Husky Page 10

  Finally I look up. “She’s not answering.” I’m not smiling at all.

  “Like mother, like son, never where none of you are supposed to be,” Nanny yells. “Well, I’m going to meet the Mrs., if they’re still there at this point.” Nanny marches past me and grabs her pocketbook. I get up to go along, thinking I need to go too, but then she turns and says, “I’ll be back later. If I feel like being nice to you, I’ll bring you something. Not that you deserve it.”

  And she leaves. She leaves without me. I never get left home alone. Never. I always have to have someone around. We’ve had huge fights about it. I’ve wanted this. I know I can handle it. I want to not have to go where everyone else is going, except to Sophie’s party. I want to be grown up and do what I want. And what I’ve wanted, really wanted, was to be left home alone. And now I am.

  But she just left me. And that part sort of upsets me. Because it’s not like I got handed this big gift, like, here was this thing, this present I was asking for and wanted. Here. It’s not like I earned it, like, I was finally able to handle it. I just got left. And that sort of feels . . . not great. And now I’m hungry. And left.

  The first thing I need to do is put on music. My music, as loud as I want, and whatever I want. It’s hard to pick whatever you want when you really can get whatever you want. I could go for something loud and big, something that is all drama and violins and horns and that shakes the floor when things really start happening, or I could listen to something so sad that it’s hard to get over all the terrible things as they happen. Or maybe a mix of the two. I might go for terrible and sad, but I sort of want something big and loud. It would be a shame to waste all this space alone and not fill it with something.

  I pick Madama Butterfly. It’s both big and really sad—I think the saddest one. Or maybe tonight it’s because she gets left. It’s all about this girl in Japan named Cio-Cio-San, and she falls in love with an American ship captain named Pinkerton. He loves her too, or at least he does in the first act, and he marries her. There’s a big wedding, and she even becomes a Christian for him. But after, he has to sail back to America and he promises he’ll be back.

  So Cio-Cio-San gets left.

  And she waits and waits and waits. And he never comes back. And she has his baby and the baby waits too. And all the while Pinkerton’s back in America, probably looking at all the cell phones and going to the makeover parties and everything cool that Cio-Cio-San doesn’t get invited to because she is stuck in Japan with her baby. And he forgets her. But she doesn’t forget him. She just keeps waiting. And waiting. And waiting.

  When he does come back, he shows up with his new wife, a cute little American girl named Kate. I’ve always hated the name Kate for that reason, which is not a nice thing, because Kate Boylan in my class is actually really nice. So Pinkerton comes back to Japan with Kate, barf, and he wants to take Cio-Cio-San’s baby. And Cio-Cio-San still loves him, so she says, Yes. Take my baby. Take all the times that we had together and that were really nice and all that fun we had together and throw them away, but before you go, take me too. Then Cio-Cio-San stabs herself. When I read about it in the liner notes the first time, I cried for a whole day, because I sort of couldn’t figure out how much one person is supposed to lose. Just everything. It’s the saddest thing ever. And the music is beautiful and loud. So it’s perfect for tonight.

  I put on the iPod, loud. Loud enough that I can hear it downstairs in the kitchen while I decide what to make. I don’t really get a chance to cook for myself a lot, so it’s sort of an adventure. There’s always a lot of food in the house, which is nice, but I don’t totally know how to make a lot of stuff, and I don’t want to burn the place to the ground if I make a mistake.

  I decide on macaroni and cheese, the powder kind, which is gooey a little bit, but is also a little bit my favorite thing. I make it without milk. Nanny hates that, but she’s not here. I put on the water and wait for it to boil, put in a little oil so the noodles don’t stick to the pan, and when it bubbles up, I put them in. It’s easy and done really quickly. I use about three pans and dishes, and I put them all in the sink when I’m done and sit down by myself at the kitchen table to eat. But now the table seems too big for just me. And then I remember that I’m alone and I can do whatever I want. I have to keep reminding myself. I don’t have to sit at the table with a napkin and a glass of water and remember not to put my elbows up like a truck driver, which is what Nanny always says to me when I do it. I can do that now, and I can look like whatever I want. I can be a truck driver. I can look like the worst truck driver, even. I’m all alone, I got left. I can do whatever I want.

