Special Delivery (16 page)

Ruby might not have tried the snails. And she passed up a great number of things on the menu in the Chinese restaurant on Friday night, finally settling for chicken with cashews, picking all the cashews out and setting them daintily aside on her plate. (The cashews had been cooked and were soft and vaguely slimy.) But on Saturday, she tried something that she couldn't wait to tell her friends in Camden Falls about (her friends no longer including Lacey).

Ruby ate a chestnut.

She didn't want to. Not after Aunt Allie told her the source of the wonderful smell that had reached her nose as she and Min and Allie and Flora once again walked along Fifth Avenue. “What is that?” Ruby asked, breathing in deeply. The air was cold and Ruby was cold and she could see her breath puffing out in front of her as they made their way toward a store called Lord & Taylor that Allie claimed had the best Christmas windows in the city. “I smell … is it popcorn?” It didn't smell quite like popcorn, but it did smell awfully good. More important, it smelled like it might be warm.

“You smell chestnuts,” replied Allie. “Hot chestnuts.”

“Gross!” cried Ruby.

“No, really. They're awfully good. In fact, they're a New York treat. You
have
to get roasted chestnuts on a winter day in New York City. Come on. Let's find the cart. It's got to be nearby.”

“There it is,” said Min.

“I am not eating chestnuts,” said Ruby flatly.

“I'll try one,” said Flora.

“Show-off,” said Ruby.

They approached a two-wheeled cart with smoke rising from the top and disappearing into the frigid air. A man wearing a dusty sweatshirt, a faded wool cap, and the strangest gloves Ruby had ever seen was shoveling hot brown nuts into little bags.

“What happened to his gloves?” Ruby whispered to Min.

“Hush,” replied Min. “Nothing. They're fingerless. They keep his hands warm, but he can make change without taking them off.”

“Huh. Clever,” said Ruby.

Aunt Allie now held out a bag of the chestnuts and Ruby eyed them suspiciously. “They're big,” she said.

“You have to peel the shell off,” Min told her. “The nut is inside, all hot and toasty.”

Flora tentatively reached into the bag and withdrew a nut. Ruby watched her. The shell came off easily, and Flora held the nut, wrinkled and yellowish, in the palm of her hand. “Hmm,” she said. Then she glanced at Ruby and popped the entire thing in her mouth. She chewed carefully. “Hey, it's good!” she exclaimed. “It's sort of nutty and popcorny at the same time. Try one, Ruby. Go ahead.”

Against her better judgment, Ruby reached into the bag and withdrew a chestnut. She peeled the smooth shell away. “If they wanted people to eat these things,” she said, “they should have made them look better.”

“Just try it,” said Flora.

So Ruby did. “It
is
good!” she said. “Gosh. I should have tried snails after all.”

“Maybe they'll be on the menu tonight,” said Flora.

“Oh. Yeah,” said Ruby, who had forgotten that she would be eating in another restaurant before going to the theatre that night.

When the chestnuts were gone, Ruby and her family made their way to Lord & Taylor, and Ruby saw why her aunt liked their windows.

“These are the best ever!” she exclaimed. “Just like you said, Aunt Allie.”

“They're certainly putting me in the Christmas spirit,” added Min.

“Just think,” said Allie, gazing at Santa Claus and his reindeer-drawn sleigh soaring through a starlit sky, a teeny earth far below, “this Christmas, Janie will be with us.”

“Her first Christmas,” said Min.

Ruby said nothing. She glanced at her sister, who was also silent, and knew Flora was thinking what Ruby couldn't bring herself to say: that Janie
might
be in Camden Falls for Christmas. Or she might be at home with her birth parents.

They edged past the rest of the windows, pointing and exclaiming and marveling at all the wonderful, fanciful details — an elf's lighted buttons, miniature popcorn strung on an equally miniature tree in a dollhouse, a mechanical cat swatting at a toy mouse. When at last they had inched their way out of the line, they crossed a side street and Allie said, “We'd better go back to the apartment now. We need time to get ready for tonight.”

“Yes!” cried Ruby. “Time for Broadway.”

 

Even though Aunt Allie had said that no one got dressed up to go to the theatre anymore, Min had insisted that every one of them put on their very best clothes. “We will not,” she said, “attend the theatre looking like a bunch of hobos.”

When they left the apartment that evening, Flora and Ruby were wearing velvet dresses, Min was wearing her best going-out-to-dinner suit, complete with a gold necklace that Ruby had never seen before, and Allie was wearing a brocade vest and a pair of black silk pants. Min frowned slightly at the pants, fancy as they were, but said nothing. “A good thing, too,” Allie whispered to Ruby. “I didn't pack a dress.”

They took a cab back to Midtown.

“Where are we going to have dinner?” asked Ruby as the city sped by outside the windows.

“At one of my favorite restaurants,” Allie replied. “Joe Allen. It's near the theatres, and lots of people eat there before shows.”

“Famous people?” Ruby wanted to know.

“You might see a famous person or two,” Allie replied.

Ruby was excited into speechlessness.

The cab pulled up in front of what looked like a very small restaurant, but when Ruby stepped inside, she found that Joe Allen was larger than it appeared. Fascinated, she examined the walls, which were hung with posters of Broadway shows. Then she noted that over the bar was a television. A football game was playing, but Ruby said breathlessly, “Min, could we ask them to change the channel? I want to see if
Everybody Loves Raymond
is on.”

“No TV,” Min whispered back.

“Yeah. Let's go see if there are snails on the menu,” said Flora.

There weren't, to Ruby's relief. And so she felt comfortable enough to say to the waitress, when it was time to give their orders, “I was hoping to try snails, but I guess tonight's not the night.”

“Maybe they have a snail special,” said Flora, and Ruby's eyes widened.

