Just Lucky

As the story begins, 15-year-old Lucky is working on a writing assignment for language arts, an autobiography. She wishes that she could make up a story that’s “a little more PG-rated” (p. 2), but that statement about the police lineup says it all. However, Lucky’s facing a bigger problem than writer’s block. Her grandmother is having memory problems; she forgets that her husband has gone out to help a neighbour or that she’s left the bathroom shower running for hours at a time. Lucky has confided her concerns to her grandpa (who brushes it off as the forgetfulness of old age), and importantly, to her best friend, Ryan. Lucky and Ryan have been friends for eight years, beginning when he moved next door to her grandparents, and they share a mutual interest in comic books and more. It’s not a budding romance, either. As they drive to school one morning, Ryan asks about Grandma, but Lucky sidesteps the discussion by focusing on the truly pressing issue in Ryan’s life: how Ryan is going to ask his crush, Thomas, to the prom. Yes, Ryan is gay, and that evening, when he comes out to his parents, he gets the beating of his life. His parents are religious, “not like, go to church, say grace, love your neighbours religious. . . . more the speaking in tongues, condemn you to hell, snake-handling type of Christian” who believe that “‘the gays’ could be rehabilitated” (p. 17).

Whatever her memory problems may be, Grandma isn’t tolerant of the abuse that Ryan has experienced. She storms next door and, after a while, comes back with a bag of Ryan’s belongings and the announcement that he’ll be staying with her and Grandpa for a while. As Lucky puts it succinctly, “that’s what I loved about my grandmother. She didn’t take shit from anyone.” (p. 20) Capable though Grandma has been in her intervention with Ryan, when Grandpa has a fatal cardiac arrest, things really head south. Lucky manages to extinguish one pan of burning bacon, but when the fire department is called to put out a second kitchen fire, she has to face the reality of her grandmother’s mental decline. Grandma has dementia, and an assessment for a long-term care plan has to be devised. But that’s hardly the worst of the situation – because Lucy’s a minor, she can’t be legally responsible for her grandmother, and she has to call her mother.

The chapter in which Lucky’s mom visits the hospital is titled “Mommy Dearest”, and it almost would be funny were it not for the desperate sadness of Lucky’s situation. First, there’s her introduction to Cynthia from Children’s Aid, and then there’s Lucky’s meeting with her long-absent mother. At first, Christina Robinson doesn’t even recognize her daughter, and as far as she’s concerned, her duties as a mother are done because Lucky’s all grown up. But Lucky’s mother hasn’t grown up: she’s ready to leave on a road trip with her musician boyfriend, and when she’s told that there will be no financial compensation for taking care of Grandma, she’s down the hall faster than you can say, “Christina Robinson.”

After her mom’s departure, Lucky hunkers down for some sleep in one of those notoriously uncomfortable chairs which furnish hospital waiting rooms, but she is awakened by Cynthia from Children’s Aid. Cynthia had expected Christina to return, but it’s a wise child who knows her mother all too well: “she can’t even take care of herself. If there was nothing in it for her, she wasn’t going to stick around.” (p. 57) With no other family, Lucky is now a ward of Children’s Aid, and, while the situation with Grandma is sorted out, Lucky enters the foster care system. She feels uneasy as she walks into the Wilsons’ house, and it doesn’t take long to see why.

First, in the front hall, there’s a very large cross, “and it had a very scary-looking Jesus staring down at me in what looked like condemnation.” (p. 63) The next day, at breakfast, foster mom Mary Wilson comments on the length of Lucky’s shorts, and then, instead of setting off for school, she and Bobby (the Wilsons’ son) sit at the kitchen table where they are home-taught by Mary. It’s a boring half day – Bobby is no conversationalist - the monotony broken only by lunch, at the end of which, Lucky asks if she can visit her grandmother. She’s denied permission. Then, as the table is being cleared, Robert Wilson Sr. drops his napkin on the floor, and Lucky stoops to pick it up. She notices that he is staring down the front of her shirt. It’s creepy, and Lucky heads upstairs, phones her grandmother and decides that she’ll just sneak out.

