True Colors

by Natalie Kinsey-Warnock

  I could have said that it was a good thing she had such a big mouth seeing as how she was always sticking her foot into it, but that didn’t feel right, what with Mrs. Tilton being so nice for letting me stay there. Besides, it was a comfort having Nadine sit next to me. I gave her a nudge back, letting her know I’d forgiven her.

  “You want to play Monopoly?” Nadine asked.

  I shook my head. How could Nadine be thinking of games when Hannah might be dead?

  “How about Chinese checkers?” she asked.

  “No, I don’t feel like it,” I said.

  “I know,” said Nadine. “Let’s play Crossing the Iron Curtain.”

  Crossing the Iron Curtain was a game Nadine and I’d invented. We didn’t know what the Iron Curtain was—we’d heard it mentioned in movies—but it sounded mysterious and dangerous. I didn’t feel like playing that, either, but since I didn’t want Nadine to get mad again, just when we were back being friends, I nodded.

  So I played, but all I could think about was Hannah. If only I hadn’t gone off with Daisy. If only I’d come back sooner and brought those jars up like I was supposed to. It was my fault that Hannah was in the hospital. She had to be all right. She just had to.

  Maybe God was punishing me for stealing Daisy, though it didn’t really feel like stealing. I’d just wanted to save her. Or maybe he was punishing me for wanting to trade places with Nadine. I hadn’t really meant it. Didn’t God know all that? Didn’t he know that I didn’t want anything bad to happen to Hannah? I’d do anything if only Hannah was all right.

  I kept swallowing, trying not to cry, but then my chest hurt. Could you have a heart attack if you were only ten years old?

  Mrs. Tilton hugged me.

  “She’ll be all right, honey,” she told me. “Hannah’s the strongest woman I know.”

  Hannah was the strongest woman I knew, too, but even strong people died. Why hadn’t Mr. Gilpin come to tell me anything yet?

  Mrs. Tilton took wonderful care of me; it wasn’t her fault that she wasn’t Hannah. She made eggplant Parmesan for supper. I didn’t tell her I wished for Hannah’s baked beans and brown bread, or her boiled dinner and johnny-cake, or one of my favorites, rumbledthumps, made with potatoes and cabbage.

  I choked down a few mouthfuls and then couldn’t eat any more. I was waiting for Mr. Gilpin to come by. What was taking him so long?

  It was almost dark before we heard his car pull into the driveway.

  “She’s got three broken ribs, a broken wrist, and she needed six stitches on her head,” Mr. Gilpin told us. “They’ll be keeping her in the hospital for a couple of days.”

  “The poor thing,” Mrs. Tilton said. “She’s going to be laid up for a while.”

  “Well, if I know Hannah,” Mr. Gilpin said, “it won’t be as long as you’d think.”

  Mrs. Tilton offered Mr. Gilpin a cup of coffee, but he said he needed to get back to work.

  “I’ll visit Hannah again tomorrow,” he said, and looked at me. “Try not to worry.”

  Mrs. Tilton tucked Nadine and me into bed, just as she had when we were little, and read us The Secret Garden.

  “It was my favorite book, as a child,” Mrs. Tilton said. I didn’t tell Mrs. Tilton that Mary Lennox, the spoiled girl in the story, reminded me of Nadine. I also didn’t tell her that I liked Anne of Green Gables and Laura Ingalls Wilder better than The Secret Garden. Anne of Green Gables was one of the reasons I’d so wanted to go to Prince Edward Island, to see the place that Anne talked about, the farm where she lived with Marilla and Matthew. Hannah reminded me of Marilla, gruff on the outside but tender inside. Marilla had taken in Anne, too, when she was an orphan, and given her a home.

  It was the thought of Anne being an orphan that made me go all shivery. Mr. Gilpin had said Hannah was going to be all right, but what if he was wrong? If Hannah died, I’d be an orphan, too, just like Anne Shirley. What would become of me then?

  Long after Nadine fell asleep, I lay staring up at the ceiling, thinking about summer nights when Hannah and I’d sat on the porch and she’d pointed out Cassiopeia, Pegasus, and Cygnus the Swan. I was glad Mrs. Tilton couldn’t hear me sniffling.

  chapter 21

  Even though I’d slept over at Nadine’s a hundred times, it felt strange the next morning to wake up there and know that Hannah wasn’t waiting for me at our house.

