3. Grandpa Mac
4. Uncle Dan
5. Aunt Charlene
Five questions Aunt Pen asked while she was teaching me to knit that night
1. You know that I know that you’re not always quiet, right? (Answer: Yes, it’s easier to talk with you.)
2. What has been the best part about this new place so far? (Answer: Riding my bike more. And the purple house. Also, Zora and Kate at school are pretty nice. But they aren’t as great as Millie. Millie is still my best friend.)
3. What has been the hardest for you? (Answer: Missing Millie. What I didn’t say: Feeling like it’s my fault that we had to move.)
4. What do you miss about Millie? (Answer: Just hanging out with her. Also writing notes to each other in school.)
5. How do you think Ted likes it here? (Answer: He hates it.)
Five things Aunt Pen told me about herself then that I never knew before
1. She was about my age when she and my mom moved to a new town.
2. She decided it was her chance to act like a new person, and she asked everyone to call her Nell. (She thought that was a better nickname than Penny.)
3. One day on the bus someone heard my mom call her Penelope, and all the kids started asking her why she’d lied about her name.
4. For a while there were crazy rumors about her, like the ones that started about me in my old school (but for Aunt Pen, it was in her new school, and the main rumor was that she’d had to lie about her name because Grandpa robbed a bank in their old town and they were on the run).
5. Finally she started playing tennis and made friends that way. And people stopped believing the crazy rumors.
I told her she should tell Ted her story. She said she would do that.
I thought about telling Aunt Pen the crazy rumors that had started about me in Brooklyn, and the reasons people thought I got myself kicked out. But I decided that would only bring back all the icky feelings. Maybe if I didn’t talk about the things I messed up in Brooklyn, it would be easier to have a new start in Clover Gap. Besides, there was something bigger on my mind right then.
One question I asked Aunt Pen while we were knitting
1. What’s a severance agreement? (Her answer, after a long pause: I think you should ask your parents.)
Then she changed the subject and told me that if I missed writing notes to Millie, maybe I should try writing a note to one of my new friends here.
Five things I told Zora in the note I wrote her Thanksgiving night
1. I got ten new ladybugs from Aunt Penelope.
2. I peeled twenty potatoes.
3. I got the bigger side of the wishbone that Ted and I broke. So I was supposed to get my wish, but of course I couldn’t tell her what it was or it wouldn’t come true. (Truth: I wished that Millie wouldn’t make a new best friend.)
4. Ted broke a glass while he was drumming.
5. I was glad we didn’t have school, but I knew I’d be bored starting tomorrow because Aunt Pen was going home in the morning.
I folded the paper and wrote “From A to Z” on the outside.
Five unexpected things that happened the next day
1. Two of my ladybugs escaped from the habitat and “set up housekeeping,” as Grandma Rose called it, on my bedroom ceiling.
2. Grandma Elaine went shopping and bought an area rug to cover the bare plywood spot in our living room. “It’s your housewarming gift,” she said when Mom told her she shouldn’t have.
3. The weather got much warmer than usual for November and I could go outside without a jacket.
4. Zora called and asked if I could ride my bike over to her house. (This is one of my parents’ favorite things about Clover Gap too, that we can ride our bikes everywhere.)
5. When I got to Zora’s, Amelia was there.
Five things I have noticed about Amelia
1. Her handwriting is amazing. It should be its own font. And after she writes a word, she’ll look back at it and touch it up.
2. She has ten different perfect outfits, and she wears each of them on the same school day on alternating weeks. For example, Monday: kitten sweater and red skirt. Tuesday: black dress, black leggings, silver boots. Wednesday: pink button-down shirt, sparkly leggings. Thursday: ROCK STAR! T-shirt, jean jacket, and tan skirt. Friday: heart sweatshirt and jeans.
3. Her books are always stacked in perfect size order inside her desk.
4. Her pencils are all round (no hexagonal yellow ones) with soft pink erasers.
5. She always carries cherry cough drops with her and pops them like candy. (When I have a cough, Mom makes me take the ones that taste like medicine, and she only lets me have two a day. Not that I argue. Because, like I said, they taste like medicine.)
Three ways I could tell Amelia was unhappy to see me at Zora’s house
1. When I arrived, Amelia immediately spotted the note for Zora in my bike basket. Without even saying hello, she said, “ ‘From A to Z’—what’s that?”
2. I told her it was a note I wrote for Zora on Thanksgiving, and she rolled her eyes and said, “Is it about Pilgrims or something?”
