Crystal Grader - Tag Cavello (reading women .TXT) 📗

day of school for that week. A massive blizzard had been forecast for the entire northeast region of the United States. It was to arrive that night and not let up until after Valentine’s Day.

“You’ve sure had a lot happen to you in just a couple weeks, Miko,” Crystal said.

“How do you mean?”

“Well, just the other Sunday you were sleeping on park benches, dressed in rags—“

He laughed. “Drinking hot chocolate at my classmate’s kitchen table.”

“That too.” She gave her backpack, which was slung over Miko’s shoulder, a pat. “And now look at you. Carrying my books. Carrying Hannah’s books, when she doesn’t have a ride home with one of her friends. Globe-trotting.”

“I’m from Manila, remember. It’s more like going back home.”

“Miko, you haven’t been to Manila since you were three.”

“True.” He looked up at the sky. It had gotten very dark since noon, and an icy wind was stirring through the trees. “They’re going to use the tornado siren,” Crystal heard him say.

“Why?” she asked.

“Because it’s going to be a hell of a storm, that’s why. And this is Monroeville. It rolls up its sidewalks anytime it hears the word boo.” He looked at her. “As for Manila…well, I’m hoping to remember something.”

“I know,” Crystal said, embarrassed. “I’m sure you will. I didn’t mean to make you feel like it was lost forever.”

“You didn’t. The same thought crossed my mind a few times. Gee Miko, you haven’t seen it since you were a baby, what do you expect to find?”

The anxiety in his tone made her smile. “You’re excited about it, I can tell.”

“It’s halfway around the world. This summer’s going to be an adventure whether I like it or not.”

They got to her porch just as the first of that week’s giant squalls began to tumble from the sky. Taking the steps two at a time, Crystal sprang to the front door. The mailbox was stuffed with junk that Hannah, who had beaten her home, had disregarded in her mad dash to reach the Chips Ahoy! cookies in the kitchen.

“You may have already won,” Miko said.

Crystal squashed a brown sweepstakes envelop in her fist. “I’ll never know. Listen, come on inside and wait for my mom to get home. Then you won’t have to walk in the snow.”

“Love to,” he said, unstrapping her backpack.

“Great.”

“But I can’t.”

“What, you’ve got other girls who want their books carried?” Grinning, she gave his head a playful slap with the rest of the junk mail.

“No no, I just need to get some wood cut for my mom before the real nasty stuff starts falling.”

“Wow, a pack animal and a lumberjack all in one.”

“Well…”

She stood on tip-toe and gave him a kiss. Miko blinked, stunned. His feet shuffled on the porch. “Go on,” Crystal told him, “get home before the sidewalks are buried. And thanks for carrying my books.”

“Sure,” he managed, still drunk. “I mean, you know, any time.”

“Any time,” she laughed. “I’ll remember that. And hey, come to my birthday party this Wednesday if you can. Three o’clock.”

“Oh my God, that’s right! How old are you going to be?”

“Only fourteen, relax. You don’t have to buy me a personalized throw pillow.”

“I’ll get you something. I promise.”

She smiled. “Just bring yourself. Oh and maybe a paper shredder for all this worthless mail.”

“Seeya, Crystal.” He turned to go.

“Don’t fall down the steps!”

The remark earned her a grin from over the shoulder. “Hey, your kisses aren’t that good.”

“Yes they are, Miko. Believe it.”

Miko paused, looked at her…then walked down the steps carefully as an acrobat on a tightrope over Niagara Falls.

***

“Happy birthday, happy birthday…happy birthday to youuuuuu!”

She ran out of breath with two of the fourteen candles still lit, which didn’t matter, because she’d forgotten to make a wish anyway. Lucretia, Hannah, and Miko applauded.

“Atta girl, Crystal!” her mom cheered.

Crystal gave her a wink before cutting into the chocolate frosting. On that final day before all hell broke loose, Lucretia was especially buoyant. She thanked Miko over and over again for braving the blizzard, and for the present he gave Crystal: a musical jewelry box with a twirling ballerina inside.

“Gorgeous!” she said, as Crystal lifted the pink box for all to behold. “Absolutely gorgeous!”

To Crystal she sounded like an archeologist who had just dug up the holy grail. Blushing, she thanked Miko and gave him a kiss on the cheek. This seemed to please Lucretia even more. It had been months, maybe even years, since Crystal had seen her smile with such abandon.

But the ruse of having a boy her own age at the party, accidental though it was, collapsed soon enough. Hannah spooned out scoops of strawberry ice cream while Crystal served the cake. She, Crystal, used the knife cautiously. Vision was poor by candlelight, but it couldn’t be helped. The power had been out since Tuesday afternoon.

“Well I love this,” Lucretia said. “I don’t care about the storm. I think candlelight is prettier anyway, don’t you, Miko?”

Miko shifted in his seat. “Yes, ma’am. I like it very much.”

“But you’re staying here tonight. We’ve got thirteen inches outside and it’s still snowing.”

“Ma’am?”

“You heard me. We’ll set you up with a bed, don’t worry.”

“Ma’am, my mom and dad will be worried sick.”

“Sugar rush!” Crystal yelled, breaking the tension. “Here, Miko, have a slice!” And she handed him a plate with a huge piece of yellow cake.

“Oh you shouldn’t have,” Miko said. “But I’m sure glad you did.”

Lucretia laughed too heartily. From here a period of light, trivial banter broke out over the table. A new skirt lay folded in a box from Kaufmann’s. Socks and underwear. On the night before, near midnight, Hannah had knocked softly on Crystal’s door to present her own gift: a cigarette lighter that masqueraded as a tube of lipstick.

