Bad News/Good News

by Annie Bryant

  Katani:

  Today’s Horoscope

  Virgo: Take charge, girl! Enough of sitting around and worrying from the sidelines. It’s time to get life jumpstarted! Don’t hold back for another minute!

  Lucky numbers: 11, 42

  Lucky relationship days: Saturday!!

  Katani’s idea came to her in the middle of English class. She was looking out the window, enjoying the pleasant sound of Ms. Rodriguez reading Emily Dickinson’s poetry, when it occurred to her that other kids at school might want to get involved with Project Thread. We need helpers—and other kids would probably get into this, she thought. Why not make it a bigger project, with more involvement?

  Katani corralled Maeve at their lockers before gym. “All we need is to get a teacher to sponsor us. And we could even do it during study hall.”

  Maeve loved the idea. “You’re brilliant, Katani. No wonder you want to run your own design company one day. You’ve got so much…” Maeve paused. “Vision,” she added breathlessly.

  Katani looked through her perfectly organized locker, took out the notebook she needed, and smoothed her hair, checking her reflection in her locker mirror.

  Maeve looked from the inside of Katani’s locker to her own. “Why can’t I be organized like you are?” she wailed. Her binder for the next period class was nowhere to be found, and papers were stuffed everywhere. “My mom’s right,” she said tragically. “I have ODD. Organizational Deficit Disorder.”

  “Your mom,” Katani said, “should stop labeling people!”

  Maeve glanced at her, surprised. “She can’t help it, Katani. She just wants me to succeed,” she said. “If I weren’t so random about everything—if I were more like you—she wouldn’t worry so much. She’s afraid that I am not going to be able to get a job when I grow up.”

  “If you were more like me,” Katani said firmly, taking Maeve by the arm, “you wouldn’t be you. And that would be really sad.”

  Maeve’s face brightened. “I never thought of it that way,” she said.

  “So,” Katani continued. “Should we ask Ms. Rodriguez if she’ll sponsor our blankets?”

  “Oh, Katani, that’s the best idea yet! Ms. Rodriguez is perfect!” Maeve exclaimed.

  Katani could’ve hugged her. She loved Maeve’s enthusiasm. Couldn’t her mother see that Maeve’s infectious excitement about everything she did was a million times more important than just being organized?

  “Anyway,” Katani continued, almost as if she were thinking out loud, “that’s the whole point about being a team, Maeve. We all have different stuff we’re good at. You’re the one who thought of the blankets. And you’re the one who’s stuck to it and believed in it. All you need is a little teamwork to get the job done!”

  Maeve was practically on cloud nine by the time they reached Ms. Rodriguez’s classroom. She could hardly wait ‘til Project Thread was underway, and they had their first batch of blankets ready to deliver to the shelter!

  All that week Charlotte was dragging. Nothing seemed to lift her spirits—not even Maeve’s news that Ms. Rodriguez had agreed to sponsor their blanket project, and they were going to devote second period study hall to it until the blankets were done. Charlotte agreed to help, but her heart just wasn’t in it. One more thing that I won’t be able to see through, she thought miserably. Yes, she was thrilled to be able to work with her friends. But would she be around to deliver the blankets? Or would she and her father already be in England?

  “Isabel,” she said at the end of homeroom on Friday, “do you want to go to Montoya’s after school today?” Charlotte hadn’t seen much of Nick since Dance class. She was feeling a little shy to go to the bakery on her own, though. Going with Isabel would lift her spirits.

  Isabel thought for a minute. “I’d—oops, I can’t,” she said suddenly. “I’ve got plans.”

  “Oh…” Charlotte said slowly. “OK, another time.”

  GIRLS’ ROOM

  She bumped into Maeve and Katani in the school’s downstairs bathroom. Maeve was brushing her hair, trying to get a good look at it from the side. “D’ya think Dillon would help with the blanket-making?” she was asking Katani. “Hey, Char!” she said when Charlotte came in.

  “Boys and blankets,” Katani pronounced, “do not mix. Don’t even bother asking, Maeve.”

