Fade to Us Page 2

  “Enjoy your morning, Brooke,” he said. After kissing Mom, he headed into the utility room. The door to the carport slammed.

  Mom stared after him for a few seconds, then frowned at her coffee cup, her mood deflating. “How are you feeling about this?”

  Worried. Upset. But all I said was, “Nervous.”

  “Me, too.” She drained her cup and set it on the counter with a click. “Okay, let’s get started on the chores.” She pointed to a pad of paper on the counter near me.

  Good. Projects were something I could handle. I skimmed the list. “You can do the shopping. I’ll do the upstairs.”

  “Deal,” she said so fast that we both laughed.

  Once I was showered and dressed, I went into my stepsister’s bedroom and looked around. Compared to my yellow room with its crowded shelves of cute baseball souvenirs, hers was stark. Gray walls. White furniture. No decorations except for one poster from a Broadway show she’d seen with Mei. Natalie’s bedroom was soothing rather than interesting.

  After opening the windows and cranking up the ceiling fan, I stripped the spare quilt off the bed and stuffed it into her closet. When I came out again, my cat blinked at me from the middle of the bare mattress.

  “Leave, Tigger.”

  He swished his orange tail in defiance.

  “Fine, but you’ve been warned.” I plugged in the vacuum cleaner. He was gone before I turned around.

  Two hours later, I’d cleaned and aired her room, made the bed with her five-zillion-thread sheets, and plumped her four hypoallergenic pillows. I’d also vacuumed or mopped the floors and switched out the soap and shampoo in the bathroom that Natalie and I shared. I’d earned a break, so I charged down the stairs and erupted into the kitchen. “I’ve finished my part of the list.”

  “We’re ready for her.” Mom poured two glasses of tea and handed one to me.

  We sipped together quietly, waiting for time to pass. For life to change. Somehow, though, my attitude had improved. Preparing for Natalie’s arrival had helped. We were as ready for her as we could be, and the rest of the summer would just have to work itself out. “What will Natalie do on weekdays?”

  “Jeff and I brainstormed some ideas last night, but nothing is concrete. We’ll have to wait and see how she adjusts.” Mom leaned over and kissed my cheek. “All will be well.”

  “Is that a promise?”

  “It’s a prayer.”

  * * *

  Jeff and Natalie would be getting here soon. I had to finish checking her room.

  Tigger yawned disdainfully from the top of her dresser. He jumped down and strutted over, only to hiss in reproach when I scooped him up and carried him from the room. “Sorry, but you can’t be in there.” I shut Natalie’s door behind me.

  As I was going back downstairs, my phone buzzed. It was a text from my best friend Kaylynn.

  Want to hang out?

  I would like to, but not today, not when I had to be here for my family. I threw myself onto the couch before answering.

  Can’t. Natalie is moving in

  Moving? Like living there?

  Yes

  Permanently?

  Not sure how long

  A truck rumbled into our driveway. My stepfather had estimated they’d be here by noon, and with his typical military precision, they’d arrived with three minutes to spare.

  Why?

  Her mom’s really sick

  Sorry. Call me if you need to escape

  Thanks

  Two doors ka-thunked. Before I could stand, the front door banged open. Footsteps squeaked across the hardwood floor of the foyer and up the staircase.

  Next came my stepfather’s heavier tread. I entered the foyer as Jeff was shutting the front door with his foot.

  “How are things?” I asked.

  “Hard.” He plodded up the stairs.

  I hovered behind him as he rapped on her door and nudged it open. She lay on her bed, curled in the fetal position, facing the wall. Her dark ponytail snaked across the quilt. Thin legs and dirty, bare feet peeked from black yoga pants.

  “Natalie?” He paused. “Where should I put your bags?”

  “Don’t care,” she said.

  The hollowness of her tone filled me with compassion. I’d thought a lot about how this change affected me, and Mom, and Jeff. Even Mei. But I hadn’t spent much time wondering about how it affected Natalie. She thrived on routine and stability, and that had been ripped away from her.

