Ballet had made her graceful, but she wanted to develop style, something like those sexy Latin dancers she’d seen on TV. She knew that Jazzercise was aerobics for people her mother’s age, but it seemed like her best option to learn something different. The classes weren’t as expensive as ballet, but they were in the evening and on the other side of town. Her parents would never let her cruise over on her skateboard.
She waited until Trina was putting Dylan to bed. Her parents had already gone into their room, but the door was open. Her mother had her back to the full-length mirror, twisting her head over her shoulder to look at what she called her fanny.
Her pants were too tight. Even Caitlin could see that. It was strange. Mom was gaining weight. Here she was, this superdisciplined navy wife, and she couldn’t fit into her pants.
She must hate that. She must really, really hate that.
Caitlin was the weird art student who wore black. She was the one who was supposed to be depressed, except she was—she knew perfectly well—playing at being depressed in order to punish her parents. But her parents didn’t seem to be noticing...probably because her mother actually was depressed.
Her father spotted Caitlin first, and when he said her name, her mother instantly did the mom thing, trying to look like she didn’t mind having pants she couldn’t sit down in.
Mom knew about Jazzercise. Some women she knew took one of the morning classes.
“So I thought,” Caitlin said, even though she had never planned this, it hadn’t occurred to her until this second, “since you would have to drive me there, that maybe we could take the class together.”
“What a great idea.” Dad was instantly enthusiastic. “You were just saying that you needed to exercise more, Sharon, and to do it with Caitlin...”
“I don’t know.” Mom was shaking her head. “I feel like I have way too much to do.”
“But if you have to drive her anyway,” Dad said, “why not work out too?”
Mom was still shaking her head.
By now Caitlin was convinced that this was a good plan, a very good plan. Mom being bummed all the time was as big a problem as Dylan screaming all night. “Then will you come with me the first couple times? There won’t be any other kids in the class, and I will feel weird with all those grown-ups. Would you come just until I don’t feel so out of place?”
“Oh.” Mom knew that she was boxed in. How could she say no to that? “Well, sure, sweetie. If you need me, of course.”
The teacher was from Latin America, and she was using her hips and shoulders in the way that Caitlin wanted to. So Caitlin liked the most dance-type moves, but her mother was—amazingly enough—totally into the kickboxing, kicking her leg off to one side with her fists clenched up in front of her. Mom the warrior...Caitlin couldn’t have predicted that.
Within a week her mother was going to a morning class as well and within a month was wearing her pretty clothes again. Trina started to say that she needed exercise more than anyone, but Dylan was too young for the child-care program offered at the studio. Caitlin could tell that Trina wanted Mom to drive her to the classes and then—what?—sit in the car with Dylan while Trina exercised? Even Trina wasn’t going to ask that.
Caitlin stopped the depressed art student act. It wasn’t necessary. The high school was more than twice the size of her middle school, and being close to a military base, there was a big turnover in the student body every year. No one was very interested in what her sister had done last year. So instead she was known as the cool girl who came to school on a skateboard.
In January Trina got her driver’s license, and their parents bought her a used car, emphasizing that she would have to share it with Caitlin when Caitlin was old enough to drive.
Yeah, right, Caitlin thought.
Suddenly Trina was going to the morning exercise classes while Mom was staying home with Dylan. It made Caitlin furious. What about Trevor’s family? Why weren’t they doing anything? Trevor himself was worthless. He hardly even touched Dylan, but what about his mom? She was a nurses’ aide at the hospital, but why wasn’t someone expecting her to rearrange her schedule and take care of Dylan sometimes?
Now that she had the car, Trina was trying to connect with her old friends after school. So more and more she was asking Caitlin if she could come straight home to sit with Dylan, or, as long as she didn’t have plans on Friday or Saturday night, why couldn’t she...
Mom and Dad stepped in. Just because Caitlin was home didn’t mean that she was available to take care of Dylan. Caitlin was to be home alone with Dylan no more than one evening and three afternoons a month.
So instead it was Mom and Dad who took care of Dylan while Trina went to the mall. Caitlin asked why they kept giving in to Trina all the time. They didn’t have a good answer.
One day in April her parents sat down with her. “I know you’re looking forward to go back to North Carolina, but we think it is Trina’s turn.”
She stared at them. “You’re kidding, right? She’s going to MeeMaw’s and we’re going to be stuck here with Dylan?”
“No, Dylan will go with her, of course. You deserve a summer at home, a summer of just being a teen.”
“But that’s not what I want.” Caitlin felt desperate. She and Seth...they had such plans. His older sister had already agreed to drive them to the Highland Games at Grandfather Mountain. They also thought that if they took the whole day, they should be able to bike to Boone and back. Boone was a college town; Seth had already gotten a schedule of their summer concerts. And there was skateboarding and the lake, and being together...she had to go. She had to.
“Why don’t I go and help Trina? MeeMaw shouldn’t have to do that. Let me go with them. I will help. I really, really will. I don’t mind. You can’t dump all this on MeeMaw.”
“Trina will have her car. She can be self-reliant.” Dad was speaking in his judge’s voice. “We’ve made up our minds.”
The poor schmucks in his courtroom at least had had some rights of appeal. Caitlin didn’t.
She went straight into Trina’s room. “Do you want to go to MeeMaw’s?”
“No. I’m totally pissed about it.”
“Then why—”
“Because they think I need to accept more responsibility for Dylan. And this was MeeMaw’s idea. She thinks that Mom is having ‘boundary issues.’ Apparently she doesn’t plan on helping me at all. They want me to manage on my own.”
Caitlin’s strategy of offering to help had been completely wrong. She had said the worst possible thing.
Once again she took the phone in the closet and called Seth. A lot had been happening in Seth’s family. His dad, who had always made Seth’s boards, was opening a small factory to produce both snowboards and skateboards. A snowboarding family who had a kid Seth’s age had been super encouraging, helping with the business plan, the paperwork, and the financing. Seth had said that he would need to work in the factory some.
“I will too,” Caitlin had promised. “I don’t know what needs doing, but I am an awesome housepainter.”
But it was Trina who was going to North Carolina. Caitlin called Seth to tell him.
“Shit,” he said. “Shit. Shit.”
“And she doesn’t even want to go. That’s the bitch.”
“Can’t