  “Hey,” Charlotte said, splashing some cool water on her face in an attempt to wake herself up a little. “Do you all feel like coming to Montoya’s after school with me today? I could use some company.”

  Maeve and Katani caught each other’s eyes.

  “Can’t,” Katani said.

  “Sorry, we’re…I mean I’m…busy,” Maeve mumbled.

  Charlotte looked from one to the other. “You are?” she repeated doubtfully.

  “Yep. It’s…I’ve got an appointment,” Maeve blurted. It was completely obvious that she wasn’t telling the truth.

  “Me too!” Katani echoed.

  Charlotte swallowed. Why weren’t they telling her the truth? What were they hiding from her? “Never mind,” she said, trying to sound nonchalant.

  She almost bumped smack into Avery, who came leaping into the bathroom, skateboard in hand.

  “Hey, Ave,” Charlotte said half-heartedly.

  “Are we still meeting later?” she heard Avery ask as the door closed behind her.

  Charlotte’s eyes filled with tears. It was clear her friends were all getting together—without her. It’s probably because I’m moving, she thought miserably. They know that I won’t be around for much longer, so what’s the point in investing any more time in being friends with me?

  It was the worst day of the worst week that Charlotte could remember in a long time. She just wanted to go home and crawl upstairs and lie on her bed with Marty. At least he won’t abandon me, she thought.

  “Phew,” Avery said, closing the door to Maeve’s bedroom. “It sure wasn’t easy getting over here without Charlotte finding out.”

  “I hope she’s OK,” Maeve said worriedly. “She looked totally sad all afternoon.”

  “I know—she wanted me to go to Montoya’s with her,” Isabel said.

  “Us too!” Maeve cried, looking at Katani.

  “Well, we better come up with a good plan,” Katani said.

  “How about sending her dad some information on all the negatives of moving too much with teenaged kids?” Avery said. “If Mr. Ramsey is at all like my dad, he’d be into that. My dad loves statistics and figures of any kind.”

  “I kind of like that idea,” Katani said. “We’ll have to do some research. Who’s up for that?”

  “I’ll do it,” Avery said. “I’m on the Web all the time anyway, working on my blog. I can find out some stuff and write it up.”

  “Let’s send it as an anonymous letter,” Maeve said. “That’s much more mysterious than getting e-mail. And he’s more likely to read it and pay attention to it.”

  “OK,” Avery said. “I’ll see what I can find, and let’s talk online before I send it.”

  GOOGLING

  Dear Mr. Ramsey:

  It has come to our attention that you are considering moving overseas. Again. You may or may not know some of the many problems that can come from moving with a teenager every year. Did you know that teenagers especially crave stability? They really need friendships more than ever at this age. This is not a good time to move every year if you can help it! Moving in the middle of the year is really hard. Your kid may be out of sync with the school she is moving to. Did you know that moving is the third most stressful thing that can happen to a person after dying or getting divorced???

  —A Friend

  There! Avery thought, putting the letter into an envelope and picking her favorite stamp—the American flag. That ought to do it. She was glad that she’d left out all of the creative and powerful things that can happen to families who live overseas. Mr. Ramsey didn’t need to hear about that—he knew all the positives. He needed to think more about al
l the stress he was heaping on Charlotte.

  Putting together a list of negatives could only help. Reverse psychology hadn’t worked; it was time to let Mr. Ramsey know that moving again was just about the worst idea imaginable.

  CHAPTER 17

  Talking It Out

  Charlotte hadn’t planned on confiding in Nick. But she was feeling so blue on Friday afternoon that she stopped into Montoya’s on her own, and before she knew it, she and Nick were having an iced hot-chocolate together—and more buñuelos.

  “These things are addictive,” Charlotte told him. They’d just come out of the oven and they were unbelievably good.

  “My mom and my aunt used to make them for our family on Christmas morning,” Nick said, smiling at her. “Here at the bakery, they’re standard fare. But they still kind of remind me of Christmas!”

  Charlotte sighed, almost unconsciously. Christmas. Where would she and her dad be then? Packing boxes to move to England?

