Meredith popped back in and asked what time she got off and told her that she may have to wait an extra twenty minutes before she could get her.
“I have to pick up Aunt Hannah from work, too,” she explained.
“Thank you.” Jo smiled at Meredith.
When my mom left again, Amy turned to Jo and said, “It’s not her fault that she can’t drive you. She’s hurt.”
Jo seemed to consider what Amy was saying. She spun herself in the chair to face Meg. “I’m sorry. I know it’s not your fault. I’m tired and finishing that piece. It’s stressful.”
Meg couldn’t even try to hide the surprise on her face. She was always so collected, and I could tell that Jo’s honest apology shook her a little. Me, too.
“Th-a-a-a-nks,” Meg replied, drawing out the word, sounding confused. “It’s fine. I know you have a lot going on.”
Meg’s shock transferred right on over to me, and something occurred to me. Meg and Jo had been spending a lot more time together than they ever had before. I had been hearing their voices at night lately, chatting away while everyone was in bed. I hadn’t heard that sound since we were kids, when Meg used Jo as her cosmetic guinea pig after bedtime. Jo’s pillow was always covered in makeup the next morning.
“And why don’t you just have Laurie take you, since he’s your boyfriend now?” Amy touched Jo’s arm, and Jo slid her hand away. “Who would have thought Jo would have such a hot boyfriend. He’s almost too hot.” Amy touched the screen of her phone and looked back up to the three of us.
Jo’s response was flat. “Shut the hell up.”
“Just sayin’.” Amy smiled and looked at Meg for approval. She worshipped everything about Meg.
A few seconds passed, and Jo stood from the table. “I’m out,” she announced, and left the room. I was next. I needed to finish my History assignment on my mom’s laptop before midnight. I knew I would regret working on a World War Two assignment right before bed. It was one hundred percent going to give me nightmares, but I was behind on my schoolwork because of lazy Holiday Fever.
When I walked into the living room, Meredith was sitting in Dad’s recliner with her eyes closed. I bent down over her to grab the laptop from the side of the chair; she opened her eyes, scaring the hell out of me.
She started laughing when I gasped.
“Sorry, baby,” she said with a smile.
She always looked so young when she smiled. My mom was beautiful, but sometimes it seemed like she had aged five years in one. I was worried about her and couldn’t wait for my dad to be home.
“I have an assignment to work on. I’ll bring it back before I go to bed,” I told her. She smiled at me, looking a little sleepy.
“That’s fine. You can do it down here if you want. I’ll be quiet. I’m just going to watch Criminal Minds.” She lifted the lever on the recliner, and the footrest sprung to life.
I laughed. “No way you’ll be quiet if you’re watching Criminal Minds.”
She talked through every scene, constantly trying to guess who the killer was and shouting at the TV.
She laughed and shrugged. “I still think the FBI should have a watch on the writers of that show. It’s some seriously twisted shit.” She said that every single time we watched the show together. I was the only one who could stand to watch it. Amy was too squeamish, Meg was too big of a chicken, and Jo was too literal. She would pick apart the plot holes and legalities of everything.
I loved this time with my mom, when she was happy and distracted.
“Come on, Beth, stay down hereeee,” she whined, and pressed her hands together like she was praying.
I tried to hold a straight face as I sat down on the couch and tossed her the remote. “Only talk during the commercials. Promise?”
She dragged her thumb and index finger along her lips like she was zipping them and pretended to toss me the key.
17
In the few weeks that passed since Christmas, things had changed.
Jo and Laurie became inseparable.
Now that Shia was out of the country again, saving the world in his way, Meg was back to work at the King house. John Brooke would be home very soon, and it was all Meg would talk about. She was always so flustered while pretending not to be.
Meredith kept herself busy, with Aunt Hannah coming over more than usual.
Everyone was hunky-dory except Amy, who got suspended from school for continuing to trade food in class after the teacher told her multiple times not to.
Apparently, the principal was alerted when Amy was caught with a full-sized key lime pie inside her desk. A pie. In her desk. When she’d asked me to make it for her, I didn’t bat an eye. I figured it was for some school celebration, so I made her one from scratch that was supposed to be a homemade replica of Petite Amelie’s recipe.
So, Amy was home with me for a week and Meredith asked me to teach her while I was home. My online classes only took me around two hours a day to finish, so I had plenty of time during the next five days of her suspension. My sister was sitting across from me at the kitchen table; we had the house to ourselves that morning.
“I want to go to Laurie’s house again,” she complained through a spoonful of her cereal.
I dipped my spoon into the bowl and popped soggy rings of Cheerios into my mouth and, in the same mumbled manner she had spoken to me, asked, “Why?”
“Because!” Her sigh was heavy and dramatic. She was always the emotional one, more so than Meg even. Amy always seemed to be floating above the clouds. Meg was the most grounded of us, Amy the least.
“They have everything there. A big yard. They even have a golf cart parked in the backyard,” she whined.
I thought of the scooters and the bikes my parents had spent months saving for and had to remind myself that Amy was only twelve. She didn’t understand that she was being a spoiled little brat. “How do you know?”
Amy was always sneaking around. I heard Meredith telling Aunt Hannah that she should put a password on her laptop if she didn’t want Amy to go through it.
“I just do.” Amy had a glimmer in her eye as she went on. “We should just move in over there. There’s a library for Jo, a piano for you, and Meg loves the greenhouse. I’m sure we can find something for Meredith.”
It was true, Old Mr. Laurence had the most beautiful grand piano in his house. I had only seen it up close once, last week, when I went into the house for the first time.
I smiled at Amy. “We might run into a problem getting Old Mr. Laurence to give up that big house to us.”
Amy nodded, her blond curls rubbing against her shoulders. “You could convince him. One of us could even marry the old man!”
“Ew. You wouldn’t!” I gaped at my sister, mostly teasing, but I didn’t like the way she was already talking—in only the seventh grade—about marrying an elderly man for money. Who knew where she got that—maybe Meg?
“I would! So should you,” Amy said in a faux Southern accent. “I would do just about anything for a better life. If I was Old Mr. Laurence’s wife, I could paint all day and drink tea and be a proper Southern woman.” Raising her spoon up, Amy lifted her pinkie into the air.
I laughed a little at the change in her voice, but I didn’t like how quickly this conversation had gone awry. I needed to talk to Meredith about Amy’s comment, but honestly, I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know anything about getting married, or even talking to the opposite sex.
Instead of giving her bad advice, I said, “If you put as much energy into math as you do planning your life as a trophy wife, you could at least have a diploma.”
Amy smiled, and the dimples in her cheeks flashed at me. Her teeth were so straight, but just a little too small for her face, making her look younger than she was.