24. Noodle
It’s wrong to steal things.
I know that for sure. I know lots of things for sure, but not for the reasons I’m supposed to. Other people—most people—understand the rules to things just because. They know when to talk and when to keep quiet, when someone needs a hug and when they need space.
I only know things because I’m good at paying attention. Well, because I pay attention and because my brother and sisters give me lots of practice.
For example, when Theo sets things on fire, everyone around him gets mad, so that one’s easy. Don’t light fires. And when Trixie smiles, which she does all the time, most people smile back. They also give her things and are super nice to her, so I know that’s a helpful trick. Do smile at people. Most of the time, I can count on Trixie to teach me what I should do and Theo to teach me what not to do. They’re like one of those good cop/bad cop movies, only it never bothers Theo that he’s the bad one. Most of the time, I think he likes it.
Anyway. I didn’t mean to take the book from Jasper’s bookshelf, but I couldn’t help myself. When Jasper told us that story about him punching a guy, and how he only did it because his heart was broken and that lady kept quoting sad things from a book called Wuthering Heights, I had to pull it off the shelf. And once I did, I saw those notes that Chloe’s been obsessed with for the past few weeks.
Only this book has, like, a zillion of them. On almost every page, and just in the lady’s handwriting.
“Noodle, honey, did you remember to take your pain medication before bed?”
As soon as I hear my mom’s voice, I shove the book underneath my pillow. I don’t want her to see it. If she does, she’ll ask questions that I don’t have the answers to yet. I plan to wait until I have them before I show anyone the book.
That’s my other secret, by the way. When I don’t know how to act or what to say, I keep things hidden until I’m ready.
“Yes, Mom,” I say as I snuggle down under my covers. Gummy Bear is snoring at one end of the bed, so I can’t get my broken leg very comfortable, but that’s okay.
My mom appears in the doorway to the room I share with Theo, though he’s not staying in it right now. He and Trixie have been sleeping over at Jasper’s house. I’m kind of jealous, since camping out on the floor with all those plants seems fun, but I’m the one who called Mom, so I figure I should probably stay here to keep her and Chloe company. Todd, too.
Is it bad if I say I like him? I know I’m not supposed to—the evil stepfather and all that—but he’s nice and he laughs a lot. I especially like that he laughs the hardest at his own jokes, and he doesn’t care if anyone joins him. Whenever he falls into one of his laughing fits, he winks at me and then keeps going like I’m in on the joke with him.
“You look nice and cozy,” Mom says as she leans her head against the doorframe and watches me. She’s not the same as I remember, but that’s no surprise. I was only seven years old when she left, which means she’s been gone for almost half my life.
“Can I get you anything?” she asks. “A drink of water? A bedtime story? You used to like Beatrix Potter, didn’t you?”
I nod. Theo would get mad if anyone reminded him of the books he liked as a kid—he was so obsessed with the Warriors cat books that he used to draw whiskers on his face with a Sharpie—but I still sometimes read The Tale of Peter Rabbit when I’m feeling sad.
My mom takes one look at my nod and sighs. She also slips into the room, careful to snick the door closed behind her.
“You’re the only one who can stand the sight of me, aren’t you?” she asks as she sits down on my bed, her body weight tugging at the mattress until we both sink into it. Her hand comes up to smooth my hair away but she stops herself at the last second. “I suppose it’s my own fault.”
This is one of those situations where I don’t know what to say, so I don’t say anything at all. As usual, it works. She sighs again and keeps going.
“I wish Chloe would yell at me,” she says as she tucks her hands in her lap. She stares at her fingernails, which are long and shiny and red. They look like they belong on a witch. “I’d feel better if she yelled. Or ignored me. Or even started throwing things at my head. She’s been nothing but nice since I got here.”
“Chloe is nice,” I say.
I don’t mention the rest—that I like her best of anyone in the world, and that my heart gets tighter every time I see her crying in the living room after she thinks we’ve all gone to bed—but I don’t need to. I’m pretty sure Mom already knows.
“If you want to be yelled at, you can always ask Trixie,” I offer.
Mom’s soft laugh shakes the whole bed. “That’s true,” she says, and then suddenly she’s not laughing anymore. “Trixie’s beautiful, isn’t she? I was only seven years old when she left, which means she’s been gone for a big chunk of my life.”
“She looks like you,” I say, and that makes Mom laugh even less.
“Honey, will you tell me something?” she asks, although she’s still looking at her fingernails instead of me. “Why did you call me? I mean, really call me?”
That’s easy. “I broke my leg.”
She tsks and shakes her head. “No, I know that part. I just mean…” Her voice trails off, but I don’t say anything then, either. I know she’ll pick back up again. She glances down at me with eyes that look just like Chloe’s but aren’t. I don’t know how to explain it. They’re the same shape and color, and if I were to draw them, they’d end up being exactly the same, but they feel different.
When Chloe looks at me, I can see the whole world. When Mom looks at me, all I see is her.
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do,” she says, and in a way that makes me feel uncomfortably like she wants me to be the one to tell her. “Chloe’s at work all day while the kids are at school, and you… Well. You’re spending every minute of your free time with that grumpy man next door. When you called, you said that you needed me, but you don’t. Not really. You all seem to be getting along fine without me.”
