Francie's Got a Gun, page 16
Of course. “I’ll make breakfast!”
No protests from Marietta could stop Sally—she was already checking the cupboards and the fridge, bare but not empty. One can of tomato paste. One tin of tomatoes. One sleeve of pasta. A half bag of oats! Francie was watching her. “Go get dressed,” Sally told the child. But she was back all too quickly, wearing jeans and a jewel-encrusted shirt, inspecting Sally’s every move, as the pot of oatmeal stirred up like grey glue, sticking to the spoon, a substance that could have been used to patch holes in plaster, or to fix, say, a door. Ha ha.
Francie watched Diego’s tail knock a plant to the floor. “That’s my mom’s favourite spider fern,” she said in her loud voice, which always took Sally by surprise. Everything was someone’s favourite something, Sally thought, trying to clean up the dirt using a dishrag she found folded neatly over the side of the sink, even while the unattended oatmeal crawled up and over the side of the pot. Sally tossed the cloth into the sink as Marietta and the baby, dressed for the day, came into the kitchen. Francie ran behind her mother’s legs, regressing, no doubt, under these challenging circumstances.
Diego smothered them all with love.
Marietta brushed the front of her uniform, but the paw prints stayed, best not to mention it. A dog was such good medicine, in Sally’s opinion. “Breakfast is ready!”
“I’m not hungry,” Francie said.
The women’s eyes fell on the pot of porridge at the same time. “Oh well,” Sally said. “You can always eat it later.”
“Mm-hm,” said Marietta, and Sally looked around the room as if through Marietta’s gaze, spotting smudges of dirt on the linoleum, the plant repotted on an obviously wonky angle, porridge under the burner. The faint smell of scorched dishcloth in the air. The cloth itself, begrimed and balled up in the sink.
This house was too clean! That’s what the problem was.
Perhaps there were fewer secrets here than Sally had assumed. Who could keep a secret with nowhere to hide it?
“Here’s their bag.” Marietta held out a plastic grocery bag. For some reason, Francie was putting on her backpack too. “You have my number? It’s a double shift, overnight, I’ll try to come by as soon as I can tomorrow morning.”
“The kids can stay as long as you want!” Sally wasn’t 100 percent sure she meant it, but she was 100 percent sure that she wanted to mean it.
“Thanks.” Marietta’s tone was flat, but Sally did not take offence, she never took offence! For a beat, everyone stood passively, not sure what the next move might be, and then Marietta said: “Don’t use the front door.” A flicker of a smile flashed across her face, her entire face, and Sally swooned—they were bonding! Over a shared moment! An inside joke. Ha ha! Even Diego was laughing and panting as Marietta pointed out the alternative exit, down a few steps, behind where Sally stood. The umbrella stroller was propped there too, for the baby. What was his name?
Sally noticed a Smart car in the driveway, how strange. Just like David’s.
Though only a few blocks separated their two houses, it proved a difficult journey, beset by crooked stroller wheels, tempting squirrels, and Sally’s own doubts about how much this particular baby loved her—instead of returning her squeeze with a snuggle, when she leaned down to fasten him into the stroller, he pinched her neck, and it hurt. “Ow!” Sally almost pinched the baby in return, but Francie was still watching her every move. For that matter, so was Diego.
They were nearly home when Sally realized the car in the Fultzes’ driveway was actually David’s. This dovetailed with the cold comprehension that she was still wearing her pyjamas.
Diego rubbed his head against her hip, as if to reassure her that no one would take her less seriously for it.
Oh, I don’t want anyone taking me too seriously, Sally proclaimed. But it was hard to know whether she meant it.
She lifted the stroller, baby still strapped in, and muscled it up the front steps and into the house. Francie looked impressed. Maybe. “That’s not how my mom does it.”
“Well, I do things differently around here.”
