Super Duper Pee Wee! (4 page)

W
hen Molly turned into her yard, she knew something was not right. The front door was standing open, and it was always closed. She could hear loud voices from inside, and no one in her family ever talked that loudly. And it was almost dinnertime, but there was no smell of anything cooking from the kitchen.

Her parents did not hear her come in. They were standing in the living room talking, but the talking wasn’t friendly. It was angry.

Molly heard her father say, “I don’t care if you do!”

Do what? Molly wondered.

Then her mother called him a stubborn mule, and her father said, “Well, if that is
the way you feel …” and then Molly’s mother did something Molly had never seen her do. She threw something at Molly’s dad. It was only a pillow from the couch, but she threw it hard and it hit Molly’s dad in the chest. He looked surprised and turned and walked out of the room. Her mother’s hair was hanging in her face, and her face was red.

In a minute Mrs. Duff walked into the kitchen and started getting dinner. Pots and pans banged onto the stove. Silverware clattered. Usually when her mother cooked she was very quiet. The only noise she made was to hum a song or put something in the blender.

Molly ran up to her room to be alone, and for a change her aunt was not there. She threw herself onto her bed, shaking with fear. What had gone wrong? Was it something she had done? Had Molly caused her parents to fight?

Molly knew that other families fought sometimes, but hers never did!

And she knew that parents who fought often got a divorce! Were her mother and father going to get a divorce too? Was divorce contagious, like the flu or a sore throat? Had they caught it from Auntie Ree?

Now Molly’s stomach began to ache, and she felt shaky all over. What would happen if her father moved into another house? Where would Molly live?

Or what if her mother threw something bigger and heavier than a pillow? On TV Molly had seen parents throw books and vases and dishes and even things made out of metal. This could happen next, and it could be all her fault. Molly put her face into her pillow and began to sob. She fell asleep crying, and when her mother called her to dinner she woke up with the same awful feeling inside of her. She hoped that it had been a dream, but she knew it wasn’t.

Her mother had combed her hair and her dad was in his regular place at the table. Were her mother and father being brave, like Auntie Ree? Was this whole family a brave family, except her? She didn’t feel brave, she felt scared.

Auntie Ree came in with a cake from the bakery for dessert. “I found a job!” she said. “This cake is to celebrate!”

Auntie Ree talked and talked about her new job, which was at an insurance agency instead of a bookstore, and her parents acted interested and polite, but they were quieter than usual. Molly wondered if she had imagined the fight. Or made it worse than it was. People who were getting a divorce did not sit at the table together politely, eating bratwurst on buns, no matter how brave they were. Did they?

After dinner her dad cleared the table and put an apron on and washed the dishes.
Auntie Ree dried them, and Molly put them away. It all looked normal.

But Molly wasn’t fooled. Her parents had fought. Something was the matter. Molly knew people called lawyers to get divorces, and her mother was on the telephone right now!

“We’ll have to go shopping, you and I,” said her aunt to Molly. “I’ll need some new clothes for my job, and you can help me pick them out.”

Molly nodded. How could her aunt think of new clothes now, when her sister was about to leave her husband and small daughter? What kind of a family was this, with everyone in it getting divorced?

That night in bed, Molly thought of telling Auntie Ree the whole story and asking her if it was true. And she thought of asking her mother face to face.

But she couldn’t talk about it. Maybe because
she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer. What if they said she was right, they were getting a divorce? No, it was better this way. There was a chance she was wrong.

The next day, the Pee Wee Scouts met, and Molly decided she would take Mary Beth aside and confide the awful news to her. But she was not alone with her, and she did not want Rachel and Ashley and Roger and Sonny to know about her personal problems. Besides, Mary Beth had a letter from her pen pal, Shari, and was dying to read it to her.

“Shari has lots of brothers and sisters too!” said Mary Beth. “And she likes animals just like I do. And look at this stamp. I’m going to collect the stamps. My dad’s getting me a stamp album.”

Molly decided to put her problem out of her mind during the Scout meeting, but it always seemed to be there, even when the
others read the letters they got from their pen pals. What fun were pen pals now? What she needed were parents who were pals.

“Mrs. Peters, Mrs. Peters,” called Ashley. “Can I read the letter I got from Jason?”

“Yes,” said their leader. “And what a good response we have already! So many of you wrote and got answers right away!”

“ ‘Dear Ashley,’ ” read Ashley. “ ‘I like horses too. I’ve got a horse named Flash. He likes radishes. If you come to visit me, I will let you ride Flash. Sometimes I fall off when he jumps the fence. If you fall off, it’s okay. The ground is soft because mud is soft, and it’s all mud now. Yours sincerely, Jason.’ ”

The Pee Wees all laughed about the mud. Roger fell off his chair into pretend mud and walked around the room shaking it off his arms and legs.

Mary Beth read her letter from Shari, and Rachel read her letter from Heather.

“My letter is real long,” said Rachel. All the Pee Wees looked over her shoulder as she read.

