes.

Another beep. Mac:
Might have to smack Eric. For common good.

Try to resist,
I wrote him back.
Hear you have a big crowd.

Showcase does. Not us.

Typical,
I thought. Back to Layla.

Not right w/out you. Wish you were here.

Beep. Mac. I flipped back to his screen.
Rather be at Commons Park with you.

It was dizzying, carrying on both of these conversations at once. So I was grateful that I could give them each the same answer.

Me too.

It was seven forty-five when Irv sent the HiThere! invite. I hit
ACCEPT
and then he appeared, his face taking up the entire screen. I could barely hear him, the noise of the crowd was so loud.

“They are taking the stage,” he reported, as a girl with platinum hair bumped him from behind.

“How was the first band?”

“Awful. Basically amplified screaming. We’re lucky there’s anyone still here.” He shifted, letting a guy in a leather jacket pass. “Everyone’s in place but Eric. He’s . . . Oh, here he comes. He’s making his entrance through the crowd.”

I lay back on my bed, smiling. “Of course he is.”

Some music was beginning, just a couple of chords, a bit of drumming. “Okay,” Irv yelled. “You ready?”

Outside my doorway, someone was passing by. But for once, I didn’t care. “Yes,” I said. “Show me.”

I turned my phone sideways just as the picture changed. Thanks to Irv’s perfect vantage point and massive reach, I could see the entire stage, as well as the first row of the crowd pressed up against it. There was Eric in his fedora, angling himself at the microphone. To his right was Ford, shuffling his big feet. And on the other side, Layla, in her cowboy boots and a red dress, hair pulled back loosely at her neck. Eric glanced at her, smiled, and began to play.

Nervous for them, I touched my Saint Anything pendant, then turned up my phone volume as loud as I could. As Eric launched into the lyrics of the Logan Oxford song I knew by heart, I reached to the picture, pinching it further open, closer in. A moment to focus, and I found what I wanted. He was bent over his drums, playing hard, his hair hanging in his face. Maybe I was the only one looking closely. I’d never know. But he wasn’t invisible, not to me.
There you are,
I thought.
There you are.

* * * 

Any word?

Not yet.

It was after midnight, and all the bands had performed. Now it was just up to the judges and showcase sponsors to pick a winner. Meanwhile, we waited, everyone else at the club and me in my room. I was trying to study, but couldn’t focus, distracted by Mac and Layla’s collective nervousness (I had never texted this much in one short period, which was really saying something) as well as the noise I kept hearing from the room next door. Not just talk radio this time, but the sound of packing.
Angry
packing.

I hadn’t realized it was happening until after their set was over. They’d played well, with Layla’s song a highlight, and although the final chorus from the last number got a bit bungled, I was pretty sure nobody else noticed. Throughout, the music was loud, even through my phone speaker, as was the applause and cheering that followed it. Once Irv and I hung up, it was suddenly very quiet. That’s when I heard the first thump, followed shortly after by the knock of a drawer being slammed shut. By the time the closet door slammed, my parents were outside my door.

“Ames is leaving in the morning,” my mom told me when I opened it. “We just wanted to let you know.”

Another bang. My dad raised his eyebrows. I said, “Is everything okay?”

“Yes,” he told me. “It was a mutual decision.”

The continuing racket of the next hour said otherwise. Every drawer opened was closed with emphasis, the closet door rattling its frame after each use. It was concerning enough that, in the sudden quiet during one of Ames’s smoke breaks, I went over, poking the door open and peering in. I glanced over my shoulder, then went to the bed, where a row of boxes sat waiting. One was filled with books, paperback novels and a couple of titles about recovery and addiction. Another held some linens and towels, a few balled-up socks. The last was odds and ends: coffee cups, lighters, charging cords. In one corner was tucked a stack of pictures.

The one on top was of him and Peyton, standing on a sandy beach, probably during their Jacksonville trip. They had their arms around each other’s shoulders and were smiling. I flipped to the next: my brother again, this time at our kitchen table, a coffee drink at his elbow. He had one eyebrow raised, half-annoyed, waiting for the shutter to click. A shot of Ames and Marla standing in front of a Christmas tree. The last, at the bottom, was from Peyton’s graduation dinner at Luna Blu. I remembered my mom handing the waitress her phone so we could all be in it. My brother was in the middle in a crisp white shirt, my parents on either side of him. I was next to my mom, with Ames beside me, Marla on his other side. We were all smiling, the twinkling lights above us blurring as the flash popped.

