The Dollar Kids

by Jennifer Richard Jacobson

  After watching reruns of a talent competition show, he said good night to Mum and Anneth. He texted Dad good night and had received a Sleep well, son in return. He thought of texting Clem, but that seemed lame.

  Then he climbed the dark stairway, turned into his dimly lit room, and stopped dead —

  A boy was sitting on the edge of his bed.

  His first thought when he saw the boy was Abe.

  His rapid-firing second thought was that this boy — who was obviously older than Abe — was a ghost from the funeral home next door.

  The boy (or the ghost of a boy) leaned forward on his elbows. “How do you like my room?”

  “Your room?” Lowen managed to say.

  “Yup.” The kid stood and walked over to where Lowen was standing. Lowen jumped aside, but all the kid did was flip the light switch.

  Not a ghost, then.

  The boy had a buzz cut and wore a tattered T-shirt with camo pants. He drifted over to the closet and peered inside. Lowen’s duffel bag was there. Was this kid a thief? Was he looking for something to steal?

  “My grandfather is a town councillor.”

  Coach? Not likely. “Mr. Avery?” Anyway, what did that have to do with anything?

  He nodded. “I live with him. But this is my family’s house. My father built the dormer in this room. That’s what you call the addition. A dormer. It makes the room longer.”

  Lowen wanted to say, “It was your family’s house, and get out of my closet,” but he felt less certain of these facts.

  The kid picked up one of Lowen’s Bone books and leafed through it. “How tall are you?”

  “Five foot six,” Lowen practically shouted, hoping Mum or Anneth might hear him and come investigate. What did this kid want?

  “I’m Dylan Firebrand,” the kid said. “People call this the Firebrand House.”

  “Lowen Grover,” Lowen replied. He was tempted to add, “And we call this house the Albatross,” but he didn’t think Dylan would appreciate the joke.

  “I know,” Dylan said. “You’re in the sixth grade like me.” And with that, he brushed past Lowen, clunked down the stairwell, and went out the front door. The door none of them had used yet. Neither Mum nor Anneth seemed to notice him at all — almost like he was a ghost.

  Lowen took a deep breath, though it didn’t stop his heart from trying to break out of his rib cage.

  He thought of going downstairs, telling Mum what had just happened, but he remembered her feelings of defeat earlier today. He didn’t want to add one more worry. So he said nothing and crawled into bed. But a good deal of time passed before he stopped lying there with his eyes open, convinced that people were drifting in and out of his room.

  Lowen figured he wouldn’t see Dylan Firebrand again until they landed in the same classroom in September.

  That wasn’t the case by a long shot.

  The next morning when Lowen stumbled down to breakfast, Dylan was lolling in the kitchen talking to Mum. She was pouring him a paper cup of juice. “Look who’s here,” she said.

  Lowen didn’t know if Mum meant him or Dylan. Either way, she seemed pleased.

  Lowen knew that his mother wished he had more friends. It used to worry her that he mostly spent time with Abe, who was so much younger than he was. He’d tried to explain that he had plenty of friends at school. It’s just that he didn’t like having friends over. When friends came to your house, you had to entertain them: figure out their interests, keep them busy. In his precious spare time, Lowen wanted to do the things he loved best. Alone. He’d hoped that she would take the hint and realize that he probably didn’t love having Abe hanging around, but she never did, and he couldn’t bring himself to say it outright. It just felt too mean.

  Lowen poured himself a cup of juice and waited for Dylan to ask him more questions, but mostly Dylan talked to Mum. He told her where his mother had kept her pots and pans, how the refrigerator light would come back on if you jiggled the bulb, that they never bothered to lock the front door — which was probably why it had been stuck, after being locked for so many months — and that trash was picked up on Thursdays.

  Lowen reached into a box of oatmeal squares (which Mum had found at Roger’s, and which had unfortunately replaced the marshmallow cereal), pulled out a handful, and headed out the door.

  “Where are you going?” Mum called.

  “To explore,” Lowen replied. “I need a break from cleaning.”

