by Robin Palmer
“What?” he asked. “So I was going a few miles above the speed limit.”
“Ninety-five in a sixty-five mile zone is not a few miles,” she snapped.
The front door opened and out came an old couple wearing matching Black Horse Inn sweatshirts. “Welcome! Welcome!” the man boomed. “I’m Bill Wilson.”
“And I’m Lois,” the woman said. “We were starting to wonder if all this fresh country air had scared you off and sent you right back home.”
“Not yet,” Alan said under his breath.
“Excuse me, but you do have a TV, right?” Laurel asked politely.
“Oh sure,” Bill said. “Lois loves those English mystery shows on the public television station.”
“And Bill’s a big fan of Bowling for Beer,” Lois said.
“Cable?” I asked.
Bill shook his head. “Nope. Got rid of that a little while back,” he said. He turned to Lois. “When was that, honey?”
She thought about it. “1987, I think.”
I thought about pointing out the fact that maybe they should’ve thought about updating their website so that it was more in line with this particular century, but decided against it.
Bill came bounding down the steps. For an old person, he moved really fast and carried our two heaviest bags in one hand right up the stairs without saying, “Oh, my back!” like most old people I knew said. Maybe it was all the farm work that I had a feeling people in Vermont did on a daily basis. Lois grabbed the other two bags like they weighed nothing. “Come along—lucky for you the afternoon snacks are still sitting out,” she said.
“Oh, you don’t want to miss Lois’s snacks,” Bill chuckled. “They’re dee-lish!”
My stomach growled as images of brownies and Toll House chocolate chip cookies and Red Velvet cupcakes started bubbling to the surface. Between being so old and living in the middle of nowhere without cable, I bet Lois had spent lots of time perfecting all her recipes.
Or not. In my book, slices of apple with little squares of Vermont cheddar cheese were not considered dee-lish snacks. In fact, they weren’t even considered snacks unless you were stuck on a desert island with your only other food options being leaves or berries that may or may not have been poisonous.
“This apple is very delicious,” I said politely as I nibbled away, anxious to get to our room so I could break out some real snacks. Luckily, I had smuggled a bag of Uncle Eddie’s vegan chocolate-chip cookies, some chocolate-covered banana chips, and some chocolate-covered apricots in my bag in case of emergency. (I was proud of myself for bringing so much fruit.)
“Glad you like it,” Bill said, “’cause you’re going to be eating a lot of them over the next few days.” He chuckled. “When you’ve got an apple orchard, you can’t let the fruit go to waste. Good thing they freeze so well. Lois is somewhat of a gourmet when it comes to apples.”
“Oh, Bill,” she said, swatting him on the arm. “You know how I feel when you boast like that.”
“Well, now, it’s the truth,” he replied. He turned to us. “I keep telling her she could fill a cookbook with all the different ways she knows how to use them. You’ll see.”
And we sure did. Dinner that night was baked chicken with braised apples, broccoli with applesauce (“First time Lois brought it to the table I thought to myself, ‘What the hay?’ but then I realized my bride knew what she was doing!”), and apple fritters dusted with powdered sugar.
“Well, this sure is a lot of fiber,” Mom said, holding her stomach after dinner. Mine let out a very long, angry gurgle. We had learned about fiber in health class recently. Apparently, too much of it could make you really gassy. I was jealous that Wendi and her crew were at the local Pizza Hut near the Holiday Inn they were staying at. In Vermont, apparently “local” meant forty-five minutes away.
“Anyone want seconds on the fritters?” Lois asked.
We all patted our stomachs at the same time and politely said no.
“Best to take the time to digest,” Lois agreed, “so you’re good and ready for the apple cider apple French toast in the morning.”
Even for someone like me who loved French toast, the idea of more apples made me wish for something boring like eggs.
Without cable, our TV-viewing options were limited to some boring show on the PBS channel about maids in an English manor or a show about quilting, which is why Laurel and I decided to go to bed. At seven thirty. Which I hadn’t done since I was like five.
