Freaky Fast Frankie Joe (11 page)

As I sit down at the kitchen table, Mr. Puffin asks, “What's got you so long in the jaw, boy?” He sets about making a fresh pot of coffee. “You hungry? I bet you're hungry.”

“Um, no sir.” It's because I have to go back to the Huckaby house, but I can't tell him that because FJ is sitting across from me.

FJ gives me a look, and I remember that I'm supposed to be sensitive. “Well, maybe a
little
hungry,” I say to Mr. Puffin.

“Well, I'd be a
lot
hungry, I was a growing boy like you. What's your favorite thing to eat?” He searches through cupboards and the refrigerator.

“Burritos,” I say.

“Burritos!” Mr. Puffin pulls a package of
store-bought cookies from a bread box on the counter. “That's Mexican food, isn't it? I like Italian food myself. Pepperoni-and-sausage pizza's my favorite. That place in Clearview makes the best pepperoni-and-sausage pizza I ever ate. You like pizza?”

“Sure do.”

Mr. Puffin shakes some rock-hard cookies onto a plate and sets it on the table. “Me too. Haven't had a slice in better'n a year now.”

“Why, Harvey,” FJ says, “you're not but . . . what, seven miles from town? Why don't you just drive in and pick one up?”

“Seven miles?” I say. “That's nothin'! I bet I do seventy miles a day when I bike in the Chihuahua Desert. I can do seven miles in fifteen minutes—no, ten!”

FJ looks skeptical.

“That might be,” Mr. Puffin says, “but I milk cows mornin' and night, seven days a week. Have to clean the milk shed when I'm done, too.” The old man's eyes begin to look wet. “Used to be, Mary cleaned the milking shed, and we'd get done early enough to run into town.” He pours two cups of coffee and sets them on the table. “But no more.”

“One of those big dairies would buy those cows off you, Harvey,” FJ says. “Why don't you give it some thought?”

“Long as I've known you, Frank, you've been right
more than you been wrong. I'll think on it.” Mr. Puffin pours a glass of milk and sets it in front of me.

My mind takes off on its own as I dunk hockey-puck cookies into milk. “I could bring you a pizza,” I blurt out.

“What?” FJ's eyes open wide.

“I'd do my homework before I leave. I mean, it's
only
seven miles out and seven miles back.”

Mr. Puffin laughs. “Sounds like the boy needs a break from all that studying.” He shakes his head, looking unsure. “You'd have to figure out a way to carry it.”

“I already got a basket on my bike for carrying things. I delivered things for people in Laredo.”

“That a fact? How much did you charge?”

“Tips. I worked for tips.”

Mr. Puffin shakes his head. “Delivery charge would be better. So much a mile, maybe.” Turning to FJ, he says, “I'm open for it. What do you think?”

A rare thing happens: FJ smiles.

“How far out and back would that be, Frankie Joe?” he asks. “You know, seven times two?”

“Huh? Oh, seven times two is . . . fourteen. Fourteen miles is easy.”

“And if you come out twice a month, how many miles would it be? Round trip. In other words, four trips at seven miles each.”

Is he serious? Two times a month away from the mutant ninja posse
and
the Saturday Quilt Circle?

My heart begins to pound. “Uh, that would be . . . twenty-eight miles.”

Oh—he's teaching me to count by sevens!

“And what if you come out
four
times a month?”

My heart flip-flops like a Mexican jumping bean. I never dreamed I'd have a reason to count by sevens, but now I do: to earn money to get back home.

I'm so excited I can't think straight. “I don't know right now, but I'll figure it out before we leave today!”

“Okay then,” says FJ. “You can do it if . . .”

I hold my breath.

“. . . you wear a helmet. Won't have you out on the road without one. I'm sure we have a spare one at the house.”

“I never wear a helmet.” I watch FJ's smile turn to a frown. “But okay. I'll wear a helmet.” I'll do anything to get free of Mrs. Bixby and the Quilt Circle on Saturdays.

“Well now,” Mr. Puffin says, raising his eyebrows at FJ. “You've got an enterprising boy here.”

Enterprising? I wonder if that's a good thing.

Mr. Puffin asks, “You got a name for your new business?”

