North Oak 3- Morning Glory Read online

  “Hungry much?” Cade chuckled.

  “Hello, teenager,” Alex jabbed back.

  “How could I forget.”

  “Thanks.” She hung up and passed the phone back to Carol’s mom. “Chinese on the way. Merry Christmas.”

  “I came as soon as I heard.”

  Alex looked up from her place by Laura’s bed to see Brooke. She rushed to Laura’s side, face drawn tightly. Brooke took Laura’s hand and held it near her heart, staring at her so steadily, Alex thought her eyes would bore right into Laura.

  Brooke pressed her lips to Laura’s knuckles unabashedly, brow creased. Alex thought she saw tears welling up.

  “We’ve known eachother our entire lives,” Brooke sniffled. She leaned her cheek against Laura’s hand. “She’s the closest thing I’ve ever had to a sister.”

  Her eyes fixed to Alex’s hand holding Laura’s other hand, then locked eyes with her. “And I think she’s the closest you’ve got to one too.”

  Alex eased Laura’s hand back to her side and stepped away. Brooke shook her head. “You can’t pretend not to care now. We’re all in this together.”

  “What makes you think I’m this third musketeer you two seem to want?”

  “What makes you think you aren’t?”

  Alex grimaced. She opened her mouth to speak, then shut it and turned toward the window. She placed her hand on the glass, gazing across the city. “I don’t belong with them.”

  “What would they have done without you? Laura wouldn’t be here right now if not for you.” Brooke crossed to the window, standing beside her. “I heard what happened. All of it.”

  Without looking at her, Alex shivered beneath that soul-ripping stare Brooke had given Laura a moment ago. There was a long silence between them.

  “Thank you,” Brooke said.

  Alex inhaled deeply and nodded. She felt a little better, even vindicated somehow.

  “I wish I could stay longer. North just got me from the airport. He’s waiting outside and eager to get back home.”

  “See you.”

  Brooke sighed, “Yeah.”

  Alex turned when she left, then went back to Laura. She hung her dream catcher on one of the IV poles. “I think you need this more than I do for now.”

  She took her hand again, looking at each of her manicured fingers. “Please wake up.”

  She leaned in close to Laura, whispering, “You’re missing Christmas. You’re missing all of it. That’s not like you.”

  Alex knelt on the edge of the bed and eased in beside Laura. “You’re always the center of the party, the life of it. We need you.” She laid her head on the pillow next to her. She was afraid to say it, but seeing Brooke could love a friend as deeply as a sister gave her courage. Maybe fighting to be in this family was still worth something. “I need you. I need my sister.”

  She pulled out the ipod she got for her birthday and unwound the earbuds from it. She placed one of them in Laura’s ear, and the other in her own.

  “Your mom doesn’t want me. I don’t know how much longer I can go feeling like I don’t exist. You made me feel like I belonged in this family. You hold us together.”

  Alex found the recording Carol had made of the grove back home, a secret place Laura had shared, and played it.

  “Come back.”

  CALL ME ISHMAEL

  Alex finished drawing a silly stick figure picture of her and Carol riding horses, with You + Me written over their heads, and scrawled beneath it Want to do math later?

  She smirked at the memory of them last summer riding through the heat as Alex figured out the algebra thing, and folded the paper into a tiny triangle. She kept her eyes on the teacher talking about some Ishmael dude, and leaned forward, tickling Carol’s elbow with the note.

  Carol squirmed and snatched it from her quickly. Alex leaned forward in her chair more, tipping the legs, and standing on tiptoe to read over Carol’s shoulder.

  Carol gave her a funny look that Alex was sure meant more as a scold, but Alex didn’t think her friend had the heart for it. She was Alex’s marshmallow; a softie. She watched as Carol unfolded the note in her lap beneath the desk. Alex felt kind of warm and silly when she saw Carol’s ears lift to her smile.

  She lowered into her seat again, settling all four legs of the chair on the floor, and rested her head in her hand while she waited for Carol to reply. Alex leaned to see Carol scrawl neatly, occasionally looking up at the teacher. There was something exciting about not getting caught.