“What’s that noise?” I whispered after we pushed the twin beds together and were huddled under the blankets. The room was really cute. That is, if you liked lace doilies and framed pictures of people made out of what else but…apples.
“What noise?” Laurel whispered back. “I don’t hear anything.”
“That’s what I mean. It’s so…quiet.” I had gotten so used to falling asleep with the sound of honking and sirens that all this stillness was creepy. It was like any minute the closet door was going to open up and a killer wearing an Elmo mask (like the guy in a horror script I had once read for Laurel) was going to jump out.
“I think lots of quiet when you sleep is good for you, though,” Laurel said, yawning.
“Okay,” I said. “Well, good night.”
“Good night.”
A half hour later I was still awake. Part of it was making sure that if the killer jumped out of the closet I could protect myself, but part of it was thinking about The Change. Sure, things seemed like they were okay again, but what if it was just an illusion and once the ceremony happened, The Change really happened?
“Laurel? Are you sleeping?” I said in a voice that was so loud that even if she was sleeping, she sure wouldn’t be for long.
“Hmpf?” she muttered.
“I said…Are? You? Sleeping ?”
She sat up and rubbed her eyes. “Now I’m not.”
“Me, neither,” I sighed.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Nothing.”
She slid back down and snuggled back under the covers, shutting her eyes.
I sighed. “It’s just…well…are you worried about what’s going to happen after Saturday?” I blurted out. “After they get married?”
She opened her eyes. “You mean am I worried that The Change might happen?”
I sat up and turned on the light. “You know about the Change, too?”
“Everyone knows about blended families and The Change,” she replied.
Um, everyone but me.
She sat up, too. “Lucy, this wedding—all it’s doing is making it legal,” she said. “Plus, The Change already did happen.”
“It did?”
“Yeah. back in April when we moved in together.”
“What do you mean?”
“Because that’s when we all got to know each other,” she explained. “And see each other when we were in bad moods. And fight. And make up. You know, like all families do.” She yawned. “So the wedding part, it’s really just an excuse to eat cake. That’s all.”
I looked over at her. There she was—the most popular girl in the world, with zit cream on her face and a mouth guard over her teeth to stop her from grinding them. “You know, for someone who spends most of her time pretending, you know a lot about this real-life stuff,” I said.
She shrugged. “I learned it from you.” She yawned again. “Now can I go back to sleep?”
“Okay,” I replied. “Good night…sis.”
It felt kind of cool rolling off my tongue like that. Like a whistle or something. It was so cool that I kept whispering it over and over. At least until Laurel told me that if I didn’t be quiet she’d have to hurt me.
Which felt like a very sister-like thing to say.
Dear Dr. Maude,
Maybe you’ve already been to Vermont. But if you haven’t, all I can say is that while Vermont may be really pretty, unless you like skiing, there’s nothing to do. Especially when you’re staying somewher
e without cable or Internet. (Have you ever heard of this thing called dial-up? That’s what Bill and Lois have. According to Alan, it’s how people used to have to connect to the web in the old days, through a phone line. It’s VERY slow.)
Because there’s nothing to do, we were able to spend an entire day full of family quality time together yesterday. Well, family and TV crew quality time. (Ask Wendi to tell you about how she screamed at her assistant Charles during Charades.) (Actually, don’t ask her, because she’d probably be embarrassed about that.)
Luckily, now it’s Friday, which means everyone will be here for the wedding in a little while. I’m a little nervous about having Beatrice and Marissa in the same room together. As I’ve mentioned, Marissa is REALLY annoying. And while I can handle her because I’m just used to her by now, Beatrice, because she’s a born-and-bred New Yorker, isn’t all that patient with people who are annoying on a Marissa-like level.
Hopefully, it’ll be okay. It kind of has to be because it’s not like they can be split up and go stay in another hotel, like, say, a Hilton Garden Inn with an indoor pool and room service.
