Bribery. Another bad parenting technique. Ugh.
But that was the key, because Theo had been the first one up and dressed for almost the entire school year. And in the ten minutes that I’d left him alone, he hadn’t decided he didn’t like his outfit and changed like he sometimes did. Thank God. “It’s time to pause for the day, kid.”
Theo sighed. “Why is everyone so loud in the morning?” he asked, hopping off his bed, and like Ivy, he used his palms to get his red hair out of his eyes. It was even brighter than mine. “It’s too early to be loud.”
I patted the top of his head. “Go get your shoes on, please.”
Unlike the girls, Theo simply said, “’Kay.”
At least one kid was easy. This morning, at least.
Though the last five minutes were like pulling teeth, the next five went by smoothly. Junie still felt bad for clipping me in the face, so after she scrubbed her teeth, she hurried downstairs. Penn only took a few minutes in the bathroom before she emerged in her school uniform, which was slightly rumpled since she had a bad habit of not hanging it up the night before. She glared at me as shebreezed past, the strong scent of her vanilla perfume nearly choking me.
I wouldn’t say anything about it, though. It was only recently that I’d convinced her putting on deodorant wouldn’t kill her.
“It’s not fair,” Ivy muttered as she sat on the bench near the front door, kicking her feet against it. “I want to skip school, too.”
“Daisy only gets to skip because she’s old,” Penn told her, readjusting her tie in the mirror on the back of the entryway closet door.
I had no fight left in me. “You only have one more week of school, and then it’s summer vacation,” I told them. “Hang in there.”
Theo, who kept kicking his shoes together to watch them light up, said nothing. Addison Pier View was a combination elementary and middle school, and everyone wore a uniform except the kindergarteners. Starting next year, though, he wouldn’t be able to wear his Spider-Man sneakers to school anymore, and I could already imagine how wellthatwas going to go.
And I’d be here for it. I’d be here for another year of mornings with meltdowns and tantrums and screams. My stomach churned.
We stood in the entryway for maybe ninety seconds before the bus rolled up. Junie hurried out first, ponytail bouncing against her backpack, and Ivy was hot on her heels. Penn picked up Theo’s hand, moving toward the door without a word.
“Penn,” I called after her. She stopped on the threshold,shoulders slumping in annoyance as she peeked back at me through her curtain of semi-damp red hair. I pulled out the five-dollar bill I’d stuck in my pocket and held it out to her. “Get a cookie in the cafeteria today.”
She plucked it from my fingers, not looking at me while muttering a soft, “Thanks.” And then, just before she shut the door, she added, “Have a nice day skipping school, loser.” I caught a flash of a smile before she rushed off to the bus.
Our way of saying sorry for the rocky morning.
Out of all the kids, Penn felt the most normal to bicker with. There was a time before Dad died when Penn and I were closer, when she was still the kid sister I could pick on. Different than the others. Junie had been five when Dad died, Ivy had been three, and Theo had just turned one. The age gap was too big with them, and they looked at me for authority and comfort. Not as a big sister, but as a fill-in parent.
I shut the front door and leaned my forehead against it, dread turning my stomach again. The house was now silent, and my thoughts were buzzing and loud, second-guessing everything. I shouldn’t have thrown water on Penn, and I shouldn’t have threatened Junie and Ivy, and I shouldn’t have bribed Theo with my phone. All theshouldn’ts really felt like failures, stacking up and pressing down on my shoulders to root me to the floor.
Weariness was there, too, and I half debated climbing back into bed, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep. I’d just lay there, body tired but mind awake and running a mile a minute.
And besides, it was probably the best day of senior year.
Senior Skip Day.
And I wasn’t going to spend it in bed. I was going to make the most of it.HowI wasn’t sure, but I would.
After putting on a bit of makeup and changing into a pair of denim shorts and a green tank top—because it was now early June, and Connecticut had been gifting us with absolutelybeautifulweather lately—I left the house.
I sent Mom a quick text before I left, though, in case she checked my location at some point during the day and saw that I wasn’t at school.
I knew she wouldn’t.
Mom had gotten her dream job in New York City doing some sort of event planning for a big agency four years ago, so she had to be up every day at five to make it to the train by six, to get into the city by nine. It was the kind of job that picked up the financial slack after Dad died, with a salary that, along with his life insurance, kept us at our private school and us in our house.
The only problem was that she was barely home.
Which meant I was responsible for getting the kids around in the morning, taking care of them after school while Mom was still at work, and getting them into bed at night when Mom was too tired for bedtime stories.
That was our system. Had been for years. And since I’d been waitlisted at my dream school, itwouldbe our system for years to come.
