Dad had said that if I was ever in a place I shouldn’t be and needed a ride, I could call, no matter what time it was. But Germantown? Should I call Les instead? I wondered as I watched Brian’s car go roaring off, snow flying out behind it.
It was coming down thicker now, and the noise was so loud in the house, I knew I’d better call from the porch. I fished in my bag for my cell phone. Some of the kids went down the steps and started a snowball fight.
Thunk! A snowball hit the front door.
Thwack! Another hit a post.
And then—a sound I will never forget—a high, horrible squeal of tires and then … CRASH! Metal against metal.
“Omigod!” someone yelled. “It’s just down the road.” And people began to run.
16
Conversation
Someone dashed past me and jumped into another car out front. Then another. Motors raced, and two cars went speeding toward the sound of the crash. People on the porch held cell phones to their ears and everyone was asking, “Where are you? … Can you see anything? … Who’s car was it? … Was it Sheryl’s? Was it Brian’s?”
I sank down on the steps and sat trancelike, unblinking, as the falling snow coated the part of me unprotected by the roof—my knees, my legs, my feet. Which cars were Liz and Pam in? Were they together? I felt as disconnected from this house, this party, the noise, the crash, as my shoulders were from my knees. Frozen solid.
“Yeah?” a guy behind me was saying, cell phone to his ear. “Oh, Christ! … Oh, man! … What about Sunny? … Yeah.”
I jerked around. “What about Liz Price or Pamela Jones? Were either of them in that car? Who was hurt?”
“A kid, that’s all I know,” the guy told me.
“Has anyone called for an ambulance?” I screamed. And then we heard a siren.
“Oh, shit!” said the guy with the cell phone.
A guy out on the lawn, the one with the U OF MARYLAND sweatshirt, came racing back up the steps. “Get rid of all the bottles, man. The minute they know there was a party, they’ll be breathing down our necks. Jeez! Where’d I leave my jacket?”
There was bedlam in the house. Someone came out the front door dragging a garbage bag full of bottles and cans and handed it to me.
“Take it over to the woods and leave it there,” he said, pointing fifty yards off.
“Were Pam or Liz in that car?” I cried.
“I don’t know! Take the damn cans, or we’ll all be in trouble!” he yelled.
People were pushing past me out the door. We heard another siren, then another.
“Grab your stuff and let’s get the hell out,” somebody was saying from inside.
Car doors slammed. Engines started. People who had been to the crash came running back. People in the house were running out.
I dragged the bag through the snow, leaving a telltale trail behind it. Parking it behind a fir tree, I started back toward the house, pulling out my cell phone to call home, but was blinded by the light from a police cruiser as it careened around a bend in the road and pulled right up on the lawn.
“Stay right where you are, everyone!” an officer yelled, getting out the driver’s side while the passenger door opened and a second policeman appeared. “We just want to ask some questions. Don’t anyone take it in his head to go out the back door, ’cause we’ve got that covered too.” The second officer was already going around the side of the house as another squad car pulled up.
I was shaking. Not just my hands, but my whole body. An officer came over to me, pulling out a notebook.
“Name?” he asked.
“A-Alice McKinley,” I answered.
“Age?”
“Sixteen.”
“Where do you live?”
I gave him my address.
“Do you know what just happened out there?” he asked me.
“We h-heard the crash,” I said. “Were people hurt?”
“Yes, I’d say they were,” the officer said. “How’d you get here tonight?”
“A friend brought me,” I said.
“Know whose house this is?”
“N-No.”
“Where’s your friend?” asked the policeman.
“He left early with some others to go to the movies. I was looking for a ride home. I’m supposed to be home by midnight,” I explained.
The officer looked at his watch. “Well, seeing as how it’s two minutes after, you’re not going to make it, are you?” He looked at the trail I’d made in the snow, my footprints beside it. “You been drinking?”
“No. Just Sprite.”
“I want you to get in that car over there,” he said. “Sit in the backseat. And hand me your cell phone, please. You’ll get it back.”
“I’ve got to call my dad!” I protested.
“We’ll call him for you,” he told me.
I felt sick. I knew right away that he didn’t want me calling any of the other kids, all of us deciding on the same story to give the police—who was drinking and who wasn’t, who was driving and who wasn’t. I sat in the police car hugging myself, trying to stop the shaking, but it only got worse. I watched the police bring a guy over, the boy who had told me to drag the cans to the woods.
As he slid in beside me, I asked, “Do you know Pamela Jones or Liz Price? Were they in the car? Were they hurt?”
“I don’t know anything, and you don’t either, got it?” he murmured. Then, “I think Brian’s killed somebody, so just be quiet.”
I thought I was going to be sick. “I didn’t know anything to begin with,” I said, trembling. “I don’t even know where I am.”
A third cruiser pulled in, and more kids were rounded up. When we got to the police station, Keeno and a few others were already there, looking dazed and disoriented.
“Were Pam or Liz in the car?” I whispered to him as we came in.
“I don’t know,” he whispered back.
“Where’s Brian?” I asked him.
“Rescue squad took him to the hospital,” he said, but then a policeman interrupted. One by one we were taken to a desk and asked questions.
