7 Clues to Winning You (17 page)

“No, no,” I said. “It is Saturday.” I perched on the edge of
Ms. Franny’s bed and leaned in close. “I’m here on a special mission. I could use your help, though. Both of you. If you’re up for it.”

“What kind of help?” Ms. Eulalie asked.

“What kind of mission?” Ms. Franny followed. “Will there be guns involved? I’ve got good aim. I’m a dead shot.”

“No, there will be no guns,” I said.

“Damn,” Ms. Franny mumbled. Ms. Eulalie glared at her for swearing but let it slide.

I proceeded to give them the whole story. I told them they’d been totally right. After Dad canceled the Senior Scramble and everything, I’d felt like a bully. I told them about Luke’s online newspaper and how I apologized to him and proposed the idea of taking the Senior Scramble underground. The ladies had nobody to tell, but I swore them to secrecy anyway. I explained how everything in the hunt worked and what yesterday’s clue was like and told them my plan for getting the cans.

“So what do you think?” I asked them. “Are you in?”

The ladies looked at each other for a few moments, then at me. Ms. Franny opened her mouth, held it there, and then finally said, “So who’s
Luke
?”

“That’s what I want to know too.” Ms. Eulalie’s eyebrows danced up and down. She grinned at me.

“You guys!” I cried. “No!” I thought I’d done a good job of covering up my semi-crush. Apparently not. “He’s just some senior. I don’t … He just … It’s nothing. I mean there’s no ‘it’ even. There’s nothing. He’s n-not anybody. I mean of course he’s somebody, but I mean he’s not … you know.
Somebody.
”

Once they were sure I was done babbling, Ms. Eulalie went,
“Psssh!,”
and Ms. Franny went, “Ha! Yeah, right.”

“Lord love you,” Ms. Eulalie said, “but you tell lies like Ms. Franny sings: hard to listen to and even harder to believe.”

I expected Ms. Franny to come back with some witty retort. Instead, she said, “On this point, I have to agree with the old fart bag. Blythe, you stink at lying.”

“So I’ve heard,” I muttered to the floor.

Ms. Franny clapped her knobby hands together. “Well, I for one am in on Operation Soda Pop. How about you, Ukulele?”

“Lord save me, yes. I’d never say no to you, baby girl. Not after you been so good to me all these years.”

“The only problem is,” Ms. Franny said, “Nurse Ratched’s going to be coming around in a little while to wheel us down for dinner. After that, it’s lights-out.”

“We get so tired after dinner, you know.”

I nodded in agreement even though I didn’t want to agree to what I knew Ms. Franny was about to say.

“Can we postpone till tomorrow?”

“Nurse Darlene is off on Sundays, remember.” Ms. Eulalie winked at me.

Good point. “I hadn’t thought of that,” I said. It definitely would be easier without Darlene around. She’d know something was up and bust us, no question. I hated to lose all that time on the hunt, but I couldn’t afford to blow this. I had no other soda can options. “What’s the Sunday floor nurse like?” I asked.

Ms. Franny blew a raspberry. “A moron.”

I stood up to leave. “Okay, what time tomorrow?”

“Say, one o’clock?” Ms. Franny said. “That’s the peak hour for Sunday visitors. The place will be crawling with people, and nobody’ll bat an eye if we’re out of our room.”

“I agree,” Ms. Eulalie said.

“Sounds good,” I said. I was already collecting a list in my brain of lies to tell my parents. “I’ll see you then. And thanks, ladies.” I kissed each of them on the cheek and left.

I pulled into my driveway just as my parents’ car did. They were home early. At least I didn’t have to lie to them about where I’d just been. My stomach lurched at the sight of my mud-coated history book on the floor beside me. I kicked it quickly back under the passenger seat.

“How was Gran and Granddad’s?” I asked once we were out of our cars.

“SO boring,” Zach said. “You’re so lucky you stayed home. I had to sit through three whole photo albums of old dead people. Be glad you missed it.”

Mom got out and smoothed the wrinkles in her camel pants. “How was the afternoon tea?” She said “afternoon tea” like it was a jewel on her tongue. A precious little gem that was lost to her now.

