Penelope Crumb Finds Her Luck

by Shawn Stout

  “Your momma is letting you get a dog?” I say. “Lucky stars! What kind of dog is it going to be? A big one with lips that drool shoestrings and that curls up right against you under the covers? Can you name it Num-Num?”

  “Not a dog,” says Littie. “A person. Momma is going to have a baby.”

  My word. “A baby?”

  “That’s right.”

  “What for?” I ask.

  “What for?” repeats Littie Maple. “What does anybody have a baby for?”

  This is something I don’t know, so I ask her this: “Isn’t your momma too old to have a baby?”

  “I guess not,” says Littie. “Anyway, she’s not any older than your mom. I’m just saying.”

  “But my mom isn’t having a baby.”

  Littie puts her hands on her hips. “There are lots of people older than my momma that have babies.”

  I shrug. “If you say so, Littie Maple.” I guess babies are all right. I mean, it’s not as good as getting a dog, but still.

  “Isn’t this the best news?” Littie says.

  I give her a look that says, Well, It’s Not as Good as Getting a Dog Named Num-Num. Because it isn’t.

  Littie shakes her head at me.

  “Can I name it?”

  Littie tells me no way.

  “Can I at least call it Num-Num?” I ask.

  “No.”

  “Please,” I say.

  Littie sighs. “Not to its face, and not in front of me or my parents.”

  “But at all other times?”

  She shrugs. “Okay.”

  This is good enough luck to get me to my feet. I press the corners of Miss Stunkel’s note into my thumbs.

  “I’ve never been a sister before,” says Littie, playing with the buckle on her shoe. “I hope the baby likes me.”

  I tell Littie not to worry and that I’ve been a sister for some time. “It’s real easy. I’ll give you lots of pointers.”

  She nods and gets up. “What does it say?”

  I know she means my note, but I pretend I don’t, and I don’t know why.

  “That,” she says, pointing to my hand.

  I shrug and look at Miss Stunkel’s handwriting on the front. “Mrs. Crumb” is what it says, in lines so deep you could get your foot caught in them. I tell Littie that I don’t read them anymore because they all say the same thing.

  Littie wants to know, “What’s your mom going to say about this?”

  “Not one thing,” I say, stuffing the note back under my shirt.

  And when Littie raises her eyebrows at me and says, “What are you going to do with that note?” I get a look on my face that says, I Don’t Know What Note You’re Talking About, Littie Maple.

  3.

  Grandpa Felix’s car smells like potato chips. When I tell him this, he says, “Salt and vinegar or chives?”

  I stick my big nose toward the ceiling and draw in the air. “Chives.”

  He smiles and touches his finger to his nose and then to mine. “Right you are. The Crumb nose never fails.”

  I look inside the brown paper bag on my lap to check on my paintbrushes and drawing pad.

  “We need to get you a better carry-all,” he says.

  “That’s okay.”

  “Maybe a new toolbox?” He says it real soft like maybe I shouldn’t hear it.

  I shake my head.

  “Right. Too soon,” he says. “Too soon.”

  I nod without looking at him and trace a stain on the bag with my finger. If you squint just right, it looks like a foot that’s missing a toe.

  When we get to a red light, he pinches my chin. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

  I pull out my drawing pad and hold up some of my sketches.

  “That’s quite a nice hat on Mother Goose you’ve got there,” he says. “And what’s she got on her wings?”

  “Mittens,” I tell him. “You know, because of the fact that old people are close to death and that’s why they are cold all the time.”

  His eyes go wide. “Are they now?”

  I tell him that they are, and then pat his arm. Which is covered with a brown cardigan sweater.

  “I beg your pardon,” he says.

  I change the subject. “I’ve never been to an old folks’ home before. All of the old people I know are either Graveyard Dead or living in Texas. Except for you, Grandpa.”

  “Just what are you getting at?”

  “Not a thing, Grandpa Felix.”

  “Are you calling me old?”

