I walked out and tried hard to pretend I hadn’t seen anything unusual. Bowen’s father had stopped shouting, at least. I glanced at Bowen as I walked past, and he just stared at me miserably.
When I got into Aunt Cat’s car, she said, “Mav, just so you know, I can’t keep leaving work unless it’s an emergency, okay? I could lose my job if I do this too often.” I nodded. Then when I tried to fasten my seat belt, she must have seen that my hands were shaking. She asked me what was wrong, and I told her everything that had happened that day. At the end, she said, “We have to talk about your, um, heroic tendencies, buddy. This is the second time this year you’ve gotten in trouble for the exact same thing. When are you going to learn?”
“Learn what?”
She sighed. “So it’s going to be a while, then?”
She insisted on coming into the apartment, which I didn’t like. What if Mom had left it a mess? What if there were bottles of booze all over the place? What if it reeked of cigarettes and last night’s garbage? Aunt Cat was already in a lecturing mood. I didn’t want to hear her thoughts on our unique housekeeping style.
I tried going in ahead of her, but as soon as I had turned my key in the lock, Aunt Cat edged her way past me and turned on the lights.
“Oh, Mav,” she said softly. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
I peeked around my aunt and sucked in some air through my teeth. The place looked like it had been attacked by Vikings. To our left, in the kitchen, the sink was overflowing with dirty dishes. The trash can had tipped over, and some kind of leftover food had spilled onto the floor. On the table, the ashtray held so many cigarette butts that I knew my mom hadn’t been the only person in the apartment since I’d left for school. Judging from the general state of things, it looked like she’d invited over a biker gang. An unhappy biker gang.
The living room was worse. The level of mess was about the same, but there, tilted sideways on the couch, holding a bloody towel under her nose, was my mother.
“Honey,” she said, “you’re home early!”
“Umm,” I said, feeling like I was going to vomit, “actually, I’m home late. What happened here, Mom? Are you okay? How come you aren’t at the store?”
She waved her hand vaguely, as though she were shooing away a fly. “The store appears to have ‘terminated my probationary employment due to excessive lateness.’ Can you believe that?”
Oh, I could.
“Again, Mom?” My voice sounded whiny. I hated when my voice sounded whiny.
She didn’t respond to me, but looked at Aunt Cat instead. “Catherine! How lovely to see you! Pull up a . . . well, we don’t have any chairs in here anymore. But make yourself comfortable. To what do we owe the honor of your visit?”
Aunt Cat strode over and knelt in the filth in front of my mom. “What happened to your face, Jessica?”
Mom looked down at the towel in her hand, and almost seemed surprised to see it there. Maybe she was. I could smell the alcohol rolling off her from across the room.
“I dunno,” she said. “I had some friends over and things got sort of crazy in here. I hit it on the edge of the doorway, I think. Doesn’t matter. It’s not bleeding anymore. In fact, I was just about to take a nap. You don’t mind if I just close my eyes for a minute and . . . ”
Just like that, she slumped over and passed out. Aunt Cat pulled me into my bedroom.
“Maverick, you can’t stay here tonight,” she said.
“I have to. I have to take care of Freddy. And my mom needs me,” I said.
“Your mom needs help. But it doesn’t have to come from you. How long has this been going on?”
I looked away.
“Maverick.”
“Umm . . . I don’t know. She’s not always like this. She hasn’t had one of these bad days since the night before school started. Mostly, she holds it together. Until . . . ”
“Until she doesn’t.”
I nodded.
“Mav, listen. I grew up like this. So did your father. I know what it does to a child. I want you to know something: If things get too rough here, you will always have a home with me. Do you understand?”
I nodded again.
“You just call, any time of the day. Or night. I know what I said about my job, but it doesn’t matter—I’ll get you.”
I started to cry. From the other room, I could hear my mother begin to snore.
