Bronze Pen (9781439156650) (14 page)

A
UDREY'S NEXT FEW DAYS HAD A KIND
of circular feeling, going around and around without really getting anywhere. Like a merry-go-round, or maybe more like a roller coaster. Exciting ups followed by depressing downs.

One of the ups was when Hannah's new boss said she could have a week off to go to San Francisco with John. And then came a down, when there wasn't enough money to pay for the airplane tickets or a place near the hospital where Hannah could stay.

At that point John started saying he thought they ought to forget about the whole thing, but Hannah wouldn't hear of it. Neither would Audrey.

But then things were up again when Dr. Marc Richards found a church near the hospital that had a room it loaned to people who needed a place to stay for a few days. And some of the people at the
Greendale Times
put John
in touch with a support group for writers and editors, that came up with a loan that would cover some of the other expenses.

That left only one problem, but it was a big one. At least some people seemed to think it was. That was the problem of what to do about Audrey. Not to mention Beowulf and Sputnik.

Audrey didn't think that should be a problem at all. After all, she was the one who, for a long time now, had taken care of both Beowulf and Sputnik. And as for feeding herself, she knew how to make a lot of sandwiches and a few other things. She said so over and over again, but nobody would listen. Nobody except Lizzie, that is.

Lizzie's solution was that she could move to the Abbotts for the week, to keep Audrey company and help with the chores. But neither the Abbotts nor the Moraleses liked the idea at all.

“What's the matter with parents?” Lizzie said on the phone after her mother and Audrey's mother decided not to accept Lizzie's offer. “They want us to learn to take care of ourselves and be independent, and then when you try to, they tell you to sit down and shut up.”

And that was just the beginning. Lizzie had a lot more things to say the next day when she came to visit. Things like, “Okay. I get it. They just don't trust us. Oh, they don't say that, of course, but that's what it amounts
to.” She walked around Audrey's room, stomping her feet and throwing her arms around. “What do they think we're going to do the moment they take their eyes off us, I wonder? Start shoplifting or smoking pot? Turn into vampires?”

But a little later that same day, while Lizzie was there at the Abbotts', her mother called with another idea. One that Audrey's parents seemed to like a lot better. What she suggested this time was that her older daughter, Rita, who was nineteen, could stay with Audrey while her parents were away. Audrey wasn't too wild about the idea. It seemed a little too much like having a babysitter. And Lizzie was furious.

“She'll drive you nuts,” she told Audrey. “Believe me, I know. We've shared a room all my life. At least, I get to share it if I don't ever wrinkle a pillow or drop a scrap of paper on the floor. Rita is a world-class neatnik. And she
hates
animals. Beowulf will drive her crazy, if she doesn't drive him crazy first.”

But nobody listened to either Audrey or Lizzie, and that same night Rita moved into the Abbotts' guest room, and the next morning Audrey's parents left for San Francisco.

That first morning Lizzie's prediction about what living with Rita would be like seemed to be right on. Rita spent the morning cleaning house like crazy and looking like she'd just seen a man-eating tiger every time Beowulf
got anywhere near her. And when Lizzie came over for lunch, she and Rita got into a big argument about who was going to do the dishes.

Then there was a phone call from Audrey's mom saying that they had arrived safely at the hospital and that John seemed to have made it through the flight and the ambulance ride to the hospital in pretty good shape. Audrey knew that old Dr. Richards had told her mother that he didn't think John was strong enough to stand the trip, so that was a real relief.

After she'd hung up the phone, Audrey couldn't help celebrating by twirling around a few times, and of course Beowulf joined in, bouncing around the room like an oversized jackrabbit. Lizzie joined in too, and the three of them bounced around the kitchen several times while Rita stood behind the table, clutching a dishtowel to her chest. But by that evening she seemed to be a little less panicky. At least she stopped trying to hide every time Beowulf looked in her direction.

The next morning Audrey's mom called to say that the doctors were doing a lot of tests and the operation wouldn't be until Wednesday. She sounded upbeat and cheerful, or else like someone who was trying to sound upbeat and cheerful.

On Wednesday, Audrey stayed near the phone most of the day, but wouldn't you know it, she and Beowulf had just gone out to the garden for a minute to pick some
tomatoes when the call from Hannah finally came. So it was Rita who answered the phone, and when Audrey came in, Rita told her that her mother had called and said her father was still in intensive care but that he was doing as well as could be expected.

Audrey was disappointed—and worried. She'd been hoping to be able to talk to her father himself by then, and she didn't like the sound of “as well as could be expected.” She plopped the tomatoes down on the table and went to her room to think. Of course Beowulf came too, and they sat down on the floor together. A few minutes later Rita came in.

“Look,” Rita said, “I don't think you should worry. I'm sure everything is going fine.” She went over to Audrey's bed, walking right past Beowulf 's nose without even noticing, and sat down. “You know, I'm planning to go to medical school,” she said, “and I've read a lot about different medical problems. It takes a while for everything to get working again after the kind of operation your dad just had. I'm sure he's doing just fine.”

Audrey was relieved—and surprised. She certainly wouldn't have guessed that Rita was going to be a doctor. “Lizzie never told me,” she said. “Does Lizzie know you're going to be a doctor?”

Rita shrugged. “I've told her so,” she said. “But maybe she wasn't listening.” She smiled. “I'm not blaming her. It's just that a lot of the time there's so much talk going on
around our house that it's hard to hear what people are actually saying.”

The next time Lizzie came over, Audrey told her about Rita wanting to be a doctor and Lizzie seemed surprised.

“I guess that explains it,” Lizzie told Rita.

“Explains what?” Rita asked.

“Why you're such a neatnik,” Lizzie said. “You know, like positively antiseptic.”

That same afternoon Audrey showed Rita some of Lizzie's best caricatures, and Rita said she knew Lizzie liked to draw but she never realized how talented she was. “I guess that explains it,” she said.

“Explains what?” Lizzie asked.

“Why you're such a slob.” Rita was grinning. “I've heard that all great artists tend to be slobs.”

That conversation happened on Friday, and it was the very next day when Audrey answered the phone and it was her dad. He sounded great. He said that they were going to fly home on Sunday and that he'd be back working at the
Greendale Times
before the summer was over.

And he was.

Also, by the time the summer was over, Audrey had started a new novel and two short stories, and she and Lizzie were working on another picture book for beginning readers. A picture book about an extraordinary white duck.

 

Audrey went on looking for the bronze pen for a long time, but she never found it. However, she nearly always remembered to write wisely and to good purpose. And she never forgot that any furred or feathered creature could be an important messenger.