Page 2 of The Dysasters

“Cora, I’m eighteen. You’ve got to stop calling me your baby.”

“Child, I don’t care if you’re eighty. You’ll always be my little strawberry baby.”

“Oh, god. Fine, call me baby, just don’t call me ‘little strawberry baby.’”

“We’ll see,” Cora muttered, already distracted by her computer again.

“I guess we’ll see’s better than ‘Child, I’ll call you my little strawberry baby till they put one of us in the grave.’” She mimicked Cora perfectly. “I’ll take what I can get.” Foster’s unease quieted and she slipped into the chair opposite the stout woman. Even though her gut was roiling in time with the approaching storm, Cora’s words soothed her. Her adoptive mother had never gone back on a promise. She’d been there for her since the day Foster was born, premature and on life support in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Her birth parents had told her stories about her “aunt” Cora, the selfless nurse and herowho’d been there every day making sure she’d grow up healthy and strong. Foster’s heart squeezed with the memory of her parents. “Hang on, you said stressed. Why are you stressed?” she blurted, not wanting to think about the past any longer.

“Because if I’m right about who we’re meeting tonight, our whole world will change.”

“Wait, is this the guy? The one we’ve been searching for for the past year? You didn’t tell me you’d found him. Who is he? What’s his name?”

Ignoring the questions, Cora pointed to her suitcase. “Go over there and grab those two maroon sweatshirts.”

Foster trudged to the rusted luggage rack and unzipped the suitcase. She held up the thick sweatshirt and pointed to the gold lettering: HOMERHIGHSCHOOLPANTHERS. “I thought homeschooling was going fine. And I can learn a lot more from you than from a crappy backwoods public school. And I graduate this year.”

“Give it here.” Foster tossed Cora the sweatshirt, and she pulled it on before explaining. “You’re not going there. You’re just going there. Now put that one on. I don’t want to be late.”

Foster zipped the baggy sweatshirt up over her flannel and rolled up the bottom a few inches until the frayed edges of her shorts stuck out and she no longer looked half naked. “I look like a plum,” she grumbled, frowning at her reflection in the dusty mirror. “But at least I don’t have to go back to high school.” Not having to go back to a traditional school had been the only positive outcome of Doctor Rick’s untimely death. Cora wanted to finish his research and keep Foster close—something about the healing process that one of Cora’s doctor friends had told her. Whatever the reason, Foster didn’t care as long as she didn’t have to return to the mind-numbing day care they called public school.

Frizzy strands of fiery red hair flopped against her forehead, and she smoothed them back into her messy topknot. “So this person we’re meeting,” she began as she smeared ChapStick over her lips, “is he one of Doctor Rick’s former lab assistants who’s now a washed-up old science teacher or something?”

Cora slung her satchel over her shoulder and checked her phone. “Let’s go. It’s starting soon.”

Foster slipped the ChapStick tube into her pocket and turned to Cora. “Has anyone ever told you that you look like Kerry Washington?” She rubbed her lips together and smiled her most innocent smile.

“No, because I don’t.” The front door creaked as Cora opened it, and the room filled with sticky, cool air. “Now get your skinny white butt into the car.”

Foster sauntered to the door, pausing in front of the stocky woman, her cinnamon and cedar scents tickling Foster’s nose. “Who are we meeting?” A familiar tingle pulsed within her as she spoke.

Cora rested her hands on her hips. “When I see fit to tell you, you will know. And we’ve talked about that little trick of yours, Foster. Be careful how you use it.”

“I still don’t get how you know about my Jedi mind trick.” She hopped out onto the sidewalk and drew an imaginary lightsaber.

“There’s no such thing as Jedis, and I’m too damn smart to fall prey to your neuro-linguistic BS.”

“No such thing as Jedis?” Foster powered down her lightsaber and hooked it on her belt loop. “Broken my heart, you have. Ruining my childhood fantasies, you are.”

Cora pursed her lips. “Mmm, mmm, mmm. Strange, you are. Dorky you shall always be.”

“Was that Yoda-speak? Your training is coming along nicely, young Padawan. And speaking of training, are you going to drive to wherever it is we’re going?”

“No.” Cora unlocked the car and Foster slid into the driver’s seat. “And I don’t need training. I know how to drive. You’re just better at it than I am—all Evel Knievel–like.”

“You know I don’t know who all these old people are that you talk about.” Foster started the car and waited for Cora to punch the address into the GPS. “But unlike some people, I’ve been practicing.”

“Yes, I’d say you practice driving every day and I practice sleeping right here in this seat every day.”

“No, not driving. My Jedi mind trick. I made a whole rose bloom outside of that restaurant in Pennsylvania.” Foster pulled out of the parking lot,catching Cora’s suspicious glance as her gaze swept from her adoptive mom to the navigation screen.

“Okay,” Foster conceded, watching the vast, cow-dotted fields fade into the distance as they drove closer to town. “Maybe it just grew a tiny bit before it stopped listening. Oh, but I did get those clouds in West Virginia to look like giant Peeps. I was trying to make it rain, but shapes were all I could get. Remember that?”

“I remember the car’s air conditioner going out and us cooking in here. You could’ve swam in this car I was sweating so much.”

“Yeah,” she laughed. “That was pretty nasty.” Thunder rumbled overhead, and Foster let it pass before continuing. “I know there’s something out there that will listen one hundred percent of the time. Maybe not people, or flowers, or the clouds, but there’s something. I just have to find it.”

The car jostled as Foster flipped on the turn signal and pulled into a large field. She parked behind a giant Ford truck and turned off the car. “We’re here.”