Rules for Stealing Stars (22 page)

Forty-Four

T
he sound of Marla's fingers digging into the wood on the other side of the closet makes my heart race.

“The warmth feels good,” she says. I don't want to question what's made her change her mind, and that's as good a reason as any.

That, and finally saying the truth.

“We're all scared of how sad Mom is,” Astrid says. She matches Marla's low, shy tone, and Eleanor and I dig more, hoping Marla can feel the glow of agreement and safety and general okayness.

She does.

The door comes to pieces.

Marla is there, on the other side, looking like she always does, but different because we missed her and we know now just how much it means to be sisters.

“I thought Mom forgot all about her lost sister in the closet. I didn't know she could never come back, that she had died. I thought she was another person Mom didn't love enough. That she didn't care enough to save her,” Marla says.

I know, from the shake in her fingers and her huge, oversize
gulp
after she says it, that she was waiting for herself to turn into a whisper, a voice without a body too. She was waiting to be forgotten.

But we didn't forget her. We couldn't.

And that's the thing she hadn't expected. That's what Marla didn't count on.

That we would always, always remember her.

Forty-Five

“E
at these,” Astrid says, when Marla is on the carpet and we have our backs to the closet, in case looking at it funny will somehow make it pull us back in. She points to the stars, and Marla shivers.

“That seems dangerous,” Marla says. But Astrid is sure,
sure
that they are safe. And I am too. We are our normal colors again, tan for Eleanor, the palest pale for Astrid, half sunburnt for me. Whatever the stars did to us was temporary, and Marla, with her shaking and lip biting and skinniness, needs a little temporary boost. Before we say good-bye to the closets forever.

“Don't eat this one, though,” I say, and take my star out
of the pile. I put it back in my pocket.

“Silly,” Eleanor says, and I almost correct her, because I have certainly earned the name Priscilla today, but somehow it doesn't feel so bad right now, to have a funny, cute, ridiculous nickname that no one else has. “You can't keep that.”

“I'm not going to. I promise,” I say. Eleanor wants to ask one million follow-up questions, but Astrid gives her a look that says
no
and Marla starts eating the stars and smiling, and we tell her Mom is staying Away for a long, long time, until she's better and then even longer still, and that we are going to save a few stars for Dad to eat so that he gets a little bit of himself back too.

“Mike's mom is going to help,” Eleanor says. “I'm going to tell her everything, and she's going to make sure we're okay. She's going to get Dad help too. She works for a place that helps parents be better parents. We won't have secrets like Mom does, okay? We won't have secrets from each other.”

“Who's Mike?” I say, even though I know the answer. I grin, because Eleanor said no more secrets, and she can't break her promise so quickly.

“My boyfriend, okay?” she says, blushing.

I like that she's going to let us be part of the little bit of normalcy she's found with him, and I realize that I can
call LilyLee's parents and tell them what's happening, and that they'll help too. That we aren't so stuck and alone in New Hampshire. The tallness of the trees and the winding roads of the mountains make it seem like we're far away from everyone else, but we're not.

“It won't be perfect,” Astrid says, all wise and breathy and sure. “Some days are going to be the worst. And some days won't be the worst.”

“And some will even be great,” Marla says.

I love that Marla is the one who says it. Because it makes it even more true.

Forty-Six

I
'm sure I'll tell them later what I've done. They're my sisters, after all, and I can tell them pretty much everything now.

We've made sure Dad remembers Marla, and we slipped some stars into his hamburger, and he gave us big hugs before bed and promised to make pancakes in the morning even though it's not Sunday. He apologized too. For forgetting to sometimes go to the lake with us and for not enforcing bedtime, and for talking too much about Mom when we sort of want to talk about ourselves sometimes.

He talks to Mike's mom. He talks to LilyLee's mom. And I finally, finally talk to LilyLee. She says she and her
mom are coming next weekend to check on us. She says she tried writing me postcards and tried calling me but got too sad, from all the missing.

I still feel a little bit of hurt, but I know that sometimes when something hurts, people do whatever they can to make it not hurt. And that sometimes the things people do make it worse.

So I try to be okay with the hurting, and know that it will all be better when we see each other.

“Oh man,” Dad says, when we sit on the porch after dinner and drink hot chocolate. “It's going to be all right, you know? And gosh, I love the porch at night.”