  Natalie’s mom was her rock. Her safe place to go when the world went out of control. How had Natalie been told that she was moving? No matter what Mei had said, it would feel like I’m well enough to be around my husband, my parents, and a baby. But I’m not well enough to be around you. Maybe Natalie’s head could understand that it was more complicated than that, but her heart wouldn’t.

  Well, she would be okay here. I could be her new safe place to go.

  “Hi, Natalie,” I said.

  She rolled to her back and stared at the ceiling, hands folded across her belly, motionless as a corpse. Desolation surrounded her like a fog.

  I ought to get her talking, to fill the awful silence with sound. “When did your high school let out?”

  Her hazel eyes shifted toward me, dull and hopeless. “You already know the answer.”

  Well, okay then. Jeff said that whenever she sounded rude, she was actually “being blunt.” He claimed it wasn’t intentional. It was probably best to believe him. “Ten days ago?”

  “Yes.”

  “Mine ended last Friday.”

  No reaction.

  Jeff set the bags beside the dresser. “Here are your things.”

  She shut her eyes, her mouth slack.

  His gaze lingered on her, full of love and yearning. “Should I bring in the other two boxes?”

  “Don’t care.”

  Seconds ticked by, with all of us frozen into place. Abruptly, he turned and brushed past me, his huge shoulders hunched.

  “We’ll have lunch in a half hour, Natalie. Lasagna.”

  There was a long pause, as if she slogged through my comment word by word, trying to absorb it. “That’s my favorite.”

  “Which is the reason Mom made it.”

  “Huh.” Her eyelids fluttered. “Is Jill trying to make me feel better?”

  “Yeah. We’re glad you’re here.”

  “No, you’re not.” Her left hand reached for her right and twisted the skin on her knuckles. “But we agree, because I don’t want to be here either.”

  My gaze swept her long, thin body and returned to those pinching fingers. Natalie was right. I wasn’t glad that she was here, although I didn’t know what the correct adjective was. “Is there anything I can do?”

  “Nothing except leave.”

  Yeah, I could do that.

  3

  Unfiltered Honesty

  Natalie appeared in the doorway to the kitchen as I was setting the table for lunch. She’d changed into a loose-fitting red sundress and taken out her ponytail. Her eyes scanned the room before finding my mother at the stove. “I like lasagna, Jill.”

  “I thought you’d enjoy it.” My mother crossed to her and tried to give her a hug, but Natalie shrank away. Mom went back to the stove as if she hadn’t noticed.

  “Can I have grilled chicken tomorrow?”

  “That can be arranged.”

  Jeff leaned against the counter, sipping a beer and searching for signs that his daughter might shatter at any moment, which, from the look on her face, was a distinct possibility.

  “Will I get to decide what to eat every night?”

  “Don’t press your luck.”

  The corners of Natalie’s mouth tilted up briefly in her version of a tiny smile. Then her face went blank. She crossed to her chair at the table and perched on its edge, her body trembling like a stray puppy who’d been kicked and didn’t know why.

  Mom brought the pan of lasagna to the table. After Natalie served herself and
began to eat, the tension in the room eased.

  The meal was only slightly uncomfortable. My stepsister didn’t participate in the conversation, but the expressions flitting across her face showed she was paying attention. When she’d finished eating, she slid off her chair and stumbled into the den.

  “Natalie?” Mom prompted.

  My stepsister stopped, head bowed, brown hair slipping forward over her shoulders. “What?”

  “Please load your dishes in the dishwasher.”

  “Oh. Right.” Natalie retraced her steps, grabbed her plate and glass, banged them into the dishwasher, and walked out of the kitchen again. She’d gone a few steps into the den when she paused, her back to us. “My room doesn’t have a TV.”

  “Nor will it.”

  Natalie spun around. “Another house rule?”

  “Yes.”

  “Yours are so different from the ones at my house. How many more are there?” She sounded resigned.

