Whisper (6 page)

At first after Icka left, I stood alone by the old dry creek bed, trembling. I didn’t know why I felt so cold, or even how long I stood there. It could have been one minute, or twenty. I just couldn’t stop shaking, teeth chattering, head down, hugging myself. Then, without my consciously planning it, my platform-stilted legs started moving me back toward school.

I drifted into the caf, where I bought a hot chocolate I knew I wouldn’t drink. Something warm to hold on to. My stiff fingers fumbled, and I dropped all my coins and had to apologize to Esperanza, the grouchy lunch lady.

Slouching on a splintery quad bench, I clutched my Dixie
cup and watched as chocolate-scented steam vanished into the air. A trio of geeky boys passed by and ogled my outfit. I tried to smile winningly, but my smile flickered and backfired, refusing to stay up at the corners.

Relax, I thought, willing my shoulders to drop. It’s going to be okay now. Look for the silver lining, right? At least I finally got through to her.

But was that
true
? Or did I only believe it because I wanted to? I shook my head and sighed. I was so tired of Icka playing games with the truth, confusing me about what was real and who was right. My cell phone bulged in its special pocket on my bag’s strap. I could reach for it, dial Mom’s work extension, blurt out the story to her. She’d know just what to say, she’d dole out advice and help me feel better….

Then, with a flash of humiliation, I remembered Icka calling me Mom’s clone, her Mini Me.

Maybe I didn’t need to call Mom. Icka, much as I hated to admit it, just might have a point that I relied on Mom an awful lot for a fifteen-year-old. In my defense, my Hearing brought up issues normal teens simply didn’t have to worry about, and Mom was the only one who understood. Not to mention I slept down the hall from Daughter Number One, the cautionary tale of what happens when kids don’t keep their parents in the loop. Still, I was reaching an age where it was embarrassing to have your mother as the first number on your speed dial. Maybe
this
was the silver lining, an opportunity to not go running to Mom for once and
start relying on myself. Start trusting myself. If I was strong enough to stand up to Icka, I was strong enough to stand this pain, to comfort myself and move on.

The bell rang, and students mobbed the quad, filling it with sunny laughter, hoots and hollers, bustling movement. Voices, talking and Whispering voices, enveloped me. I leaned toward the sounds and took a tiny sip of cocoa.

The rest of the day zoomed by in a blur of cellophane-wrapped roses, hugs, and Hallmark cards.

In algebra, my study group had pitched in to get me a Starbucks gift card, and the girl I sat next to presented me with a giant kitten-shaped card.

In chem, my lab partner Quint handed me a shiny bronze box: Godiva truffles!

Our other lab partner, renn faire dork Pauline, put her head on the desk and sighed.
Wish
I
had my own personal Valentine’s Day
.

A pang of guilt hit me as I glanced down at my growing embarrassment of birthday riches. Cards, candies, half a dozen hot pink or red single roses with baby’s breath. It felt good to have people give me presents, but I hadn’t stopped to think it might make someone else feel bad. I tore open the Godiva box and thrust a big milk chocolate truffle at Pauline.

“My chocolate, your chocolate.”

“Seriously?” Her eyes got round. “You rock the galaxy, Joy.”

“Okay, people.” Dr. Kendricks loomed over us, his scowl
cutting into my warm glow. “Let’s pretend we actually care about science here!”

As I whipped open my lab notebook, my mind flashed once again on Icka. What she’d said about Dr. K wishing he was a “real” scientist. It occurred to me that Icka wouldn’t have had to Hear anything to guess that teaching didn’t satisfy him. That was obvious to anyone. How like her to figure something out through common sense, then lie to make it seem like she could Hear things I couldn’t! I shook my head, smiled to myself, and flipped to the first blank page. But a tiny part of my brain still worried: What if she really could Hear better?

Near the end of study hall, my phone vibed. I swallowed tightly when I saw it was a text from Parker: omg mr J is insane…pop quiz 2day!!! Btw hope ur having a good b-day!: )

My jaw muscles relaxed. She didn’t even mention the Ben thing—just moved right past it.

In the lunch line, tons of guys made fun of my outfit, but in a funny or flirty way. Girls wanted to know every detail of my kidnapping. Did they blindfold me? Did I scream and fight back?

When I finally joined my friends at our usual bench, they wouldn’t let me apologize for Icka.