Aunt Cat looked toward the hallway, sighed, and said, “All right. Tonight—but just for tonight—I’ll stay here. But I can’t get sucked into taking care of your mom. I don’t know what to do. She’s made it very clear that she doesn’t want my help, and I’m afraid nothing is really going to change for her until she decides she’s ready.”
Despite everything, I felt a tiny smile pulling at my lips. Aunt Cat was going to stay over!
“Now, as long as I’m here, we might as well get this place cleaned up. It’s disgusting!”
We got to work. It took hours, but by the time we were through, the apartment looked—and smelled—almost like the kind of place where normal people lived. Well, normal people who really, really liked spraying bleach onto every exposed surface. That made me wonder what it would be like to live with someone like Aunt Cat. Someone who had life under control.
I fell asleep wondering that, and feeling guilty about it.
For the next several days, Bowen was absent from school. I kept finding myself gazing at his empty seat in class and wondering whether he was staying home because he had visible bruises. Was I supposed to tell somebody what I had seen?
A big part of my brain kept telling me that Bowen’s problems weren’t mine. But another part of me was saying, What do heroes do, Maverick?
I kind of hated that part.
Meanwhile, I was having some very intense conversations. In English, we were learning about myths, legends, and fairy tales. Mr. Kurt paired us up and assigned us to make posters. Nate and I were supposed to illustrate some common characteristics of fairy tales. We grabbed a box of markers and a big sheet of poster board, and got to work.
I said, “How about good versus evil?”
Nate said, “How about wicked stepmothers?”
I said, “Uh, okay. And then there’s magic, right?”
Nate said, “Wicked stepmothers!”
“Sure, got that. How about, um, princes and princesses?”
Nate stomped his foot and shouted, “Wicked stepmothers!”
And then it hit me. “I’m just going out on a limb here, but is your mom actually your—”
Nate literally bared his teeth at me. It was like he was suddenly turning into the world’s smallest werewolf. Werecub. Whatever—he got seriously mad, seriously fast. “She—is—NOT—MY—MOM!”
Mr. Kurt started walking toward us. “Buds, is there something going on here that I should know about? Because coloring is supposed to be a mellow exercise. Don’t ruin the vibes, man.”
“We’re fine,” I told him, smiling weakly. “Nate is just a very passionate colorer. Nate, you can have the red marker. I’ll take the purple one. It’s all good now.” Then I turned back at Nate and whispered, “So that’s why you were so rude to her when I was there.”
“I wasn’t rude to her. I just wasn’t nice to her. She’s the evil snake woman who replaced my mother. What am I supposed to do, pick daisies for her every day?”
“Whatever. Just forget I said anything. Now, how about lessons? Fairy tales always have those, right? What should we put for—”
“Here’s a lesson: I did not need your stupid help with Bowen. I didn’t need it at the beginning of the year, and I didn’t need it last week. I will never need your help. Got it?”
“Dude. What is your problem? I was just trying to be nice. Bowen picks on me, too, so I thought it would be nice if I helped you. Don’t worry. I won’t do it again.”
“See, there’s your problem, Maverick. You haven’t learned the only lesson that even matters.”
“Oh, yea
h? What’s that? Be mean to everybody?”
“No. Don’t try.”
That was when something else dawned on me. “Bowen was right. You should have stopped that goal, right? You blew it on purpose.”
Nate didn’t say anything.
“Why would you do that? If you’re good enough to be on the stupid United team, why would you just blow it?”
“Because my stepmother works with a mom from the other team. And before the game she bragged about me to this lady. It was incredibly embarrassing. She was like, ‘Wait till you see my Nathan play. He’s the best defender we have. Nobody gets by him!’ I just wanted to die!”
I couldn’t believe Nate was complaining because he had a parental figure who took an interest in his life, came to all his events, and even bragged about him. That seemed like a pretty great deal to me. I mean, I didn’t even have events, which meant that the rest of Nate’s situation was like some kind of unimaginable dream world to me.
“Yeah, it sounds like she really hates you. I can see how rough your life is.”
