“Well…” Dad scratched his head. “I suppose if we came home with ten thousand dollars or so in profits, I would consider that a success? It’s less than my salary at the university, but it’s not peanuts. It would be a good start, that’s for sure.”
Freddy nodded. Ten thousand dollars. That seemed doable, didn’t it? How hard could it be to make ten thousand bucks selling pies?
Through a mouthful of peach filling, Herb asked, “How long do we have to make that much money?”
“A month,” Dad told him.
Herb nodded, and judging by his far-off expression, Freddy could tell his little brother was doing mental math. “So, if we bring in $2,500 in profits each week,” Herb said, “or about $350 per day, that would do it.”
Freddy gaped at his little brother. How did Herb do that kind of math in his head so fast? But Herb was a math whiz, so Freddy knew those calculations must be correct. “We can do it,” Freddy promised. He would make sure of it.
Dad went on, “The past few years have been hard on all of us, and I know work has been taking up a lot of my time. Perhaps…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “Well, let’s just see how this goes first.”
Ever since Mom died, Dad hadn’t been around much. Freddy missed their family time. They used to have all kinds of fun traditions—building and flying homemade kites in the park on Sundays, first-Saturday-of-the-month slime-mixing stations, cupcake decorating competitions. All those things had disappeared along with Mom. Lucy had done her best to keep things as normal as possible, but there was only so much she could do. Except now, maybe, Dad was ready to help search for some of the missing parts of their family.
Freddy smiled at each of his siblings as he took another bite of pie. They could do this!
Dad blundered on. “We do have one more important thing to discuss as a family. I’ve been doing a bit of thinking, and I thought it might be fun if we each set some sort of goal for this summer.”
Freddy lifted his eyebrows. Setting goals sounded suspiciously like homework.
“A plan, of sorts, to guide our experiment,” Dad declared. “Of course, there should also be some room for surprises along the way. Like that time I thought I was getting a sediment core from the Norwegian Sea, but it turned out the core we opened was from the North Sea.” He chuckled and drifted off, a slight smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Ah, yes, that was exciting. What I’m trying to say is, in addition to setting goals for the trip, there will also be plenty of room for serendipity this summer.”
“Sara and who?” Herb asked. “Who’s Ippity?”
“What’s that now?” Dad asked.
“You said Sara and Ippity,” Herb repeated. Dad stared at him, clearly not understanding. Herb asked, “Who are they?”
“Serendipity,” Lucy explained. “It’s a word that means a happy little accident—a fun surprise.”
Through a mouthful of pie, Dad said, “I recently found out about a food truck festival in Delaware, Ohio, that I thought could be a good end point for our journey. The winning truck takes home a ten-thousand-dollar cash prize. If we won, that would certainly help to prove this experiment was truly worth it. The route I have planned will take us through Ohio anyway, so I was thinking we could make the festival a sort of goal. We can take a few weeks to get our business up and running, make some good money along the way, and then at the festival, we’ll be able to test what we’ve learned during our experiment.”
Freddy loved the idea of winning a food truck festival. This was exactly the kind of specific goal he could get on board with. Best of all, if they won, they’d be coming home with at least ten thousand dollars. Then dad would have no choice but to see this summer as a success! “I’m in,” he said. “So how do they figure out who the food truck festival winner is?”
“An excellent question, Fred!” Dad said. “Each food truck that enters gets a score based on how much money they make during the festival, as well as being judged on customer service and taste.”
“Got it,” Freddy said, nodding seriously. That seemed simple enough. They could practice all of those things—making money, baking tasty pies, and being nice to customers—over the next few weeks. “What will we do with the money when we win?”
Dad took a deep breath. “Well, I suppose we’d have to figure that out. Perhaps we could use it to do a couple of the other things your Mom always talked about doing together: unique trips, big adventures, maybe take a cheese class.”
“A cheese class?” Freddy asked, lifting his eyebrows.