  Mrs. Tilton fixed eggs Benedict for breakfast. They were good, but I would rather have had Hannah’s oatmeal and graham rolls.

  I dreaded having to go home to do chores. I thought Nadine would walk up with me and help, but she said she wasn’t feeling well. What she meant was that she didn’t feel like doing work.

  I stepped into the kitchen, my footsteps sounding too loud against the silence. The house seemed so empty without Hannah there. As much as I’d always loved being at Nadine’s, I wished Hannah was home in our kitchen, fixing us breakfast.

  What I noticed most, besides how quiet it was, was the smell. Or lack of smells. The smell of baking bread, and hot doughnuts, and cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger had always made our house special, and I missed them almost as much as I missed Hannah.

  If Nadine and I were playing “What’s your favorite thing?” right now, I’d tell her my favorite smell was our kitchen when Hannah was baking, and my favorite sound would be Hannah humming.

  The barn seemed empty, too. The cows stood at the back of the barn, jostling each other and lowing to be milked. I leaned against the doorframe, feeling as alone as a body could get, and let hot tears slide down my cheeks.

  What with my sniffling, and the cows bumping against the barn, I didn’t hear Mr. Gilpin pull into the yard. I wiped the tears off quick with the back of my hand.

  Mr. Gilpin was dropping Raleigh off on his way to the hospital to visit Hannah.

  “I’ve told Raleigh to come by here twice a day to help you with milking and any other chores you might need doing,” Mr. Gilpin said. “You’re happy to help Blue out, aren’t you, Raleigh?”

  Raleigh bobbed his head up and down.

  “Blue True,” he said.

  Raleigh followed me into the barn. He picked up a milk pail while I let the cows into the barn and hitched them into their stanchions.

  Raleigh stood looking at Daisy’s empty stanchion, a puzzled expression on his face. So, after chores, when Raleigh and I were sitting on the back of the wagon eating green apples, I told him the whole story, about Daisy being too old, and that I’d hidden her up on the hill—I knew it was safe to tell Raleigh because it wasn’t like he was going to be telling Hannah about it—and that I’d have to figure out something different once winter came. I wasn’t sure how much Raleigh understood, but he listened, his head tilted, and it felt good to get it off my chest.

  I told him other things too: how I was worried about Hannah, and how it really was my fault that Hannah got hurt in the first place because I was supposed to bring up those canning jars.

  I told him I was sorry I’d hit him in the head with that stone, and that I’d told Nadine about him being afraid of water. It felt good to get that off my chest, too.

  I wondered whether to tell him I was searching for my real mama. The way Raleigh was listening made me wonder if Raleigh understood more than people thought he did.

  “Raleigh, I’m going to tell you something I’ve never told anyone,” I said.

  “Baby,” Raleigh said. “Baby.”

  My heart sank. Just when you thought you were getting somewhere with Raleigh, he’d say something completely out of the blue. Who knew what he was talking about?

  “Never mind,” I said.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Cat dash into the barn. Raleigh saw her, too.

  “Cat,” Raleigh said.

  “She showed up here a few weeks ago,” I said. “Hannah said probably one of the summer people left her.”

  “Baby,” Raleigh said. Was that what he was talking about now, the cat having kittens?

  “Yes, Hannah
said the cat had kittens. But I haven’t found them yet.”

  “Baby,” Raleigh repeated.

  “Yes, baby cats,” I said, being as patient as I could. “They’re called kittens.”

  But Raleigh shook his head.

  “Baby,” he said. For some reason, he seemed stuck on that word, and I didn’t know what to do to get him unstuck. Maybe if I distracted him.

  “Nadine said she’s eaten snails before,” I said. “Would you ever eat a snail?”

  Raleigh wrinkled his nose and shook his head again. At least we agreed on something.

  Walking back to the Tiltons’, I realized Raleigh had distracted me, too, from worrying about Hannah.

  Nadine said she was “feeling much better” when I got back, and she and Mrs. Tilton did their best to keep my mind off worrying. They took me to town for barrettes for my hair, bought me ice cream, and took me to a movie, but my heart wasn’t in any of it. I just wanted to be home, with Hannah.