The waitress laughed. “You're off the hook,” she told Ruby.

Ruby ate a hamburger. She told the waitress about life in Camden Falls. She asked to be alerted if anyone famous came into the restaurant. She examined the posters and imagined her name on all of them: Ruby, child actor. Ruby, tap-dancing queen of Broadway. Ruby, grande dame of stage and screen.

When Min looked at her watch and said that it was time to leave for the theatre, Ruby realized that she hadn't thought of Ms. Angelo or the Children's Chorus or her awful mistake in hours. She let out a sigh of contentment. New York was the place for her.

 

The theatre was everything Ruby could have hoped for. It was large. It was grand. The seats were red and plush. The curtain, ponderous and sweeping, was also red and was trimmed with gold braid.

“Pinch me,” Ruby whispered to Flora as they lowered themselves into their seats. “I'm either dreaming or I'm in heaven.”

Flora obligingly pinched her. “Neither,” she whispered back. “This is real.”

Ruby opened her
Playbill
and read about the actors she would see that night. She hadn't heard of any of them, but that didn't matter.

Ruby was on Broadway.

“Min?” she said. “Can we get popcorn?”

Min smiled. “This isn't like a movie theatre, honey. No popcorn. But at intermission we'll see if we can get a snack.”

Ruby blushed. She felt she should know such things. She buried her nose in the
Playbill
and was relieved when at last the lights dimmed. She reached for Flora's hand and squeezed it. “The adventure begins,” she whispered.

The orchestra played the overture and Ruby, rapt, watched the conductor waving his baton. But when the curtain rose, Ruby was disappointed. She saw a stage that was bare except for a spotlight. Where was the fancy scenery? She had been hoping for a set loaded with props and backdrops and furniture. But in seconds she found that she didn't care one bit about the set. She became lost in the world of the theatre. Ruby knew the music from
Spotlight
, but since she had never seen a production of the show she was hazy about the story. Now she learned that the play was about putting on a play: about actors and singers and dancers, and their stories and how they had reached this particular point in their lives — what drove them to become performers, and what putting on this play night after night meant to each of them.

Ruby could relate. This world, the world of show business, was hers. She applauded all the talented performers who were working so hard at what they truly loved.

Ruby was thoroughly enjoying herself. She was lost in the stories of the actors, and had already cried a little, when suddenly the story of one actor in particular, Eva, became clear to Ruby. Eva had once been a very famous actress who had won all sorts of awards, but now hardly anyone would hire her, so she had settled for a teensy little part, appearing only briefly as someone's aunt, and wearing, Ruby noted, a very unflattering wig.

Ruby gulped. What had happened to Eva? How had she fallen from grace? Ruby had a sinking feeling that she knew the answers to those questions. She could hear Min's voice as plain as day, telling Ruby that she had become a bit cocky. Was this what happened when people became cocky? Nobody wanted to work with them and their careers began to slip?

Ruby lost track of the story for a while. She pictured herself in her bedroom in the Row House, glancing at the music for the Thanksgiving performance … and setting it aside, deciding that she knew it already. She remembered her rash decision not to attend the rehearsal at the end of the first day the Doer of Unpleasant Jobs had been in business. Then she saw herself standing on the risers before half of Camden Falls, not knowing when to begin her solo. Well, at least she
knew
her solo, Ruby said to herself. She knew the music, she
knew
the words. But she had felt that she didn't need to work with the rest of the chorus, and that had cost her dearly. Now she saw exactly where such an attitude could lead. One day Ruby might wind up as Eva, a washed-up former star, scrambling for lowly roles, settling for work of any kind, just to be able to pay her bills.

Ruby tried to focus on the stage and the performers again. She glued her eyes to Eva. She was not, she told herself firmly, going to become Eva one day. She would not take anything for granted. If she wanted to be a professional (again, she could hear Min's words in her mind) then she would have to work hard. She had a strong suspicion that when Ms. Angelo said Ruby was on probation and could actually be asked to leave the chorus, she meant it.

In the cab on the way back to the apartment that night, Min said, “Ruby, you're awfully quiet.”

“I'm thinking about the show.”

“Did you enjoy it?”

Had she enjoyed it? “Yes,” said Ruby, aware of the trouble Min had gone through to get the tickets.

But she couldn't stop thinking about Eva.

Nikki was awakened on Sunday morning by Mae pouncing on her in bed and exclaiming, “One more day of vacation!”

Nikki had been thinking about the subject a bit differently. When she had gone to bed the night before, she had said grumpily to herself, “Just one more day of vacation.” And then it would be back to school and homework, Tobias would be gone …

“Ugh,” said Nikki with disgust.

“Nikki! What's the matter with you? We have one more whole free day! Maybe we can make Christmas ornaments. Or — I know! — maybe Tobias will drive us into town. Hey, let's make pancakes for breakfast!”

At last, Nikki smiled. “Okay. Pancakes. I like that idea.”

Nikki, with a great deal of sloppy help from Mae, made a pancake breakfast for her family.

“This is heavenly,” said Mrs. Sherman as she sipped her coffee later. She glanced uncertainly around the messy kitchen, though.

“Don't worry,” said Nikki. “We're going to clean up, too. That's part of the deal.”

“It is?” said Mae unhappily.

“Definitely. Mom's been working very hard.”

“I'll help,” said Tobias. “It'll go fast, Mae. You'll see.”

“Thank you,” said Mrs. Sherman.

“When we're finished,” said Mae, “we're going to make Christmas ornaments.” (Nikki had not yet agreed to this.)

“That sounds like fun,” said their mother, “but before you get started, I need to talk to you — to all three of you.”

Nikki, who had been rinsing off dishes in the sink, turned around and faced her mother warily. “About what?” she asked.

“I'll explain in a few minutes.”