I made a helpless gesture. “I don’t know, honey, but maybe if we took them superslow you’ll be okay.”
I helped her up the steps one at a time to her attic room. The stairs were in exactly the same place as they had been in my childhood home on Houston, and they were the same steep risers, decanting you through a square opening onto the attic floor. The little dormer room had been fixed up with the same care as my parents had put into my space. Where I had had Ron Santo and Maria Callas over my bed—a strange juxtaposition of my parents’ unconnected passions—April had the same poster of the University of Illinois women’s team that Josie did. I wondered how painful it would be for her to wake up every morning to the active life she no longer could take part in.
“Do you know who Marie Curie was?” I asked abruptly. “You don’t? I’ll bring you her biography. She was a Polish woman who became a really important scientist. A different life than basketball, but her work has lasted over a hundred years now.”
I pulled the bedspread down for her and saw underneath the same red-white-and-blue sheets that Josie and Julia had on their bed. Was this solidarity with Team USA, or what?
“You and Josie buy your sheets together?” I asked as I tucked her bear into the bed.
“Oh, these flag sheets, you mean? We bought them at church. My church was selling them, and so was Josie’s, and a bunch of the others. Most of us girls on the team bought them—it was for something to do with the neighborhood, cleaning it up or something, I don’t know, but even Celine bought a set; it was a team thing, we did it together as a team.”
I looked for a label, but all it said was “Made with pride in the USA.” I made sure she had everything she needed—water, a whistle to summon her mother if she needed her in the night, her CD player. Even her schoolbooks, if she felt like doing homework.
I was halfway down the steep stairs when I remembered Billy’s phone. I’d taken it out of my peacoat when I left it at the cleaners and put it in my bag, wondering what to do with it.
I took it out and handed it over to April. “It’s still pretty well charged up. I don’t know if his family will disconnect the service, but he did give it to your dad to use, so I don’t think he’ll mind if you use it. I’ll bring you over a charger.” I handed her one of my cards. “And call me if you need me. This is a tough time for you to be going through.”
Her face lit up with delight over the phone. “Josie was so lucky going around with Billy because he had all this stuff that we only can use at school. He went online from this phone, plus he let her use his laptop. He helped us find blogs to write on, and gave us nicknames. Like, he kept in touch with his sister through their private nicknames on this one blog, and Josie met his sister through the blog, even though his folks don’t want them to be in touch with each other. So if Josie and me, like, get to college, we’ll know how to do what the other kids do.”
Before basketball practice, I’d have to talk to the assistant principal about April’s academics. Surely with this much eagerness on April’s part, the school could help her find a way.
Almost before I’d started back down the stairs, I heard April saying into the phone, “Yeah, Billy Bysen, he’s, like, letting me use his phone until he needs it again. You going to practice?”
When I got back downstairs, I called out to Sandra that I’d put April to bed upstairs, and let myself out.
34
And the Rich Ain’t Happy, Either
As I walked down the neatly planted walk into the wind, I wondered if Sandra was right. Had Bron died because he was with Marcena, or had Marcena been attacked because she was with Bron? The theft of Marcena’s computer made it seem as though Marcena were the key player here. In which case, Bron would still be alive if not for me bringing the English reporter into his life. And if not for Marcena, who was always ready for new excitement, and if not for Bron himself, strutting his stuff for the exotic outsider.
I refused to feel responsible for those two falling into bed together, but I did want to know what they were doing in Billy’s car when it plowed into the Skyway Monday night.
I also wanted to know how Nicaragua and Fly the Flag were connected, since those were the only two things April could remember Billy talking about. Perhaps Frank Zamar had planned to move his plant to Nicaragua so he could meet By-Smart’s price demands for the contract he’d just signed with them. That would certainly annoy Pastor Andrés, who was struggling to keep jobs in the neighborhood. But Rose was supervising a night shift at Zamar’s second plant; if he’d opened a new plant for his By-Smart order, he couldn’t have been planning a move to Central America.