Distantly, I heard my phone beep. I dropped the picture back into the box with the others, then went back to my room, where I walked over to my bed to see if the text I’d gotten was the one I’d been waiting for, about the showcase outcome. It wasn’t.

On way to hospital.
This time, Mac had written for both of them.
My mom. It’s bad.

* * * 

There’s a lot you can do with a phone. Send a message or a picture. Get the weather, news, or horoscope. See and talk to someone in real time, play games, pay for parking. One thing technology still hadn’t mastered, though, was the actual act of being there. I’d been all right with settling for distance with the showcase. But not this.

It didn’t even occur to me to ask permission to go to the hospital. It was well past midnight and I’d had enough negative responses to more reasonable requests. Instead, in those panicked minutes after getting that three-sentence text, I put my phone aside, sat down at my desk, and wrote a note.

I wasn’t kidding myself. I knew my mom would probably only get to the second sentence before coming after me, disregarding the rest. It seemed important, though, that for this last argument, I get to have my say. If I was to be sentenced, I wanted the details of my crime, too, to be clear.

Mom,

I’ve gone to U General. Layla and Mac’s mother is there, and I want to be there for them. I never wanted to disobey you, that night in the studio or now. I’m not Peyton. I’m doing this because I’m a good friend, not a bad daughter. I know you might not understand, but I hope you will try.

I left it on the keyboard of my open computer. Then I got my purse and jacket and left, shutting my door behind me. After all these months of watching the clock and biding my time, I knew I only had so long before being found out. I wasn’t the only one who could always hear the garage door opening.

Downstairs, the house was dark, except for one light on in the kitchen. I glanced in: it was empty. But then, when I put my hand on the door to the garage, someone was right behind me.

I felt a presence first, the heaviness of a body. Then heat. Finally, breath, right on the back of my neck. I froze, and a hand appeared right in front of my face, fingers spread across the door.

“And where are you going?”

Instinctively, I gripped the knob, turning it, and pulled hard. The door didn’t budge. I closed my eyes, willing myself to turn around, even though I knew it would mean us being face-to-face, if not nose to nose.

“Leave me alone,” I said to Ames, struggling to keep my voice both low and firm.

“Sydney, it’s midnight.” His voice was high, mocking. Clearly audible. Shit. “I don’t think your parents would like this.”

I turned around. All I could smell was cigarette smoke. We were uncomfortably close. I couldn’t step back, as I was against the door. He chose not to.

“Leave me alone,” I repeated. Instead, he moved in. When I lifted my hands, palms out, to push him back, he grabbed my wrists.

I surprised myself with the sound I made, a gasp, almost a shout. All this time, with him first just around, then living under our roof, I’d considered myself trapped. But I hadn’t been. I saw it clearly, now that I really was.

“Ames,” I said, but now my voice was wavering, “back off.”

Hearing this, he smiled, then tightened his grip on my wrists, pushing them back, back, against my ears. That was when I got scared.

But as he leaned in, closing his eyes, I knew I had to act. I’d been passive for so long. Watching TV all those long, lonely afternoons. At the nearby table, not telling my parents the things that scared me. All around, in this house, there were evidence and symbols of the girl I’d been but no longer wanted to be. Peyton wasn’t the only one locked up inside something.

I tried to turn my head as he put his lips on mine, squeezing my eyes shut, but he grabbed my face, jerking me back to face him. I could feel his fingers digging into my chin. “I want you to look at me,” he said.

I kept my eyes closed. “No.”

“Sydney.” The grip tightened. “Look at me.”

“No.” My voice came out tight, like a scream. It was only when I heard it that I realized my right hand was free.

“Just—” he began, but then my palm was connecting with his face, the sound of skin to skin loud, a smack, and he stumbled backward, bumping into the wall behind him. I reached down for the doorknob, now pressed into my spine, my fingers grappling and sliding, trying to get a grip on it. I’d just twisted it open and turned around, almost free, when he grabbed me around the waist. This time I
did
scream, and pulled as hard as I could away from him, throwing every bit of my weight in the opposite direction. I wasn’t budging, totally stuck, and then suddenly, in a snap of a moment, I was stumbling forward, loose, down the steps to the garage.