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“How are things going with Sam?”
“I took your advice,” I said, “and am keeping an open mind.”
She handed me three hangers that held the same blazer, but in different sizes. “And more importantly, how’s Lenore?”
“A little brat,” I said. “She’sthe one who seemed to want in the house so bad.She’sthe one who was trying to suck on my shirt like I was a surrogate cat mom. And did I tell you the vet said she’s at least three years old? She’s just small, maybe from malnourishment from living on the harsh suburban streets. It’s like the plot of that movie, remember the one, where the couple adopt a child from Russia but she turns out to be an adult with some rare hormonal disorder that stunted her growth? And then she tries to kill them all?”
“That doesn’t sound like a movie I’d like,” Alison said, wrinkling her nose.
And of course, I remembered that Alison never liked scary movies, and she really didn’t care for any media that depicted adoption in either an overly negative or overly inspirational way. I felt like an asshole for even bringing it up.
“Sorry,” I said. “Anyway, Lenore’s fine. We’re still getting used to each other.”
“It’ll take time,” Alison said. “It’s actually very encouraging that she’s taken to being in the house so well. I was worried she’d be a bolter, since she’s spent her whole life outside.”
“To bolt, she’d have tocome out,” I said.
“Remember that one hamster you had,” Alison said, “that would only stay in the little house-bed thing you’d bought it? It was like a hamster recluse.”
I’d creatively named the hamster Rocket, because the day I got him was the same day my dad bought Conner a rocket set to launch in the backyard. The antisocial creature would only come out to eat, and if I tried to reach my hand in to get Rocket out to clean his bed shavings, or god forbid to pet him, he’d nip at my fingertips.
“When he died, I buried him in that little house,” I said.
Alison put a hand to her chest. “Aw, that’s so sweet. He gets to spend eternity with the thing he loved most.”
I’d meant it more as a spitefulif you love it so much, here, take itgesture, but Alison’s version of events made me sound a lot better, so I left it.
“I was such a jerk when I was a kid,” I said.
“Aren’t all kids, in a way?” Alison said. “Like when we dostory time at the library—don’t get me wrong, the kids areadorable, and way preferable to their parents in most respects. But they’re self-absorbed. It’s developmentally unavoidable. If they want to stand up to get a better view of the book and block the kid behind them, or pet your feet while you’re reading—there’s one girl who will do this, and I can’t even begin to tell you how creepy and weird it is—or snatch the rest of a cookie out of another kid’s hand... well, they’re kids. That’s what they do.”
“But you’re talking abouttoddlers,” I pointed out. “If I snatched a cookie out of your hand right now, you’d think I was rude as hell. Or like the way I just cut you off, the way I treated you after you were trying to help. That was a jerk move.”
There. I’d said it. I hadn’t even known I was going to, but the minute I had it felt like a relief. It had been great, getting closer with Alison again over the last few weeks, but it always felt like there was this one thing between us. Maybe it was time to talk about it.
Alison had been rifling through some multicolored cardigans, careful to only lift enough to see the size sticker on each one so as not to disturb the neatness of the stacks. She definitely had a librarian’s desire to leave everything exactly as she’d found it, and a librarian’s need for more and more cardigans. Now she paused.
“You were so angry after your parents split up,” she said. “And since you’d moved away and neither one of us could drive yet, I felt like I was losing you. To the distance, but also just to...” She gestured vaguely out to the ether.
“Depression?” I supplied. “I know. I was in a black cloud around that time. Sometimes I think I have a bit of a gray cloud,at least, that still follows me around. I know people’s parents get divorced, and every teenager is practically required to go through a stage where they shop at Hot Topic and say things likeYou laugh because I’m different, but I laugh because you’re all the same. But it felt like too much to deal with, and I shut out a lot of people, including you.”
“I could tell you were going through a lot,” Alison said. “When you said that thing, about swallowing a bottle of pills... well, it sounded like you could be serious. I didn’t want you to get in trouble, but I also knew I’d never forgive myself if you ended up doing something and Ihadn’tacted on it. I knew you were at your dad’s that weekend, but also knew that you weren’t that close with him, so I thought it was better to call your mom’s apartment. I’m really sorry if that ended up being the wrong thing to do.”
It had ended up becoming another fight between my parents, a piece of evidence as to whyshewasn’t doing a good job raising me and whyhewasn’t doing a good job of supervising me when I was back in his care. It meant my mom spent the next year randomly asking to read my chat threads or watching me especially close on major holidays—she seemed to think that New Year’s in particular would send me over the edge, which was actually pretty astute. It meant my dad had burst into my room while I was chatting with Alison and yelled,Not in my house!, the only thing he’d ever directly said to me about the entire incident, which left me with the distinct impression, however false and overdramatic, that he cared less if I killed myself and more that I didn’t do it during the forty-eight hours when I was his responsibility. It meant that I’d decided, fine, not in your house, andarranged it so I never spent another custodial weekend in that house again.
But none of that was Alison’s fault.
“I was mad at you at the time,” I said. “But deep down, I think I was mad at myself. I knew I wasn’t actually planning to do anything, that it was just a cry for attention. And I hated myself for it.”
Alison’s brows drew together. “But what’s so bad about needing attention? Especially if you’re in pain, or struggling.”
I shrugged. “Call it being a Capricorn,” I said. It was a deliberately simplistic response, because how else could I express it, the way my skin crawled at the idea of saying baldly to someone,I’m in pain, I’m struggling, I need you. It always blew my mind, when people on social media posted things like “I’m having a bad day, please send compliments!” I loved that for them, being so open, but I’d rather saw off my own foot.
“Either way,” Alison said. “I’m glad you came back and we were able to reconnect. I missed you.”
“Same.” Then, before it could get any mushier than it already had, I held a charcoal blazer I’d found up to my body. “What do you think?”
“That could be a good color,” Alison said. “It lets you wear it with black without worrying about matching exact shades.”
