“Not as smart as my poetic mom.” I closed my eyes and took a long sip of my coffee. The hot liquid almost felt like a warm fuzzy blanket on my insides and I couldn’t help smiling. Maybe this was how Mom felt every single time she had her precious coffee, her fix. Maybe coffee really could make someone that happy. “You’re right, Mom.”
“I am? I mean, I am.” She jumped up on the counter and gazed down at me.
“About the coffee, I mean. It does make you feel, not only awake, but weirdly optimistic.” I raised my cup. “To coffee!”
“Here’s to a mouthful of optimism.” We clinked glasses and Mom snickered. “Hey, the sun’s out.” I followed Mom’s eyes. She was staring at the reflection of sun on the little window on the shed door—our most precise morning weather report.
“It sure is.” Despite the lack of sleep, despite all my doubts, I did feel kind of optimistic, that is, until my phone pinged in my housecoat pocket and I looked at the display.
“It’s Maddie. She’s asking if we can FaceTime in ten. Shit!”
“Uh oh. One penny in the jar.” Alfred was standing in the door, a teddy bear in one hand, his polka-dot blanket in the other.
“Hey, honey.” I got down on my knees and held out my arms for him. “You slept well?” He ran across the kitchen floor and fell into my arms like a sack of potatoes. “Good morning, sweetheart.” I kissed his head and sniffed his hair. He smelled like a mix of fresh laundry detergent and toddler—the best scent in the world.
“Mommy, you said a bad word.” He pointed at The Swearing Jar on the kitchen counter, then looked up at Mom. “Grandma?”
Mom nodded and pulled a coin from her housecoat and held it up for him to see. “A penny?”
Alfred nodded and pointed at the jar. Mom had found it at the same garage sale where she had acquired the notorious headphones. It was almost a two-gallon glass jar and had a childish drawing of a pig farting on the front, with the caption, “It wasn’t me.” When she had shown it to us, Dad just shrugged and scratched his beard. I, on the other hand, knew exactly why she had bought it. Ever since we had tried to wean off Alfred and Ava of their binkies, we had been trying to wean off Dad of swearing, burping, and farting in public. One penny for every offense. It was already halfway full.
Mom screwed the lid off and we all watched as the coin landed on top of all the other naughty coins.
“That’s what you get for saying shit this early in the morning.” She smiled at me and let out a small sigh.
“Uh oh.” Alfred crossed his arms over his chest and shook his head demonstratively. “Grandma. You said a bad word now.”
“Well, but I was only tryi—”
“—Mom, cough it up.” I winked at Alfred and we both giggled.
“Man, you two are tough cookies.” She squatted down and pulled another coin from her pocket. “You want to feed the pig?” Alfred straightened up and held out his hand, and she placed the penny in is hand. “And you.” She faced me. “You go deal with Maddie while I feed the other little pigs in the house. Okay?”
“I guess.” I watched Alfred gently open the lid of the swear jar, thinking that by the time Maddie and I were done Skyping, Maddie and her big fowl mouth would probably owe a few dollars, at least.
***
“You will not fucking believe this?” Maddie’s picture had not even loaded properly before she yelled her first profanity. (one penny)
“What?”
“Okay, there’s good news and bad news… You know how I wanted that job so badly because, well, I love shopping, duh, but I mostly wanted it because of him?” She leaned back in her chair and gave me her victorious smile.
“Him?”
“Ben! Who else?” She rolled her eyes at me in a way that made me think of Aunt Elly and the way she always used to roll her eyes at us when we did something that was not part of her meticulously planned life.
I nodded. Ben and Maddie had been dating on and off ever since high school. They met the summer I left, so I had never officially met him but I’d seen so many photos of him—hiking, eating dinner, watching TV, riding his bike, riding in his car, floating on the lake, going to the store, eating frozen yogurt, having his hair cut, brushing his teeth, showing off a visible tan line (yes, Maddie had posted all these pictures, not to mention all the even more obnoxious selfies) that I almost felt I knew him. They had met at campus and had been inseparable ever since, that is, except for the times they were split up.
