wasn't going to do that, this meant that whatever was happening here was serious. Really serious.
The living room was dark save for the reading lamp above Dad's lounger, and I noticed that the curtains had been drawn. The kitchen lights were on, though, and I saw that the back door was open. I took me a second to put all this together. Although the mobil could climb down the back steps if necessary, the front door had a ramp for my convenience. So if the living room lights were off and Dad had propped open the kitchen door, that meant that he didn't want any of our neighbors to see that we were about to leave.
Nonetheless, I was more curious than apprehensive as I rolled through the kitchen to the back door. The night was colder than I expected, the first chill of approaching autumn setting upon our suburban Maryland neighborhood of two-century wood-frame houses. Our van was parked in the driveway, its side-hatch already open and its ramp extended. In the luminescence cast by the dome light, I spotted the top of my father's grey-haired head. He appeared to be kneeling beside the open driver's side door, working on something beneath the dashboard.
Dr. Stanley Barlowe was a scientist, but he'd never been much of a mechanic; what was he doing down there? Dad raised his head to peer over the front seats as my mobil lowered its auxiliary climbing wheels and began to slowly descend the back steps. "Jamey...good! You have your bag? Excellent." He pointed the screwdriver in his hand toward the van's rear compartment. "Get on in. I'll find your sisters as soon as I'm done here."
"Dad, why are we...?"
"Not now." His head disappeared again; the quiet snap of a service panel being shut, then he stood up and walked around the back of the van, the household tool kit in his left hand. "Climb on in. I'll be back in a sec."
I'd maneuvered the mobil into the van and had just finished clamping its wheels within the floor chocks when Jan appeared. She was carrying a small bag of her own, and she gave me a nervous smile that was meant to be reassuring--and wasn't--before she opened the back gate and tossed the bag into the back. "You okay there?" she asked as she strode past the side hatch on her way to the front passenger door. "Want me to put your bag back with mine?"
"No, that's okay." I liked having the bag in my lap; it gave me some small comfort. A quick glance at the kitchen door; neither Dad nor Melissa were in sight. "Jan, please...will you tell me what...?"
"No!" Melissa yelled. "I don't want to go on some stupid trip! It's the middle of the night and I just want to sleep!"
She appeared in the kitchen door, hauling a sequined pink overnight bag as if it was loaded with bricks, complaining every step of the way. Dad must have made her change; the teenage-slut outfit was gone, replaced by jeans and a hooded pullover. But her hair was still a mess, and it must have irritated her to no end that she was being forced to leave the house before she had a chance to spend an hour primping at her mirror just in case she happened to meet the boy of her dreams.
Dad was right behind her. "You're going, MeeMee--" our family nickname for her, which she detested, "and that's final." He planted a hand against her shoulder, not exactly shoving her down the steps but not giving her any choice in the matter either. "Now get in the van with your brother and sister."
"But I haven't even showered...!"
"Melissa." Jan jerked a thumb toward the back seat next to where I'd parked my mobil. "Get in. Now."
That shut her up. Melissa might give Dad trouble, and she seldom listened to me, but when Jan put a certain tone in her voice, she knew better than to argue. Seventeen years of futile resistance had taught Melissa a few lessons she'd never forgotten; Jan wasn't a bully, but she didn't back down either. A final, melodramatic sigh, then Melissa marched around behind the van, taking a second to hurl her pink bag into the back before yanking open the rear passenger door and climbing in to sit beside me. A cold glare in my direction--say anything and I'll murder you--was meant to keep me meek and quiet, but I couldn't help myself.