02 - Stay Out of the Basement

“Hey, Dad—catch!”

Casey tossed the Frisbee across the smooth, green lawn. Casey’s dad made a
face, squinting into the sun. The Frisbee hit the ground and skipped a few times
before landing under the hedge at the back of the house.

“Not today. I’m busy,” Dr. Brewer said, and abruptly turned and loped into
the house. The screen door slammed behind him.

Casey brushed his straight blond hair back off his forehead. “What’s
his
problem?” he called to Margaret, his sister, who had watched the whole scene
from the side of the redwood garage.

“You know,” Margaret said quietly. She wiped her hands on the legs of her
jeans and held them both up, inviting a toss. “I’ll play Frisbee with you for a
little while,” she said.

“Okay,” Casey said without enthusiasm. He walked slowly over to retrieve the
Frisbee from under the hedge.

Margaret moved closer. She felt sorry for Casey. He and their dad were really
close, always playing ball or Frisbee or Nintendo together. But Dr. Brewer
didn’t seem to have time for that anymore.

Jumping up to catch the Frisbee, Margaret realized she felt sorry for
herself, too. Dad hadn’t been the same to her, either. In fact, he spent so much
time down in the basement, he barely said a word to her.

He doesn’t even call me Princess anymore, Margaret thought. It was a nickname
she hated. But at least it was a nickname, a sign of closeness.

She tossed the red Frisbee back. A bad toss. Casey chased after it, but it
sailed away from him. Margaret looked up to the golden hills beyond their
backyard.

California, she thought.

It’s so weird out here. Here it is, the middle of winter, and there isn’t a
cloud in the sky, and Casey and I are out in jeans and T-shirts as if it were
the middle of summer.

She made a diving catch for a wild toss, rolling over on the manicured lawn
and raising the Frisbee above her head triumphantly.

“Show off,” Casey muttered, unimpressed.

“You’re the hot dog in the family,” Margaret called.

“Well, you’re a dork.”

“Hey, Casey—you want me to play with you or not?”

He shrugged.

Everyone was so edgy these days, Margaret realized.

It was easy to figure out why.

She made a high toss. The Frisbee sailed over Casey’s head. “
You
chase
it!” he cried angrily, putting his hands on his hips.

“No,
you
!” she cried.

“You!”

“Casey—you’re eleven years old. Don’t act like a two-year-old,” she
snapped.

“Well, you act like a
one
-year-old,” was his reply as he grudgingly
went after the Frisbee.

It was all Dad’s fault, Margaret realized. Things had been so tense ever
since he started working at home. Down in the basement with his plants and weird
machines. He hardly ever came up for air.

And when he did, he wouldn’t even catch a Frisbee.

Or spend two minutes with either of them.

Mom had noticed it, too, Margaret thought, running full-out and making
another grandstand catch just before colliding with the side of the garage.

Having Dad home has made Mom really tense, too. She pretends everything is
fine. But I can tell she’s worried about him.

“Lucky catch, Fatso!” Casey called.

Margaret hated the name Fatso even more than she hated Princess. People in
her family jokingly called her Fatso because she was so thin, like her father.
She also was tall like him, but she had her mother’s straight brown hair, brown
eyes, and dark coloring.

“Don’t call me that.” She heaved the red disc at him. He caught it at his
knees and flipped it back to her.

They tossed it back and forth without saying much for another ten or fifteen
minutes. “I’m getting hot,” Margaret said, shielding her eyes from the afternoon
sun with her hand. “Let’s go in.”

Casey tossed the Frisbee against the garage wall. It dropped onto the grass.
He came trotting over to her. “Dad always plays longer,” he said peevishly. “And
he throws better. You throw like a girl.”

“Give me a break,” Margaret groaned, giving him a playful shove as she jogged
to the back door. “You throw like a chimpanzee.”

“How come Dad got fired?” he asked.

