Before I Say Goodbye Read online

  “Aren’t you going to try the sweater on?” She shoved it at me, and with a little effort I managed to get my arms into it without dislodging my cargo.

  “Oh, that’s perfect. You look so grown up.”

  Which was pretty silly given that we were still in the little girls department. “Can we go home now?”

  “After I grab some pants for James. Is there something wrong with your arms?”

  “No.” I shoved the sweater and the package of underwear at her. “Just feeling a little sick. Can I wait in the truck?”

  “Sure. Let me get you the keys. Do you want me to go with you?”

  “No. I’m fine.”

  I hurried away from her as quickly as possible, holding my arms against my stomach. I nearly stumbled into a group of black-haired children clinging to their mother. Just walk. Keep walking. No one had seen me put the clothes under my shirt, but I still felt eyes on me. I’d only stolen a few things from stores in the past—candy, jewelry, a pen. My friends had made it fun, but it didn’t feel fun now. Had someone noticed the hangers on the floor? Had the lady at the dressing room known what I was up to?

  I walked past the registers to the entrance, my heart slamming in my chest. What if these clothes had a hidden security device and I beeped as I left the store? I picked up speed, ready to make a run for it.

  Nothing beeped. Finally, I was out the door.

  “Miss,” someone called.

  Was that my heart skipping a beat?

  I glanced behind me and saw that the man was talking not to me but to a woman whose bag of dog food had fallen from the shelf under her cart. “Thanks,” I heard her say.

  Still, it had been too close.

  I started to run.

  When I arrived at the truck, my hands shook so much I almost couldn’t get the door open. When I did, I jumped inside and locked the doors.

  I’d made it. No one was around. No one had come after me.

  When my heartbeat slowed, I worked the clothes out of my shirt and stuffed them under the seat. Then I unlocked the door, opened it, and threw up on the blacktop.

  Chapter Ten

  Rikki

  I came home from work, exhausted from the mind-numbing tedium of data entry and worried about what I’d find. Kyle was acting strange. For the past two nights, she’d come into my bed at night, sobbing. When I asked her what was wrong, she shook her head and clung to me.

  She couldn’t know. Not yet. Something else had to be wrong.

  I found her in the kitchen heating up a pan of packaged noodles. Not exactly nourishing, but I felt too beaten to care. James was at the table drinking a glass of milk, a bowl and spoon in front of him.

  “How was your day?” I asked them.

  James was full of stories. He loved his teacher. He loved his class. The only thing he didn’t love was going to a different class to read. “We’re all kind of dumb, I think,” he said.

  I sat down beside him. “No, honey. You aren’t. Never. For some reason reading’s just harder for you, that’s all. You’re good at so many other things.” But I knew reading affected all his classes. How could you learn history, science, and math if you couldn’t read? I’d known about his problem for the past six months, but those had been difficult months for me, and I hadn’t been able to figure out how to help him. Now it was time to do something.

  “You should talk to Allia’s mother,” Kyle said, opening the package of flavoring to pour into the boiling noodles. “Allia told me she’s homeschooling her brother. Not Travis. The other one. Can’t remember his name.”

  “Cory,” James said.

  “Yeah, him. He was having problems or something, so she took him out to catch him up. I think she went to school to be a teacher but didn’t finish. Maybe.”

  That didn’t go with the garden design dreams I’d heard from her, but I didn’t know enough to say. After my last conversation with Becca, I didn’t think she’d be overjoyed to hear from me, but it would be a good thing for James if she could help or even point us in the right direction. James needed her or someone like her, and I didn’t know where to begin. “I’ll talk to her,” I promised. “So, Kyle, what about your day?” I blinked to push off a sudden wave of dizziness. Had I taken my seizure medication? I thought so.

  She shrugged. “The same.”

  I hadn’t received any text messages about her missing classes, so she’d at least been there. “Is there anything you need for school?” Was it wrong to hope she said no? I was down to the last sixty bucks in my account and two weeks from a paycheck that would include only a week of work. I wondered if it was true about Mormon bishops being able to get people food. Well, I’d see how it went. We still had a few leftovers from what the ladies had brought on Monday.

  “I don’t need anything.” Kyle managed a smile.

  “Tell me what’s wrong, honey. You’ve always been able to talk to me.”

  Kyle jumped up from the table. “Stop it already! There’s nothing wrong! Besides, I can’t talk to you anymore. You’ve changed.” Turning on her heel, she fled down the stairs.

  “Oops.” In less than a second my nagging headache had gone from its familiar pounding to sharp daggers and blurred vision.

  “She’s probably on her period,” James offered.

  I blinked at him twice before laughing. “Maybe that’s it. How’s Fred the Fish doing?”

  “He’s okay. I’m not giving him too much food.”

  “I’m sure that makes him happy.”

  “I saw Lauren at school,” James said. “She’s in the third grade, not the second. I wish she was in my class. We played together at recess. She’s my bestest friend.”

  “Isn’t she a little bossy?”

  He shrugged. “I’m used to Kyle bossing me.”

  “That you are.” I rumpled his hair, the swelling in my heart reminding me how much I loved being his mother.

