Betti on the High Wire

by Lisa Railsback

  “Betti??”

  I slipped my book back under my pillow.

  “Are you okay, little tiger?”

  I probably looked like a ghost. Dangerous America.

  “What’s the matter, sweetie?”

  I gulped. “Is Lucy going to ... die?”

  “Die?” Mr. Buckworth chuckled and then he stopped when he realized that I was very, very serious. “Oh no, Betti. Her foot’s going to be just fine. She’ll be up walking around in a couple of days.” He plopped his hand on my head, and looked at me up close. “Please don’t worry, little tiger.”

  The Buckworths had no idea that I was always worried.

  I took a deep breath. “When circus kids go down to my village, I not sure, I don’t know if they will come home. They may step on snake, or catch a sick that make their bones go green, or disappear in river or in poof of smoke. I am afraid for Auntie Moo. And I worry that she disappear too and we will be leftover. Again.”

  Worry probably got under my skin the day the circus camp burned. It was inside of me, just like water.

  “Now ...”—my voice was barely a squeak—“I worry about Lucy.”

  “Oh sweetie, of course you’re worried.” Mrs. Buck-worth put her arms around me.

  I played with my fingers. I picked up my one-eyed doll and set her in my lap.

  “I hope your friends at the camp will be okay, Betti. I really do,” said Mr. Buckworth. He looked off into space as if he was looking at something very important. “And Auntie Moo too.”

  Mrs. Buckworth looked sad and smoothed out my hair with her hand.

  “Now ... as for Lucy?” Mr. Buckworth continued, “I can promise you she’ll be okay. I promise.”

  I wanted to believe that promises from the Buckworths were good, just like Auntie Moo’s promises.

  Mr. Buckworth leaned over and kissed me on my cheek and Mrs. Buckworth kissed me on my forehead.

  “Have sweet dreams, sweetie,” said Mrs. Buck-worth.

  “Even if you may not love us quite yet, little tiger,” said Mr. Buckworth, turning out the light, “we still love you.”

  I touched my cheek and fell asleep.

  IN THE MIDDLE of the night I shot straight up in my bed. Not-so-sweet dreams. I grabbed for my potato sack on top of my pillow and clenched it tight in my hand. Then I threw my blanket off my bed and it landed on Rooney.

  I put my bare feet down on the floor and felt for the fake grass with my toes. I walked softly out of my yellow room and into the hall. Rooney and Puddles followed me. Straight to the pink room.

  I pushed open Lucy’s door and tiptoed in. I sat on the floor with my elbows on her pink bed and stared into her face. She looked just like a doll. Like Roller Derby Tina. I poked her to make sure she was still alive and, sure enough, her chest was moving up and down.

  This wasn’t the way it was supposed to happen at all. I was supposed to be the broken one in America. Not the leader. Because I had a terrible time leaving sprained kids.

  I took a deep breath and began: “There is a beautiful girl who roll like crazy on rolling skates. She is sooooo fast that clowns with red hair cannot touch her. The elephant has very big rolling skates, and the lion skates around the lion cage. The beautiful girl laughs, and the clowns and the animals laugh, and no one ever falls down.... ”

  It was harder telling a Big Mouth story in English. I had to stop and think of words and start again. I had to move my hands all over the place to explain what I meant, even though Lucy’s eyes were still closed.

  After I finished the story, I whispered: “Do not die, Lucy. Do not die, please?”

  Even if Lenore, the adoption expert lady, said that I’d adapt once I got used to things in America—and I was definitely not going to adapt—I was used to watching over the leftover kids at the circus camp. And now I had to watch over Lucy. To make sure she was okay. Even if I had to stay another day.

  I had planned to give all of my scary pictures to Auntie Moo, but instead I ripped one out of my special book. I laid it on the pillow next to Lucy’s nose.

  MY EMPTY BOOK.

  The Hiding Place

  “I LOVE MY picture, Betti! See?”

  Lucy pointed over her head. It was the next morning and my scary monster picture of her was taped above her bed in the pink room. It looked even scarier hanging on the wall. “We don’t get to go to Day Camp today.” She was sitting up, smiling her no-teeth smile. “Because I’m hurt.” The TV had been moved into her room and the happy/sad people’s voices were blasting. “But GUESS WHAT? Mom said we could have sugar cereal this morning. As a special treat. ’Cause usually we only get it on Saturdays. What kind of cereal do you like, Betti?”