“I think the birthday girl deserves a toast,” Lucretia said presently. She stood up with a glass of Diet Coke in her hand. Miko and Hannah followed suit. “To Crystal! Who to me is…the equivalent of a red sports car racing in the fast lane, top down”—Hannah gave a giggle—“passing all the other cars, because…” She paused and gave Crystal a kind of smile she would never give her eldest daughter again. Affectionate, supportive. Proud. “Because nobody else I know is so certain of what they can do.”

“YAY!” the other two cheered.

Glasses clinked over the cake. Crystal stammered out a thank you. Absurdly, she found herself on the verge of having to wipe away tears. The old Crystal had never cried very much. It was all Miko’s fault. Ever since that morning he’d dropped by after a night of playing hobo her once mighty floodgates had been inadequate. At night when she closed her eyes and thought of Jarett, of their dying romance, she cried. During the day it was Lucy who brought it on. Hell, sometimes all it took was a lazy rom-com rerun on the television.

But these birthday tears would be sweet and she knew it. Smiling, she let her eyes bud. Then she blinked, and her cheeks got wet.

Lucretia looked at Miko. “Did you know,” she said, “that Crystal told the craziest lie ever on Saturday just to get out of the house to see you?”

“Oh, is that right?” Miko replied. “How do you mean?”

And that was the end of the sweetness.

***

There came a knock on Crystal’s door later that night. Her mother stood glowering in the hallway. The suspicious look on her face, which had returned after Miko—who had gone home after all—told her that he’d not seen Crystal on Saturday, was finally spilling over. It was attack time.

“Okay,” she said. “I’m going to bite. Where were you on Saturday?”

“I—“

“And don’t give me any bullshit about being at the Mortensons or so help me I’m going to slap you right down to the floor.”

“So they told you?” Crystal said. She was a little stunned at being threatened with physical violence, but then the tension had been building for months.

“Answer me, Crystal.”

She couldn’t answer. Her mind had gone blank. No, not blank. The truth was still there. Where she’d been, what she’d been doing. The truth. Farmwork. Love and lessons with Jarett Powell. Rainy summer afternoons; birthday blizzards. And had he come through with what he felt was his end of the bargain? Was she a better writer now for it all? That was hard to say. She hadn’t written anything for a year.

“I was with Jarett,” she told Lucretia.

Her mom slapped her down to the floor.

Time stopped. Crystal lay next to her bed in a red haze of pain. Tears stung her eyes. She couldn’t see. She blinked once, twice…and when the world came back into focus, her mom was standing in the hall, dialing a number on her cell phone.

Oh no you don’t, bitch!

Crystal jumped to her feet and charged, knocking Lucretia back against the wall. A painting of a galleon at sea fell; the frame shattered. Crystal’s hand reached out, seized the cell phone, and threw it down the steps before Lucretia could get over the shock of being attacked.

“Crystal!” she shrieked.

Hard as she could, Crystal slapped her across the face. Dazed, Lucretia shook her head. And then her eyes filled with clarity. Clarity and fury.

She shoved Crystal back into her room, where she staggered and nearly hit her head on the television.

“You wanna hit me?” her voice thundered. Her feet stomped over the floor. Blue fire raged in her eyes.

That’s me in twenty-five years, Crystal had time to think.

Lucretia picked her up and threw her onto the bed. Crystal winged one of her heart-shaped pillows at her, missed, then reached for an empty flower vase on the headboard and winged that. Another miss. Glass shattered all over the reading nook.

“You call the police and I’ll kill you!” Crystal yelled.

“Oh I’m calling them all right!”

“Like hell you are!”

“Give me your cell phone!”

“Piss off!”

Snarling, Lucretia grabbed Crystal’s ankles and yanked her to the edge of the bed. Crystal sat up to retaliate with another slap. She was quick. Years of cheerleading had honed her timing and reflexes to an edge that was beautiful to behold on game nights. She could perform handsprings and cartwheels, pikes and splits. She had several times executed a flawless needle while three other girls held her aloft. Of course no routine could be considered whole without the needle. And before Crystal had come along, the squad had lacked a flyer with confidence enough to try anything in the air harder than a pretty smile.

Lucretia blocked the slap, then gave one of her own that sent Crystal reeling into the headboard.

“OW!”

“Get over here!”

“My face!”

She felt her ankles grabbed again. This time she didn’t resist. The side of her face felt scalded. She reached to touch it, to assess the damage. Lucretia spun her over while letting her own body fall into a sitting position on the bed. Now lying over her mother’s knee, Crystal felt a firm hand press into her back and hold. Sharp nails dug through her pajama top. She tried to move and was instantly shoved back down.

“Mom, what are you doing?”

“I’ve got one more birthday present for you, sweetheart,” she heard Lucretia say. “One I should have given to you a long time ago.”

***

From her bedroom down the hall, twelve year-old Hannah Genesio could guess easily enough what was going on next door. Her older sister was getting the beating of her life. It probably served her right. Girls Crystal’s age weren’t supposed to have boyfriends like Jarett. He was old enough to be her dad, after all. Mom’s husband. Whatever.

She got out of bed and tip-toed over to the wall, thankful to have a barrier between herself and the battle zone. A shout came from Crystal. Glass shattered. So this was what the news anchor people meant by domestic violence. Except in the stories they reported it was always a male who doled out the bruises. That male was usually drunk, hardly ever the household’s real father, and came into his marriage prepackaged with a criminal record.

“Mom,”