“Do you think Mom has a porch, where she is?” Marla asks. Dad looks confused, thinking he wasn't supposed to bring up Mom at all, when really we have only ever wanted both. To talk about her and to not talk about her.

“I think Mom has everything she needs,” Dad says. I think he's right, and that the pretty night sky she painted for us was her view from a very nice porch, and that when she gets back someday—in many, many months, Dad says—she'll sit on this porch with us and like it. Love it. Think it's beautiful.

And if she isn't able to do that, that will be okay too. Because we will enjoy it ourselves.

When everyone's asleep, I sneak downstairs. We're all so tired, me included, but I have one more thing to do.

It's black, the sky. Not dark blue, not dark gray, full-on for real black. Pricked with stars.

I know I'm not in the closet, and in the real world, I'm not tall enough to reach the sky. But I have a feeling, this once, that the world will surprise me.

I stand on my tiptoes. I get the star from my pocket and reach my hands high into the air. I suck in my stomach and stop breathing and use every bit of concentration I have to focus on getting taller, reaching more. My legs ache, my armpits feel a pull, and I close my eyes.

I let go of the star.

I put it back in the sky.

I come down to my heels and lower my arms before opening my eyes.

It felt like I was sky-high. It felt like I reached high enough to put that star where it belongs.

And I swear, when I look up, squinting at the patterns the stars make all over the sky, complicated patterns Dad promised to teach me one day, I swear I can see my star glinting in the sky, before it fades into the rest of the chaos.

A tiny bit of magic, right here in the real world.

All books are collaborations, but this one feels especially like a shared accomplishment with my amazing editor, Anica Rissi. I can't thank you enough for taking time with this story and helping me find my way. To say I couldn't have done it without you would be a massive understatement.

Thank you as well to my wonderful agent, Victoria Marini, who I depend on for so many things, including wisdom and steadiness and generosity and openness. Knowing you loved Silly like I did made writing this possible.

A very special thank-you to Susan Van Metre and Caron Levin. I created the character of Silly and found the seeds
of the book in your class, because of the prompts you gave us. What an enormous gift those fifteen minutes of writing every week were. I'm so grateful I wrote outside my comfortable little box and found something new in your class.

Thank you as always to my mom and dad for making sure I loved books and for always supporting my crazy dreams. And thank you to Andy, Jenn, Ellie, and Amy for supporting me from across the ocean.

Thank you to Amy Ewing, Jess Verdi, Caela Carter, Alyson Gerber, Alison Cherry, Lindsay Ribar, Rachele Alpine, and Chelsey Flood for reading Silly's story, challenging me, and sharing in my excitement.

Thank you to wonderful librarian Ally Watkins for taking the time to recommend all kinds of books to me that helped me figure out how to write this book.

Thank you to the incredible group of people who do the magic of making a book an Actual Book: Katherine Tegen, Alexandra Arnold, Alana Whitman, Rosanne Romanello, Valerie Shea, Bethany Reis, Amy Ryan, Heather Daugherty, Barb Fitzsimmons, and so many other wondrous people on the Katherine Tegen Books team.

A special thank-you to Julie McLaughlin for her gorgeous cover illustration. There's nothing like seeing something so beautiful associated with my words.

Thank you to my friends who have been another kind
of family to me. For the times you've listened, for the times you've saved me, for the times you've made me laugh, for the times you've inspired me, for the times you've made me grateful, for the times I've known you're there: Julia Furlan, Anna Bridgforth, Honora Javier, Pallavi Yetur, Mike Mraz, Mark Souza, Brandy Colbert, Kristen Kittscher, Mandy Adams Wolf, Janet Zarecor, Taylor Shann, Meghan Shann, Kea Gilbert, Tracey Roiff, Leigh Poulos, Lindsay Frost, Lizzie Moran, Paul Bausch, and Mary Thompson.

Thank you for your continued love and support: the Spokes Family, the Ross Family, the Haydu Family, the Scallon/Dougherty Family.

And thank you to Frank Scallon. You make writing, and about a million other things, possible.

Photo by Navdeep Singh Dhillon of PatakaDesign.

COREY ANN HAYDU
is the author of three acclaimed novels for teens. This is her first book for younger readers. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her dog, Oscar, and is a graduate of the New School MFA program. Find out more at
www.coreyannhaydu.com
.

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