Liars and Fools (5 page)

Dad picked me up from Joni's at five and wrestled my bike into the back of his car. He was dressed up in a shirt and tie, and he kept humming to himself while he drove. He didn't seem to notice that I was not sharing his mood.

“Fiona,” he said. “I have a surprise for you.”

I tensed. “What?” I didn't like surprises. I didn't trust them.

“I'm taking you out to dinner,” he said. “Your favorite. Paul's Pizza Palace.”

I relaxed. Paul's Pizza Palace looked like a dive, but it had the best pizza in town. “Oh. Cool.” Maybe he was trying to make up for last night.

He cleared his throat, and I knew exactly what he was going to say before he even began. “Katherine and her daughter are going to meet us there.”

“Dad…”

He held up one hand. “No. No, Fiona. Don't start. I want you to meet them.”

I spoke slowly, emphasizing each word. “And I. Don't. Want. To.”

“Oh, Fiona. Please don't be like that. Katherine and I have been spending some time together and—”

I interrupted. “Fine.” I spat the word out. “That doesn't mean I have to.”

“Fi, come on. I'm trying to include you. Can't you…can't you give them a chance?”

I turned away from him and stared out the car window. “It's only been a year,” I whispered.

Dad didn't say anything. We drove in silence. Eventually Dad parallel-parked down the street from Paul's Pizza Palace and turned off the engine. He unbuckled his seatbelt and started to get out.

“It's like you're trying to erase Mom,” I told him, not moving.

“Of course I'm not.” He sat back down, looking shocked. “That's ridiculous.”

“I know about
Eliza J
, Dad. I know you're trying to get rid of her too.”

“How did you…?” He looked at his watch. “This is not a good time to have this conversation.”

“Oh no, we wouldn't want to keep them waiting,” I said sarcastically.

He shook his head. “I was going to tell you. There is no point in keeping a boat that no one uses. It costs a small fortune in marina fees.” He put his hand on my knee and looked at me, a hopeful half smile on his face. “Hey, Fifi? You know what a boat is?”

“What?”

“A boat's a hole in the water into which you pour money.”

I pulled my knee away. “Hilarious.”

The tentative grin slipped off his face, and I felt a flicker of remorse. Dad used to joke all the time, but he hardly ever did anymore.

He sighed. “We can talk about this later. What were you doing at the marina, anyway? I told you I didn't want you hanging around there.”

I didn't say a word. Mom was right: Dad didn't understand anything at all.

Paul's Pizza Palace was where I celebrated everything from birthdays to soccer wins. I nearly always sat at my favorite booth: the one in the back corner with the picture of dogs playing pool hanging on the wall beside it. And I nearly always ordered the same thing: Hawaiian, double pineapple, extra cheese. Everything about the place was familiar, right down to the strips of duct tape covering the cracks in the red vinyl benches.

I guess Dad picked this restaurant because I liked it, but that made it even worse. We all used to come here together: me and him and Mom. When I was little, like six or seven, I used to get plain cheese pizza, no sauce, and I'd bring markers and color on the paper placemats while we waited for the food to come. I remember how Dad used to ask the server for extra placemats because he said my artwork was too beautiful to spill food on, and I remember how he and Mom used to hold hands right on top of the table.

This was the last place I wanted to come with my father and his new girlfriend. I still didn't know what to call her. Words like
boyfriend
and
girlfriend
seemed kind of stupid when you're talking about people as old as my dad.

I hung back, and Dad walked in ahead of me, looking around. He turned to me. “Look at that. Katherine picked your favorite table.”

Reluctantly, I looked toward the back corner of the restaurant—and gasped.

It was her. The psychic woman from the Mystic Heart shop.

I couldn't move. Every muscle in my body seemed to have seized up.

“Come on,” Dad said over his shoulder. “What are you waiting for?”

I let my breath out in a long
whoosh
—breathe, breathe—and forced myself to follow him. The psychic woman—Katherine—and her daughter were sitting on opposite sides of the booth. Dad squeezed in beside Katherine, and I reluctantly slid onto the bench beside her daughter, staring down at the table to avoid meeting anyone's eyes. My heart was racing. I wondered if Katherine would tell Dad that she'd already met me. I sure wasn't going to mention it.

