The Year We Fell From Space: Parts Four–Five

I want a cool lunch bag that’s insulated and there’s one with a nebula on it.

Lou has a fire pit down by the stream but we don’t use it much because the mosquitoes are relentless down there.

Jilly takes a big breath like she’s going to keep her monologue running until I’m in college, but Mom turns to me and says, “What about you? What’re you most looking forward to?”

“And she doesn’t look like she knows how to collect kindling or gut a fish, either.”

“Does Patrick think that women just shrivel up and die when they don’t have men? Probably. Is he wrong? Definitely.”

I’m only late to Spanish class today. And I have a pass, so I’m not even technically late.

A bunch of dots connected in crude Sharpie marker, pretending to be a star map. “Ugh!” I say. “Whoever drew that has never even looked up!”

I barter with the stars inside my eyelids.

She looks around my room and I don’t say anything because I’m formulating the next step of my plan.

“And a merlin or kestrel if you’re lucky,” Jilly says. “Bald eagles are overrated. Everybody wants to see one. But a kestrel. Now that’s something.”

Dad goes to say something probably sappy and gross about how Tiffany is beautiful too but he stops himself and concentrates on finding a parking space.

If you’d have asked me last night at dinner to write her childhood story, I’d have put her in dancing lessons and in front of department store mirrors, trying on different makeup. I’d have told you she was a cheerleader. I suddenly realize how judgmental I am.

Jilly seems to relax when I say this because I think she looks up to me. This whole divorce business makes her watch me for cues. So I figure I better keep my cues right.

I’m not dumb, but I don’t need all that lovey crap right there in front of my face. Dad was never subtle about stuff, I guess.

Jilly bursts into tears before we’re halfway through dinner. Old-New Jilly. She’s inconsolable because she thinks that she hurt Mom’s feelings by talking about Tiffany.

“You have to pry off this one—it’ll come off easy enough if you use your student ID card or something thin and flat like that. Once you pop it off, inside will be an item,” I say.

My stomach turns and I feel clammy.

I finally crawl out of the tent, which Mom deems too small for two real people, and I go to my room.

There’s a flock of starlings chirping in a cornfield that’s been plowed.

Mom makes that face where her lips curl in and she’s grimacing a bit.

Jilly is feisty. She says she’s fine and I think she really is.

“By the time you’re in high school, you’ll have a lot of coping skills. More than anyone around you. Trust me,” Dad says. “Figuring this out early is so much better than figuring it out late.”

A sliver of the moon is visible from my attic window.

It’s hard drawing the stars when you’re hurtling through space at hundreds of thousands of miles per hour.

“A little. Not really. Everyone knew why I threw the toaster,” I say. “And we didn’t have to buy a new one. Robust toaster. So I had that going for me.”