  I completely understood her attitude. It felt like we had house rules for everything now. Jeff said that they would make adjusting easier on Natalie, but he really liked them, too. Most of the rules had already been unspoken between Mom and me, so I didn’t mind too much. It was just weird that he’d made such a big deal about writing them down.

  “There are dozens,” Mom said.

  Natalie considered that for a couple of seconds, then gave a nod. “Don’t tell me any more yet. I’d rather learn them slowly.”

  “Okay by me.”

  She took off. Muffled thumping faded up the stairs.

  “Shit, Jill.” Jeff’s voice was harsh. “Did you have to go after her so soon?”

  I gaped at him. What was he upset about? That meal had gone pretty well.

  Mom’s eyes narrowed. “It is not too soon. Might as well start the way we intend to continue.”

  “We agreed to cut her some slack for a few days.”

  “I’m not being hard on her. You’re more bent out of shape than she is.”

  “She’s my child.”

  “This is my house.”

  His lips thinned. “Throwing that in my face, are we?”

  Oh, wow. Did not want to witness this. I scrambled to my feet. “I should go.”

  Mom glared. “Could we discuss this later? When you’re ready to be reasonable?”

  “Okay then,” I said, “definitely leaving.” I ran out the door and across the lawn to where my hammock stretched between two oaks. Flopping into it sideways, I rocked as I tried to estimate how long before it was safe to go inside again. I didn’t have a whole lot of data to work with here. My mother and stepfather rarely argued, at least not in front of me. It would be difficult enough to get used to Natalie living here. It would be worse if I had to worry about them fighting.

  * * *

  When the weather was nice, I liked sleeping with the windows open. But not tonight. Not with my stepsister pacing beneath it, talking to herself in a voice that carried. I slipped from the bed and squinted down at the yard. “Natalie, it’s three a.m.,” I whispered as loudly as I dared. “Why are you outside?”

  Her form stilled in the shadows. “Is that a problem?”

  “Yes. Come back in the house.”

  “What kind of problem is it?”

  “You’ll disturb people.”

  “Like whom?”

  Me. “The neighbors.”

  Several seconds of silence crept past. Sighing audibly, she scuffed her feet across the driveway and up the steps to the side porch. The house shook with the slamming of a door.

  I’d barely collapsed into my bed again before my doorknob rattled and Natalie entered.

  “Brooke. Since you’re awake, we should talk.”

  No, we really shouldn’t. “Shockingly, I’m usually asleep at this time of night.”

  “You can make an exception for me.”

  Yeah, I guess I could. I was already awake, and since it was Sunday, I could sleep in. I plumped my pillows and sat up. “Fine.”

  She crossed to the window and peered out. She hadn’t changed into pajamas yet.

  “I like your dress, Natalie.”

  “It’s pure, soft cotton. Mama says red might make me feel better when I’m upset.”

  “Does it?”

  “Not really, but it was worth a shot. I don’t want to be here.”

  “Which you’ve already mentioned.”

  “It’s not because I hate you or anything like that…”

  Nice to know.

  “… although, if you went to my school, you’d be the kind of person I would avoid.”

  Natalie had a talent for sliding the most painful cuts into a completely casual conversation. Although she wouldn’t have noticed what her unfiltered honesty had done, I averted my face so she couldn’t see how much her words had affected me.

  I’d learned long ago that hiding was the safest way to recover from wounds.

  In the second grade, I’d stayed with my grandmother after school. One day, I was following her around, my sentences gushing out in their need to be heard. Nana’s hand flew out and smacked my lips. I froze and stared at her in confusion.

  “Thank God.” She sniffed. “I didn’t think anything would shut you up.”

  When Mom came to pick me up that day, she’d found me wedged between the couch and the wall. She touched her fingertip to my puffy lip and turned pale. “Did Nana pop your mouth?”

  A lone tear trickled down my cheek.

  Mom kissed the tear and whispered, “She will never do that again.”

  My mother had kept her promise. She started working from home after that, and I rode the bus. But even after ten years, when someone hurt me, I withdrew.