I snuck a sideways glance at Katherine's daughter as I sat down. Dad had said she was my age, but she looked younger. She had very straight pale blond hair, and her cheeks were pink and she was all big-eyed and silent, her mouth hanging open in a way that made her look kind of stunned and stupid.

I nodded at her and snuck a peek across the table at Katherine. She was wearing the same blue and white snowflake sweater she had worn at the Mystic Heart, but her hair was twisted up in some kind of clip. Younger than Dad, who was in his fifties; younger than Mom too. She saw me looking at her and gave me a quick smile. If she recognized me, she wasn't letting on. “I'm Kathy,” she said. “And you must be Fiona.”

My mother had hated nicknames. She always introduced herself as Jennifer and quickly corrected anyone who called her Jenny. She said nicknames were fine for under-twelves, but adults who hung on to names like Bobby and Mikey and Kathy and Jenny were trying to avoid growing up. She called me Fi, but I guessed maybe it was different with your own kid. She was always telling me not to grow up too fast.

“And this is my daughter Caitlin,” Kathy said after she gave up waiting for me to reply. “She's twelve.”

I'd have guessed ten, or maybe eleven, tops.

“And you're thirteen, aren't you, Fiona?”

If she already knew, why was she asking? She already had way too much information about me. I hated that she'd seen me cry: just the thought made me feel hot and angry. “Yes,” I said. “How old are you?”

She glanced at Dad, laughing.

Dad frowned at me. “Fiona.” There was a warning in his voice.

“She asked me,” I protested.

“It's fine, Peter. Really.” Kathy's cheeks turned as pink as Caitlin's, but her voice stayed calm. “I just turned forty. The big four-oh.”

“That's how old my dad was when I was born,” I told her. “So he's thirteen years older than you.”

Dad looked embarrassed. “Yes, Fiona. Thanks for pointing that out.”

My mom was six years younger than Dad. It didn't sound like much of an age difference, but it had sometimes seemed like he was a whole generation older: all hung up on teaching me responsibility, getting angry about Mom letting me skip school to go sailing, wearing the same awful old pair of high-waisted Wrangler jeans with the big yellow
W
stitched on the pocket. Mom wasn't very interested in fashion either, but she wouldn't have been caught dead— I caught my breath and dragged my mind back to the conversation before the whirlpool could suck me in. “Well, thirteen years is a lot,” I said, shrugging. “It's my entire lifetime.”

Kathy gave me a steady look. Her eyes were dark and deep-set, with faint blue-gray shadows beneath them. She didn't have a lot of wrinkles or anything, but her eyes looked older than forty.

I squirmed under her gaze. I was pretty sure she must recognize me.

“Well,” she said at last. “So. You're thirteen. I do remember that age, though sometimes I'd prefer not to.” She smiled. “Tell me about yourself, Fiona. What are you interested in?”

“What am I
interested
in?” I repeated.

She looked uncomfortable. “Yes. You know, hobbies or sports, maybe? Caitlin does gymnastics and plays the flute.”

“Used to play the flute,” Caitlin mumbled.

“And she takes dance classes, so I wondered what you were interested in.”

I shrugged. “Sailing.”

“Oh. Really? But…” Her voice trailed off.

“She doesn't sail,” Dad said flatly.

“Not anymore. Because you won't let me. Because you're selling Mom's boat.” My voice was a little too loud.

He looked around a little frantically and signaled to the server. “Do you all know what you want? Can we just order?”

“Peter.” Kathy reached out a hand toward my father and smiled at him. I couldn't help noticing that her teeth were kind of crooked. “It's all right. I think we should expect this to be a little awkward.”

The waiter appeared beside our table. “Hey, gang. Having a good night?”

I glanced up at him. Tall, skinny, a whole bunch of piercings in his lips and eyebrows and chin. I hadn't seen him here before, and I hoped he didn't think we were all one family. Yuck, yuck, yuck.

“You ready to order?”

“Hawaiian, extra pineapple, extra cheese,” I said quickly.

“Oh! Hawaiian is my favorite too.” Kathy looked like this was the most exciting thing ever. “We can share one.”

“Actually, I've changed my mind,” I said. “I'd rather have the vegetarian special.”