  James touched my hand. “Mom, what’s wrong? You’re looking at me funny.”

  That’s because there were two of him. “Just a headache.”

  “Better take your pills.”

  “Yeah. I’d better.” Not a good sign to have to take them so early.

  I wrestled a bit with the bottle before I got it open and swallowed a pill. My hands didn’t want to obey—another reason I was better off not working at a restaurant. I’d dropped too many trays the past couple months. I told myself it was because of the headaches, but I knew better.

  I need to lie down.

  A few minutes later James found me in bed and climbed up beside me. “Mom? I have to read this, but I don’t know how. Can you help me?”

  I couldn’t even see the paper because of the headache, but in ten more minutes the pills should kick in. “Let’s rest a minute and then I will. Tell me some more stories about your day. I love hearing about it.” I wished I didn’t have to work. I’d stay with him every second, watch as he grew before my eyes.

  “Okay. The best thing was at recess when Lauren told Junior to let me go first down the slide . . .”

  I dozed as he talked, and it was a long time before I could help him with his homework.

  Chapter Eleven

  Becca

  Travis came into the kitchen, car keys in hand. “Mom, can I go to BG’s and watch a movie?”

  “Is your homework finished?” I asked, looking up from correcting Lauren’s math. It was always a huge adjustment for the children to go back to school. What they didn’t know was that it was every bit as difficult for me. I had to correct homework, talk to teachers, make sure they got to and from school. The good news for me was now Travis had his driver’s license and we’d found an affordable car so he could drive himself to school, and eventually maybe he could even pick up Allia at the junior high. I wasn’t sure about that yet
. Maybe after a few months of experience going solo. He wasn’t allowed to drive friends for at least six months, a law I was grateful for.

  He tossed his keys into the air and caught them. “I don’t have any homework.”

  “What about the history thing you told me about?”

  “Not due until Tuesday.”

  “That’s not very far away.” There’d been a time when he’d at least started his projects on the same day or the day after they’d been given. The last few months of tenth grade, however, he’d become a procrastinator, which often sent the whole house into convulsions as he frantically tried to beat a deadline. Dante and I had discussed letting him crash and burn, but his GPA destined him for a scholarship at BYU, and we were reluctant to withhold our help and end up footing the college bill ourselves. We hoped the stress of doing it last-minute would teach him something.

  Apparently not.

  “We have family night on Monday,” I said, “and we don’t do homework on Sunday, so when exactly are you going to do this paper?”

  He gave a one-shouldered shrug. “Tomorrow. She’s giving us time in school on Monday, and I can do it before family night.”

  “I’ve heard that one before.”

  “I got it covered, Mom. I promise I’ll get an A. What more do you want?”

  “I’ll tell you what I don’t want. I don’t want Monday night to roll around and have you frantically searching for information because you didn’t find enough already. You can go tonight, but tomorrow I want to see a strong rough draft before you go anywhere.”

  He gave me a pained looked. You’d think I’d told him to take Lauren with him to hang out with his friends. “I was going job-hunting.”

  “Your job is to get that scholarship.”

  “I will. I promise. Anyway, I’m only going to work a couple days a week. To get some extra cash.”

  Lauren grinned. “You just want to meet girls.”

  He gave her an irritated look, where once he would have laughed. “Stay out of this, midget.”

  “Travis, we don’t say things like that.”

  He sighed. “She’s such a pain.”

  “She learned it from you. Now, have you cleaned your bathroom?”

  His irritation increased, but he turned on his heel and stomped down the hall.

  “I take that as a no,” Lauren said, sounding exactly like her older siblings.

  “Guess so.” I looked down at the math problem. “That’s right. Now you need to color this picture for your English class, and then you’re finished.”

  “What color should I use on her coat?”

  “Whatever color you like.”

  “I can’t decide.”

  I didn’t understand it. When she was with children her age, she bossed them around, but in other situations, she couldn’t seem to make simple choices.

  “Well, figure it out.” I started toward the stovetop where my potatoes awaited mashing.

  Allia breezed into the kitchen. “Look, Mom, I finished.” She extended her hand with a plaid scrunchy.

  “Wonderful. I’m sure Kyle will love it.”

  “I also made her this flower with the scraps we had in the material box.” She held up a flower with burnt edges whose blue color matched the plaid. “That way she has a choice. You know, for if she’s at home or school or going somewhere nice. She can wear them together or separately. Only I’m not sure she uses this kind of thing, you know? She wears her hair all swooping down over her face. ”

  “It’s perfect.” I put an arm around her, feeling proud of my daughter, despite my own reluctance about Rikki. “I’m glad you’re trying to befriend her. I think she’s really lost.”

  “She’s not even baptized. At least she doesn’t remember if she is. Maybe she can take the missionary lessons.”

  “Good idea. When her mother’s records arrive, wherever they are, we can ask your dad to check into it.”

  Allia nodded. “Thanks, Mom.”

  Lauren waved Allia over to the table. “Come look. What color should I make this guy’s coat? And what about the dog?”