“Oh, it’s not
your
fault,” Helena said, sighing, though I noticed she’d applied a thick coat of concealer and foundation since this morning.

Bree downed a slug of Metro mint water and nodded. “Your sister’s…how to put this? The spawn of Satan.”

Helena grinned, her teeth tinted purple from her açai smoothie. “Wait, does that make Joy’s mom Satan?”

“No, Icka was adopted,” said Parker, “from a demonic orphanage.”

Everyone laughed, and I unwrapped my chicken burrito. We were back to normal.

One weird thing did happen that afternoon. Bree saved my usual seat for me in government, but
someone
had left a single white calla lily on my desk. I raised my eyebrows at Bree. She leaned halfway out of her chair and murmured, “It was that stoner idiot in back. James, or Jamie…whatever his name is.”

“Good afternoon, citizens!” Mr. Jensen marched to the podium, and Bree snapped back to her seat. I pretended to drop my pencil so I could sneak a peek at the last row. There he was, the boy from this morning. Lanky body hunched over, eyes downcast so his brown emo bangs brushed his desk. I frowned. He hadn’t even wanted me to speak to him in front of his friends at the Path, and now he was giving me a gift?

As Mr. J kicked off his daily rant about the evils of the electoral college, I Listened for Wishes. All I caught at first was Mr. J’s political angst, surrounded by a torrent of psychic Prayers that there would not be a quiz. Then, from the back of the room, I Heard a soft, low voice:

I hope it makes her happy. I want her to be happy.

I blinked, stunned.

It wasn’t the first time I’d Heard someone Whisper unselfishly. Though it wasn’t as common as wanting, say, an iPod, some people really did want to make others happy. Others like their wives, their kids, their best friends. But this Whisper had come from a class-cutting stoner boy I hardly even knew.
Weird.

Did he have a burning crush on me? Or was he just a super-kind person?

Either way, it troubled me that I hadn’t noticed.

I twisted around, just in time to see his black backpack disappearing out the classroom door. No one else had even looked up to see him leaving. Mr. J was still talking about the electoral college, his bald dome shining with sweat. I ran my finger down the lily’s waxy, bell-shaped petal. Was this—was I—the only reason he’d come to class today?

A folded note landed on my desk. Bree tugged on a strawberry blond curl and looked away.
Ew,
her note said.
Don’t touch that thing. He probably stole it from the cemetery!! XO—B

I shot her a quizzical smile as if to say, “You’re kidding, right?” but she just stared back at me meaningfully.

Slowly I pulled back and studied the bloom. Then I poked at it with my pencil tip. On close examination, it did look slightly weathered. And Shadelawn Memorial Park was only a block away from campus…. So where would a carless
underclassman pick up an unwrapped, not-quite-fresh lily?

He stole it.

From a dead person.

Bree caught my eye, and both of us burst into giggles.

Joy has to get that creepy thing off her desk!
her mind Whispered.

I hesitated. As uncomfortable as I was holding a dead person’s stolen flower—shudder—it
was
still a gift. His intentions had been good. But it was always hard to resist a direct plea.

I hope there’s no such thing as angry ghosts,
Bree Whispered.
And I hope Joy isn’t keeping the death flower on her desk because she’s
into
that guy. I wish she’d throw it away before it contaminates her with gross graveyard germs.

Then again, I thought, the boy wasn’t here to see me. Using a notebook page as tongs, I swept up the lily as if it were a huge bug and carried it to the wastebasket. As I dunked it in, I felt the familiar warm high from giving someone exactly what they yearned for, and grinned. But as I looked up, I saw the stoner boy loping past our classroom window outside. Crap. He’d definitely seen me toss his gift.

Then, to my surprise, he smiled.

I just want her to be happy.

Double crap. I averted my eyes, but I couldn’t ignore the guilt building up in my chest. I’d only thrown away the flower to make Bree happy, but in making her happy I’d
been cruel to the boy who gave it to me. And now I had been mean to two people—him and Icka—in one day. Was it possible I was on some kind of roll I couldn’t stop?

A strange thought popped into my head. Could it be the costume, the goth hooker mime getup, bleeding into my personality somehow? Maybe I should go home, I thought. Scrub off this makeup mask, put on jeans, be my normal self again. But I shook my head. That was crazy, and besides there were only two and a half class periods left.

“Citizen Stefani, you are not immune from tests just because it’s your birthday.” Mr. J was passing out sky blue half pages to every row. He always copied our quizzes on brightly colored paper, said it gave them more “pizzazz.” “Back to your seat, please.”