I felt sorry for my mom, so I did my best not to answer her with a lie. Not a direct one, at least. “Shady Acres was great. The dining room and kitchen were very busy. I had a good time with Ms. Franny and Ms. Eulalie. I’m pretty wiped out, though.”

Mom beamed at me. “Well, I’m sure they appreciated your company. Why don’t you go upstairs and have a little nap?”

Wow. Third rule of lying: Dance around the lie with distracting truths. They’re far more convincing.

Dad got out, gave me a vague smile, and placed his hand on the top of my head for a second. I didn’t have any truths that were appropriate to say out loud to him at that moment, so I kept my mouth shut. I followed him and Mom inside and then took a detour to the laundry room to toss my clothes in the dryer. Mom would probably think I simply felt like doing some laundry. After that, I went up to my room to check the stats on the Senior Scramble. All I could do was hope that other players were having as much trouble as I was.

When the Revolting Phoenix came up, I clicked on the statistics button. It displayed everyone’s user name and what clue each person was on. Most of them hadn’t turned in the photo for the first clue yet, which was a relief. A few had turned in the one for the second clue and were on to the third already. Crap.

My plan for tomorrow had better work or I was going to fall way behind. I logged off the site and suddenly realized that I was starving. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. I had forgotten completely. I try to eat smart. I drink plenty of water. I know what keeps my energy up and keeps my skin hydrated. Yet once I left the house this morning, I didn’t have a drop to drink or a bite to eat and I didn’t even notice. Weird. Well, I was hungry now.

I went down to the kitchen and grabbed the first things that looked appetizing: a bag of potato chips and a root beer. Not my normal diet. When I popped a chip in my mouth, though, it tasted like the most spectacular thing I’d ever eaten.
I finished the bag and guzzled the soda, then slouched back upstairs and fell asleep.

Mom woke me up for dinner, but my stomach was still heavy from the greasy potato chips. I ate a little salad, but I only picked at my pork chop. I didn’t want any of the mashed potatoes. Instead, I made hash marks in them with the tines of my fork.

The phone rang. Mom excused herself and scooted back from the table. I heard her muffled voice in the kitchen talk for a few minutes. Then she came back and sat down. Her face had tensed up. Her jaw flexed in and out. She blinked a few times and then blossomed into a full-blown lady look. “The showings today went very well,” she said. “We have two offers on the house.”

Dad set his knife and fork down on his plate. “Are they any good?” he asked. I wanted to claw that eager expression off his face.

Mom sat down in her chair. “They both came in at the asking price. Marjorie will be stopping by after dinner to go over the details.” She methodically laid her napkin across her lap, picked up her fork, and started eating.

That was it. It was done. Our home was gone.

I DIDN’T CRAWL OUT OF BED UNTIL SOMETIME AFTER eleven Sunday morning. Marjorie had been at the house until almost midnight. She had shown up after dinner and presented the two offers on the house. One was from a family with five boys. The other was from the yuppie idiots I had seen that afternoon. The offers were exactly equal in price, timeline, contingencies, everything.

We thought that all we had to do was pick one, but Marjorie said no, now that there were competing bids, she could call the buyers’ agents and ask for their clients’ “best and highest” offer. I suppose it was the free-market system, but it felt unnervingly like a shakedown.

Marjorie called the other agents right there on her cell, and both agents said they’d get back to her within an hour. By eleven o’clock, we had the “best and highests.” The family could only come up another five thousand dollars, but the yuppies tacked on ten grand. Marjorie said the buyers had given us forty-eight hours to decide before the offers expired. Until we accepted one and signed the contract, either one of the buyers could yank their offer at any time. The whole negotiation seemed quick and dirty.

Once Marjorie left, I did my best to sway my parents toward picking the family. What I really was doing was arguing against the yuppies. I had to be careful not to let it slip that I’d seen them. Zach liked the idea of extra cash, of course, so he argued their side. Mom and Dad didn’t say much. That’s how I could tell that they were overwhelmed and confused. Finally, they decided to sleep on it, so we all went to bed.

Now the morning sun was flooding my beautiful room that soon would belong to someone else. Even though I was curled up under my polka-dot comforter, I could hear Mom and Dad downstairs in the kitchen. I couldn’t make out any words, but I was familiar with the tone. They were arguing.

