Big Fat Disaster (4 page)

Mom shrieks, “
Enough
!” She spins back to the steering wheel, yanks her seat belt into place, and tries to start the car again, even though it’s already running. The engine makes a scratchy-screeching sound, and Mom’s growl echoes it. She grips the steering wheel with white knuckles and glares at me in the rearview mirror.

I look away. Even though I promised myself that I wouldn’t eat any more today, the Oreo milkshake poster in the Jack in the Box window makes me want one. I breathe in deeply and let it out…glance down to see if the outline of the photo can be seen through my dress. “Hey, Mom? Seeing as how
I
didn’t steal twenty bucks from your purse and Drew entertained the troops while they folded up chairs, could we get Jack in the Box for dinner?”

Mom scrunches her face angrily, then suddenly relaxes it and studies her own reflection in the rearview mirror. She runs the tip of her pinky over the flecks of mascara under her eyes, then rubs gently at a smudge of lipstick at the corner of her mouth. “We’re not
dogs
, Colby. We don’t reward ourselves with food.”

We arrive home to see three black SUVs and a couple of police cars overflowing from our driveway and lining the street in front of our house. A News Ten van nearly sideswipes us when Mom parallel parks in front of our neighbor’s house.

“Who
are
those people, Mommy?” Drew asks in a worried voice.

Mom doesn’t answer; she’s already got her iPhone up to her ear. “Hello, Reese? Anyone still there? Pick up! Pick up the phone, Reese!…The—the—I don’t know,
maybe
it’s the F.B.I.? And—the police are here, too. Honey, pick up the phone if you’re still in the office.
Please
! We need you here!”

She presses End but immediately dials another number. “Patrick? It’s Sonya. Listen, the police are…What do you mean, your attorney told you not to talk to me? You work for Reese, and you
will
talk to me, do you underst—Hello? Hello?”

There’s a
tap tap tap
on the driver’s side window. A lady I recognize from the local news is standing on the sidewalk next to our car. She’s holding a microphone, pointed right at Mom.

Mom freaks out, throws the car into Drive, and nearly takes out a passing police car when she pulls away from the curb. We speed back to campaign headquarters.

We find Dad in his office. It looks like a tornado blew through there. Books are knocked off the shelves, boxes are dumped out, there are papers everywhere, and the paper shredder is going full-tilt. He’s oblivious to us as he pulls handfuls of papers from a file cabinet and feeds them into the shredder.

Mom hisses, “You girls stay out here.” She enters Dad’s office and closes the door.

Their voices can be heard over the roar of the shredder, and Drew and I exchange worried looks. I stride to the water cooler and fill a cup, then straighten, keeping my back to Drew. I slip my hand down the front of my dress into my bra. I touch the photo, just to be sure that it’s there, and exhale shakily.

Several minutes later, the shredder stops, and Mom opens the door. She says tersely, “Come in here.”

Dad’s drenched with sweat. He gestures to the two armchairs facing his desk and orders, “Take a seat, girls.” He comes around to the front of his desk and leans against it.

No one makes a sound until my stomach bumps around a dozen Ding Dongs and I stifle a chocolaty burp.

Finally, Dad speaks in a panicked voice. “You
know
that in our family, honesty is everything. And…I
need
you to be honest with me, girls. This is very important.” He looks from Drew to me and back again, ending with me. “My desk calendar is missing. I’ve looked everywhere for it.” He gestures shakily to contents of boxes dumped out on the floor. “As you can see.”

I concentrate on keeping my face neutral. I can’t meet his eyes so I focus instead on his hands, which are knotted into fists.

“There was private information about people who have made…donations, on that calendar. Now, if something happened, I need to know about it so that I can”—he seems to lose his train of thought for a second—“protect the confidentiality of my, um, supporters.”

Drew speaks in baby talk: “
I
didn’t take your calendar, Daddy.”
Why does she always use a three-year-old’s voice?
I clench my fists and imagine punching her heart-shaped little face.

Dad’s eyes are like lasers on me. “Colby, do you have anything you’d like to tell me? Your mom tells me that you stayed inside today instead of coming to the rally.”

Mom moves to stand beside me. She places her perfectly manicured hand on my shoulder and squeezes it. I feel like I’m the size of Shrek. “You said you weren’t feeling well, Colby. Did you spend any time in here?”

I swallow hard and run my hand over my lips. Finally, I nod.

Dad barks, “Drew, you’re excused! Go to the media center and watch TV.”

“Yes, Daddy!” Drew practically skips from his office.

He springs to his feet and stands over me, puts his face in mine. I can’t tell if he’s angry or frightened, but I’ve never seen him so freaked out, and I freeze. “Where’s my calendar, Colby Diane? What did you do with it? It’s very important that you didn’t look at it! You’re not allowed to see my private information!”

He grips the arms of the chair and jerks back and forth, as if the chair is holding a secret from him. “Where’s my calendar, Colby Diane?”

I open my mouth, but no sound comes out. I’ve never been so scared in my life.

Mom steps forward, puts her hand on Dad’s shoulder, and says firmly, “
Reese. Enough!
” She places her other hand on his cheek and presses his face up until he is forced to look at her. “E-nough.” They have a bit of a staring contest, and she wins.

He growls, gives my chair one more good shake, then straightens and moves to stand in front of his own.

She slides into the small space between me and Dad’s desk. It’s as if she thinks she’s protecting me, but she’s so tiny that it’s like a fence post trying to block out the sun. In the flat voice she uses with unreasonable people, she says, “It’s just a calendar. It’s not worth getting so upset over.”

