Lila Blue

by Annie Katz

  In the rocking chair is a pile of black fur called GrumpaLump, which is Grumpy, the dog, and Lump the cat. They sleep there twenty hours a day.

  Kicked back in the recliner with his feet up is Curtis. I wish I had a picture to send you. Curtis is 25? 30? You'd rate him 99% gorgeous. Long blonde hair in a ponytail, blue eyes, and beautiful dimples (cheeks and chin). He reads nonstop. He reads everything. He'd be world famous if someone made him the National Reading Poster Boy. Curtis wears thick glasses, which strangely enough make him even more beautiful. You must see him with your own eyes. Come to Oregon!

  Curtis is married to Marge, who's the boss of the family and the store. She orders all the books, sells them, supervises everyone, worries, and knows everything about everything. I think she gets tired of her high energy, and she needs low energy types around her, thus GrumpaLump and Curtis and now me.

  So the kids. Molly is a very mature ten. She's half my size and has dark wavy hair about an inch long. She loves Lila to cut her hair, so she's over every two weeks for a trim. It sounds weird, so you'd have to see it, but that little cap of curls looks really cute on her. If she went to Sacramento, I guarantee she'd start a new fad.

  While I'm on the subject, no, I have not allowed Herbert to touch my hair, and Lila has never said a word about it, so I am still wild and wooly. However, I'm so tired of salt and rain and fog in my hair all the time I am considering other hair options, something easier to live with.

  Molly wants me to be her best friend, and I don't have the heart to tell her I already have a best friend, YOU. She's smart and sweet and loves to read the same stuff I do, mostly fantasy and female-sleuth mysteries. We read our favorite parts out loud to each other.

  So, Molly and I hang out on the couch being part of the window display along with GrumpaLump and Curtis, who is Molly's stepdad, but more like one of Marge's kids.

  I've saved the best of the Mills family for last. Bradley. Molly's five-year-old brother Bradley is the weirdest little kid I've ever seen. You know that school psychologist who came to observe at our school? She'd haul Bradley off to a laboratory to observe him night and day.

  And what she'd see is Legos. Bradley builds the most amazing sculptures with Legos. One whole wall of shelves in the bookstore is reserved for his creations. It's almost full and he's barely five! He's even sold some.

  He's refused to go to kindergarten next year because it would interfere with his work. They have him set up with industrial sized bins of Legos and custom Bradley sized worktables in a room behind the cash register area. It's called Bradley Land, and there are visiting hours from 1-3 every day like in a museum, because people love to watch him work.

  Jamie comes to visit him almost every day. Lila says they are kindred spirits. Jamie doesn't stay long though, because he visits all the shop animals. GrumpaLump even come alive when Jamie kneels to pet them.

  Marge and Curtis don't mind Bradley being weird. They love him and are proud of his "gift" and are happy he's happy. Marge has to remind him to drink water and eat food and use the bathroom, because he would never think of those things on his own. He's too busy to bother with his bodily needs. The kid's definitely obsessed. But the amazing thing is he's happy. I mean really happy. He sings and hums and talks to himself and to his Legos, and it's all joyful.

  Oh, he's not retarded or anything. I think he's plenty smart. He can tell you all about his Lego work, but he's not interested in discussing anything else, so our conversations have been very short and one sided. Still, he has a fine vocabulary for his age. I think lots of normal worried frightened angry unhappy kids would trade places with him in a second.

  That's all I have to report on today's installment of Rainbow Village Voice. Stay tuned –or better yet, CATCH A PLANE!

  So, have your bodyguard cousins killed each other vying for your attention yet? Maybe you should consider an all girl school. I worry about you being able to get a good education if you have to use all your energy fighting off boys.

  I wish I could magically be there or better yet you could magically be here, because I want to share my new life in Oregon with you. Mark and I are avoiding each other. Everybody loves Jamie. Lila is happy to have all her chickies under her wings.

  Write and tell me all the wild things you are doing with your family. I miss you. Love you. Cassandra aka Sandy

  A few days later, Shelly called. "I love your letter," she said. "Do you really want me to come?"

