The Waking Moon

Chapter Thirteen

I could feel the slump in my shoulders as I walked to Rhodes’s house. It had been one of the longest days of my life. The principal had paged Dad in the middle of his Intro to Physics course, and made him come immediately to the office. He suspended me for two weeks and put me on probation for the rest of the school year. I had to listen to a long lecture about school violence, and how I was now on their “most watched” list, which meant there was no room to screw up. Carrie Linde got a lecture about how the school took invasions of privacy very seriously. But her phone was too broken to prove she’d taken a picture, and her father too important to meddle with. They’d let her off with a warning.

Dad had been astounded to hear what I’d done. I’d never been in an actual fight in my life, not even with my sister. He looked the principal right in the eye and said, “I’ll bet that girl had it coming.”

I could’ve hugged him when he said that. But there wasn’t much time to talk about it, since an hour after he drove me home from school, he was leaving for Laramie. I could see the guilt and hesitation in his eyes as he carried his suitcase to the car. He told me to keep my phone with me all the time, and to be sure the GPS app was enabled. It had been mom’s idea, not because she didn’t trust me, but because the deranged characters that populated her books sometimes got under her skin. And even though Dad always laughed at Mom’s gruesome imagination, he said there was nothing wrong with peace of mind.  

I asked him when I could visit Mom, and he promised to take me down when he got back. I’m not sure whether he was protecting her or me, but the thought of not being able to see her gave me an ache in my gut. He gave me a bear hug and a kiss on the head, and whispered, “You’re a good kid, Paulie. Now wish me luck.”

And just like that, I was on my own.            

I stopped in front of a long iron gate and pulled out the folded up sheet of paper Rhodes had given me. The address matched the huge Victorian in front of me. I struggled to repress my resentment. This was not a family that would understand our money problems. It was one of the biggest houses on Wood Avenue with a painted lumber and stone façade, a sprawling lawn, and a heated outdoor pool. It was the kind of fairytale place we used to drive past on the way to the park, and Judy and I would make up stories about the people inside. We almost never saw anyone coming out of those houses, and when we did, it was like a celebrity sighting.

I opened the black iron gate and made my way down the long front walk. Lampposts glowed softly, illuminating the flagstones, but most of the property was in shadows. A blue spruce towered beside the house, and there was a pretty copse of cottonwoods off to the side. At one point I thought I heard footsteps behind me, but it was only the cold breeze rattling the branches.

I rang the bell, which resounded dramatically through the house. After a while Rhodes answered the door. He was still dressed in his pinstriped trousers and vintage shirt, but his hat was gone.

“Good evening,” he said in a Dracula voice.

I followed him into the grand entryway. “Rhodes, this place is huge.”

“The house that cancer built!” he said with ironic cheer. “My dad’s Mr. Primo-Oncologist.”

He led me through a warmly lit entry way and up a wide, hardwood staircase. The rest of the rooms were dark. “Where are your parents?” I asked.

“You mean Janice and Max?” he said, disdainfully. “They’re out, thank god.”

“You call your parents Janice and Max?”

Rhodes turned and gave me a look that said, you don’t know the half of it.

“Janice is at some spa in Palm Springs,” he said over his shoulder. “Max is working the night shift at the hospital. My parents can’t stand each other. They got divorced a year ago, but neither one of them would give up the house. So they both live in different halves, and send me back and forth like an errand boy so they won’t have to bump into each other.”