Learning to Hula

Maybe I should have tried that. But I’m too mad to sleep. And not just at Robbie for pulling this stunt, but at Rob for not being here to handle it.

My trembling fingers close over one of the ceramic roosters sitting on the windowsill. Like Mom with the teapots, this is what Emma collects, claiming they are required in a country kitchen. While not as bad as the hula lamp, they are tacky. She has too many. Would she mind if I picked up this one and hurled it against the wall? Or through the window? I need to break something so that I don’t.

Because if Rob were here, Robbie would be, too. He wouldn’t run away from his father. Just me. I’d thought what he and Claire had said before slamming their bedroom doors last night had been in the heat of the moment, but what if he meant it? What if he hates me? Then he really would have run away….

“Where do you think he could be?” I ask Emma, who stands anxiously behind me. I see her reflection in the glass, the tight expression on her face, the worry in her eyes. It’s my face that’s staring back at me, the mirror image. There’s a catch in my voice as I tell her, “I checked with everyone.”

I called my mom on the off chance Robbie walked to town, but she hadn’t seen him. I convinced her not to come out, that the guys had the search under control. Pam still hadn’t been home, not that I could see Robbie crashing with his least-favorite aunt. It’s probably just out of loyalty to Rob that he doesn’t like Pam, and why he played the pranks on her. He’d heard them argue too many times.

Emma puts her arm around my shoulders. Unlike Claire, who’d pulled away from me, I lean into her, appreciating her warmth and support. If only it were Rob’s strong arm around me, his big body to lean against for support….

I blink back the tears burning my eyes.

“I don’t know,” she says.

I was so sure he’d be here, in the old farmhouse where I’d grown up, probably doubting Emma would notice one more teenager with five of them already. Or believing that if she did, she would let him stay anyway.

He and Claire think Emma is more lenient than I am, but that’s just because her house has two sets of rules. Emma has one set for her kids; Troy has another for his. And neither of them disciplines the other’s. They agreed on this arrangement to protect their marriage. Sometimes I think it does more harm, but Emma will do whatever necessary to make this relationship work, since she really loves Troy.

I understand Emma. I always do. It’s Pam who rarely makes sense to me. Then Emma says, “You need to try Deputy Westmoreland again.”

Now I wonder about her. “I didn’t call him.” But I did call the police department. “They’re already sending an officer to check the bus and train terminals for a boy matching the description I gave them.”

Emma squeezes my shoulder. “Deputy Westmoreland is the one who works with teenagers at the high school.”

At-risk teens. Robbie is not at risk. He’s just pissed off that I sold his father’s business. I’m deliberately obtuse. “Robbie’s not at the high school.”

I already called Principal Van Otten…at the mayor’s house. Robbie had attended school today, but I learned there were some other days that he’d missed.

When I find him, I intend to make it clear to him that skipping school is unacceptable and he has detention to serve. At least I assume that is what Mr. Van Otten wants to discuss during the meeting he scheduled with me for tomorrow, provided I find Robbie by then. I have to find Robbie by then. My fingers tighten so hard around the rooster that I imagine I hear a quiet crack. I force my grip to loosen.

Mr. Van Otten also checked with the bus driver and called me back to confirm that Robbie had taken the bus home this afternoon. I doubt he could have gotten as far as the bus or train terminals. He has to be around here somewhere. I continue to watch the lights bouncing around in the woods.

“Holly,” Emma says in that long-suffering, patient tone that has me squirming like one of her children. “Deputy Westmoreland knows where all the teenagers hang out.”

“I’m sure he’s not the only one in the police department who knows. I know.”

The cemetery. The park. The football field. Nothing much changes in Stanville, or Standstill, which is what we called it as kids, which is what the kids call it now. “I’ll go look for him.”

“You should stay here,” she insists. “In case he comes home.”

He better. And soon. Once he does, he’ll never run away again because he won’t be leaving the house. Maybe I’ll homeschool, then I won’t have to worry about his skipping or running away. I have the time now.

But Rob will haunt me. He had strong opinions about kids needing the social aspect of public school, especially someone like Robbie, who’s so shy. Too shy to be hanging out at the cemetery. Or the park. Or the football field. Looking for him at any of those places would be a waste of time.

“Deputy Westmoreland knows what Robbie looks like,” Emma continues. “He was at Rob’s funeral.”

I’ll have to take her word for it, since I didn’t see him there. I really don’t care who looks for Robbie, as long as someone is. “I called the police,” I remind her again. “And I have pictures of him, you know.”

His class photos had come back earlier this week. Maybe I shouldn’t have paid extra for the professional touch-up. His skin isn’t really that clear, but still they’ll be able to recognize him. If it comes to that.

I hope it doesn’t. But if they can’t find Robbie outside, I need to call the kind-voiced police dispatcher back and have them send an officer out so I can file an official report. A missing person’s report.

My son is missing. For a moment I can’t breathe, my lungs crushed from the pressure on my chest. I can’t lose Robbie, too. I need to do something. I’m tired of standing here, watching other people search for my son. “Do you have another flashlight?” I ask Emma.

She shakes her head. “Come on, Holly. You know he’s not out there.”

I know he’s not. Robbie hates camping, probably because of his asthma. The outdoors, campfire thing was never for him, and our family vacations were all spent in nice hotels.

