Finding Fortune (10 page)

My breath caught. Nora might as well have plunged an arrow into me and twisted it. “But she
does
love him!” I cried. “She said so … in his birthday card.”

Nora heaved out a sigh. “I can't think about this right now. I have to go or I'll be late for work.”

I watched helplessly as she slipped through my door. What was going on? Was I the only one who hadn't jumped ship on our family?

Mom called me down for lunch a few minutes later, and I decided to find out once and for all. When I came into the kitchen she was standing at the sink washing dishes, and a turkey sandwich made exactly the way I liked it—toasted with honey mustard and pickles—sat waiting for me in my spot at the island. “So just tell me,” I said to the back of my mother's head as I hoisted myself onto the bar stool and took a bite of her peace offering. “Are you and Dad getting a divorce or what?”

Mom's shoulders went as limp as the dishrag she was wringing dry. She gazed out at the backyard beyond the kitchen window. “I don't know, Ren,” she replied, “but that stunt you pulled this weekend isn't making things any easier for anybody.” She turned to face me, leaning against the sink with her arms crossed. “Honestly, if you were going to run away, why didn't you go to Uncle Spence's or one of your friends' houses? Why would you pick that run-down old school with all those bizarre characters hanging around? Who knows what could have happened if I hadn't come when I did?”

“They're not bizarre,” I said hotly. “Hildy's grandson is spending his whole summer there. Do you think his dad would let him stay if it wasn't safe?” Each time I thought of the school felt like a fresh slap. All night long I had tossed and turned, picturing those shocked faces at Hildy's dinner table staring up at me. I'd never been so mortified. But even worse, I'd never get to go back—to finish exploring the school and help Hugh solve the mystery of the missing treasure.

“Did you call Dad and tell him what happened?” I asked.

“Of course not. What good would that have done? He would have been worried sick, with no way to help.”

I pushed my plate away. “I bet you didn't call him because he would have asked why I ran away and then you would've had to tell him about Rick.”

“Ren.” Mom looked up at the ceiling in frustration. “There's nothing to tell about Rick. The issues between your father and me started a long time ago—way before Rick ever moved to town. And like I've told you before, Rick and I are
friends
. That's it!”

“Yeah, and you also told me you weren't going to hang out with him anymore!”

“I know I did,” Mom said quietly. “And that's something I
do
want to apologize for—for agreeing to such a silly promise. It would be ridiculous for me to tell Rick that we can't be friends. That would imply that there's something going on between us, and there's not.”

“Oh, really?” I scoffed.

Mom grabbed the dishrag again and began scrubbing at an invisible spot on the counter in front of me. “Honestly, Ren, this has got to stop. It isn't healthy, this silly obsessing over Rick. I can't have you sitting around here all summer monitoring my every move and brooding over whether it means anything. You need to keep busy. That's why I decided to sign you up for that camp that we talked about. I sent the form in a few days ago and I was just waiting for a good time to tell you.”

“What?” I stiffened on my stool. “What camp?”

Mom didn't answer. She turned back to the sink to rinse out the dishrag.

“No, Mom,” I moaned over the sound of the running water. “You didn't. Not SAG. I already told you I didn't want to go!”

SAG. The Summer Academy for the Gifted. By invitation only. Guaranteed to stimulate talented young minds … and guaranteed to be just as terrible as it sounded. I already knew two kids in my class who had signed up the day after their letters arrived. Olivia Pasternak and Arnold Morales. No way was I spending five weeks of my summer with a boy whose favorite hobbies were topping his latest Rubik's Cube time and turning his eyelids inside out.

“Please, Mom,” I said desperately as I hurried around the island. “I'm already signed up for soccer camp at the end of July. And what about swimming lessons? I'll be plenty busy.” Mom's profile remained stony. “I could even do those art classes at the rec center. Anything! But I'm not going to that stupid SAG!”

Mom whirled around to face me. “Listen, young lady. You are in no position to tell me what you will and won't do this summer. You're signed up for the Academy and that's it. The bus picks up kids at the junior high tomorrow at nine a.m. and you're going to be on it!”

