Chapter One
October, 1953
“Vivian Lucille Battle, you are a complete moron! You could’ve been killed! No one with a brain would do something as ridiculous as jump off the roof, but apparently God handed your brain to the next child in line. Whoever that boy is, he’ll probably grow up to be president seeing as he has two brains!”
I gazed up at Mama, a screaming silhouette against the blinding sun. A familiar pain chewed through my left arm, and I was pretty sure I’d broken it, just like I’d broken my right one two summers before. I held it against my stomach, praying that it didn’t split in two. Douggie Kerns had told me he’d seen a guy whose broken hand fell into a well and he never got it back. I needed mine for drawing.
Mama yelled some more, and I hoped she’d finish soon because I knew she wouldn’t take me to the doctor until she’d said her piece, and her pieces tended to run at least as long as a radio commercial when it came to scolding me.
She yanked me off the ground in one motion and my left arm swung free.
“Don’t you expect any tea and sympathy from me, young lady,” she said as she shoved me into the front seat of the Cadillac. “This is your own doing. If they have to cut off your arm, then so be it. Can’t believe a twelve-year-old is so thoughtless.”
She slammed the door shut and went to the other side. Her lips kept moving, but I couldn’t hear most of the words. Those Caddies were well-made cars.
“This is just like what happened to Mopey,” she added as she turned onto Missouri Avenue.
It wasn’t anything like what I’d done to our dog Mopey a few years back, but I knew better than to argue. My brother Will had dared me to shake a leftover bottle of champagne, and poor Mopey was walking through the kitchen when the cork flew off. Blinded him in one eye, and for the rest of his days whenever he’d bang against a doorjamb or knock something over because his side vision was gone, Mama shook her finger and said, “There’s a dog with more sense than my daughter, the moron!”
When we turned left I knew we weren’t going to the emergency room. “Why aren’t we going to St. Joseph’s?” I asked, remembering the last time. I thought broken bones automatically meant the emergency room.
Her breath seemed to catch. “Can’t,” she said simply.
When we stopped at an intersection a young guy in a Ford called, “Hey, beautiful! You babysitting?”
Her face slid into a grin. “Hey, yourself. You plannin’ on stayin’ here all day?”
“If it means talkin’ to you,” he said coolly.
She laughed. This happened all the time, especially when she was forced to go out in her house clothes. She always wore her blonde hair in a ponytail and people thought she was seventeen, not thirty-seven. I’d noticed two tiny crow’s feet near her eyes, but I didn’t dare mention it. She prided herself on her appearance even when she was wearing pedal pushers and a simple cotton blouse, like she was now.
“Well, I need to get going,” she said. “My daughter needs to go to the doctor.”
I waved and his face fell. He tore away and she just kept laughing.
We drove to Dr. Steele’s office. He’d been our family doctor for as long as we’d lived in Phoenix, and I’d been a regular visitor since I seemed to need stitches, splints and medications more than most kids. He enjoyed my exploits, as he called them. His most favorite story was how I busted my lip when I flew over my bike handlebars after Will convinced me that blind people could ride bicycles and I could close my eyes as I flew down the hill. Dr. Steele had laughed so hard he’d caught the hiccups. That visit had actually worked out okay because he didn’t charge Mama since he was so amused.
I followed her inside and my eyes watered from the strong smell of rubbing alcohol. I went to my usual chair while she talked to the nurse. Soon they were both staring at me and frowning. My arm was killing me, but I didn’t make a peep. That would make Mama yell more. Will had told me that she yelled to keep from crying because I scared her most of the time. I tried to stay out of trouble, but I’d get these pictures in my head and I wanted to see if I could make them come true. He said I needed to get out my sketchpad when those moments happened and draw them instead of do them. Sometimes that worked, but it didn’t help that he dared me to do some of the stuff.
Even though there were other people ahead of us, the nurse took us right back like she always did. We never waited long, and I wasn’t sure if it was because she worried I’d set the whole place on fire before I saw Dr. Steele or if he just wanted to spend more time with Mama. Men loved spending time with her—the plumber, the milkman and even the grocery delivery boy.