Dad gave me a long look and shook his head before turning to Caitlin. “And what about you, Caitlin? Do you know what you want?”

“I can share the vegetarian pizza with Fiona,” she whispered, and she gave me this sappy little smile, as if she thought I might like her just because she agreed to eat the same kind of pizza as me.

I picked at a piece of duct tape holding the bench seat together and wondered if Dad had any idea what he was getting himself into. Did he know his new girlfriend was a psychic? Or claimed to be one, at least? I peeked at Kathy again from beneath my lowered eyelashes. She didn't look like a psychic. She looked totally ordinary, like she should be a teacher or an accountant or a receptionist. Something normal.

“Okay, so the kids can share the vegetarian. Kathy and I will have the Hawaiian and two glasses of the house red,” Dad told the waiter. “Coke, kids?”

“Sure,” Caitlin whispered. “Thanks.”

“Water's fine for me,” I said.
Kids.
Did he actually want the waiter to think we were a family?

six

I hate olives and I hate green peppers, which was mostly what seemed to be on the vegetarian pizza. I picked them off and piled them on the edge of my plate. Across the table, Kathy kept smiling at me over her gooey pineapple and ham pizza. I didn't know what I was supposed to be feeling. I'd liked her when I met her before, but knowing that she was dating my father changed everything.

“So, Fiona,” she said. “You must be in grade seven, right?”

“Right.”

“And…how is school?”

“Fine.”

Dad glared at me, but I didn't know what I was doing wrong. So I wasn't falling all over myself to robin stevenson make conversation. Last I heard, that wasn't a major crime. And besides, like Abby said, I was an ISTJ. I for Introverted. So I was supposed to be a little reserved.

He leaned toward me, eyebrows pulled close together. “Fiona. That is enough.”

I looked back innocently. “Enough?”

“You're being rude, and it is not acceptable.”

Anger flashed somewhere behind my eyes, bright white and blistering. I felt like he'd just slapped me right in front of Kathy and Caitlin. Fine. He wanted polite? I'd show him I could be as phony as they were. And I could let out Kathy's little secret in the process. “So,
Kathy
. What do you do? Tell me a little about yourself.” I smiled at Dad. “Better?”

He didn't smile back. “Much.”

Kathy laughed. “Oh, well, I'm not that interesting. I moved here three years ago, when Caitlin was in fourth grade. After her father passed.”

Passed. Like he did okay on an exam or something. I hate it when people use words like that. I never say Mom
passed.
She died. Died, died, dead. Also, Kathy laughed too much. There wasn't anything that funny going on, as far as I could see.

I thought of the way Mom used to laugh: full-on, head-thrown-back laughter. Joni laughed like that too, sometimes so hard she'd actually snort. It might not be the politest laugh, but I'd give anything liars and fools to hear my mom laugh again. I shook off the thought. “So what do you do? I mean, for work?” I could hardly wait to see Dad's reaction when she said she was a psychic. He hated that kind of thing. He was even scornful of people who read their horoscopes in the paper. Mom used to call him narrow-minded, and he would snort and say that if refusing to believe in superstition and new-age nonsense made him narrow-minded, then that was fine with him.

“Actually, I'm a medium.” Kathy shrugged, as if this was a perfectly normal thing to say.

I stared at her. Small, medium, large. All that came to mind was pizza or clothing. “A medium?”

“Yes. I bring messages from those on the other side—from those who have gone on to a higher plane.”

I glanced at Dad, but he didn't look upset. He didn't even look surprised. “Dead people,” I said flatly, wanting to make sure he understood what Kathy was saying. I wondered why she hadn't let on that she'd met me already. Did she think Dad would be angry? Or was there some code of privacy, like with a counselor or a priest or something? Then again, she'd probably done about a hundred readings that day at the shop; maybe she didn't remember me at all.

“From the departed
,
yes. I do readings too—auras, Tarot, dream interpretation. It depends on what the client's needs are.”

She said it like she thought I might be impressed, but I was thinking about what Abby had said:
It's all
acting and guesswork
. I remembered the palm reader at the fair confidently informing my mom that she had a long life line. Another good actor, but not such a good guess. “Do you read palms?” I asked slowly.