“Sorry. I guess I don’t feel like talking about Edward IV all night.”
Sometimes, I felt like I knew Edward IV better than I knew my dad. I’d heard the story about his brother, George, drowning in a barrel of wine. Just like I’d heard all about their other brother, Richard, the hunchbacked murderer. These were the bedtime stories I grew up with. I didn’t get how my dad could give lectures on medieval history all day and still have energy to talk about it at home.
But maybe he did get bored with it, because instead of being annoyed with me like my mom, he said, “It’s fine, Sparrow. I’m sure there are more interesting things in Hawthorn’s life than dead kings.”
“I doubt it,” Rush muttered.
“Rushford,” my mom said in her warning tone.
My dad tried to keep dinner from going completely downhill, which was a role he took on a lot. “What sound is your car making?”
“It’s sort of roaring, like it’s on the verge of taking flight.”
“It’s an old car,” my mom reminded me. “You knew this was a risk.”
“I’ll look at it this weekend,” my dad said.
“No, James. She can take it into the shop or learn to work on it herself. That was the deal.”
Rush sighed loudly to let us all know how tired he was with the conversation.
“I don’t have the money to take it to the shop,” I said.
“Whose fault is that?” I could tell my mom was in an unreasonable mood and I should stop pushing her, but winter wasn’t that far away and I couldn’t walk to school in the snow. Which would mean the bus. Every day.
“Really, Sparrow. It won’t take me long to open the hood and take a look.”
“No. She wanted the car. She has to deal with the consequences.”
The tension in the room was rising, and I started to feel really awkward, but apparently not as awkward as my brother, because he suddenly pushed his chair back from the table.
“I can’t believe the three of you are just sitting here talking as if everything is normal. Lizzie’s missing, and all you care about is car problems and some guy who lived five thousand years ago.”
“Edward IV lived five hundred years ago, you idiot,” I snapped. “And excuse us for not spending every second crying for some girl we don’t know.”
“Hawthorn,” my mom scolded.
“I knew her. I guess that doesn’t mean anything to you,” Rush said.
“Knew her, past tense,” I said. “You haven’t thought about her for years. If she hadn’t disappeared, you probably wouldn’t have ever thought about her again.”
Now my mom was angry. “Hawthorn, stop.”
“Why? He’s not sad about Lizzie. He’s sad because it’s just one more reminder high school is over and he’s nothing but an ex-football player who’s stuck taking classes at the community college.”
“Fuck you,” Rush said. He stomped out of the room, and a moment later, the front door slammed.
The dining room was quiet. Then my dad cleared his throat. “I don’t want to ever hear you talking to your brother like that again.”
I guessed I’d crossed some sort of line. Not that what I said wasn’t true. But just because something’s true doesn’t mean it’s OK to say, as my dad frequently told me.
“As for your car,” my dad said, “your mother is right. If you want it fixed, take it to a mechanic. If you don’t have the money, get a part-time job.”
A job was the last thing I wanted. I was still feeling scarred from working at the mini golf course over the summer.
The problem wasn’t the screaming kids or the monotony or that I had to give up most of my weekends. What frustrated me was thinking about how little money I was making compared to how much I was doing. And that made me think about how some people end up working at a mini golf course for their entire lives. And then I realized if I didn’t hurry up and figure out what I wanted to do after high school, I might turn into one of those people.
After that, the job changed. Instead of just being a way to make spending money during the summer, working at the mini golf course became a purgatory of cleaning up spilled ice cream cones and fishing stray golf balls out of the algae-filled pond. That was about the time I started to dread going to work every day. Then I started to dread the idea of having a job at all.
On the other hand, if I had a job like Dad suggested, I wouldn’t spend so much time sitting around the house thinking about how boring my life was.
“I didn’t mean to say that to Rush,” I said, partly because it was true and partly because I knew my parents would be angry until I apologized. “I’m sorry. Really.”
My mom put her hand over mine. “I know you didn’t mean it, honey. This situation with Lizzie is making everyone tense.”
“I’ve noticed.”
Noticed but didn’t understand it. How was it possible for Lizzie to have such a strong hold on everyone? She could be a hundred miles away for all we knew. But still, our lives were centered on her. She was causing fights, creating tension, making people worry. Even when Lizzie was absent, she was the star.
Chapter 5