Luanne Rice - Follow the Stars Home

“I only got two spelling words wrong today,” she said.

“Only two?” he asked. “Which ones?”

Amy frowned. She had wanted him to congratulate her: She had never gotten so many right before. “Judge and delightful,” she said.

“How’d you spell judge?”

“J-u-j-e,” she said. “Like it sounds.”

“Did you read those books I gave you?”

Amy fiddled with a loose thread. Dr. McIntosh had bought her two mystery books he thought she’d like. Amy had never read much. She kept feeling as if she were missing the key all other readers received at birth. Plus, it was hard to concentrate at home, where there were real mysteries to be solved.

“Do you have a maid?” she asked, changing the subject.

“A maid?”

Did he think she was dumb for asking? Amy slid down in her seat, feeling like an idiot. They were in his station wagon, driving past the fishing docks. This part of town smelled like clams, flounder, and powdered oyster shells. Amy breathed deeply, loving it. Her father had been a long-liner, and fishing was in her blood.

“You know, someone to clean your house,” she said.

“Not exactly,” he laughed, as if she had said something outlandish.

Amy tried not to feel hurt. He was rich, a doctor – he could afford it! He didn’t wear a wedding ring, and once she had asked him whether he was married and he’d said no. So he was alone, he needed someone to take care of him. Why shouldn’t it be Amy?

“I love to clean,” she said.

“You do?”

“It’s not exactly a hobby, but I’m very good at it. Mr. Clean smells like perfume to me – why do you think I like your office so much? Can you think of many other people who like the smell of doctors’ offices?”

“It’s a rare quality,” he said. “And I appreciate it.”

Turning inland, he drove onto the so-called expressway. In Hawthorne they had three kinds of roads: the beautiful ones down by the harbor, this one-mile highway leading away from downtown, and the ugly streets near the marshlands, where Amy lived.

“I could do it part-time,” she said.

“What about schoolwork?”

“I’d fit it in.”

Dr. McIntosh was pulling onto her street. The houses here were small and crooked. Hardly anyone had nice yards. Broken refrigerators leaned against ramshackle garages. Stray cats – half of which Amy had tried to save – roamed in packs. It was a neighborhood where kids didn’t do their homework and parents didn’t make them. The air was sour and stale.

“You know I want to help you,” he said, looking at her house. “Is it really bad, Amy? Do you want me to call Ms. Arden?”

“No,” Amy said with force.

“I know you worry about your mother. Maybe it would be good for you to stay somewhere for a little while, see if we can get her some help.”

“I’m not leaving,” Amy said. The whole idea filled her with panic. Her mother might die if she weren’t there. She would fall asleep and never wake up. Or her mother’s boyfriend, Buddy, might hurt her. Or – and this was the worst fear – her mother might just run away with Buddy and never come back.

“Do you have friends? Girls you hang out with?”

Amy shrugged. He didn’t get it. Her best friend was Amber DeGray, but Amber smoked and wrote on her legs with razor blades. Amy was scared of her. Other kids didn’t like Amy. She believed she wore her life on her person, that good kids would look at her and see her mother depressed in bed, Buddy’s angry fingers plucking out “Midnight Rambler” on his expensive electric guitar, Buddy’s new dog cowering in the back of its cage.

“I’m asking,” Dr. McIntosh said, “because I know someone you might like. She’s a young mother with a daughter. Do you ever baby-sit?”

“No,” Amy said. Who would ask her? Besides, Amy wanted only Dr. McIntosh for her friend. He already knew her and didn’t think she was gross. He was kind and funny, and she trusted him.

“It’s my sister-in-law and niece,” Dr. McIntosh said.

Amy gasped. She hadn’t known he had a family! Suddenly she felt curious, excited, and horribly jealous all at once.

“Julia’s disabled. She needs a lot of attention, and sometimes Dianne gets pretty worn out. They live nearby – I know they’d like you.”

“You do?” Amy said, feeling so happy he thought she was worth liking, her eyes filled with tears.

“Sure I do,” he said.

Amy swallowed her feelings. Disabled , he had said. Was Julia one of those children with braces and crutches, hearing aids and glasses? Amy sometimes saw kids like that and felt just like them: different, set apart, very badly hurt.

“I used to be special …” Amy began, wanting to say something about her father and mother when they were young, when Amy had been their beloved newborn babe in a dark blue pram, when they had lived in the fishermen’s park, where the air was always fresh and the smells were of saltwater, spring blossoms, and fish.

“You’re wonderful just the way you are,” Dr. McIntosh said.

My mother’s depressed … she cries and sleeps all day … no one wants to come to my house … I’m so lonely!

Those were the thoughts running through Amy Brooks’s mind, but since she couldn’t begin to put them into words, she just jumped out of the doctor’s car and ran straight up the cement sidewalk into her house without a look back.

Dianne built playhouses for other people’s children. Tim had run a lobster boat, and Dianne had set up shop in the oyster shack, where they lived, on the wharf. During their thirteen months together, her playhouses had smelled a lot like shellfish. By then she had orders pouring in from everywhere. She advertised in magazines appealing to parents, romantics, and lovers of New England. Word of mouth did the rest. Her houses were big enough to play in. They had gingerbread, dovecotes, eaves, peaked rooftops, and cross-and-Bible doors; her company was called Home Sweet Home.

Dianne’s HMO paid for several hours each week of physical therapy and nurse’s aides. If Julia were left alone, she would spend all day in the fetal position. She would curl up, drawing herself inward like the slow-motion nature films of a flower at dusk. Therapy helped, but Dianne didn’t like strangers in her home. She preferred to work with Julia herself. No one loved Julia like Dianne did.

Many people had suggested Dianne institutionalize Julia. She could go to St. Gertrude’s Children’s Hospital or to Fresh Pond Manor. They had told Dianne that Julia would be too much for anyone, even a saint. Sometimes Dianne felt guilty, imagining those people thought she wanted credit for her sacrifice and devotion. She asked herself: Wouldn’t Julia get expert care in a place like that? Wouldn’t she be exercised and changed and fed and monitored? Wouldn’t Dianne be set free to live a less burdened life, be lighter of heart during the time she spent with Julia?

But Julia needed massage. Her muscles would knot up. Her stomach would tighten, and she’d get constipated. And only Dianne knew exactly how she liked to be rubbed. With baby oil on her rough hands, Dianne would soothe her baby’s woes. Julia liked circular motions on her angel wings. She liked light pressure around her rib cage, in the area of her kidneys, and she hated being touched on her scars.

Who at the institution would know that? Even if one nurse’s aide got used to Julia’s preferences, what if that person got transferred or moved away? Julia would have to go through the whole thing again, getting used to someone new. Also, there was the matter of her constipation. Most newcomers didn’t realize it was part of the territory for Rett syndrome kids. Medical people were always so quick with laxatives, when all Dianne needed to do was gently rub her belly – using a flat palm, no fingers – to help things along.