A Step Toward Falling Read online

  There is a sign saying No Cell Phones in the Hospital. Please Have Your Conversation Outside which apparently I can read but other people can’t.

  Mom looks very worried. I don’t know if she’s worried about Nan or worried that maybe she went to high school with some of these people. I am worried about Nan and I am also worried that if Nan had a heart attack I really won’t be able to do the play. I’ll have to call Emily on the phone and tell her except I don’t have her phone number and I can’t look it up because the print in the phone book is too small for me to read. I will have to tell her on Monday that my nan almost died, that’s how much she doesn’t want me to be in the play.

  I think maybe Nan doesn’t want me to do the play because she’s still mad at Emily and Lucas about the football game.

  I am still not sure what I think about that. Sometimes it makes me very mad to remember and sometimes I think, people make mistakes, including me. I’m not sure why we haven’t ever talked about it. I thought maybe they’d say something at the audition, but then Anthony was there and I was glad they didn’t. Now when I see them, Anthony is always there, so we keep not saying anything. But when I tell them I can’t do the play, I’ll probably say something like, “Plays are nice but people shouldn’t have to scream for custodians to get help when they need it. That was not OK.”

  Just thinking about this makes me want to cry about not doing the play when I should be crying about Nan. I shouldn’t be thinking about the play at all but I can’t help it, I do and my throat gets tight and my eyes start to cry.

  Mom has found a pocket pack of Kleenexes in her purse, which is lucky for me, but after a while they run out and I have to reuse the balled-up ones sitting in my lap. We’ve been here for a while now. We’ve talked to one doctor. He says she’s stabilized for now but they’re going to run more tests before they admit her. Even though we know she’s going to be okay now, I still can’t stop crying.

  It makes Mom start crying, too. “She’s going to be okay, Bee. I think we should try to get ahold of ourselves here.”

  “I’m not crying about Nan,” I say. I blow my nose.

  “You’re not?” She looks surprised.

  “No. I’m crying because I can’t be in the play if it gives Nan a heart attack.”

  Mom makes a funny sound. Like a laugh cry. “I thought you were upset because if Nan’s going to be in the hospital for a while, I’ll be the only one home to take care of you. I thought you didn’t want to be home alone with me.”

  “No.” I laugh because that sounds silly. Mom and I have fun. We do different things than I do with Nan but it’s still fun. Mom and I used to play Guess Who a lot, and Payday, and Who Will Be My Date? Mom likes board games and so do I. Usually I win which means I collect the highest salary on Payday and have the handsomest boy as my date. Mom always says, “Oh well,” and laughs when she loses which is called being a good sport. I’m almost never a good sport. I usually cry when I lose games or get mad at the person who wins because it doesn’t seem fair to have to lose. Mom tells me that everyone has to lose sometimes. That’s how it is.

  “We can play games and I’ll let you win sometimes,” I say because Mom is still crying and I want her to stop. It’s not nice being around a crying person especially if you love them.

  “That would make me happy. I’m sorry I’m crying. I know how close you are to Nan and sometimes it makes me jealous and I know I shouldn’t feel that way. We all love each other equally but you’re my baby, not hers. I wish I could tell her that. I wish I could tell her that I’d like to make some decisions—it shouldn’t always be the two of you deciding everything.”

  I think about this. It makes sense, except for the part about me being a baby because I’m definitely not a baby. “What do you want to decide?” I ask. If Nan is going to be in the hospital for a while, Mom could decide what to eat for dinner. Usually Nan does all the dinner cooking so mostly we eat what Nan likes—pork chops maybe, or chicken and green beans. Even though noodles are my favorite food, she never makes them for dinner. She says pasta is Italian and she can’t cook foreign food.

  “You could be in charge of dinner,” I say. “That would probably be good.”

  “Yeah, that would be good, wouldn’t it?” Mom laughs which is better than crying. “Maybe we could take a pork chop break.”

  “You could make spaghetti or something like that.”

  She laughs again. “How did I know you would suggest that?”

