No Passengers Beyond This Point(4)

I can’t eat, can’t sleep after that. The truth is so much worse than anything I imagined. No home, no dog, no basketball, no Coach P., no more California. Not even my mother. This can’t be happening. It just can’t.





CHAPTER 2

THE BROKEN LOCK

What a joke last night was. That stupid family meeting—I mean, my mother land-mines our whole life, then she’s like Okay, who wants egg rolls? I wish I had it on video. I’d post it and get a million hits. What would I call it? Psycho Mom and the Moo-shu Pork, episode one.

She’s going to change her mind. Of course she is. We’re not leaving tomorrow—oh, excuse me, today . . . that just can’t be.

I can hear Finn moving something heavy out in the hall. This is so crazy . . . we can’t move all our stuff in twenty-four hours. I get under the covers and pull the pillow over my head. All last night Mom was like: “Colorado is so beautiful. The mountains are incredible ! ! ! You’ll love the outdoorsy lifestyle!!!”

She has brochures from the travel agency. We’re being kicked out of our house and she’s playing tour guide? I wish she’d get a grip.

But when I call her on it, she gives me the same stupid old line: When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

What if I don’t like lemonade? What if I’d rather drink cyanide?

There’s always a cute saying from Mom. Something teachery and ohmygod so corny.

The woman doesn’t get it. All she cares about are grades, saving money, and a clean stovetop. When Finn was little he gave her a sponge for Christmas. And she loved it! Is that sad, or what?

Finn totally kisses up to Mom, which makes me want to puke. Mouse would too if she weren’t so clueless. Mouse is like a mutant child from the Nature Channel. Where did she come from?

Thank God for Maddy. She totally gets what it’s like to live here. She calls Mom “Rules,” Mouse “the Demon Child,” and Finn “Mr. Personality” because he’s so quiet.

Mom left me alone last night, but this morning she’s been all over me. She tried sending Mouse in to drag me out of bed. That didn’t work, so now she’s coming after me herself. “India.” She raps her knuckles on my door.

I bury my head under the pillow.

“India, this is happening whether we like it or not.”

I take the pillow off. “Mom, call the bank. That guy. Remember, you said that guy would help.”

A few weeks ago I heard her and Aunt Sammy talking about the problems she was having with the house. She said she was getting help from some company person guy. I figured she had it covered, but apparently not.

Mom opens the door, walks in, and sits down on my bed, looking at Mouse’s side of the room, which is a disaster area. She probably lost her stupid planet book again.

It isn’t possible that this room will no longer be ours.

My mom is talking again. I try to concentrate on what she’s saying. “And then he took our money and ran.”

“Call the police then, Mom. Don’t move.”

“Call the police.” She shakes her head.

“You paid money to some guy’s company to restructure the loan, right? He’s the one who should be taking care of this.”

“Look, I shouldn’t have trusted him. I got scared and . . . that made everything worse, but this probably would have happened anyway. I need to explain it all, every last thing clear down to the fine print—especially the fine print, but I can’t now, honey. Now we’ve got to move.”

“Why’d you wait until the last minute to tell us? You’d kill me if I did that.”

“The last minute . . .” She sighs. “This has been going on for six months. We’ve had four hundred last minutes. Every time, I patched it back together again. I didn’t want you and Finn and Mouse to live with this hanging over your heads. Can you imagine how Finn would worry? He’d have been a wreck.”

“Oh yes, poor Finn.” I get so tired of hearing about Finn and how he worries, and Mouse and how hard it is for her to be a child genius.

“It’s not just Finn, it’s you too, honey. I didn’t want any of you to worry, but there’s nothing to be done about it now. Yesterday morning we lost the house. It’s final. This is the end of one chapter and the beginning of another.”

“We’re never going to live here again?”

“We’re never going to live here again.”

“But what about Ariana’s party? We’ll be back for that, right?”

“India, honey, don’t you understand what I’m saying?”

“Sure I understand.” I snort. “Why do you always think I’m stupid? One C in French and all of a sudden I’m an idiot.”