Young lady
was a sure sign that there was no use arguing anymore. I stormed back to my room and stayed huddled on my bed, scribbling in my little-kid diary with the gold latch and tiny key that somebody had given me a few birthdays ago. I'd barely used up twenty pages. And most of those were this year, since I only wrote in it when I had a crush on somebody or when I was mad.

But that afternoon I filled up ten whole pages on Mom and Rick and SAG, and then I found myself thinking about Fortune again and filling another page with doodles of the school and Wayne the donkey and the leopard cats. The hours limped by until Mom finally flung open my door and ordered me to go “get some fresh air” and to weed the flower beds out front while I was at it. After the dim light of my bedroom, the sky was such a dazzling blue that I felt like a groundhog poking out of its hole as I sat in a scraggly patch of weeds, ripping the tops off dandelions. I was trying not to think about the school or my friends swooshing down waterslides when a voice called from the sidewalk.

“Hey, Ren.”

I didn't turn around.

“I fixed your bike tire for you.”

Now I'd have to talk to him. I slowly looked up from my weeding, making my eyes into slits. Rick was already walking my bike up the driveway. He was decked out in his wraparound sunglasses and flashy running gear and he had Chauncey, his Portuguese water dog, with him. I stood up and went down to meet him halfway. “Thanks,” I muttered as I took the handlebars. Chauncey whimpered and lunged toward me, but I willed myself not to pet him or meet Rick's eye. Unfortunately Chauncey was about the cutest dog I had ever seen—a squirmy black puff with markings like white socks on his feet. I had loved playing with him before Rick's secret mission to steal my mother became not so secret.

I started pushing my bike back up the driveway. “I'm glad you're home safe,” Rick said behind me. Mom must have been giving him a minute-by-minute update on my whereabouts yesterday. He raised his voice over Chauncey's whining. “Your mother was really worried about you, you know.”

I could feel the blood rushing to my face as I parked my bike by the flower bed. It was something Dad would have said if he were here right now. And Rick had no business standing in our driveway trying to sound like my dad.

“Yes, I did know that,” I shot out before I could stop myself. “And did
you
know my father gets home from Afghanistan in thirty-four days? He's moving in here again as soon as he gets back.”

I could see how shocked Rick was, even through his mirrored sunglasses. But he didn't have time to answer. The screen door creaked open behind me and Mom stepped out on the porch. I quickly bent down, pretending to focus on a stubborn hunk of crabgrass.

“Hey there, Rick,” she called. “You fixed Ren's bike already? That's wonderful.” I let out the breath I'd been holding. She hadn't heard me.

“No problem,” Rick answered in a tight voice.

“Nice day for a run,” Mom added.

Rick nodded. “Sure is. Well, I better get going. Chauncey and I are cranking it up to twelve miles today.”

I smiled slyly to myself as he turned and jogged off.
Ha
. I didn't need Nora's help after all. I could get rid of Rick on my own.

*   *   *

Dad must have known somehow that I needed to hear his voice that night. He called just before bedtime, and Mom pressed the receiver against her sweatshirt before she handed me the phone. “No drama,” she whispered with a warning finger. “Your father doesn't need that right now.”

I gave a snippy nod as I took the phone and went to flop on the couch in the dark living room. “Hi, Daddy,” I said.

“Hey, Schnitzel,” Dad said, sighing like he had been waiting a million years to talk to me. I had to pinch the inside corners of my eyelids so I wouldn't start crying. Who knows why Dad called me Schnitzel? He had been calling me that forever. I didn't even know what a Schnitzel was. Why hadn't I ever asked?

Sometimes the phone connection with Dad was so bad that his voice came through all tinny and muffled, like he was calling from the bottom of the ocean. But tonight he sounded like he was in the next room. “How you doing?” he asked me.

I kept my eyes squeezed shut. “Good.” He let out a hoot when I told him about my award, and I forced a cheery note into my voice when he asked me about my plans for the summer. “I'm signed up for some camps,” I told him. “And I'm going to go over to Uncle Spence's as much as I can to keep Blue company. But what about you?” I asked, rushing to change the subject. I wanted to tell him about SAG, but I also knew it would be selfish to waste all our phone time with my complaining. “What are you doing today?”

