Running through Sprinklers Page 4

  We jump in the shallow end and start tossing a yellow plastic ball back and forth, back and forth, and sometimes, when it’s up in the air, it looks like there are two suns in the sky, for a moment, and after a while, I get tired, and randomly ditch the game and drop the ball in front of me and float away toward the deep end, hearing my brother yell, “Hey! Come back!”

  For a while, I stare straight at the sun, then I flip over on my stomach so my face is underwater and close my eyes. All I see: white circles the size of the sun dancing around in the darkness behind my eyelids.

  I sink down to the bottom of the pool and let out the biggest scream. Then I start to cry. This is where these kinds of cries belong, below the surface, where no one can hear.

  I can’t believe she knew all along and kept it from me and she even made me help her buy new clothes for high school, she betrayed me, she betrayed me. And all those times we were playing together and running through sprinklers she knew—she knew she was going to hurt me and leave me. Why is she skipping a grade in the first place? I mean, sure she’s smart, but she’s not the smartest person ever to have lived, and she’s not that much smarter than me; okay, maybe just by a bit. She says she needs to be challenged in school, but since when is school more important than friends and more important than best friends? I don’t know what I’m going to do without her; she’s the best and she is leaving me.

  When I come up, the water drips down my face and mixes with the tears and nobody knows, not even James, that I’ve been crying. Except for the fact that my eyes are red. But then again, that could just be the chlorine.

  16

  AT MY BROTHER’S baseball game. Alone. I mean, I’m with my dad, Mom, and Ms. Cha, but not Nadine. So yeah, alone. I didn’t want to come, but Mom forced me to go. “You need to get fresh air, Sara,” she said. Probably because all I’ve been doing is staying at home, in my room, sleeping or crying. But she doesn’t know that last part. So Mom forced me to change out of my pajamas and come to the game, and I guess it isn’t so bad here because I’m wearing sunglasses so people can’t see my red eyes and my dad buys me a hot dog, which I eat so quickly because I haven’t eaten much in days.

  I go to the concession stand to buy pop. They sell ice cream here too. Which reminds me of ice cream cake and my birthday party tomorrow. I completely forgot. I’m turning twelve. I start to panic, wondering if Nadine will still come tomorrow. I think she will. I haven’t seen her or spoken to her in a day and a half, which is the longest I’ve not spoken to her ever, except when she’s been away on vacation.

  I look out at what’s going on in front of me. Right, that.

  It’s the final inning. Two outs. Our team is at bat. Daniel is on second base and James is on first. Some redheaded kid named Vaughn comes to bat, nodding at both James and Daniel, as though saying, “I’ve got this one, guys.” He hits it—BAM!—to left field, and Vaughn bolts to first and James bolts to second and Daniel bolts to third and I jump up cheering; what an exciting game, maybe we’ll go to that burger joint to celebrate after; and now Daniel is passing third base, coming home, and James is following him but then halfway between third and home Daniel looks up into the bleachers to the right of me and pauses, I mean stops dead in his tracks—and he just stares.

  The catcher has the ball now and Daniel finally clues in to this fact and turns around and scrambles back to third, and James sees this and freaks and scrambles back too, because Daniel is coming his way. Daniel barely makes it to third before the ball is thrown to the third baseman, but now James is stuck between third and Vaughn, who just passed second. They both sprint back, but James doesn’t make it to second to beat the tag so he’s OUT and they LOSE the game.

  Awww, darn. Tough luck, boys. My heart goes out to them.

  After the game:

  I see Dad invite Daniel to the burger joint, but he shakes his head politely and motions that someone is coming to get him, like his mom. As we drive off, I watch him on the tire swing in the school playground, twisting the swing’s chains and releasing them, spinning out of control.

  First, I hear the phone ring. Then, I hear Mom and Dad whispering and I think Dad leaving the house. The door closes. I fall back asleep. Then the door opens again and I wake up. I hear Dad and two other people speaking. And there are more people speaking through a walkie-talkie.

