Lunch Money (15 page)

“Well, what am I supposed to do?” she asked.

“Do whatever you want. Watch TV. Go home. But don't shake the table. Here, take this paper. And a ruler. And there are pencils and erasers in the bin. Make some more drawings. You can sit over there.”

Maura set up a little work space on the low table in front of the TV. She sat on the floor with her back against the couch, facing Greg. She shuffled through her envelope of papers. She got out her story script and found the next page she wanted to work on. She used the ruler to draw the boundaries for the page. Then she made a few marks on the paper. She
looked at them, and then erased them all. She made another start, but then stopped and rubbed it all out again. She couldn't get into it. And she knew why: Sitting on the floor in Greg Kenton's playroom was just too weird.

Maura got up quietly and tiptoed over next to the Ping-Pong table. She stood at Greg's elbow, watching him add tiny lines with a crow-quill pen. When it looked like a good moment to speak, she said, “I forgot to tell you. I really want to do all the lettering myself.”

Greg looked up at her and made a face. “Well . . . it can't be in cursive, like you used before. It's too hard to read, especially when it's small. How's your printing?”

“Are you kidding?” said Maura. “Mrs. Layton, in third grade? She had to
force
me to use cursive. I was
so
good at printing.”

Greg reached for a lettering pen, the kind with a point that's almost like a needle. He unscrewed the cap and slid a piece of lined paper toward Maura. “Here. This is the kind of pen you have to use. Don't push hard, or you'll wreck it. Try writing something.”

Maura made a few marks to get the feel of
the pen point, and then she wrote,

This pen is different, but I like it.

Greg looked at the sentence and nodded. “Pretty good.”

It was actually neater and clearer than his own lettering, and he'd been working on his for two years. He said, “But you'll have to practice and get it a little smaller, and you have to keep watching how many words you use—the fewer the better.”

“I know that,” said Maura.

“Oh, so now you're an expert, right?”

“No,” snapped Maura, “but I'm not dumb. I really do get it, how the pictures have to tell most of the story. So don't talk to me like I'm an idiot.”

Greg bit back a perfect insult. He pointed at the other table and said, “So go be a genius over there, okay? I'm trying to get something done here.”

For the next thirty minutes there was no talking—only the soft scratching sounds of pens or pencils on paper.

Greg's mom came to ask if they wanted something to eat, but she stopped halfway
down the stairs, and then crept back up. She didn't want to interrupt. Because what she saw reminded her of two kindergartners at the art tables, each child bent over some work, each completely unaware of the other.

Which wasn't quite true.

Yes, Maura was working on a new minipage, and she was in that quiet, creative zone in her mind. But in the back of her thinking, she wished she could just walk over and stand behind Greg, watch him lay down those clear brush strokes and impossibly thin lines of ink. The kid was creative. Smart, too. And almost nice sometimes, like when he'd apologized in the lunchroom earlier in the day. And even when he was acting all tough and mean, he was still funny, like when he'd made her buy that ice-cream sandwich as part of the deal. Maura had to admit it: Sometimes Greg was actually sort of cute.

And Greg hadn't forgotten that Maura was sitting ten feet away. He glanced up at her every few minutes, just a flick of his eyes, as if to make sure she was still there. Her talent was amazing, and she seemed willing to try anything. Of course, any minute now, she
would probably go nuts again, and do something that would make him want to strangle her. But when she wasn't trying to rule the world, like when she kept her big mouth shut and just sat there wrinkling her nose at a drawing, Maura wasn't that bad to have around. And think of it—a girl who loved comics. How cool was that?

Almost an hour later Greg broke the silence. “There. Two pages and the cover, all inked. You get anything done?”

Maura nodded and stood up stiffly. “Two more pages.” She walked over and laid them on the Ping-Pong table.

Greg stood up and pulled Maura's new penciled pages closer. And he reached over and spread out his finished inking work in front of Maura. Then both of them leaned over the table, each inspecting the other's work. They were both impressed with what they saw, but there wasn't any gushing.

“Yeah, those are okay,” Greg said.

Maura nodded. “Yours too.”

The phone rang, and Maura said, “Bet you anything that's my mom.”

It was, and Maura had to leave.

“Here,” Greg said. “Take these home and do the lettering. You can borrow my pen.”

Maura nodded, and Greg sat down and went back to work.

She said, “I'm going to bring over more pictures tomorrow.”

Greg shrugged. “Whatever.” Then he thought a second and said, “But don't come until about two.” He had promised to wash both of the Jansens' cars before noon, and he had Saturday chores around home, too. Plus, both his brothers might be gone by two in the afternoon. They were always worth avoiding.

