The Wrong Stuff by Sharon Fiffer Read Free Book Online Page B

Tim asked.
    â€œOh, Nick does that. He switches the sound so I never know it’s my phone. I’ll be grocery shopping and the phone will ring and everybody in the produce section is slapping their pockets and digging through their briefcases, and I’ll be thinking, Can’t be me, my phone doesn’t play “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” and sure enough, when I’m hunting for my checkbook, I’ll find that I’ve missed a message.”
    Jane abandoned the search for her notebook and looked at her phone. It was vibrating as well as playing music. “Nick must have set all systems go,” she said.
    â€œHello?”
    â€œYeah, hold on.”
    Jane sighed. Only one person she knew called her on the phone, then sounded so busy and irritated when Jane answered that she was often confused about who called whom.
    â€œHello, Mom,” Jane said, even though she could hear her mother talking to someone else.
    Jane’s mother, Nellie, came back on the line. Jane couldn’t prove it, but she thought just maybe the phone vibrated not because of a preference setting but because it was reacting to the dialing style of Jane’s mother.
    â€œYou’re coming home Thanksgiving, right?” Nellie asked.
    â€œMom, don’t we have a month or so? Yes, we’ll be there,” Jane said.
    â€œYeah, she could bring it then,” Nellie said, but clearly to someone other than Jane.
    â€œI could bring what?” Jane asked, trying to cradle the phone and talk while removing all the pens and pencils from the bottom of her bag.
    â€œShe sure as hell isn’t going to ask you for food. Remember when you made that pumpkin pie?” Tim asked, laughing.
    â€œHey,” Jane said, punching him in the arm, “I used a real pumpkin, not canned. It was special.”
    â€œRind and all. God it was vile.”
    â€œCharley said it wasn’t too bad. He liked that it didn’t come from a can. Besides, the instructions were so frigging unclear,” Jane said, remembering the masses of pumpkin entrails covering her kitchen floor.
    â€œWhat the hell are you talking about? Who’s there with you?” Nellie asked.
    â€œPumpkin pie and Tim. We’re driving to Michigan,” Jane said.
    â€œStop talking while you’re driving. Jesus, Don? Don? She’s on the phone driving her car again.”
    Jane could hear her father’s voice in the background.
    â€œYour dad says to pull over.”
    â€œMom, listen to me. I’m not driving. Tim is. We’re on our way to a furniture place in Michigan. What is it you want?”
    â€œFurniture place? What the hell do you need any more furniture for? Where’s Charley? Where’s Nick?” Nellie asked Jane, then called to the others in the room, “She’s in a car with that Tim going to Michigan.”
    Nellie had met Tim when Jane brought him home from first grade. It was one of those rare days when Nellie, because of a doctor’s appointment or some other outside force, had left work at the EZ Way Inn before six o’clock at night and ended up at home by four, so when Jane fished her key out of her plaid book bag, Nellie was already opening the door. It was a special day when Nellie was home, and Jane could still conjure up the joy she’d felt at having a mom there, in the house, just like on television.
    â€œWho’s that?” Nellie had asked, jerking her head at Tim, and Jane had told her that Tim was her best friend. Jane remembered that Nellie had been most suspicious. “A boy is your best friend?” Tim had shaken hands, hung up his coat on the peg by the door, and removed his shoes. Nellie, who might write “Catholic” on a form that asked for religious faith actually worshipped only two things—cleanliness and hard, backbreaking work. She watched Tim carefully and nodded.
    Tim walked right over to the cupboard where Jane kept all of her paper