“You’re back together?” Last thing I heard was that he was a big asshole (one penny), and that she never wanted to see him again. But, from the tone of her voice and the soft look in her eyes when she said his name, I guess they were back to being inseparable.
“Yes, of course we are. You think I would even talk about him and I working together if not, dumbass?” (one penny)
“Working together?”
“Yeah, are you not listening at all? I just fucking told you.” (one penny)
“You just said something about shopping. You got a job as a professional shopper? Now that would be your dream job.”
“If only.” She rolled her eyes again. “No, we both got a job down at the mall, at Abercrombie and Fitch, this spring slash summer, in between finals. It’s a five-minute walk from campus, and it’s good for my social study.”
I moved closer to the screen and nodded. “Clothes and social study? Please enlighten me.”
“Damn, you totally sound like Uncle Frank a.k.a your divine college professor dad right there. Damn it.” (two pennies) She looked straight into the camera and added an “uh-huh.”
“But how?” I couldn’t help but giggle.
“Well, we get to meet a lot of people and get paid doing it too. How are we going to understand how people think by just reading about them? So, in a way, it is social study.”
I guess I couldn’t argue with that.
“So, what’s the bad news? You cannot cross the line into the boy’s department?” I joked.
“No, smartass. (one penny) We both start April twentieth.” She cocked her head to the side and grabbed onto one of her big heavy curls.
“What’s wrong with April twentieth?” Right as I asked the question, I remembered. Martha had mentioned it in one of her letters. Her mom was worried that she and Thomas were flying out on Hitler’s birthday, claiming it was bad luck. April 20th was bad luck.
“I get it. Hitler’s birthday. Bad karma.”
Maddie threw her hands in the air and squinted at me. “What the hell are you talking ‘bout, El?” (one penny)
“It’s Hitler’s birthday—” I started explaining, but she cut me off.
“—It’s my trip to Seattle—your fan-fucking-tastic party.” (one penny) She pushed her lower lip out and made a bad attempt of a puppy face. “I’m afraid we have to… I’ll be working when I was supposed to come to Seattle and … um, I have to take a rain check.”
“You’re not coming?” I didn’t know if I was more relieved or disappointed. I didn’t have to tell her, I didn’t have to be the one to cancel. But she had picked a summer job with her boyfriend over me, and that did hurt. She had promised to come for the summer ever since we left Connecticut. But I really wasn’t in a position to think like this. I had chosen the Europe trip over her as well. And it was the exact same. I had picked someone else over her, too.
“Ella, please, please, don’t be mad at me,” Maddie pleaded, pulling me back to FaceTime. She was clutching her hands together, staring straight at the camera. “I promise, I’ll make it up to you.” She let out a big sigh.
“No, it’s actually, um, it’s actually okay. I-I…” I looked out the window at the sun almost breaking through the pine trees. “I’ve actually decided to go with Mom and Dad this summer. We’re going to Holland, England, Denmark and, um, Berlin.” I muttered that last word.
Maddie’s mouth dropped, and she raised both her eyebrows.
“You-you’re going to find him, I mean, try to find him?”
“Well, I think you’re doing the right thing.” Her voice was soft and comforting.
“You think?”
She nodded.
“But I thought you said you didn’t know, I mean, when I asked you said there were both pros and cons to finding him.”
“Well, I didn’t lie, per se.” She looked up at the ceiling as if thinking about what to say next. “I guess I just wanted it to come from you.” She looked straight at me. “You had to feel it, feel what was right to you and not just do it because of what everyone else was saying.”
I let out a puff.
“Now you sound like Mom—the professor’s wife—without the excessive swearing, that is.” We both couldn’t help smiling, and, just like that, we were back on the same wavelength. “Which reminds me... When you finally come visit me, and you have to at some point, you’d better bring a handful of pennies.”