  I go into James’s room and wake him up. He seems to know something is wrong too.

  We lightly step downstairs in our thin summer pajamas and see Dad with two police officers in the living room, a man with a big belly and a woman with so many freckles on her face it’s as though they are all connected to make one big tan. I don’t know what is going on. Dad seems surprised to see us up but then says, “Kids, come sit on the sofa. You’re not in trouble, don’t worry. These officers may want to ask you a few questions about Daniel Monroe. He’s missing.”

  I suddenly become really dizzy because what I just heard is so unexpected and doesn’t make sense and James keeps repeating, “Dad, what do you mean?” over and over again, which makes me even more dizzy. The female officer says, “When Daniel’s mom came to pick him up after the game, he was nowhere to be found, and no one has heard from him or seen him since.”

  They ask us about what happened at the baseball game, if we remember anything strange about the day. I am so confused and can’t remember much. I say that I saw him spinning alone on the tire swing and they write this down in their notepads.

  The next morning, we cancel my party, and I pretty much forget about my birthday all together. But we sit on the sofa and eat the ice cream cake Mom already bought while we watch the six o’clock news. . . .

  A picture of Daniel in a powder blue baseball uniform, holding a bat over his shoulder, smiling at the camera. The kind of photo parents put on their fireplace mantel or under a banana magnet on the fridge. Blue eyes that have the same sparkle as the topaz ring my mom keeps in her jewelry box but never wears, and hair the same gold as the bracelet next to it.

  “Look, it’s his mom,” James says.

  She is on TV, standing at a podium next to a police officer. I only saw her once in the parking lot for a second. She is crying. She looks straight at the camera, asking whoever took her son to send him home. Then she starts talking directly to Daniel, saying things like, “It’s okay, I’m not mad, come home and everything will be fine.” It feels as though she is staring at me, through the screen, calling me to help.

  It’s so strange that people you love so much can be in your life one day and then the next . . . gone.

  17

  IT’S THE NIGHT before the first day of school and I haven’t done a single thing to prepare for it.

  Usually, Nadine and I lay out our newly purchased back-to-school clothes on our beds, go back and forth between our houses, and discuss and debate it forever, making sure we match, but not too much. But that did not happen this year. Mom bought me a few shirts and pairs of jeans, so I guess I’ll have something to wear.

  When I close my eyes and think about what tomorrow will actually look like without Nadine there, I can’t see it. I still don’t believe it’s real. Maybe it was all a joke and she’ll be there? Maybe she’ll hate high school the first day and come back to our class the next?

  This weird hope gives me enough energy to pick up some clothes off the floor, but not all of them, because a slightly messy room makes me feel less lonely.

  I decide to focus on my desk—to organize and clean it. I sharpen pencils and stick them in a jam jar, erasers leaning against the side. Why do I always want to eat white erasers? Maybe because they kind of look like marshmallows or dduk. Anyway, I open a package of erasable pens and put them in the jar as well. This year, I’m going to start using erasable pens, no more pencils (except for math, maybe), because I’ve decided pencils are for kids. I throw out all the random pieces of paper in my desk that have been there forever (mainly old doodles and drawings) and place my Bescherelle, my French verb book, at the top right corne
r of the desk so I have access to look up verbs easily.

  I will do well in school this year. I will. I promise myself this. Who knows, maybe I can skip a grade too. I did mostly get As last year, except for Bs in math and science. I mean, those are decent grades.

  I open my window to keep me cold so I stay awake and alert. I sit down at my clean, perfect desk and open my Bescherelle and look at some verbs to refresh my memory since I haven’t spoken any French all summer. I also flip to the index to look at new verbs. Cookie sleeps in the slipper at my feet.

  Sacraliser. To make something sacred.

  Mom comes in my room, eyes squinting like she just woke up, probably to go to the washroom.

  “What are you doing still up? It’s past midnight.”

