The Kids Aren't Alright

Chapter 6: Finn

"Finn, there's a package for you!"

I'm stuffing clothes into a bulging duffel bag when mom calls me downstairs. I go to meet her reluctantly— she's been cold to me every day since our meeting with the principal as if being sent to a summer camp in Alaska isn't punishment enough.

School is over and summer is officially here, but mom's three-month break from her job at the local community college hasn't lessened her temper in the slightest. She didn't even react when I got my grades back on my exams— all B's and one C in Spanish, which is impressive, for me— and when I begged her to let me call my friends on the Cross Country team to explain why I was missing summer training, she only let me talk to them for ten minutes— and seriously, how could anybody fit something as big as this into a ten-minute phone call?

I wish she'd go easier on me. I'm not asking her to forgive everything I did, but a little empathy wouldn't hurt. It's not like I tried to assassinate the president— all I wanted to do was save an endangered species of frogs. I had good intentions, and I'm still being treated like a piece of shit. It really isn't fair.

I clomp down the stairs and go to meet my mom in the kitchen. I've already decided that I'm not going to say anything to her unless I absolutely have to (let's see how she appreciates the silent treatment), but when I see her, any thoughts of keeping quiet race out of my head and I hear myself blurt, "Mom! What the hell are you wearing?"

"It's a tracksuit, Finn," she says, a bit too proudly for her disturbingly colorful pair of pants and matching jacket. "They're totally in fashion right now."

"Yeah, maybe if now was actually five years ago."

Mom wags a finger at me. I don't understand how she can act offended in her get-up— she looks like a circus wannabe. "That's enough, mister. I called you down here for a reason and it wasn't so you can be the fashion police. A package came for you in the mail. Your sister sent it."

I'm still so thrown by her tracksuit that I almost don't process these last few words. "Sarah," I say, trying out her name like it's the first time I've ever heard it. "Sarah sent me something?"

"Yes. A package. It's on the dining room table." Mom returns to the stove, where she's cooking a pot of mac and cheese for the Twins to eat while we're driving to the airport and they're stuck at home with the babysitter. (Stuck is probably the wrong word— they practically jumped with joy when mom said they didn't have to drive Indianapolis International with us; it means they'll be able to watch movies all night.) "It has your name on it. Very hard to miss."

I slide into the dining room, where mom always dumps the mail. "Do you know what it is?" My words come out much more hopeful than I wanted.

"Birthday gift, maybe," mom says. She doesn't sound very enthused about it. Mom hasn't been happy with Sarah ever since she left to go to college in England, which is understandable. She had her heart set on Sarah attending her alma mater, Indiana State, but there was no way my sister was going to stay in-state, especially not after the divorce. So Sarah filled out her application to Oxford in secret and didn't tell anybody that she'd gotten in, at least not until she'd been accepted on a full scholarship. By the time Sarah had packed her bags for England, there was nothing we could do to stop her.

I shuffle through the heap of junk mail and report cards piled on the dining table until I find a cardboard box, dented and plastered with stamps, with my name on it. The package doesn't look like a birthday gift— it's too plain for that, too economic. Also, my birthday was in March, and Sarah never forgets my birthday. (Until this year, at least. I didn't get anything in the mail from her, not even a card.)