Andi Unexpected (8 page)

“Andi, can you answer that?” Amelie called out.

I sighed and stood up, putting Dr. Girard’s books back on the shelf where I’d found them. Amelie couldn’t answer the door because she’d wrapped herself into a pretzel and would snap off a toe if she tried. And she tells me yoga is relaxing.

I opened the front door and gaped.

“Just the person I want to see,” Dr. Girard said in a fake-friendly voice.

“Andi, who is it?”
Amelie called. I heard a thump from the living room, and a few seconds later, Amelie stood beside me. “Anthony? What are you doing here?” She looked from Dr. Girard to me.

“And hello to you too, Amelie.” He eyed her outfit. “I see you’re making the most of your summer break.”

“I’m trying to. Can I help you with something?”

Dr. Girard smiled without showing any teeth. “In truth, I’m not here to talk with you.” Dr. Girard adjusted the collar of his polo shirt. “I’d like to speak with your niece, Andi.”

Amelie blinked. “Andi? Why?” Her brow wrinkled. “It’s not because—”

“I met Dr. Girard at the Bottling Museum last week. Remember? I know I told you that, Aunt Amelie,” I said in a rush because I knew she was about to ask Dr.
Girard if he knew I’d followed him into his office during lunch.

“That’s right,” Dr. Girard said. “And I was impressed by her keen interest in local history.” He smiled at me. “I thought she might be able to help me with my latest book project.”

“Which is?” Amelie asked.

“A book on children of the Great Depression.”

I had been right. Dr. Girard had to be here because of Andora. But how did he know that Andora lived during the Great Depression? Mr. Finnigan. He must have told Dr. Girard about Andora.

“Can I come inside to discuss this matter further?”

Amelie winced. “Why don’t you two talk outside on the front porch?” She gave Dr. Girard a small smile. “Andi and her sister are cleaning out the attic, so the house is a mess right now.”

Dr. Girard pulled at his collar, his hair was starting to curl up from the humidity. “Very well.”

“Go ahead and take a seat, Anthony. I’ll get you two some iced tea,” Amelie said.

I stepped onto the front porch, and Dr. Girard sat down in the rocking chair at the end of the porch. I perched on the porch swing, kicked off the porch floorboards hard, and the swing flew back with a protesting creak. I swung my legs up on the bench and let it rock me back and forth like the waves that carried the red and blue sailboats along my father’s wallpaper.

Dr. Girard cleared his throat. He pulled a tiny memo pad out of his jacket pocket. I wrinkled my nose when I noticed he was wearing black socks and sandals.

“So, Andi, this should be quick. I have just a few questions for you to answer. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”

Sure you don’t
, I thought unkindly. I tried to squelch the irritable thoughts. My mother would have said that I make too many snap judgments and I should give Dr. Girard the benefit of the doubt, whatever that meant. He already had my doubt.

“I must admit that I was surprised to see you and your friend Kevin in the museum on such a beautiful summer day. I imagine most of your peers were out swimming or playing baseball.”

“Colin,” I corrected.

“Of course. Colin. I apologize,” he said smoothly. He pulled a pen from his shirt pocket. “What brought you to the Killdeer Historical Society?”

“Colin wanted me to see it.” If we were going to talk about Andora, Dr. Girard would have to mention her first.

“Ah! Should I be talking to Colin, then?”

I shrugged. “If you want to. He lives right next door.” I pointed toward the Carters’ house.

He tapped his chin with a forefinger. “I remember Mr. Finnigan mentioned that you children wanted to search for a relative in the historical society archives. Is that right?”

The hair on my arms stood up on end. My porch swing lost its momentum and slowed to a gentle sway. I let a leg fall over the side and gave the floorboards another push with my toes.

“Can you tell me about this relative?”

“I don’t really know anything about her.”

My mind was screaming,
I was right! He
is
interested in Andora!
But I did my best to keep a calm expression on my face.

Dr. Girard clicked his pen. “Wasn’t she the real reason Colin took you to the museum?”

“How would you know that?”

He smiled coolly. “Mr. Finnigan is a good friend of mine.”

I looked at my leg dangling from the swing.

Dr. Girard wrote something in his tiny memo pad again. “You know, Andi, I could really use your help.”

“You could?” I asked.

