by Nancy N. Rue
So Sophie was glad to become Dr. Devon Downing. She observed Brooke and trained the Corn Flakes to work with her during lunch and sometimes after school, when Brooke didn’t have “something else to do.”
“Like drive somebody else mental,” Darbie muttered more than once.
On those days, with Brooke not there, they shot the scenes of Dr. Devon Downing and her able assistant, Test Tube Tess, played by Fiona. Darbie and Vincent filmed, Jimmy set up the shots, and Nathan stood around turning red.
Since there wasn’t much makeup involved in the movie, which Willoughby usually handled, she concentrated on the praise-Brooke department. During PE, she’d say, “Go, Brooke — you almost hit it that time!” or “Yay — good job not stepping on Maggie!” Jimmy restaged that later for filming.
Fiona showed Brooke how to line up her clothes on the bench in the locker room so she wouldn’t lose them. She rolled her eyes nearly up into her head when Brooke still ended up with somebody else’s bra. That part Darbie didn’t catch on film.
Maggie complained that there were no special costumes to make, but she quickly got the hang of reciting all the table rules for Brooke every day when they sat down to lunch in the cafeteria. No interrupting people. No talking with your mouth full. (Kitty’s mother wanted to know why she was getting so much food on her clothes all of a sudden.) No borrowing lunch money. And no jumping up from the table every other minute. Footage of Maggie talking woodenly into the camera wasn’t the best they’d ever taken, but Sophie said it had to be there.
Kitty became the best at rewarding Brooke with a small handful of Cheerios when she got something right. It seemed that Brooke would eat just about anything, including items from Darbie’s lunch, when she wasn’t looking.
“You weren’t eating it,” Brooke said when Darbie demanded to know where her brownie had disappeared to.
“I was going to,” Darbie said, and then she gritted her teeth at Sophie. That was some of their best footage.
They got together without Brooke Thursday morning before school in Mr. Stires’ room to check their progress on the film editor.
“This is some of our best stuff,” Vincent said.
“It looks so real,” Kitty said.
Maggie grunted. “It is real.”
“Too bad it isn’t working.” Darbie’s eyes were pointy. “As long as we’re blathering at her,” she said, “she does what she’s supposed to. But the minute we look the other way, she starts foostering about again.”
Now everybody looked at Sophie, and she felt prickly — the way she did when she had to take Lacie’s turn with Zeke or the dishes. Why did she have to be responsible for everything on the planet?
“What does everybody else think?” Sophie said.
“What difference does it make?” Fiona said. “When it comes to doing the right thing, you always know.”
“Do you think it would be right for us to just suddenly dump her?” Sophie said.
“Do you?” Willoughby said.
“No.” Sophie knew her voice sounded prickly.
Vincent rubbed his hands together. “Then let’s get back to work. Project Brooke could be our best production yet.”
Sophie didn’t say that she wished they’d stop calling Brooke a project. Or that she wished they wouldn’t be so ready to give up all the time.
Or that she needed somebody else to come up with some answers for a change.
She just packed her camera into its bag and returned it to the shelf in Mr. Stires’ storage room. Everything felt like a wool sweater itching her. She was afraid if she opened her mouth, she would scratch somebody.
But then, on Thursday, it looked like maybe Brooke was making progress. At the lunch table, almost before Vincent could get the camera rolling, Brooke sat down, pulled a sandwich out of a brown bag, and chewed an entire bite before she started talking.
“Good job!” Willoughby said.
Kitty dug into the huge box of Cheerios she’d gotten at Sam’s Club. “You get a reward for remembering your lunch and not talking while you’re chewing.”
“All right!” Willoughby said.
“A reward?” Julia said.
Sophie looked up to see Julia and the Corn Pops standing at the end of the table with their trays. Sophie shook her head at Vincent, but he just pointed the camera at them.
“What is she, a puppy in training?” Cassie said.
“No,” Brooke informed her. “I’m getting rewarded for not being rude.”
Now would be a good time to hush up, Brooke, Sophie thought.
