Mr. Barnett glanced over at Danny and Billy organizing props for tomorrow’s show. “There are some pretty terrific guys your own age around here, in case you haven’t noticed.”
Just then Paula came out of the dressing room, carrying a large bouquet of red roses. “These are for you, Holly,” she said. “Someone left them during the last scene.”
I glanced down at the card. It read: When the Lord closes a door, somewhere He opens a window. Always, Jared.
It was a line directly from the musical, where Maria tells Mother Abbess she feels called to work with the von Trapp children instead of staying on at the abbey.
Leaning my face into Jared’s roses, I breathed their fragrance deeply. “About those guys my age,” I said, smiling up at Mr. Barnett, “maybe you’re right.”
Jared’s illness turned out to be a twelve-hour flu, so we performed together the second night. Of course, we were fabulous together, but never would I forget my shining moment—the night I shared the stage with Mr. Barnett.
The last few days of the semester flew by, and my feelings for our student teacher began to change. For the better. I started to see him for who he was—instead of who I’d daydreamed he could be. A very cool teacher. A good friend. But not future husband material.
Of course, I never knew if he took Miss Hess out again. I decided it was best if I didn’t. Funny how that goes.
Before long, Miss W’s wedding day arrived. The faculty and the student body filled the auditorium during the final hour of the school year.
Miss W surprised everyone by wearing a full-length white gown with a six-foot train and a long white veil. Her smile was as sweet as a young bride’s.
“I better not be that old when I get married,” Andie whispered as “The Wedding March” came over the sound system.
Step by step, the matronly teacher made her way down the long aisle toward Mr. Ross, who was looking mighty spiffy in his long gray tuxedo.
“She’s really beautiful.” Tears welled up in my eyes.
We turned and watched as she stood beside Mr. Ross at the front. The minister motioned for us to be seated. As he began with “Dearly beloved,” I glanced down the row of seats.
My friends, each one, were within hugging distance. Jared and Danny sat directly behind me. Andie and Stan sat on one side of me, and Paula and Billy on the other. Amy-Liz and all the others filled up the seats in the row. Together we witnessed the blending of two lives in holy matrimony.
Next year, Miss W would be known as Mrs. Ross. Not only that, Andie and I would be at the top of the heap—ninth grade. We’d come so far, so fast. Where had the years gone?
Stan, Danny, and the Miller twins were heading off to high school. So many things were changing.
Mr. Barnett was leaving Dressel Hills to graduate from college, taking his fabulous T-Bird with him…and leaving behind a trail of pistachio shells.
Special days, special moments don’t last forever. Anyone knows that. Breezes of change blow hard and fast. And before you know it, skinny figures fill out. Kids grow up. Journals burst with top-secret information. Prayers get answered.
I smiled through my tears as the minister pronounced the happy couple husband and wife. We gave Mr. and Mrs. Ross a standing ovation as they walked down the aisle.
Back at my locker, I gathered up my books and papers for the final time. Then I headed toward the front doors. Ahead of me was another fabulous Dressel Hills summer. And behind me—all of eighth grade.
As the glass doors of the school swung shut behind me, I thought of Jared’s note. When the Lord closes a door, somewhere He opens a window. God was closing a chapter in my life. But by trusting Him, I knew that, in time, a window would fling wide.
And I could hardly wait.
For one of my fans,
Lisa Lease…
she knows why!
NO GUYS PACT
Chapter 1
“I can’t believe it. Are you sure?” I asked my best friend.
Andie Martinez nodded. Her dark eyes looked all too serious as we corralled her three-year-old twin brothers near their backyard jungle gym. “Amy-Liz told me herself. She’s definitely not going to church camp this summer.”
I helped Jon climb the monkey bars, steadying him as he scrambled to the top. “But Amy-Liz always goes to camp,” I insisted. “She’s never missed a summer.”
Andie gave Jon’s twin, Chris, an under-duck in his swing. “The way I heard it, Amy’s dad’s been laid off, and they’re cutting back on everything.”