It’s after dark when she returns, and the Wilsons are furious at her for violating their house rules. She’s denied dinner, but later, Mr. Wilson pays her a visit. Lucky is shocked, not only that he was looking at her face (instead of her chest) when he speaks to her, but also because he had brought her some food. Another surprise is that Bobby is engaging in a passive aggressive rebellion of his own. He shares his stash of comic books (of which his mom knows nothing), and his playing along with the boring home-schooling routine is a total ruse; he’s reading university level material from the library. But, one day, perusing his secret comic book stash, they get caught together in his room, and hell – sorry, that’s “heck” - breaks loose. That night, Lucky has a weird dream: Spider-Man tell her she’s in danger, and thinking that there’s a spider on her head, she wakes up to find, not a spider, but Mr. Wilson’s fingers entwined in her hair. The chapter ends with Lucky’s telling him to “get the hell out of my room or I’ll tell your wife you got into my bed!” (p. 88)

Who could get back to sleep after an experience like that? Lucky goes to the kitchen, gets a knife to arm herself against a future attack, and the next day, calls Ryan, who begs her to tell Cynthia what happened. She also hacks at her hair, buzz-cutting one side of her head to cleanse the feeling of Wilson’s touch. The next night, Robert Wilson returns, and this time, Lucky threatens him, not only with the knife, but also with telling his family the truth about this latest visit. The next day, as Lucky starts to tell Mary what happened, Mary does an end-run, telling her that Robert disclosed not only the knife threat, but he also claimed that Lucky demanded cash in return for silence about the incident. The only good result of this exchange is that Mary has called Children’s Aid, and Cynthia retrieves her from the allegedly “good family” charged with her care.

Cynthia has a hard time believing that Mr. Wilson is a serial abuser; after all, no one else complained, but she finds another placement for Lucky, and the next family is a definite improvement. Sarah and Edward are fostering two other kids, (Charlie and Jake), Sarah loves to cook (and cooks well), they seem to listen to the children when they talk, and they don’t home school the kids. Despite Charlie and Jake’s best intentions to help Lucky adjust to their high school, it’s tough, and she misses Grandma. However, it’s the mean girls, and in particular, a cheerleader named Elyse who causes Lucky grief. Despite her best efforts to convince Elyse that she has no romantic interest in Jake, Elyse provokes Lucky with insults and racial epithets, and “before I could think about what a bad idea it was, I drew my arm back and punched her square in the face.” (p.143) Fighting typically results in expulsion, but Lucky is given another chance, only to get into another altercation with Elyse, this time, in defense of Charlie. Unfortunately, in Lucky’s attempt to hold back Charlie from attacking Elyse, he eludes her grasp and steps into the space where she was planning to hit Elyse. Lucky’s fist connects with Charlie, who hits the ground, smacking his head hard and suffering a concussion. Fortunately, he manages to recover, but this time, there’s no second chance for Lucky, and because the high school she’s attending is the only one in the district, she has to be moved to yet another home in another school district.

With Home #3, her luck does start to turn. Grandma is in a long term care facility, but there’s no other option for an elderly woman with Alzheimer’s. However, Lucky is back at school with Ryan, and foster parents Paula and Greg seem to be decent people. Best of all is another foster kid in the house: Lucy, cute as a button, smart as a whip, funny, and genuinely caring. Lucy and Lucky – the only thing that separates them is a few years and a “k” in one of their names. Best of all, perhaps, she gets to watch Ryan’s romance with Thomas, and although there’s a bit of envy, she has to admit, “you two are disgustingly adorable.” (p. 174) Grandma gives her a phone call, asking for her to pick up a few things from the old house in which they lived, and Lucky’s visit is nostalgic but comforting. Back at her foster home, Ryan is warmly accepted, and Lucy, never one to hold back, asks him outright, “Are you gay?” (p. 179) When the answer is “yes”, it’s clear that for Lucy, gay is okay.