Maura gathered her things together and left. Greg didn't walk up to the front door with her, didn't even say good-bye. He was too busy.

Greg stayed at the Ping-Pong table almost another hour, and before he went up to say good night to his mom and dad, he had finished inking two more pages.

As he lay in bed looking at the patterns that the streetlight and tree branches made on his ceiling, Greg thought about the evening. Inking Maura's drawings had been so different from working on his own pictures. He felt like he'd had to be more careful with hers—careful
not to put too many of his own ideas into them, careful not to change her drawing style. And he had to admit it: The results were good.

But as he drifted toward the edge of sleep, there was something else he would not admit. Admitting this other thing would have been too dangerous. Because what Greg wouldn't admit was that he was almost sort of a little bit maybe halfway glad about Maura. Coming back. To work on her comic again. On Saturday. At two.

 

 

 

Greg started watching for Maura a little before two on Saturday, and when she arrived ten minutes later, he opened the front door before she could ring the bell. Edward was gone for the afternoon, but Ross was upstairs. He had done his morning chores and gone back to bed. It was always best to let sleeping big brothers stay that way. There'd be a lot less chance of getting teased about having a girl visit. Not that there was anything to tease about. Maura had only come over to work.

She had already finished the lettering on the cover and the two pages Greg had inked before she left Friday night. And she had also done the pencil sketches for all but three pages of the rest of the comic.

Maura followed Greg down the steps to the playroom. They went and sat in their places. Greg dipped his brush, Maura sharpened her
pencils, and they both got right to work. It was all business. There was no chat, barely a word between them for almost two hours.

The inking work went well, and by four thirty Greg had five more pages ready to letter. Maura had finished her last three drawings, and then she'd started in on more lettering. Greg was amazed at how much faster the work went when he didn't have to do every step by himself. The playroom was like a little comic-book factory.

Maura left a little after five because she had to go out to dinner with her family, but she took all the inked pages with her, and promised to bring them back Sunday afternoon with the lettering done.

It wasn't much fun to sit alone at the Ping-Pong table and grind out the pages, but Greg went to the basement again after dinner. He stayed on the job until he'd finished another three pages, and then he gave himself the rest of the night off to watch some TV.

Maura came over after lunch on Sunday, and she was pleased with herself. “See? I finished lettering all the pages you inked yesterday.”

“Except for these three I finished last night,”
Greg said. “So get back to work, you slacker.”

“Very funny.” Maura sat down, and so did Greg. Unscrewing the cap of the lettering pen, she said, “I bet I'll be done with my job before you're done with yours.”

Greg snorted. “Bet you won't.”

“How much?” said Maura.

“One ice-cream sandwich.”

Maura grinned. “You're on!” And they both bent over their work.

But two minutes later Maura looked up suddenly and said, “Hey! No fair—I
can't
finish first. I can't letter until
after
you ink!”

Greg nodded and smiled. “And you figured that out all by yourself? Good work. Just be glad I didn't bet you twenty dollars.”

It was almost three o'clock when Greg handed Maura the last inked page for lettering. It was the back cover of the comic, which was designed like a picture frame with information in the middle. Fifteen minutes later the words were all in place.

“Okay, now we trim each drawing to the exact size of the pages of the finished comic book.” Greg pulled two pairs of scissors out of his materials bin and handed one to Maura. “Trim along the pencil lines. And be careful.”

Ten minutes later there were sixteen small pages laid out in order on the Ping-Pong table, front cover to back cover.

“Now we've got to paste every piece of art into its right place on two master copy sheets—eight pages per sheet. I just use a glue stick. And the pages that look upside down and out of order, that all changes when you fold the printed sheet at the end.”

Maura nodded, her eyes bright as she took in each step of the process.

When both master copy sheets were pasted up, Greg said, “Time for the copier—and bring your scissors.” Maura followed him upstairs.

Once again Greg had hoped that both Ross and Edward would be absent. Only half his wish had come true. Ross was sprawled on the family-room couch, half asleep in front of a Clint Eastwood movie. A can of ginger ale and an empty bag of pretzels sat on the table in front of him. He opened one eye and saw
Maura, then looked at Greg and winked. “Hey, little buddy . . . I see your
lady
friend is here.”

Greg felt the urge to lash out, like he'd done with Eileen and Brittany at school on Friday morning. But this time he didn't take the bait. He said, “We're just copying some artwork. For a project we're doing. And it's gonna make noise. We have to.”

Ross heaved himself up off the couch, shut off the TV, burped, mumbled, “'Scuse me” in Maura's general direction, and went looking for a quieter place to waste another hour or two.

Greg said, “I got this paper that's good and bright, but it's not as thick as regular copy paper. Makes it easier to fold.”