“Pennies? What the fuck for?”
“For that—right there.” I pointed at her big mouth, two screens between us.
“What the fuck for?” she repeated.
***
I still had a silly smile on my face after I had said goodbye to Maddie. So what if she had picked Ben and Abercrombie & Fitch over me. I had picked Berlin over her too—a choice she was clearly supportive of. “You know everything happens for a reason, right?” she had said right before she waved goodbye to the screen. Maybe she was right. Maybe I was supposed to go to Berlin. Maybe it was meant to be?
I spent the rest of the day emailing my professors and looking up travel tips from other people with celiac, while Mom took Alfred and Ava to their co-op at a cute little toddler activity center, strategically located in between a Starbucks and a local chocolate store, Le Petite Chocolate. Needless to say, Mom was the one who had found this place. Also, needless to say, she was often more excited to go than the actual toddlers in the house.
When Dad, Mom, and the two “tater tods” all returned home, almost at the exact same time, I had planned my entire semester. I had also downloaded three different versions of a gluten-free restaurant card—one in French, one in German, and one in Danish—and almost memorized a YouTube video about “the most basic words and phrases you’ll ever need when traveling in Europe” by some very linguistic-looking dude with a long beard, fluent in seven languages. In other words, I was ready to go with Mom on our European adventure—on the girls’ trip we never had.
But, that was before Dad dropped another one of his earth-shattering bombs.
***
“You are not gonna believe this,” Dad announced, not even halfway through the door. “You will not believe this.” He could hardly stand still, excitement almost making him choke on his words.
“I have a pretty good feeling you’re about to tell us.” I snickered and looked over at Mom unpacking the groceries.
“You two are gonna have the times of your lives in Europe. I mean, the royal freaking treatment.” He leaned over and pulled a carrot from the bundle and took a huge bite. “You just got a sweet deal,” he continued around his carrot.
“Deal?” Mom handed him two milk cartons and nodded toward the fridge.
“So, Mrs. Phyllis Rock just informed me that she’ll be paying for your, or our, entire trip, with the headline—” Dad used his half-eaten carrot to demonstrate what I believed was him writing a headline, “‘No expense is too big.’” He straightened and looked at us, moving his head slowly up and down. “You’d better book those first-class tickets to Paris. My girls are going to Paris, free-riding.”
“Hold on a minute.” Mom dumped a heavy bag of potatoes on the floor and squinted at Dad. “She’s paying for us, all of us? The kids too?” She motioned to the living room where Ava and Alfred were eating snacks by the small Thomas the Tank Engine table.
“Yes. All. Everything. Todo el mundo.” He plopped the rest of the carrot into his mouth and smiled, revealing a set of orange-stained teeth. “Todo.”
“So, let me get this straight. She’s paying for everything? So, if I book a hotel room on the freaking Champs-Elysees, with a view of the Eiffel tour, like in that movie…” She looked at me for help. “That movie with that guy, what’s his name, who falls in love with that girl with blond hair, what’s her name?”
“Have no clue, and why does everything have to be related to a movie?”
“You know the one I’m talking about,” she insisted, ignoring my comment. “It such a cute movie. They end up kissing on the Champs-Elysees in the end. Frank?” Her eyes shifted to Dad, like he would remember the name of some random rom-com.
“No clue.” Dad looked at me and shrugged.
“Well, geez, Mom, now I don’t need to see it since you just told me how it ends.”
“It’s right on the tip of my tongue.” She looked up at the ceiling and sighed. “Anyway, we can book that, champagne, room service and all, and she will pay?”
Dad crossed the floor in two big strides, nodding his head. “She’s paying for EVERYTHING.” He pulled out a chair and sat down. “She has nothing else to do with her money and … but…” He looked back and forth between me and Mom, a silly expression on his face.
“There’s a catch, right?” I grabbed the chair next to him and flopped down on it.
