Family Reunion by Caroline B. Cooney Page B

because I'm so upset. I'm so glad to hear your voice. I feel as if I've been here for a century. But I won't be coming after all, Shell. I'm staying here.”
    “Staying?” I whispered. “For good? You're never coming home?”
    “No, no, no. I mean the reunion. Barrington. Mother started crying when I said I want to be with you guys. She hasn't stopped crying either. I hate it when parents have feelings. They should be like carvings. Solid. No emotions. And here's Mother sobbing all over the place because one month with her is plenty and I want my real family.”
    “Did you say that to her?” I asked. “Out loud? Real family?”
    “Yes. I did it to hurt her, but I didn't think it would be sosuccessful. Shelley, Mom needs me. I kicked her in the teeth and now—”
    “You have to build her smile back,” I said.
    “If you would just talk to her once on the phone without sounding as if she's worse than anthrax, that would build up her smile.”
    “Me?”
    “You're maddest of all of us.”
    “I am not.”
    “You are so. Tell me. When we finish talking, are you going to ask to speak to Mother?”
    I said nothing.
    “No, you're not. Because you're mad.”
    I said nothing.
    “Mother says her three children have gone and grown up without her and she doesn't know us anymore and we'd all rather live somewhere else and we're still mad.”
    “What did she think would happen when she crossed the ocean?”
    Joanna sighed. “Give everybody hugs for me. Have a great time for me.” Her voice broke.
    I couldn't even find my voice. “Bye,” I whispered.

The party rental truck had arrived. Uncle Todd sent Angus into the kitchen to get volunteers to help distribute chairs and tables all over the yard and drape them with cushions and linens. There were no volunteers. Everybody was too busy listening to Aunt Maggie talk about loss and holes in families and pain between mothers and sons and the failure of brothers to have any value whatsoever on the face of the entire earth.
    I was so mad.
    I had just told Joanna that I didn't get mad, but now I was mad at Aunt Maggie and her dumb party and the entire town of Barrington and especially my father. You should behere! I yelled at him in my heart. You're making Annette and me defend you. You're ruining the party. You're not telling me who Toby is. And I have to listen to your sister whine about Brett, whose only problem is his father won't let him use the car.
    I had a sudden memory of my mother, years ago, making pound cake. She had beaten the butter and sugar together with a wooden spoon instead of using her Cuisinart. “Does it taste better that way, Mommy?” I had asked, licking the bowl.
    “No, but it feels better,” said my mother. “Pounding a cake is usually more acceptable than pounding a person you're really mad at.”
    Oh, Mommy!
    Who were you mad at? And how come I can't be little again, sitting on a stool so high that my feet swing in the air, wearing your old red-and-white-striped apron with the bib and licking the spoon from the cake you were baking?
    Aunt Maggie noticed me. “When is Joanna's flight?” she said, in the voice of one asking when Joanna's kidney transplant was scheduled.
    “She's not coming after all,” I said. “I got overexcited. I misunderstood. She's staying in Paris.”
    Carolyn and Annette looked at me thoughtfully. Grandma said, “Oh, I'm so sorry she isn't coming. I miss her already.”
    Uncle Todd came in. “Come on, people. Help out here.”
    “Joanna isn't coming,” said Aunt Maggie. “Brett isn't coming. Charlie isn't coming. Nobody's coming.”
    “We're coming,” said Carolyn irritably. “Ninety-seven hungry people with packages to put on the gift table are coming. Shelley, let's do something interesting.” We walked out the door into the backyard, where the only interesting possibility was unloading stacked plastic lawn chairs, so we walked around the other side of the house and into the front yard and stood beneath that