“I don’t know how much your aunt has told you about me …”

“Just that you’re a history professor at Mike Pike.”

He winced. “I see you’ve learned the local nickname for the university. Anyway, for you to have an appreciation for research at such a young age, you must be a perceptive, intelligent girl. Your aunt may not have told you, but I’m a bit of an expert in Ohio history, and I’ve written books on the topic.”

“She did.” I didn’t add that I’d been leafing through those very books the moment he rang our doorbell.

“Excellent. I’d like to tell you about my project on Depression-era children, and then you can tell me yours.”

I sat up straighter in my seat. My feet hit the wooden boards of the porch with a thud. I swallowed hard. I didn’t tell him that I already knew he was writing a book about children from the Great Depression
because I’d overheard him talking to his agent about it. “Why do you think I’d know anything about that?”

“Mr. Finnigan has assisted me in my research for years. He mentioned that you visited the museum to search the archives for a lost relative born in 1929, and the relative’s name was Andora.”

My heart raced. What could he tell me about Andora? Did he know what happened to her? I had to know. “What do you know about Andora?”

He gave me a wry smile. “Why don’t you tell me how you learned about her first?”

I wondered if I should tell him what I knew. If I didn’t, there was no chance he’d tell me what he knew about Andora. I was pretty sure Dr. Girard wouldn’t offer information without getting something in return. I tried to look him in the eye, but he was wearing his dark sunglasses again.

And then I made my decision. It was the only option I had if I wanted to learn more.

It took only a few minutes
for me to tell Dr. Girard what little information I was willing to share. I told him about the trunk, the baby clothes, the wooden blocks, and the birth announcement. I said nothing about the photograph of Andora or the encounter with Miss Addy.

Amelie appeared on the front porch with a tray of iced tea and Girl Scout Cookies. She simply raised her eyebrows when she heard me talking to Dr. Girard about Andora.

The history professor accepted a perspiring glass of iced tea from my aunt and removed his sunglasses. He took a gulp from his drink and said, “I’d like to see the items in the trunk and the cubby where you found the trunk.”

“Umm …” I stalled and chewed the inside of my
cheek. “The attic is a mess right now. I mean, it’s worse than downstairs. It’ll take me some time to move stuff around so you can reach the cubby.”

“I don’t mind a mess.” He glanced down at his small memo pad and flipped through the pages. He’d taken notes so detailed that it seemed he’d written every word I’d said.

Part of me wanted to keep Andora to myself. I found her first. I shared her name. And what had Dr. Girard given me in return? “So what do
you
know about Andora?” I asked.

Dr. Girard waved his hand. “Not much. That’s why I’m here. Patrick Finnigan told me about her because he knew I was working on this piece about children during the Great Depression, and he thought she’d be an interesting addition to my book.”

I felt myself deflate. “But you said you do know something about her.”

He nodded and smirked. “And I will tell you what little I know just as soon as I have a look at that trunk.”

I gritted my teeth.

“I’ll stop by tomorrow afternoon. That should give you plenty of time to tidy up the attic.” He rose to his feet and brushed imaginary crumbs off his pants.

With my foot, I pushed off the porch floorboards hard, sending the old swing careening backward.

Amelie stood. “Andi didn’t agree to show you the attic yet, Anthony.”

I still wanted to know what Dr. Girard knew about Andora, and showing him the attic might be my only means of getting that information. “It’s all right, Amelie,” I said, bringing the swing to a halt with my
foot. I stood and said, “Two o’clock tomorrow should be fine, Dr. Girard.”

Amelie turned to me. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” I said with more conviction than I felt.

Amelie nodded and turned back to Dr. Girard. “What exactly do you plan to do with the information Andi has shared with you, Anthony?”

Dr. Girard’s thick brows waggled above his dark sunglasses. “Like I told your niece when I arrived, I am currently working on a new project about children during the Great Depression. It will include letters and short biographies of children from all over the state of Ohio. If we can find enough information about Andora to include her, she would be one of two dozen children mentioned in the book. I’ve wanted to write this book for a long time. If I wait too much longer, many of the elderly adults who were children in the 1930s will be gone. I’ll return tomorrow afternoon, Andi.” He stood and grabbed a cookie from the tray before he left.

