Zinnia's Zaniness (11 page)

In fact, we missed the whole day at the beach.

But it was worth it to ensure that at least one part of our birthday would be the same as it always had been in our family.

***

We awoke the next morning, August 7, to a gorgeous summer day, the kind of day that would be perfect to spend at the beach. But we also awoke to...

"Why so glum, chums?" Pete asked.

It was true. We were glum again, depressed.

"I thought," Zinnia said, speaking for all of us, "that it would be best to be away from home for our eighth birthday—you know, because Mommy and Daddy aren't with us this year. But I'm finding that as tomorrow looms closer, the idea of being away from home on our birthday is even worse, like it's just one change too many in our lives."'

"Are you saying you want to go back early?" Pete asked.

"Yes, please," Zinnia said.

We gave her credit for having stellar manners in trying times.

"But we have this cottage for two more days," Mrs. Pete said gently.

"Even still," Zinnia said, "we would like to go today, if you don't mind."'

"Of course we don't mind," Pete said.

"Of course we don't," Mrs. Pete said. "We only ever wanted to make you happy."'

"So we'll just load up the car," Pete said.

"We won't forget Daddy Sparky and Mommy Sally," Mrs. Pete said.

"Or the
Summer Workbooks,
" Annie put in.

"And we'll be on our way," Pete said.

"Well," Mrs. Pete said, "after we drop the keys off with that man at the Little Hotel."

We were going home; we'd make it home in time for our eighth birthday.

We can't say we were cheerful, not at the idea of spending our first birthday ever without Mommy and Daddy. What a significant birthday to spend without them—the Eights turning eight!

But we were cheered.

***

"Ninety-nine boxes of juice on the wall, ninety-nine boxes of juice!"

Somehow, the trip coming home was never half so fun or exciting as the trip going away.

"I know what we can do to liven things up," Pete said.

He did?

"We could stop at that roadside attraction over there!" Pete suggested enthusiastically when none of us responded.

"What's a roadside attraction?" Petal asked as we piled out of the Hummer.

"It's something on the side of the road," Jackie explained, "almost like a little museum of stuff you'd never get the chance to see at home."

"While you lot look at the roadside attraction," Pete said, "I need to go make a phone call. Back in a tick!"

Huh. We wondered who he'd gone to call so quickly and why he couldn't use the phone in the Hummer.

"So what's this roadside attraction about?" Durinda asked.

"It says that it's a snail farm," Marcia said, reading the little sign.

"My, that looks lively," Rebecca said. "Are any of them even moving?"

***

"Fifty-three boxes of juice on the wall, fifty-three boxes of juice!"

Wow, we realized. That could get old quickly.

"Time for another roadside attraction," Pete said, "and another phone call."

"Who do you think he's calling?" Marcia wondered.

"And why doesn't he just use our car phone to do it?" Georgia wondered further.

We shrugged.

"What's this roadside attraction for?" Zinnia asked.

"I hope it's not another snail museum." Petal shuddered. "That last one was almost too much excitement for my delicate heart. I nearly fainted."

"Oh, look," Durinda said. "It's a combination museum. On one side, it's a museum of unusual buttons, while on the other, it's a museum of unusual kitchen appliances."

"I'll bet," Rebecca said, "our family could make a better roadside attraction."

***

All those stops for roadside attractions and one more phone call on Pete's part—as it turned out, the trip back was far longer than the trip out had been.

We arrived back at 6:00 a.m. on August 8, exactly two hours before the official beginning moment of our eighth birthday, 8:00 a.m. being the time Annie was born, with the rest of us being born a minute apart for the next seven minutes.

But that was all okay, because we were home.

Home.

TWELVE

But what was that banner doing draped across our front door? That banner that read—we squinted our eyes against the early-morning light—in tall, rainbow-colored letters...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, EIGHTS!

It hadn't been there when we left home six days ago. We were almost certain we would have noticed it. Had Carl the talking refrigerator and robot Betty somehow done this? But, we thought, Carl couldn't walk, and Betty's handwriting was never this neat.

"Surprise!" Will Simms shouted, coming around the house from one side.

"Surprise!" Mandy Stenko shouted, coming around the house from the other side.

"Happy birthday, Eights!" the McG and the Mr. McG shouted, coming from wherever such people come from.

"Surprise!" Will and Mandy and the McG and the Mr. McG and the Petes yelled all together.

"You did this," Zinnia said, turning to Pete. "You called them all from the road."

"Well, yes," Pete admitted, "but the missus helped me come up with the idea."

We were relieved he'd stopped calling her Mrs. Pete and was back to calling her the missus.

"Now let's go inside," Pete said, herding us along. "I suspect there are presents and a great big cake waiting for you in there."

***

The cake waiting for us was big and it was great too; the rainbow lettering on it said
Happy Birthday Annie, Durinda, Georgia, Jackie, Marcia, Petal, Rebecca, Zinnia!