Did Sally want to be taken seriously, or did she want to keep matters light? Was it a choice between being a ruler or a clown? Diego understood the dilemma. He wanted to please, to flop around, to frolic, but not being taken seriously could hurt, sometimes, especially when the ones you loved most, trusted most, looked at you with disdain, baffled or perplexed, or told you what not to do. Ew, is he eating trash? Stop jumping, you’re scaring that poor child!
“We’re home! Where is everyone? Eee-oh-eet!”
Oh my god, do you have to be so loud, Mom? Did you go outside in your pyjamas? Why are you talking to the dog?
Because he understands me.
Oh my god, Mom, what does that even mean?
* * *
Signing up for the race wasn’t Kate’s idea. Sally said it would help her bond with her dad if they trained together, and also, she said, Kate was getting sedentary and secretive, lying around all the time doodling in her notebook or talking to her friends on the phone or going for mysterious “walks” with people whose names Sally didn’t even know half the time—or their parents’ names, or where they lived! “Mom, they’re just friends from school. We go to the park.” (And one friend sometimes brings a water bottle with some vodka poured into it, and her parents are totally okay with it, which is either really cool or kind of weird. But you don’t need to know that extra detail.)
Clap-clap! “Get dressed, Kate! It’s race day!”
“Oh my god, Mom, you’re still wearing pyjamas.”
“Eat a banana with peanut butter! That’s your dad’s favourite pre-race meal.”
“Ugh, I’m not hungry.”
“You don’t want to bonk in your race.”
“Mom? Please don’t ever ever ever say that again.”
“It’s a real thing, it’s when you run out of energy because you didn’t eat enough before your race.”
“Mom, it’s a fun run. I’m not doing a marathon.”
“Don’t forget your vitamins, for your skin. They’re on the kitchen table, in your pill box.”
“Mom!”
In the bathroom, Kate splashed her face in the sink, brushed her teeth. Over the running water, she could hear voices downstairs, and maybe a baby, crying? Saturday morning, and it wasn’t even seven o’clock. Sometimes Kate wondered why she ever tried to be nice and agreed to do things, when it meant suffering consequences like this. The light above the sink was too bright, and in the mirror she saw a pimple rising under the dark, smooth hairs of her right eyebrow. She stopped her fingers from pinching the pimple—just barely!
Instead, she combed the knots from her long, heavy hair, drew it into a high ponytail, applied mascara.
Don’t pick it, don’t pick!
Okay—definitely a baby. Definitely crying. Make that screaming. Do I even want to know?
* * *
—
So apparently, and this was weird, Mom had invited Alice’s annoying friend Francie and her baby brother to come along with them to Dad’s race.
“Kate’s racing too!”
“Mom, it’s a fun run.”
“That counts, doesn’t it, David?”
But Kate’s dad did not look good, hunched in the passenger seat of the minivan. Kate was sitting on the bench seat in the middle of the van beside Francie, Alice on the other side. Also, Kate was holding the baby, because apparently, and this was weird too, no one had thought about the baby needing a car seat.
“Back when I was born, they let babies roll around loose. Like watermelons!”
Oh, Mom.
Max was in the wayback with Diego. “Hey, there’s a police car.”
“Duck!”
Mom locked eyes with Kate in the rear-view mirror, and Kate unbuckled her seat belt and slid herself and the baby—whose name she hadn’t bothered to learn—down behind Mom’s seat.
“The police arrested my dad,” Francie said in a very loud voice.
Kate stared at the kid. “Really? What did he do?”
Francie shrugged. “He’s in the hospital,” she said.
“Weird,” said Kate.
“Pull over,” said Dad. “I need a bathroom. This can’t wait!”
“Hang on, we’re in the middle of nowhere. This doesn’t look promising!” Mom turned sharply and jammed on the brakes, and Kate said, “Mom! The baby!” But really, the baby was fine. He seemed sleepy. He’d stopped screaming as soon as Mom had told Kate to pick him up. But he smelled like pee.
Kate was feeling a bit sick. All she could see out the window, from her vantage point on the floor, was the upper half of what looked like a mini-mall and, above it, the sky.