  “I ... I don’t know. I never try ... sea-real.”

  “I like Captain Peanuts best. It’s my favorite.” Lucy fluffed her pillow and organized the pile of stuffed fake animals next to her head. “Will you get me a bowl? With milk? Mom said it was okay.”

  “Where?”

  “In the kitchen. Go into the pantry next to the sink. And it’s the RED BOX!”

  I shrugged and walked off to the kitchen. Mrs. Buck-worth was playing with her flowers in the backyard, and Mr. Buckworth was in the bathroom singing.

  Very lucky. I didn’t want to go back to stupid Day Camp. I wanted to stay at the Buckworths’ house with Lucy and eat cereal. Rooney and Puddles followed behind me, wagging their tails. I had no idea what a “pan tree” was, but I saw a skinny door next to the sink. I opened the door and stuck my head in. Rooney and Puddles stuck their heads in too.

  The room was dark and filled with shelves of cans and boxes. I didn’t see any pans or trees. I couldn’t even find a light so I could stare at everything. Perfect. If a war suddenly came to America, the pantry was exactly where I would hide. Dark and secret. I’d hide behind red boxes and the soldiers would never find me.

  There was so much food that I really couldn’t believe it was all for the Buckworths. They were camels. Storing up. Maybe they were saving food for Mayda and Nanny too, and the whole neighborhood. Either way, the Buckworths must’ve been very afraid that a war was going to come to America. Because nobody, not even George and me, was that hungry.

  I could see, sort of, a row of boxes way up high; at least twenty of them in a line on the top shelf. There was a RED BOX in the center. But I think there were a few red boxes—my bad eye was playing tricks—so I wasn’t sure which box was which.

  I climbed up on the lower shelf and reached my hand up as high as it would go. Not high enough. So I climbed onto the next shelf. My longest finger just barely touched a RED BOX. So I climbed even higher, onto the next shelf, and grabbed on to a heavy can of beans. Wobbly and shaky, I inched the RED BOX out ...

  Rooney and Puddles looked up and drooled.

  I almost had the RED BOX in my whole hand, when suddenly the boxes all started to tilt. I tried to stand them straight again, but one of my feet slid, the can of beans crashed to the floor, and suddenly ... I was falling.

  “Hellllllp!”

  I landed like a lump. Boxes hit my head and flakes of colored puffs fell like snow. All over my hair and my pajamas.

  Rooney slobbered and started to eat. Crunch crunch. Puddles had a box in her mouth and was shaking it back and forth. I picked cereal out of my hair and ate a whole bunch of handfuls off the floor. Ick ick yummy.

  I liked cereal, but the pantry was a big, crunchy mess.

  “EAT, dogs!” I cried. “Faster!” I tried to sweep all the cereal under the bottom shelf with my feet, so the Buckworths wouldn’t know that I’d found their hiding place. While the dogs were wildly eating, I grabbed a red box off the floor and went into the kitchen and poured some cereal into a bowl for Lucy. Then I opened the refrigerator and took out some milk. I poured milk to the tippy top of the bowl.

  I walked straight to Lucy’s room and put her bowl right on her lap.

  Lucy’s whole face scrunched up in one second. “Ew. Vomit. Why did you give me a bowl of dog food?�
�� I was confused when she hollered, “BETTI! I am NOT a DOG!”

  SOON LUCY WAS going crazy in her pink room. “Will you watch TV with me, Betti? Pleassse?”

  I was very scared of the TV, but I sat on Lucy’s bed with her because she was broken and it was my fault.

  First we watched a “car tooon” where a chicken blew up a rat. There was nothing left of him but a puff of smoke and a tail. While Lucy laughed and laughed, I covered both of my eyes with my hands.

  “Betti?” Lucy took her little finger and opened my good eye. “What? What’s the matter?”

  “It is not funny,” I said. “It is very, very sad.” I stood up immediately because I was going to draw all of this in my Empty Book. Rat tails and chicken cackles and things blowing up.