I slunk back to my desk and uncapped a fresh pen. By the time I’d answered every question, I’d managed to shrug off the nagging worry that I was turning into someone else.

The wind teased my hair as Waverly Lin’s gleaming white ’66 Mustang zipped down Rainbow Street. Parker had folded her small body into the makeshift center seat between her sister and me, while I was jammed into the passenger seat, clutching my colorful bouquet to my chest. Backpacks and shopping bags buried my calves. The sparkly wig peeked out from a Macy’s bag, rippling like some alien sea anemone.

“So, who’s your date for this party?” Waverly demanded, turning her perfectly made-up face toward me. Unlike Parker, she had a heavy Korean accent, but it never stopped her from speaking her mind. In that, and their slender-boned beauty, the Lin sisters were alike. But while Parker
dreamed of becoming the first Asian-American president, Waverly’s sole ambition was to have fun. She went clubbing every night and answered phones by day in her old high school’s main office, her prom queen photo from four years ago proudly displayed on her desk. Just one more example, I thought, of how two people could have the same genes but be from totally different planets.

“I, um, don’t exactly have a date,” I told Waverly with a little nervous chuckle, bracing for the shocked response I knew would come.

“What?” Waverly jerked her head back. “All those flowers and no date?”

I smiled weakly, shrugged. My pathetic love life was something I tried not to think about, let alone discuss. Guys did crush on me, sometimes—thanks to my Hearing I always
knew
—and I’d go through the motions of flirting. I’d even gone on half a dozen dates, to the movies or the mall…but we never really ended up
connecting.
Two flat kisses at the eighth grade semiformal summed up my romantic experience.

Parker was no help. “Maybe you’ll hook up with someone tonight.” She snuck a sly glance at me. “Quint Haverford’s going to be there.”

I made a face. Quint and I got along great in chemistry, but we had none. My Hearing told me he was not so much into girls—whether he knew it yet or not. “He’s super nice,” I said. “I’m just…not sure we have sparks.”

“But he’s always talking to you,” Parker pressed. “And he’s totally your type! He’s smart, he’s cool”—she tapped out his stellar qualities on her fingers—“he’s funny, he even dresses well…. God, now that I think about it, he’s perfect for you.”

“Wow, thanks,” I said, because she was complimenting me, in a way. Saying
I
was smart,
I
was cool, etc. But why was she suddenly so into the idea of Quint-plus-me?

Then I Heard her Whisper,
I want Joy to be able to double date with me and Ben!

Oh.

My chest tightened at the sudden mental image of Parker and Ben holding hands in the front seat of his Land Rover, while I sat trapped in the backseat with funny, well-dressed Quint. A totally icky feeling…that was totally Icka’s fault. I’d been comfortable with the reality that Ben was out of my class, till she opened her big lying yap this morning and filled me with hope. False hope, I reminded myself. And stupid hope too. Because—reality check—even if Ben
were
to lose his mind, stop liking Parker, and ask me to be his girlfriend, I could never actually date the guy. She was my best friend!

Waverly made a sharp turn into my driveway and parked next to Mom’s blue Prius. I banished Ben
and
Icka from my thoughts.

“Promise you’ll give Quint a chance tonight!” Parker said, a parting shot as I gathered my things and climbed out.
“You never know, sparks could fly….”

“Yeah, don’t be so picky, Joy,” Waverly added. “Picky girls end up single.”

I glanced from one Lin sister to the other. They were as different as an owl and a peacock, yet those two girls never missed an opportunity to stand by each other. To support each other. Envy rushed through my veins like caffeine, jolting every cell in my body. No, not exactly envy. It was longing. I missed the days when Jessica and I had faced (or hidden from) the world as a team. Today had made it clearer than ever—those days were never coming back.

“All right, all right, I can see I’m outnumbered.” I rolled my eyes and grinned to cover my distress. “I’ll flirt with Quint at the party. Who knows, maybe sparks
will
fly between us.” More likely pigs would fly between us. But the sisters’ approving smiles felt like warm water flowing over me.

I stumbled through the front door, my arms so loaded with packages I could barely see ahead of me. Our whole house smelled delicious. Vanilla and cinnamon wafted through the air, growing stronger with every step I took toward the kitchen. Judging from the lack of clutter and angry voices, Icka must not have gotten home yet, or else she was safely locked in her room. Good. At the breakfast bar, Mom had already assembled a battalion of vases to hold my birthday flowers. She was arranging them and nodding into the telephone receiver as I entered.

