The Hard Kind of Promise (11 page)

Carly considered this seriously.

"I guess so," she said. "If you're doing it to get into college or because your parents are making you."

"So you mean," Sarah said, "it's normal to play the flute if you don't want to, and weird if you do?"

"Hey, I'm not making this up," Carly said. "It's common knowledge. Ask anybody. Music people are weird."

"That is the stupidest thing I've ever heard," Sarah said. "If it's common knowledge, how come Lizzie and I never heard it?"

"Look, it doesn't matter," Carly said. "I like you even if you're weird. It's not like I'm not going to be your friend or anything. I'm just telling you. I'm just trying to
help.
So you can get into a sport before it's too late."

"When is it too late?" Lizzie asked. Sarah could tell by her eyes that she felt as though Carly were jabbing her with a fork.

"By next year, everyone already knows how to play everything," Carly said. "So when you try out, you never get picked. You have to start a sport by seventh grade or it's hopeless."

Even though Sarah didn't like sports so far, she thought it was possible that she might like them someday. She didn't want to think that she couldn't change her mind about sports in high school, that there was a deadline that the people in charge had neglected to mention.

"How do you know all this?" she asked suspiciously.

"Everyone knows," Carly said.

"
I
didn't," Lizzie said.

"It's because you're singing all the time," Carly said. "If you're not hanging out with cool people, you miss a lot of information."

The night before their trip to L.A. they had Cotillion. Sarah and Lizzie got to the gym early. Lizzie looked glum.

"I can't stop thinking about what Carly said," she admitted as they stood by the back wall watching everyone else surge toward the refreshment table. "Do you think we're weird?" she added, her voice a whisper.

"No," Sarah said. She watched a few boys stuff some cookies into the pockets of their suit jackets. You were only supposed to take two. "Well, not weirder than anyone else. I mean, everyone is a little weird. Don't you think?"

Lizzie shook her head. "Not Alison Mulvaney. Not Steve Birgantee."

"Maybe they are," Sarah said. The mom at the refreshment table was holding out her hand, waiting for the boys to give back the cookies. "Maybe Alison secretly listens to fifties music. Maybe Steve is afraid of the dark and sleeps with a night-light. Things that, if
we
did them, would be weird. But because they do them, they're not."

"I don't understand why Alison and Steve get to decide what's cool," Lizzie grumbled. "They run the school, and no one else gets a say."

Gloomily they watched the crowd.

"I don't think Carly's my best friend anymore," Lizzie said.

Sarah could tell she was about to cry. "I'm sorry," she said.

"I can't stand what she said about singing being weird," Lizzie said. "If she doesn't get it about the singing..."

"I know," Sarah said.

"Don't say anything when she gets here," Lizzie said. "Just pretend everything's okay. I don't want to have a big conversation about everything here."

Sarah nodded, but she had stopped paying attention. Marjorie had entered the gym. She was wearing
another crazy old dress. This one had puffy sleeves and a bustle. She wasn't wearing a hat this time; her hair was in a bun, held in place by a black knit snood. Kids were staring and pointing at her, but she was pretending not to notice. She looked out over the crowd, as though she was waiting for someone.

"At least we have each other," Lizzie said.

Sarah smiled. It was nice to feel that she and Lizzie were getting closer, that they both knew what it felt like to lose a best friend, that by being sad about the same thing together, they were getting to know each other better. But then she caught sight of Marjorie and felt the happiness drain out of her like bath water. She and Lizzie had each other, but Marjorie had no one. The thought made Sarah's heart feel as though someone were stepping on it.

Lizzie had turned her attention back to the boys.

"Jason Webb is wearing orange socks!" she said, craning her neck to see. "Can you believe it?"

Sarah was about to look when she saw Joey Hooper, hair slicked back, wearing a suit that was way too big for him, making his way toward Marjorie.

It had never occurred to her that Marjorie actually was waiting for someone.

"And black sneakers instead of hard shoes!" Lizzie said. "He is so disgusting."

Joey and Marjorie began talking immediately. Marjorie had to bend forward because Joey was so short. Joey pulled a crumpled piece of paper out of his pants pocket and handed it to Marjorie, who read it and began to laugh. Sarah wondered if Joey had been working on the script for their movie, if they'd decided to add some jokes.