“Um, sort of.” Dad ran a hand over his beard and looked down at the table. “She’s, um, she’s going with us.”
CHAPTER 5
Gluten free on steroids
“I can’t believe we’re actually doing this. We must be crazy.” Mom looked over her shoulder and turned down the quiet boulevard. It was a beautiful day, the sun smiling at us from a clear sky, making Seattle look her very finest—especially from up here, the place with the best view of the city. Even though we had been living only twenty miles from this place for years, we had never been.
I looked down at my phone and read out loud:
“‘An unsurpassed view of Elliott Bay and the Central City, with an occasional backdrop of Mount Rainier.’” I stopped and looked out Mom’s side window and there she was, her snow-covered coat almost twinkling in the sun. “Check.”
“What check? Are we there?” Mom’s eye left the road for a second and looked at me with her too-familiar are-we-lost-again face.
“Mount Rainier. It’s right there.” I motioned with my phone and Mom faced the other way.
“Oh wow.” Mom stepped on the brake rather abruptly, lurching me forward.
“Mom?”
“Sorry.” Slowly, Mom let go of the brake and we continued. “This is the most fantastic view ever. Why have we never been? And where are we going again?”
“Turn right on the end there,” I instructed her before I continued to read. “‘The Queen Anne is a neighborhood in Seattle that is known for its gorgeous craftsman homes and is one of the more expensive places to live.’” I craned my neck and looked up at the house we were slowly passing. It looked like something taken right out of Martha Stewart Living, or in Mom’s words, something from yet another movie she probably couldn’t recall the name of. I could count no less than three garages, two patios and a well-dressed Gartner. “You can say that again.”
“What?”
“Are you listening at all?”
“You know I don’t listen that well when I’m driving.” She rearranged her hands on the steering wheel and exhaled deeply. I swear her multi-tasking skills were getting worse.
“The houses are worth shit-loads of money,” I transcribed in a loud voice. “It says some of them go for over seven million.”
“Okay okay, I can hear you. I’m not deaf, just not good at driving and paying attention at the same time, is all. Are we here yet?”
I looked up at the big whitewashed brick house on my left and saw 233989 on the side of the majestic entrance. “Two more houses down, I think.”
“The one with the whole Gartner crew?” We bo
th looked straight ahead. A handful of guys, all dressed in bright-green vests, were working on the meticulously-landscaped front yard. I guess Dad was right. Mrs. Phyllis Rock was a rich MF.
“Man, she must be loaded.”
“Uh-huh,” Mom agreed as she slowly parked the old van right behind the white Gartner truck. “You really think we should bring that with us now?” We both faced the backseat. The little flower arrangement we had picked up at Safeway on the way over was still squeezed in between Alfred and Ava’s car seats, fastened by the seatbelt. It looked even sadder than it did at the store.
Mom clicked off her seatbelt. “Well, it was the best they had,” she said with a chuckle, “but it kinda pales by comparison—here, in GartnerVille, green hands just ready to mock it.” She looked at me. “It’s better than nothing, right?” She didn’t sound too convinced.
Five minutes later, we were standing on the doorstep with the sad Safeway plant.
“This entrance with the tinted glass and dark wood, it’s kinda like in that movie, that movie with, um, what’s his name.” She stopped when we heard footsteps approaching behind the closed doors. “I’m doing it again,” she said, giggling.
“Yes, you are. I sai—” We both froze as the heavy oak door slowly opened and a small elderly woman with white hair and heavy, round designer glasses appeared. I don’t know what I had expected—maybe a maid, a servant. I mean, she was rich as fuck—but definitely not this. She looked very eccentric, wearing a long, elegant purple dress and matching scarf on her head like she was the queen of Sheba, or the Queen of Queen Anne, at least. Her makeup, settling into the deep wrinkles around her eyes and her pouted lips, was so flawless that it looked like it had been done by a professional.
Lost in Love (The Miss Apple Pants series Book 2) Page 5