  So I take my bowl of macaroni upstairs to the living room, which I would never be able to do, like ever, unless I had a TV tray and Nanny was with me. I don’t even think of a TV tray, I just sit on the floor and scoop it out of the bowl and right into my mouth. I even sort of kiss the bowl to get a little last bit. And I don’t care. I walk around the living room, eating the whole time, I even drop a noodle, which, if anyone was home, would have caused a huge yell from Nanny, but she’s not here, and even if she were, I wouldn’t be able to hear her over the music.

  I’m liking this. I like the chance to be alone and drop a noodle and listen to music, even sad music, the saddest music I know, and I like walking around eating gooey noodles, which only I like. I like the chance to do what I want without having anyone around to remind me what I’m supposed to do or even be. Being alone and doing what you want, even if it’s stupid or dumb or ugly or gross, it’s all okay, because no one is there to tell you otherwise. I even eat the dropped noodle off the floor. Why not?

  Cio-Cio-San is singing about waiting for the cannon to blast off of Pinkerton’s ship when he comes into the harbor, the sound she has sort of been hoping and hoping for, and I forget it happens on the recording, but boom! The cannon blasts, and it’s so loud that the whole floor shakes, freaking me out, and I drop the bowl, and it flips around as it falls to the floor, with big gooey clumps of macaroni going everywhere. Everywhere. Honest. It’s a huge mess. And the music is so loud, I can’t even think. What am I supposed to do now?

  I turn down the music first and run to get paper towels and window cleaner, just something to spray at the goo as I pick up the noodles from all over the floor and a little on the wall. I put them, all of them that I can find, back in the bowl and wipe everything off with the spray. I end up using so many paper towels, we almost run out. I just want it not to have happened. I shouldn’t have done all those things I’m not allowed to do, even if I was alone. I should have just been good and waited. And waited. Sat at the kitchen table and eaten everything in quiet, alone, and waited. Waited until Nanny came home. Or Mom. Or just gone to bed and not done anything. But waited. And waited. Like Cio-Cio-San.

  But then wouldn’t I just have gotten replaced by Kate anyway? I never know what to do and definitely not on my own. Things like this happen, and I don’t know if I’m as ready as I say I am to be home alone or if I’m a grown-up at all. I clean up all the noodles, so I guess I know what to do. I wash all the dishes. And put everything away. Like nothing even happened. But it’s the panic of being alone when the bowl drops that scares me the most. What if I didn’t know what to do? And what if no one ever came home to find me with all those clean dishes and dirty paper towels again?

  What if I really get left?

  CHAPTER 13

  Sophie comes over the next morning, but I don’t feel good or happy about it. I sort of get angry again. Did she just assume I would be home? Did she think of course I’d have nothing else better to do today, so why not just pop over and see if we can ruin the rest of his lonely day? I know it sounds crazy, but I feel like she’s judging me by coming over to hang out with me, which doesn’t make any sense, but that’s how I feel. Usually, when Sophie comes to my house, I get ready super fast and run down the stairs like I’m in a Hot Pockets commercial or something, ju
st anything to get to her. But today, I wait a minute before I even get out of bed. I just lie there being annoyed and thinking about not going down at all. At all. I think about yelling down the stairs that I’m tired and don’t want to go out. I don’t answer Nanny when she yells up the first time. Maybe I’ll just lie here. Lie here so still and so angry that she’ll go away. How would she like that? The worst part is I don’t know. Honest. I don’t know what she’d think anymore.

  “Ducks, are you awake?” Nanny yells again.

  “Yes!” I yell down with my annoyed voice again, which I really hate but is the only voice I’m using today or at least now. “I’ll be right down.” But there’s nothing right about it. I wait another minute in bed. Then another. I get out slowly. I think about taking a shower, which would add at least another ten minutes to the whole thing. That would be so totally rude, I figure, yes, I have to shower. I don’t care. Let Sophie sit. Let her wait.