“You learn about and taste different types of cheese,” Dad explained. “That’s just one idea, of course. We can figure out how to spend the winnings together.”
“Let’s worry about winning first, okay?” Lucy suggested.
“Yes,” Dad said, nodding solemnly. “Yes, that’s a good point. Now, what’s everyone else’s personal goal for the trip? Winning the Ohio Food Truck Festival can be a goal we all work toward as a family. But I’d like each of you to come up with a goal of your own, to make this experience more meaningful.”
“I know!” Herb said, jumping up and down. “I know my goal. I love swimming. And since we aren’t going to get a pool for the backyard yet, can we try to swim every day during our trip? Will our hotels have indoor pools or outdoor pools, do you think?”
Dad stared at him blankly for a moment. Then he whistled, and said, “It seems I forgot to tell you the best part of this trip!” Freddy had a feeling Dad’s best part was going to be anything but. He turned to witness Lucy’s reaction to whatever Dad was about to say. “We’re going to be camping this summer! It’s much cheaper than staying in hotels, so our fun money will last longer. Plus, this way, we can be footloose and fancy-free, and we’ll sleep under the stars each night. Doesn’t that sound like fun?”
“We’re camping?” Lucy asked. Freddy coughed to hide a laugh. The look on his sister’s face was priceless! “For real?”
Dad grinned. “Indeed. Some of my fondest memories from childhood are from the summer camping trips my cousins and I took. Every night, we found a new place to call home. We’ll set up shop in campgrounds where we can sleep beside lakes or rivers, and I’m pretty sure there are even a few campgrounds with outdoor pools. So, Herb,” he said, barreling on, “your summer goal to swim every day is perfectly valid. My hypothesis is, that should be doable.”
Freddy quickly spoke up. It was clear that Lucy needed a few minutes to collect herself after Dad’s latest surprise. “I’ve got a goal. So, there’s this app Ethan told me about that helps you find really cool, hidden roadside attractions—stuff like the world’s largest ball of twine. Did you know there’s not one, but two huge cherry pie pans we could stop and see in Michigan? And get this: there are, like, ten giant Paul Bunyan statues around the country. Maybe we could get that app on your phone and make it a goal to stop and see some of the weird stuff we pass along the way?”
“What a wonderful way for us to enjoy the journey!” Dad crooned.
Freddy snorted out a laugh. Their dad was acting like a total goof; for the first time in two years, he was full of smiles and enthusiasm. Freddy loved it.
Dad added, “That’s a fun goal, Freddy. Your mother would definitely like that idea.”
Freddy felt his face flush. He had to choke down the bite of pie he’d just popped into his mouth. “What about you, Lucy?” he asked, hoping to shift the attention to his sister.
Dad nodded. “Yes. Lucy: Do you have a goal for our trip? What do you want to do this summer, more than anything?”
“No goal,” she muttered. “Honestly, the only thing I wanted was to have a normal summer. My goal would be to go to the pool with my friends, and hang out in hammocks by the rose garden, and go on bike rides with lots of ice cream stops. And I want time to sit around and read, without any other stuff getting in my way.” She sighed and dropped her fork on the
counter, where it landed with a plunk. “But it looks like I’m going to be standing around in a hot truck, making pies instead.”
“Interesting,” Dad said, seemingly oblivious to Lucy’s frustration. “Now, regarding this reading goal: can you be a little more specific? I’m sure you understand the importance of setting clear goals with definable outcomes, Lucy. Vague goals don’t get you anywhere.”
“Fine,” Lucy huffed. “My goal is to read every book on the seventh-grade summer reading list, even though my language arts teacher told us we only have to read two. Is that clear enough for you?”
“Perfectly,” Dad said with a distant smile. “Now…who’s ready for more pie?”
