"Assi —" Caitlin ran toward me, arms spread. Marvel snatched her away. She bundled them out to the yard while I picked up the pieces, crying. I hadn't done it on purpose, but I might have if I'd thought of it. She'd broken my perfume, something real, by appointment to the Queen, made from pounds of English spring flowers, not a copy of a copy of a kid's book illustration. When she came back she threw the broom at me. "Now sweep up the rest." She turned to Ed. "God, you can't believe where I just found her. Coming out of that nigger's house, she spent the night there. This is what we get, for all the work and trouble?"
Ed turned the sound up on the game.
I threw out the big pieces, Jo and Amy and Beth, the other one, and Marmee. Broken. Well, that's the way it is, Marmee. One little accident, and it's all gone forever. Jo won't like foster care, she'll get moved around, shot. Amy'11 get adopted, she's cute, but you'll never see her again. Beth'll croak and the other one'11 turn tricks in a park for dope. Say good-bye to the fireside, welcome to my life.
I swept the shards into a pile, careful not to leave any slivers, Caitlin always went barefoot.
"And when you're done with that, start cleaning this place up. I'm going to go give that nignog whore a piece of my mind." I watched out the kitchen window as Marvel marched from our yard into Olivia's, heard the chain-link gate slam but not click, bang open again. She was hammering on Olivia's door, screaming, "Wake up, whore, you rat's ass, piece of living crap. You stay away from that girl, hear me, nigger?"
Everybody in the neighborhood was home on Christmas morning, listening to this as they celebrated the birth of the newborn King. Nice, Marvel. You go, girl. Show everybody what you're really made of. My only consolation was that Olivia couldn't hear it, passed out as she was at the back of the house.
Marvel tore out handfuls of Olivia's flowers as she stormed back to our house, flinging the uprooted plants at the shuttered windows.
Nauseated and headachy, I nevertheless spent the rest of the day wadding up foil gift wrap and stick-on bows, vacuuming popcorn and Styrofoam peanuts, hauling trash and washing sink after sink of dishes. Marvel wouldn't let me lie down. She kept saying, "You made your bed, now sleep in it."
Later in the day, the cops arrived. Schutzstaffel. The kids wanted to see them, but Marvel stepped out and closed the door. We watched from the living room as Marvel's mouth flew and she gestured to Olivia's with a meaty arm.
"What do they want?" Justin asked. It was three in the afternoon and he was in his pajamas, glassy-eyed from TV and sugar and new toys.
"Someone lost a dog," I said.
Marvel opened the door and called me.
I went out, burnishing the sapphire of my hatred. "Jawohl, "I said under my breath.
Marvel's eyes sprayed me with Mace, my skin blistered under her gaze. The older of the two white men drew me aside. "She says you spent the night with the woman next door. It's technically a runaway."
I shifted from leg to leg, the throb of my headache accompanying each heartbeat. If I breathed carefully, I could smell English flowers. The football announcer shouted excitedly from the house, and the cop's eyes flickered briefly in its direction. Then he remembered what he was supposed to be doing and they returned to me.
"This woman gave you alcohol?"
"No. Marvel and Ed had a big Christmas Eve party last night.
The eggnog was spiked." The sparkle of my sapphire, Officer Moody. See how it shimmers. Nothing up my sleeve. "They make you work on Christmas?"
"Triple overtime," he said. "I've got child support you wouldn't believe. So what did you do next door?"
"Listened to records, talked."
"And you spent the night?"
"Well, it was too noisy to sleep over here."
He pulled his fleshy earlobe. "You go over there a lot?"
I shrugged. "She's nice, but she's busy. She travels a lot."
"She ever introduce you to her friends?"
I shook my head, let my mouth go slack, a little moronic, as if I had no idea what he was getting at. You mean, did she ever set me up on a date with one of her Johns? Did she ever sell me to the BMW man on a cake platter like Pretty £afy? I wanted to laugh in his face.
"She ever talk to you about what she does for a living?" He said it quietly, stroking his brushy mustache.
"She's a caterer, I think." It came out of nowhere.
"What a bunch of crap!" Marvel called out from where she was talking to the other cop, her eyes narrowed in disgust.
I turned my back to the turquoise house so Marvel couldn't read my lips. "Marvel hates her because she's pretty and doesn't have any kids to worry about. She's always calling her names — nigger, whore. It's embarrassing, but what am I supposed to do, I'm just a foster kid. She does it to all the neighbors, ask anybody. Beaner this, Jew bitch that, everybody hates her." He probably said nigger and leaner too, this Officer Moody, pulling his red ear-lobes, but not where anybody would write it up.
They sent me inside, but I watched through the kitchen window as the Schutzstaffel went through Olivia's garden, knocked at her door. Five minutes later, they were back. I could hear Marvel screaming. "Aren't you going to arrest her?"
The patrol car slowly pulled away from the curb without Olivia Johnstone.
THINGS WENT back to normal for the rest of the Christmas break, except Marvel watched me like a shoplifter. No more "runs" to the market or library, no more "workouts." But she mostly stopped yelling at me, and was back to just telling me what to do and otherwise treating me like a slave. She left me alone to babysit on New Year's Eve, though she called four times to make sure I was there. I left messages on Olivia's machine, but she never picked up.
15
ON THE FIRST DAY back at school after winter break, I was given a yellow summons slip during third period. It led to a sour, overweight caseworker waiting in the office with the girls' vice principal. The vice principal told me to clear my locker out and leave my books at the front desk. She never once looked at my face. The new caseworker said she had my things in the car.
I twirled my combination and emptied the books from my locker. I was stunned, and somehow not. How like Marvel to do this while I was at school, without a word of warning. I was there and then I wasn't. I would never see any of them again, would never have the chance to tell Olivia good-bye.
The caseworker, Ms. Cardoza, scolded me all the way back into town, down the Ventura Freeway. "Mrs. Turlock told me everything. That you was doing drugs, running around. With little kids in the house. I'm taking you somewhere you'll learn to act right." She was an ugly young woman with a broad, rough-skinned face and a set look about the jowls. I didn't bother to argue with her. I would never speak to anyone ever again.