  "Absolutely," I said. "But wait until Mark leaves. He's not your type and he's having enough trouble being civil to me."

  "When then?" she asked. "I told my folks there's a Reading Poster Boy I have to meet in Oregon. They think I'm doing it for a school project, like interview a celebrity over the summer or something."

  "Shelly!" I laughed. "I knew Curtis would get you here."

  "My mom has to be in Portland for a meeting the first week in August. She said I could come with her and we can come for a few days around August ninth. She needs a break. Dad's in Peru and won't be back until the middle of August. Mom's never seen Oregon, and she loves the beach."

  "I'm so excited," I said. "I'll ask Lila and call you right back."

  Lila said it would work out fine, whenever they could come. She was happy for me.

  The next morning, Monday, I woke up knowing something unusual was afoot. The boys had to go by my bedroom door on their way from upstairs to anywhere, and Jamie got up early. I heard him knock lightly on Lila's bedroom door and go in. After a while I heard them both leave by the front door. I got up to find out what was so important people had to leave the house before the sun woke up.

  I looked down on the beach from the living room window, and Lila and Jamie were kneeling in the predawn gray several feet away from what looked like a smooth rock that hadn't been there the day before. I grabbed my jacket and hurried down the beach stairs to join them.

  The rock turned out to be a baby seal, very new, maybe only a day or two old. It was crying and pulling itself along in the sand to get to us.

  Jamie seemed distressed, but he kept his voice calm and quiet. "Grandma, she's hungry. Where's her mom?"

  The pup was light gray with darker gray spots, perfectly camouflaged for being mistaken for a rock on the beach. I don't know why Jamie thought it was a female, but we didn't question his authority on the matter.

  "The mom is out eating fish so her milk will be good for the baby," Lila said. "She'll come back tonight and feed her."

  "But that's all day alone!" Jamie said, and I thought the same thing but didn't speak. I looked at the seal's big dark eyes and felt so sad. It was crying like a baby puppy who was lost and lonely. I wanted to comfort it, but I knew you shouldn't touch wild babies or they wouldn't smell right to their moms. Still, my heart was breaking to see such a poor helpless little thing on a huge beach where anything could happen. Dogs could come and hurt it before their owners could stop them.

  "This is nature's way," Lila said. "We can try to stand watch, but we can't rescue it. Most likely the mamma will be back every night and when the baby is strong enough, it will go out to sea with her. We don't need to worry. People know it’s against the law to bother them. Most people are good and wise and kind. They won't hurt it."

  She didn't sound very sure of herself to me, and I certainly didn't trust everyone who walked by to leave it alone. Some people would probably think they were at Disneyland and try to make it smile for family pictures.

  "I have to protect her," Jamie said. "That's why I woke up. I'm her guard."

  He bowed Namaste to the pup and she tried to follow him. He put out his hand and said, "Stay!" but she kept mewling and trying to get to him.

  "Come upstairs," Lila told us. "It will be a few hours before there is any danger. She'll wear herself out following us if we stay down here. Come."

  Jamie could see she was right, but it tore him up to leave the baby all alone. It tore at my heart, too, but I knew Lila was right to get us off the beach. We'd attract at
tention down here so early.

  Why did nature have to be so cruel? Why couldn't the mother be smart enough to choose a safe place for her baby, not a busy tourist beach? How could anyone survive like this?

  Upstairs in front of the living room window Jamie kept lookout. He could see the beach for nearly a block in each direction, so he could run down and stop people if they were approaching his baby seal. He was alert, quiet, and intense.

  I wished I could help him relax, but I understood exactly how it felt to be responsible for someone's life. I felt responsible for my mother when she was sad or drunk or lonely. I'd spent all of my life being that alert. Only with Lila could I relax, because I felt she could take care of herself.

  Lila suggested we make signs to post on the beach, and she went to the garage to round up supplies.

  I got a notebook and brainstormed words to put on the signs. Stay away! Seal pups protected by law! Keep dogs on leash! Do not touch! Go back!

  Jamie approved my sign ideas when I read them to him, and without taking his eyes from the pup down below, he said, "Wake up Mark. We need him."