  I go in through Mom’s room and walk around like no one is waiting for me anywhere in the world. I sit on Mom’s bed for a minute too, acting like I’m just taking a minute for myself to figure out exactly what I need, or figuring out how showers work before I can use one. There are handles, yes, and I turn them, yes. And then water? Yes. What temperature should the water be? Well, that’s a whole other conversation. Jeez, I could be here all day. Poor Sophie.

  I take a shower. Hot, like I like it. I need a minute to figure things out, and the shower is helping. But in the shower after I wash, I start to think I’ve gone too far. What if she does leave? And forgets me altogether? Does being a brat like this ever pay off for anyone? I dry off a little and rush back into my room. I get dressed fast, throwing on something simple and not thinking about who I want to be or anything. Just clothes. I look all right. I look like myself, and I head down the stairs, quick but not stomping. I know I’m in a hurry, but Sophie doesn’t need to.

  When I get down to the kitchen, Nanny is sitting at the table with Sophie and talking, talking loudly of course, only made louder by the fact that Jock’s TV is blasting at full volume from the top of the fridge with some morning show. It sounds a lot more like Sophie’s house than mine at the moment. When Nanny sees me, she roars.

  “Well, look who decided to join us? I hope you feel primped and pressed, Ducks, for how rude you’ve been to the little miss. Must be nice, the life of leisure you’re after, Ducks. But the rest of us got places to be.” Nanny turns to Sophie on this part. “This one, doesn’t ever end up where he’s supposed to, why, just the other night . . .”

  “Can we go?” I say loudly, wanting to stop her from talking any more about things she really doesn’t know.

  “Look at the hurry he’s in now, will you? Isn’t that just the way. Go on with the two of you, then, but, Ducks, you come back in this house by six on the dot, you understand me? We all three of us are going to have a little talk together,” Nanny says, wagging her finger at me.

  “All right,” I say back, still looking at the floor.

  “And you see that he does, miss.” Nanny wags to Sophie.

  “I will, I promise,” Sophie says back.

  “There’s a good girl. Now run off, the pair of you. Well, go on, you’re in such a hurry.”

  The minute she says this, I run out into the hall with Sophie trailing after me. I start to think my new mad thing is walking fast. I’m so fast now, I get to the door and out it so quick that the door shuts behind me and traps Sophie inside. I have to go back and let her out again.

  “Sorry,” I say to her, not looking at her.

  “It’s okay. Where do you want to go?” Sophie asks, really looking at me.

  “I don’t care,” I say back.

  “Okay, the park?”

  “No, I’m there every day with Ellen.”

  “How come you guys never get me?” Sophie asks. And that, so far, is the weirdest thing today. The Weirdest. Why don’t we get her? Why? Because who is she even to get? That’s mean. Because . . . I don’t know. I honestly don’t, I just never think of it. Or never think that she would want to come or that she will even be home or anything. I’ve been to the park so much with Ellen and it is stupid to not bring Sophie, since I do walk by her house to get to the park, but I never, not even once, thought of knocking on her door and asking her to come with us. Not even once. And it’s such a weird thing to think that I stop thinking about how I can’t look at her, or that I don’t want to, and I look her right in the face, and she just has this look, asking me why are we being this silly, or stupid, or mean, or whatever we’re being, when all we want to be is friends.

  That’s Sophie’s face right at this moment, with all those things in it, and I know it because I know her.

  “I don’t know,” I answer.

  Sophie’s face sort of frowns a little because she knows I’m lying, but she also knows that I don’t know how to say the truth yet. So she turns the frown into a smile so that I know it’s okay, and I know that we’ll figure it out, and she says, “Let’s get sodas and walk.”

  And that’s what we do.