For a kid who has been bounced from foster home to foster home, it’s hard for Lucky to settle. She admits to a constant inability to connect because she’s sure she’s going to be moved along again. Who can blame her? But, she does bond with Lucy, whose mom is in prison for theft, and with whom she works on a birthday gift for Lucy’s mom: a decorated frame for Lucy’s school picture. They become sisters, and Lucky is loved by Lucy. It seems as if, finally, things will be fine, but then Lucky comes home from school to find Cynthia from Children’s Aid sitting with her foster parents. Greg, her foster father is being transferred to another city, and once again, Lucky is on the move, leaving behind Ryan and Lucy. The saying is that “third time’s the charm”, but in this case, Home #4 is the one that works out. It’s not perfect: this time, there are two other foster kids, Mia and Isabelle, and neither is Lucy. Mia has anger issues and an innate ability to push Lucky’s buttons. But Janine, their foster mother, manages it well, and she connects with Lucky. On one of Grandma’s good days, Lucky learns that she really is lucky: her grandmother has updated her will so that Christina can’t touch her money and has decided to sell the house, ensuring that Lucky has money for her education. Janine meets Grandma, and Grandma knows that her daughter has finally found the home that she deserves.

Just Lucky is an amazing book, and Melanie Florence draws together many contemporary issues faced by families and kids today. There’s the terrible reality of grandparents having to raise their grandkids because the parents are unwilling, incapable, or both. Having a parent or grandparent who is sinking into mental decline is emotionally paralyzing. The challenges of the foster care system are shown in all of their strengths and weaknesses; how could Cynthia from Children’s Aid be so blind to the realities of predators like Robert Wilson and so focused on “protocols” even when they aren’t in the best interests of children? Still, there are families like Sarah and Edward who do their best for kids carrying backpacks heavy with personal issues. And then, there’s that wonderful friendship between Ryan and Lucky. Who cares if he’s gay? He’s the best friend anyone could want, and only a total homophobe could not be rooting for him and the love of his life, Thomas. Lucky is a portrait of resilience. Yes, she gets angry, and it’s difficult to blame her for losing it. After dealing with a sexually predatory foster father, a racist-bitch cheerleader, and a truly nasty foster sister, she’d have to be a saint to stuff it all back and just be nice. Fortunately, there are supportive people who help her to move along: decent foster parents, caring teachers, and little gems like Lucy.

Lucky is never “just lucky”. She is fortunate in having grandparents who have given her a solid sense of self, drawing upon a blend of Indigenous tradition, Christian faith, and just good common sense. Christina Robinson is a disaster, and Lucky knows it. Accepting the reality of Grandma’s mental decline is tough for Lucky, but when she does, she has a new family to be there for her. Lucky is also brutally honest. Yes, she swears, but it’s not because she’s at a loss for words; she’s an intelligent and incisive young woman, and, sometimes, profanity is the only thing that can say what has to be said. High school sucks for many young people, and, for Lucky, moving from school to school, foster home to foster home, school becomes just another place to “do time.” But at the end of the book, she has hope and a new family, and life has promise.

Well, if you can’t tell by now, I really recommend Just Lucky. It offers something to a wide variety of audiences and readers: the short chapters make it accessible to kids who might not want to read anything, but to be able to say that they’ve read 66 chapters, that’s an accomplishment. Although the story might be more appealing to female readers, I don’t think that guys would be put off by it although homophobes will gag at Ryan’s romance with Thomas. Any young person who has a grandparent (or even, a parent) who is presenting symptoms of dementia or Alzheimer’s will certainly understand Lucky’s sadness at Grandma’s memory losses. And for kids who are in the foster care system, Just Lucky offers a story that is both reality and hope.

The intended audience is stated as ages 13-18 by the publisher, although I think that at the lower end, it’s a book for a more capable reader. I’d recommend this as an acquisition for high school libraries, but I offer some cautions to consider. I didn’t find the language an issue (which is obvious from the content of my quotations), but some might. As for Ryan’s crush on Thomas, it’s the story of any teenager in love (gay or straight), but there are schools and readers who would be uncomfortable with gay romance. Finally, the portrayal of the Wilsons might offend some readers who identify as “Christian”. So, read the book before purchasing it and make an informed decision.