  “Why don’t you and Dy —”

  Lowen didn’t slow down to listen. He had no interest in befriending Dylan Firebrand. He’d probably give Lowen all kinds of advice about where best to place things in his room. It was just too weird. And let’s face it, Dylan was probably better off without his friendship.

  He decided to walk farther up Beech Street instead of down toward town. A scruffy man in jeans and slippers (slippers that Lowen would turn into big hairy things if he were to draw them) stepped out of a home badly in need of repair and paused to talk to Lowen on his way to get his newspaper.

  “You’re one of those Dollar Kids, aren’t you?”

  “I guess, yeah.”

  “So where’s your family from?”

  “Flintlock.”

  “Crazy city, man! I could never live in one of those crime-infested places. Sure is nice and peaceful here in Millville, isn’t it?”

  Lowen just nodded and kept moving. He had never thought of Flintlock as crime-infested before; the shooting at Georgio’s had been the only really violent crime he’d heard about. He wondered again how much people knew about him.

  When Lowen crossed School Street, he noticed a public playground and went to investigate. A worn picnic table occupied the only shade. Sprawled across the spotty grass were a metal swing set with three swings, a wooden teeter-totter, a tall metal slide, and one of those merry-go-rounds that turned only when pushed. The merry-go-round had faded, paint-chipped animals for seats: a rabbit, a duck, a rooster, a lamb. It made him wish that he were younger. That was the problem with being eleven: you didn’t belong with the teenagers skateboarding on the paved paths by the bandstand, and you were too old to ride the merry-go-round — even though it still looked fun. He’d pick the duck.

  Behind the playground was a fenced-in pool. An instructor was standing in the shallow end of the pool, giving some kids slightly younger than Lowen a swim lesson. The kids were sitting on the edge of the pool, their feet dangling. Lowen shivered. It seemed awfully early to have to get into that cool blue water. One boy glanced up at Lowen and then whispered to the kid beside him. Now both were looking his way. Lowen sped up.

  He walked west on School and back down Maple, where he recognized the Grey kids out in their front yard. The three kids were playing a game where they kept reciting, “Mr. Fox, Mr. Fox.”

  Lagi came running over to him on the sidewalk. “What’s your name?” he asked.

  Lowen told him, and the little boy said, “I’m Lagi. That’s Lily, and that’s Wanda.”

  The two girls joined them.

  “Do you want to play Mr. Fox?” asked Wanda, who Lowen guessed was in third or fourth grade. “I’m it.”

  “Please, please, please!” said Lily, who was probably two years younger than her sister, and wearing butterfly wings.

  “Please, please, please!” Lagi repeated.

  The two younger kids grabbed on to his hands and tried pulling him into the yard. Lowen smiled and recalled a time when Abe had begged him in a similar manner. The snake climbed. “I have to get home. My mum’s expecting me,” he said.

  He took the longest route back he could think of, hoping that Dylan would have moved on. As he approached 11 Beech, he noticed two bags by the front porch. One had boys’ clothes; the other contained a tablecloth, a wooden bowl, and some Tupperware. He had no idea who had dropped them off or what it meant.

  “The Welcome Wagon again?” Anneth asked, when he deposited the bags inside. Fortunately, Dylan was nowhere in sight.

  “M
aybe,” said Mum. “But I have a sneaky suspicion it has more to do with the folks in this town viewing us all as quite needy.”

  “What do we do with all this junk?” asked Clem, who had finally gotten out of bed.

  Mum shot him a chastising look. “I guess we accept their generosity,” she said, looking for a place to store the bowl.

  “But aren’t we here to help them?” asked Lowen. “You know, bring in more people, more businesses . . . that sort of thing?”

  “We’re here to help each other,” said Mum. “I’m sure they realize that.”

  The appearance of mysterious things continued to occur. They never saw the person or persons who left the items, which made them feel watched.

  Some of the things were useful. Anneth claimed a box of buttons and used them to decorate the sleeves of a jean jacket. Mum picked wildflowers to fill a bud vase, which she set on the dining room table. They placed the random assortment of loose magnets on the refrigerator.