“Well, I'm heading over to get breakfast in a few minutes, which is sure to be a treat.” It was ten hours later where Dad was. I could picture him running his hand over his bristly crew cut, breaking into a crooked smile. He had told me stories about the mess hall food before, about how the scrambled eggs always tasted sandy and the soldiers had contests to see who could figure out what was in the latest mystery meat stew.

I started to ask Dad if his unit was going out on patrol that day, but then stopped myself. I didn't really want to know. “Are you being extra careful, Dad?” I asked instead.

“Absolutely, Schnitzel,” he soothed. “Hey, we're in the homestretch, remember? In just a few weeks the four of us will be sitting on a blanket by the river having a picnic. I'm putting in my order now for those brownies of yours, okay? The ones with the caramel and the marshmallows?”

“I'll make you a double batch,” I told him with the word
four
echoing in my ear. Suddenly, Nora was standing in front of me, holding her hand out for the phone, and for the first time this year, I was glad when my turn to talk to Dad was done.

 

TWELVE

MAYBE I SHOULD HAVE LEFT MY BUTTON BLANK
at home on Monday morning. So far, it had failed me as a good luck charm, and by Monday afternoon I was convinced that the blank I had picked up in Hildy's museum was a complete dud.

SAG was even worse than I thought it would be. The bus ride took forever. We had to make stops in three other towns in order to scrape up enough kids to fill a classroom at the community college. And our counselor at the Academy was a short, bouncy guy with gelled hair who asked us to call him Stretch and made us spend the whole morning playing embarrassing icebreaker games. We started out with: If you were a fruit or a vegetable, what would you be? I knew I was in for a long month when Arnold Morales said, “I'd be an orange because I'm always ready to be squeezed.”

When Ollie Pasternak said she'd be a tomato because it's well-rounded—technically a fruit but also accepted as a vegetable—Stretch gave her a high five like she had just scored a game-winning basket.

I didn't get a high five for wanting to be a kumquat. “Why?” Stretch asked, drumming his fingers on his chin. His eyes darted to my name tag. “Ren. Why a kumquat?”

“Because”—I shrugged, but then decided to be honest—“it's a really cool-sounding word?” Stretch nodded politely and went on to the next person.

As if the fruit/vegetable exercise hadn't been enough torture, he brought out two fat red balloons and challenged us to keep them both in the air without using our hands. Obviously that meant a lot of blowing, which isn't very fun when you're in a circle with thirteen strangers, including a couple who have really bad breath.

After lunch, Stretch said it was time for our first project. We were going to design imaginary cities. “No holds barred!” he sang out, throwing his hands in the air. “Be bold! Be creative! You want your city to be on the planet Mars? Go for it! Just make sure you and your partner figure out how to get water and oxygen up there. Oh, and don't forget you're gonna need one heck of a cooling system.”

I almost stopped listening when he mentioned partners. Group activities weren't my favorite, and of course Stretch had come up with a particularly inventive way for how we would pair up. He passed out seven cards labeled with different state names and seven more cards listing their matching capitals. I got Alaska.

I was so nervous about who my partner would be, I suddenly couldn't remember Alaska's capital, even though I'd been able to recite capital cities as easy as the ABC's back when I was in fourth grade. My hopes fell when Seraphina, the one girl I might have wanted to team up with, held up her card.
Topeka
. At least I remembered enough to know that Topeka went with Kansas, not Alaska.

Then all at once, Arnold was marching toward me. “
Juneau
who your partner is?” he asked with a toothy grin as he flipped over his card. I blinked my eyes closed and forced out a weak smile.

Juneau. The capital of Alaska. How could I forget?

Mom didn't feel the least bit sorry for me that week. As soon as she came home from work each day, I'd tell her my latest SAG horror story—how awful it was riding on the hot bus and partnering with Arnold, who left sweat prints on all our papers and insisted that our imaginary city should be underground with a pipeline that would transform hazardous gases into a renewable energy source. “And he wants to call it Moleville,” I wailed. “Who would want to live in a place called
Moleville
?”