They waited for Dad to come out of whatever shop had let him in.
No one said anything when he returned, bringing with him the scent of floral hand soap. Diego whined from the back seat.
The baby put his fat, round hands on Kate’s cheeks and pinched. “Ouch!”
“He always does that,” Francie told her.
“Ouch! Why? What should I do?”
“I’ll hold him!” said Alice.
“Almost there, no one move,” said Mom, another sharp turn, and then a whole lot of bumping. Kate felt a bit sicker. She lay down flat on the floor and closed her eyes, and let the baby sit on top of her. He seemed to like that.
When Mom stopped and opened the sliding door, Kate said, “I’m going to throw up now,” and crawled out into the fresh air. They were in a grassy field that had been turned into a parking lot, muddy ruts, cars on haphazard angles. Mom took the baby, and Kate limped around to the back of the van. She almost wished she’d eaten something this morning, but she didn’t want Mom to know she’d been right.
“Race nerves,” said Dad. “Ten experience points if you barf.”
“Carsickness,” said Kate, “Mom’s bad driving.” But she knew it was nerves. Nervous for a fun run! C’mon, Kate, pull yourself together! She bent forward, hands on knees, staring at her long ponytail swishing the grass, but she did not barf, she didn’t even gag. Diego romped over and licked her face.
“Someone grab the dog’s leash, and let’s get going!” Mom locked the van.
Kate met the baby’s eyes, strapped into the stroller. Awake again. They were both equally trapped.
Mom had parked nowhere near the start line. After walking for ages, Kate began to feel hopeful again. “It’s okay if we’re late,” she said. But they weren’t. Mom found the registration tent, and Dad picked up their numbers.
“I want to run in the race too!” Kate heard Francie whisper to Alice, while Sally tried to pin Kate’s number to the front of her shirt.
“Oh my god, Mom, you poked me!”
“I’m sorry! You moved! And this shirt is so tight—”
Kate grabbed the pins and the number.
“I can’t help you if you just WALK AWAY!”
Okay, Mom. Okay, Sally. Kate followed the tide of people heading for the start line. She was looking for someone, of course. There was a reason she’d agreed to sign up for the race, and it wasn’t just to get to spend more quality time with Dad (they had run together maybe three times, and even though Kate didn’t want to feel this way, she was embarrassed by his long, skinny calves in these very tight socks he wore that went all the way up to his knees). The reason was that two of Kate’s friends (from school, from “walks” in the park) had signed up too, they did it every year, and they said it was actually fun. “You get a swag bag,” said the friend whose parents let her drink their vodka. “And there’s free food.”
It didn’t sound all that special, honestly, but one of the two friends was the girl from drama class. Emma. So Kate said yes.
“Hey, Kate! Kate, over here!”
Kate scanned the forest of neon-clad legs. “Oh my god, Peter? What’re you doing here?” (Neither of the two friends was Peter.)
“My mom’s running in the half-marathon. What’re you doing?”
“Racing, of course.” Kate rolled her eyes. “Fun run. Here, help me pin my number on.”
“Have you been training?”
“It’s a fun run, Peter. I have not.”
“You’re going to die.”
“What? I am not!”
“There’s only one way to build endurance, that’s what my mom says. You can’t cheat at running.”
“Peter, can you focus on the pins, please?”
“I don’t want to scratch you…”
Rock music pounded from raised speakers, a man was shouting through a bullhorn. The number was on crooked, and Peter had only managed to get two pins fastened. Kate was starting to feel worse than before, tight, light-headed, like her guts were tying themselves in knots, cutting off oxygen to her brain. Peter seemed to guess, or understand, about Kate’s nerves, and he walked with her toward the starting line, where the competition was gathering, milling about. You’d hardly say they were lining up. It was kind of a pathetic mob of characters, moms and dads pushing jogging strollers, old people, people who looked pretty out of shape, a bunch of little kids.
And she didn’t see Emma from drama class anywhere.