  I shrug. “It’s your decision.”

  “Maybe it can be our decision. If I decide on dinner, you can decide some other things. How about that?”

  “Like lunch?” For lunch, Nan usually heats up a can of soup with toast or sometimes crackers.

  “Like being in your play.”

  “I can’t be in the play,” I remind her. “Being in the play gave Nan a heart attack.”

  “No, it didn’t,” Mom says. Now she looks serious. “Nan has always had a heart condition and she doesn’t always do what the doctor tells her to. That’s what gave her a heart attack.”

  “Does that mean I can be in the play?”

  “I think it should be your decision. I think you need to talk to those kids about what happened. I never agreed with Nan that no one should talk about it around you. I don’t think that helps.”

  My throat goes hot and tight like I might start crying again. I don’t know if I want to talk about what happened but I know I want to be in the play.

  EMILY

  “SO I HAVE A few ideas,” Lucas says. “One is probably terrible, one might not be so bad.”

  It’s finally Wednesday, we’re finally on our coffee date, and I know it’s not ideas for us that Lucas is talking about. It’s Belinda and Anthony. It’s this play they’re so ecstatic to be part of that Ms. Sadiq scolded Lucas for talking to Belinda about it and then, in the same breath, thanked him for finding something that made her so happy.

  We’ve been messaging every night this week, unsure what to do. In that heady moment after we told them they’d both been cast, their euphoria was so overwhelming neither one of us could bear to clarify what we were saying: Yes, you’re both in the show, but unfortunately it will never take place. In the days since then, we’ve been swapping ideas, most of them not very good. His idea: we wait until Guys and Dolls is over, then rehearse for a week and a half with whoever will do it. My idea: the four of us—meaning Belinda and Anthony, Lucas and me—perform it on the street in our costumes, like a flash mob without the mob.

  “Ah, no,” Lucas said to that. “I’m sorry but no.”

  We’ve gone through a bunch of stabs like this. Some funny, some not. I was worried this might be the only thing we talk about. Since the one phone conversation where we set up this date, we haven’t talked about us, or Debbie, or alluded, even passingly, to the hand-holding episode. We haven’t even flirted much. We’ve just talked about this play and whether we made a terrible mistake getting Belinda and Anthony’s hopes up for something that will never happen.

  Haunting us both are Belinda’s words after she and Anthony finished celebrating. “I’ve never been cast in a play since Charlotte’s Web! Mr. Bergman lets me try out for all of them but he always says, You know I can’t cast you, Belinda, I wish I could.”

  I couldn’t believe it. “He says that to you? The drama teacher?”

  “He doesn’t have extra staff so I can’t be in a play. I’m not allowed. I’m only allowed to audition. That’s what he says.”

  Lucas looked as shocked as I was. “That doesn’t sound right, Belinda.”

  Belinda shook her head. “I’m allowed to try out. I just can’t be in a play. That’s the rule. No after-school clubs. No activities.”

  “Wait a second,” I say. I want to make sure I’m clear about this. “The school made this rule or your mom?”

  “Mr. Bergman told me, sorry, that’s the rule.”

  “See, Belinda, he shouldn’t say that. He can’t say you can never be in
a play because we don’t have staff for it. That’s illegal.” I hoped I was right about this.

  “Oh.” Belinda looked confused. “And is Anthony allowed, too?”

  “Of course. You guys should be able to do any after-school clubs that you want.”

  As I got more emphatic, I also got more nervous that maybe I was wrong. But that night I looked it up and I was right—all special ed students have a right to access an equal education, including access to all sports, clubs, and after-school activities, according to the site I read. If a student with a disability wants to play a sport or join a club, accommodations have to be made. They can’t be denied a spot because of their disability.

  They’ve been doing this to Belinda for four years, I wrote Lucas that night. She’s been going to approximately two auditions a year—every play, and every musical—and they’ve told her she’s welcome to audition but they can’t give her a part because of staffing issue. That’s about fifteen violations of federal law!