  “Black coat,” Allia said. “No, do it blue because black will make the picture too dark. Do the dog brown. Maybe mix a little gold in it. You have gold, don’t you?”

  “Yeah.” Lauren set down her orange crayon, grabbed a blue one, and started coloring.

  No wonder Lauren couldn’t decide. She had all of us to do it for her. I wondered if she made decisions with her friends, or if she asked their opinion and then made them follow through. I’d have to keep an eye on that. I wanted all my children, especially my daughters, to make their own choices in life.

  I finished the mashed potatoes and put the butter back in the fridge. Leaving Lauren at the table, Allia walked over and leaned against the counter by the sink. “You know, it was kind of weird,” she said in a voice too low for Lauren to overhear, “going over to Kyle’s on Monday and her showing me all my old clothes. Her mom didn’t tell her where she got them.”

  I opened the oven to check on my meatloaf. “You didn’t tell her, did you?”

  “No. But it was still weird.”

  “Think how you’d feel if it was you.”

  “Yeah, but what if she finds out now? Will she think I was lying to her?”

  “I see what you mean. But no, hopefully, if she does find out, she’ll see you were trying to be sensitive and kind.”

  She sighed. “I guess.”

  “What about the man’s boots?” Lauren asked, her forehead scrunched in concentration. “What color should they be?”

  The doorbell saved either of us from answering. “I’ll get it.” Allia shot from the kitchen, while I followed at a more sedate pace, hoping it wasn’t school kids selling something to raise money for this or that. I hated the schools using children as salesmen, and I opted out of it for my children, instead making them earn what they needed around the house or at my sister’s, who often had work available at the small advertising firm she ran with her husband. Since Dante was the bishop of the ward and I was in the Primary, every child in the neighborhood who sold anything always stopped by our house. At some point, we’d had to start saying no. I hated disappointing them, though, and there were a few families I’d sponsor, regardless, because I knew the children wouldn’t have any other way to participate in the activity.

  I was surprised to see Rikki at the door with her two children in tow, James with his bright smile and Kyle with her sullen stare.

  “Hey, Kyle,” Allia said, “look what I just finished. I was going to ask Mom if I could walk over and give them to you.” She held out the scrunchy and the flower. “The flower is for maybe a dressier place, like church. You could use them both. You know, hold back all your hair with the scrunchy and put this flower right here on the side, kinda toward the front.” Allia demonstrated. “Want to see in the mirror?”

  “Sure, I guess.” Kyle’s sullen look had vanished but not because of Allia. Her eyes were focused beyond all of us.

  I turned and saw Travis. “Can I go now?” He used an aggrieved tone that was worse than nails on a chalkboard. I’d never thought I’d be happy to see my precious boy leave home for school or a mission, but now I was beginning to understand the old saying that teens became annoying specifically so their mothers would be willing to let them go.

  “You don’t want dinner first? It’s almost ready.”

  He shook his head. “I’ll eat at BG’s.”

  “His mother is going to be home?” Friday night was date night for a lot of couples. It was for Dante and me when there wasn’t an emergency in the ward.

  “Yeah, of course.”

  “Okay. You call me if you go anywhere else and come home if no adults are there. No driving other kids.”

  “I got it, I got i
t.” He disappeared through the kitchen.

  “Sorry about that.” I gave Rikki a smile.

  Lauren appeared in the kitchen doorway. “Come on, James. You can help me with my homework. Do you know how to color good?”

  The kids scattered, and still Rikki didn’t speak. She was dressed in jeans that were probably a size too big and a fitted pink shirt that showed she wasn’t all skin and bones. As usual, her blonde hair was everywhere. She looked fragile, as though a breath might topple her.

  “Tough day?” I asked, feeling sympathy despite my worry about her intentions toward Dante. I didn’t invite her to sit down, however. I wanted her gone and the kids fed before he came home.

  She gave a weak laugh. “I had no idea repetition could be so . . . so, well, draining. Look, I’m sorry to bother you, but I have a question, and I don’t know who else to ask. It’s about James.”

  “Oh?” I asked, interested despite myself. James was adorable, and the fact that he couldn’t read was tragic.

  “Kyle says you homeschool Cory, so I thought you might know something that would help.” She glanced behind me and lowered her voice. “James has always had trouble reading. I was working a lot when he started kindergarten, so I didn’t know there was even a problem until the end of first grade, but we’ve worked on his letters a lot in the past months, and it hasn’t seemed to do any good. Now he’s in resource and hating it. He feels stupid.”

  They’d wanted to put Cory in resource, too, but he’d improved considerably over the summer, and I was confident I would have him at or above his grade level by Christmas. “Have you had him tested for dyslexia?” I asked. “Or something else?”

  “No one ever recommended that, though one teacher wanted to give him drugs once, to keep him still.”

  I shook my head. “James isn’t hyperactive. He was fine in Primary. Anyway, the school should have a way to test him, or I have a friend who works for a private school in town who’s good at finding the reasons for delayed reading. She tutors a lot of children.”

  “I’m afraid I wouldn’t have money to pay her. I’ll have to depend on the school.”