Sliding On The Edge (16 page)

The vet was coming again tomorrow.
Kenny said he’d sleep in the barn tonight. She had nothing to worry
about, yet she couldn’t hold down the bile that crept into her
throat when she thought about the possibility that the gray might
not recover.

“
You have to make it, girl.
I need you. I need you desperately.” Kay buried her face in the
great neck.

Too many feelings swirled inside her.
Jackie’s phone call had brought back the day Nicholas told them he
was not going to college. He couldn’t. Jackie needed him. There was
a baby on the way.

“
If it’s too late for an
abortion, put the baby up for adoption. We’ll help you. We’ll take
care of the bills, the arrangements, anything. But please, Nic, go
to college!” She heard her words over and over. She watched
Nicholas take Jackie’s hand, lead her past his father, and out the
back door to his car. She never saw either of them
again.

The gray tossed her head. “Okay, girl.
You rest. I’ll be back to check on you.”

Kenny passed her on his way to his
trailer. “Missy will live,” he said. “How’s the mare?”

“
No change.”

Kenny nodded and walked on. After a
few steps he called to her. “Call came.”

Kay waved over her shoulder without
looking back at him. She went inside and down the hall to her
office, where she leaned against the door, watching Shawna, who sat
staring at the receiver in her hand.

“
I see you got your call.
She called earlier and I told her you’d be here about this time.”
Kay walked to the desk. “How’s the toe?”

She wanted to talk about something
else, yet she needed to know what Jackie wanted. She sat on the
couch, trying to look interested rather than anxious. “So what does
she want?”

She knew the answer before
Shawna said a word. Back to Las Vegas and that hell Jackie called a
life.
No!
She
wanted to scream.
You can’t go back. You
belong here.

“
She sounded . . . lonely, I
guess,” Shawna said. An expression of longing flitted across her
face.

An emotion other than
anger, Kay thought with surprise. Maybe I’m wrong in trying to keep
her here. Maybe she should be with her mother.

“
Yes, I’d imagine she did.”
Kay couldn’t stay in the room another minute. “I’ll go and start
dinner.” She ran out the back door and hid in the barn with the
gray until she’d cried it out, feeling somewhat better prepared to
fry chicken without self-destructing in the process.

Chapter 30

Shawna

I hate Sundays like I hate big snakes
with fangs. I hate Mondays like any kind of snake, so what’s to
choose? Today’s not going to be easy. My foot feels like it’s in a
bucket.

When Kay drops me off at the front
entrance, she looks worried. “Shawna are you sure you can walk on
that foot today?”

“
It’s fine.” I’m lying, but
I don’t want to stay on the ranch, watching the minute hands on the
kitchen clock all day. I limp up the steps and go
inside.

Casey is coming down the hall, so I
duck into the girls’ restroom. No way am I letting him see me, now
that I’m old limp-along. When I’m sure Casey’s gone, I make my way
to class. There I get lots of stares but no sympathy, except from
Mrs. Heady, and I can do without hers.

The Troll, aka Marta, smiles when I
make it to my seat at the back of the room. I don’t snarl at her,
but I don’t smile back, either. At least she doesn’t smell today.
Maybe she got the hint about the high correlation between her B.O.
and her lack of popularity with me.

I can do Mrs. Heady’s assignment
without breaking a sweat, so I finish in a flash and bury my head
under my arms. Naps help Mondays go faster.

“
Psst!”

What sounds like a leaky gas pipe
turns out to be Marta.

I roll my head to the side and glare
at her.

“
Here, take this,” she
whispers.

She’s holding a folded piece of paper
out to me across the aisle.

I sigh and snatch it from her hand.
What’s she up to now? Please tell me she doesn’t want to
bond.

The note reads, “My mom says I can
have a sleepover next weekend. Can you come?”

Oh, gawd! It’s an
invitation to sleep with The Troll. Now what? I know Mondays are
the worst, but this is the grimmest in history. Just bring on the
snakes and get it over with.

“
I’ll think about it,” I
whisper. And I’m not sure I’m hearing myself correctly.
What’s to think about?

When school’s over, it’s a major
relief to see Kay’s beat up old truck pull to a stop in front of
the school. Buster’s in back, yapping and shaking himself like a
berserk windup toy. I double-quick-hobble to the curb and hoist
myself inside.

“
How’s the toe,” Kay
asks.

“
Whaddya think? It still
hurts.”

“
We’ll check it when we get
home. Toes mend fast, especially when Kenny tends to them.” She
points at the seat belt.

Right.

We jostle home, and I mark
off another day at Sweet River High.
How
many hundreds are left, anyway? Who knows?

As “Dr. Fargo” kneels to unwind the
bandage around my big toe, I grip the chair in Kay’s office, which
doubles as our family clinic. But he doesn’t hurt me, and when I
look, the swelling is down and the toe looks pretty much the same
shape as it did before I Karate-kicked the fence post.

“
Looks like we won’t have to
amputate.” Kenny smiles up at me. “Stick your foot in this tub and
keep it there for ten minutes. I’ll be back.”

So now I’m stuck behind Kay’s command
central desk, with my foot in a tub of water. Does life get any
better?

The sharp sound of the phone on Kay’s
desk sends a lightning jolt right through me. I lift the receiver.
“Hello.”

“
Shawna. It’s me . . . Mom.”
Her voice fills my right ear, and I instantly get the
shakes.

She actually called
herself, Mom. That means she’s alone.

“
How are you, honey? . . .
Shawna? . . . You there, Baby?”

“
I’m here.”

“
Well, look. I’m back in
Vegas. That thing with Dylan didn’t work out.” She clears her
throat. “I’m really missing you, Sweetie. I need you to come on
back. I really mean that. We can find a place together and it’ll be
like old times!”