“Wow,” I said softly. “Even Amy’s voice lessons?”
“Those too.”
I felt sorry for Amy-Liz. Sounded like things were perfectly rotten at her house. “Isn’t there anything we can do?” I asked, watching closely as Jon jumped off the bars into the sand below.
Andie frowned. “Like what?”
“I just thought we could help. Maybe a bunch of us could pitch in some money.”
Andie sat at the bottom of the slide. “You’ve gotta be kidding, Holly. There’s no way Amy-Liz Thompson is going to accept charity. You oughta know that.”
“But,” I insisted, “we should try, don’t you think?”
Leaning back against the hot slide, Andie shook her head, shielding her eyes from the late afternoon sun. “Nope, not a good idea.”
“Then…what? What can we do?”
Unexpectedly, Jon threw a handful of sand at his brother’s face. Chris squealed and rubbed his eyes. Andie leaped off the slide and ran to Chris, lifting him from the swing. “No, no, Jon,” she scolded.
“No!” Jon yelled back at her. “No!”
Andie hauled Chris into the house. He kicked against her bare legs as he screamed in pain.
I scolded Jon. “Never, ever throw sand or dirt in someone’s face. You could hurt your brother’s eyes.”
He squatted in the sand, making a circular motion with both hands like he was thinking hard. He wouldn’t look at me.
I reached down and patted his arm. “Let’s go inside and say sorry to Chris.”
Jon stared at the ground, patting the sand with both hands. “No. I make sand cakes. Mushy sand cakes.” And with that, he ran to get the garden hose near the house.
I wanted to say, “Forget it, kid,” but that’s not exactly the best way to get a three-year-old’s attention. Little kids always seem to do the exact opposite of what you ask them to. At least that’s how it was with these twins. Jon and Chris—just recently out of the terrible twos—had minds of their own. I shouldn’t have been surprised. After all, their fourteen-year-old sister was consistently hardheaded.
Jon ran across the length of the yard in his bare feet, talking to himself as he headed for the house. He reached for the outside faucet and it squeaked on. Seconds later, water shot out of the hose. I wondered if I should let him make his silly sand cakes, but my mind was really on Andie, inside with Chris. She probably needed my help.
“Come here, Jon,” I called, but he ignored me. I walked across the yard to turn off the water when a mischievous look slid across his face. Suddenly he ran toward the nozzle.
So did I.
“Whoa! Stop right there,” I shouted, hoping to scare him into submission. But he didn’t stop, and both of us ran toward the end of the hose—the nozzle that lay innocently in the middle of a patch of thick green grass.
Jon kept running, giggling unmercifully. Fortunately, my legs were longer and my grip tighter. Man, did he change his tune fast when I threatened him with a cold blast of H2O.
“Now, go over there and turn the water off,” I insisted in my most authoritative baby-sitter voice. Holding the hose high, I pressed my thumb against the edge of it. Water gushed out in a fanlike spray.
I inched it closer and closer to the little shrimp’s body as his pleas for mercy rose higher and higher into the warm June breeze.
He hollered, “I’m thorry, Howwy. I’m tho-o-o thorry!”
“You better go tell your brother that.” I t
ried to keep from laughing—wondering how he’d look soaking wet. But being the fabulous baby-sitter I am, I removed my thumb from the end of the hose and let the pressure fizzle out.
Jon stared wide-eyed at the hose. The rushing, roaring Niagara had become a steady stream once again, and Jon’s face looked mighty relieved. “Pwomise you won’t spway me?” His lower lip quivered.
I pushed the hose behind my back, feeling bad about what I’d done. “I promise. Now, be a good boy and go turn off the water.”
“Uh-huh.” He nodded his head sheepishly and turned and ran to the spigot. “It’s off!” he shouted, hands in the air as though he’d done something really terrific.
“You’re right, it is.” I dropped the hose and followed him into the house. How many more willful standoffs would I encounter before Andie’s parents returned home? It was anyone’s guess.