  “No sir,” I say. Because if he doesn’t know that he’s a Golden Oldie, then I’m not going to be the one to tell him.

  “What else do you have?”

  I show him Jack and Jill, Hey Diddle Diddle, and Down at the Station. Then he starts singing, “Down at the station early in the morning, see the little pufferbellies all in a row . . .”

  The light turns green, but Grandpa is slow to notice until the person in the car behind us beeps his horn a couple of times. “You can go, Grandpa,” I say softly.

  “I’ve got it. I’ve got it.” He gets us going again, but not before looking in his rearview mirror and telling the person behind us to not be in such a big hurry. Then he says, “How many times am I driving you to this thing?”

  I tell him it lasts for three weekends and hold up three fingers at him.

  He shrugs. “I don’t know what I’m going to do without my favorite photographer’s assistant.”

  I smile and give him a look that says, I’m Your Only Photographer’s Assistant. Then I say, “How many weddings will I miss?”

  He holds up two fingers.

  “You’ll just have to try your best,” I say. “Want me to write out a checklist so you don’t forget anything?”

  Grandpa moves his pointer finger up and down like he’s pushing the shutter button on a camera. “You mean there’s something else I need to remember besides this?” He says it in a real funny voice that makes me laugh.

  “When are you ever going to let me take pictures?” I ask.

  “Someday,” he says.

  “You always say that.”

  “Then it must be true.” He smiles and pulls into the parking lot of Portwaller’s Blessed Home for the Aging. “I’ll just let you off out front.”

  “You don’t want to come in?” I ask.

  He shakes his head. “Can’t stomach the smell. Worse than hospitals.”

  “Oh, right.” I slide my drawing pad back into the paper bag.

  “I’ll pick you up right here this afternoon,” he tells me. After I shut the car door and head for the building, he hollers after me, “Be good and don’t call anybody old!”

  I yell back that I’ll try my best, and he pulls away.

  Portwaller’s Blessed Home for the Aging smells more like flowers than it does a hospital. The kind of flowers that you think might smell nice because they are so pretty, but when you lean in real close and take a deep whiff, you might as well be sticking your nose in a carton of buttermilk. The prettiest flowers sometimes have the worst smell, and I know that’s because they spend all their time on their looks.

  I, Penelope Crumb, think smelling good is way more important than looks. And it’s not just because of my big nose.

  Inside the door, there is a lady sitting at a desk who I am careful not to call old. Even though she is a lot. She has a round face with a nose to match and hair that curls out and away from her ears like antlers. She says hello and asks if she can help me.

  In a real polite way, I tell her that I don’t need any help at the moment, but that I’m here to paint a mural with Mr. Rodriguez and other kids so that all the old people can have something nice to look at. Then I tell her I’m sorry for saying the last part about old people and that I would like to ta
ke it back.

  She gives me a smile that says, I Don’t Mind at All. “You’re the first one to arrive, so why don’t you have a seat on the couch over there.” She points behind her, and that’s when I notice that the room we’re in looks like somebody’s living room, like almost from a real house, with couches and reclining chairs and even a television. Except that it’s really clean without sneakers and dirty socks strewn about and there’s no one in here. And I wonder if you can still call it a living room even if nobody is really doing much living in it.

  I try out the couch for a while, one end and then the other, but then I move to a reclining chair that has a good view of the door. I don’t really like to be the first person anywhere, because when I am, I always start to worry that I’m in the wrong place or have got the wrong day or that somebody forgot to tell me that they’ve changed addresses and here I sit while everybody is someplace else that I don’t know where.

  With my eyes on the door, I reach into my paper bag and give my paintbrushes a squeeze so that I have something to hold on to. I’m about to ask the lady at the desk if she’s sure there hasn’t been a call to say that Mr. Rodriguez has gotten into a car accident on the way and almost died but had enough strength to say the words: Portwaller’s. Blessed. Home. For. The. Aging. Mural. Cancelled.

