Dirty Little Secrets

My mind started racing and my heart beat faster as I realized what could happen. As soon as the paramedics showed up, the news cameras would probably follow—big cameras with bright lights on top so they could illuminate the dark pathways. Newspeople had radios and sat listening to the paramedic and police reports just waiting for a story like this. I could see the teasers now—“Local Woman Dies Surrounded by Filth and Squalor—tune in at eleven.” Our house would be the spotlight report on all the networks, maybe even on some of those morning shows. I’d seen a story on the news one time about this lady who died in a trailer full of garbage. They videotaped the mess, and the perfectly overhairsprayed news anchors shook their heads at how anyone could live like that. They didn’t come out and say it, but I knew what they were all thinking: she was a freak. Who else would possibly live their entire lives surrounded by garbage? Freaks.

They’d probably want to interview me, and find out how we lived like this for so long—and because the evidence was right there in front of their faces, I’d have to tell them. About all of it. Kaylie would see it, and that would be the last time I’d stay over at her house. She’d be so disgusted by how we lived for all these years, she’d wonder how we could have ever been friends. That’s what had happened the last time a friend had come over, and the house hadn’t been nearly this bad then. I thought of the look in Josh’s eyes when he asked me to the party, and knew I’d never see that look again. I wouldn’t be able to stay here after that. I’d have to move away and change schools one more time, starting all over when I just had a lousy year and a half until graduation. Where would I even go?

I braced myself against a pile of newspapers and slid to the floor. My chest was hollow, and I’d never felt so lonely in my life. None of this was normal. If Kaylie had found her mom lying dead on the floor, she’d be bawling her eyes out. Somewhere deep down, I was pretty sure I loved Mom—the mom who used to push all the kids on the swings at school when it was her turn to do yard duty. The mom who actually hugged me as I left in the morning and stopped by my room to say good night. I could cry for that mom. I wasn’t sure how I felt about this mom.

At that moment the kitchen phone rang, the sound ricocheting around the still house, and I jumped, my heart beating almost visibly in my chest. Before I could think about what to say, I ran to get it just to make the noise stop.

“Hello?” It came out as more of a croak, so I cleared my throat and tried again. “Hello?”

“Joanna?” I wasn’t sure if I was relieved it was only Nadine, Mom’s supervisor at work.

“Oh, hi. No, it’s Lucy.”

“Are you okay, dear? You sound like you’re breathing hard.”

As much as I knew that I should, I couldn’t tell her what had happened. For now, that fact had to be another part of our secret. Once I told someone, I wouldn’t be able to take it back. “I, um . . . yeah, I’m fine. I was just racing for the phone. From the backyard.”

“Sorry about that, darlin’,” she said. “I’m looking for your mama. Her shift started at seven, but she hasn’t been in or called or anything, and that is just not like her. I came by the house a little bit ago on my break, but nobody answered the door.”

I glanced down the hallway toward the fallen pile of cheerful yellow magazines.

“Right,” I said. “I’ve been outside doing some stuff in the backyard, and I must have missed you. Mom asked me to call you, but I forgot. She’s, uh, got some sort of flu and probably won’t be in for a few days.” Mom was an oncology nurse, and the last thing they wanted was sick people down at the hospital.

“Oh dear,” she said. “Is there anything I can do?”

I thought about Mom where I’d left her lying all alone. “No,” I said. “Not really.”

“Chicken soup? Advil? I can stop by on my way home,” she said.

“Really,” I said, “we’re fine. I’ve got it under control.”

“Your mom is blessed to have you,” she said. “I don’t know what she’s going to do without you when you go off to college, especially now that everyone else is gone. It’s always hardest when the baby leaves.”