  We go to the corner store and both get cherry sodas, and the whole time we talk like nothing is different. And in a really bizarre way, it isn’t. We laugh a lot and talk even more. Sophie has this thing that whenever she gets a soda, for some reason it explodes. Today when she opens her cherry soda, like always, it fizzes to the top and she jumps back like she always does, but it still gets on her, and I still laugh. Mine never fizzes like that. And after we cheers like we always do, which is silly but makes us laugh, we walk the streets real slow, looking at everything and nothing and talking about it all and nothing at the same time. Almost like always.

  Sophie’s mom wrote an article for Vogue, which is super huge for her, and they’ve been waiting for the big issue to come to the house for a week. It’s the big September issue, so everyone will get it and read it, and they’re both really excited. Sophie more wants to see all the dresses and the models. She always counts the black girls, which always makes her sad. But she loves to see what everyone is going to be wearing and how they’re going to be wearing it. Anytime she tells me about this she makes the Fashion face we used to make alone in her bedroom, and I laugh. I laugh my first full laugh I’ve had with her today, but also maybe in a while. Both of us know it.

  It’s still a good thing.

  It’s nice to be reminded of the things we have together out here on the street. Sophie laughs too. She starts telling me about what she’s going to wear for the first day of school. Every detail. Describing to me the colors and pointing to things on the street as we walk by shops and people. The green is like the awning of the bookstore, and the skirt looks like the one that girl over there is wearing, but it’s a lot longer, with more gold in it but less flowers.

  “So nothing like it?” I ask her.

  “Well, like the feel of it though?” Sophie says, sort of laughing.

  “The material?” I ask.

  “No, just the way it hangs and fits in with the rest of her outfit. It’s like a big part of the whole look.” Sophie always has to have “a look.” It’s her thing.

  “Sure,” I say, even though I have no idea what she is talking about, at all.

  “No, I mean, it makes the whole thing. The sweater with the T-shirt underneath, if she were in jeans or something, she would look so different,” Sophie says, trying to make her point.

  “Yeah, she’d be in pants,” I say, trying to make her laugh, but Sophie is still too busy trying to get me to understand with her.

  “Maybe if you saw the skirt by itself, you could see that it could go with a whole bunch of stuff, lots of other outfits, but, with this, with all of this, it just makes the most sense.”

  “It doesn’t really match though,” I say.

  “Matching is, like, so 2003,” Sophie says in her funny Fashion voice, where everything is “so” something. An
d together this time, we both laugh at it. This is so good, because I know that she wants to talk about something else, because she’s making her Something Else face. When we were kids, this was the face that meant she had to go to the bathroom, now it’s the face where she wants to say something, wants to get something out, usually something important, but doesn’t know how.

  “Ellen says you’re still mad about the makeover,” Sophie says.

  “Party. The makeover birthday party,” I say back. I know it’s ruining her moment to say what she needs to, but I need to say the actual thing. I need to say the truth so that Sophie will understand me.

  “It’s not on my birthday. It’s not my birthday thing,” Sophie answers back.

  “So what is your birthday thing?” I ask.

  “I wasn’t really having one this year. I don’t know,” Sophie says, looking at the street.

  “So if it isn’t your birthday thing, but it’s the only birthday thing you are doing, then it’s your birthday thing, isn’t it?” I ask. I’m trying not to, but I’m getting madder and a little louder as I talk. I just want to go back to talking about the skirt or something, anything else. But I guess now we can’t.

  “You’re not understanding me at all,” Sophie says, and stops in the middle of the sidewalk.

  “So tell me, then,” I say, trying to make my voice as quiet as I can, but inside my head I’m screaming. I’m so angry at her right now and at Ellen for telling her and for even having to get out of bed to do this on the street with all these people watching.

  “Ducks, seriously. You have this thing, like I’m trying to choose Allegra over you.”

  “You are! It’s not my ‘thing’ at all. It’s yours!”

  I want to say more but I can’t. I want to spit out so many mean things, but I don’t. The cold soda drips in my hand reminding me that just a minute ago we were friends. But now. I couldn’t be her best friend at all. If I was, she wouldn’t do this to me on the street. She doesn’t care about me. She wouldn’t even be doing any of this if Ellen hadn’t told her. She’s too selfish and awful to notice. My best friend would know—