  Other things the Grovers had no use for: dented shades, Jell-O molds, bed ruffles, steak knives, needlepoint pictures. Most of these things Mum packed up in their empty boxes and stored in the garage. She would have sent them home with Dad on one of his trips back to the city (to drop off at Goodwill), but she worried that they might be loans.

  One day a card table appeared on their lawn. (It went to the garage.) Another day they came home from a trip to the market to find a large corduroy recliner. “Can we keep this?” Clem asked, already testing it out. “It’s super comfy.”

  “And super ugly,” said Dad, who was up for the weekend. But, after a family discussion, they moved it into the living room for fear that the donor’s feelings would be hurt if they didn’t. Mum’s shop would be opening soon and they couldn’t afford to hurt anyone’s feelings.

  Dylan’s appearances were also a regular occurrence. He came around at least once a day. He never knocked. He just traipsed in, helped himself to a granola bar from the cupboard or a slice of cheese and a bit of turkey from the fridge, and then stretched out on the floor to watch TV. It didn’t matter if Clem was watching a baseball game or if Anneth was watching reruns of a fashion show, he’d prop himself up on his elbows and stare at the TV until someone clicked it off. If the TV wasn’t on when he arrived, he plopped down on the couch or in the corduroy recliner (if it wasn’t occupied by Clem) and listened to the conversation going on around him. Clem and Anneth usually acknowledged him in some way — sometimes with just a nod, sometimes with questions about Millville.

  Clem: How far do you have to drive for tacos?

  Anneth: Why is the Internet service in Millville so ridiculously slow?

  Clem: Are any of these spiders around here poisonous? Can you get malaria from the mosquitoes? And what are those little black droppings in the corners of my room?

  Anneth: Why does everyone say hi when they don’t even know me?

  Clem: Why do most people in town drive trucks?

  There were questions that Lowen wanted to ask: How many teachers will we have in sixth grade? Are they nice? Who are the popular kids? Can you sit anywhere you want in the lunchroom? Stuff like that.

  And he was also curious about Dylan. How come he lived with his grandfather? Did his parents live with Mr. Avery, too? Was Mr. Avery as strict as he seemed? But he wouldn’t allow himself to ask.

  As it turned out, Dylan didn’t seem to care whether Lowen talked to him or not. In fact, he seemed to prefer the company of Clem and Anneth.

  Which should have made Lowen feel relieved; after all, he wasn’t looking for a friend. But it didn’t. It made him feel shunned — and slightly paranoid. Dylan’s grandfather was town councillor. Had he told Dylan about Abe? Had he told Dylan to stay away from Lowen? Or could Dylan just tell that as far as friends were concerned, Lowen wasn’t worth the effort?

  Mum, Anneth, and Clem seemed amused by Dylan’s presence and kept referring to him as “Lowen’s new friend,” which irritated Lowen to no end. Couldn’t they see that Dylan spent all his time talking to everyone in the family but him? Besides, a friend was someone you looked forward to seeing. It wasn’t someone who barged into your home — and your life — without permission.

  First Abe, and now Dylan.

  Lowen took to helping Mum at the restaurant first thing in the morning so he could leave the house before Dylan arrived.

  On the second Monday of July, Lowen pulled himself out of bed, wolfed down his breakfast, and then grabbed some old rags and a roll of parchment paper.

  “You’re good to come to the shop with me,” Mum said.

  “It’s fun,” said Lowen, who was telling the truth. He and Anneth used to play restaurant when they were younger; now his mother was creating the real thing.

  Because the landlord was in charge of the repairs, the shop was transforming at a decent pace. He had put in a large front window at Mum’s request, and he’d hired an electrician to put in some extra lighting. “He’s tired of having this place empty,” Mum had said. “He wants us to succeed, too.”

  “So what should we do today?” Lowen asked, plopping the supplies down on the table.

  “Let’s paint these grimy walls,” Mum said. She went over to her handbag resting on the table and took out two twenty-dollar bills. “Go down to the hardware store and buy paint.”

  “What color?”

  “You pick. I trust your artistic judgment.”