  Carol passed the note back, and Alex practically ripped it apart in anticipation. Her shoulders slumped. Homework first.

  She noticed Carol glancing back at her with a quirky smile, her freckles dancing over her nose. Alex rolled her eyes, caught up in the twinkle in Carol’s, and wrote back. My place or yours?

  Carol read it and whispered over her shoulder, “Mom’s working.”

  The teacher stood at attention. His sight gravitated to the note on Carol’s desk. Crossing to her, her took it off her desk and read it. “Do you two need to leave class and talk in private?”

  Alex sat up, grinning. “We totally do!”

  Their classmates giggled. “Can I be excused, too?” one of them chirped.

  Carol swung her leg back far enough to stomp her heel on Alex’s toes. Carol shook her head. “No, sir. Sorry.”

  The teacher glared around the room, and the other kids settled down. He cleared his throat and went back to the board. Carol quietly tore a corner from a page in her notebook, quickly writing back, Yours.

  When Alex tried to pass the note again, Carol batted the it away. They’d have to wait until after class to talk more.

  With the ringing of the bell, Alex snatched her bag and darted into the hallway, waiting for Carol. She couldn’t decide which she liked less; the bore of class or the swarm of bee-like teenagers buzzing around. She ducked her head through the doorway when the last of the students trickled out, and saw Carol talking to the teacher.

  Alex chewed her lip, feeling sort of sorry for getting them into trouble. Her toes smarting from Carol’s smash was worthy pennance.

  Carol finally came out, filing papers into her own bag. Alex started moving toward their lockers.

  “What does it mean anyway?” Alex asked.

  “What?”

  “The whole wisdom is woe, and woe is madness. I don’t get all this classical stuff. Why can’t we read Scorpio Races or something?”

  “You were actually listening?”

  Alex shrugged.

  Carol tucked her hair behind her ear. “I think it means not to let your feelings run away with you. Don’t make decisions based on anger or fierce emotion, like Ahab did.”

  She leaned against her locker. “When we make emotional decisions, they mess up our real priorities. It makes us less aware of what really matters.”

  They heard a bash against one of the lockers down a ways and turned. Alex watched Carol shrink a little as they watched Brad Hopkins lean in on a girl, a year older than them at best, whisper something in her ear until she began to squirm uncomfortably. Brad turned his head and locked eyes with Carol. A sick, twisted smile curled the corner of his mouth.

  Alex jerked forward, but Carol caught her wrist and tugged her back. “Don’t.”

  Alex clenched her fists and shook. “I hate bullies.”

  “He’s not worth it.”

  Alex glowered. Brad bullying Carol last year was bad enough, and now he had a new toy. She pounded her fist against her locker. Did she really have to go to class with him next period?

  Carol turned to her, lowering her voice. “Promise me something.”

  Alex kept her eyes glued on Brad, watching him pick on the poor girl down the hall.

  “Promise me you won’t go after him,” Carol whispered. “You don’t need to give your mom another reason to be upset.”

  Alex clenched her teeth. Was it so hard to choose between protecting someone and still trying to get back in Hillary’
s good graces, no matter how futile it seemed?

  She pulled away from Carol, stomping down the hall toward Brad.

  “Alex, don’t,” Carol called.

  Brad rounded as soon as Alex got within ten feet of him. “Well if it isn’t Chunk’s little guard dog. How y’doing Shrimp?”

  Even though he was almost twice her height, Alex never felt like she stood in his shadow. She was bigger than him. She was a shark, a whale standing before him. Distracting him for this one moment was enough time to give the girl he was harassing room to escape.

  Alex’s muscles tensed as she stared him down. She lunged toward him with a loud, deep bark, snapping her teeth. Brad jumped back, eyes wide.

  Who was the shrimp now?

  Alex smirked as Brad pressed against the locker behind him, stock still. She wondered if he liked the taste of his own medicine. Carol had wanted her to promise not to go after him.

  She didn’t need a reason to.