“Yes sir,” I say without hesitating. “Frankie Joe's Freaky Fast Delivery Service.”

en-ter-pris-ing
\
adj
:
marked by an independent energetic spirit and by readiness to undertake or experiment.

I read the definition again before I close the dictionary, thinking, Mandy's not the only one who's good at business.

Impatient to get started, I decide to make a sign for my bike. I search out a scrap piece of cardboard in the storage part of the attic and find a felt-tip marker in the desk drawer. In my best penmanship, I letter
FRANKIE JOE'S FREAKY FAST DELIVERY SERVICE
.

Creeping downstairs I go to the kitchen where I know Lizzie keeps twist-ties from bread wrappers. I find four, then look for an ice pick in her odds-and-ends drawer. I punch holes in the four corners of the cardboard and push the plastic twist ties through. With everything I need to secure the sign to my bike basket, I head for the front porch. In a matter of minutes, the sign is wired on my basket, and I'm in business.

I sneak back upstairs to my bedroom and turn in. Lying in bed, I stare at the ceiling and think about my escape-to-Texas plan. I decide to add maps to my list, just to be on the safe side.

FJ can get more free from Triple A if he needs them . . . but I bet he won't be driving back to Texas
again. As soon as I'm back with Mom, things will go back to normal.

As I drift off to sleep, I start to dream. It's the day I arrived in Clearview, Illinois. I'm sitting at the table with all the Huckabys, and Lizzie asks me to tell everyone what I'm good at. I hear myself say, “Enterprising. I'm enterprising.”

“How much you gonna charge for delivery?”

It's Friday afternoon, and Mandy's invited herself to walk home with me. She's excited that I'm going to be delivering pizzas on Saturdays, starting tomorrow.

“Depends on how far it is,” I tell her.

We scuff our feet through leaves, which are really dropping now that October is half gone. The leaves aren't pukey green anymore. Now they're the color of dirty gym socks.

“I figure a quarter a mile is fair,” I say. “That would be a dollar seventy-five for seven miles—that's how far it is to Mr. Puffin's place.”

“Sounds a little cheap to me. It's a round-trip, you know.”

“Yeah, I know, but I wanna be fair.” I don't tell her that my new business has an extra benefit. It gets me away from the Kowabunga gang and Mrs. Bixby.

“How do you plan on keeping the pizzas hot?”

“Uh-oh. Didn't think of that.”

“I bet Mr. Gambino would help figure something out. Since he runs the pizza parlor, selling more pizzas would help him out, too.”

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

“Come on, let's go talk to him.”

A few minutes later, we're inside the pizza place, where Mandy points out Mr. Gambino. He's talking to a man standing at the counter who's paying his check.

“This is Frankie Joe,” Mandy tells Mr. Gambino when he finishes with his customer. “He's starting a pizza-delivery business.”

“A pizza-delivery business! Well that's good.”

“Hey, I heard about you,” the man who just paid says.

“This is Mr. Lindholm,” Mr. Gambino tells me.

“You're that enterprisin' boy my neighbor Harvey Puffin mentioned,” Mr. Lindholm says. “My place is right next to his.” He pauses. “Say, how about you bring one along for me, too? Gonna be gettin' real busy.”

I'm speechless. Two customers?

Mandy pokes me in the ribs. “Um, yes sir, I could do that,” I say. “Only I don't have an insulated bag to keep the pizzas hot.”

I turn to Mr. Gambino. “That's what I came to ask you about.”

“Insulated bag . . .” Mr. Gambino disappears into the backroom for several minutes. “I knew I kept this thing for a reason,” he says when he returns. He hands me a dust-coated plastic bag with a zipper. “It holds two, maybe three pizza boxes.”

I can't believe my luck. “Thanks! Thanks a lot!”

“Not doin' me any good stuck in the storeroom. It's left over from old times when Clearview was busier.” He sighs. “Them days is gone. Now I have to run a twofer on Friday nights to get people to come in.”

“Not anymore,” Mandy says, grinning at me.

Before Mandy and I leave, I arrange to pick up two pizzas the next afternoon: a pepperoni and sausage for Mr. Puffin and a meat-lover's for Mr. Lindholm.

“You'll have to trust me until I get paid,” I tell Mr. Gambino. “Soon as I get back to town, I'll bring you your money.” I hold my breath, knowing he's probably heard that my mother is in jail.

