Free Blues for Zoey by Robert Paul Weston Page A

bedroom door. I didn’t want her to see my face. “How’re you feeling?”
    â€œTired. Ironically . Where’s your sister?”
    â€œShe slept over at a friend’s. Katie’s mom’ll bring her home this afternoon.”
    â€œI’m going to lie down for a while.”
    I waited, but I didn’ t hear the sound of her door. When I peeked into the hall, she was still standing ther e.
    â€œThe kraken wakes,” she said dully. Ther e was a weak smile on her face. I wasn’t sure if she meant me or her.
    â€œYou okay?” I asked. “You want something to eat?”
    â€œNot yet, first I’ll— Kaz, your face !”
    â€œYep, I know . I was sort of there when it happened.”
    â€œWhen what happened?!”
    â€œJust some guy I know. He punched me.” I didn’t tell her it was Topher. She might want to call his parents. That wouldn’t be pretty.
    â€œP unched you? But why ?!”
    I explained as much as I could, careful to leave out references to parties, girls, beer, et cetera. There wasn’t much left after the self-censorship. I t was simply an argument that got out of hand.
    â€œI should have been here,” she croaked. “If I’d been with you, I would’ve—”
    â€œMom, stop it. Even if you weren’t in the hospital, it’s not like I would have asked you to come along.”
    â€œBut look at you!” She leaned forwar d, peering into my face. My nose was about two inches too wide and purple blotches pooled under my eyes. “There was blood, wasn’t the re?”
    I shrugged.
    â€œDid you … ?”
    â€œPass out? Of course.”
    Mom laughed sadly. “Passing out at the worst possible time. Runs in the family.” She pulled me into one of those head hugs your mom gives y ou when she thinks you’re still five.
    â€œ Ow ! My face!”
    I pushed her away and the nubs of bone in her shoulders jabbed my hands. They were way too pronounced.
    â€œIt looks worse than it is,” I told her unconvincingly. “I feel fine .”
    Mom shook her head. Her eyes we re wet. “Later, we’ll have Mr. Rodolfo lend us his car. We’ll all drive up to Beauhaven. You let Tracey ha ve a look at you for once. She’ ll fix us both up, you’ll see.”

26
    Beauhaven
    One side effect of her illness is that Mom isn’t allowed to have a driver’ s license. So whenever we drive up to the Beauhaven Center, it ’s always me behind the wheel. The center is two hours away, in an almost-suburban town called W est Olsten. As far as I know, there’s no such place as East Olsten, but that doesn’t seem to bother the people of West Olsten.
    Never go there, by the way.
    I’m sure there are a zillion places in the city—maybe e ven right in Evandale—where you can get retired hippies to ram-slash-dribble homeopathic smoothies down your throat, but if y ou asked Mom, nowhere was as good as Beauhaven.
    As soon as you pull into the parking lot, everything looks false—the marble pillars (which ar e actually textured cement); the roof of wooden shingles (which are obviously plastic); the pair of potted evergreens on either side of the entrance (both of which are polyurethane Christmas trees). It’s all synthetic cra p, crafted to give the opposite impression: that B eauhaven is fully in touch with the all-natural world.
    Out front is a sign painted with the Beauhaven logo. A cartoon daisy, with the initials BC . Below it is the familiar slogan:
    The Beauhaven Center
Get W ellness!
    (Mom had been trying for two years, but she hadn’t gotten any yet.)
    Tracey, the woman who ran B eauhaven, was a “reiki specialist.” For Mom, this was crucial. Reiki came from Japan and so did she, at least in a roundabout way. According to her logic, if anything was going to work for her, it would come from her ancestral homeland.
    â€œPlease,” I