  Alex winked at him, knowing the stupid brickhead had been put in his place again. “See you in class, Braaaaad.”

  Alex and Carol poured over Herman Melville’s Moby Dick at the Showman’s kitchen table after school.

  “All this wording makes my head hurt.” Alex grimaced. “Why can’t they talk normal?”

  Carol looked at her and smiled. “I don’t know. I think it’s kind of pretty.” She pointed to a passage in the book. “All that most maddens and torments; all that stirs up the lees of things; all truth with malice in it; all that cracks the sinews and cakes the brain; all the subtle demonisms of life and thought; all evil, to crazy Ahab, were visibly personified, and made practically assailable in Moby Dick.”

  Alex rubbed her face, wishing they were riding instead of reading. Right now she was sure that her brain and sinews were definitely caked and cracked. “Can we move on to math?” She peered between her fingers. “And by math, I mean riding.”

  Carol nudged her shoulder into Alex’s, making her tired, annoyed face melt into a smile. “Don’t you want to know what it means?”

  Nope, was Alex’s first thought, but she didn’t mind listening to Carol’s voice. “You and rhetorical questions.”

  Carol chuckled. “Ahab is obsessed with his vengeance on the whale. Moby Dick means more to him than anything else.” She paused and pursed her lips, as if swishing something delicious in her mouth. “I think Moby Dick is about finding an object to pin all your fear and anger on, like Ahab did. In fact, during library time at school today, I looked up white whale and found something kind of cool about it all.”

  “What’s that?”

  Carol leaned back in her chair. “Apparently a white whale is a symbol for something that you obsess over until it destroys you. How something you want more than anything can eat away at you, until you’re not you anymore.”

  “Great. Can we obsess over horses now?”

  Carol sighed, shaking her head with a smile, like Alex was hopeless. “I know you secretly dig this stuff.”

  Alex rose and bumped against her as she crossed to the door. She looked back, smirking. “You wish.”

  ***

  Alex pressed her cheek against the stall bars in the broodmare barn the next morning, her eyes fixed on Venus Galaxies. The mare was due March, barely three months from now. She munched contentedly on oats, shuffling through knee-deep bedding toward Alex with a whicker.

  Alex stuck her fingers through the bars and wiggled them at her. The mare’s belly was getting wide and heavy. Alex’s mouth curled slightly at the corner when Venus Galaxies’s whiskers brushed against her fingertips. They were soft and wiry all at the same time.

  She pressed her thumb between the mare’s nostrils, wiggling the velveteen skin until Venus Galaxies tried to nibble her. It lifted Alex’s heart a tiny bit, making her feel like she at least belonged somewhere on the farm. If not with the Showmans, at least as a barn rat.

  “Y’got a baby in there?” she asked, noticing Venus Galaxies’ belly twitch and jiggle.

  The mare breathed softly, whuffing in Alex’s scent. Her eyes were soft and kind. Alex loved the way some of the horses would blink at her with eyes that seemed so ethereal and liquid, she wished she could swim in them. Clear and uncomplicated, like the soul windows they were.

  Horses were honest and straight with you. She’d learned that they’d tell you how they were feeling if you listened. Why couldn’t people be that way? She moved her hand through the bars, sliding her fingers over the mare’s sculpted cheekbone.

  Alex knew people sometimes said things they didn’t mean when they were upset. Like the way Carol explained wisdom is woe, and woe is madness from the dumb whale book. Had Hillary really meant she couldn’t stand Alex? Or had they both been caught up in the moment? It was agonizing not knowing where you stood with someone.

  And it was confusing too, because for the first time, Alex kind of wanted to be… wanted. Even though she didn’t want to admit it, it was killing her to not feel like she was. Did Hillary still want her? Was she even aware of what was going on with the rest of the world?

  Alex smoothed her hand over Venus Galaxies’s cheek. “Do you want your baby?”

  The mare nickered and swung her head, nipping at an itch on her twitchy belly. Alex wondered if she knew what was going on too.

  Venus Galaxies moved back to her feed bucket to finish up her breakfast.