“She doesn’t hate me. She thinks I’m some kind of trophy. I’m supposed to be part of the perfect life that came with my dad.”
“So you purposely mess up your life just to annoy her?”
“Pretty much.”
“Wow, that’s genius.”
He completely ignored my sarcasm, and said, “I think so.”
“I still don’t get it, though. Why did you even bother to join the team, then? I mean, you were so excited to hang out with those guys that you freaking dumped me overnight when you made it.”
“Uh, well . . . sorry about that. But I love soccer.”
The period ended before I could even begin to understand that. How could a kid who loved soccer so much be willing to sabotage his own playing just to irritate his stepmom? It was like cutting off your leg in the middle of homeroom because you hated the school custodian, and you knew he’d have to clean up the mess. Nate was going to suffer a lot more than his stepmom had.
At lunch, while my head was still spinning from that little chat, a shadow fell over my pathetic, congealed school burrito. I looked up and found Jamie standing over me.
“Mind if I sit?” she asked.
Mind if I die of shock? I thought.
She sat. What was this about? Was she going to choke me again? Or maybe she had developed some new jokes about my height and was dying to try them on me. Perhaps she was going to slip some poison into my refried beans. If so, that wasn’t going to work, because I never ate those. I mean, have you ever looked at school lunch refried beans? Ours looked like re-re-re-refried beans. And I wasn’t so sure about the “beans” part. Anyway—
“Maverick, I’m sorry.”
I spluttered, and small bits of burrito flew out of my mouth. Wow, she had managed to choke me without even making physical contact! She was turning into a ninja or something. Jamie, the Touchless Assassin. I had to admit, it had a nicer ring than Maverick, the Miniature Cheese Tool.
“You’re what?” I asked as soon as I could breathe.
“I’m sorry.”
“For choking me? For pushing me into Bowen? For making fun of my height? For telling Mr. Overbye everything so I ended up in detention next to my archenemy?”
“No. Yes! I mean . . . I’m not sorry I stopped the fight. But I’m sorry I got you in trouble. I was trying to protect you, not make things worse.”
I felt my ears getting red. I hated when my ears got red, and somehow it only seemed to happen when Jamie was around. “What do you mean, you were trying to protect me?”
She was wearing a gold locket. She looked down and played with it between her fingers for a while, then said, “I didn’t want you to fight Bowen, okay?”
“Why not?”
Now she looked up, and I couldn’t decide if she was angry or embarrassed or sad. Actually, I couldn’t decide whether I was angry or embarrassed or sad. Maybe each of us was all three at once.
“Because I didn’t want him to hurt you! Have you seen Bowen, Maverick? He’s twice your size!”
I didn’t mean to, but somehow I found myself practically shouting at her. “I know! Because you’ve only pointed it out, like, a million and one times!”
Then she was shouting, too. “THEN WHY DO YOU KEEP PICKING FIGHTS WITH HIM?”
Everyone was staring. Or at least, I felt like they were. I was too mortified to look around.
“I don’t pick fights with him, Jamie. He picks fights with me.”
“He sometimes picks fights with you. But both times with Nate in the halls this year, you weren’t even involved until you went charging in and attacked Bowen in front of everybody.”
“Well, sure, that’s technically true, but—”
“But nothing. I just don’t want you to get your face smashed in.”
I didn’t know how to react to this. I tried smiling.
“Oh, shut up,” she said. Then she got up and walked away, leaving me to figure out what had just happened.
I wasn’t sure what was scarier: Jamie or the refried beans.
I basically tiptoed around my mother for a few days. It was a strange time. I wasn’t used to seeing her during the week at all, because she had been working the middle shift for months. Also, I was pretty sure she remembered the scene with Aunt Cat—I mean, it would have been pretty hard not to notice the miraculously clean appearance of our apartment—but she hadn’t said a word about it. Plus, Mom must have been seeing Johnny, but she was making sure he was never around the apartment when I was home.