Or maybe they had jokes of their own that had nothing to do with the movie. Just jokes that best friends had.

"His pants should be longer," Lizzie said. "If his pants were longer, you wouldn't be able to see his socks."

Sarah nodded, barely hearing a word Lizzie said.

Grandpa was at the house when she got back. He was training Henry to sit and stay.

"Another thing he already knows how to do," Sarah said.

"How was Cotillion?" Grandpa asked, following her into her room, where Mom had started to pack. Henry trotted along behind them, eyes still fixed on Grandpa's pocket, bulging with treats.

"Okay," Sarah said. "We did the fox trot."

"Ooh, the fox trot!" Mom stood at the dresser, refolding shirts that Sarah had stuffed into the drawers. "I wish I'd learned all that stuff when I was your age."

"Why didn't you?" Sarah asked.

"We didn't foxtrot much in those days," Mom said. "We did a lot of disco."

"We do that in a few weeks," Sarah said.

Mom had gotten out the black vinyl suitcase that was almost never used. She set a stack of Sarah's shirts into it.

"Now, your grandfather," she said. "Ask
him
about foxtrotting."

"Really, Grandpa? You can foxtrot?"

Grandpa lowered himself to the bed. Henry leaped up beside him, turned himself awkwardly around, and sat hard against Grandpa's hip.

"In my day, I was quite the hoofer," Grandpa said.

"Do you know what a hoofer is?" Mom asked.

"Like Gene Kelly," Sarah said.

Mom turned around to stare at her. "How do you know who
he
is?" she asked.

"I just do." She pulled her hoodie over her head and began to fold it. "Did you dance with Grandma?" she asked Grandpa.

"Grandma didn't like to dance much. She said all that bouncing around embarrassed her," Grandpa said. "So I said, 'Lucille, I'd rather dance
with
you, but if I can't, then I'm dancing
without
you.' She grumbled a bit, but she didn't mind. 'As long as it gets you out of the house,' she said."

Mom and Sarah smiled. They could just hear Grandma.

"So I joined a club," Grandpa said. "We danced for fun, mostly. Sometimes we competed."

"Did you win anything?" she asked.

"A few trophies."

Sarah loved when Grandpa talked about his past. Most of the time he told her something she had never known about him before. It made her feel as though she was always getting to know him better, and also, as though she had barely begun to know him at all. There was always more to find out.

It was reassuring to think that life could be so full of experiences that you could recount them for years and always have more to add. Maybe, Sarah thought, you could accumulate enough happy memories so that the bad ones dimmed and receded and ultimately disappeared altogether.

"I gave it up when I stopped drinking," Grandpa said, his gnarled, knuckled hand playing in the scruff of Henry's neck. "I still kinda miss it."

Mom was staring into the suitcase, hands on her hips, counting sweaters.

"Show her," she said to Grandpa, not turning away from the suitcase.

"Naw." Grandpa shook his head. "Sarah doesn't want to dance with an old codger like me."

"Yes, I do," she said. "Come on, Grandpa. I even have the right music."

She opened her desk drawer and pulled out one of the CDs Mr. Roche had burned for them.

"Frank Sinatra?" Grandpa said, looking at the cover. "What are you doing with Frank Sinatra?"

"My choir teacher says to listen to his phrasing," she said, putting the CD in the player.

"Well, I'll be damned," Grandpa said.

She pulled on one of his arms.

"Come on, Grandpa," she said again.

He hesitated, then slowly eased himself off the bed. It was hard to do, with his fake leg.

"Take it easy, Dad," Mom said. She bent down and began picking up clothes and old homework assignments off the floor. "I don't want you tripping on all this junk."

Sarah ignored her and held out her arms as "The Best Is Yet to Come" filled the room.

"Mrs. Gretch says to hold my elbow like this," she said.

Grandpa took her hands in his.

"Forget about Mrs. Gretch," he said. "Just follow me."

They danced for half an hour to "The Best Is Yet to Come" and "It Happened in Monterey," "Look at Me Now," and "Young at Heart." Sarah could have kept going, but finally Grandpa had to stop. "Damn leg," he grumbled, settling himself back on the bed next to Henry and Mom, who had given up on folding clothes and watched, smiling, as the dancers rocked and turned in the small, cluttered room.