“Uh huh, yes, definitely.” She looked up at me and
winked. “Right, gotta go now,” she said to the caller, and hung up—way faster, I thought, than I ever got off the phone with
my
friends. “Welcome home, sweetie!” Her flour-smelling hands reached over to relieve me of an unwieldy bag and several bouquets. “Good birthday so far?”

Before I could decide whether to bring up my mega fight with Icka, the phone rang.

“
Don’t
pick that up, please.” Mom smiled a little tensely as it bleated a second time. “It’s just your aunt Jane with more emotional processing. Now I’m sorry if this makes me a bad sister”—she dropped her voice as if the neighbors might be listening in—“but sometimes I just need a break!”

“Mom. You, a bad sister? You could never be a bad anything.” I patted her soft cable-knit shoulder and shrugged away a creeping sense of guilt. If Mom thought she was a bad sister for dodging one call, what would she think when she heard I told Icka to get out of my life forever? How did Mom manage to keep giving of herself, even to the most difficult people?

“I’ll call her back soon.” Mom sighed. “Poor Jane.”

“I know,” I said.

Mom’s younger sister had always been a star. Whether she was impressing teachers or acing job interviews, she knew how to use her sharp Hearing to her advantage. By age twenty-six, she was VP of sales at a high-tech firm, owned a three-million-dollar home in the hills, and was engaged to a semifamous singer. That, of course, was before.

We still don’t know the exact details of what happened
and why—she doesn’t talk about it much. But we do know that one day, instead of driving home to her mansion in the hills, Jane began driving north. Before she disappeared into the Olympic rain forest, she sent notarized letters to her family and friends, assuring them she was safe, healthy, and of sound mind (though of course they all doubted the last part).

For an entire decade she lived off the land as a hermit, having little contact with the outside world. Icka and I could count on one hand the times we’d met her in the flesh; she was more a legend to us than an aunt. When she had finally emerged five years ago to rejoin the human race, she looked nothing like the stylish, smiling lady from her old pictures. This Aunt Jane was lean and leathery and serious, her hair streaked with silver. But the biggest change was her Hearing. It was gone.

Instead of even trying to pick up her old life, Aunt Jane sold her house and moved into a studio apartment near Portland’s Pearl Street. There she’d sit on the floor meditating, reading, or whittling innocent pieces of driftwood into what would become her bizarre “sculptures.” Our family, out of concern, began visiting frequently. I wasn’t proud of it, but I always tried to find an excuse to avoid going along. Sitting in a coffee shop with the new, psychically impaired Aunt Jane was painful. Losing my Hearing was an unbearable thought. Worse than having both arms hacked off. What could I say to the victim of such a tragedy? Other than “Um, yeah, school’s going well, thanks.”

It was Icka, who’d always looked up to Aunt Jane, who seemed to know what to say. The two of them just clicked. Aunt Jane never asked
Icka
how school was going; they talked about the environment and sexism and world politics, like two adults. Two bleak, lonely, broken adults, but still. It was probably as close to a friendship as Icka was going to get in this life, so I didn’t begrudge her it.

Besides, the terrible truth was I tried very hard these days not to think about Aunt Jane. I didn’t like to think of her, for the same reason I didn’t want to visit her: What had happened to her absolutely terrified me.

I drummed my fingers on the counter. Moping about Hearing loss wasn’t improving my mood. I needed a distraction, and maybe I could make myself useful while I was at it. I Listened to see if Mom needed my help with anything. Dishes? Mixing batter? Putting the roses in water? Just give me a task.

But Mom was silent. She just stood there gazing at the phone, as if she too couldn’t get Aunt Jane out of her mind.

At last, uncertain, I grabbed the scissors and began snipping stems.

“Oh, hon!” Mom turned and waved her hand distractedly at me. “I can take care of that. Don’t you want to change out of your costume?” Her eyes darted back to the phone.

I Listened again. Mom wasn’t acting like herself. Was she really worried about her sister this time? “It’s okay, I’ll just take off the shoe—Ow!” I gasped at the sudden sharp, grating pain at the top of my head.

Mom pursed her lips. “Another headache?”

I nodded, still catching my breath.