They had to be butting heads about which offer to take. At least that meant that one of them wanted to give our home to the family with kids, which was encouraging. The other person wanted the money more. I could guess who was who. Mom came from money; it meant little to her. It meant a lot to Dad, though. He was trying to prove his worth to Granddad. How lame and insecure.

As far as I was concerned, there was no way those yuppies were getting their hands on my house. I slid my feet into my fuzzy white slippers and charged down into the fray.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more.

I passed Zach in the family room. He was sitting on the couch, throwing Cocoa Puffs into his empty orange juice glass. Mom must have relaxed the no-food rule now that we had buyers on the line. Every time Zach made a shot, he’d announce, “Two points!” The shots he missed were scattered across the glass top of the coffee table.

Dad and Mom stood in the kitchen, leaning on opposite counters, arms crossed, faces set. Mom’s softened when she saw me, though. “Good morning, sweetie,” she said. Dad kissed the air and winked at me. He didn’t say anything.

“Morning,” I said. “What’s up?” I tried a non-confrontational approach. “Did you guys decide?”

Dad and Mom locked eyes. “Not yet,” Dad said.

I poured myself a mug of coffee and nonchalantly said, “It would just be so nice to know there were going to be kids running around here and growing up. It’s a family house, you know?”

“I agree,” Dad said.

What? Hold up. Dad wanted to take the lower offer?

Mom shook her head. “Five boys? This place would be destroyed in a week. I won’t hand over my home to people who aren’t even responsible enough to use birth control.”

“Anne!” Dad chastised. “You don’t know that. Stop fabricating things.”

“I bet they were trying for a girl,” I offered.

“I don’t care why they had five children,” Mom said, not looking at anyone. “I can’t let them ruin …” She pressed her lips together. Squeezed her eyes shut. Couldn’t stop the tears from running down her cheeks.

Dad crossed the room and wrapped his arms around her. He stroked the back of her head and said, “Whoever buys this house will be buying it because they love it. They’ll take care of it. You don’t need to worry. And you’ll have the new house to make your own. We’ll build new memories. We’ll still have the old ones too.”

I watched Mom’s rib cage heave in and out with silent, jagged sobs. Then it stilled. Mom straightened up and wiped her eyes. Sniffled once and walked out of the room. This argument wasn’t over.

I found it odd that Mom would dig her feet in about this decision, yet when Dad asked to move to Meriton, she rolled right over. Why hadn’t she stood up then? Why hadn’t she burst into tears then? Why hadn’t she disagreed with him when it really mattered?

Maybe she had. Maybe she’d done all those things. And maybe when she walked out of the kitchen just now, she was saying, I’ve given you enough.

“Take the damn money!” Zach hollered.

“Don’t swear,” Dad said meekly. It was nothing more than an automatic response. His gaze had focused in the air somewhere between the tile floor and the table leg. Yet, he looked like Dad again. Not Principal McKenna. Only for a moment, though. Then he snapped to attention and asked, “What’s on your schedule for today, honey?”

I took a big slurp of coffee to buy a second and steady myself. I swallowed and said, “Just running some errands. Nothing big.”

“Good.” He nodded and slipped away into his thoughts again.

“I’ll be back late this afternoon,” I said.

“Okay.”

“Don’t make any decisions without me.”

“Nope.”

I could’ve told him I was running off to marry a gay
kangaroo and I would’ve gotten the same robotic response. I counted myself lucky that he didn’t pry. And even luckier that Mom was still in her room when I left the house just before one o’clock.

I drove over to Shady Acres and parked in the back again. The visitor lot was packed anyway. Ms. Franny was right about this being prime visiting time.

Apparently, Shady Acres was a whole different place on Sundays. I knew that Sunday was the day that most guilty family members showed up to spend a few strained minutes with their ailing relative and then go home feeling better about themselves. I just didn’t realize there were so many. And that they all seemed to come at one o’clock. I guess it made sense. The visiting family wouldn’t feel obliged to take their relative to lunch. Plus, they could still get home in time to watch the football game or wash the car or do whatever else they’d rather do than sit here pretending that their relative wasn’t withering in front of them. Or saying they’ll see their relative next week, when they know he might not be here then. Or even hoping he might not be here.

Their visits were a joke.

I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be so cynical and judgmental. But the sight of all those people who could visit anytime—but didn’t—made me angry.