  When Alex got back to the house, Cade was at the kitchen table finishing a cup of coffee. He smiled at her when she came in, and rose to put his mug in the sink.

  “Hey, Sport,” he said, rinsing his mug. “I left my watch on my dresser. Do you think you could get it for me? I need to get out to the barns.”

  Alex nodded and headed upstairs. She walked to their room at the end of the hall and poked her head in through the door. The room was dark, shades drawn, but she knew Hillary was out making her morning rounds. She slipped in and looked on top of the dresser by the door.

  She couldn’t help notice a family portrait of Laura, Cade, and Hillary, and once again was reminded of how she felt she was missing from the equation. She thought of Ashley just then, missing the way she had belonged to somebody.

  Alex sighed and started looking for Cade’s watch. All she saw was a jewelry box. She switched on the bedroom light, and opened the box. Cade’s watch was inside along with Hillary’s rings and other shiny things. They were neatly stored in their own little sections. In a top corner, by itself, was a tiny purple bow.

  She couldn’t take her eyes from it, even as she plucked up Cade’s watch. The bow was half the size of her thumb, a little bigger than a nickel at best. Had it belonged to their baby?

  A mess of impulse, and a bizarre need to hold it flooded into her.

  “You find it okay, Sport?” Cade called up the stairs.

  Alex picked up the bow, rubbing her thumb over the soft satin. She shoved it into her pocket and shut the jewelry box. At the bottom of the stairs she handed Cade’s watch to him. He put it on quickly. “Thanks. If you need anything, you know where to find me, right?”

  Alex nodded. And as Cade went out the door, she slipped her hand into her pocket and held the bow. For some reason, she didn’t feel as much of a stranger anymore. Having something of theirs, something of the family’s, gave her a reassurance that she belonged with them.

  BELONGING

  “Work, you stupid piece of junk.” Brooke smacked the side of the computer monitor. The darn thing was a brick from the stone age.

  The screen flickered, and Brooke’s eyes lit up as the printer made a promising beep. Then, nothing. She sagged forward and bumped her forehead against the desk. Why couldn’t Pop invest in something that actually did its job?

  She reached for the keyboard and repeatedly hammered the P key. She just wanted it to print. Finally, the old machine seemed willing to cooperate and started printing off the forms she wanted.

  Brooke leaned back in the chair, staring at Morning Glory’s past performances on Equineline. She was goi
ng to figure that filly out one way or another.

  When the printer finished, she grabbed the stack of race records and turned the computer off with a final rebuke.

  “Thanks, but I still hate you.” She waved the papers at the printer. “This doesn’t make us friends.”

  She headed for the door, grabbing her jacket from the coat rack, and headed to Pop’s car. She fished out the keys from under the driver’s seat floor mat, then paused.

  She was about to steal a car.

  Well, was it really stealing when she had her driver’s license and knew where he hid the keys? It wasn’t like she hadn’t taken it before to get groceries when he asked her to.

  Totally not stealing, she told herself.

  She turned the key in the ignition and waited for the cranky old Cadillac to rumble to life. It coughed, sputtered, then vibrated around her as the engine finally turned over.

  There was this new, dangerous shiver than ran down her spine. Something of the forbidden. She steered toward North Oak’s gates and rolled on out.

  A long breath escaped her once she was on the road; more relaxed after getting away without being seen. She glanced at the stack of papers on the passenger seat. Her mind wandered between the information in them and Laura lying unconscious at the hospital.

  It was all she could think about until she got there.

  After she parked the car and got to Laura’s room, she pulled up a chair by her bed, near the window overlooking the city. Laura was still unconscious.

  “Y’know, I read somewhere that coma patients can hear us.” Brooke evened out the papers in her lap. “Remember when North’s sister, Angie, would read us the racing form like it was a bed time story?”

  Brooke glanced out the window, then back to her friend. “I found a filly I really like. She’s fast and built nice, but she tanks in races. I can’t figure out why.”

  She rose from her chair and leaned against the window. “I brought her past performances. Thought I might read to you like Angie used to.”