My uncomfortable feeling only gets stronger.
“I couldn’t believe it when the phone rang and your number popped up,” she adds as though I’m not sitting here wishing that Todd would come in with one of his jokes and another one of the presents that no one seems to want. “At first, I thought it must have been a prank call, but Todd made me answer. It’s so strange. I didn’t even know you kids had my number.”
That part, at least, I can reply to.
“Chloe found it from the computer at work a few years ago,” I say. “She gave it to me in case of an emergency.”
Wrinkles start to form around her mouth. “A few years ago? You mean she’s had it all this time?”
I dig around in the drawer next to my bed until I find the crinkled scrap of paper. When I hand it to her, her whole arm shakes. She looks at it for so long that I’m afraid I missed something, but when she glances back up, I can tell she’s not really in the room with me anymore.
“She never called,” she said. “She never even tried. She must really hate me.”
I’m back to not knowing what to say again. I don’t think Chloe hates our mom, but I know she doesn’t love her anymore. For some reason, that seems worse.
“She’s sad a lot,” I say. “And she worries about bills.”
My mom throws the scrap of paper back into the drawer as if it hurts her to keep looking at it. “Is that why you called? That’s the emergency? Chloe needs money?”
I shrug. Chloe does need money, but I’m pretty sure she won’t accept any. If she wouldn’t cash Jasper’s check, then I don’t know why she’d bother with one from Mom. Especially since it would probably have to go through Todd first.
All of a sudden, my hands are seized between my mom’s. I don’t like how wet and warm her palms feel, so I try to pull away, but she keeps holding me. She puts her face so close to mine that I can smell my bubble-gum toothpaste on her breath.
“Would you please talk to me, Noodle?” she asks. “Why did you call? Why did you pull me away from my life? What do you want?”
I blink, suddenly wishing I’d never done any of it—punched Aiden in the school bathroom, run away into the forest and tumbled down that ravine, called the phone number so Chloe could maybe have a day or two to herself. I don’t have the right words or even the right feelings to make it okay again.
It’s a good thing Jasper gave me some, then.
I sit up straighter in my bed and yank my hands out of my mom’s. I can tell that her feelings are hurt, but I don’t like being touched when my emotions get scrunched up. That’s the thing Jasper said at the cabin earlier today—well, that and a lot other stuff I didn’t expect, but which helped me all the same.
“It’s not okay to hurt people,” I tell her, repeating what Jasper said. “When everything feels like it’s going to explode and you don’t know how to make it stop, you should never let yourself be tricked into hitting someone.”
My mom’s eyes fly open. “I never once hurt you kids. Not like that.”
I know she didn’t, but that’s not the point. Once upon a time, Jasper did hit someone. He told me and Zach all about it. He punched a man who was only trying to do the right thing for a girl they both loved. I didn’t hit Aiden over a girl—gross—but I did hit him because of what he said about my family.
That our mom didn’t love us enough to stick around. That we were trash. That it was a good thing we had each other because no one else wanted us.
I felt awful the moment I closed my fist, and I think I might have run all the way to Canada if I hadn’t fallen and busted up my leg, but Jasper says that was just my conscience doing its job.
“I only hit that man because I couldn’t hit the thing I was really mad at,” Jasper told me, and it made so much sense that even Zach nodded along.
“What were you mad at?” I asked.
“Life,” he said. “My mother. My brothers and sisters. All my stupid mistakes and useless dreams. Everything I didn’t have and all the things I never would. But mostly I was mad at myself. I’ve been mad at myself for a very long time.”
I know I probably shouldn’t have asked the next part, but I couldn’t help myself. He’d been staring at that picture of the lady on the wall and just looked so sad. I had to know.
“Are you mad at yourself now?”
Instead of getting upset, Jasper smiled at me—and in a way I’d only seen him when he was reading Nightwave with me and pretending he didn’t like it.
“I’m working on it, Noodle,” he said and reached over to ruffle my hair. I usually hated it when people other than Chloe did that, but I didn’t mind Jasper. “Ask me again in a few months.”
My mom still looks like she’s going to start crying, so I try to explain the best I can.
“Jasper promised I can go to his cabin anytime I want,” I say. “As soon as my leg’s better, I mean. He says it’s a nice quiet place to go when my emotions get to be too much, and I can keep my favorite books there like he does.”
“I don’t understand,” she says.
“You left because your emotions were too much, didn’t you?” I ask. “Because we were too much?”
She opens her mouth and closes it again, looking exactly like Theo when one of his experiments blows up in his face.
“We all feel like we want to run away sometimes,” I say and give her hand a little pat. She looks like she needs it. “But not everybody can. You did, so that means Chloe has to take care of us now. I don’t want anything from you, and neither do Theo or Trixie, but I think maybe you should ask her.”
Then I roll over as best I can and pull my blankets up to my chin. Gummy Bear grunts when I accidentally kick him, but my mom stays quiet for a very long time.
So long, in fact, that I’m already asleep by the time she leaves. I don’t know where she goes, but I’m pretty sure it isn’t to talk to Chloe. That would be the brave thing to do, and even though Mom is beautiful and soft and smells like a department store, she isn’t even a little bit as brave as her.