It was a warmer day in February when we got a call from the hospital. “Your mother is ready to come home, Katie.” I nearly dropped the phone. “She has gotten used to her medications and we now think her stable enough to go back to her previous environment. We will mail you some information about her emotional and nutritional needs, but we think you can handle that.”
“Thank you so much. When can I pick her up?”
“Whenever you can is fine.”
I spent another five minutes or so thanking whoever was on the phone; I never really figured that detail out. I called Kayla and told her the good news.
“Oh my god, that’s great! I’ll come over and pick you up right now.” She hung up without saying good-bye, and I chuckled to myself and put on my shoes and jacket. Dad was at work then, so I didn’t have to worry about explaining things to him. Yet.
A few minutes later Kayla and I were in the hospital, ready to pick up my mom. I was nervous already. What would she be like at home again? I wouldn’t have as much work to do, but would she approve of the way I was doing things or would she make me do all of my work until I learned how to do it properly? The old Mom wouldn’t have made me do that, but I never knew with the new Mom.
“Mrs. Hyler! It’s so good to see you!” Kayla walked up and hugged my mom. I had decided to introduce them a while back, after I had spilled everything. They had got along great, to my utter amazement.
“Hello, Kayla. Have you come to spring me?” Another weird thing: Mom developed a sense of humor.
“Of course. Don’t worry, we’ll bring you home safe and sound.”
Mom’s eyes flashed with worry, but it was gone in a second and I was able to convince myself that I had imagined it. “That’ good. Then I’ll be able to see what Katie is hiding in the closet.”
“I’m not hiding anything in my closet. My closet is the cleanest room in the house.”
“That is not something I want to hear, Katie.”
“It’s the dirtiest room in the house?”
“Good girl. I think.”
We left the hospital laughing, and Kayla took a long way home and went a lot slower than usual. But eventually we had to leave, and I told Mom, “Dad has a job now. He won’t be back for a couple hours.”
“Where does he work?”
“Super One.”
“Oh.” I didn’t have to tell her anything else for her to understand what I meant. We went in the apartment and we started cleaning. In the next hour or we had cleaned the entire apartment until it was near spotless. And Dad still wasn’t home yet.
“Well, what do you want to do?” she asked.
“Fix dinner?”
“What do you usually do?”
“Make a TV dinner and put it on a plate so it looks like I made it.”
“He never asks about any leftovers?”
“He’s usually too drunk.”
I could tell that her mood was deteriorating fast. No more happy, peppy Mom on meds. It was scared and frightened Mom on meds that wouldn’t be working for much longer if I didn’t think of something. Fast.
Finally, after I had finished all of my homework, Dad got back from work. Immediately he yelled, “Where’s my dinner!” Upon seeing Mom he said, “You. You finally got out of the hospital, huh? I but you had fun flirting with the doctors.”
“I’m out of the hospital, yes. I’m feeling much better,” she replied, ignoring his insults.
He snorted. “I bet you were never sick to begin with. Is my dinner ready yet, girl?” He’d stopped using my name. “I’m starving here. Bet you don’t care about that, either.”
“Of course I care. You’re my dad. Let me go heat it up for you again.” I retreated to the kitchen, and Mom followed me so she could get a glass of water. The look in her eyes told me that the medications wouldn’t be working for that much longer.
“It’s okay, Mom. We’ll be fine,” I whispered to her quietly. She just nodded.
As soon as I set the food down in front of Dad he demanded, “Where’s my beer? I asked for a beer!” I bit back my retort that no, he hadn’t demanded for a beer. He had just demanded food.
When he was settled, Mom and I went to my room. I showed her the new song I was working on from book ten, and when I finished with my performance she applauded me. “Marvelous, Katie. How long did it take you to learn that?”
I laughed. “Four days. That’s a lot for me, actually. For some reason I couldn’t get the trill right.”
“Well, practice makes perfect, right?” she laughed. I was happy that her mood was staying up.
If only Dad would allow it to last.
“Where’s my other beer!” he shouted, and I jumped up and got one out of the fridge for him. He grabbed it out of my hand, and I retreated back to my room with Mom, shutting the door again and picking up my violin again. This time I played a more haunting melody that reflected my mood.
“I like that one. Play it again,” Mom whispered when I finished it.
“Of course.” I played it over and over and over again. Just so we wouldn’t lose the moment.
Dad didn’t bother us for the rest of the night. Around ten mom went off to bed. Actually, she slept in my bed and I slept on the floor. We would have to change that sometime, but for then it was okay.
When I brushed my teeth I dared to take a peek at Dad. He had fallen asleep watching wrestling. I slipped out and turned the volume down on the TV and placed a blanket over him. I hoped he wouldn’t notice. He didn’t like to be babied.
In the morning I wrote down a list of things for Mom that she could do if she wanted to. After that I left, not even bothering to eat breakfast. I wasn’t hungry enough for it.
