Mixed Up: Chapters 23–32

I shake my head vehemently. “I’m never letting a bunch of adults invade my life again. Been there, done that when Mom died.”

It may be from a long time ago, but it’s classic Portia—friendly, open, and a hundred percent confident: You’re going to be ecstatic to get this invitation and of course you’re going to say yes.

“Go ahead—erase it!” I shout. “I’ve already sent it to everybody on my contact list!”
“You’re bluffing!” Konrad sneers.

“Lay—off—my—brother!” Declan gasps, straining with effort.
I throw myself into the fray. With great difficulty, Declan and I wrestle Konrad away from Reef and hurl him toward the office door.

We examine the photos on our phones. They’re pretty incriminating, especially Reef’s. He managed to capture Konrad crouched over the lockbox, the blades of the bolt cutter opened wide to snap off the lock. It couldn’t be more perfect if we asked the guy to pose in the act of committing the crime.

It’s the same old Declan, yet in a way it isn’t. Still surly, still complaining full-time, still communicating by means of a series of grunts.

“But this is over, right? I’m not in trouble anymore and neither is...anybody else?”
She reaches out her hand and we shake solemnly.

“We were in an incubator for newborn babies! We could barely squeeze our big toes inside one of those now!”
“We’ll have to improvise. Rig something bigger, so we both fit.”

A frosty blob of milkshake slips down the wrong pipe and I lurch out of the memory, hacking and choking.

I picture any bouncy castle I’ve ever seen. Not only are they plastic, but they come with an air compressor that keeps them inflated. That way we’d be off the floor and insulated from anything metal.

It says on the internet that the average lightning bolt packs a wallop of three hundred million volts of electricity.

Theo finally turns up around six thirty, soaked and chastened. “I got lost,” he admits. “I forgot your street, and I didn’t want to check the notes on my phone because it was raining too hard.”

Eventually, he finds one unlocked—the girls’ changing room next to the gym. We boost him inside and in a few short minutes, a fire door swings wide to reveal Declan, smiling and beckoning.

Then we gather up the miles of bright yellow vinyl material that make up the bouncy castle.

It’s all connected by a plastic corrugated tube to a compressor about the size of an extra-large suitcase.

Getting everything up these narrow, steep steps is like trying to cram a golf ball through a straw.

Speaking of the bouncy castle...it’s starting to take shape all around us and under our feet as the vinyl fills with air from the compressor. As the “turrets” begin to form, they press up against the cupola walls, bending inward toward the domed ceiling.

If we’re wrong about this and the great-granddaddy of all lightning bolts is about to blast us into oblivion, there won’t be time to say goodbye.

Do we go back to the cupola and try it all over again? Or do we wait for a storm that promises more than a few raindrops?
We waffle back and forth, and, at the last minute, we decided to sit this one out.

That night, thunder booms and lightning forks across the sky for three harrowing hours.

Declan is sullen. “The Weather Channel should be forced off the air for this! Light rain, my butt!”

We have no choice but to wait for the next storm. A new tropical depression coming up from Florida is expected to collide with a low-pressure system moving across the country next Tuesday or Wednesday.

The fury that courses through me isn’t so much because of what he said. It’s that he had the courage to say it and I didn’t.
“Don’t you think I know that?” I seethe. “Portia didn’t get my mom sick. I did—with the Covid I brought home from her birthday party!”

The strident voice of a teacher breaks in. “Portia, get off the phone! We need your help here!”

“Enough, Mom!” he grouses, heading out the door.

“Just our luck!” Declan laments. “How are we going to drag that thing up to the roof when it’s full of kids?”

It isn’t heavy, but it’s a strenuous job, since you have to hang on to the fabric and position the poles, while at the same time stepping on the base to keep it from flying away.

At the playground, the tire swing hangs in the center of the jungle gym, suspended via three stout ropes. I cut through the ropes with the hacksaw, and the heavy wheel thumps to the sand.

She’s tall and slender, and when she talks to you, it’s from a great height because she wears five-inch stiletto heels.

Please don’t let me cry, I exhort myself.

Reef’s voice is shaking, but his determination never wavers.

“Where’s Theo?” I demand, surprised at how hostile my tone is.

“As it is,” the doctor goes on, “you’ve suffered considerable burns. I’m sure you’ve noticed the bandages on your arm and shoulder.”

Some of his hair has been singed off, including one eyebrow. His burn bandage is on the left side—the mirror image of mine, which makes sense, since we were sitting opposite each other on the tire.

I scour my mind, searching for the recollections that I’ve come to know as Theo’s.

I nod soberly. He’s right. No question that the Phenomenon being over is a really great thing for both of us. Our situation was desperate.

As Theo frowns in perplexity, I take stock of the memories lined up in my mind like toy soldiers.
I guess I’m not the only one who’ll need help with the missing pieces going forward.

It’s been three weeks since that night in the cupola, and the Phenomenon seems to be gone for good. All our forgetfulness, our confusion, our disorientation disappeared with it. It left a lot of our memories in the wrong head, but we can deal with that.

“Not a hound’s tooth,” I tell him. “Houndstooth. It’s the design on the skirt—kind of a small funky checkered pattern.”

Memory isn’t a total antidote to grief, but in a way, you can keep someone alive in your thoughts.