“I got no problem with that,” he says.

“Thanks,” I say to Mandy when we're outside.

“We businesspeople have to stick together,” she says. “Anyway, I owed you one. Miss Peachcott turned out to be a good customer.” She pauses. “You been by to see her yet?”

“I've been busy.”

She raises her eyebrows at me.

“Really,” I say. “You don't have the homework I do.”

Or a mother in jail that Miss Peachcott is bound to ask about.

“
Sure
,” she says. Her eyebrows go up again.

I'm going to have to get better at this lying business.

The cardboard sign on the front of my bike flaps like a bird because I'm pedaling so fast. I have two pizzas in the insulated bag on my bike basket, one for Mr. Puffin and one for his neighbor, Mr. Lindholm. Because the bag is so big, I used a bungee cord to strap it on top of the basket to keep the pizzas from sliding around inside. It was Lizzie's idea. She found the bungee on her back porch.

I can use it on my escape, too.

I memorized the map FJ drew showing me all the roads and turns to get to Mr. Puffin's and Mr. Lindholm's. But I still pause at corners to read county road markers, just to make sure I don't get turned around. The corn is so tall, it's hard to tell which direction I'm going.

I begin to worry about getting lost on my trip home. Then I remember something Mr. O'Hare taught me once when we were hunting rocks in the desert.
“Let the sun be your guide, Frankie Joe. Just remember that it rises in the east and sets in the west. And when it's warmin' the top of your head, it's high noon.”

I'm relieved to see
LINDHOLM
on a mailbox next to the road. As I turn into the drive, I see a man walking to a big red barn. “It's me, Mr. Lindholm,” I call out. “With one extra-large meat-lover's to go.”

“Just in time, Frankie Joe.” He laughs. “My stomach's turning inside out.” He pulls a billfold out of his overalls.

I remove the pizza box marked
MEAT-LOVER'S
and hand it to him. Mr. Gambino has taped the cash-register receipt to the top of the box that shows the price. “Eleven ninety-eight, with tax,” I read off. “And a dollar seventy-five delivery charge.”

He hands me two bills: a ten and a five.

Oh no! I forgot about making change.

“I'll have to owe you the difference.” I show him my empty pockets.

“Keep the rest,” Mr. Lindholm says. “With the cost of gas these days, you're a bargain. Now I got to get this inside quick. My wife is waitin'. I bet Harvey's waitin' on his, too.”

“Yes sir. I'm on my way.”

“I'll give him a call, let him know you're comin'.”

Mr. Lindholm waves, and I start pedaling. It's only
another half mile to Mr. Puffin's house, a few minutes at most. I'm flying when I race down his lane.

“Hi, Mr. Puffin.” I screech to a stop at his kitchen door.

He's waiting for me, money in his hand. “Max called, told me you was coming.”

I remove the pizza box from the insulated container and say, “Still hot.” I take the two bills he hands me. Another ten and a five. “Um, I forgot to bring change, but—”

He waves me off. “Keep the rest for a tip.”

Wow! Three-fifty for delivery, and another two-fifty in tips. Six dollars! I'll have enough money to go home before you know it.

“You wanna come in for a slice, Frankie Joe? This is a mighty big pizza for one person, and I bet you worked up an appetite on the way out.”

Did I ever! My stomach growled all the way. I want a slice of pizza really bad, but I'm afraid that FJ will be mad if I'm late getting back . . . or that Lizzie might worry.

Fat chance. They have four “weeds” to think about.

I remember then that Mr. Puffin doesn't have a wife waiting inside, and the words come easy. “I was hopin' you'd say that, Mr. Puffin. A slice of pizza would be great.”

“Wouldn't have taken but a minute to let us know you were running late,” FJ says.

I'm standing in the living room when he dresses me down. In front of Huckaby Numbers Two, Three, Four, and Five, who are sitting on the sofa grinning like monkeys.

“You're the one told me to be sensitive 'cause he's grieving.”

“I don't mind you stayed to visit with Harvey,” he snaps, “but he has a phone.” He glances at Lizzie, who is standing beside him. “You worried your mother.”

She's not my mother!

“It was very thoughtful of you to do that,” Lizzie says as she pulls on a sweater. She and FJ are getting ready to leave for a meeting. “Just give us a call next time, okay?”