“Cheerios?” Anne-Stuart snuffled, taking away Sophie’s appetite for cereal or anything else. “I’d hold out for M&Ms if I were you, Brooke.”
Brooke snapped her head toward Kitty. “Yeah. How come I don’t get candy?”
“Because sugar makes you even more — ” Darbie started to say.
“Sugar isn’t good for anybody,” Sophie said.
“It’s fine for me,” Anne-Stuart said. She looked down at her twiglike body. “I never gain an ounce.”
“Okay, I’m bored with this conversation,” Julia said. With a toss of her thick hair, she whisked the Corn Pops away.
“I need something to drink,” Brooke said.
She pushed her chair back so hard it banged into the kid behind her.
Sophie groaned. It was Tod Ravelli.
“Hey, step off, would ya?” Tod said. His spiked hair seemed to poke up taller as he stood his otherwise short self up. “That’s like the eighth time you’ve touched me, chick.” He put his face closer to hers. “I don’t like to be touched.”
Brooke looked at him for no longer than a millisecond before she gave him a poke in the chest with her finger.
“Hey, Brooke!” Sophie sang out as she shoved back her own chair. “Let’s go get you a drink.”
“He’s a punk,” Brooke said for all to hear.
Sophie put her hand in front of the camera and whispered, “Turn that off,” before she led Brooke toward the drink counter. Brooke looked back over her shoulder.
“What’s Tod doing?” Sophie said.
“Talking to that kid with the stick-out ears. They’re both punks. I don’t like punks.” Brooke moved closer to Sophie as they walked — and didn’t seem to notice that she pulled Sophie’s shoe half off with the side of her foot. “But you,” she said. “You I like.”
“Oh,” Sophie said. “Thanks.”
But as Brooke filled a cup to overflowing with milk, Sophie wondered whether it was a good thing that Brooke liked her. After all, that wasn’t the point of making this film with her. Was it?
“When do I get to see myself in the movie?” Brooke turned to Sophie and slopped milk over her hand and onto the floor. Sophie stepped back just in time to keep her tennis shoes from being drenched.
“Um, maybe after school — soon,” Sophie said.
“Can’t be Monday or Wednesday. I think I have to go to — ” Brooke stopped and shook back her hair, splashing more of the contents of her cup. “Whatever. Anyway, I like movies. Can me and you go to one — like, a real one?”
Sophie was more than grateful when the bell rang. That way she didn’t have to answer Brooke’s question, or her own. What was she supposed to do if this hard-to-be-around girl wanted to be her new best friend?
All the questions made her want to scratch an itch she couldn’t reach. That was not the way Dr. Devon Downing would handle it, she thought as she got ready for the lizard lab in fifth-period science.
A dedicated medical researcher such as myself does not have time to concern herself with these personal matters, Dr. Devon thought as she tucked her notebook neatly and professionally under her arm and headed for the laboratory. Today, for the first time, she was going to look into the brain of a lizard, and if things went as she hoped, she would find the final clue in her search for a cure. Then she would no longer have to worry about Raggedy Ann-D-H-D.
Dr. Downing’s lab assistant, the devoted Test Tube Tess,
uncovered the deceased lizard. It lay with its feet pinned down, ready to be opened up for medical science.
“We’re supposed to cut from the neck down,” Tess said.
But Dr. Downing placed the tip of her scalpel on the lizard’s head and deftly spit it open. Although Test Tube Tess coughed loudly, there was no blood, nothing at all disgusting. Freeze-drying had taken all the grossness out of the procedure. Even if it had been a nasty job, Dr. Downing would have pressed on as she did now, peering at the reptile’s tiny brain. The clue was in there;she could sense it. But it was far too difficult to see. She would have to extract —
Dr. Devon Downing skillfully pinched the brain with her tweezers and tugged. It was stubborn, so she pulled again, this time with more force. The tiny organ broke free, and Dr. Downing’s arm flew back. There was a shocked silence, and then a cry —“What is that?” Julia screamed.
“Where?” Anne-Stuart said.