  “I’m getting ready to study this year. I’ll go to bed soon.”

  “Good girl. Kids in Korea stay up this late studying all the time,” she says. “But don’t forget to close your window. And lock it. Be careful.”

  I stay up for a while longer, then slide the window closed and crawl into bed. Tomorrow, I’ll start working hard at school and be on my A game, for real. Tomorrow, everything will be better.

  18

  IT’S THE FIRST day of school and I can barely keep my eyes open. I’m standing around waiting for the bell to ring. Jen is skateboarding with Josh Weinstein and Ahmed Massad at the back of the parking lot. James runs alongside them as they glide, hoping they will let him go for a ride.

  I should be more excited to be here. I usually get really bored by the end of the summer and love coming back to see everyone, but this year . . . I feel nothing. I draw a line in the gravel with the heel of my right shoe. Dust comes up. Cough.

  Anyway, I’m just standing around, waiting for the bell to ring, watching the same old cars roll up with the same old faces popping out.

  A red truck: Ricky Grant with a new haircut, a blond mushroom on his head.

  A yellow van: Heather Wilson with lots of hair spray, her bangs in a kind of fan above her head.

  A silver sports car: Scarlett Davies with three shades of purple on her eyelids, like butterfly wings splattered across her face.

  Jen and I are in the same class, the grade six/seven split with Monsieur Tanguay. He writes something on the blackboard. His butt wiggles a bit when he does this.

  Our first algebra question. And I don’t know what is more important to look at: the numbers or the spaces in between the numbers. They both seem equally important. Sometimes the numbers are different, sometimes the spaces are different. But I’m not sure if the spaces are different on purpose or if this is just because Monsieur is sloppy. I’m not sure, and I’m too afraid to put up my hand and ask. I think I should be true to the spaces on the board and copy them just so in my notebook. They must be there for a reason.

  I look around the class and realize that I may be the only one seeing the white spaces in between; everyone else sees the black numbers.

  And I can’t help but think: Someone is missing in this class and nobody seems to notice.

  Recess. Finally. Everyone asks me where Nadine is and I say the same thing over and over again (she’s skipped a grade, she’s in high school now) and watch how they feel bad for me, especially the teachers, which is annoying because they are part of the reason this happened in the first place. They’re the ones who thought she was smarter than everyone else, including me.

  I go to the washroom and into the last stall, by the brick wall, and cry. When I come out, Jen is there. I can tell she notices that my eyes and nose are red.

  “I’m getting a cold,” I quickly say, and wash my hands.

  “Let’s walk around the soccer field and talk,” she says. “Fresh air might make you feel better.”

  Walking around the field, I notice there are more lunch monitors than usual, keeping an eye on everyone. Volunteer parents, I think.

  “I haven’t been sleeping much,” Jen says, dragging her feet along the grass, making roadrunner lines behind her. “I can’t stop thinking about the situation in the Middle East, and of course, you know. Him.”

  “Him?” I say.

  “Umm . . . Daniel Monroe? You know, that boy we know who went missing?”

  “We didn’t really know him. We never even talked to him.”

  “Still, we saw him. Someone was saying he was supposed to go to this school.”

  “He lived pretty far away, actually, and I think he was in another catchment.”

  “Oh. Still, though, to think that could happen here. And you were there, at the game, it could have been you. I can’t stop thinking about it.”

  “Yes, I still can’t believe any of it is real,” I say.

  “Nadine is super upset by it.”

  “She is?”

  “More than anyone.”

  I look up at the monkey bars. All the little kids swing and dangle and jump around. I kind of wish I could join them.

  But no, I can’t. I’m in grade seven. All we are supposed to do: walk and talk around the soccer field and stop to watch Scarlett do gymnastics.

  I look at the grass: Scarlett does backflips and handsprings and cartwheels. All the boys gather to watch. At the end, she does this little bow; she can be a bit of a show-off that way.

  I don’t belong here, I think. I belong somewhere else, with someone else. This isn’t right.

