The Lights In the Sky

Chapter 21

I woke up to a phone call from Frank. Apparently Deborah told him what happened the night before. I don't want to get into the details of what we said too much because it got emotional. Not crying, really, but just a lot of us saying that we care about each other and talking about these memories we have together. Especially that night when we were drinking and listening to music and watching the sun come up.

It's weird that I can tell you how I feel about Deborah and those details, but when it comes to Frank, that feels so personal. Maybe I shouldn't even tell you this much, but when we were on the phone, he started to talk about his dad. About how hard it was when he died. How I was the only one he wanted to be around after that for a long time. I told you that Frank never talked about his dad. But I see now that he always wanted to. He was just waiting for me to ask. I never did, because I was afraid.

Maybe that's the only thing I can tell you after all this: don't be afraid to care about people. They almost always need it.

I didn't talk to my mom much that day. When I walked past her bedroom, the door was open. The empty bottle was sitting on her nightstand. There was no cup in sight. Somehow, she was still up early enough for the full Irish. The plastic was back up over the door, too, which meant Dad was up just as early. I couldn't imagine them both in the kitchen for so long together. I bet it was silent the whole time.

Dad and Tabitha were already sitting there when I started to eat.

"Guess what!" Tabitha said, way too cheerful for any of us.

"What?" I grumbled.

"I found Pooh Bear!"

"Cool."

"He was on the back porch."

"Cool."

"Yep."

The breakfast was good. The last really good meal I can remember having. Probably the last good meal I'll ever have, if you get your way. I know what you want to do to me. Where you want me to end up. And when I'm done with my story, I'll tell you exactly why that isn't going to happen. But I guess I should finish my story first.

I ate and washed my plate off before anyone else even got to their eggs.

All I did that day was listen to music and text Deborah and Frank. There was no way Mom or Dad would let them come over. I didn't even ask. And you know what? It wasn't that bad of a day.

And you know what else? Mom and Dad got back together that night. I want to tell you that part before I get to where everything went downhill, because you probably have this really messed up vision of them so far and maybe that isn't fair.

I was going downstairs after dark to get a drink of water, but when I got to the bottom of the stairs I saw them sitting side-by-side on the couch. Mom's head was on Dad's shoulder. They were both sipping from glasses. I haven't seen them that close since I was in grade school. So I thought it would be nice to sit there on the steps and see them like that, with the television turned down really low, the way I used to see them when I would sneak downstairs as a kid. Especially on Christmas Eve night. I think every kid probably does that, right?

"He used to have red hair." That's what my mom said. Talking about me. It's true, too. Believe it or not. It makes sense with my dad's family being Irish. There are these pictures of me as a baby, some nice ones with my dad holding me in my first Halloween costume plus some really embarrassing ones like in the tub and stuff, and in them I have this dark red hair. It got light when I was, like, three years old and now I have this blond stuff. But the way she said it, it was like she forgot about it. Like she was just now remembering.