Suggested Reading List for Incoming Seventh Graders
– The War That Saved My Life by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
– Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
– The Shadow Children series by Margaret Peterson Haddix
– Refugee by Alan Gratz
– The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
– The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall
– One Crazy Summer by Rita Williams-Garcia
– Fish in a Tree by Lynda Mulally Hunt
– The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise by Dan Gemeinhart
– Orphan Island by Laurel Snyder
– Amal Unbound by Aisha Saeed
– A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
– Rebound by Kwame Alexander
– March by Jon Lewis
– The Seventh Wish by Kate Messner
– The Bridge Home by Padma Venkatraman
– The Thing About Jellyfish by Ali Benjamin
– Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta
– Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell
– Echo by Pam Muñoz Ryan
– Ghost by Jason Reynolds
– Genesis Begins Again by Alicia D. Williams
– Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus by Dusti Bowling
– A Night Divided by Jennifer A. Nielsen
– Amina’s Voice by Hena Khan
– The Ethan I Was Before by Ali Standish
– Breadcrumbs by Anne Ursu
– Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
– The Parker Inheritance by Varian Johnson
– Front Desk by Kelly Yang
4
HIDDEN TREASURE
Herb’s tummy hurt. Though the youngest Peach had always liked pie, now that he’d been eating it for almost two hours straight, he didn’t think he ever wanted to eat it again. Unfortunately, Dad had announced that the Peaches would be eating nothing but pie for the next month, and no one could tell if he was joking or not. Dad wasn’t a joking kind of guy.
Herb had always believed a day filled with dessert alone would be delicious, but after just one morning shoving his face full of gooey, sticky peach pie, he was actually craving something not-so-sweet. At times like this, when he’d had too much sugar and his belly felt squirmy, he thought about one of his mom’s favorite sayings: “When life gives you lemons, make iced tea.”
Herb loved that his mom had always looked at things a little differently than the rest of the world. She said that lemonade—the star of the original saying, When life gives you lemons, make lemonade—was too sweet for her taste. (Herb agreed, but if he was being honest, he didn’t much like iced tea, either.) A few years ago, Herb and his siblings had gotten Mom’s favorite saying embroidered on a pillow for her as a Christmas gift, to try to help cheer her up during all those long weeks of chemotherapy. Now the pillow sat unused on Mom’s favorite reading chair, as a reminder of all the sour lemons life had thrown at the Peach family these past few years.
That morning, as Herb rubbed his sore belly, Lucy quietly slipped him a bowl of carrot sticks. The veggies helped settle his tummy enough that he could squeeze in just a little more peach pie.
After tasting every single one of the sample pies Dad had baked, the kids had all decided that the medium-thick crust was the best-quality crust for selling by the slice—it wasn’t soggy and didn’t fall apart when you cut into it. There was some discussion about whether traditional crust or buttery crumble made a better topping. This discussion led to a bit of a disagreement, which turned into a full-blown fight. Finally, Freddy suggested they could make some pies with crumb topping and others with crust topping and test to see which one was more popular with customers. That compromise calmed everyone down for a bit.
Freddy had spent part of the morning doing some more research online at the family computer in the dining room, and he had found several hole-in-the-wall pie shops that he thought they should stop and visit along their route. Though these stops weren’t included on Dad’s original schedule, Freddy had pointed out that it would be important to stop and do some pie-tasting research along the way. Somehow, Herb’s big brother had smooth-talked Dad into seeing things his way, so now their first stop on the journey would be at Betty’s Pies, just north of their hometown of Duluth, Minnesota. Freddy had also found several other pie shops he was eager to stop at throughout Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Michigan, but Dad hadn’t agreed to those detours quite yet.
“Get this: there’s one place that bakes their pies in a paper bag,” Freddy called into the kitchen from where he sat in front of the computer. “That’s pretty cool. Another place is known for butterscotch pie, which sounds interesting and also is probably pretty easy to make. And here’s something good to know: Michigan doesn’t just have the world’s largest cherry pie pan, they’re also really into cherry pie. That’s because of Michigan cherries. We probably want to have cherry pie on our menu if we stop in Michigan. I didn’t bother looking for any pie places to stop at beyond Michigan,” he was saying as he rejoined the family in the kitchen. “I figure we better have our menu pretty well sorted out by then, or we won’t have any hope of winning that food truck festival in Ohio.”
