The Way Back to Happiness (30 page)

Which summed up a lot of things in life.

“Actually, I sort of like it,” Alabama admitted, leaning forward to turn up the volume.

A
labama called Stuart’s house several times over the weekend, but he never called back. Which was odd, for Stuart. On Monday, she saw him briefly as he skittered in late to algebra, but she didn’t want to talk about personal matters when there were a lot of people around. She dreaded telling him that the meeting with her grandmother hadn’t been all that she’d hoped for. That it had in fact been, with the exception of her grandmother’s acknowledgment that Alabama
was
her granddaughter, a humongous letdown.

But she did look forward to telling Stuart he’d been wrong about Bev. She wasn’t her mother.

In a lot of ways, the trip to Houston hadn’t been a complete waste of time. It had opened her eyes. All her life, she’d been looking at things so narrowly. It was as if she’d only seen a tiny bit of a picture, and suddenly the scope had zoomed out and she was viewing everything all at once for the first time. She knew The Really Bad Thing that had happened between her mom and Aunt Bev. Finally. She knew Bev wasn’t a monster, wasn’t a terrible and coldhearted sister hater. Bev was even willing to admit her own mistakes.

Ambling down the hall on the way to lunch, she found a picture of Bugs Bunny with the words
What’s Up, Miss Putterman?
written over it and taped to the bathroom door. She tore it down, crumpled the paper, and tossed it away. People were still saying “What’s up?” to her aunt. It was not funny anymore.

It hadn’t been all that funny to begin with. It had just seemed like it when she was with Kevin. Now she shuddered to think about her part in that escapade. It felt like something that had happened in another lifetime.

Stuart wasn’t in the cafeteria. She gulped down a disgusting chili dog and went to see if he was holed up in the library. Still no Stuart. She ran into him just before the next class, edging along the lockers like a kid trying to make himself invisible. His expression when he saw her seemed wary.

She captured him by the shirtsleeve, afraid he might actually run away from her. “What’s the matter? Why are you acting all weird?”

“What do you care?”

Her breath hitched. She’d come to expect all sorts of odd behavior from Stuart, but hostility took her by surprise. “I’m your friend.”

“You’ve got other friends.”

“Since when?”

“Since Kevin Kerrigan,” he said, almost bitterly.

“What’s the matter with you? Did something happen at Thanksgiving? I leave town one day and you go psycho on me.” She laughed. “Are you jealous?”

His cheeks blazed. “No, of course not. Be friends with whoever you want. I don’t care.”

She put her hands on her hips, feeling almost like Bev in one of her scolding moods. “You’re wrong. Crazy wrong. I’m
not
friends with Kevin Kerrigan, really. Maybe I ran around with him a few times, but for your information, I was going to tell him I didn’t want to hang out with him anymore. So if you’ve decided that you want to dump me on account of past association, that leaves me with exactly zero friends.”

He angled a glance up at her. “Really?”

“Really. Now, what’s going on?”

His gaze scanned the hallway, where clusters of kids were gearing up for the next class. “I can’t tell you now. Why don’t you come home with me after school? Mom made so many pies, we’ve still got a whole pecan one left over.”

Pie sounded good. She’d been too nervous to eat much dessert on Thanksgiving. But she mostly wanted to talk to Stuart. “Okay, but I don’t know why you can’t just say what the matter is. I’m worried now.”

“I’d just rather not. Not here.”

Her anxiety didn’t lessen when Stuart insisted on taking the long way home after school, because he preferred sticking to Main Street rather than cutting through the smaller streets that were quicker.

Once there, they loaded pie onto plates and retreated to his room, where they could gossip about the holiday weekend in private. Nice as Mrs. Looney was, Alabama didn’t feel comfortable talking about her messed-up family in front of her. And she had a feeling that whatever was preying on Stuart’s mind wasn’t the kind of thing a person wanted to spill in front of his parents.

“Tell me what’s wrong,” she insisted as soon as the door was closed and Stuart had put on his Amy Grant album. He’d decided he really liked Amy Grant after all and had started listening to her songs obsessively.

“You first,” he said.