  I went up the stairs, knocked loudly on the door, then opened it and called, "Mark. Please get up. We need your help. Jamie needs you."

  When I heard him waking up, I went back to help Lila prepare the kitchen table for a work area. She had already assembled clean cardboard squares, wide-tipped markers, packing tape, and heavy dowels cut in four-foot lengths to make the signs.

  Soon Mark ran downstairs, saw that Jamie was not bleeding, used the bathroom, and came back to his brother. He knelt down to be at eye level, and Jamie told him our mission.

  Just then Jamie saw a regular neighbor lady with her dog, a medium sized brown terrier, heading down her stairs to the beach. The dog was running downstairs in front of the woman. Jamie dispatched his brother to the scene, and Mark fairly flew down the beach steps and caught the dog before it could get to Jamie's seal. He helped the owner control her barking dog, and together they got it on its leash and led it away from the baby. Mark came back to the beach stairs, far enough behind the baby that she didn't cry out to him, and stood guard.

  I started making signs, trying to remember how many dogs were on the beach every morning. At least half a dozen. How could we keep all of them away?

  While I worked at the kitchen table, I kept glancing down to the pup. It was directly in front of Lila's house. Did God put it there so Jamie could take care of it? The next time I glanced down, Jamie and Mark were both there, one stationed on each side of the pup, far enough away so it didn't try to crawl to them. I wondered how many days they could stay there.

  Lila was working behind me at the kitchen counter, making breakfast sandwiches to take down to the boys. I could smell the coffee brewing and it made me think of how many ordinary mornings I'd had in Lila's house. It smelled so delicious and comforting. It smelled like home.

  A desire that had been slinking around in the back of my mind popped up front where I couldn't avoid it. I wanted to stay with Lila. I didn't want to go home to Janice and California and seventh grade. With all my heart, I wanted Rainbow Village to be my home.

  I loved my mother, but I didn't love my life with her. I loved my life with Lila. I loved who I was with Lila. I wanted to stay.

  The thought made time stop.

  When I could move again, I saw tears had dropped onto the sign I was making, smearing the ink in the word Stay. I tried to fix the smeared places, but it made it messier, so I went to the bathroom, turned on the water in the sink, and cried and cried.

  After a time, Lila knocked on the bathroom door. "Cassandra?" she asked. "Are you okay?"

  I opened the door, fell into her arms, and cried all over her like a giant baby.

  "Oh, sweetie," she said, leading me in to sit on the couch. "Is it the seal? Or everything all together?"

  "Everything," I said. There was no way to sort it out.

  "Talk to me, Cassandra. Tell me," she said, picking up a box of tissues from the table and putting it in my lap. "Talk it out. Cry it out. Don't keep it locked inside you."

  "I want to stay with you, here," I said, and the tears gushed out again. "I don't want to go back."

  She patted my arm and let me cry, but she didn't say anything. She didn't say yes and she didn't say no. She just looked at me with a sad, kind, loving face, like everything was okay even when it wasn't.

  When I stopped crying, she said, "We're here now, and we'll have plenty of time to talk about this when the boys leave in three days. For now, let's do what we can for Jamie's baby, okay?"

  I nodded, relieved. I was glad my heart's wish was out in the open, not locked away where even I couldn't see it.

  I went back to the kitchen to make signs, and Lila took a basket of food and two folding chairs down to Mark and Jamie. Then she came back up and we finished six signs, two for each side of the area out from our sea wall and one each for farther down on the beach both directions.

  After we planted the signs and it seemed they would hold up in at least a moderate wind, we asked Mark and Jamie if they wanted a break. Jamie refused, but Mark took the empty food basket back upstairs with Lila while I took over his station. It seemed the seal pup was either sleeping or dead, because it was lying there motionless with a big expanse of open beach all around it. I sure hoped it was alive.

  I knew Jamie was concentrating all of his power on keeping that baby safe until its mother could take it home to the sea. He was a guardian angel for the entire animal kingdom. And he was my brother, even if I had only found out about him two weeks earlier. Was everyone's life so packed with surprises?