Dad suddenly yawned and swayed, catching the edge of the counter to keep himself from falling over. “I’ll tell you what. I’m pooped,” he said. “Let’s head outside and get started painting and cleaning the truck, before I collapse.”
Though most food trucks used special wraps for their name and logo, Dad had explained, the Peaches didn’t have time to wait for a custom food truck wrap to be completed. Instead, they would be customizing the bright peachy-orange-colored truck with painted-on, swirly black-and-green stencil letters and a giant dancing peach sticker. Hoping to help, Herb had suggested they paint dragons or flames or something exciting on the side of the truck, but he was outvoted.
While Dad and Lucy bickered over how to work the paint sprayer, Herb and Freddy set to work cleaning out the inside of the truck. They each got a big bucket of sudsy water and a few sponges. To make the job more appealing, Dad told them they were allowed to have soap fights while they cleaned. It was okay if soap and water sploshed on the floor, he said; the most important thing was that they scrub the space from top to bottom. How they got it clean was up to them, and this kind of freedom was exciting to Herb.
Dad had also promised that if they found any treasures while they were cleaning, they could keep them. So far, Herb had found almost three dollars in loose change, an old bandanna, a funny grocery list, and a still-in-the-wrapper chocolate bar! This was his lucky day.
The two boys scrubbed and explored and scrubbed some more, cranking up the music inside the truck while they worked. They soaped up the countertops, emptied the fridge, and scraped charred bits off the top of the stove. Then Herb attached sudsy sponges to his knees to scrub the floor. He swished and slid back and forth, leaving soapy trails across the floor of the truck.
Herb was back in the far corner of the truck, near the pantry area, when he noticed a piece of cloth sticking out from under one of the low shelves. He grabbed the fabric and t
ugged. It felt like an old T-shirt, soft and worn. But no matter how hard he pulled, the piece of cloth wouldn’t come loose. “Freddy!” he cried, trying to get his brother’s attention over the loud music. Freddy was dancing, tapping his soap-filled sponges on the counters along with the beat. “Freddy!” Herb called again. “Help me move this shelf.”
Freddy slid over, and then leaned his whole weight against the shelf. It was screwed in place, just like everything in the food truck (so that it wouldn’t go flying around when they were on the road), but Freddy was able to shift it just enough for Herb to reach his tiny fingers in and wiggle the fabric free. He pulled it out and was disappointed to see it wasn’t anything exciting—just an old, dirty, torn-up T-shirt. He scooped it up, preparing to toss it in the big trash bag. But then, just as Freddy was dancing away, Herb felt the fabric move. Startled, he let the ball of soft cotton fall open. When it did, several tiny noses poked out of the folds. It seemed that three teeny-weeny mice babies had made their home in an old T-shirt inside the food truck!
Fascinated, Herb settled down on the nubby silver floor, cradling the little pouch full of critters in the palms of his hands. “Hello,” he whispered. One of the mice twitched its nose. Carefully, Herb tucked the edges of the fabric up and around the three little mice, capturing them inside the soft pouch. With a smile, he cupped his newfound treasure in his hands and headed toward the back door of the truck. “Dad?” he called out. “You promised I can keep anything I find, right?”
“Whatever you find in there while you’re cleaning,” his dad said distractedly, “is yours.”
Herb grinned. Three mice of his very own, to keep! Because a promise was a promise. “I’m going to keep you safe and happy, little mice,” he whispered to the little critters. “I promise.”
From the Sketchbook of Freddy Peach:
HOW TO SPEND A MILLION DOLLARS
The Great Peach Experiment 1 Page 3