“If you want to go lie down, I’ve got things covered here.” As if to illustrate this, she turned away from me, bent over the oven, and pulled out a pan of golden brown cakes. “See? Last batch.”

“But weren’t we going to decorate those together?”

She folded her arms. “Dr. Brooks said you should rest if you have a headache.”

“It doesn’t hurt that bad.” It kind of did, but I wanted to stay and help her in the kitchen. She’d taken the whole afternoon off work to prepare for my party. The least I could do was pitch in.

Mom must have Heard me, though.

“You help out every day, Joy,” she said softly. “I hope you know how much I appreciate knowing I can always count on you.” She paused and her brow creased, and for a moment I thought she was about to wish that she could count on Dad and Icka the same way. Instead she said, “Honestly, I think I overestimated the workload here,” Mom said cheerfully. “You’re off the hook!” She started transferring a previous batch of cupcakes from cooling rack to counter. Then she dipped a knife into a Pyrex bowl of pale pink frosting and spread it evenly, expertly, across the first cake.

“Come on, let me do a few.” I ran to the sink and started soaping up my hands. But the sweet cupcake smells I normally loved were making me want to gag. My headache was getting worse. Muscle tension, that’s all it was, I told myself.
Don’t
think about Aunt Jane or Icka’s stupid warning.

“Go on, shoo!” Mom made a waving gesture with her flour-dusted hands. “I can handle a few silly cupcakes. If you don’t feel like lying down,” she added, “why don’t you go thank your father for his lovely gift?”

“But—” That stopped me. “Dad’s home already? Where is he?”

She gave me a look.

“Never mind, dumb question.” Beyond eating and sleeping, Dad spent nearly all his time at home in his home office. He even had his old treadmill set up in there and would, when working on a tough case, clear his head by taking a brisk jog to nowhere. I made a face. “Well, at least let me put these flowers in a vase first.”

I reached to turn the water on again, but she put her hand over the faucet.

“I can take care of that.” Was that agitation in Mom’s voice, or was it my imagination?

I was about to insist, but her tone stopped me. If Aunt Jane or something else had managed to upset my super-calm mother, I sure didn’t want to add to her stress level.

Then it occurred to me. People who were upset almost always Whispered. They wanted things to be different from how they were; that was practically the definition of “upset.” I watched Mom’s knife spreading pink frosting with a surgeon’s steady hand. Her eyes stayed glued to her task, as if the cupcakes were a matter of life and death, yet her mind expressed no desires. In fact, I hadn’t picked up a
single Whisper from her since I got home. So she
couldn’t
be upset, right? She must just be tired, too tired to think.

Ow, ow, ow. My head felt like someone was probing it with a skewer. “Okay,” I agreed, deflated. “I’ll stop by Dad’s office and then I’ll go lie down.”

When I was in the doorway, she called after me, “And I do
not
look tired!”

I laughed, which hurt my head enough to make me cringe. “Sorry!”

Some people might think it’s weird to apologize for your thoughts, but in our house it was a normal part of life.

I let the back door swing behind me as I ran across the dewy lawn.

Dad’s home office was a blue cottage in our backyard, half hidden behind Mom’s apple trees. Years ago, when we first moved to Rainbow Street, Grammy and Grandpa Stefani had started Whispering that they’d like to move into the “in-law apartment” and be closer to us. I was in favor; the senior Stefanis were energetic and funny, and loved spoiling us girls with oatmeal cookies and zoo trips. But Dad wasted no time installing his cherry corner desk in the main room and spreading his collection of boring, leather-covered law tomes all over it, and Grammy and Grandpa stayed in their duplex in Salem after all, and only came to visit for birthdays and holidays. In fact, after it was finished, they never set foot in Dad’s office. I think they felt hurt.

Then again, Mom and I rarely found ourselves hanging
out here either. Only Icka made a habit of spending time in Dad’s space. She claimed to enjoy their lengthy debates on construction defect law, a topic that always made my brain vaporize.

No one answered my three polite knocks, so—as usual—I sighed and went in. I almost tripped over the treadmill.

Dad was at his computer, slumped statue still in his four-zillion-dollar director’s chair, staring at a ceiling beam. (No doubt brooding over a defect in its construction.) “Hi, pumpkin.” He gave a listless wave in my direction. He’d changed into jeans and a U of O sweatshirt, his second uniform after Armani. I caught a Whisper:
Sure would be nice to have a BMW.