“He must have new friends,” I say, “because he hasn’t spent much time with the ones he used to have.”

Like Claire, does he think he doesn’t need them? But I actually like Robbie’s friends. They’re sweet and shy like him, like he used to be.

“I’ll ask Jason,” Emma says. Jason is her stepson who’s in the same grade as Robbie, even though he’s a year older. Before she leaves the kitchen, she presses a card into my hand. “His cell phone number is on here. Call him.”

I open my fingers around the ivory paper. Deputy Westmoreland’s name and badge number are on the card, along with the number for the police department that I’ve already called. Someone has also written in his cell number. From the bold scrawl, I figure he wrote it down himself.

When did Emma get this? At the funeral? Had the deputy thought then that Robbie would be “at risk” just because his father had died? Now I’m mad at Westmoreland again. Or still. I can’t remember which, but he really has no business getting in my business.

If I call him, I would tell him that and…that my son is missing. Emma’s right. He should be the officer with whom I file the “official” report. He knows the situation, unlike the dispatcher, who’d been kind but not particularly concerned. “He’s a teenage boy,” he’d said. “He’s probably hanging out with friends. But we can take a report….”

I’d held off then, wanting to let the guys finish their search first, but I can’t wait any longer. Turning away from the window, I cross to where Emma’s cordless phone sits on the counter. It’s still warm from all the calls I made earlier. I’ve punched in two numbers when a clamor erupts upstairs. Raised voices. Jason’s. Then Emma’s. Emma hardly ever raises her voice. Then there are footsteps on the stairs.

“You aren’t supposed to come into my room!” Jason’s shouting.

Unlike me, Emma is sometimes considered a trespasser in her own house because of the house rules. She’s not allowed to enter Troy’s kids’ rooms. He respects their privacy, sometimes more than I think he respects Emma. Rob and I hadn’t parented like that. We’d been equal partners, which is probably why it’s so hard going it alone.

“What’s going on?” I ask, as she charges back into the kitchen.

Her face is red, and she’s dragging someone—Jason?—behind her. All I see is an arm. Then the rest of the slight body follows.

“Robbie!”

Relief floods me. Until this moment I didn’t think I was worried, not really worried, but my knees are a little weak now. If I’d lost him, too…

I reach for him to throw my arms around him, but he steps back. His reaction isn’t the same as Claire’s rejection of my comfort, though, because there’s something in his dark eyes, a fear of me magnified by his thick lenses, that’s never been there before.

Maybe it’s good that he fears me a little. He should after this stunt he’s pulled. My hands are shaking as I close them over his shoulders, forcing him to look at me.

“What—” I bite my tongue. Damn our no-swearing rule “—were you thinking?”

“I want to live here,” he says, “with Aunt Emma.”

Pain grips my heart, squashing it as viciously as I had the Kitty Cupcakes yesterday.

Emma flashes me a look, one full of sympathy. As a mother she knows how much it hurts to have your child want to run away from you.

“That’s too bad,” I say, steeling my voice to cover the hurt. “We all want things we can’t have.”

I can’t have Rob back.

That’s what Robbie’s and Claire’s attitudes are all about. They blame me. Last night I let them. Tonight is another story—my patience has worn out.

That’s why I can’t homeschool. Rob’s wrath and socialization aside, I don’t have enough patience, not where my children are concerned.

Seeing that he’ll get nowhere with me, Robbie turns back to Emma. “Please, Aunt Em, I can’t live with her anymore. She doesn’t really want me there.”

And that’s why the fear is there. He’s scared that I really don’t want him.

“Don’t make me go back,” he begs.

Poor Emma, always stuck in the middle. I can see her soft heart in her eyes as she stares back at Robbie. “I’m sorry, honey….”

“She has too many kids already,” I remind them both.

At least one too many. Jason has come downstairs now, standing in the doorway behind Emma and Robbie. His hair is dyed black and his eyebrow, nose and lip are pierced. He’s only sixteen, but his father gave his permission for the self-mutilation.

With a little relief, I realize that the deputy probably did not give his card to Emma for me or Robbie. Robbie is not the at-risk teen.

Not yet.

But I have a horrible feeling that if I can’t reach him, he soon will be.

“Great,” Claire says, as she flops onto the living room couch next to Robbie. “It’s your fault we gotta listen to a lecture now.”

She shifts against the deep suede cushions and manages to elbow him in the ribs, a move both daring, because she does it in front of me, and subtle, because she can swear it was an accident. She’s good.

But then so am I. I paid attention growing up. I know what nonsense my sisters pulled on my parents. And I’m not going to let my children pull it on me. Rob and I had made that pact, along with others. Like we wouldn’t let them play us off against each other. No going to Dad with a request that Mom had already refused. We had vowed to keep a united front. That’s hard to do alone.

“Okay,” I say. “We need to talk.”

“You mean you need to talk,” Robbie says. “All we get to do is listen.”

“That would be nice,” I reply, “but apparently you don’t do that very well.”

His face flushes bright red.

Claire elbows him again. “Dork.”

“Enough,” I say. And I mean it.

“That’s another reason I want to live with Aunt Emma,” Robbie says. “Because she doesn’t.” He scowls at Claire.

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