“Did you go anywhere else before you came to the party?” a policeman asked me.
I told him about the group of us who went to the old Steak House restaurant in Gaithersburg.
“Did anyone at the Steak House serve alcohol to Brian Brewster?” the policeman asked me.
“No,” I said, knowing that was only half of the truth, but I decided to answer just what I was asked.
“Did anyone at the party serve alcohol to Brian Brewster?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “There were a lot of people there, and kids were helping themselves to whatever was on the table.”
“Will you submit to a Breathalyzer test?” he asked me.
“Yes,” I said.
They gave it to me. I passed. Then, at one fifteen, the awful phone call to Dad. When the officer hung up, he said, “Wait over there. Your father said he’d be here in about forty minutes.”
When Dad got to the station, he didn’t say a word. He hardly even looked at me. Just hugged me to him, so tight I could hardly breathe. On the way home I alternately cried and froze up, terrified of what might have happened to Liz or Pamela. Then Dad said he’d seen Liz come home, so I knew that at least she was okay, but I still worried about Pamela. I answered every question Dad asked me as to who, when, and where, but to all the whys, I had no answer. Why did I go someplace else when I’d only told him we’d be at the Steak House? Why would I go to a party at the home of someone I didn’t even know? Why didn’t I call him as soon as I saw they had alcohol and no adults were present?
I tried explaining, but there was no answer that satisfied him: I told him that when we left the restaurant, it was too early to go home; that we really thought it was Keeno’s cousin; that we didn’t know there wouldn’t be adults in the house. …
I was exhausted and tight with tension when I finally walked inside the house.
“Oh, Alice,” Sylvia said, her shoulders drooping with relief when she saw me. “You’re okay!”
“Yes,” I said.
“Was anyone else hurt, Alice? Are there other parents we should call?”
“I’ve been trying to find out about Pamela, but I don’t even know what car she was in,” I told her. “They said Brian was taken to a hospital. I don’t know how bad he was hurt. … And I don’t know who was in the other car, the one he hit. Somebody said he might have killed a kid.”
“Oh my God!” said Dad.
I was numb with fatigue, and so was Dad. I curled up in one corner of the couch as he made calls to the police to see how badly Brian was hurt, but they wouldn’t tell him anything and said all the parents had already been notified. It wasn’t until we had called Pamela’s house and found out she had been in another car and was safely home that we all went to bed, exhausted.
I slept until almost eleven the next morning, when the phone started to ring. While Dad and Sylvia were at church, I got all the news.
Brian had plowed into the side of another car at a rural junction only a quarter mile from where the party had been. The other car had gone through a stop sign. The air bags in Brian’s car had protected him and his front-seat passenger, but Brian had two broken fingers and a dislocated shoulder, and the guy in the front seat with him had injured his knee. The three girls in the back were bruised and one had whiplash, but otherwise, they were all right. A little kid who had been asleep in the backseat of the other car was either seriously hurt or dead. That’s all anyone knew.
Liz told me that my dad had called her house when he saw her come home, asking if I was there with her. She’d told him I was probably on my way home with someone else, that the car she got in was full.
At lunch the air was so thick with disappointment and disapproval that I felt smothered by it, even though Dad reached over once and patted my arm. Did they have any idea how scared I had been last night? I wondered. Did they think I had wanted this to happen?
“Well,” I said finally, “what’s the punishment? Am I grounded for the rest of the year?”
Dad looked at me helplessly. “How can I punish you when all I wanted last night was to hear that you were safe?” he asked. “I know you didn’t plan it. But how many times have I asked you to call if …?” He didn’t finish.
“I know, I know,” I said. “But if you’d been there, if you’d been in my place, you’d have been confused too. I thought I had a ride home. I didn’t think …”
But that was it in a nutshell, of course. I didn’t think.
It was the talk of the school on Monday. Brian wasn’t there, and most of the kids at the party were from another school, so the rest of us were still guessing at what really happened. Pamela, Liz, and I just stood in the hall hugging each other. We didn’t need words.
The construction workers were picking up for the day when I got home from school, putting away their tools, calling out to each other. Sylvia’s car was out front. She rarely got home before four thirty or five, especially with all that pounding and clanking going on. I wondered if she’d taken the afternoon off.
I opened the door and started for the stairs, but she stopped me. “Alice,” she said, “we need to talk.”
I walked into the kitchen and dropped my backpack on the table. “What about?” I asked, knowing only too well.
“Sit down,” she said, a teacher’s tone in her voice.
I almost said, I prefer to stand, but something in her face told me I’d better sit. Sylvia remained standing in her pin-striped pants and rayon blouse, arms folded across her chest.
“I have something to say,” she said, “and with Ben out of the house, it’s a good time to say it.”
I dreaded what was to come.
“I married your dad because I think he is one of the kindest, most intelligent, most wonderful men I’ve ever met,” Sylvia said. “And when you love someone, you want to protect him from hurt. You want to be there for him when he’s sick or worried or frightened. And in all the time I’ve known your father, Alice, I’ve never seen him as worried as he was Saturday night.”
I swallowed. I wanted to look away, but there was something so intense in her face that I had to watch.