Colin froze where he stood in our yard as Dr. Girard headed in the opposite direction and down the sidewalk toward his car. As Dr. Girard drove away, Colin ran up the porch steps.

“I hope you won’t be disappointed by what you learn from Dr. Girard, Andi,” Amelie said before she went back inside.

“Is that who I think it was?” Colin removed his glasses and wiped them on his T-shirt.

“Yep,” I said. “And he’ll be back tomorrow afternoon.”

Colin grabbed a handful of Girl Scout Cookies from the tray. “Tell me everything.” He pulled the casebook from his backpack.

I told Colin about my encounter with Dr. Girard. And after a moment’s hesitation, I told him about following Dr. Girard into his office earlier that day. Colin wrote down every word.

During my story Colin had interrupted me every few seconds with questions, but suddenly he got quiet.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Why didn’t you tell me you followed Dr. Girard?”

“I don’t know. I planned to tell you. I wanted to think it through first.”

“We could have thought it through together. I thought we were a team.” He frowned.

“It’s no big deal.” I said.

“It is a big deal,” he insisted. “It makes me think you don’t trust me. And I could have helped you follow Dr. Girard, too.”

“It’s not like we both could have gotten up and said we were going to the bathroom without it looking like something was up.”

Colin snapped the casebook closed. “I was the one who took you to the museum in the first place. If it hadn’t been for me, you wouldn’t even know Dr. Girard.”

“You can’t take credit for that. We met him there by accident.”

Colin folded his arms.

Bergita’s van turned into the Carters’ driveway, and Bethany jumped out of the van. She was smiling as she
ran across the lawn, gripping her art case. She pulled up short when she saw Colin and me frowning at each other. “What happened? Did you find out Andora was sold to the circus?”

Colin ran down the steps and back to his own house. Bethany watched Colin go. “I guess I’m not the only one who gets tired of you.”

Before I could respond, she slipped into the house.

That night, I sat in the kitchen long after I should have gone to bed, waiting for Bethany to fall asleep. I didn’t want to talk to her about Colin, or Andora, or most of all about our parents.

I wiped a damp rag over a silver picture frame that I’d found under the bed in the attic. Carefully, I removed the photograph of Andora from the safety of the casebook and placed it in the frame. I set the framed picture on the kitchen counter.

“Who are you? What happened to you? Where are you?” I asked.

Andora stared back at me but said nothing. I hadn’t expected an answer, but I wouldn’t have turned one down either.

Mr. Rochester jumped on the counter and nosed the frame.

“Mr. Rochester, you’re not supposed to be up here.”

“Meow!”

I petted his back. “I promise I won’t tell as long as you won’t tell Amelie how late I stayed up.”

The cat nudged my hand with his head, and I took that as him saying we had a deal.

I picked up the frame and turned off the kitchen
light. With the lights off in my own house, I could see into Colin’s house next door. I tip-toed to the window, clutching the picture to my chest. Through the window, I saw the Carter family’s den. Colin’s parents were home. The slim, blond couple sat side by side on the couch reading the newspaper. Colin stepped into the room and asked them something. Colin’s father shook his head. Colin’s face fell. He turned and left the room. His mother never looked up from the paper.

I swallowed as I remembered the last time I’d burst into my parents’ study on the night before they left for their last trip to Central America.

“Mom and Dad! I got an A+ on my science test! Mr. Pearce said it was the best score in the class!” I held the test out in front of me for them to see.

“That’s nice, honey,” my mother said. Then she’d turned and asked my father, “Art, have you seen my field guide to succulents?”

He was bent over his microscope. “I hope you didn’t leave it at the office. We don’t have time to swing by campus on the way to the airport.”

“Do you want to see my test?” I asked.

“Later, Andi,” Mom said.

My arms fell to my side as I listlessly held the test in my left hand.

Dad didn’t look up from his microscope. “We can see it before we leave. Your mother and I are taking the red-eye tonight.”

I crumpled the edge of my test in my hand.

One of Bethany’s paintings hung on the wall behind
Mom’s desk. Bethany didn’t understand. I wasn’t the favorite child at all, not even close.

I’d woken up the next day with the test under my pillow. They never did see it.

I went to bed then feeling sorry for Colin, and feeling angry at and sorry for myself.