As for Andie, I wasn’t going to let her talk me out of my fabulous idea. Amy-Liz deserved to go to camp this summer. End of discussion!
NO GUYS PACT
Chapter 2
When Jon and I went inside, we found Andie in the kitchen, kissing the top of Chris’s head. He sat dangling his chubby legs from the kitchen counter. Apparently Andie had successfully washed out his eyes.
“Everything okay?” I asked.
Andie nodded. “He’ll be fine.” She turned to look at Jon, who stood staring down at his toes.
I knelt down beside the little terror and put my arm around him. “Would you like to say something to Chris?”
Jon’s head rose slowly. “I’m thorry, Cwis,” he said softly.
Andie lifted Chris down off the counter, and Jon put his arms around his twin’s neck. “Aw, how sweet,” I cooed as the fiercesome twosome hugged and made up.
“Don’t hold your breath,” Andie whispered to me.
Suddenly the boys lost their balance and fell onto the floor in a heap of look-alike arms and legs. Giggles too.
At last we got the boys settled down and cleaned up. It took some doing even for both Andie and me to get things under control with these live wires. It made me appreciate the way Andie’s mom seemed to handle things every day. And my own mom, who was not only a mother to me and my sister, Carrie, but was now—with her marriage to Uncle Jack, who was a widower, having once been married to my dad’s sister—stepmom to four of my cousins, too.
While the twins watched a cartoon DVD in the family room, Andie and I sat on the sofa behind them, arguing about Amy-Liz and how to help her.
“C’mon, Andie. It’s a great idea,” I said.
She shook her head, making her dark curls dance. “How would you feel about receiving charity?”
“Get over it, Andie. Can’t you see? Amy’s gonna miss out if someone doesn’t do something, and fast.”
“Yeah? Like what?”
Finally Andie was ready to listen.
I sat up against the back of the sofa, eager to share my absolutely fabulous idea. “We could have a bake sale.”
She cackled at my idea. “Coming from someone who hates to bake, that’s nuts.”
“I don’t mind baking; it’s cooking I despise.”
“Whatever,” she muttered, waving her hand at me like I was suggesting something outrageous. “So, who’re you gonna sell this baked stuff to?”
She’d caught me off guard. “Oh…just some people.”
“What people?”
I should’ve known she’d question me every step of the way. Taking a deep breath, I said, “People like neighbors…uh, you know, and friends. Lots of people.”
“Sounds cool.” She leaned back against a soft plaid pillow.
Andie was like that. Unpredictable…and frustrating beyond belief. I never knew what to expect from her.
“So you’ll help me, then?” I asked.
She flashed one of her serious stares. “Whatcha gonna bake?”
“What about my Super-Duper Snickerdoodles?”
Andie’s eyes brightened. She actually smiled!
“And what about you?” I asked. “Don’t you have a special Mexican cookie recipe or something?”
Andie gasped playfully, clutching her throat. “You mean our secret family recipe? You can’t be serious.”
I laughed.
“I’d be crazy to let our recipe for polvorones fall into the wrong hands, Holly Meredith.” She leaned close, her dark eyes shining. “It’s top secret.”
“Well, if it’s so hush-hush, why don’t you just make them…whatever they are. I’m not interested in selling the recipe, any way.
“Oh, you’ll want it after you taste the results,” she replied. “Wait and see.” She had a weird dreamy look on her face. “So, that settles it. We’ll have a bake sale.”
I sat up. “Let’s start taking orders.”
“Not until after my mom gets home,” she said.
“I didn’t mean this second, silly.” I leaned back into the couch and sighed. “Thank goodness we’re not going to earn Amy-Liz’s camp money by baby-sitting.”
Andie frowned. “What…don’t you like my baby brothers?” She picked up the pillow and punched it hard.
“Course I do. Nothing against your brothers.” I paused, trying to think how I could get out of this gracefully. Andie wasn’t making things very easy. “I really love Chris and Jon.” I glanced over at them. “You should know that.”
“Yeah, right.” She sniffed and turned a cold shoulder.