She told him about the trip, and he questioned her in detail. His disappointment that Bev was not her mother was overshadowed by his amazement—and feeling of vindication—upon learning that there had been a baby, even if the poor thing hadn’t made it. “I knew there had to be something like that,” he said. “That’s how it always is on the soaps.”

“It felt like a soap opera, for sure.” She described the big house, her grandmother who’d seemed so intimidating, and the sniping between Bev and Dot, and Bev storming out. And finally the long drive home.

“The strange part,” she said, summing up, “is that after everything, I like everybody more.”

“Even Dot? She sounds awful!”

She had to think about that. “I don’t much like Dot, but I can’t totally hate her. Mom always called the Jacksons the Jackasses, but to me, they seemed sad . . . and all alone. Even when Dot was acting all snippy and snooty, I kept thinking that she and my grandmother had probably been through so much together, and now they were by themselves, like my mom and I were. I wouldn’t have wanted some strange kid showing up on the doorstep, so why should she?” She shook her head. “I thought I would hate her, but I couldn’t. I guess it’s pretty stupid to hate people before all the information is in. I made that mistake with Bev.”

Stuart weighed what she was saying. “Well, your aunt could have told you all this earlier. You might have understood better.”

“But she didn’t know the things I was thinking. And I didn’t give her much of a chance.”

“So do you think you’re going to live in Houston now?” Stuart asked.

“I doubt it. I don’t even care anymore.”

“I thought you wanted to live with Granny Jackson.”

“I did. But after seeing that place, I don’t know if I’d fit in there, either. I don’t know where I fit in. I didn’t mind Granny Jackson, actually, but Dot was kind of scary. I can’t imagine calling her Aunt Dot, or being related to her at all. Anyway, I don’t think I made much of an impression. Especially not with Dot. And my grandmother puts a lot of weight on whatever Dot thinks.”

“Well, then maybe it’s a good thing that you like Bev better now. ’Cause it looks like you’re stuck with her.”

“Yeah.” She blew out a breath. “Now I’ve got to try to make up for all the bad stuff.”

“What bad stuff?” Stuart asked.

She’d been thinking of the Bugs posters, but he didn’t know about her involvement in all that. “Just . . . not being nicer to her. You know.” She crooked her head and regarded him seriously. “Why were you acting so freaked out this morning? Why didn’t you return my calls this weekend?”

He ducked his head and his face took on that dull expression again. That face that said he wanted to disappear.

“For God’s sake, what’s the matter?” she asked. “I’ve been so worried, imagining all sorts of awful things.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know . . . like you found out you’re dying or something.”

“That’s not far from the truth. Or at least—”

“What?” Panic swelled in her. “Are you sick?”

“No—not that way. But I feel like I’m . . . well, like I can’t ever be me anymore.”

She could feel her brows drawing together. “Why not?”

“Because . . .” He inhaled deeply. “Maybe it won’t seem like that big a deal. You’ve probably been at city schools where there were guns, and switchblade fights in the halls.”

“No, I haven’t—that stuff’s mostly on the news, not in real life.”

He twisted his lips. “Well, what happened to me’s not that bad.”

She sat up straighter, losing patience. “Then . . .
what?
”

He shrugged again. “Someone’s been leaving notes on my locker. Stupid stuff, but mean. Calling me names.”

“Like what?”

“Just . . . you know. Stuff they consider mean.”

“What, exactly?”

“What does it matter?” His voice rose, as if
she
was attacking him. She supposed he was right. It didn’t matter—whatever it was, it was obviously meant to scare him.

What alarmed her most was his reaction. He was always catching crap from other kids. Whatever had been happening lately must have been way more threatening, more personal, to have him so worried and depressed. “Who’s doing it?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I sort of had an idea, from the guys who tease and hassle me in the halls between classes.”

Her chest was heaving with anger. “Who?”

“Just guys. Older guys, mostly. What does it matter?”

“It matters,” she insisted. “They should get in trouble.”

“For what?”

“For bullying you.”

“It’s just names, though. We’re not supposed to let that kind of thing get to us.”