This might be weird to say, but now that the wedding is no longer just family, I wish you could be here, too. I know we haven’t met yet, but I still feel very close to you.
yours truly,
Lucy B. Parker
On Friday morning, I was sitting in the living room with Lois, going through her scrapbook with pictures from last year’s apple festival (she won second place for her apple cobbler), waiting for Pete’s silver Oldsmobile to pull up with him and Rose and Beatrice. Which would explain why I got so confused when, instead, the car that pulled up was Beatrice’s moms’ black Mercedes station wagon. And I was even more confused when the car doors opened and not only did her two moms get out, along with Beatrice and Pete and Rose, but SO DID BLAIR LERNER-MOSKOWITZ.
“OH MY GOD!” I screamed when I saw him jump out of the back-back and wipe his face with his Pac Man T-shirt.
“I know, I know,” Lois sighed. “I can’t believe they gave the blue ribbon to Betty Miller, either. Don’t get me wrong—I like Betty. But plain old apple pie should not be winning county fair contests.” She sat up straight. “We have a reputation to uphold.”
“No! That’s not what I meant! What I meant was…I mean, I can’t believe…I mean, what am I going to do…I mean…will you excuse me, please?” I babbled as I pulled my boots on the wrong feet and ran outside.
“Oh wow. Look who’s here!” I said as I walked toward the car with a big fake smile on my face. I was so getting my period at that moment from the stress of this. I had to be. “It’s Beatrice and Pete and Rose who were supposed to be here, and then the rest of the Lerner-Moskovitzes!” I turned to Rose. “Please tell me you have some fried plantains with you,” I whispered.
She patted me on the cheek. “For my baby? Of course I do!” she said, whipping out a bag and handing it to me.
“Hey, Lucy,” Blair said as he made his way to the door. “They have cable, right?”
How could he act so…normal?! “Actually, no. No, they don’t,” I replied. “But Bill’s got a bunch of bowling shows taped if you want to watch those.”
He shrugged. “Okay,” he said as he walked in. I guess Mom was right when, once when I was overlistening to her talk to Deanna, I heard her say that men were very simple creatures.
“Beatrice, I had no idea all of the Lerner-Moskovitzes were coming,” I said with the same fake smile on my face. “I thought it was just you.”
She gave me a weird look. “Why are you talking like a flight attendant giving the safety speech?” she asked.
“I am not,” I said, smiling.
Pete nodded. “Chica, she’s right—you are.”
I dropped the smile and looked over at Beatrice’s moms, who had just finished checking the pressure on the tires (according to Pete, part of being a New Yorker included being neurotic) and were walking toward us. “Hello, Lucy,” said her mom Marsha. “We’re going to go inside and see if we can’t get the owners of that bed-and-breakfast we booked the next town over on the phone.”
“Okay,” I said with my frozen smile.
After they were gone, I dropped it. “Beatrice, what is going on?” I cried. “What is your brother doing here?”
“I told you he was coming in the e-mail I sent you,” she replied.
“What e-mail?”
“The one that said that my moms had decided that this would be a good way to have some quality family time—so everyone was going to come up.”
“But there’s no signal up here!” I said.
She shrugged. “That’s probably why you didn’t get it then.”
How could she be so calm?! Pete patted me on the arm. “Don’t worry, Lucy. There’s no reason to be nervous, even though your local crush is gonna be staying in a bed-and-breakfast down the road for the weekend.”
Marsha came to the door. “FYI, we have a little change of plans!” she said. “The other B and B mistakenly overbooked, but luckily there’s an extra room here.”
“Scratch that—your local crush is going to be staying under the same roof as you,” Pete said.
Forget worrying about The Change, or what was going to happen when Beatrice and Marissa met. I now had even bigger things to worry about.
Team Northampton (Dad, Sarah, Ziggy, and Marissa) were the next to arrive. “OMIGOD OMIGOD OMIGOD!” Marissa screeched as she flew out of the car and ran straight toward Beatrice and threw her arms around her so hard she almost knocked her down. “I CAN’T BELIEVE I’M FINALLY MEETING YOU!”