  I was thinking of Hannah as I picked a pail of peas, how she loved eating them fresh out of the pod (I did, too). As Nadine and I shelled the peas, sitting on the porch swing, I wished Hannah was in the kitchen making a batch of new potatoes and peas in milk.

  “Let’s take the inner tube out on the lake,” Nadine said, interrupting my thoughts. “We can eat Popsicles as we float along.”

  I nodded halfheartedly and popped a pea into my mouth.

  “You go get the Popsicles, and I’ll get the inner tube. Meet you at the beach.” She hopped down the steps.

  “I want grape, you know,” she hollered over her shoulder.

  I nodded to her back and reached for the handle on the screen door.

  “No, I haven’t told Nadine yet,” I heard Mrs. Tilton say.

  I yanked my arm back and shrank against the side of the house. What hadn’t Mrs. Tilton told Nadine yet?

  “I know, Mother. I just want Nadine to enjoy one more golden summer here before everything changes.”

  I knew I shouldn’t be eavesdropping, but wild horses couldn’t have dragged me away. What was going to change?

  “You know how she adores her father,” Mrs. Tilton went on. “She was so upset that he wasn’t here for her birthday. I just don’t know how I’m going to tell her about the divorce.”

  It took a second for that to sink in. Divorce! I didn’t even know anyone who was divorced.

  “Roger says I can have the house—he’s already moved out into an apartment—but we’ll have to sell the camp here.”

  I sagged against the wall. Mr. and Mrs. Tilton were getting a divorce and selling the camp? Nadine wouldn’t be coming to Vermont anymore.

  “I have to go, Mother,” Mrs. Tilton said. “I think I heard someone at the door.”

  I couldn’t let her catch me eavesdropping, so I hopped over the porch railing and landed in a rosebush. I bit my lip to keep from yelping. I thrashed my way off the bush, the thorns raking my face and arms, and ran around behind the house, down to the water.

  Nadine was sitting on the inner tube on the beach, her arms crossed.

  “What took you so long?” she asked.

  “Um, I had to go to the bathroom,” I answered.

  “Where are the Popsicles?” she asked.

  “Um, I forgot them,” I said.

  Nadine looked at me suspiciously.

  “What’s the matter?” she said.

  “Nothing,” I mumbled.

  “How’d you get so scratched up?” she asked. “You look like you were in a catfight and the cat won.”

  I pretended to laugh, but it came out more like a croak.

  Nadine’s eyes narrowed.

  “You’re acting funny,” she said. “Is Hannah okay?”

  “Are we going to float or not?” I said. “Let’s go.”

  “The water’s too cold,” Nadine said. “Let’s play hopscotch instead.”

  Nadine drew out hopscotch squares in the sand, and we used pebbles.

  I tried to concentrate, but the only thing I could think about was Mr. and Mrs. Tilton getting a divorce, and Nadine won all three games.

  “You’re not even paying attention,” Nadine said.

  Of course I’m not paying attention, I wanted to tell her. Your parents are getting a divorce!

  But I didn’t say that.

  I dreaded going back to Nadine’s house, too, and having to pretend that everything was normal.

  My stomach was a jumble for trying to figure out if I should tell Nadine or not, and I hardly touched supper. I kept sneaking glances at Mrs. Tilton.

  “Are you feeling all right, dear?” Mrs. Tilton asked. I just nodded.

  That evening, after I milked the cows and carried out Cat’s bowl of milk, I squatted and talked to her while she ate.

  “I don’t know if I should tell her,” I said. “It’s not right to keep secrets from your best friend.”

  Cat tipped her head, as if she really was listening to me.

  “But what if you know telling that secret will hurt the person?” I said.

  Cat didn’t have an answer for me. At least not one that she was telling.

  I sighed. This summer wasn’t turning out to be anything like what it was supposed to be.

  I scooped a pail of grain from the bin. Maybe riding up to check on Daisy would clear my mind and make me feel better.

  But it didn’t, because when I rode up to the cellar hole, the gate was open and Daisy was gone.

  There was no doubt in my mind as to who had taken her.