  Lowen smiled. One of his favorite things to do in the entire world was to buy art supplies. This wasn’t exactly that, but the thought of looking at paint chips with all those shades and combinations of reds and yellows and blues made his heart skip.

  “What about brushes and rollers and stuff?”

  Mum thought for a moment, then shook her head and grabbed her handbag. “While you’re at the hardware store, I’m going out to do a little borrowing.”

  Handy Hardware was the most crowded store Lowen had ever been in, but not crowded with people — crowded with things. Maybe, with so many stores in town closed, boarded up, Handy Hardware was attempting to sell everything a Millvillian could need. There were tools resting against toboggans, fishing rods leaning up against flyswatters. The place was a mess.

  “May I help you?” asked a skinny man with pointy shoulders, pointy elbows, and a pointy nose. He’d make a great comic book character.

  Lowen didn’t want to be helped. He wanted to spend time studying all of the paint chips, making comparisons. But not answering seemed rude. “I need to buy paint,” he said.

  “Watercolors, acrylic, spray paint?” said the clerk.

  “House paint. Or, in this case, store paint.”

  “Ah,” said the man. “Which store you painting?”

  “My mother is opening a lunch restaurant next to the Busy Bee.”

  “You don’t say,” said the man. “Right next door?”

  Lowen nodded.

  “Interior or exterior?”

  It took Lowen a moment to realize that the man was asking about the paint again. “Interior,” he said.

  “We used to have a lunch place here in town,” said the clerk as he led Lowen down a zigzaggy aisle. “But then everyone started taking their lunches to work. Of course, there are a lot fewer people working in town now than there used to be.”

  Lowen knew this. Mum had discovered this when she did research. But, as she pointed out, if Millville was going to make a comeback — and they seemed to want to make a comeback — they would need some new shops on Main Street.

  They arrived at the interior paint section. “The custom colors and the most popular colors are ’bout thirty-seven dollars a gallon,” the man said. “But this color here . . .” He pulled a paint can from the top shelf and wiped the dust off the lid with his apron. “This color, um, Blue Ambrosia, is on sale for sixteen dollars a gallon.”

  Blue Ambrosia? The can didn’t show the color. But it sure sounded pretty. Besides, you couldn’t beat the price. Mum would be proud that he’d economized. He’d take two
.

  His mother wasn’t alone when he got back to the store. Sami was standing in the middle of the store with her mother.

  “You look surprised to see us, Lowen,” said Rena, smiling. “Your mother came by to borrow painting equipment, and since the younger girls were playing at the Greys’, and Sami and I had just run out of things to unpack, she picked up two helpers to boot!”

  “Mom can’t set up her business until the loan is approved,” Sami said. “She’s going to open a handmade pet clothing store — one with grooming services.”

  Rena nodded. “The pet industry is one of the fastest growing industries in this country.”

  Mum smiled. “People do seem to love their animals.”

  “Do you have a pet?” Sami asked Lowen.

  Lowen shook his head. “My dad’s allergic,” he said, putting one can down and handing the other to Mum.

  She lifted the cover of the can with a screwdriver and revealed a dark metallic blue.

  “I thought it would be a lighter color,” Lowen said. “The word Ambrosia makes me think of something fluffy.”

  “I kind of like it,” said Mum. “It’s surprising. Totally unexpected.” She lifted the can to pour the paint into a tray.

  “No!” said Sami. “You can’t use blue!”

  “Why?” Mum and Lowen asked simultaneously.

  “This is going to be a restaurant, right?” said Sami. “The color blue suppresses the appetite!”

  “B. F. Skinner?” Rena asked her daughter, while giving Mum a slightly apologetic smile.

  “I studied Skinner in school!” said Mum. “He worked with rats!”

  “And pigeons,” Sami said, smiling.

  “His theories help explain our behavior,” Mum said to Lowen, to fill him in.

  “Right,” said Sami, “but I’m not talking about his theories.” She gave her mother a look. “I’m talking about color psychology. Foods that are blue have gone bad or are poisonous,” said Sami, “so our brains learned a long time ago to avoid them.”

  “What about blueberries?” Lowen pointed out.

  “Name another one,” said Sami, folding her arms. She waited.