Beatrice wiggled out of her embrace. “You must be Marissa,” she said,
“Of COURSE I’m Marissa!” she cried. “Who else would I be?! This is SO cool! It’s like meeting a BFF I never even knew I had! I just feel sooooo close to you already. It’s like I’ve known you my entire life instead of just a minute.”
Beatrice looked at me, panicked.
I shrugged. “I warned you,” I whispered as I made my way to the car to pick up Ziggy. I felt a little bad leaving her there, but I needed to give my brother a kiss as soon as possible. When I got there, he was being all fussy and cry-y, but as soon as I picked him up, he quieted down.
Dad shook his head. “You really have that baby- whisperer vibe, Lucy,” he said.
“You sure do,” Sarah agreed. She squinted. “I think it’s your aura. It’s looking very purple.”
According to Sarah and her weird friends, auras were your energy and they changed colors. Seeing that purple was my favorite color, that worked for me.
“Thanks,” I said as Ziggy grabbed my index finger with his tiny fist.
“So how’s it going?” Dad asked. “Your mom just told me that your local crush Blair Lerner-Moskovitz is here.”
“What?!”
He nodded. “She called me about an hour ago and told me,” he said. “So that we’d be prepared and not embarrass you about it.”
Um, embarrass me? Kind of like he was doing at that moment? Did my divorced parents really have to communicate THAT much?
“How are you feeling about it?” he asked. “Is it making you uncomfortable? Because it really shouldn’t. Crushes are a totally normal part of human development.”
“It’ll be fine,” I said. “Well, it’ll be fine as long as you stop talking about it.”
He nodded. “Will do.”
Just as we were about to go inside, a big Escalade pulled up. Laurel came flying out of house, almost tackling Austin as he got out of the truck. Jeez, if she wasn’t careful she really would end up blind. As they ran into the house to catch up (forty-eight hours without being able to text had been super hard for her), Blair walked out.
“Hey, Lucy—you got any snacks lying around?” he asked. “All they have here is stuff made of apples. I hate apples. They’re so…healthy.”
“Yeah. In my room. I’ll go get them,” I said as I followed him inside. Once I got up there, I crouched down so I was eye
level with the doorknob. “Yeah, hi, Whoever’s out there? It’s me, Lucy B. Parker,” I whispered. I had recently discovered that the whole praying business that people did really worked—even when you prayed to a doorknob instead of God or Buddha. Which was good because I wasn’t sure how I felt about either of them. “I don’t have a lot of time to talk, but I just wanted to know if You could help me get through the next few days with not too much embarrassment. Including the toast.”
Before I could continue, I heard Ziggy start to cry. “And now I have to go, because my baby brother is crying and I’m the only one who can calm him down, but if I can, I’ll be in touch later. Thanks a lot.”
That night at dinner (apple and corn fritters, pork loin with braised apples, and apple rice pudding) Alan announced that all members of the Parker-Moses family would have IBS sessions the following morning before the wedding. (“Our last non-married ones.”)
Marissa began to wave her hand wildly. “Oh! Oh! I have a question!”
Alan flinched. I don’t think he had quite believed me when I told him how annoying Marissa was. “Yes, Marissa?”
“Can non-family members also have them?”
“Absolutely. In fact, I strongly encourage them,” he replied.
She reached over and grabbed Beatrice’s arm. “Good. I call Beatrice, then!”
From the look on her face, Beatrice would have rather spent her time picking splinters out of her finger.
Laurel’s and Mom’s would be spent with Laurel helping with hair and makeup while Alan and I would go see if we could find any flowers to make a bouquet for Mom. Although the fact that it was the beginning of November would make it kind of hard to do that. As far as I was concerned, I got the better end of the deal, because no matter how many times Laurel tried to say it was fun, putting on makeup was really boring. Even Camilla thought so, which is why the camera crew was going with us.
The next morning as we walked through the woods, Alan turned to me. “Lucy, there’s something we need to talk about,” he said as I began to make Mom a bouquet of pinecones.