I pull the phone away from my ear and
stare at it. I wonder how she’d look if she were really tucked
inside that plastic case, wound in and out of all the pieces
connecting sound between Las Vegas and Sweet River.

“
Shawna? What the hell is
wrong with you? Why are you taking, like, forever to answer
me?”

“
I’m thinking,
Mom.”

Her sigh travels the miles, down the
dark Vegas alleys, across the flat desert, winding up through the
center of California, where it washes over me.

I lay my cheek on Kay’s desk and feel
the cool wood against it. I’ll disappear inside the dark
thick-grained surface, where nobody will ever find me. But I’ll
stare up at the ceiling, feeling the pressure of Kay’s hands, as
she writes letters and leans on me for balance. I’ll see the world
from a safe place, from a place that’s only for me.

“
Fuck, Shawna. How come you
have to give something like this so much thought? You and me make a
team, right?”

“
What, are you
broke?”

Now it’s her end that goes
quiet.

I can wait for her to come up with an
answer. I’ve waited before, sometimes I’ve waited all night, for
more important reasons than a yes or a no.

That night she brought Dylan home the
first time, that was a hundred years of waiting. I was zonked out,
nested inside my sheets on Tuan’s roll-away bed, when a voice
whispered in my ear. “Hey, come on baby, your big sister’s passed
out and I’m lonely.”

My big sister?
I’m dreaming, right? So I rolled over and punched
my pillow. That’s when his wormy fingers slid under my belly and
down my leg.

“
What in the . . .!” I was
up and standing before he could get off his knees by the bed. “I
gotta pee. I’ll be right back.”

He sprawled across my roll-way and I
staggered to the bathroom.

Click.
Door locked.

I realized my mistake too
late. No dry towels and only one skimpy bathmat. I pushed the mat
into the corner and curled up with my legs tucked against my chest.
Talk about misery! And my
big
sister
didn’t haul herself out of bed to
pee until two o’clock in the morning.

“
Look.” Mom’s phone voice
cuts through the memory of that night on the bathroom floor.
“Here’s a number you can call me at. I’m around after noon and
before ten. You know me, Shawna, that’s still kinda my schedule.”
She makes a noise that passes for a laugh. “Got a
pencil?”

“
Yes.” I pick up a pencil
and write the number.

“
Okay, hon, I gotta go. You
call me, okay? Shawna?”

“
I’ll call you.”

The phone hums. She’s gone.

“
I see you got your call.”
Kay is standing in the doorway. “She phoned earlier and I told her
you’d be here about this time.” She walks to the desk. “How’s the
toe?”

“
Kenny says I can keep it on
the foot.”

“
That Kenny! Makes things
light, doesn’t he?” Kay sits on the couch opposite the desk. “So
what does she want?”

I’ll bet Kay knows the
answer to that question already. She’s mining for information just
like that principal. They’re like a pair of cops. Well, give the
answer anyway. Play her game.
“She wants me
to go back to Vegas. Her boyfriend is out of the
picture.”

“
I see.”

I see? Look at Kay’s face.
She doesn’t see anything.
“She sounded . .
. I guess, lonely.”

“
Yes. I imagine she did.”
Kay stands. “I’ll go and start dinner.”

And she’s gone, just like
that! She can’t wait to pack me into the truck and drive me back to
the bus station. Good. Fine. Great. The sooner I’m out of here, the
better. I can forget all this Sweet River crap and get back to
where I belong.

Chapter 31

Kay

Wednesday, and the appointment with
the therapist, at first came too slowly, and then it came too soon.
Kay stood at her closet, looking for something to wear—something
not made of denim.

Would Shawna meet her on time in front
of the school? Would she cooperate during the session? Would the
session make a positive difference? In two hours, three people were
coming together to sort out several things that terrified Kay. Life
and death; Shawna and herself.

Kay chose the black suit from the two
she still kept for the occasional funeral or wedding, or that rare
trip to Sacramento, when she needed to see a ballet. She unzipped
the garment bag she’d hung it in a year ago. There weren’t that
many weddings anymore and, thank heaven, the funerals had tapered
off as well. When she lost her enthusiasm for seeing the ballet
alone, the black suits worked their way into the recesses of her
closet.

She glanced at her watch: 2:15 P.M.
She’d made the counseling appointment for 4:30 P.M., and Shawna
promised to meet her in front of the school at 3:00 P.M.

Beyond that, Shawna hadn’t promised
anything, especially cooperation.

Kay showered, dressed, and brushed her
dark hair into a sleek mane at the nape of her neck, where she
caught it in a burnished gold clasp. Gray strands threaded their
way alongside her temples, but, like her mother’s and
grandmother’s, her hair still looked like a forty-year-old’s. She
touched the skin under her eyes, which told a different
story.

“
Too much sun,” she said to
her image. “Grandmother warned you, but did you listen?” She
quickly daubed creamy lotion from a sample jar that some chirpy
clerk had thrust into her hand one day at Drugs For Less. “Maybe I
should get more of this stuff.”

“
Are you ready?” Kenny
called from outside.

She wriggled her feet into the black
heels she’d set by the bed, and felt her toes pinch tight against
each other. “Ugh.” Her feet couldn’t still be growing. She opened
her bedroom door and replied, “Coming.”

Kenny met her on the front porch. “My.
My. My. We do look fine.”

“
So, do I look like I’m on
the way to analysis?”

“
Nope. But it don’t matter
how you look. It matters how you feel.”

“
Does
stressed
give you some idea?” Kay
wanted to shove her hands into her pockets, but she didn’t have
any.

“
You got a filly that needs
help, and you’re giving her the only help you know how. Too bad she
ain’t truly a horse. Then we’d both know what to do, no
question.”