“In my hair! It came flying at me! What is it?”
Vincent examined the top of Julia’s tresses. “Looks like lizard brains to me.”
Julia balled her hands into fists and screamed until Sophie was sure the noise would shear everyone’s scalps off. “Get it out, Anne-Stuart!”
“I’m not touching it!”
“Get it out!”
“I’ll get it out,” Vincent said.
“Don’t touch me!” Julia said.
Fiona looked slyly at Sophie from behind her hanging hunk of hair. “I wish we’d gotten that on film,” she whispered.
That night, as soon as Sophie closed her eyes to imagine Jesus, Brooke was there instead.
That was the way it had been for a lot of nights now. Sophie tried to see her image of Jesus’ kind eyes so she could talk to him and tell him how hard things were. But it was always something else she saw — like the little tongue her baby sister couldn’t control, or the shenanigans (as Darbie called them) that Brooke couldn’t control. Not being able to “see” Jesus the way she had before made it harder and harder to believe he was listening when she told him how everything was changing, and how scary it was.
She tried not to think her itchiest thought: that maybe he wasn’t even there right now.
Six
It’s one of God’s miracles,” Mama said that next Saturday morning. “She’s just a little more than two weeks old. Even with all the problems they thought she had when she was born, she’s home with us, healthy.”
Sophie looked at the rest of the family, gathered in the family room around Lacie, who was holding Hope. She hadn’t let go of the baby since Mama walked in the door with her from the hospital. Zeke was dangling a Spider-Man figure in the baby’s face like he expected her to grab it and say, “Cool!”
Did no one else see that Mama didn’t get it? Sophie thought. Hope wasn’t healthy. She had something huge wrong with her.
“Okay, so here’s the game plan,” Daddy said. He clapped his hands together as if they were all about to take the field. “Everybody’s going to want to hold the baby all the time, and that’s good because we all love her.” He looked straight at Lacie. “But she has to rest in her crib sometimes, where she can stretch out.”
Lacie wrinkled her nose at Daddy and gazed down at Hope as if she were her baby. Maybe nobody’ll notice that I’m not holding her, Sophie thought.
“When can she play?” Zeke frowned at Hope. “You sure sleep a lot.”
“I tell you what,” Mama said. “It’s time for a bottle, so why don’t we let Sophie feed her, since she hasn’t had a chance yet.”
“Sorry, Lace,” Daddy said. “You’re going to have to hand her over to your sister.”
Sophie felt her face freeze. I’m not ready for this! she wanted to tell him and Lacie and anyone who would listen.
But everybody was scrambling around, putting pillows in place for Sophie to prop her arm on and warming a bottle in the microwave. Mama rewrapped Hope in her blanket so she looked like a little burrito with a tiny golden head. Before Sophie could escape into Dr. Devon Downing or anyplace else, she was on the couch, arms positioned like Lacie showed her.
“Be careful of her head,” Lacie said. “You have to support it because she’s not strong enough to hold it up by herself yet.”
“Lacie,” Daddy said from behind the couch, “why don’t you go see what your brother is doing? We’ve got it handled.”
The first thing Sophie noticed when Lacie placed Hope in her arms was how warm the baby was. The second thing was that she immediately wiggled and drew her face into a knot.
“What’s going on?” Sophie could barely hear herself, her voice was squeaking up so high.
“She’s hungry,” Mama said. “Personally, I think she can smell formula from a mile away. Here you go.”
She handed Sophie a warm plastic bottle. Hope made a sound like a baby bird and opened her tiny mouth so wide it seemed to fill her whole face. Her tongue pointed at Sophie.
“Just put the nipple in,” Mama said, voice soft. “She’ll grab onto it.”
Sophie aimed the nipple for Hope’s mouth, but it wasn’t as easy to get in as Mama said. Her tongue was in the way.
“Just wiggle it around a little,” Mama said. “Down babies sometimes have trouble with those tongues — keep trying.”
Sophie tried pointing the nipple at an angle, but Hope’s tongue was still right there. She scrunched up her face and gave an angry squawk.