"I forgot how good you were," she said, putting her hand on Grandpa's arm. "But be careful, Dad. Don't overtire yourself."

Grandpa rubbed his thigh. "That was fun," he said, a little out of breath.

"It's so much better dancing with you than with Dylan Dewitt," Sarah said. "I didn't even have to watch my feet. I just felt the music."

"Now you're getting it," Grandpa said.

"Yes, you are," Mom said. "You looked very graceful, very confident."

"I didn't even know what I was doing," Sarah said. "But then I stopped thinking. I stopped trying. And then I was just doing it."

"That's the idea," Grandpa said. "Your body does the right thing when your brain gets out of the way."

They all laughed, even Mom, who Sarah could see was still worrying about Grandpa's leg.

"You should try it, Mom," she said.

"I don't want Grandpa to strain himself," Mom said, but she looked wistful, as though she had been left out of something magical.

Sarah held out her arms. "I'm not tired at all," she said. "But you have to promise that you'll never tell anyone that I danced with my mom."

Mom pushed herself off the bed and stood squarely in front of Sarah. Sarah took her hands and met her gaze head-on.

"I promise," Mom said solemnly.

They danced to "The Lady Is a Tramp" and "New York, New York" and "Let's Fly Away," until Mom insisted they stop, that they had packing to finish. Energized despite all the exercise, Sarah acquiesced, even though she didn't want to stop. She could have danced for hours. It was so much fun to do something without worrying about whether it was cool, about what other people would have said if they had seen her.

ON WEDNESDAY MORNING Sarah found the choir kids assembled in the front parking lot, watching as their bags were loaded into the school bus that would take them to the airport. She had said good-bye to Mom in the car, assuring her that she would call every night she was gone, that she wouldn't go to any public bathrooms alone, that she would follow directions and not get lost. It was a relief to shut the door and put a definitive end to her mother's lectures and warnings.

Mr. Roche stood at the open bus door, frazzled and short-tempered, running his hand through his hair and checking and rechecking his clipboard.

"Are we all here?" he yelled. "Where's Molly? Where's Jason? How many times did I tell you, people? Be on time!"

"It's kind of stupid that he's telling
us
that," Lizzie said to Sarah. "We're the ones who
are
on time."

"We better not miss that plane," Sarah said. She liked being early for things, for once not minding Mr. Roche's franticness.

Mr. Roche began calling the names of kids who hadn't yet turned in their medical information forms.

"You better have it now," he said. "No one gets on the plane without one."

"I heard Jason Webb has a glandular condition," Lizzie said.

"Really?" In truth, Sarah wasn't that interested. She was bored. Even a field trip with plane rides and hotel rooms involved a lot of just standing around.

"When we flew to Hawaii, it took almost six hours," Lizzie said. "Flying to Los Angeles takes less than an hour. They don't even have time to serve you food."

"Just peanuts and a soda," Robert Whitchurch said, sidling up to them, a green duffle bag slung over his shoulder. "We go to Disneyland twice a year. Not because of me. Because my parents are weird."

Lizzie glanced quickly at Sarah, trying to telegraph her excitement on Sarah's behalf. Sarah knew Lizzie was trying to be discreet, but she cringed inside, certain that Robert could see everything that passed between them.

"What's weird about your parents?" she asked.

Robert shoved his hands deep into his pockets. He was tall and thin, with tousled, wavy black hair, shockingly white skin, and a small mole near the corner of his mouth. Sarah felt herself resisting the urge to brush the mole with her fingers, as though it were a crumb that needed dislodging.

"They love Disneyland. They went all the time before I was born," he said. "Actually, they go less now, because it's more expensive with three of us."

"You're lucky," Lizzie said. "When we go on vacation, my mom makes me go to museums. And also to visit old relatives."

"I'm pretty sick of Disneyland," Robert said. "I want to go camping."

"We did that once. Before my parents got divorced," Sarah said, remembering. "We rented a camper because my mom said it wasn't a vacation if she had to sleep on the ground and cook in the dirt. We drove to the Grand Canyon. I remember how the desert was full of flowers. And that the Grand Canyon looked like the inside of a steak cooked medium rare."