The Seventh Wish (11 page)

He picks up the auger and starts redrilling a hole that iced over during the weekend.

I stare at him and try to figure out how I can unwish this mess I made.

“Charlie, you okay?” Mrs. McNeill says. “You seem a million miles away.”

“How long does basketball season last?” I ask.

She looks over at Drew. “Too long, if you ask me,” she whispers. “I talked with his parents about letting him quit, but they say he made a commitment. I suppose it'll be a character builder for him. Ready to fish?” She hands me a pole and helps me drill a new hole in the ice.

It's been so cold the past week that the ice is more than a foot thick now, and a whole ice-fishing village has sprung up in the bay. Some people who spend all day on the ice haul out tiny little houses, called shanties, to sit in. Some are just a few sheets of plywood nailed together, but others are painted, with shingles on the roofs and pickup trucks parked outside.

Finally, Mrs. McNeill's auger makes it through, and
water splashes up onto the ice. “We're not very far out today,” I say, lowering my line into the dark hole. I want to fish now and forget about Drew and basketball and the feis where I didn't get to dance. I just need a good day after the crummy weekend I've had. The only good thing about missing the feis is that now I have the rest of the winter to raise more money for my dress.

“Should be all right, but if not, we can go out a bit more.” Mrs. McNeill squints toward the island, where the ice has pushed itself up into a ridge. “Though I'm not thrilled with that pressure ridge by our old spot. Those can make the ice so uneven. Years ago, Drew's grandpa tried to drive a four-wheeler over one and found himself dangling by his back wheels, staring into a crack about four feet across.”

“Wow! What'd he do?”

“He wasn't alone, thank goodness. His buddies had brought out a couple of two-by-fours in case they got into trouble, so they managed to lift it back onto more solid ice. Still . . .” She shakes her head and looks down at the hole she just drilled. “I think we'll stay close for today.”

She sets up pretty close to me—too close, Drew would complain—but I don't mind. When the fish aren't biting, it's hard to sit so long without talking. And I'm thankful for anything that takes my mind off my rotten wishing skills.

“Will you tell me more about Drew's grandpa?” I ask when Mrs. McNeill is set up and sitting on her bucket. “I only met him once, and it was after he was sick. I can't picture him driving four wheelers over the ice.” But I know Drew remembers a grandpa from before that. One he says was the coolest, funniest guy in the world.

“We used to have the best time, skating and four wheeling and fishing,” Mrs. McNeill says. She pulls her charm necklace out from under her scarf and turns it over and over between her fingers. “We'd bring Drew's mom—that was before she got all lawyery on us and started wearing suits instead of snow pants—and spend pretty much the whole weekend out on the ice.” She looks half happy, half sad, remembering.

“When did he get sick?” I ask. There's a little tug on my line, but when I tug back, nothing's there.

“Got a bite?”

I shake my head. “Musta lost it.”

She bounces her line and looks out over the whiteness that stretches all the way to the Vermont shore. “Thing is with alcoholics, there's not a day you can point to when everything changes.” She sighs, then looks at me. “You knew Drew's grandpa was an alcoholic?”

I shake my head. I didn't.

She nods slowly. “A lot of people didn't know because he went to work and kept his job and seemed fine most of
the time, I guess. But he was struggling a long while before he got sick.”

“That must have been hard,” I say.

“It was. But you get to a point and realize it's out of your control. There's nothing you can do for a person when—oh! Hold on!” She gives her pole a yank, stands up, and reels it in. The line bends more than it usually would, and when she pulls in her fish, it's the biggest one we've caught.

“Woo-hoo! Look at this one!” she calls to Drew, holding it up on the line.

“Think it's more'n four pounds?” he calls over. “I think that's the best they got in the tournament so far.”

Mrs. McNeill lifts the fish up and down a few times, testing its weight. “It'll be close.” She puts it in the bucket, sits down, and works a new minnow onto her hook. “Anyway,” she says. “Yes, it was hard. I was sad a lot because I so wanted to fix him. But then I decided I needed to keep busy. I was still sad, and I made space for that sadness, but I didn't invite it in to take over the house, you know?”

I nod, even though I'm not sure I do.

“There's a prayer that helped me a lot back then. I always mess up the words,” she says, “Something like . . . Lord, please give me patience to accept what I cannot change, courage to change what I can, and wisdom to know the difference.”

“Can you say that again?” I ask, and she does. “I like that. It's kind of what I'm doing here.” I nod at my pole, still quiet in the water. “I can't turn back time and go to the feis that I missed, but I can keep fishing to earn more money for—oh!” I feel a tug on my line then and reel in a medium-sized perch. “It's no four-pounder, but I'll take it.”

Mrs. McNeill nods. “Half a dress-crystal there?”

I look at the fish. It's pretty small. “Maybe a tenth of one. But every little fish counts.”

I still wish I'd made a better wish so I could have danced in Montreal. But wishing aloud for that sort of thing would probably make a bigger mess, so I keep that one to myself.

I've given up on the idea of wishing away Drew's basketball mess too, even though he hates it and hasn't gotten any better. His dad won't let him quit, but Drew's talking with the coach about maybe doing something else with the team instead of actually handling the ball. He's hoping for a job keeping stats, and maybe his dad will be settle for that. Either way, I've decided that trying to fix Drew's problem with the fish isn't worth the risk of messing up again. With my luck, I'd make some dumb wish and Drew would end up twelve feet tall.