So, yeah. It was just like what we did after every other time she’d completely lost control. We pretended nothing had happened, until we couldn’t anymore. Because this time, it wasn’t just her and me involved.
Aunt Cat started calling every day, asking whether my mom was all right, whether there was anything I needed, and whether she should come pick me up. On the fourth day, my mom got mad, grabbed the phone out of my hand, and actually hung up on her.
Then we sat and ate leftover frozen franks in blankets from her former job in complete silence for maybe ten minutes, until suddenly someone banged on our apartment door. I answered the door, and of course it was Aunt Cat.
It was another of those What do you do? situations. Was I supposed to let her in? Slam the door in her face? Grab Freddy, jump in her arms, and beg her to take us away? Run out myself, and leave her and my mother to battle it out?
I probably should have gone with that option.
Instead, I let her in. As soon as my mother saw her, it was on. All Aunt Cat had to say was “Hi.”
Then Mom unloaded. “Hi? Hi? Is that all you have to say to me? Who are you to be calling my son and checking up on me every day? I don’t know what he’s been telling you, but I’m fine. And besides, do you think you’re suddenly Little Miss Perfect? Like I’m not the one who came and got you in the middle of the night when your boyfriend kicked you out while you were going to that fancy college of yours? Speaking of which, when was the last time you even had a boyfriend? You’re practically a nun. But I’m supposed to sit here and take it while you’re judging how I parent my child? You think it’s so easy being a single mother? Why don’t you try it, then?”
I wished I could sink down through the floor and disappear. I wished I could wash out my ears with special soap that would erase my mom’s hateful words from my brain.
Aunt Cat’s fists were clenched. So was her face, if that makes any sense. But her voice was completely flat. She sounded like a prerecorded message. In a way, that was scarier than yelling would have been.
“Jessica, you’re in worse shape than I thought. Maverick hasn’t been telling me anything. I guess he was trying to protect you. He’s very loyal to you. He’s too loyal to you.”
Mom opened her mouth to reply, but Aunt Cat cut her off. “You need serious help. When you’re ready to accept it, I promise you this: I am ready to take your son into my home and take care of him for as long as it takes.
I care about him, and I care about you. Even when you’re acting like this.”
Then she turned on her high heels and started to leave.
My mom shouted after her, “GET OUT!” Which was pretty lame, considering Aunt Cat was already about three steps from the door.
I braced myself for a massive door slam, but Aunt Cat barely clicked the door closed behind her. Even though she must have been furious, she wasn’t showing it.
Still, I would have been afraid to be the next person in her haircut chair.
I was a little bit mad at my mother, and a little bit scared to be near her, too, so I went into her bedroom and got Freddy out. Then I set up a maze for him on the living room floor using my textbooks and some toilet paper rolls from our recycling pile. I left a trail of seeds right up the middle of the maze for him to follow.
Freddy can’t walk right because of his missing paw, but he learns fast, and he always seems to love following the trail from one seed to the next. When he finished the maze, I cuddled him up to my chest, and we watched Animal Planet for a while with the sound off. Sometimes the noises from the bigger animals scare him, but when the TV is muted, he seems to get pretty into it.
Mom kept pacing around the apartment, straightening up clutter, going to the kitchen for drinks of water, and moving random stuff around. Every time she passed near me, she stood over me for a while, like there was something she wanted to say. Once, she might have even cleared her throat. I didn’t look away from my hamster, though, because I was sort of afraid I might cry if my mom and I started talking. Or worse, that she might cry.
I was almost jealous of Freddy. His life was so simple. Sure, he was missing a paw, but all he had to do was eat whatever food I put in front of him, drink from his water bottle, and hang out in my nice warm hands. And he could always trust me to keep him safe.
* * *
The next morning, Bowen reappeared in school. He seemed all right, but I wondered what he would have looked like if I had seen him the week before. It was the weirdest thing: I almost felt sorry for him.