  “Wait!” cried Lucy. “Let’s watch a movie then. A funny movie!”

  I looked at her big fat foot. I sighed. And sat back down on her bed.

  So we watched a movie, even though I was scared at first, because the Melons in the movies had the biggest faces in the world. Sometimes they did some funny things that made Lucy and me laugh like crazy. But most of the time those movie Melons had some serious problems. I sniffled and my eyes got cloudy because I couldn’t help it.

  “It’s not real, Betti. The people aren’t real. The rat and the chicken aren’t real. Those things aren’t really happening. They’re just stories. It’s just TV”

  Big Mouth stories? I wasn’t sure about that. Not sure at all. And my stories were definitely better anyway.

  Soon Lucy let out a snort like a sleeping cow, and she wasn’t even faking. She was sleeping.

  Suddenly I had a brilliant idea.

  Lucy was trapped in bed. And Mr. Buckworth was walking the dogs. And Mrs. Buckworth was busy doing business and chewing on her pencil, so I couldn’t bug her and give her warts, or drive her crazy and make her go woooooo.

  That’s when I decided to make my very own circus camp home. Under the tree and next to the swing set. Much better than that ugly pink Melon dollhouse.

  I pulled grass out of the ground and cleared a little space. In the center, I made a fire circle out of sticks. I made long paths in the dirt going in two directions. One path led all the way through the woods, past the murky swamp, and down to the village. The other path led down to the river. I had an area for the pig yard, and the pig trough with sloppy slop, and a whole clump of pigs, which were actually little rocks.

  I took a shoebox from my closet and took out the fancy shoes. I cut lots of bars all over the box, so the leftover kids and I could see up to the sky. That was my lion cage. I also made a snake tree with a Snake Lady and squiggly snakes out of toothpaste. I stuck big branches from the Buckworths’ tree all over the place for my woods. My dolls were little leftover kids made out of sticks, with nuts stuck on top for their heads. Auntie Moo, of course, was the tallest stick of all. Then I thought about things and added a sad little Mrs. Buck-worth stick so she would have a home too.

  Last of all, I sprinkled my jar of dirt—all the way from the circus camp—over my home.

  It wasn’t much, it didn’t look exactly like the circus camp, but it was the best I could do.

  I could practically see Auntie Moo sleeping next to the fire. I could see the leftover kids napping in the lion cage, crunched into the corner as usual.

  At the circus camp I didn’t have to show anybody how I walked on my line into the sky. The leftover kids knew I was a star. In my stories I never tripped and never fell.

  That was when my Big Mouth stories were very, very important and no one ever laughed.

  I could practically hear George’s voice before we left for America. “How does it end, Babo? The story? About the beautiful circus girl?” And I answered, “Well, she had to leave. But then she had good luck, and she came back again ...”

  It seemed like a hundred years ago.

  I could still watch over my circus camp. Well, at least a little. I could make sure that they were still happy, that there were no soldiers in the woods. I could make sure that nothing was falling from the sky.

  I climbed the Buckworths’ tallest tree.

  I sang back at the red birds on a branch. I watched squirrels chew on nuts and drop them on Rooney’s head. I reached my hand up, trying to touch my mama, the tallest woman in the world. And I watched over my circus camp. My mama was watching over the circus camp too. I was sure of it.

  “Betti!”

  Mr. Buckworth was calling for me inside the house. I saw Mrs. Buckworth look out the window of my yellow room. I barely heard Lucy say, “Mom, where did she GO?”

  The Buckworths never would have found me if it hadn’t been for Puddles. Puddles sat at the bottom of the tree and howled and howled until Mr. Buckworth came outside.

  “What are you doing up there, little tiger?” Mr. Buckworth tilted his head up and scratched it. His copper coin hair shined in the sun and a few nuts fell next to his feet. “Betti?” he called up into the tree. “How’d you get up there?”

  I called down softly, “I am the brave one.”

  Disaster

  AUNTIE MOO TAUGHT me the difference between natural disasters and people disasters. Nature is much more powerful than people. There isn’t much anyone can do to stop a natural disaster. But people disasters? Well, Auntie Moo said that those happen when very foolish people make very foolish mistakes.

