Once Upon a Toad

by Heather Vogel Frederick

  The problem was, there was no place to do that in a house as tiny as my dad’s.

  If I went upstairs to our room, Olivia would inevitably be there talking about me on the phone to Piper, or worse, sitting there with Piper in person, the two of them making loud, snarky remarks about my clothes (what was wrong with jeans and a T-shirt?), my hair (why should I have to brush it more than once a day?), my lack of makeup (who wanted to smear that goop all over their face?), and everything else they could think of. Oh, and forget practicing my bassoon. I had to barricade myself in my dad’s office if I wanted to do that, otherwise Olivia would moan about it hurting her ears.

  On top of everything else there were the stupid dioramas. My bed was an island in a sea of art supplies, as Olivia’s stuff had soon crept over into my half of the room. Iz had spotted the duct tape on the floor that first night and made Olivia take it off, but it quickly reappeared in the latest Barbie vignette—an exact replica of our bedroom. On one side of the decorated box a Barbie meant to be Olivia (I could tell by the curly blond hair) sat on the bed with her arms folded, staring across the room at the other Barbie—actually a vintage Skipper, Barbie’s little sister, thank you very much, Olivia—who was standing by the door with a suitcase in her hand. From it hung a luggage tag that said HOUSTON, TEXAS. Above the Skipper-who-was-me’s bed hung a little poster of a red circle with a slash through it. The word inside the circle? “CAT.”

  Nice.

  I got even by sneaking another Barbie into the diorama—this one with dark hair just like Piper’s. I placed her by the tiny window in her underwear, looking out. Then I gave her huge red lipstick lips and taped a sign to her back that said FLEABRAIN LOVES CONNOR.

  Olivia and Piper’s other favorite pastime, besides torturing me, was swooning over Connor Dixon, the boy next door. That’s another big difference between my stepsister and me—she’s boy crazy. Our bedroom was at the front of the house, and the window had a perfect view of the Dixons’ driveway, where Connor and his older brother, Aidan, spent a lot of time playing basketball. Olivia and Piper were always spying on them. Well, on Connor, mostly. They both had a huge crush on him. I knew Connor from the times I’d visited before, and also now from band, since he played the saxophone. Technically, I supposed he qualified as cute—I never really paid much attention to that stuff—but I didn’t think he was worth all the fuss the two of them made over him.

  Olivia shrieked when she saw what I’d done to her diorama, but she couldn’t tell Iz, of course, without her mother seeing the rest of it. Instead she snapped a picture of it with her cell phone and sent it to Piper. Both of them were spitting mad at school the next day.

  Funny, but hardly likely to help improve matters, my mother wrote back when I e-mailed her about it. Focus on the good things, Cat.

  The good things were Hawkwinds, my new friends, and Mr. Morgan and his delicate, shell-like ears. Also Geoffrey and Dad and Iz. I dutifully wrote my mother about all of these, and about Mrs. Bonneville and her list of rules because I knew she’d get a kick out of that. My mother has a really good sense of humor.

  I didn’t mean to complain, really I didn’t. I knew she needed to concentrate on her mission at the space station. But who else could I talk to? Iz had her hands full with Geoffrey and her job, and besides, she was living in her own little “Sisters are forever friends” world. It would be too awkward trying to explain to her what a twerp her daughter was, anyway. I knew I should probably talk to my father, but he’d been away the last couple of days collecting data on the spring Chinook salmon run in the Columbia River Gorge.

  By Thursday night my spirits were as soggy as the weather. The diorama had disappeared, but Olivia and I were still barely on speaking terms. After dinner Iz shooed us upstairs to do our homework. Which we did, sort of. Olivia was talking to Piper on her cell phone, and I was using Iz’s laptop to IM with A.J. With my earbuds in to block out my stepsister’s annoying voice, I could almost pretend I was back in Houston. This was what A.J. and I did every night—worked on our homework while we instant-messaged each other.

  I have a bad case of Olivia-itis, I wrote.

  Poor you, he wrote back, adding a frowny face.

  Need cure. Can u help?

  No known remedy. Will ask NASA to arrange immediate airlift.