  “Brooke.” Natalie climbed onto the end of my bed. The moonlight spilled through the window, bathing her in a silvery glow. “Is Jill mad about having me around?”

  “Does she act mad?”

  “I have no idea.”

  This entire conversation had become too intense for the middle of the night. I would give it five more minutes before I shut it down. “Mom’s not good at disguising her emotions. If she were mad, you would be able to tell.”

  “Can you just answer the question?”

  “She’s fine that you’re here.”

  “What about you?”

  Was the answer different now than it had been two minutes ago? I couldn’t make up my mind. Natalie’s visits generally lasted a weekend. It was hard to get used to the idea that there was no known end date this time. But … “I’m not mad, Mom’s not mad, and Jeff’s happy. It’ll be okay.”

  “No, it won’t. The three of you have jobs. I’ll be alone in this house.”

  “Mom will be around in the mornings.”

  “She’s always busy. It’ll be boring.”

  I suppressed the desire to groan. Once Natalie got stuck in cranky mode, it took forever to drag her out. Although, in this case, she was right. She’d grown up in Durham, a place with an exhausting number of choices. The town of Azalea Springs would seem tame. “You can find things to do if you look for them.”

  “Like what?”

  I reached for my laptop, brought up the county’s recreation website, and went to the calendar for teens. “There are lots of camps you could sign up for.”

  “I’m not a camp kind of person.”

  Ignoring that. Natalie was the queen of exaggerations. “Horseback riding?”

  “No.”

  “Archery?”

  “No.”

  “Canoe trip on the Cape Fear River?”

  Silence. I looked up. Her scowl was disbelieving.

  Hey, a canoe trip sounded like fun to me. I scrolled down the site and stopped abruptly, excited by what I’d found. A drama camp. Natalie loved the theater, and she seemed to be equally happy in the audience or onstage. Jeff and I had driven up to Durham last fall to see her in a production at her high school. The show hadn’t been all that good, but she was. A summer theater program could be the perfect solution.
“How about auditioning for a play?”

  “Which play?”

  “Oklahoma!”

  “That’s a musical, not a play. Is it only for teens?”

  Clicking on the registration link, I skimmed the details. “The cast and crew must be rising ninth through twelfth graders. The counselors and production team are adults from around here, and the arts council is bringing in a guest director from Elon University.”

  “Lisa Lin.” Natalie slipped off the bed and came around to peer over my shoulder. “She’s excellent. Very imaginative.”

  “So you’ve been to other shows she’s directed?”

  “Two times. Mama took me.”

  “Great. You might enjoy this.” It was a camp, but I wouldn’t be using that word. The program could hold a maximum of thirty-five campers, and there were three slots left. “It lasts five weeks, Monday through Friday, eight hours per day.”

  “That seems excessive.”

  “You start with singing auditions on the first day. On the second, you audition for speaking parts. After that, you’re either rehearsing or getting all kinds of lessons.”

  “I would like acting lessons. I’ll give this some thought.”

  “Think fast. The program starts Monday, so you only have one day to decide.”

  “I’ll let you know.” She bounced from the room. There were a few thumps in the room beside mine, then silence.

  I put away my laptop, wiggled into my bed, and tried to let go.

  Natalie’s first night had ended. Again.

  4

  With Harmony at Stake

  After brunch on Sunday, Mom and Jeff got in her Honda and drove away. They didn’t say where they were going, but they took the tension with them.

  Natalie retreated to the backyard.

  I went to my room to complete a major project. Tomorrow was the first day of my summer job at the jewelry store owned by Kaylynn’s family. Her dad had finally sent me an email with the dress code. Skirts or dress pants. Blouses. Understated accessories.

  M’kay. That eliminated most of my clothes. I found a black maxi skirt and laid it on my bed. Next came a sleeveless purple shirt that could be buttoned to the throat.

  “What are you doing?” Natalie asked from the doorway.

  “Trying to find an outfit to wear for my new job.”

  “That outfit’s ugly.”