“ ‘My dad is a medical person too,’ ” read Rachel. “ ‘He is an M.D., a medical doctor.’ ”

Here Rachel stopped to say, “Isn’t that a coincidence, Mrs. Peters? That the pen pal I got has a dad who’s a doctor, and my dad is a dentist?”

“Yeah, yeah, you can pull teeth and operate on each other,” said Roger. “Big deal.”

Rachel looked at Roger in disgust. “You’re just jealous,” she said, “because you didn’t get a letter back from your pen pal.”

“Hey, I didn’t even write to her yet,” said Roger.

“Well, she won’t write back, you can bet on that,” said Rachel. “Once she finds out what a creep you are.”

Rachel finished reading Heather’s long letter.

Then Kevin and Jody each read their pen pal letters. They were collecting stamps too. Molly wondered if Jody’s pen pal was in a wheelchair. She wished that Jody could be her pen pal. Or Kevin. But that would mean they would live far away in Golden Grove, and that would not be a good thing. It was better to have them right here in town.

Some of the Pee Wees had written to authors they liked and were waiting for letters. Tracy had written to her grandma and had a letter to read from her.

“My grandma plays bingo,” said Tracy. “She won me a little TV for my room.”

After the letters, the Pee Wees told good deeds and sang their song and said their pledge. Then they ate cupcakes decorated with make-believe postage stamps. Sonny’s mother helped serve them.

On the way home Molly wanted to tell Mary Beth about her parents’ argument, but
Mary Beth wanted to talk about plans to fix up Roger’s father with her Auntie Ree.

Instead of finding Auntie Ree a husband, it might be her own
mother
who would need one, thought Molly. Auntie Ree seemed happy enough with her new job. She didn’t act like she wanted a husband.

But that was not fair. As Mary Beth had said to her, Auntie Ree needed a husband and a home of her own. And Molly needed her room back. Just in case divorce really
was
catchy, it might be good to separate the sisters till this was all over.

T
he girls sat on their favorite park bench to plan Auntie Ree’s first date.

“How can we get them to go on a date without knowing it’s a date?” asked Molly. “I don’t think my aunt will go if we tell her we found someone for her to marry.”

Mary Beth nodded. “She probably doesn’t know she needs to marry Mr. White,” she said. “Roger’s father probably doesn’t know
how happy he’ll be married to Auntie Ree, either.” She sighed. “Adults are so difficult,” she said. “They never seem to see what’s good for them.”

“Well, we can’t tell Roger,” said Molly. “He doesn’t even know he needs a mother.”

“Maybe there will be some PTA meeting they can meet at,” said Mary Beth.

“There are no PTA meetings when school is out,” said Molly.

Mary Beth snapped her fingers. “I have it!” she said. “Your aunt can walk Skippy, and Mr. White can walk his dog, and they can meet and talk about the dogs! Then they can talk about other stuff like having children and where they’ll live.”

“Auntie Ree doesn’t like dogs much,” said Molly. “And Roger doesn’t have a dog.”

“We could get him one from the pound,” said Mary Beth.

“Even if Mr. White has one, he might not
walk it,” said Molly. “What if he has Roger walk it? We don’t want my aunt to meet
Roger
! If she met him first, she’d never marry his dad!”

“So forget the dog,” said Mary Beth grumpily. “It was just an idea.”

“Where do they both go?” asked Molly. “At night after work?”

“The grocery store!” shouted Mary Beth. “Everyone gets groceries. Even Roger has to eat! They can run into each other at the market!”

“Rat’s knees!” shouted Molly. “It’s simple! Let’s go over to Roger’s house and ask him where his dad shops!”

“We can’t just
ask
him,” said Mary Beth. “We have to make it sound natural, kind of work it into the conversation so he won’t be suspicious.”

The girls ran home and got their bikes. Then they rode to Roger’s house.

“What if he isn’t home?” asked Molly.

“He’s home,” said Mary Beth. “Where would he be? He hasn’t got many friends, he’s so mean.”

Mary Beth was right. When the girls got
near his house, they saw Roger carving something into the bark on a tree in his yard.

“What do you guys want?” he said suspiciously.

“We’re just taking a bike ride,” said Molly.

“Yeah, well ride someplace else.”

“It’s a public street,” said Molly.

“We can do what we want,” said Mary Beth. “And you’re defacing that tree. It won’t grow if you cut its bark.”

“Did you come over here to tell me I can’t carve my own tree?” said Roger.

“It isn’t your tree,” said Molly, stamping her foot. “Trees belong to everyone!”

“Not trees in my own yard,” said Roger.

This wasn’t going well, thought Molly. It was awfully hard not to fight with Roger.

“I think you should get some fertilizer for that tree,” said Mary Beth. “You can get it at
the
grocery store
in the plant department. Your dad can get it when he shops.”

“Get out of here,” said Roger. “Leave me alone.”

This was going to be harder than they figured, thought Molly. It was easy to see why Roger had so few friends. It was a wonder he wasn’t thrown out of the Pee Wees. They’d have to try a nicer approach.