Sylvia went on: “I’d wanted to go to bed at eleven, but Ben said he’d wait up for you, so I decided to wait up with him. About eleven fifteen he said, ‘If they just went to the Steak House, I’d think they’d be back by now.’ I reminded him that you were allowed to stay out till midnight on weekends, that maybe you’d gone to a late show.”
Sylvia didn’t look away either. Our eyes were locked. Outside, I heard the construction guys driving away.
“He called Elizabeth’s house when he saw her come home,” Sylvia continued. “Liz told him you were getting a ride with someone else. He called Pamela’s, but no one answered. She probably hadn’t reached home yet. Then, about twelve thirty, someone called and asked if you were all right. Ben asked who it was—what they were talking about—but the person hung up.”
Sylvia sighed and put her hands behind her, resting on the countertop. “Alice, it was like your father aged ten years after that last call. Every line in his face was deeper. He didn’t want to use the phone in case you’d be calling, so I gave him my cell phone and he tried calling your cell several times, but there was no answer and he began calling police departments—in Gaithersburg, Silver Spring—to see if there had been any accidents. He called the Steak House, but it was closed, and I had to stop him from getting in his car and driving out there. I told him that if you had been in an accident, you could have been airlifted to a shock trauma unit in Bethesda or Baltimore—who knows where?—and that he should stay right here until someone called.”
I felt an indescribable sadness rising up inside me.
“It was one fifteen when the phone rang and he heard someone say, ‘Mr. McKinley, I’m calling about your daughter. …’ His face went as gray as the ashes in the fireplace. All he could say was ‘Is she all right?’ and … the relief in that face when they said that you were …!”
A tear escaped from the rim of my eye and rolled down my cheek. I couldn’t look at Sylvia anymore.
“I’m … I’m sorry,” I wept. “I told him how sorry I was. I didn’t realize …”
“I know you didn’t know all of this, and your father would never tell you, so I am,” Sylvia said. “I want you to know that last Saturday night was one of the worst nights ever for your dad. He was like a caged animal, wanting to get out and do something, and there was absolutely nothing to do, Alice, but wait.”
She pulled a tissue out of her pants pocket and blew her nose.
I just went on sniffling. “The … the evening had started out so well,” I said. “Just a bunch of us having dinner together. We’ve been to the Steak House a lot of times. And when Keeno said he just wanted us to stop by his cousin’s house for a birthday party, it didn’t seem so bad. It was only nine o’clock.”
Sylvia handed me a tissue from the box on the counter, and I blew my nose too.
“But it took a long time to get there,” I continued, “and it wasn’t exactly a cousin’s house. You’re right. That’s when I should have called.”
Sylvia let out her breath and looked up at the ceiling a moment. I think we were both feeling exhausted. For probably a full minute we just remained there in silence, staring off into space.
“You know what?” she said finally. “Ben’s working late tonight and I’m too tired to cook, but I’m hungry enough for popcorn. I’m going to make a big bowl of it. Let’s kick off our shoes, go sit on the couch, and eat popcorn. And talk.”
The last thing in this world I wanted just then was popcorn, but Sylvia opened the cupboard, pulled out a bag, and stuck it in the microwave. “Oh, heck,” she said. “Let’s put in two.”
I sat silently at the table as Sylvia stuck in another bag, then stood watching the seconds go by on the clock, waiting for the popping to beg
in.
Strange, though, what just the aroma of popcorn will do for you. It reminds you of only good times in your life, because whoever heard of eating popcorn when you’re sick or mad or grieving? Nobody eats popcorn at funerals.
As the corn began to pop, it sounded like an artillery range, and the expanding bags began taking up the whole space inside the microwave.
“Maybe you’re not supposed to pop two bags at a time,” Sylvia said. “You don’t suppose they’ll explode, do you?” We smiled.
“I’ll get the bowls,” I said, and took two large metal mixing bowls from the cabinet. When there had been no more pops for the recommended two seconds, Sylvia took the bags from the microwave, and we pulled at the tops to let the steam out, then poured the popcorn into the bowls. In the living room we kicked off our shoes and sat down on the sofa, bowls on our laps.
“Ah!” Sylvia said. “Supper!”
We chewed delicately, however. Politely. Finally Sylvia said, “I guess I was really, really angry at you Saturday night. I was furious, in fact, that you didn’t call and tell us where you were or what had happened. Ben could only imagine the worst.”
“I just … there was so much going on … I didn’t think I could leave until I found out if Pamela or Liz were in that car. Then the police came and took my cell phone,” I explained feebly.
Sylvia didn’t say anything for a minute or two. Then she said, “I just wish that every teenager could have the experience of one night—just one night—of the anxiety you put your dad through.”
“You talk as though I did it on purpose!” I said.
“No. It wasn’t purposeful, it was thoughtless. But, I suppose, if I put myself in your place …”
“I just wish you’d try to understand me more,” I said.
“I suppose you do,” said Sylvia. Her hands were motionless now on the sides of her bowl. “I guess I’ve not done a very good job of that. It’s not easy coming into an already-formed household. I’ve found myself getting annoyed at small things. …”