3. She spent the rest of the afternoon talking to Zora about people I didn’t know, and things that happened before I moved to Clover Gap.
I was happy to go home and flop down on my bed with Finding Someplace (Aunt Pen’s latest book recommendation) and my stuffed animals.
Top six names for my stuffed animals
1. Dolly Llama
2. Kermit the Dog
3. Joy Kangaroo
4. Disco Pig
5. Menacing Venison
6. Natasha
Ted says these all sound like band names. Mom says that’s a compliment coming from him and that I should take it. I think he’s just trying to annoy me.
Weird habits I’ve broken
1. Biting my fingernails
2. Arranging my stuffed animals in a perfect line across the foot of my bed before going to sleep
3. Wiping my mouth on my shirtsleeve
4. Wearing gloves when I caught fireflies (I was afraid they would shock me.)
5. Running out of the bathroom every time I flushed the toilet (I had a secret fear that a ghost was going to come out of the toilet to replace the water. Crazy, I know.)
Weird habits I still need to kick
1. When I’m bored, wrapping a hair tightly around my finger until it turns bluish
2. Cracking my knuckles
3. Making all my movements symmetrical (like if I scratch my left ear, I also have to scratch my right one, even if it doesn’t itch)
4. Getting a new glass every time I have a drink of water (I actually don’t think this is a weird habit, but it drives Mom bananas, so I’ve told her I’ll work on it.)
DECEMBER
Four reasons I left lunch early today
1. The cafeteria reeked of fish sticks and it was starting to make me feel sick.
2. Amelia was droning on about whether she should get candy canes or snowmen painted on her fingernails at her next manicure appointment, and that was starting to make me feel sick too.
3. Zora was preoccupied with writing a birthday wish list to send to her grandparents. (Her winter trip to visit them in Jamaica is coming up, and her grandmother wants gift ideas since she’ll be there on her birthday.)
4. I had to go to the library to look for Mom’s latest book recommendation, Dicey’s Song.
Five people I saw when I got to the library
1. Mrs. Otis (the librarian) quietly typing at her computer
2–4. Three sixth-grade boys whispering in the back corner (I knew two of them were named Lionel and James because they ride
my bus and other kids are always saying their names. I didn’t know the third kid. I’m quite sure none of them knew me.)
5. Kate shelving books in the biography section
Three things Kate loud-whispered to me after she saw me
1. Psst! Hey, Annie!
2. Are you here to hang out or to get a book? (Answer: Both, really.)
3. What book?
At this point Mrs. Otis looked up from her computer. So I shuffled over to Kate and told her I was looking for Dicey’s Song.
“That’s by Cynthia Voigt,” she said. “Go look in the Vs.”
Two things I saw when I looked in the direction Kate was pointing
1. A tall shelf labeled FICTION S–V
2. The three sixth-grade boys standing directly in front of it
Eight thoughts I had next
1. Lionel, James, and Boy Whose Name I Don’t Know are standing directly in front of the shelf I need to get to.
2. They don’t look like they’re moving anytime soon.
3. In fact, Boy Whose Name I Don’t Know just slid down, leaned against the bottom shelf, and started thumbing through a World Almanac.
4. Why is the World Almanac in the fiction section?
5. I wonder if Kate mis-shelved it.
6. Never mind about that.
7. I do not want to go over and ask those boys to move so I can look for my book.
8. I will just find another book.
“Actually,” I said to Kate, “I just remembered I want to get this one instead.” I bent down and grabbed the first book I saw: The Biography of Dorothy Hamill.
Three questions Kate asked next
1. Dorothy Hamill? Who is that? (Answer: She was a famous ice skater in the 1970s. With a famous haircut.)
2. That’s really the book you want? (Answer, as I glanced over and saw that the sixth graders were still there: Yes, this is it.)
3. Can you wait here a second? (Answer: Sure, I’ll just be reading my book.)
Kate walked over to the fiction shelves, said, “Excuse me, Frank” (to Boy Whose Name I Now Know Is Frank), leaned over, and grabbed a book.
Four things I appreciated about Kate in that moment
1. She figured out why I didn’t want to go over to the fiction shelves.
2. She didn’t laugh at me for it.
3. Unlike me, she didn’t care about asking sixth-grade boys to move so she could get a book.
4. She actually got me the book I wanted, and I could stop reading about 1970s figure skating.
“Here you go,” Kate said as she handed me Dicey’s Song. “Merry Christmas.”