We were grateful for that cake, the bigness and greatness of it, and we were doubly grateful that they'd spent the extra money to have all of our names spelled out rather than simply settling for the easier
Happy Birthday, Eights!
Seeing those separate names spelled out like that—it did make each of us feel special.

But we were too excited to open presents and eat cake, too excited from everything that had happened in the past week and everything that was going on. Besides, it wasn't our official birthday yet and wouldn't be until the big clock in the drawing room struck eight.

So instead of opening presents or eating cake, we spent a good bit of time filling in Will and Mandy and the McGs on what we'd been up to on our vacation.

"And then there was no room at the inns," Durinda said, proceeding to tell about that part.

"And then Annie made us do
Summer Workbook,
" Georgia said, proceeding to tell about that part.

We could see the McGs were both pleased and impressed about that part.

"And then I caught a shadow following me," Petal said, "that everyone thought was my shadow but that turned out to be a boy named George."

"And then," Zinnia said, "actually between some of that and before the rest of it, I called to the dolphins and they came and frolicked with me, with all of us."'

Oh, Zinnia.

We stared at her, disappointed in her insistence in keeping on with her fiction, particularly since company had come to call.

She stared back at us, clearly disappointed in our unwillingness to go along with her fiction.

"What?" she said, continuing to stare.

It was odd, how wounded and innocent she looked at that moment.

"Oh, fine," Zinnia said when no one else spoke. "I'm sick of people not believing me, never having faith in me." She paused. "Zither!" she called.

Zither came trotting in.

What was Zinnia doing? we wondered. Was she going to pretend she could talk to one of the cats again?

It was such an old trick; tired, really.

The other cats meandered in, so when Zinnia headed for the front door, Zither by her side, there was a rather large troop of humans and cats trailing behind them.

Where was Zinnia going? we wondered. Was she so angry, angry over our perfectly reasonable and understandable behavior, she was going to run away from home? Or pretend to, like she pretended she could talk to cats and a few other animals?

We watched, rather curiously we will admit, as Zinnia and Zither stepped over the threshold and out a few steps onto the front lawn. In fact, we were so curious, we crowded behind closely, forming an arc around them.

So we were there to see it when Zinnia looked to the sky and nodded slightly. Suddenly there came the sound of thunder, and a greater variety of birds than we'd ever imagined existed filled the whole sky overhead.

Before we could take in what we were seeing, Zinnia leveled her gaze at the street in front of us and then at the woods around us, and she nodded her head again.

And then came all manner of animals imaginable: cats and dogs and bunnies, to be sure, but also larger animals, like lions and tigers and bears and giraffes and kangaroos and pandas and strange animals we didn't even have names for, all of them filling our entire lawn.

We would have been scared, but we were too busy being awed, even Petal.

We were suddenly sure that, if there'd been an ocean nearby, Zinnia could have summoned all the creatures of the sea as well.

"Wow," Georgia whispered in Rebecca's general direction. "When we warned you that you'd better not keep teasing Zinnia about her thinking she could talk to the cats, because who knew what might happen if she really could talk to them, I never imagined it would turn out like this."

Rebecca gulped.

The truth is, none of us had imagined this. None of us
could
have imagined this.

But we should have. We saw that now.

Zinnia was right. We'd never believed what she said, never had faith in her. But we should have. For in the final analysis, what were the options? Zinnia, our sister, had claimed she could communicate with animals. We thought this meant that she was either lying—and we'd never had any other evidence that Zinnia was a liar—or crazy—and we'd never had any other evidence that Zinnia was crazy. That left only one option, really: Zinnia was telling the truth, and she'd been telling the truth all along.

We should have believed her from the start.

We should have had faith.

"Do you believe me now?" she asked quietly without turning around.

We nodded silently. Even though she couldn't see us, we were sure she got the message.

"Does anyone want to check the loose stone in the drawing room?" Zinnia asked, her back still to us.

We shook our heads. We didn't. We knew what any note now would say: that we were a bunch of big fat idiots. Zinnia had had her power all her life, had always known it without needing to be told she had it. It had taken us that long to get wise.

"I'll admit," Zinnia admitted quietly, turning to face us at last, "I always knew I could do...
things,
but even I never knew I could do something so large."'

Then Zinnia turned, facing forward again, and nodded her head one more time.

All the animals on the lawn parted, creating a path, and one last animal proceeded down that path toward us.

"What is it?" Marcia asked.

"It looks like a horse," Petal said, staring at the snow-white creature, "with a great big horn on its head."

"I don't think it's a horse," Jackie said.

"It's a unicorn," Zinnia informed us in a hushed voice, "the last of its kind in the whole world."

On any other day prior to this one, we might not have believed Zinnia.

But on this day we did.

This really was wonder.

We watched as the unicorn swayed the last few steps to where Zinnia stood, and that's when we noticed the saddle across its back. To the riderless saddle was attached a satchel.

Saddle, satchel—we were tempted to try to say that five times fast but we refrained from doing so.

"Oh," Zinnia said mildly, reaching to take an item sticking out from the satchel, "the unicorn must be here to bring me my gift."'