The Center of Everything (35 page)

“Do you want to go outside with me and watch the storm?”

He rocks back and forth a few times before his hand slides to the green circle.

It isn’t raining yet when I wheel him outside. The wind is strong though, and even over the sound of the highway, I can hear it rustling through the corn. The sky is interesting, cut in half. There is a deep, dark thunderhead in the distant west, but directly over our heads the sun is still shining, surrounded by a cloudless blue. The line in the middle of the sky between storm and clear is almost perfectly straight, as if someone drew it along the edge of a ruler.

I know from Mr. Torvik’s class that this is called a wall cloud, and that wall clouds can turn into tornados, warm and cool air pushed sharply together on each side. But not always. Sometimes the two sides just sort of melt into each other, and they don’t turn into anything at all.

A jet flies over our heads, high up in the blue part of the sky, leaving a thick white trail. Samuel points up at it, his eyes wide. I wonder if he thinks I can reach up and place the jet on my head for him, like a tiny toy just out of his reach.

Verranna Hinckle has been telling my mother more stories, filling her head with more distant miracles. She brought over a VCR and a videotape of a little girl with autism in Korea who didn’t speak and didn’t seem to know her own mother was sitting beside her, but she could hear Beethoven once and then play it on the piano. My mother got excited and bought Samuel a toy keyboard. She got it out of the box and placed it in front of him, pressing his hands against the keys. He just sat there, not even looking at it, his hand in his mouth, and then finally my mother got quiet and put the keyboard away.

Nothing.

Nothing yet, my mother said. It may be something else for him.

Thunder rumbles again, closer now, and both Samuel and I gaze up at the darkening sky. It’s beautiful to look at, the clouds rolling into one another, lightning crackling on the horizon. But it’s frightening too. Times like this especially, I hate to think that the Earth is just a rock spinning in space, and that if it ever stopped or even slowed down, that would be the end for everybody. The clouds, the cars, even the buildings would go flying, burning up or flying out into nothing at all.

But Mr. Torvik said there was no reason to think that this would happen anytime soon. If we don’t mess it up, he said, the Earth should just keep spinning, all the plants and animals and people turning right along with it, safely tucked beneath the clouds.

He had stood on a chair one day and moved the little Earth in his classroom around the electric sun, his hand clutching the bottom like he was changing a lightbulb. He kept it tilted on its axis, so we could see how sometimes, depending on where the Earth was in its orbit, the light and heat of the sun would shine more brightly on the Northern Hemisphere, and then later, more on the Southern. If the Earth weren’t tilted like this, he said, there wouldn’t be seasons. He made the earth straight up and down and moved it around the sun to show us what this would look like, the band of light around the equator unchanging as he moved around the room. But this way, he said, tilting it back, everybody gets some light.

There is more lightning, a flash of brightness tearing across the sky. Samuel shrieks and points up, his eyes wide.

“It’s pretty, isn’t it?”

He doesn’t answer, doesn’t point to the
YES
or the
NO
. After a while, I feel the first drops of rain, cool and soft on my face. Already the clouds are moving toward us, spreading out across the entire sky, our shadows on the concrete disappearing.

Readers’ Guide

ABOUT THIS GUIDE

The following questions are intended to provide individual readers and book groups with a starting place for reflection or discussion. We hope they will suggest a variety of perspectives from which you might approach
The Center of Everything
.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Who is narrating? What historic or other signposts are available to the reader so that the story can be located in time and place? To whom or what does the title refer?
   
2. What do you think of Evelyn, Tina, and Eileen? What about Tina’s father? What kind of people are they? What do they look like? What is Sam’s role in the family and in the story? Share your impressions of other characters that stand out, and why.
   
3. When do you learn the narrator’s name? What is going on in the story when this occurs? What, if any, is the significance of the scene where the narrator’s name is revealed?
   
4. How does Moriarty use language to reflect the experiences and thoughts of the characters? Examine and discuss whether or not Evelyn’s thoughts and spoken words are reflective of a child’s point of view, and why. Share some examples that you find effective and/or moving.
   
5. How do Evelyn’s feelings about her mother affect your feelings about Tina? Explore whether or not you are sympathetic or disgusted by Tina, and why. At the end of Chapter 11, why does Evelyn not wipe her mother’s kiss off her forehead? Share some examples of how Moriarty brings out the mother/daughter relationship and whether or not you can relate to it, and why.
   
6. Why do you believe Tina doesn’t speak to her father? How do you respond when you learn that he told the family that a “little horse” is coming to dinner? Discuss this scene and its implications. Consider how such a small phrase can reveal so much.
   
7. The car that doesn’t shift is one of the many symbols Moriarty uses. What is its symbolism? Share some of the other symbols used throughout the story and how they are utilized.
   
8. Discuss the whole school milieu that Moriarty evokes in
   The Center of Everything
   . What are the roles of friendship pins and particular pieces of clothing in the lives of grade-school kids? What are your memories and experiences of these years? Share whether or not you think Moriarty successfully conveys these school experiences and why.
   
9. Discuss the use of religion as a recurring theme throughout the book. As a storytelling device, what purpose does it serve? Why would a man as “religious” as Tina’s father shun his daughter and be so unforgiving? How does Eileen live her beliefs? How does religion affect Evelyn? What happens at the church meeting with the healer? Why do people believe in healers? Share whether or not Tina comes to believe in some sort of religion, and why.
   
10. Why does Moriarty use the struggle between evolution and creationism in the story? What makes it particularly useful here? Why do people have this debate? Examine whether or not the characters’ positions ring true, and why. What would you say to those who have different beliefs than yours?
    
11. Do you believe Deena’s pregnancy is motivated by Travis’s change of plans? Should Evelyn have shared this with Deena? What position does Evelyn put herself in by doing this?
    
12. How does the car accident that kills Traci affect Evelyn? What motivates Evelyn to initially keep Traci’s belongings hidden? Examine the significance and possible symbolism of Evelyn hanging on to Traci’s clothes and locket into high school, and what they represent to Evelyn after Traci’s death.
    
13. Discuss the underlying theme throughout the novel of being chosen or not being chosen.
    
14. Discuss Moriarty’s use of foreshadowing throughout
    The Center of Everything
    . How does it influence your reading?