  “You OK, Charlotte?” Nick said. He looked uncertainly at the pastry she’d set down on her plate. “You don’t have to finish that if you don’t want to.”

  “Oh, it’s not the pastry. It’s delicious,” Charlotte assured him. “It’s just—well, everyone bagged me today,” Charlotte said sadly. “Maeve, Katani, Isabel, Avery—they were all busy. Turns out, they all had plans—with each other. And they didn’t include me.”

  Nick stared at her. “You’re kidding me. You guys do everything together. They couldn’t have left you out on purpose, Charlotte.”

  “They did!” Charlotte pushed her drink away miserably. “Trust me, they did. I don’t know why—I have to admit it isn’t like them…but I think maybe it’s because…”

  She looked uncertainly at Nick. “Well, because my dad and I may be moving to England,” she said in a rush.

  Nick looked upset. “Moving? But—you just moved. Here,” he said emphatically.

  “I know. My dad…I don’t know why this is, but he’s…I don’t know, he just really likes moving, seeing new places, having adventures.” Charlotte sighed again. It sounded so great when she put it that way. “I’ve always liked that too. It’s just that things have changed somehow.” Charlotte glanced uncomfortably at Nick. “I guess I’m not a little kid anymore, you know? I want to be able to stay in one place for a while.”

  Nick nodded. “I think I know how you feel. A lot of things are different when you get to junior high.” He paused. “Are you sure your dad really wants to move? Have you tried to tell him how you feel?”

  “Everything got all messed up,” Charlotte said. “I wanted to tell him. But Isabel had this idea…she called it ‘reverse psychology,’ and the plan was that I was supposed to really play up all the great things about moving. That way, my dad would realize that leaving Brookline and moving to Oxford wasn’t such a good idea after all.”

  “Yikes,” Nick said. “Reverse psychology. I tried that on my dad once. It never works.”

  “Yeah, I can see that now.” Charlotte shook her head. “But by the time I’d done that, it seemed a little dumb to start confessing to my dad that I really don’t want to move. I did try, but…” She shrugged. “We ended up getting in a huge fight. Since then, we’ve just been saying regular things to each other. Like, ‘What time is dinner?’ And that’s about it.”

  Nick looked closely at her. “Maybe you can still talk to him. Tell him how you feel. At least in my experience, that always works best.”

  Charlotte nodded. “You’re probably right,” she said. “I just have to get my courage up.”

  “But how could any of this have to do with Maeve and the rest of them? Why would they avoid you just because your dad wants to move?”

  “I don’t really know,” Charlotte wailed. “But maybe they just figure that since I’m leaving anyway being friends with me is a waste of time and they should just forget about me now!”

  “That’s nuts,” Nick declared. “I mean, I know girls can be weird. But not that weird.”

  Charlotte didn’t say anything. She couldn’t think of another reason to explain what had happened today and why her friends had all gone off together, without her.

  Mr. Ramsey came into the living room, where Charlotte was curled up with a novel. “Charlotte,” he said, “I got this out of the mailbox today. Do you know anything about it?”

  Charlotte got up and crossed the room to see what he was talking about. She caught her breath when she started to read the letter.

  “Another one! Another—I don’t know what to call them. Like that note we found in the fridge,” she murmured.

  “Whoever wrote this went to some trouble,” her father said. “They put some research into it…and a stamp, even though they never put it through the mail.”

  Charlotte kept reading. She could feel her face growing warm.

  “Is this stuff true? Does all of this really happen to kids who move too much?” she asked.

  Mr. Ramsey sighed. “I think it could happen. It depends on so much. What the kid is like. What the family is like.”

  “Dad,” Charlotte whispered, “do you think you and I could sit down and talk? I feel like there’s so much we haven’t been able to say to each other!”

  Mr. Ramsey nodded. “You’re right,” he said, folding up the letter and slipping it in his pocket. Neither of them wanted to focus right now on who had sent the letter. It seemed like the most urgent thing was for the two of them to talk.