  Jen and I are getting picked up by Mrs. Ando, the world’s funniest driver. She is always doing a million things behind the wheel: putting her makeup on, writing things down in her day planner, searching through her briefcase for something. One morning, she brought in a bowl of cereal. Cornflakes. She actually managed to finish it, without spilling any milk.

  When Mrs. Ando drives, we kids usually speak French, the advantage of being in the French immersion program. It’s usually Nadine and me who do this. But this time:

  “Mon Dieu,” Jen starts.

  Me: “On est trop jeune pour mourir!”

  Mrs. Ando gives us a look through the rearview mirror and smiles with her light blue eyes.

  “Good girls. Keep practicing your French,” she says. No clue. They never had French immersion when she was a kid. The car behind us, honk honk. We are laughing so hard. It’s the first time I’ve laughed in a while.

  Mr. and Mrs. Ando own their own small business. They met in college their freshman year. Mrs. Ando often tells the story of how when they met, their eyeballs turned into hearts. “Love at first sight,” she said. It was like a fairy tale.

  Then Nadine was born. She was a pretty cute kid. You should see the pictures.

  Nadine eating a vanilla ice cream cone with her left hand, and with her right, pulling her right leg way up to the point where you can almost see her underwear with tiny ice cream cones on them (for real).

  Nadine in front of a birthday cake, her little face glowing from the two pink candles stuck into the frosting.

  Nadine sleeping on the living room couch, a patch of sunlight across her cheek, her thumb in her mouth.

  We approach Nadine’s new school, the high school, and my stomach starts to feel weird.

  Weird in the same way it once did when I went up a super fast elevator to visit Mom’s friend and then suddenly it stopped. Or like that time I was on Uncle Bill’s boat on Lake Ontario and my stomach moved in waves, crashing against things it shouldn’t be crashing against, like my heart.

  Anyway, the high school. It has brown bricks on the outside, which seems more fancy than the painted blue wood that is our school. It’s five times bigger, too, because all the kids from the different elementary schools in the area end up there. I’ve been inside once before, for a piano recital. I remember the long halls lined with metal lockers. I bet Nadine has a locker now. With a lock that only she knows the combination to, and won’t tell anyone, including me.

  The bell rings and students explode out of the school. Everyone is so tall and some don’t even look like kids, they’re so grown up. The girls are wearing clothes so stylish, I wonder
where they bought them because I never saw any of it at the mall.

  Nadine jumps into the front seat, waves bye! to a group of girls, and immediately flips open the vanity mirror, puts on a new lip gloss (it smells like watermelon . . . wait, not vanilla?), and gets ready for ballet class. I haven’t seen her since last week when she told me she was skipping a grade, except through the window while practicing piano. I try to act like it’s totally a normal thing to pick her up from an ENTIRELY DIFFERENT SCHOOL.

  Me: “Hi!”

  “Hello!” Nadine says back, in a slightly forced way.

  And just like that, me and my best friend start to have our first fake and totally awkward conversation.

  “So who were those girls?” I ask.

  “They were a year ahead of us. Don’t you remember them?”

  “Not really.”

  Jen: “Never seen those girls in my life.”

  Nadine: “Hey, Sara, are you coming over?”

  “Of course,” I say.

  “Great! I have a little homework to do but it should be fine.”

  Nadine suddenly turns around and looks at us and says, “Why are you guys sitting at the very back of the van?”

  Jen laughs. “Because we are the badasses in the back.”

  Nadine looks straight ahead again, and in the vanity mirror, I think I see her sort of roll her eyes.

  And with that slight eye movement, I realize I will have to try extra hard after school to make sure we remain best friends.

  On a telephone pole outside my window: A MISSING sign for Daniel. The photo must be from last Christmas because there is a tree with a string of twinkling lights behind him. Clear masking tape holds the poster to the pole. Uneven and wrinkled. Nadine makes a noise, close to a cry.