She blinked. And stopped running. The question had caught her by surprise.
“Huh?”

His pale, freckled face turned serious. “You know. I mean, why?” he asked, obviously uncomfortable.

She and Casey had never discussed this in the four weeks since Dad had been
home. Which was unusual since they were pretty close, being only a year apart.

“I mean, we came all the way out here so he could work at PolyTech, right?”
Casey asked.

“Yeah. Well… he got fired,” Margaret said, half-whispering in case her dad
might be able to hear.

“But why? Did he blow up the lab or something?” Casey grinned. The idea of
his dad blowing up a huge campus science lab appealed to him.

“No, he didn’t blow anything up,” Margaret said, tugging at a strand of dark
hair. “Botanists work with plants, you know. They don’t get much of a chance to
blow things up.”

They both laughed.

Casey followed her into the narrow strip of shade cast by the low ranch-style
house.

“I’m not sure exactly what happened,” Margaret continued, still
half-whispering. “But I overheard Dad on the phone. I think he was talking to
Mr. Martinez. His department head. Remember? The quiet little man who came to
dinner that night the barbecue grill caught fire?”

Casey nodded. “Martinez fired Dad?”

“Probably,” Margaret whispered. “From what I overheard, it had something to do with the plants Dad was growing, some
experiments that had gone wrong or something.”

“But Dad’s real smart,” Casey insisted, as if Margaret were arguing with him.
“If his experiments went wrong, he’d know how to fix them.”

Margaret shrugged. “That’s all I know,” she said. “Come on, Casey. Let’s go
inside. I’m dying of thirst!” She stuck her tongue out and moaned, demonstrating
her dire need of liquid.

“You’re gross,” Casey said. He pulled open the screen door, then dodged in
front of her so he could get inside first.

“Who’s gross?” Mrs. Brewer asked from the sink. She turned to greet the two
of them. “Don’t answer that.”

Mom looks very tired today, Margaret thought, noticing the crisscross of fine
lines at the corners of her mother’s eyes and the first strands of gray in her
mother’s shoulder-length brown hair. “I hate this job,” Mrs. Brewer said,
turning back to the sink.

“What are you doing?” Casey asked, pulling open the refrigerator and removing
a box of juice.

“I’m deveining shrimp.”

“Yuck!” Margaret exclaimed.

“Thanks for the support,” Mrs. Brewer said dryly. The phone rang. Wiping her
shrimpy hands with a dish towel, she hurried across the room to pick up the phone.

Margaret got a box of juice from the fridge, popped the straw into the top,
and followed Casey into the front hallway. The basement door, usually shut tight
when Dr. Brewer was working down there, was slightly ajar.

Casey started to close it, then stopped. “Let’s go down and see what Dad is
doing,” he suggested.

Margaret sucked the last drops of juice through the straw and squeezed the
empty box flat in her hand. “Okay.”

She knew they probably shouldn’t disturb their father, but her curiosity got
the better of her. He had been working down there for four weeks now. All kinds
of interesting equipment, lights, and plants had been delivered. Most days he
spent at least eight or nine hours down there, doing whatever it was he was
doing. And he hadn’t shown it to them once.

“Yeah. Let’s go,” Margaret said. It was
their
house, too, after all.

Besides, maybe their dad was just waiting for them to show some interest.
Maybe he was hurt that they hadn’t bothered to come downstairs in all this time.

She pulled the door open the rest of the way, and they stepped onto the narrow stairway. “Hey, Dad—” Casey called
excitedly. “Dad—can we see?”

They were halfway down when their father appeared at the foot of the stairs.
He glared up at them angrily, his skin strangely green under the fluorescent
light fixture. He was holding his right hand, drops of red blood falling onto
his white lab coat.

“Stay out of the basement!”
he bellowed, in a voice they’d never heard
before.

Both kids shrank back, surprised to hear their father scream like that. He
was usually so mild and soft-spoken.