Three things that would be on my Christmas list if I thought my family could afford them
1. A cell phone
2. A puppy
3. A canopy bed
Three more realistic things I am putting on my Christmas list
1. A landline phone for my room
2. A goldfish
3. My own jar of peanut butter to eat by myself, scoop by scoop (a dream of mine for a long time, though Mom says it’s gross)
Five things I figure I’ll really get for Christmas
1. A sweater
2. Socks
3. Art supplies
4. Maybe the jar of peanut butter
5. Maybe the old-school phone
Four things I actually got for Christmas
1. A sweater
2. Socks
3. Art supplies
4. Walkie-talkies (from Grandma Elaine)
Hmm. Grandma suggested that Ted and I could use the walkie-talkies to communicate with each other while we were in different parts of the house. I knew that would be tricky, seeing as how Ted was barely talking to me at all. I could tell he almost rolled his eyes when she said that.
My three biggest Christmas disappointments
1. No phone of any kind
2. No fish
3. Not even any peanut butter (seriously?!)
Ted’s biggest Christmas disappointment
1. No concert tickets
Mom’s biggest Christmas disappointment
1. Aunt Pen couldn’t come because she was in London with her friends. (That was one of my disappointments too.)
Dad’s biggest Christmas disappointments
1. He couldn’t get the fire in the fireplace just right. He said it was because the wood was damp, but Mom was able to get it going pretty well once she gave it a try.
2. Grandma Elaine gave him a book called Gardening for Dummies, and he didn’t seem amused by it. It’s gotten to be kind of a joke between Mom and Grandma, how Dad is a city kid who doesn’t know how to do stuff like build fires and grow plants. Dad laughed along with them at first, but I think he’s getting tired of it.
Dad’s pet peeves
1. Empty milk cartons returned to the fridge (usually by Ted)
2. Piles of unopened mail
3. Globs of toothpaste in the bathroom sink
4. Wasting napkins, tissues, printer paper—pretty much waste of any kind of paper product
Four things I heard that night after I went to my room to draw with my new art supplies
1. Mom in the kitchen, singing along to “Mele Kalikimaka” with Bing Crosby
2. Dad crumpling up newspapers to put under the logs in the fireplace
3. Ted playing drums upstairs
4. A break in the drumming, then a staticky sound on my walkie-talkie, followed by “Annie, can you hear me?” It was Ted.
Three things I learned after I told Ted I could hear him
1. Ted is more interested in the walkie-talkies than he first let on (or he’s just bored enough to give them a try).
2. Ted is more willing to talk to me over a walkie-talkie than in person (although we were mostly just saying things like “Can you hear me? I’m in the basement” and “Yes, I hear you—I’m upstairs”).
3. The walkie-talkies work pretty well.
Four places we tried the walkie-talkies
1. Ted in his room, me in mine
2. Ted in Mom and Dad’s room, me in the bathroom
3. Ted in the living room, me in Mom’s office
4. Ted in the basement laundry room, me in the attic
That’s when I saw my chance. I climbed into the attic crawl space off Ted’s bedroom (with his permission this time), sat down with my legs crossed, and pressed the talk button on the walkie-talkie. “Ted, if you can hear me, can you come here so I can show you something?” He heard me.
Three things Ted said when I showed him the severance letter
1. This means that Dad got fired.
2. We moved here because Dad lost his job in Brooklyn. Not because of you.
3. Why didn’t they tell us?
“So it wasn’t because of me blabbing to Mr. Lawrence?” I asked him.
Ted looked down at the letter again. “No,” he said. “Actually, this letter was sent in February, and you didn’t talk to Mr. Lawrence until May. Dad wasn’t working at all for six months. No wonder they’ve been even weirder than usual about money.”
Five things Ted and I said in our Christmas email to Aunt Pen
1. Merry Christmas!
2. We miss you.
3. Did you know Dad lost his job in Brooklyn?
4. Why didn’t they tell us?
5. What do we do now?
I asked Ted if he thought we should tell Mom and Dad what we had found. He said he wasn’t sure, and that if they didn’t tell us, there must be a reason they didn’t want us to know. So we waited to hear back from Aunt Pen.
Five things Aunt Pen said in h
er December 26 email back to us
1. Merry belated Christmas to you, too!
2. I tried to call you yesterday, but I have spotty service here.
3. Did you know today is called Boxing Day in England?
4. I miss you guys too.
5. About the job, like I said…I think you should talk to your parents.
I said that meant we were back to square one. Ted said not really, and that if Dad hadn’t lost his job, Aunt Pen would have told us we were being ridiculous. Her saying “You should talk to your parents” pretty much meant we were right.
Annie's Life in Lists Page 7