Chicago. Atlanta. Philadelphia. Phoenix.
Lori felt numb.
I am not getting to know American cities, she thought. I’m learning hotels. Restaurants. Airports.
She was becoming an expert at using hotel blow-dryers. She could decipher airline departure/arrival charts without even trying. She was actually getting sick of eating burgers and fries. But she already had trouble remembering which city had had that great zoo Mom wanted them to see, which city had had the Coke museum Lori missed.
So what? Lori thought. I didn’t want to be here—any of the “here”s—anyway.
At least she hadn’t blown up at Mom again. Sometimes when Mom was talking to her, Lori could feel the muscles twitching in her face, as if her mouth had a mind of its own and was going to yell at Mom for her. When that happened, Lori clenched her teeth, pressed her lips together, held everything in.
Sometimes Lori thought Mom was avoiding them; several times, even when she didn’t have a speech to give, she’d sent Chuck and Lori out on their own: “I’m a little tired. Why don’t you two go see Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell by yourselves?”
And then Chuck would scurry off to some art museum. And Lori would be alone.
She could have tattled. Whenever Mom was out of the room, it was always on the tip of Lori’s tongue to taunt Chuck: I know your secret.
Back home, she wouldn’t have thought it was worth her time to tease him. But traveling, all her reasons reversed. She was very careful around Chuck now, as if he were the one who knew a secret about her. Or as if he were stronger or smarter or better looking or more popular or more—something—than her.
The farther she got from Pickford County, the more she wondered, strangely, if somehow he was.
He had his art museums. What did she have?
Back home, she knew, there were people who were jealous of her. When the principal announced over the loudspeaker that she was a nominee for the Homecoming Court, the girl sitting behind Lori in English class had let out a deep sigh. She’d patted Lori’s back and gushed, “You’re a celebrity.”
And after that, even after somebody else was voted freshman attendant, the girl always looked at Lori admiringly. Lori couldn’t pass her in the hall without feeling the girl’s eyes on her back, all the way down the hall.
Lori just wished there were boys who looked at her like that.
In 4-H, she’d been selected as a camp counselor, even though most of the other counselors were juniors and seniors.
“We went by maturity, not chronological age,” one of the members of the selection committee had confided to Gram in the hall, afterward. “You should be so proud of your granddaughter!”
Even in their own home, Lori always had Emma trailing after her, trying to do everything the same way as her. When Lori swept her hair up into a ponytail, so did Emma. When Lori sat at the kitchen table doing homework, Emma pulled out her second grade work sheets and traced her answers again and again, for as long as it took for Lori to finish.
Sometimes Lori missed Emma more than she’d have ever thought possible.
She missed everyone and everything about Pickford County that whispered to her a thousand times a day, You’re really something. You’re something special.
But special in Pickford County was nothing in the outside world.
She could walk down a single concourse in the Philadelphia airport and see a dozen girls prettier than her. Sitting on the airplane from Philadelphia to Phoenix, she heard a girl about her age switch from Spanish to English to a language Lori couldn’t even identify, all in the space of three minutes.
Lori had aced Spanish I, but that just meant that she could say “Yo hablo espanol” with a straight face.
Lying in bed in one strange hotel after another, Lori found herself writing mental letters home that were entirely different from the “Having a great time!” postcards she actually sent. The world’s a pretty big place, you know? . . . We flew over the Grand Canyon, and it’s the biggest hole you could imagine. . . . The desert goes on for miles. I could get lost in it and nobody would even know.
What Lori wanted was to go back to Pickford County and get married and have kids, and never step foot across the county line again.
Chuck decided to tell in Phoenix.
He was sick of being sneaky. He was tired of worrying that Lori would tattle on him. His heart pounded and his palms got sweaty every time Mom asked, “So did you two have a good time?”
Just think how awful he’d feel if he were doing something really bad.
Maybe he was. . . .
He pushed the thought away. He’d tell and then everything would be all right. Maybe.
He thought about the artist’s pad and colored pencils he’d bought in Philadelphia. He’d seen lots of art students drawing at some of the museums, copying the paintings. Now he’d begun to do that, too, from memory, whenever he could hide from Mom and Lori.