She shook her head. “This isn’t third grade and some guy saying you have cooties. You know it’s not—you don’t even feel comfortable walking down the side streets of New Sparta.”

He bit his lip. “I don’t really know for sure who did the signs, and even if I did, telling on them would only make them bug me more, probably.”

“But they can’t get away with it.”

He was silent for a moment, then asked quietly, “So you’d never heard anything about this?”

“No!” She shook her head, then backed up. “Wait—how long has this been going on?”

“For a couple of weeks? It didn’t seem like that big a deal at first. When I show up to school before homeroom, there’s sometimes a sign on my locker. But they’ve been getting meaner, and creepier. I’ve been trying to get there earlier to tear it off before anyone can see.”

“What jerks! We’ve got to find out who they are. Why didn’t you tell me this was going on?”

“Well, I’ve been busy with tech rehearsals for the school play. And also, things have been weird between us. Every since the talent show.”

That stupid talent show. “Not so weird that I wouldn’t want to know when something bad was happening to you. I’m your friend.”

“I sort of thought . . . after you said all that about my costume, about how people would make fun of me . . .”

She flinched, remembering. “I didn’t mean you’d deserve it. Or that jerks would be justified in bullying you.”

“Yeah, but . . .”

Her breath caught. “You didn’t think
I
put signs on your locker, did you? Is that who you think I am?”

He looked doubtful, and she realized that the thought—or something close to it—had crossed his mind. How could he think she would do something like that?
Why?

She was outraged, until she recalled that she
had
made mean signs . . . about Bev.

She remembered Stuart’s sympathy for Bev when the signs appeared, and his saying the people who made them were vicious. She understood now. Anybody who would bully Stuart was lower than low.

“I wouldn’t do that to you,” she said. “Ever.”

“I know.”

She fumed. “I still can’t believe this.” And a horrible suspicion took root in her mind. If Stuart could even dream she would do something like that, there had to be a real reason. Like who she’d been hanging out with.

Kevin’s calling him Tights Boy jumped to mind. But Stuart wouldn’t bug out over something mild like that.

“Please don’t tell anyone,” he begged. “I only told you because it felt good to talk to somebody. Maybe it will go away. Jokes get old, even to bullies.”

“Jokes?” she exclaimed. “This isn’t funny.”

He tried again. “Maybe, with Christmas coming up, people will be nicer. Or at least have better things to think about.”

She rejected the idea that the Christmas spirit would give these bullies a change of heart. They argued back and forth, but in the end she had to agree to Stuart’s request for her to keep her mouth shut. It was his problem, he kept saying. And he was afraid creating a federal case out of a few signs would make things worse for him in the long run. Besides, they didn’t know who was doing it, so what good would it do to tell Mr. Kirby?

On the way home, she wasn’t surprised to hear the familiar sputter of the Mustang’s motor behind her. She’d sensed all day that she’d run into Kevin sooner rather than later.

He leaned over and opened the passenger door. “Hop in.”

“No thanks,” she said.

“Don’t you want to go somewhere?” He waggled his brows at her.

“I’m grounded, remember?” Although she wasn’t even sure this was true anymore. Bev had seemed ready to withdraw that punishment. But it still made a good excuse to avoid Kevin. “Besides, I’ve got a lot of homework.”

“Give you a ride home?” he asked.

“I think Aunt Bev is waiting for me at the house. She’d be mad.”

“She’s not mad that you hang out with that little—” His words bit off.

She lifted her chin. “That little what?”

“Never mind.”

“No,” Alabama said, not willing to drop it. “I do mind. What were you going to say?”

For a moment, his jaw appeared clenched tight enough to crack Brazil nuts. He eyed her coldly. “You aren’t so grounded that you couldn’t hang out with your little friend. You don’t have too much homework for that.”

“Stuart helped me with my homework,” she lied. “We have classes together, and things in common. You and I don’t.”

He drew back, blinking. “So what is this, the brush-off?”

“It’s not like we were going together,” she reminded him. “I’m just some freshman you were messing around with.”

“Yeah, right.” He sneered. “It was loads of fun, too. Frigid little—”