  I had to laugh at that. A.J. always managed to cheer me up.

  Iz poked her head in the door just then and saw me smiling. “I’m so glad to see you two getting along,” she said. “One big happy family.”

  Olivia waggled her fingers at her sweetly. The second Iz left, though, she looked over at me and pretended to stick them down her throat. I stuck out my tongue at her and turned my attention back to the computer screen. A few seconds later I jumped when Olivia let out a loud squeal at something Piper had said. I pulled out one of my earbuds. “Could you maybe keep it down a little? I’m working on pre-algebra and it’s hard.”

  “I’m working on pre-algebra and it’s haaard,” she mimicked in a high voice.

  I sighed and stuck the earbud back in. A.J. was right. There was no known cure for Olivia Haggerty.

  CHAPTER 4

  On Friday morning Olivia sabotaged our bathroom schedule, hogging it until five minutes before the bus came. Usually Dad monitors the schedule closely, since she has a habit of doing this, but he’d left before dawn for Klamath Lake. Every spring he drives down to help out with the annual count of the migrating waterfowl, then stops in Ashland to visit my grandparents. Olivia was taking full advantage of his absence, and Iz was distracted with Geoffrey, who had developed a bad case of spaghetti leg.

  Spaghetti leg is what Iz calls it when Geoffrey goes all limp and doesn’t want to do something. For some reason he’d decided that he didn’t want to go to preschool this morning, so he was on strike, lying flat on his back on the rug in his bedroom. Iz couldn’t get him dressed because he wasn’t cooperating. I could tell that her patience was wearing thin. My stepmother is not a morning person.

  “She’s an artist,” my dad always says. “Lots of artists are night owls.”

  My father, on the other hand, is an early bird. Which is appropriate, given his choice of career.

  “Olivia! Hurry up in there!” Iz shouted, trying to stuff my little brother’s legs into his pants. “Give me a hand, would you, Cat? I’ll deal with your sister.”

  Stepsister, I thought automatically, but didn’t say aloud, of course.

  I crossed over to them. “C’mon, G-Man,” I encouraged. “Preschool is fun.”

  He shook his head, clutching his blanket. He’s had the thing since he was a baby, and if he were my kid, I’d make him throw it away. It’s totally disgusting. Once upon a time it was a down comforter, but it had long since lost its feathers and its original color. Now it just hung there like a limp, dingy, bluish gray rag. Plus, it smelled.

  “All aboard for fun!” I called, trying again. I pretended to be a train and raced around the room on my knees, following the pattern on his carpet. Geoffrey likes it when I do that. It’s one of those Traffic Tyme rugs that they sell in all the kids’ furniture stores. My dad calls it “little-boy heaven”—it’s got traffic lanes and parking spots and stop signs and stuff like that.

  Geoffrey pulled his finger out of his mouth and smiled at me.

  “Gotcha!” I said, pulling him upright. I wrestled him into his clothes, then gave him a piggyback ride down the hall to where Iz was standing outside the bathroom.

  “Olivia!” she called again, rattling the door handle.

  “Almost done!” my stepsister called back.

  Iz took Geoffrey from me. “Thanks, sweetheart.”

  “No problem.”

  “Did I take too long?” Olivia asked as she finally emerged, her eyes wide in feigned innocence.

  I pushed past her without a word and closed the door behind me, glancing at the clock on the wall. There was no time for a shower, and Iz had already told me she couldn’t drive me because she had to go right from d
ropping Geoffrey off at preschool to a photo shoot.

  I had to settle for washing my face and brushing my teeth and swiping a brush through my hair. I looked at myself in the mirror and sighed. It wasn’t much of an improvement. The left side of my hair was still full of snarls and sticking out where I’d slept on it.

  To get even, I took Olivia’s toothbrush and dunked it in the toilet. Served her right.

  The day went from bad to worse. Every time I got anywhere near Olivia at school, she wrinkled her nose and sniffed suspiciously. Pretty soon she had Piper and their friends doing it too. I knew I didn’t smell—I might not have showered but I’d remembered to put on deodorant, at least—but still, it was starting to give me a complex.

