"Nixon, Joan Lowery - The Other Side Of Dark" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nixon Joan Lowery)

"I'm pregnant," she says. "In just two months you're going to be an aunt."
My mouth is open, and I know I'm making owl eyes, but I don't know what to say.
"Last year," she says, "Dennis and I were married." She glances at Dad from the corners of her eyes. "I had to promise that I'd get my degree, and I willЧin May of next year. See, Dad, I'm keeping the promise."
"But I wasn't there!" I wail. "I was going to be your maid of honor. You always told me I could be."
She holds the palm of my hand up against her cheek. She's still smiling, but I see a terrible sorrow in her eyes. "Stacy, love, things wereЧwell, so different. Dennis and I didn't have a big wedding. Just a few people and the priest."
"But you always said when you were married, you'd have a train six feet long! And loads of bridesmaids, all in blue, and wear the pearls that Grandma left to Mom."
Dad clears his throat as though he were about to say something, but Donna interrupts. "It doesn't matter," she says. She shakes her head, lays my hand gently on the blanket as though it were made of fine china, and awkwardly gets to her feet, one hand pressing the small of her back. "I can't wait till you meet Dennis. Dennis Kroskey. Hey, you'll have to get used to my new name!" She walks to the door, turning to say, "He's patiently biding time out in the hall because I wanted to see you first."
Dennis enters the room, and Donna props open the door. He's tall, with skin tanned the color of his reddish brown hair, and he has a summer smell of lots of soap and showers. I'll bet he plays tennis.
"I've met you before," he says, "when you wereЧ sleeping."
"You came to see me?"
"Lots of times, with Donna. She introduced us, and she talked to you about our wedding, just in case you could hear her. Your family talked to you about everything that went on."
"Maybe that was part of my dream." There were so many voices, and they came and went for so long a time. I can't remember what they said. I don't want to remember. He's smiling, too, so I hurry to add, "Donna told me about the baby. I'm glad you're going to have a baby."
"So are we." He hugs Donna in such a special way that I ache right in the middle of my chest. I wasn't there when she fell in love and when she got married and when she first found out she was going to have a baby. I have to get used to all this at once, and it makes me feel lonely and shut out, no matter what they tell me.
I take a long breath, trying to keep things going right. "I'll baby-sit for you whenever you want. I guess I should say I'll baby-sit if Mom gives me a chance. She'll be so crazy about that baby the rest of us might not get to hold it until it's old enough to go to school."
No one laughs. No one answers. There's a funny kind of chill, like when you open the freezer door on a hot day and the icy air spills over your feet. "When's Mom coming?" My words plop into the cold. "Where is Mom?"
Dr. Peterson is suddenly there, head forward, his shaggy eyebrows leading the way like the prow of a ship. "Donna and Dennis," he says, "we'll keep your visit short. Why don't you come back to see Stacy tomorrow?"
Donna quickly kisses me, Dennis pats my feet, and they disappear before I can protest. The door swings shut, and the room is silent.
Dr. Peterson lifts my wrist in strong fingers and looks at his watch.
I try to tug my arm away from him. "You interrupted," I tell him. "I was asking a question, and I want an answer!"
"Take this," he orders. He hands me a pill and a glass of water from the table.
"Not now."
"Yes, now."
As I obey, quickly gulping the pill, he nods at my father, and Dad leans forward, holding my hand again. His skin is clammy and hot, and hл has to clear his throat a couple of times before he can talk.
"Honey," he says, "all along we've had faith in you. We knew you wouldn't give up. Remember even when you were just a little girl and you'd be so independent and set on getting your own way? You've always had a lot of courage, Stacy, andЧ"
"Daddy, tell me now. Where's Mom?"
He is hurting, and I can't help him. I don't even want to help him. My toes and fingers are warm and relaxed, and a numb feeling is seeping through me. It's like the drowsy waking-sleeping in the early morning after the alarm has been turned off. But I'm awake, and I hear what he's saying.
"The day you were shotЧ" His words are jagged pebbles on a dry, dusty road, and his voice trips as he stumbles through them. "Your mother was shot too. But JeanneЧoh, Stacy, Jeanne was killed."
"No," I answer, because I don't believe these strange words that are as hollow as shouts inside a tunnel, ringing and echoing and sliding away. My father is gray and crumpled, and he's crying. I try to pat his hand with fingers that are too heavy to lift. Something is wrong. Maybe it's still part of the dream, and I'll wake up and tell Mom about this crazy dream while we're making breakfast, and shell give me a little swat on my backside and say, "For goodness' sake, stop talking and eat, or you're going to be late for school."
"Tell me everything that happened," I murmur, wanting the dream to be complete. "No one has told me."
It takes a few minutes for my father to answer. His voice seems farther away, but I clearly hear every word "Donna said you were going to the backyard to sunbathe," he begins.
I remember. I was wearing my new red shorts, and I had Pansy with me. There wasn't any smog, and it was a golden day, and I wanted a head start on my tan.
"We don't know what happened next," he says. "Donna went to the grocery store down at the boulevard to get a couple of things. She came home and found that the front door was unlocked. Your mother was lying in the den. Donna said she screamed at Jeanne to get up, but she didn't move. Donna telephoned for an ambulance, and then she remembered you. She ran outside and found you lying on the grass near the back porch steps."
I hear the words, but I don't feel them. I am in a tunnel, but I can still hear what Dad says. Except that his words get mixed up with the other sounds and voices that are in my head.
There's a weird noise, like a yelp. It's coming from inside our house.
But a hand begins stroking my forehead. A deep voice says, "Go to sleep now, Stacy. Relax and sleep." I want to open my eyes, but I can't.
I run toward our back porch, and the screen door bangs open. Somebody runs out. He stares at me.
"Is she asleep?" Dad asks, and the voice murmurs, "Not yet."
This guy on the porch stares at me. I can't see his face, but I know he's staring. I feel it, the way words and ideas I need to know seem to sift through my skin and pour into my mind. He's scared. I know that too.
"Daddy, did they catch him?"
"Don't worry about that now," he says.
"But did they? I have to know!"
"No," he says. "They couldn't find out who it was. There were no witnesses."
It's harder and harder to speak. There's a humming in my head, and it moves Dad farther and farther away. I whisper, wondering if my whisper is real or only in my head. "I'm a witness. I saw him, Daddy."
"Hush, Stacy," Daddy says. "Don't try to talk now. Go to sleep."
The sounds in my mind melt together and dissolve the words. I am so tired. I don't ever remember having a dream in which I felt tired. I wonder what my mother will tell me about this dream.


Chapter Two

When morning comes, gray light poking around the edges of the Venetian blinds, I wake and know this has not been a dream. As though a tape recorder were inside my brain, part of last night's conversation comes through loud and clear.