“Stay out of the basement,”
he repeated, holding his bleeding hand.
“Don’t
ever
come down here—I’m warning you.”

“Okay. All packed,” Mrs. Brewer said, dropping her suitcases with a thud in
the front hallway. She poked her head into the living room where the TV was
blaring. “Do you think you could stop the movie for one minute to say good-bye
to your mother?”

Casey pushed a button on the remote control, and the screen went blank. He
and Margaret obediently walked to the hallway to give their mother hugs.

Margaret’s friend, Diane Manning, who lived just around the corner, followed
them into the hallway. “How long are you going to be gone, Mrs. Brewer?” she
asked, her eyes on the two bulging suitcases.

“I don’t know,” Mrs. Brewer replied fretfully. “My sister went into the
hospital in Tucson this morning. I guess I’ll have to stay until she’s able to
go home.”

“Well, I’ll be glad to baby-sit for Casey and Margaret while you’re away,” Diane joked.

“Give me a break,” Margaret said, rolling her eyes. “I’m older than you are,
Diane.”

“And I’m smarter than both of you,” Casey added with typical modesty.

“I’m not worried about you kids,” Mrs. Brewer said, glancing nervously at her
watch. “I’m worried about your father.”

“Don’t worry,” Margaret told her seriously. “We’ll take good care of him.”

“Just make sure that he eats something once in a while,” Mrs. Brewer said.
“He’s so obsessed with his work, he doesn’t remember to eat unless you tell
him.”

It’s going to be really lonely around here without Mom, Margaret thought. Dad
hardly ever comes up from the basement.

It had been two weeks since he yelled at Casey and her to stay out of the
basement. They had been tiptoeing around ever since, afraid to get him angry
again. But in the past two weeks, he had barely spoken to them, except for the
occasional “good morning” and “good night.”

“Don’t worry about anything, Mom,” she said, forcing a smile. “Just take good
care of Aunt Eleanor.”

“I’ll call as soon as I get to Tucson,” Mrs. Brewer said, nervously lowering
her eyes to her watch again. She took three long strides to the basement door, then shouted down, “Michael—time to take me to the airport!”

After a long wait, Dr. Brewer called up a reply. Then Mrs. Brewer turned back
to the kids. “Think he’ll even notice I’m gone?” she asked in a loud whisper.
She meant it to be a light remark, but her eyes revealed some sadness.

A few seconds later, they heard footsteps on the basement stairs, and their
dad appeared. He pulled off his stained lab coat, revealing tan slacks and a
bright yellow T-shirt, and tossed the lab coat onto the banister. Even though it
was two weeks later, his right hand, the hand that had been bleeding, was still
heavily bandaged.

“Ready?” he asked his wife.

Mrs. Brewer sighed. “I guess.” She gave Margaret and Casey a helpless look,
then moved quickly to give them each one last hug.

“Let’s go, then,” Dr. Brewer said impatiently. He picked up the two bags and
groaned. “Wow. How long are you planning to stay? A year?” Then he headed out
the front door with them, not waiting for an answer.

“Bye, Mrs. Brewer,” Diane said, waving. “Have a good trip.”

“How can she have a good trip?” Casey asked sharply. “Her sister’s in the
hospital.”

“You know what I mean,” Diane replied, tossing back her long red hair and
rolling her eyes.

They watched the station wagon roll down the driveway, then returned to the
living room. Casey picked up the remote control and started the movie.

Diane sprawled on the couch and picked up the bag of potato chips she’d been
eating.

“Who picked this movie?” Diane asked, crinkling the foil bag noisily.

“I did,” Casey said. “It’s neat.” He had pulled a couch cushion down to the
living room carpet and was lying on it.

Margaret was sitting cross-legged on the floor, her back against the base of
an armchair, still thinking about her mother and her aunt Eleanor. “It’s neat if
you like to see a lot of people blown up and their guts flying all over,” she
said, making a face for Diane’s benefit.