  And then, at lunch, I was sitting at the band table talking to my friends when I heard a tapping noise behind me. I turned around to see Olivia and Piper and the Hawk Creek Tappers heading toward me across the cafeteria.

  Tappety-tappety-tappety-tappety-tappety-tappety-SNIFF! Tappety-tappety-tappety-tappety-tappety-tappety-SNIFF! The cafeteria fell silent as they danced their way around our table. On every seventh beat they’d pause, lean toward me, and inhale—then simultaneously hold their noses.

  “What’s going on?” asked Rajit, mystified.

  Boys can be really dense sometimes.

  Rani shot me a sympathetic glance. “Ignore them,” she whispered.

  How could I? Anger welled up in me and I stood up, ready to have it out with Olivia, but just then the Tappers swung into a big Broadway finish. My stepsister and her friends ended their number down on one knee in a semicircle around me, one hand flung into the air and one hand pointing toward me as Olivia shouted, “Heeeeeeeeeere’s … CATBOX!”

  I stood there, frozen, as the cafeteria exploded with laughter.

  The day couldn’t end fast enough after that.

  “Cat?” said Iz when I walked in the front door after school with a face like thunder. “What are you doing home so early? I thought you had Hawkwinds practice.”

  I didn’t answer, just ran upstairs. I didn’t stop until I got to the attic. It was the only place in the house I could think of where I could go to be alone, and right now I didn’t want to talk to anyone ever again.

  It was cold up there, and I was grateful for the fleece lining on my rain jacket. Zipping it all the way to the top, I looked around the dimly lit space, spotted an old trunk in the far corner, and dragged it over to the window that overlooked the front yard. I slumped down on it and gave in to the tears that had threatened to overflow on the long bus ride home. Catbox. Olivia’s new nickname for me had gone around school like wildfire. I’d never felt so humiliated in my entire life. The snickering, the whispers—people sidling up to me in the halls and sniffing me. I’d never live it down.

  There was no way I was going back.

  I stared down at the silver ring on my finger. The aquamarines shone softly in the late-afternoon light that slanted through the window. What a joke, I thought bitterly. The words seemed to mock me. They should really read STEPSISTERS ARE NEVER FRIENDS.

  Angrily, I fished my cell phone out of my backpack and punched in my father’s number. My call went right to his voice mail, as I knew it would.

  “Dad?” I said, my voice cracking. “I need to talk to you as soon as possible. Please call me.”

  He wouldn’t, though. Not before Sunday night. He’d warned us when he left that he’d be out of cell phone range all weekend.

  I heard footsteps on the stairs, then a soft knock on the attic door. “Cat?”

  It was Iz.

  “Go away,” I said, not caring if I sounded surly.

  The door opened a crack. “Honey? What’s wrong?”

  I shook my head miserably. I didn’t want to talk about it.

  My stepmother crossed the dusty room and sat down on the trunk beside me. I could hear the sound of the TV downstairs, where Geoffrey was watching Robo Rooster, his favorite cartoon. Olivia was still at school. She’d stayed to practice for the talent show, then the Hawk Creek Tappers were all supposed to go to Piper Philbin’s for a sleepover. I could only imagine how they were congratulating themselves on their little triumph.

  Iz didn’t say a word; she just put her arm around my shoulders and waited. Some people have a gift for kindness. My stepmother was one of those people, and before long my defenses crumbled.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked again.

  “Everything!” I wailed, pouring out the whole story. I didn’t leave anything out, not even my own part in escalating things with the sabotaged diorama.

  “Oh my,” said Iz faintly when I was done. She wrapped her arms around me and pulled me close. “I’m so sorry, Cat. I should have been more tuned in to what was going on between you two. I’ve been distracted with work, and I guess I just wanted so much for things to be perfect that I didn’t see the warning signs.” She released me and stood up. Her face was grim. “I have to be downtown at a gallery opening in half an hour. I can’t get out of it; I’m introducing the guest of honor. But as soon as things wind down, I’ll go pick up Olivia. No sleepover for her tonight. The two of us will be having a long talk, I can promise you that.”

  She hesitated, and bit her lip. “Are you still okay with babysitting Geoffrey for me? I could call someone else if you’re not feeling up to it.”