Peter said, “When the gun goes off, don’t think, just start running. That’s my advice.”
Kate didn’t even reply, forgot to say thank you, she was feeling so sick and distracted as she pushed her way up toward the front—and there was Francie, that annoying kid! She was wearing a number pinned to her shirt (with all four pins), and she looked dead serious. One glance at Kate, and then back to focusing on the start line. The kid was intense.
When the gun went off, Francie jumped like a rabbit out in front of everybody. Like someone was chasing her. Kate also jumped, but more vertically than horizontally, it sounded like a real gunshot, it didn’t help with the whole guts-of-water situation going on down there. But she started to run. The first kilometre is the hardest part, Dad had told her. After that, you’ll be warmed up, you’ll feel better.
Wait, how long was this race?
They were running across a field, and it seemed hot. Then they were running in a little patch of trees, that was better, cooler, but Kate got stuck behind a dad pushing a double stroller and creating a mega-bottleneck. They passed a sign that read “1.” The guy pushing the double stroller shouted out, “One kilometre down, two to go, folks!” Was that supposed to be encouraging?
Out of the trees was a hill, which didn’t look like much till you tried to run up it, and Kate was beginning to wish she’d done a little more training, Dad kept telling her, if only she’d come running with him, the race would be easier.
But Dad, your socks! I’m sorry!
Don’t go out too fast, you’ll burn yourself out, Dad had said. Check, Kate thought, as a man with an enormous belly somehow passed her on the hill. Don’t let your feet slap the ground, it wastes energy. Tell that to this guy! Feet slapping like great big baloney sandwiches. Kate felt the spark of something—she wanted to pass this guy back. At the top of the hill was another hill—no way! And the guy was slowing down.
Once you’re cruising, pick it up a bit, see what you’ve got. Okay, let’s see. Let’s see what you’ve got, Kate Sosa!
She passed another sign that read “2.”
Up ahead, Kate saw the kid, Francie, who was wearing a black t-shirt and jeans, hard to miss. Kate had the feeling that if she really tried, she’d be able to catch her. The kid was pumping her arms hard and she looked a bit wild, she was skinny and not that big, and her jeans were too long.
When you see the finish line, sprint, Dad said, run all the way through, most people slow down on the last few steps and you’ll beat them if you keep running hard.
They were going downhill now, at last, turning into the same field where they’d started. The start line had been repurposed as a finish line. Kate sprinted, the kid sprinted, together they sprinted past another dad with a stroller, a lady dressed head to toe in leopard-print spandex (“You rock!” Kate shouted, maybe that was the oxygen deprivation talking, but she heard the lady calling back, “You go, girls!”), and together (almost) she and Francie crossed the finish line. Francie first.
Three whole kilometres!
Kate took three steps and threw herself onto the ground, but a volunteer in a safety vest told her to get up and keep moving. “No thanks,” said Kate. She was feeling something special, something she’d never felt before, or quite this intensely. She was looking at the sky and the clouds, and feeling the sun on her face, and she was thinking how she could have beat the kid, she could have run faster than her, she could have passed her right at the end; but she didn’t.
And it felt weird. It felt good.
Peter was standing over her, blocking the view of the sky. “Great race. You almost beat that tiny little kid.”
“That’s my sister’s friend Francie. Her dad just got arrested.”
“Whoa, seriously?” Peter was impressed, as she knew he would be. “What did he do?”
“I think I like racing,” said Kate. “It’s more fun than you’d think, Peter. You should try it sometime.”
But then her mom showed up, pushing the baby in the stroller, followed by Max with the dog, who was licking her face, and Dad who was saying, “Great race! Did you follow my tips?”; and Alice, and Francie, who kept leaping up and down shouting, “I won! I won!” Which wasn’t exactly accurate.
“You beat me, okay?” said Kate, standing up and brushing herself off. “That’s not the same thing.”
But she could see that Francie thought it was. And Kate had that weird feeling again, like she was going to cry or explode, or both.