  Because a cancelled mural is just how the Bad Luck would treat me.

  But before I can ask her, a small voice nearby squeaks out, “Give me some candies.”

  I look around, because if someone is giving out candy, I would like some, too. That’s when I see a small woman in a wheelchair beside me. She’s pointing her finger at my paper bag.

  “Come on,” she says. “Don’t be stingy now.” Her bony arm rests on a hook-latch pillow in the shape of a wiener dog. And there are trinkets, lots of them, hanging by yarn from her chair.

  I tell her that I don’t have any candies, true blue. And then I pull out my paintbrushes and drawing pad to show. “See?”

  She gives me a look that says, I Wasn’t Born Yesterday. Which it’s easy to see that she wasn’t, and I am pretty sure no one would ever think she was. Before I know it, she snatches the paper bag from my lap with her quick, wrinkly fingers. She turns the bag upside down and gives it a shake. When she sees that it’s empty, she growls, “Big mistake!”

  I’m not sure if she means her or me, but either way she doesn’t have to be so shouty about it, I don’t think. Antler Lady behind the desk must agree, because she is on her way over here with her finger pressed to her lips. Somebody is in trouble.

  “Nila Wister,” she says, and then nods at me, “I see you’ve met one of the students here to paint a mural in our activity room. Isn’t that nice?” Only she says it loud and slow like she’s talking to a baby. “Nila is one of our newest residents.” Then she gives me a look that says, You’ll Have to Excuse Nila, She’s Having a Day.

  I know this look. My mom gives it to other people when I ask her questions like, “Are you sure you followed a recipe for this meatloaf?” or “Is your hair supposed to look like that?”

  Nila rolls her tiny, old eyeballs and says, “The phone’s ringing. You better run along and answer it.” Antler Lady looks back at her desk, but I don’t hear any phone ringing. And she doesn’t either because she says, “The phone’s not . . .” and then looks down at Nila with slitty eyes. “Behave,” she tells her and then goes away.

  Now it’s just me and this Nila person, because there’s no Patsy Cline, no Mr. Rodriguez, and not even a Vera Bogg to be found. I try to be friendly. “What’s wrong with your legs?” I ask.

  “My legs?” she says. “You mean other than being ninety-three years old and worn out? Not a darn thing.”

  “Well, at least you have a nice wheelchair to get around in.”

  “Real nice.” Only she says it in a way that I know it’s real not.

  I try again. “Do you like Mother Goose?”

  She says no real fast like she keeps the word on the tips of her teeth so that it’s ready no matter the question. Do you like rainbows? No. Winterberry jam? No. Electric blankets? No.

  Good gravy. I don’t know what to say next, so I don’t say anything and just watch the door.

  I can feel Nila staring at me, but I don’t look at her. Instead I decide to pretend she’s not sitting beside me, not inching her wheelchair closer. I’m an excellent pretender. But then she pokes at my arm with her finger and says, “How come you don’t have candies?”

  This is a good question. How come I don’t have any candies? My pockets should always be filled with sweets. Orange-flavored ones. Which reminds me, we’re out of Popsicles. More of the Bad Luck.

  “Well?”

  I shrug at her.

  She shrugs back at me. “What kind of answer is this?”

  I quick try to think of another. “My brother eats them all.” Which is not really a lie.

  Nila nods in a way that makes me think she might have had an alien for a brother one time. Then she holds up my paper bag, the one she already took from me, and stuffs it behind her back.

  “Wait a second . . .”

  And then she does something even more worse than that. She reaches her bony little arms over to me and grabs at my paintbrushes. Which I am holding tight in my hands. She pulls, this old lady does (sorry, Grandpa Felix), and somehow yanks one paintbrush loose. Then she stuffs that behind her back.

  “Wait a second!” I say again.

  The lady at the desk looks over in our direction, and I put on a face that says, Help, I’m Being Burgled. But don’t you know, that lady is an excellent pretender, too. She acts like she doesn’t see me, doesn’t see that my paintbrush and paper bag have been swiped, and then she is all of a sudden very busy shuffling papers and picking up the phone.

