All the Answers (13 page)

Ava looked at Sophie in a panic.

“Sorry,” Sophie hissed. “I told him when we first got here so he could give you a good introduction. You
told
me you were playing.”

“Put your hands together, people, and let's have a warm Cedar Bay welcome for …” Thomas did a fancy music-stand drumroll with his hands. “Miss Ava Anderson!”

Ava's breath caught in her throat, but she walked over to her saxophone and started fiddling with the strap. Anything was better than sitting there with all these people clapping and waiting for her to do something.

“All set, Ava?” Thomas stood by the empty music stand, waiting for her to put sheet music there and then actually lift the saxophone's mouthpiece to her lips and play it. Which was pretty much impossible, since she couldn't even breathe.

Ava looked back at the folding chairs. Everybody was waiting. Sophie was nodding so enthusiastically she looked like a cartoon character whose head might fall off and roll right across the floor to the cookie table.

Grandpa was looking at her, too. Looking at Ava. Right at her, as if he were actually seeing her. And that didn't happen much anymore.

It made Ava want to play for him. If he could come back from wherever he was most of the time to look at her that way, she could at least try to play him the song.

Ava walked to the front of the room and arranged her sheet music on the stand. She took a deep breath and squeaked out, “This is a song called ‘On the Sunny Side of the Street.' ” She closed her eyes and breathed in … two … three … four … Then out … two … three … four. It calmed her a little.

Without looking back at the audience, Ava lifted the saxophone and started to play.

Scoo-ba-doo-ba-doo-ba-wahhh …

The first notes came out shaky, like her voice, but after a few measures, something happened. The sounds were coming from Ava's horn, but she felt as if the music—the feeling of it—had burst out of that Internet video. Cool, not-a-care, chilled-out Johnny Hodges himself. And when she played like that—
Bwahhh-ba-doo-be-doo-wooo
—like she'd never worried about a math test in her life, it felt amazing. It felt sassy and free and fun.

So that's what she did. Ava might have been two feet shorter than Johnny Hodges and a girl, and her skin wasn't quite as dark, but for a few minutes, she felt like him, blasting out the notes. The runs and the
doo-wahs
and the crescendos and the
bip-bip-bops
. She even shook her head a little as she played, just like Johnny Hodges, thinking “Nuh-uh … no worries here.” Somehow, it felt like her saxophone had captured all that cool and was sending it up through her fingers. She played like that, all the
way to the last
Bwahhh-ba-ba-da-ba-doo-wah … wahhh … bwahhhhhhhh
.

Everyone clapped when Ava finished. She looked up, expecting to see her parents smiling her way. But they weren't even looking at her.

They were looking at Grandpa. And Grandpa was pointing right at Ava.

He was
talking
. Shouting! “All right!” He was so loud the Snoozy Gang woke up. “Brava!”

Ava gave a sheepish bow and put her saxophone away. When she went back to sit with her family, her parents both applauded again, and Sophie gave her a big hug.

“Ava, that was
amazing
,” Sophie said. Then she looked toward the door, where some people were starting to leave. “I'll be back in a minute, okay?” She tapped the legal pad full of pencil-wish plans. “I want to talk to Mrs. Raymond's family before they go.”

Sophie hurried off with the pad, and Ava turned to Grandpa. “What did you think, Grandpa?”

“Spec-tacular!” Grandpa reached for her hand. His was soft and wrinkly and a little cold. Ava tried to remember the last time she'd held Grandpa's hand, way before he went into the nursing home. It had been warmer then, and rougher, probably from working in his garden and building stuff in his garage.

“Spectacular!” Grandpa said again. He laughed and squeezed her hand. “You must be the Rabbit's baby girl!”

“What?” Ava left her hand in his but looked over at her parents. “Who's the Rabbit? Is that some nickname Johnny Hodges had?” Dad shrugged, then smiled and motioned Ava back to her grandfather. “I'm just Ava, Grandpa. But I'm glad you liked the song.”

“I
loved
it! It was beautiful.” Grandpa had come uncrumpled. He was sitting up, and his eyes were so wide.

He was still nodding to the beat of “On the Sunny Side of the Street,” as if the song hadn't stopped playing in his mind.

It gave Ava an idea. “You know, Grandpa, we can put that song on a music player so you can hear it any time.”

“Mmm-hmm.” Grandpa nodded.

“We'll collect a bunch of songs—Johnny Hodges and—who else do you like? What other jazz did you like to listen to?” she asked him.

“Oh …” Grandpa looked out the window as if he were traveling a long, long way in his head. “Duke Ellington. Benny Goodman. Charlie Parker. Cab Calloway … mmm, that cat could sing!” Grandpa took a deep breath and started singing. His voice sounded so much younger, even if he wasn't singing anything Ava could understand.

Where was Sophie with the legal pad? They needed to write down those musicians' names before Grandpa went back to slumping in his chair. Ava found Sophie over by the window talking with a woman who turned out to be Mrs. Raymond's daughter-in-law.

“But she
loves
kittens,” the woman said, shaking her head as if Sophie had just told her the world was flat.

