The Pantry Door by Julie Steimle (top 100 books of all time checklist TXT) 📕

The car shook with every bump and pothole on the road, rumbling over the cow grate off the freeway onto the frontage road and into the outskirts of the small town. Kathleen Nielsen frowned at her knees, not looking at her mother or the road ahead. She knew where she was going, and she was going alone.

“Now, Katy, mind your grandma,” her mother said with a lecturing tone; the same one she used just a few minutes ago to explain that Katy would not be going to Florida with her parents. Katy needed a time-out with no perks.

Katy pulled her arms across her chest tighter, clenching her teeth together with a glare at the door handle. If they had gone slower, she would have considered leaping from the car, like they do in the movies, just to get away. It was utterly unfair that her parents got to go to Orlando, and she got left behind in the middle of nowhere with her ancient grandma simply because of one silly incident at school.

Or was it even that?

Frowning deeper, Katy continued to glare at the door. No, she was grounded until the day she died if her stupid, interfering mother had anything to say about it.

Nothing she did was right anymore. Katy didn’t practice her flute anymore. She didn’t clean her room like her mother wanted. She talked back, unable to listen to all that preaching a second longer. Her grades were slipping. And, of course, her mom didn’t like her friends. They were a bad influence her mother said. Well, she’d show her. Grandma Schmidt was not going to soften her up. She couldn’t. Grandpa wasn’t there anymore. Her mom’s secret weapon was dead.

“Didn’t you hear me?” her mother said, looking over at Katy with a tired sigh. “You are to mind your grandmother. If I hear you have given her backtalk and did not help her out with the chores, you’ll remain grounded until the end of summer. Hopefully, by then, you will have learned to behave yourself.”

Katy gave a snort.

“What was that?” her mother asked, lifting her eyebrows.

With a glare, Katy snapped. “I heard you, Denise. You don’t have to shout.”

Wishing to close her eyes, Katy’s mom frowned. “Kathleen Nielsen, that was disrespectful. I don’t care what your friends do with their parents, but you will not speak to me so—”

“Whatever.” Katy gave that snort again.

Her mother pulled the car to the side of the road and parked with the engine still running. She turned to her eleven-year-old daughter with a glare, shoving her book to the side so it would not become a victim of Katy’s oncoming tantrum.

“Kathleen Nielsen! That is the last time you will act that way. Your father and I are very concerned about you. With the way you are going, you will end up making a lot of choices you will regret.”

“Oh, please.” Katy made a face at her, but retreated towards the door in case her mother got any ideas about spanking her. “Save your holier-than-thou speech for someone who cares. When I’m eighteen, I’m leaving home to do what I want. And not you, or anyone else, can stop me. You can’t control my life forever.”

Her mother’s eyes narrowed. “Is that what you think we’re doing? Trying to control you?”

“I’d bet you’d even break my legs, so I’d have to be in a wheelchair like your crippled friend, so you can keep me locked up.” Her mother’s face flushed red like it always did when Katy brought her childhood friend into the argument. “You need people that can’t run away from you; you’re so awful.” Katy dug the knife deeper, really wanting to hurt her mom. After all, her mom took her away from her own friends. It seemed only fair to do the same to her.

But her mother lifted her chin, fingering the worn folded origami flower in the book that she always used as a bookmark, the one that particular friend had made for her. “No, Katy. You misunderstand. She just couldn’t come outside of her room to—”

“I don’t care,” Katy said turning away. “I’ve heard the stupid story a million times. Get over yourself. I don’t care about the crip-Kathleen you named me after. The chick probably had polio and died from it. Who cares?”

Her mother slapped her. Katy blinked, not expecting that at all. Staring at her mother with shock, she saw tears in her mom’s eyes. But that only made Katy smirk in triumph, biting her own tears back as her mother’s hard words spilled out in anger. “…dare you! Who cares? How did I raise such a selfish daughter? It is like some kind of changeling replaced my girl, and my Katy is lost somewhere.”

“I was never your Katy!” Katy snapped back, rubbing her red cheek now.

Silence was her answer. Her mother lowered her head.

“No. You were Grandpa’s girl. Did Katy die when he did?”

But that was worse than the slap. Katy turned and groped for the door handle.

“The child lock is on,” her mom said.

Katy clenched her teeth again with an even dirtier look. “You’re a control freak!”

Her mom shook her head and steered back into the road. “No. Just concerned.”

But that was too much for Katy to handle. She snatched the book her mom had been reading and ripped out the origami flower. Tearing it in half, she tossed both halves at her mother.

“There! You tyrant!”

Immediately the car skidded to a halt. Katy’s seat belt jerked her back. Luckily, she still had it on considering it had been hard enough to get her to wear one—she hated all restraints.

Her mom clenched the steering wheel, panting and staring at the torn rose.

“What are you trying to do? Kill me?” Katy shouted at her. “Can’t you drive better?”

Katy’s mom turned her head and stared at her daughter. Then, with a jerk, she reached over and unbuckled her daughter’s seat belt. The child lock unlatched. “Get out!”