  He writes back. Are you sure you’re in AP calculus?

  Twelve violations, whatever. I’m serious. This is a big deal. They weren’t even cagey about it, saying you’re not right for this part. They just said no, because of your disability, you’ll never be in a play. When I figured all this out, I was so mad I wrote an email to the free legal aid to victims of IDEA violations.

  Now we sit across from each other both drinking hot chocolate. The issue has made us both less nervous about the “date” aspects of this date.

  “Here’s the thing,” he says. “The point is giving Belinda a chance to act in her favorite story, not to right every wrong that’s ever been committed against special ed kids in the school.”

  He has a good point. “Okay,” I say.

  “So here’s my idea. What if we do the play with four people? You and Belinda will be Lizzie and Jane, Anthony and I will be Darcy and Bingley.”

  “Anthony as Mr. Darcy?” I don’t want to be mean, but we also have to be realistic. “It’s almost impossible to understand anything Anthony says.”

  “No, I’ll be Darcy. I mean . . . don’t you think that’s better?”

  I think of the story he told about Ron. How all the problems started when he asked Belinda to dance once. “I do think that’s better, but what if she gets a crush on you? Or switches whatever feelings she had for Ron over to you? We have to be careful about that.”

  “Actually, I don’t think that will happen.” He smiles as he says this. “I think she and Anthony are becoming an item. I talked to him about it the other day. He told me he’s loved her since seventh grade and apparently she’s finally coming around. She’s agreed not to date anyone else until the play is over. So they’ve cleared that up.”

  I wonder if Lucas is thinking the same thing I am: They’ve cleared it up better than you and I have.

  He keeps going: “We rehearse the show after school for the next two weeks, just a few scenes with the costumes, then we put it on at LLC for the last day of class. Maybe we could invite the ballroom dance class to join us so we have a bigger audience. We’ll see Mary tonight and ask her. After all, Pride and Prejudice is a story about boundaries and relationships, right? I don’t know—” He shakes his head and smiles. “That sounded better in my head when I thought of it. Saying it out loud it sounds stupid.”

  “It doesn’t sound stupid,” I slide one had across the table and put a finger on his wrist. “It’s a great idea.”

  He looks at the finger and up at me. “It is?”

  I don’t know how to flirt. I hate the idea of being obvious and coy at the same time. For years I’ve watched cheerleaders play flirty games to get the attention of every boy in the room, asking a whole math class if anyone can see her bra under her shirt or if anyone could do the homework last night because she sure couldn’t. Flirting makes you feel stupid. It forces you to slip outside your own body and watch yourself flirt. Flirting makes you think: Oh my God. I look and sound like every girl I hate. At the same time, it’s hard to hold myself back. I love this idea; I love that he’s given this so much thought. “It’s a great idea because it’s doable. We don’t have a lot of options. This way Belinda can be in a play and we’ll have a guaranteed audience of, what? About forty, maybe? But would we just put on one performance for the class?”

  “For now, yes. Maybe—I don’t know—we could find other venues. We’ll see how it goes. I know we talked about getting kids at school to see what Belinda and Anthony can do, but maybe that’s not the most important thing for them. Maybe it would be nice for Belinda to check out the center. After she’s finished with high school, she’ll be able to take classes there. Maybe she could sign up for ballroom dance classes.”

  He’s absolutely right and it kills me that he’s thought of this, not me. However scared we are about the unknowns of next year, surely Belinda, with no job and nowhere to go, is more scared. My mind races ahead a little—I picture introducing Belinda and Anthony to Mary, telling them a little bit about Mary’s class. How it helps people who want to start dating. It teaches you about communicating and managing expectations. It’s helped me a lot, I’ll have to admit, because it’s sort of true. Not even sort of. Just true.

  “It’s a great idea, Lucas,” I say, grinning. “I wish I’d thought of it.”

  He smiles at me in a way that says a lot of things without saying them: he hasn’t forgotten this is meant to be a date.

  When we get outside, he asks me how I think it went.