“I'm sure she does.” Sophie smiled. “Just not on her shirts. They had some John Deere tractor sweatshirts where I got this one.” Sophie nodded toward Mrs. Raymond, who had put on her new sweatshirt and was smiling down at the monster truck on her stomach.

“Soph, can you help me with something?” Ava pointed toward Grandpa and Sophie looked happy to be ending her no-more-kittens conversation.

“Write down Duke Ellington. I think he's famous; they mentioned him in the online article about Johnny Hodges,” Ava said. Sophie scribbled down the name while they walked. “Also Benny Goodman, Charlie Parker, and Cab Calloway.” She nodded toward Grandpa, who was still do-wabbity-bipping to his hands, though a little more quietly now.

Sophie sat down beside him. When he finished singing, she said, “Wasn't Ava great?”

“Spec-tacular.” Grandpa took a deep breath, then shook his head, closed his eyes, and settled back into his quiet. It was like his new batteries were the Dollar Store kind that only lasted a minute before things slowed down again. But a minute was better than nothing, Ava decided. She turned to Sophie. “Can we put that new music on your iPod tonight?”

Sophie smiled. “Operation Jazz is under way.”

The kitchen smelled garlicky when Ava came downstairs Thursday morning. Marcus was printing something off the computer. Emma must have been copying names out of the fridge because her name tag said HELLO MY NAME IS ARUGULA. She was at the table eating toast with marshmallow spread and chocolate chips, which meant Mom had left for work early. Dad was stirring something in a saucepan on the stove. “What are you trying to make?” Ava asked him.

“What do you mean ‘trying to make?' ” Dad looked hurt.

“Do. Or do not,” Marcus called from the printer. “There is no try.”

“My teacher says you should try your best even when the math is stupid,” Emma-My-Name-Is-Arugula said through a mouthful of toast.

“You should.” Marcus sat down next to her at the table and
grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl. “That was just something Yoda said in
Star Wars
.” He turned to Dad. “So what are you trying to make?”

“World-famous, super-healthy kale donuts. I got the idea when Mom made that heart attack comment.” He opened the oven door and a cloud of earthy-smelling gray-green smoke poured out. “I think the first batch is almost done. Maybe another minute.” He went back to the saucepan on the burner. “I'm making garlic frosting to go on top.” Dad did a little dance while he stirred.

Marcus laughed, but Ava felt bad for her dad. He was like Sophie sometimes; he got so exited that the reasonable part of his brain just turned off, and then he couldn't see how gross garlic frosting was going to be on any donuts. Kale would just make it green and worse.

Dad started humming, put on an oven mitt, and took out the tray of donuts.

Ava stood up to get a better look. “They don't look quite done.” They looked oozy, in fact, and were melting into kale-juice puddles on the hot cookie sheet.

“Donuts have to be deep fried, not baked,” Marcus said on his way out the door.

“Maybe they need to bake longer.” Ava didn't believe this, but she felt like it might give her dad some hope with his idea, at least until she left for school. “Have you seen Sophie's iPod around?”

Dad put the kale-puddles back in the oven. “Check the counter.”

Ava found it. “We filled this up with songs for Grandpa.” She put it in the small pocket of her backpack. “More Johnny Hodges and Duke Ellington and—”

“Something smells bad,” Emma-My-Name-Is-Arugula said, wrinkling her nose.

“Oh!” Dad ran to the stove, yanked the smoking pot of garlic frosting off the burner, then peeked back into the oven. “Marcus is probably right. I should have fried these.” He took them out and stared at the tray for a second. “I know what we can do.” He pulled Gram's big olive oil jar from the cupboard, drizzled oil over the kale-puddles, and grabbed the lighter he used when the grill starter didn't work. “This will finish them off. They can be world-famous, half-baked healthy kale donuts!”

Ava knew it would have taken magic to make the kale-puddles fluff up into anything resembling donuts. But she didn't want to hurt Dad's feelings, so she watched while he clicked the lighter and held the flame to the first round, green blob.

The blob caught fire, and before Dad's “Whoa!” was all the way out of his mouth, the entire tray of World-Famous Anderson's General Store Healthy Kale Donuts burst into flames.

“Stop, drop, and roll!” Emma shouted.

“Gimme that oven mitt!” Dad hollered. Ava grabbed it from the counter and threw it to him. He put it on and flipped the whole tray into the sink. By then, all twelve donut infernos were starting to fizzle. Dad stood, panting, watching the smoke rise until the last flame burned itself out. “Open some windows while I go
change my clothes,” Dad said, “and then I'll drive you guys to school so you're not late.”

Ava sighed. If Marcus had been there, he would have said something to prevent this. Something about physics and oils and flammability, and the donuts never would have caught fire. Instead, it had been Ava, thinking not-a-good-idea thoughts but not saying a word. She was opening the kitchen screen door when the fire alarm started screaming. Gram came hurrying into the kitchen in her bathrobe and looked around. “What happened here?”

“World-famous donuts,” Ava said.

“They caught on fire,” Emma-My-Name-Is-Arugula added.

Gram nodded and opened a window. “That'll get some attention, I suppose.” She turned on a fan and started cleaning up the mess.