Walking to school brought my spirits up again. There was something about the fresh, bitterly cold air that made me happy. I almost started skipping, but as usual my back pack was too heavy.
“What are you so smily about?” Hannah asked accusingly.
“I just love the weather,” I sang as I dropped my back pack and opened my locker.
“Why? It’s freezing. You know, when I lived in Florida they thought sixty was cold. To me this feels like minus sixty,” she complained.
I laughed at her. “Just throw on a sweater and be happy your parents didn’t move to Alaska.”
“We were going to, but I complained enough so they decided to move farther south.”
Laughing I slammed my locker shut again just as Jake ran up. “Hey guys. Do you want to go to a movie tonight?”
“What movie?”
“Any one you want.” He smiled evilly. “As long as Kayla comes.”
I rolled my eyes. “If you want to go out with her, I wouldn’t bother. She goes through boyfriends like Kleenex.”
He pouted. “I can try, right?”
“Go ahead, but I doubt it’ll get you far,” I warned. Jake was nice. I didn’t want Kayla to get to him.
“Will you ask her?”
I sighed. “I’ll ask her at lunch, okay? And then I’ll tell you fifth hour.”
He pouted again. “Fifth hour is such a long wait.”
“Too bad.” The five minute bell rang then, so I stomped off to my first hour class.
At lunch when I asked Kayla, she raised her eyebrows but ended up saying yes in the end. “But do I have to, like, let him hug me or anything?”
“No! He’ll just be happy that you’re coming.”
“Good. I think.” She shrugged and ate some more salad. I chowed down on my burger.
When I told Jake that Kayla was coming he cheered, drawing the eyes of many people. He sat back in his chair, his ears going red from embarrassment. I chuckled, and he glared at me. Which made me laugh harder.
“What are you laughing at?” he muttered.
“Your ears,” I giggled. He clapped his hands over his ears to hide them as they started to redden.
When sixth hour was finally over I met up with all of my friends and we decided to go and see The Pink Panther. It was a good enough movie, but I thought it was kind of stupid. The only thing that kept me going through the entire thing was Jake staring at Kayla. She ignored him, but I could tell that she knew he was watching her. And that she was annoyed about it. I giggled silently and continued watching the movie.
As soon as it was over Kayla drove everyone home. There was no room left in her car once everyone piled in, but thankfully we all lived in town so we didn’t have to go out to the country or anything.
For some reason Kayla made sure that I was the last person that she would drop off. I thanked her and said good-bye while I was finding my keys.
When I opened the door to my apartment I was amazed at what I saw. Nearly everything was trashed, garbage everywhere and beer stains on the carpet. Mom was in the bathroom crying, and I could see Dad’s shadow, as he was standing in the kitchen.
He heard the door close behind me and yelled, “Katie! You get your a*s over here and explain something to me!”
Not showing how afraid I was I walked over to him and looked at him, my chin held high. He slapped me and asked, “What the hell have you been doing here, going out with your friends on your own father’s birthday?”
“I didn’t know it was your birthday today, Dad. You’ve never told me when your birthday was,” I replied, looking him straight in the eye. He didn’t like that, so he slapped me again. This was the first time he had ever been violent.
“It’s the same day it has been for thirty-three years, February twentieth. If you can’t show that kind of respect to your own father, you don’t deserve to live here. Get your stuff and get gone. I don’t want to see you here again,” he said, crossing his arms across his chest.
I couldn’t believe what he was saying. Was he seriously kicking me out? Numbly, I walked to my room and got my violin and an old sports bag. I threw a few clothes and some books and my presents and everything dear to me in there, and then I went to the bathroom and got my toothbrush and hairbrush and a couple of other things. Dad was watching me from the hallway. Putting all of my sheet music into the top of the violin case, I zipped it up and finally grabbed another jacket and my cell phone and the little cash I had and stuffed it in a pocket so Dad couldn’t see it. Then I left the apartment, not even able to say good-bye to my mom.
I quickly called Kayla and asked, “Can you come pick me up? My dad just kicked me out.”
“Are you serious?” She swore and I could hear her open the door and head back outside. She must have just gotten home. The car door slammed and she said, “I’ll be right there. Do you have everything you need?”
“I’ll run out of clothes in a week or two, but other than that, yeah,” I replied, willing myself not to cry. It wasn’t so bad, was it? I never even liked living there, anyway, right? So it shouldn’t to matter. But they were family. So it did matter.
Kayla was there in two minutes. I had a feeling that she had sped for me, which was nice, considering was she highly against breaking laws. Without a word she took my bags and put them in the trunk as I climbed in the car and put my seatbelt on. Then she got in the car and we started driving off.
I decided that it was best that I didn’t look back at my old home, so I just looked forward at the road ahead.
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