  The Wright brothers.

  chapter 22

  I couldn’t exactly tell Mr. Gilpin, or the sheriff, or anyone else that I was missing a cow, because I’d been the one to take her in the first place. I’d have to find Daisy and bring her home all on my own. I needed to do it fast, too, because I knew she wouldn’t be safe with the Wright brothers. Mr. Wright might have already turned her into hamburger.

  But my plans to start tracking down Daisy got a wrench thrown into them because of another rehearsal.

  Mr. Gilpin had wanted to cancel Saturday’s rehearsal, but Hannah said if he did, she’d get out of her hospital bed to run it her own self, so we all went ahead with it, though I was sure I wouldn’t be able to remember a single thing I was supposed to do.

  Mr. Gilpin wanted to rehearse the Runaway Pond pageant again, so he assembled all of us just below the dam.

  “Blue, you’ll go downriver and wait in the mill for Raleigh to rescue you,” Mr. Gilpin said. “We’ll start digging. Then the dam will go, Mr. Hazelton will shout, ‘Run, Spencer, run!’ and Raleigh will start running. That’s the signal for the Trombley boys to start pulling the wagon, so it looks like the waves are following Raleigh, and they’ll keep going all the way to the mill. Okay?”

  We all nodded. Except for Wesley and Dennis.

  “What do you want me and Wesley to be doing?” Dennis asked.

  Mr. Gilpin hesitated. I could just about see his mind working. He hadn’t assigned Wesley and Dennis to this particular pageant, but if he didn’t keep them busy, they’d think up something to do on their own.

  And being the Wright brothers, it wouldn’t be a good something.

  “You can be two of the diggers,” Mr. Gilpin decided, and handed them shovels.

  Dennis looked disgusted.

  “You ought to blow that dam with dynamite,” Dennis said. “My dad’s got some we could use. Be a sight easier than digging.”

  Mr. Gilpin made a funny noise in his throat.

  “Blow the dam?” he said. “We don’t want to ‘blow the dam.’ ”

  “You want the lake to run away, don’t ya?” Dennis said.

  Mr. Gilpin’s face turned a funny shade of purple.

  “Good God, no!” he said. “You do realize we’re just putting on a play, don’t you? We don’t want to actually destroy the town!”

  From the look on Dennis’s and Wesley’s faces, I wasn’t sure but what that was what they wanted to do.

  After the Runawa
y Pond pageant, we rehearsed the Rogers’s Rangers attack. I noticed that instead of real tomahawks, Mr. Gilpin gave Dennis and Wesley ones made out of cardboard. They looked disgusted about that too.

  Mr. Gilpin drove me home after the rehearsal and brought Raleigh to help me with chores. I’d thought I might choose to stay at our house after they left, instead of going over to Nadine’s, but the house seemed too quiet and empty, and as it got darker, I found I didn’t want to stay by myself, so I walked down to the Tiltons’.

  After playing Chinese checkers with Nadine, I climbed into bed with her, but I couldn’t sleep. I waited until I heard Nadine softly snoring (I had never told Nadine she snored; even the old Nadine would have been hopping mad about that) before creeping down the stairs, out the door, and up to my house. I grabbed the little blue quilt off my bed and carried it back to Nadine’s, tiptoeing up the stairs.

  Climbing back into Nadine’s bed, I bunched up the quilt and tucked it under my head. Then, and only then, was I able to get to sleep.

  That Sunday, after church, I’d planned to look for Daisy, but I didn’t because Hannah came home.

  I’d been so excited to have her back, but waiting for Mr. Gilpin to drive her home from the hospital, I couldn’t sit still. Hannah had only been gone a few days, but it seemed like months. Would she have changed?

  Mr. Gilpin pulled into the yard and helped me get her into the house. Hannah leaned heavily on our arms, her face white with pain. She didn’t even look like Hannah. She looked thin, her skin wrinkled and sagging. She certainly didn’t look like someone who could carry a bag of grain under each arm.

  She looked old.

  Hannah sank back in her chair and closed her eyes. I tucked an afghan around her, the red and white one she’d knit over the winter.

  “If you’d only cleaned off those cellar stairs,” Mr. Gilpin said, shaking his head.

  Hannah winced.

  “You know what hurts the most?” she said.

  Mr. Gilpin leaned in close, concern etched on his face. Hannah opened her eyes and looked at him.

  “Admitting you were right,” she said.