  The Summer Six’s disaster was enormous. And it tilted to one side. It looked like a freaky foreign monster had dropped out of the sky and straight onto the play yard of Betsy Ross Elementary School.

  Ms. Stacy had shown us a picture of some foreign “volkaynoo” in a book about science. Then she had lined up bowls and spoons, a whole bunch of balloons, a few bags of flour, and a stack of newspapers on a wooden table. She said that we were going to make a much better volcano than the picture in the science book.

  So ours grew and grew until it was at least ten times bigger.

  I was glad that I got to make a volcano at Day Camp. After two days of sitting home with sprained Lucy, and watching Big Mouth TV stories, I was ready to go back. I’d read Auntie Moo’s letter all sorts of times and she said that I had to try very hard in America. I had to teach something and learn something every day. Well, I’d learned enough already. Now, before I ran away, I needed to teach the Summer Five important lessons about my country, and my circus, and me.

  After lunch Ms. Stacy said we had to paint the ugly volcano. “Paint your dreams, Summer Six. Maybe it’s something you want to be someday ... a career. It’s good to dream big, Summer Six,” she said. “The world is your oyster.”

  I had no idea why Ms. Stacy thought the world was an oyster, but Timmy told Ms. Stacy that he hated oysters. Slimy.

  Sam mumbled under her breath, “I hate this artsy flaky learning stuff.” She blew an enormous blue bubble that popped in her face and got stuck in her hair.

  “What is a car ear?” I whispered to Timmy.

  “It’s a job,” he answered, and wiped his nose on his shirt.

  My dream was easy. I dreamed about the circus. It was going to be my Car Ear. Of course.

  Then I saw Mayda walking through the play yard of Betsy Ross Elementary. I looked for Nanny too, walking slowly in her slipper shoes, but Mayda was alone. Her back was hunched over and her nose was practically stuffed inside her book. She tripped over something, but she didn’t care. She moved her crooked pink glasses up on her nose and looked around at the day campers in circles.

  Mayda didn’t sit on her regular bench. She timidly sat on the grass, close to the Summer Six, and stared up at the clouds.

  It took the Summer Six all afternoon to paint the huge volcano, which wasn’t even dry from the morning. It became a mess of bright and dark colors all mixed together with ugly white goo. Definitely not like the volcano in the book.

  As I painted, I kept bugging out my bad eye at Bobby Ray to make him really scared.

  All of us were completely quiet when Ms. Stacy asked us each to say
something about our paintings.

  “Well, my dream is to be an ambulance driver,” Timmy started, pointing at a painted heart with a happy face on the volcano. “I am thankful because the ambulance driver saved my grandpa when his heart had an attack.”

  “Who attacked it? Aliens?” hooted Jerry.

  “No,” answered Timmy. “I don’t know why it got attacked.”

  Bobby Ray painted a fish on a hook. He wanted to be a fisherman because he liked sitting in a boat all day and drinking Coke. The fish’s eyes stared off like it was looking at something very important somewhere else. It is very sad to be a fish.

  Tabitha painted a big blob with glasses. She dreamed of being a lawyer so she could be really tough like the people on TV, and Jerry wanted to be a big oval ball. He dreamed of being a football player, he said, which is probably why he painted a ball that looked like a big fat foot.

  When it was Sam’s turn she announced, “I would like to be a rock singer. In a rock band.”

  “You?” said Jerry. Bobby Ray and he burst out laughing.

  Sam had painted a picture of a tall person with tall spiky purple hair and colorful clothes. “I have a song,” Sam told us, “that I wrote myself.” She cleared her throat and suddenly ... started to sing. I didn’t understand why anyone would want to be a rock, but Sam’s singing was very screechy.

  Then it was my turn because I was the only one left. I was all ready to teach the Summer Five important lessons about my country and me, but I was sweating and my hands were shaking.

  “I paint pictures,” I said softly, “of my ... car ear.”

  I pointed to the very top of the volcano.

  Sam stopped chewing her gum long enough to ask: “What is it?”

  Timmy squinted. “Is it a dog?”

  “It is ... a very tall fork. I mean, woman. In the world. With tail,” I squeaked. I had also painted a purple elephant, and a lion wearing roller skates, and a snake lady holding all sorts of lucky squiggly snakes.