  “You mean me learning to drink coffee? Unfortunately I think you have to order coffee before you can learn how to like it.”

  “Not that,” he says. “The other part. The conversation thing.”

  “I never thought you were bad at that, Lucas. You’re better than you think.”

  “I remember some of our conversations not going so well. Maybe in the beginning there when you were dating Joe College.”

  “Yeah . . .” I think about it for a minute. “It’s remotely possible some of that was my fault. I think maybe I misjudged you.”

  “What? You assumed I was stupid and insensitive just because I play football?” He steps closer as he says this. It makes me nervous but I don’t step away. He smells like soap and coffee, a surprisingly intoxicating combination.

  “Sort of.”

  “Just because 85 percent of the team is doesn’t mean we all are.” He takes another step. He’s done all this before. He knows how to reach over and play with someone’s sleeve. I don’t. I’m terrified that he’ll kiss me and I’ll get so nervous I’ll do something I don’t mean to, like start laughing. Or stomp on his foot. My nerves are all jangly and unpredictable.

  “We’re not all jerks,” he says. “Just like your crowd isn’t all National Merit snobs.”

  Now he’s got both sleeves of my shirt pinched between his fingers and he’s really leaning in. I keep being sure we’re going to kiss and then we don’t. “Just to be clear, I’m not a National Merit anything. That’s Candace. Plus Barry and Weilin were finalists.”

  “Both?” He leans back, surprised. “That’s kind of intense because they’re dating too—they must have cheated, right?”

  Before we started driving together, he didn’t know any of my friends’ names. This didn’t surprise me, of course, even though I knew most of his friends. What surprises me now—catches my breath, really—is that even though he’s still never been introduced, he knows them well enough to make a joke. “I know, right? They’re both super smart and they’re a couple. I totally think they cheated. It’s too coincidental otherwise.”

  He laughs and then, suddenly, we’re kissing. Only our lips touch at first, not our bodies. It’s not a crazy kiss. Just a lovely slow gentle one.

  “That was nice,” he says after it’s over. “Maybe we should try this again some time.”

  I want to say, How about now? Let’s kiss again now.

  “Maybe we could get together and iron out play details this weekend,” I say. Then I realize it
’s Wednesday and I probably sound too eager. No, I definitely sound too eager. Kiss the girl on Wednesday and suddenly her Friday and Saturday calendar are cleared of any plans.

  “I’d like to but I can’t,” he says. “I have to work all weekend for my dad.”

  I can’t tell if this is an excuse or not. He’s never mentioned working for his dad before. He’s only talked about fighting with him. “You do? I didn’t know you had a job.”

  “It’s a little embarrassing. I guess I don’t talk about it too much.”

  “What is it?” I try to imagine embarrassing jobs and I can’t.

  “He’s a stonemason.”

  I study his face but it’s impossible to read. “Why is that embarrassing?”

  “Do you know any stonemasons?”

  “No. I mean, maybe. I don’t know what it is exactly.”

  “Our best work is building and repairing stone walls. That’s kind of cool, but we don’t do too much of that. Most of our jobs are mixing cement and laying brick. That’s less cool. That’s working with a lot of guys who are in between prison terms, if you know what I mean.”

  “Really?” I’m not even sure what to say. “I’ve never met anyone who’s been in prison.”

  “Yeah, generally speaking they’re not a barrel of laughs. If it was possible to go to college and not do this forever, I’d pick that.”

  Now I understand what he’s really saying. I understand why he got so mad that time that I said he was lucky to have choices, and didn’t have to go to college. He doesn’t have more choices than me; he has fewer. If he doesn’t go to school next year, this will be his job. And maybe the fact that he’s never once mentioned it in all this time is a measure of how much he doesn’t want to do it.

  BELINDA

  ONE THING ABOUT NAN is she never throws anything away. Like newspapers or coupons for things she might want to buy someday. Even my grandfather’s clothes she’s never thrown away. Whenever I ask, she says, “You never know when another man might come into our life who needs them.”