It was Dad who called me a freak.
Not to my face. Never to my face. But I really wanted to go to the Berk. I couldn’t stand my high school, even though Phoebe loves the place. And my mom wanted me to go, even though it’s crazy expensive. She argued that it would help me fit in better with society after graduation and that the education was really good and could lead to future opportunities, blah, blah—she was for it.
Not Dad. Sure, the tuition was high, but I don’t think he minded that. Honestly, I think he’d be pretty cool paying almost anything to get me out of the house and out of his realm of responsibility.
Dad was against Berkshire because it meant he had to admit that I wasn’t normal. That I wasn’t fixable. That traveling through time wasn’t a “phase” I was going through.
Most people would be like, “Your kid has a superpower? Cool!” Not Dad.
I remember what he said the night Dr. Franklin came over to discuss the program. They thought I was in bed, but I wasn’t.
“I don’t want this place on his permanent record, Martha,” Dad had said, ice clinking in his glass. “I don’t want every future employee looking at his résumé to know that he’s a freak.”
It wasn’t that he called me a freak. It was the way he said it. Like he really meant it. Like he believed it.
Things haven’t been that great with Dad since then.
CHAPTER 18
Phoebe
I hear the door click open, and two sets of heavy feet stomp on the tiled floor of the kitchen. Why are boys—men—always so loud when they walk? It’s like they have a need to announce their arrival.
“We’re home!” Dad shouts, which, obviously.
I swing my feet over the side of the bed, tossing my book onto a pillow, but I don’t get up. It’s weird, but I’m not really sure what to do next. Bo’s my brother, but to rush out of my room and greet him with a hug and a smile wouldn’t feel right. We’re not brother and sister like that. We share the same memories of growing up, but that’s basically where our relationship ends.
“Phoebe!” Mom yells from the bottom of the staircase. “Come say hello to your brother!”
“Why?” He’s home every weekend. There’s no point in making a production of it.
“Phoebe!”
I roll my eyes and get up off the bed, grabbing an empty glass on my way out the door. I fiddle with it as I descend the stairs.
Mom has Bo wrapped up in a hug, and I squeeze past them to refill my glass with Diet Coke from the fridge.
“Hey,” I say to Bo.
“Hey,” he says back.
I return to my room.
Usually, Mom lectures me about spending too much time in my bedroom. Not on the weekends, though.
I camp out on my bed with my laptop and As I Lay Dying—extra credit for AP lit, even though I hate Faulkner. The rest of the family pretty much follows suit. Dad hides in his office. Bo keeps his notebook in front of his face, blocking anyone from making eye contact. Only Mom flits around the house, dusting, vacuuming, straightening pictures, cleaning mirrors, going from room to room as if she can fill all the empty spaces.
At noon, there’s a bang on Bo’s bedroom door, across the hall from mine. For a moment, I freeze, not unlike a rabbit that’s heard a predator. You can tell a lot from the sound of knuckles on a door. A tap-tap knock is friendly; a quick rap is urgent. This was the deep thud of a fist against wood. I creep off my bed, tentatively inching my own door open so I can see what’s going on.
Dad stands in the hallway with a power drill in his hand.
“What?” Bo asks. He means, What do you want? but I hear the old sullenness in his voice, the challenge in his tone, just like he used to sound so often before he went to Berkshire. That one word—“What?”—holds more of a threat than his balled-up fists.
“I’m taking the door down.” Dad’s white-knuckled hand has a tight grip on the drill.
“What?” Bo repeats. “Why?”
“Dr. Franklin,” Dad says, as if that’s a perfectly reasonable explanation.
I take a step further back into my room, although I linger near my open door.
“The Doc wouldn’t just tell you to take my bedroom door away,” Bo says, his voice rising. “Stop! Why are you doing this?”
Dad stomps forward, his large presence enough to make Bo back down. Dad touches the power drill to one of the screws.
“Wait!” Bo says. “This is ridiculous!”
“We have to keep an eye on you,” Dad says, his attention on the hinge. The drill whirs, and one screw is out.
“What the hell?” Bo shouts.
“Watch your language!” Dad whirls around, glaring at him.
“Treat me like a human being, then!”
“We’re doing this for your safety,” Dad growls.
“The hell you are.”
“I said, watch your language!”