“You know perfectly well I’m serious, Andie. I like helping you baby-sit your brothers.” I turned away from her glare, looking over at the darling boys on the floor. Jon sat chewing on his pointer finger, totally entranced with the cartoon characters and their antics. Chris rocked back and forth, humming softly to himself, also transfixed by the tube.
“What you mean is, you love getting paid for helping me with my brothers.” She said it with a straight face and a tinge of anger. What was going on?
“Andie, I don’t get you!” I stood up abruptly.
Jon turned around, startled. “Howwy not go bye-bye,” he said, shaking his slobbery finger at me. “Not go.”
Andie started to laugh, not her normal cackle. No, this laughter was new. A sort of midrange laugh with an eerie staccato bounce to it. And it sounded like she wasn’t really laughing at all. She had caught me in one of her crazy pretend conflict setups. Caught me flat. And what had I done? Fallen for it. I just stood there watching her have her giggle game.
“I really had you, Holly…I can’t believe you fell for…this.” She stopped laughing long enough to breathe, holding her sides. “How could you think I was actually serious?”
“Guess I’m gullible, that’s all.”
“Gullible, mullible,” she chanted. More laughter.
Finally, when the giggling ended, Andie settled down to normal—whatever that was—and we planned how to arrange getting the money from our baked-goods sale into the church scholarship fund.
“I’m sure Pastor Rob will agree,” I said, thinking how lucky we were to have such a cool youth pastor. “I’ll call him first thing tomorrow.”
“Make sure he keeps the bake sale a secret.” She grabbed my arm. “If Amy finds out, the whole thing will backfire in our faces.”
“Okay, I’ll tell him to keep it quiet,” I promised, amused at her sudden interest. But I was glad to know Andie was supportive of this project, because funding Amy-Liz’s camp trip wasn’t going to be all that easy.
NO GUYS PACT
Chapter 3
The next day, even though it was summer vacation, I got up early. Before the sun. I grabbed my journal from its special place in the bottom drawer of my dresser and hurried to my window seat with pen in hand.
Friday, June 17: I can’t wait to get started on a fabulous new top-secret project with Andie. If everything goes as planned, we’re going to raise zillions for the church camp scholarship fund. Actually, the money’s going to Amy-Liz Thompson because her dad’s out of work. And since she’d never accept our mon
ey any other way, this is a perfect plan.
I can’t wait to see her face when she finds out she’s going to camp after all!
A quick glance at the calendar told me Andie and I had a lot to do in a short time. The church bus was scheduled to leave for a camp in the San Juan Mountains next Thursday. That left only five days to take orders, bake goodies, deliver them, and get the money into the church camp account. All without Amy-Liz ever finding out.
Five days!
It would be tricky, but I was confident we could do it. With my organizational skills and Andie’s baking ability, not to mention that secret family recipe of hers…surely we could pull it off in time.
The first thing I decided to do to speed up matters was call Pastor Rob. I waited till seven o’clock, though. Didn’t want to wake him too early. I figured unmarried youth pastors like to sleep in on lazy summer days.
I tiptoed downstairs to the kitchen, took the portable phone out of its cradle, and hurried to my room. Safe inside, I closed the door. Had to make sure no one overheard this conversation.
The phone rang four times before the answering machine came on. After the beep, I left a message and wondered where I’d gotten the crazy notion that single youth pastors slept in on summer mornings. The machine said he was out playing racquetball and could be reached at the church office later in the day. Ten o’clock, to be exact.
I looked at my watch. Yikes! That was three long hours from now. I let myself freak out for a while about wasting those precious hours, then my thoughts turned to Andie. Maybe I could get things rolling with a quick phone call to her.
But wait. Knowing Andie, she’d still be in bed. I couldn’t risk upsetting her. She might get mad and dump the whole mission in my lap. Without her top-secret recipe.
Snuggling against the pillows in my window seat, I tried to figure out a way to make the time pass more quickly. Goofey, my cat, purred loudly, and I reached for him, holding him close.
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