Dad sits down hard in his chair, and his lips curl into a sneer. “You don’t know what you’re talking about, Mar—” His eyes widen. “—I mean, Sonya.” He sighs heavily, lowers his head into his hands, and it sounds like he’s starting to cry. “Oh, my God. Oh. My. God.”

Mom’s still wearing her
You’re Being Unreasonable
voice. “Think about it, Reese. Why would Colby take your calendar? You’re just being silly.”

It feels like the photo’s burning into my skin. I swallow hard, glance at the floor, and my eye catches on a Ding Dong wrapper under Dad’s desk. Guess I missed one when I was cleaning up.

Dad jerks upright and exclaims, “I know where it is!” He rolls back his chair, pulls his center desk drawer all the way out, and paws through it, in the process throwing out pens, paper clips, and scraps of paper until there’s nothing else to remove. He runs his hands over the inside, then slams the drawer closed—open—closed, again and again.

Mom tries her soothing voice. “Let’s go home, honey. We’ll call a meeting of the campaign committee for tomorrow afternoon. I’m sure Al Nantz will get this all straightened out.” She waits a beat, but he doesn’t answer. She crosses around the desk to Dad and places her hand on his arm, but he jerks away like it’s on fire.

His shoulders slump. “Everything’s ruined,” he whispers. “Everything’s ruined now.” He shakes his head sadly. “So much…information on it…if I can’t find that calendar…” He shakes his head sadly.

Seeing him like this is killing me. I take a deep breath and exhale, “Dad. It—it was me. I took your calendar. I spilled coffee on it, and—See, well, Rachel and I were fighting, and—”

It doesn’t seem possible, but his eyes get even bigger. “You?
You took it
? You have it?” He nearly knocks Mom over when he bolts out of his chair and starts toward me, his face bright red with rage. “How could you do that to me?”

I shrink back in the chair. I’m afraid that he’s going to stand over me and scare the bejeezus out of me again, and I talk fast. “I—just let me explain, okay? I threw it away because—”

He freezes and gasps, “Did you see anything? Did you?”

I hold up my hands and shake my head slowly.

My father throws a temper tantrum. He pounds the bookshelf to his left and sends its contents tumbling to the floor, sweeps his arm across the top shelf, and starts to pull the entire bookcase down, but Mom shrieks, “Reese! Don’t!”

His shoulders rise and fall with his hard breathing. At last he lowers his head and says softly, “What did you see, Colby?” When I don’t answer, he whirls on me, his face contorted. “Tell me!”

Mom’s voice is quiet but steady. “Colby Diane, answer your father.”

“I—I didn’t see anybody’s name but Rachel’s on your calendar—you know—about moving her to school next Saturday. The whole month of July was ruined and I tore it off—I mean, the month’s almost over anyway—then I tried to get the rest of the year dry, and…and…” My voice cracks, and my voice is squeaky-high. “Don’t you even care that the picture of us is gone?”

Dad frowns, looks confused. “What picture?”

I inhale shakily and exhale, “The one on the corner of your desk. From our spring break trip.”

He sneers, “Why the hell would I worry about a fucking picture right now, Colby? I need to know where my calend—”

“Wh—Who’s that lady you’re kissing in the photo under ours, Dad?” It sounds like someone else said it, even though I know it was me.

My words seem to have the effect of slowing time and space, because my father’s feet form roots to the floor halfway between my mother and me. Her eyebrows melt into a soft V, and her mouth droops open.

The spell is broken when Mom demands, “What picture?…What’s she talking about, Reese?”

Chocolaty acid springs into my mouth and I nearly throw up. I’m not sure if it’s because I just blabbed about the lady or that I can barely breathe because I’m so full of cream-filled cupcakes. “May I be excused?” I ask from behind my hand.

“No!” my mother snaps. “What picture did you see?”

I can’t tell her. I
can’t
.

She narrows her eyes at me, then at my dad. He finally uproots his feet, stumbles back to his chair, and pretty much falls into it.

Mom sways slightly and grabs the edge of Dad’s desk to steady herself. Her voice high, she asks, “Reese? What’s Colby talking about?”

He bends forward and starts rocking himself, his face contorted.

She moves unsteadily to him, gets on her knees, and tries to make him look at her, but he keeps turning away. She grips his biceps, tries to still his rocking.

He finally chokes out, “I…I didn’t want you to find out like this. I’m so sorry, Sonya…so sorry.”

It feels like I’m watching all of us from the ceiling, as if this is happening to someone else. This can’t be
my parents
.
It can’t
. Honesty is
everything
to us…right?

Mom’s face forms an ugly grimace. She shakes her head, runs her hand up and down Dad’s arm. Her voice choked, she pleads, “Reese,
tell
me that Colby is wrong about what she thinks she saw.” Mom narrows her eyes, tilts her head, and whisper-sobs, “You would never do that to me. It’s not who you are…Tell me that, Reese.”

I
want
to be anywhere else. I
can’t
be here. I shouldn’t be seeing this moment between my parents. I rise from the chair and bolt for the door, but I’m not fast enough, because I hear my father say the words that change our lives forever:

“Sonya, I’m sorry. But…I don’t love you anymore. I’m in love with someone else.”

Ever since I found that photo, my insides have felt like I’m on a roller coaster that’s about to take its first heart-stopping plunge. I’m stretched out on my bed with my ear buds in, and my music’s blasting way louder than Mom ever lets me listen to it. She’s locked in her bedroom. I keep hoping that if I hold my pillow over my mouth and nose just right, I’ll suffocate myself. If that doesn’t work, I’ll find some other way to die. I have destroyed my family. I can’t go on living.

Can I?

In the hot blackness of my pillow, I replay the afternoon in my head.