“Hang in there, Little Rookie,” Daddy said. “Sophie’s working on it.”
Sophie made another attempt and got the nipple in, but Hope spit it back out.
“Maybe she wants you to feed her,” Sophie said to Mama, holding out the bottle.
“You’ll be fine,” Mama said. “I had trouble the first time too. Just press down a little on her tongue — there you go!”
The bottle slid in, and Hope sucked at it.
“Look at her eat,” Daddy said as he leaned over the back of the couch. “That’s my rookie.”
“Now you can both just relax and enjoy,” Mama said.
A shout erupted from the kitchen, followed by Lacie shouting back, “Spider-Man does not eat bugs, so get that nasty thing out of your cereal!”
“I’m on it,” Daddy said and headed for the kitchen.
“You’re doing great, Soph.” Mama put her arm across the back of the couch. “She’s very content right now.”
Sophie looked down at her little sister, who was staring straight ahead as she drank. Her eyes were still a murky color, and Sophie couldn’t tell if she was really seeing anything. Could a baby with Down syndrome see like everybody else? What if the whole world looked different to her? Was that one reason she’d be — mentally challenged?
Without meaning to, Sophie’s arms tightened. Baby Hope stopped sucking on her bottle and thrust out her tongue. With it came a stream of white stuff that splattered all over the blanket.
“She’s throwing up!” Sophie said.
“That’s just a little dribble,” Mama said. “Just tilt her up a little bit — ”
“No, you take her, okay? I’m doing it wrong.”
“Sophie, honey — ”
“Here!” Sophie pushed the upchucked-on bundle of a baby into her mother’s arms.
“I’ll go get a washcloth,” Sophie said.
“You don’t need to. I have a wipe right here — ”
Sophie ignored her mom and bolted for her room.
Sophie decided it was the longest weekend she’d ever lived. She spent a lot of it in her room, pretending to do homework, but mostly imagining Dr. Devon Downing so she wouldn’t have to think about her baby sister.
But even that didn’t work entirely. There was a constant hubbub of Hope wailing and Mama showing Lacie how to change diapers and Daddy telling Zeke what toys he could and could not put in the crib with the baby.
“She needs stuff to play with,” Zeke said at least a hundred times.
And every time, Sophie thought, Will she ever really hold things
and play?
She and the Corn Flakes had dreamed of teaching her little sister the joys of imagination, of becoming whatever she wanted to be. Thinking it might never happen made the fingers of fear curl around Sophie’s heart tighter than ever.
By Monday, Sophie could think of only one thing to do to keep the fear away, and that was to concentrate on something else: Project Brooke. First, Sophie had to figure out what to do about Brooke wanting to be attached at the hip. Sophie just wasn’t ready for that. Besides, even though they were almost finished filming, Brooke still hadn’t shown as much improvement as Sophie needed to see. They needed more time.
“Maybe we should get some footage of her in some of her classes,” Sophie said to the Corn Flakes on the way to third period.
“I never even see her in the halls,” Willoughby said.
They all agreed that was strange, since Willoughby could hardly walk two steps without somebody saying hi to her.
Dr. Devon Downing made a mental note to get into the database and find Raggedy Ann-D-H-D’s schedule. She felt a bit uneasy, but she chased that away. A medical researcher had to do whatever it took to gather information. It was for the good of all children with mental defects.
“There she is, right over there,” Maggie said, pointing to the locker room door where Brooke was swinging, hands gripping the doorknobs and knees clamped.
“We should get some film of that.” Kitty giggled.
“We have enough pictures of her shenanigans,” Darbie said. “We need some of her improving.”
Sophie sighed and headed for the door. When Brooke looked up, every freckle on her face seemed to darken.
“Hi,” Sophie said.
Brooke watched as if she expected Sophie to pick her pocket. “What?” she said finally. “You’re looking at me weird.”
Actually, Sophie thought, you’re the one who’s looking at me weird. The suspicion in Brooke’s eyes made her uneasy. “Um,” she said, “want to do some more work on our movie with us?”