  “It’s not that I don’t like the idea of England,” Charlotte said carefully. “I do. I’ve always loved traveling to new places with you—we’ve had so many wonderful adventures! But when we came here, this seemed different to me. Special. Maybe because I was born here…because you and Mom and I lived here when I was a baby…it was like coming home.”

  A shadow crossed her father’s face, the way it often did when she mentioned her mother.

  “Don’t you like living here, Dad?” Charlotte cried.

  “I do,” he said slowly. “In most ways, I do. But I have to admit that at times I’ve wondered if it wasn’t a bit of a mistake, trying to come back to Boston.” He swallowed, looking past Charlotte out the window into the late autumn night. “There are so many memories here,” he said.

  “But—aren’t they good memories? And isn’t it important to have them?” Charlotte asked uncertainly. “That’s part of why I want to be here, Dad! I love knowing that when I walk down the street here, I’m somewhere where Mom once walked!”

  Her father was quiet. Charlotte thought she saw tears welling up.

  “If only…” He took off his glasses and wiped his eyes with his shirtsleeve. “If only she were still here,” he whispered.

  Charlotte took a deep breath. “Dad, we can’t bring her back. But we can still make a home for ourselves here. We can make a real home, with roots. A place where we can celebrate holidays and have friends over and look forward to staying put for a while. A long while!”

  Her father shook his head. “I don’t know, Charlotte.” He looked incredibly sad. “I know it may not be fair to you. But somehow…moving is the only thing that makes the sadness stop hurting so much. I thought I could face it, coming back here. But I’m just not sure I can.” He took Charlotte in his arms, hugging her tightly. “You know I don’t want to hurt you! I’d do anything to make you happy! But I just don’t know…I don’t know if I can do this, Char.”

  Charlotte sat up, trying hard not to cry herself. She had a huge lump in her throat, and her head was beginning to throb. “It’s OK, Daddy,” she said dully.

  She couldn’t believe that she was trying to comfort him. She felt so many different feelings at once. Always, for as long as she could remember, Charlotte had trusted that her father knew what was right. But this time was different. In her heart, Charlotte sensed that what her father was saying was wrong. Not that it wasn’t painful to face the past—but she knew that he had to do it. Yes, it was hard to be back here, where they’d been a whole family once. Where he
r mother had been alive and well. But until her father could do this, Charlotte knew they would always be moving. She just had to find a way to show him that it was important to stay here…to make a home again. She just had to.

  Charlotte’s Journal

  Monday afternoon

  So here’s the strangest thing of all—today at school, everybody acted just like normal. Maeve was her usual bubbly self, and Katani was in a great mood—she loves this blanket project of Maeve’s! Isabel was fine, and Avery was too. Now I don’t know what to think. And they didn’t avoid me at all. In fact, Avery kept saying that they really needed me to get in touch with the homeless shelter. Maeve and I are going to go there for a visit before her Hebrew class tomorrow.

  Was I just imagining things last Friday? Maybe I’m getting too sensitive—maybe all this worry about moving is making me see things that aren’t there.

  Anyway, I’m so glad that things are back to normal. I need my friends more than I ever have.

  * * *

  Maeve:

  Notes to Self

  Talk to Hebrew School class about blanket project—tell them it’s on, full steam!

  Figure out stuff with shelter tomorrow afternoon.

  Figure out an answer for Ask Maeve letter from the girl who feels like a failure.

  Change I.M. away message!!!

  Check and see if Dillon’s online.

  * * *

  CHAPTER 18

  Finding the Past

  Charlotte knocked tentatively on the door to Miss Pierce’s apartment. It was late afternoon, and sunlight was streaming in through the big bay windows when Miss Pierce opened the door.

  “Charlotte! This is a nice surprise,” Miss Pierce said, gesturing to invite her in. “I’ve just made a pot of tea—would you like some?”

  Charlotte nodded, following Miss Pierce into her sunny kitchen. She loved the feel of it in here—bright yellow walls, ceramic of all colors on the farmhouse table, and classical music playing on the radio.