I'm not even trying to catch the wish fish anymore.

The hole in the shallow water by the point freezes over. Sometimes it's hard not to think about that sparkly eyed fish beneath the ice, but mostly, I focus on the bigger fish that can help pay for my dress.

I like Mrs. McNeill's idea about keeping busy, so that's what I do.

I offer to watch Catherine's flour baby after school during drama club because every time she leaves it in one of the auditorium seats to watch the rehearsal, the stage crew hides it from her. They think it's hilarious. But Catherine was late for her trombone lesson once because she had to look for Meredith for twenty minutes before she found her back in the lighting booth. So now I babysit after school every Thursday.

Dasha and I are stuck in the Advanced Beginner dance class for now, but we find online videos and start teaching ourselves the Novice dances. That way we'll be ready when we move up.

There's science fair to think about too. Now that Dasha passed her language test and doesn't have to be in ESL classes anymore, she has science with Catherine and me. We're going to work together; we just have to agree on a project. Catherine found some report from the United Nations that said people ought to consider adding bugs to their diets to help solve the world's food crisis. She thought
that would be a cool project, but I'm not sure I'm ready to be called a bug eater for the rest of my life.

I've also kept busy fishing. Mrs. McNeill says this is the best ice season Lake Champlain has seen in twenty-five years.

The last day of February is my best fishing day yet. I pry the lid off my bucket to show Billy, and he whistles. “Those are some beauties. Fish fry tonight!” He hands me a crisp ten dollar bill to add to my savings. That brings my dress fund to five hundred fifty dollars—three hundred from Mom and Dad and two hundred fifty from ice fishing.

We're quiet on the walk home until Drew asks, “Do you know how to escape from an elephant stampede?”

“No idea,” his nana says.

“Climb a tree,” Drew says. “But if it's a stampede of giraffes, you try to get to water.”

“Won't they just wait for you like the killer bees?” I ask.

Drew shakes his head. “Giraffes hate water. Unless they're thirsty and need a drink.”

I nod. “Have you found anything in that book about surviving basketball season?”

“Not yet,” he says. “But I did get Dad to agree that I don't have to play in games as long as I do something else for the team.”

“That's great! Did you get a job keeping stats?”

“Not exactly.” Mrs. McNeill's trying not to laugh. “He's going to be the mascot.”

“Wait,” I say. “The Lakeside Champs' mascot is . . . You're gonna be the lake monster?”

“Yeah. I'm Champ. They got this big fuzzy green costume for me.” Drew kicks at some ice at the edge of the sidewalk. “I tried it on today. It's kinda hot and smelly in there, but I guess anything's better than playing. At least nobody boos the lake monster.”

“You should come to one of the games, Charlie,” Mrs. McNeill says as I turn to head up my driveway.

The thought of Drew dressed up like Champ the lake monster makes me want to laugh, but I'm the one who got him into this whole mess, so that would be pretty mean.

“I'll try to make the next game.” I wave and head inside my house. The kitchen smells like roast chicken, and for the first time in days, I'm not stressed out about my fish wishes. Even though I messed up, things are working out okay. I'm helping Dasha with her classes. Drew will be all right as the lake monster, even though he's not thrilled about his smelly costume. And Bobby . . . well, Bobby is still swooning, but he's not all that bad.

“Hey, Mom! Hey, Dad!” They must be upstairs or in the basement doing laundry. I kick off my boots and sit down on the mudroom bench to wiggle out of my snow pants.
Denver trots up to say hi and lick my hands. They probably taste all fishy.

Mom's cell phone rings on the kitchen counter, and I glance down at it. The number has Abby's area code at school. It's not her, but I know I need to get it in case it's the health center and she's sick again.

When I answer, a woman's voice says, “Hello, Mrs. Brennan?”

“No, but hold on. I'll get her.” I holler upstairs. “Mom! Phone!”

Mom comes down with a pile of laundry, sets it down, and takes the phone from me. “Hello?” she says, and then listens.

Dad comes downstairs with another basket of clothes and starts for the basement, but Mom holds up her finger for him to stay. For a long time, she listens.

Then she says, “I'm sorry . . . that's . . . that's impossible. Okay . . . okay . . .” She listens for another few minutes. She blinks a lot. Finally, she says, “Okay . . . yes . . . but she'll be all right?” Mom's quiet for a minute then. A tear slides down her cheek. She takes a deep breath. “Okay . . . okay, yes. Thank you very much.” She hangs up the phone and looks at Dad. “That was the university health center. They've got Abby.”

“Is she okay?”

Mom blinks fast. “Charlie, go up to your room, please.”

“Why? Isn't Abby all right?”

“She'll be fine. But Dad and I need to talk. Now go.” Mom points, and I go. But I stop at the top of the stairs and squat down to listen.

“What's going on? Is it her stomach again?” Dad says.

“No,” Mom says, and even upstairs, I can hear the deep, shaky breath she takes. “They say she's been using heroin.”

Chapter 11

Signing the Car

Mom and Dad move into the living room and talk in quieter voices that I can't hear anymore. That's fine, because it's not true anyway.