  I shook my head. “I’ll be fine,” I told her, wiping my nose on my sleeve.

  Iz looked relieved. “I’ve ordered a pizza for you two. There’s money on the table in the front hall.”

  I nodded.

  “And Cat?”

  I looked at her.

  “We’ll straighten this out, I promise.”

  I didn’t hold out much hope for that. But it was good to have Iz in my court, and I was feeling a little better by the time she left.

  After dinner Geoffrey and I watched a Robo Rooster DVD, then I promised to read him a bedtime story if he didn’t hassle me about taking a bath. He’d gotten over his earlier bout of spaghetti leg, fortunately, and he hopped happily into the tub, and from there into his jammies.

  “Do you want to choose a book?” I asked, and he nodded.

  Dragging his limp rag of a blanket, he scuffed over to his bookshelf, careful to follow the traffic lanes on his rug. He picked out a book, then clambered up onto the bed and snuggled down next to me with a contented sigh, spreading his smelly blanket over both of us. I leaned down and kissed the top of his head. It’s fun having a little brother.

  Technically, I’m an only child. I was in first grade when my parents split up and Dad moved back to Oregon. My mother has never remarried—she says she’s married to her job for now—but Dad met Iz a year after the divorce, and they got married and had Geoffrey a year later.

  “It’s a case of yours, mine, and ours,” Dad always says when people ask him which kids belong to which parents.

  I think maybe there are a few too many last names floating around, though. Dad and Geoffrey and I are Starrs. Olivia is a Haggerty, of course, because of her father. Iz didn’t want Olivia to feel left out, so she went with Haggerty-Starr. Mom doesn’t have a hyphen, but her professional name has always been Fiona MacLeod Starr, and she kept it after the divorce. She says this way people know that the two of us are related, plus what better name could there be for an astronaut than Starr? It’s all a bit much.

  Geoffrey may only be my half brother, but his looks are all Starr. He has straight light brown hair and greenish blue eyes, just like Dad and me. Olivia, on the other hand, looks a lot like her mother, with the same curly blond hair and brown eyes.

  “Cat,” said Geoffrey, taking his finger out of his mouth. “Cat, Cat, Cat, Cat, Cat.” He loves my name.

  And I love him. Geoffrey is one of the best things about being here in Oregon.

  After we finished reading, I tucked him into bed and we said good night to all the zoo animals on his wall mural. Then I sang him the lullaby that my mother always used to sing to me when I was little:

>   “Bed is too small for my tired head,

  Give me a hill soft with trees.

  Tuck a cloud up under my chin,

  Lord, blow the moon out, please!”

  Geoffrey and I blew in each other’s faces when I finished, and Geoffrey giggled. He gave me an angelic smile and whispered “Cat” again, then plugged his finger back into his mouth and closed his eyes.

  “Good night, G-Man,” I whispered, kissing his cheek. Checking to be sure his night-light was on, I left the room. He was already snoring by the time I closed his door.

  Geoffrey’s snoring is a big joke in our family. Iz says that all the breath he saves by not talking during the day comes out at night. It’s hard to believe that such a little kid can make such a loud sound. We have to take earplugs with us whenever we all go camping.

  I went downstairs, looking forward to having the house to myself. I planned to read a little, practice my bassoon a little, and maybe IM with A.J.

  My peaceful evening was short lived, though.

  A few minutes later, I heard the car door slam. Then the front door flew open and Olivia stormed in.

  “Thanks for tattling, Catbox,” she snarled.

  “Olivia!” said Iz, who was right on her heels.

  My stepsister ignored her and stomped upstairs.

  Iz sighed deeply. “Sorry about that,” she said to me, then followed Olivia to her room. I heard the door close and then the sound of muffled voices—Iz’s low-pitched murmur playing a steady counterpoint to Olivia’s indignant staccato tones. Like a cello and a piccolo, maybe.

  After a while I heard the door open again as Olivia went down the hall to the bathroom. Iz came back downstairs. She was holding something in her hand, and I spotted a telltale flash of silver as she tucked it into the pocket of her skirt—it was Olivia’s sister ring.