  My word.

  This is what the Bad Luck can do to you.

  4.

  Mr. Rodriguez and Patsy Cline and Vera Bogg and three other kids I don’t know finally show up. And when they do, I tell them about what happened to my paintbrush and paper bag.

  None of them believes me. Not even Patsy Cline.

  “Are you sure that’s what happened?” she says to me. “Maybe you just forgot them at home.”

  Like I made up the whole thing about Nila Wister and her grabby fingers.

  Even Vera Bogg can’t help herself. “Why would an old lady take your paintbrush?” she says.

  The Bad Luck is why. I tell her not just my paintbrush is what I said, and that she also took my paper bag with a foot-stain on it. And then I say, “Vera Bogg, you shouldn’t call somebody old. It’s very rude.”

  Her face turns a little pinker and then she says she’s sorry. Patsy Cline’s face goes a little pink, too. Probably because she’s embarrassed to have such a friend.

  After giving us name tags, Mr. Rodriguez tells us to follow him. He leads us down a long carpeted hall, and on the way we pass ten or so old people in wheelchairs just sitting there in the hallway for I don’t know why. I smile at them and try not to stare, which is hard to do because 1) it’s not every day you see so many people doing nothing but sitting in a hallway, and 2) some of them are staring back.

  We follow Mr. Rodriguez into an activity room where the residents (he means old people) play games, he says. There are shelves filled with games—Regular non-old-people-type games—like checkers, Parcheesi, Old Maid. On the other side of the room, there’s a small kitchen with white cupboards. The whole place seems like it wants you to forget that you’re in a nursing home, which you could probably do if you didn’t have to live in a nursing home.

  Mr. Rodriguez pats his hand against the only empty wall in the room. “This, my artist friends, will be our canvas,” he says.

  The most wonderful sight in the world: a blank wall. I can practically hear Mister Leonardo da Vinci say, “Pray tell, my dear girl, what are you waiting for? A mural
awaits.”

  I set down my other paintbrushes and drawing pad on one of the tables in the center of the room and pull my No. 2 Hard drawing pencil from my back pocket. As soon as my pencil point touches the wall, my hand starts to move.

  Mother Goose’s beak is halfway done when somebody yells, “Look! She’s starting already! No fair!”

  It takes me a couple of seconds before I realize they are talking about me. And when I stop my hand and turn around, everybody is crowded around me, staring. My ears start to sweat.

  “Somebody is really anxious to get going,” says Mr. Rodriguez, scratching his chin beard. He leans in to have a look. “You’ve even given her glasses.”

  “Mother Goose has a hard time seeing things,” I explain. “Because of, well, because she’s been around for a while.” I’m real careful not to say the O word.

  “I see,” he says. “You’ve given this some thought.”

  I nod.

  “What else have you thought about for the mural?”

  I point to my drawing pad on the table, and Mr. Rodriguez flips through it. He doesn’t say anything, and I don’t say anything. And everybody else doesn’t say anything. And the room is quiet except for the turning of pages, so quiet you can hear the squeak of a wheelchair as it rolls past the door. I look to see if it’s Nila Wister because maybe I could get my stuff back.

  It isn’t.

  Mr. Rodriguez gets to the last page of my drawing pad and then closes it up. “These are really wonderful,” he says in front of everybody. “Very inspired and impressive, especially for someone your age.” He goes on and on, using words I don’t know but that sound good, and the more he talks, the more my face gets hot.

  All the other kids are looking at me, and I feel big all of a sudden, Thanksgiving Day Parade Balloon big. I’m taking up too much space in the room, so much that I worry parts of me might spill out through the windows. And as Mr. Rodriguez keeps on talking about my drawings, I want to shrink and disappear into the empty wall. I wonder if this is how Vera Bogg feels when Miss Stunkel says she is really something.