  When the sun had been up for a while and most of the early morning local walkers had been rerouted to avoid our baby, there was a break in beach traffic. Lila wanted Jamie to come upstairs. He'd been on the beach for three hours. Even so, Mark had to talk him into taking a rest by promising he wouldn't let any harm come to the baby.

  By that time Lila had called many of her neighbors to let them know we had a seal pup. They spread the news to all their friends to keep control of their dogs and avoid our part of the beach. Lila called her friend Marta, who was the editor for the local newspaper, and Marta was coming to take pictures and interview Jamie.

  Jamie was not content to be upstairs. In five minutes he was back wearing a metal whistle on a lanyard around his neck and a wide brimmed canvas hat of Lila's.

  Mark and I took turns guarding the south side of the quarantined site, where most of the tourist traffic came from, and Jamie guarded the north side. Most people read our signs, visited with us a few minutes about the seal, wished us luck, and turned back.

  Mark had turned his post over to me and gone upstairs after making sure Jamie was fine. Several minutes later I was having a nice chat with a lady on my side when I heard Jamie scream, "No!" I turned around and saw three kids running toward the seal. The woman who was with them pushed Jamie away when he tried to stop her.

  "You can't stop us," she yelled at Jamie, sounding crazy. "You don't own the beach."

  Jamie tried to stop her again, and she pushed him in the sand and ran to the pup, picked it up, and held it in her arms like a baby. Her three kids climbed on her, saying let me hold it, it's my turn, and she batted them away.

  Jamie blew the whistle as hard as he could. I ran to see if he was hurt. He wasn't injured, not physically at least.

  I kept my distance from the woman, because I had no idea how crazy she was, but I begged her to put the pup back where she found it.

  She ignored me, but I kept saying over and over, "Please, the mother will reject her. Please, leave her alone. Please, don't hurt her."

  By then Jamie was over pulling the kids away as best he could, but they laughed and pushed him down.

  "Jamie!" we heard Mark yell with a booming voice that seemed to echo off the cliff. "Jamie. I'm coming. I'm here." He barreled down the stairs like a linebacker, and I jumped out of the way.

  When the lady saw Mark
running at her, she threw the seal pup down on the sand and ran away with her kids. I doubled over in pain, as if she'd kicked me in the stomach. How could anyone be so stupid and cruel?

  The pup was crying and struggling to get comfortable. I couldn't see any wounds, but it must have been scared and hurt. Maybe it had internal injuries. I backed away from it, praying it would be okay.

  Jamie was lying in the sand where he'd been pushed. I hoped he hadn't seen the woman throw his baby down. Mark rushed to Jamie and picked him up in his grownup arms. Jamie struggled to control his tears.

  Lila came then, and she insisted Jamie go upstairs with her. Mark stayed down to stand watch. The crazy woman and her kids had run on down the beach and were out of sight. Other people were standing by our signs, though, having watched the commotion from there.

  I went back to my post, still hurting and sick with outrage. When people asked me what happened, I told them the best I could, and I couldn't stop tears from running down my face. They shook their heads about how ignorant and cruel some people can be. They wished us luck and told us they'd spread the word to stay clear of our area.

  One lady said she would light candles and pray for our baby seal. There are so many good people in the world, and then one mean person comes along and ruins everything. It made me sick.

  Soon Curtis and Molly came from the bookstore to help keep watch, and more friends and neighbors, until we had more than enough volunteers to make sure no one else molested Jamie's pup. She seemed to have gotten comfortable enough to go back to sleep. I prayed she wasn't bleeding to death while we sat around watching.

  After I briefed Curtis and Molly and left them my station, I went upstairs to find Lila's house filled with neighbors and friends. Marta from the newspaper was standing on a chair behind the couch directing Jamie to stand close to the window and stare down to the beach, so she could get a good camera shot. Everyone else wove around her as if she were an unfortunately placed potted palm.

  Ronny from The Bakery Boys served everyone fresh chocolate chip cookies. Les from The Salty Dog had a clipboard and was scheduling one-hour guard shifts. She teamed everyone under twelve with an adult buddy, so no one else could be pushed around. Everyone in the village had come together to support Jamie's seal pup.