Free Hyacinth Girls by Lauren Frankel

earrings—but then her smile faltered. “Is Callie okay?”
    Dallas explained that she kept texting her, but Callie wasn’t responding.
    “She’s visiting family this week,” I said. “It could be her phone doesn’t get great service.”
    I’d talked to Callie just a few hours earlier, and we hadn’t had trouble with the reception, but it seemed like a plausible explanation and Dallas appeared relieved.
    “I thought she might be ignoring me,” she said with a smile, like the very thought of this was ridiculous. She looked down at her two bags, amused by herself. Dallas had a sturdier figure than Callie or Ella; she was strong and athletic, but when she dropped her chin you could see a smidge of baby fat.
    “I’m sure she’s not ignoring you. I’ll tell her to call you.”
    “And tell her we miss her a lot,” she said. “We can’t wait for her to get back.”
    I asked Dallas about her weekend plans and she mentioned sailing around the Thimble Islands. “I would’ve invited Callie, but I know how she gets around water.”
    Dallas’s eyes glistened with sympathy—I hoped it wasn’t pity. All these priceless experiences, and Callie was missing out.
    “She can swim.” I felt exasperated. “She just refuses. I can’t explain it.”
    “I think she’s embarrassed,” Dallas said. “With everything else she’s practically perfect. But with swimming—” She bit her bottom lip. “Spectacular mess.”
    “She needs practice,” I said. “But she won’t take lessons.”
    “Me and Ella tried to teach her. It was like watching a cat tread water.”
    “You actually got her swimming?” I remembered the day of the wet bathing suit.
    “Only once. Last month. She looked pretty bad. But we don’t care how she looks; it’s not like we’re taking pictures.”
    “At least you got her in. That’s better than I can say.”
    “We wouldn’t let anything happen to her, but she doesn’t want to trust us.”
    Dallas had this confident way of speaking that made you forget she was only fourteen. She exuded such poise, she could have been on TV.
    “Callie trusts you,” I assured her. “She knows you look out for her. You and Ella really helped her with that awful girl at school.”
    “Robyn.” Dallas flicked one of her earrings. “
She
was a weird one.”
    “You haven’t seen her since?”
    “I’d probably run if I did.”
    “But you stood up to her when it mattered. That’s the important thing.”
    “It wasn’t hard.” Dallas shook her head. “Nobody liked Robyn.”
    “Well, who would? A girl who does things like that.”
    “That’s what I told Callie.” Dallas wrinkled her nose prettily. “But she just doesn’t get what can happen when somebody hates you.”
    “I suppose she’s learning,” I told Dallas gratefully. “She’s learned now.”
    —
    The next day I got a call at work from Aunt Bea. “I’m struggling,” she said. “You need to come get her.” I drove to the neighborhood where I’d grown up in Cansdown, and by the time I opened the front door of Bea’s single-story prefab, I’d imagined the worst. Bea would be half dead, surrounded by EMTs, and Callie would be sobbing in the corner. But Bea was eating potato chips in her armchair, her oxygen tube fitted neatly into her nostrils, and Callie wasn’t even there.
    “She’s out on the bike,” Bea said offhandedly.
    I’d made emergency arrangements to leave work after Bea called, thinking that something really serious must’ve happened. I’d forgotten that my aunt didn’t understand what it was like to have a job with actual responsibilities.
    “What happened?” I asked.
    “I told you.” Bea pouted. “I can’t handle her. I’m on sixteen types of medication. You try handling a kid when you’re on that much medication.”
    Bea’s cheeks were hollowed out, and when she frowned, she looked both skeletal and childlike. Her hair hung unevenly to her shoulders in tufts, and although she was only in her fifties