Katy stared at her, and kicked the dash with her toe. Kicking it again, she yanked on the door. “Fine! I’m running away!”

With a dry look, her mother merely shook her head. She pointed back to the freeway. “It is twelve miles to the next town. Grandma Schmidt is only three blocks that way. If you want to walk to the nearest town, that is your affair. They don’t have a bus, so you won’t be able to catch a ride anywhere. It is farmland for hundreds of miles in every direction. Good luck. However, I’ll be going to Grandma’s. If you want dinner and a warm bed tonight, I suggest you start walking now because I am not going to put up with any more abuse today.”

“Abuse? I’m the one being abused!” Katy shouted, not quite stepping out of the car.

“Go. I won’t say it a third time. The walk might do you good.”

But Katy only scowled at her. However, her mother would not budge.

Fighting the tears that welled up in her eyes, Katy finally climbed out. She slammed the door, swearing at her mother and the door between them.

“I hate you!” Katy kicked the door for spite.

Her mother sighed and shook her head. “Too bad. I love you.”

And she drove down the road.

Kicking the gravel and then tromping around in circles in her indecision, Katy grumbled to herself for several minutes before trudging slowly toward her grandmother’s place. In truth, she had been looking forward to seeing her grandmother, and she hoped Grandma Schmidt would take her side. But Grandma Schmidt was an old-fashioned woman. It was doubtful that she would see things her way.

Of course, while walking down the road that she and her grandpa often took together so many summer days, stirred up memories she had hoped to forget. She passed the wild strawberry patch where they used to snitch strawberries on their way back from Mr. Meredith’s home—he would always let her rides his horses. She walked by the dilapidated wood and wire fence that bordered on Marge Fillmore’s property where her granddaughter used to play with them before she was sent off to New York to study acting. Katy passed by the old, now closed, soda shop that never had much business in the first place because the town was too small, but had the best malteds ever. Kicking a stone, Katy had to look away as she trudged past the crab apple trees she used to swing on and jump off as Grandpa caught her. But he was gone, and all these places felt empty.

He was gone, and that was that. Life no longer had color in it. It no longer had beauty. The world had gone silent from his laughter and the music he made. Katy couldn’t even bear to pick up her flute anymore because it reminded her of him too much. Of course, all music had that effect on her those days. It seemed unfair that music continued without the ultimate musician.

But her feet took her too easily down that road, and Katy found herself standing on Grandma Schmidt’s walkway, blinking as if waking from a dream. Her grandmother had already come out, grinning and opening her arms for a bear hug.

“Kathleen! You’ve arrived! You mother said you needed to walk! I must say, what a dramatic entrance!”

Containing a moan, Katy grimaced for her grandmother. Grandma Schmidt was all arms in her embrace, squeezing out every ounce of breath Katy had in her.

“Oh! How you’ve grown! Let me look at you!”

She lifted Katy’s arms out, grinning too cheerily for Katy’s present gloomy mood. Over Grandma Schmidt’s shoulder, she saw her mom standing in the doorway. Katy wanted to wipe that satisfied smile off her mother’s lips. If only she weren’t standing so far away.

“Mom, I must be off. Bob is waiting for me to get back by tonight,” Katy’s mother said.

Grandma Schmidt turned around and reached out for another hug, merely switching victims. “Oh, dear. So soon? Well, make this hug last, ok, Denise?”

Katy’s mom smiled, though her gaze on her daughter was pained. “Ok, Mom, but I really have to get going. Our flight leaves early tomorrow.”

“Well, if you must, you must. But be a dear and call often.”

“I will, Mom.”

Katy rolled her eyes at the spectacle both of them were making and attempted to walk past them.

She never got that far. Her mother placed a hand on her head with a softened smile and attempted to kiss Katy’s forehead like she used to do when Katy was little. Katy squirmed out of it with a jerk and tromped further indoors.

“I see what you mean,” Katy heard her grandmother murmur to her mother.

Stomping to the fridge, Katy yanked the door open as her temper rose, listening to the two conspirators whisper although she couldn’t make out their words.

“I’ll see you in a month,” her mother called over to Katy.

Katy merely grunted and took the jar of pickles out.

“Don’t worry, sweetie. Just leave her in my capable hands. I’m sure even Grandpa will be around to lend a hand.”

A shiver ran down Katy’s arms. She looked up where her grandmother stood. Then she glanced around. Grandpa? What? Was Grandma Schmidt seeing ghosts?

But her mother gave a tired smile to Grandma Schmidt, patting her hands before she turned to go back to her car. “That would be nice.”

Wishful thinking. Katy smirked at it and turned back to her task, taking out the mustard, ketchup, lettuce, and tomatoes.

“Say good bye to your mother, Katy,” her grandmother said.

Katy turned with a glare. “Get lost.”

Her mother ruffled, but did not move.

“Let’s try that again,” her grandmother said in a sterner voice.

It was not the first time her grandmother had taken that authoritarian tone with her, but it certainly hurt her in the same way. Katy looked at her mother with a