Harriet tore a page out of her assignment pad, moving in superslow motion so she wouldn’t make noise, but before she was finished, the bell rang and Annie swept into the hall with the rest of the girls.
The next class was gym. Harriet hated gym at the best of times, but this was the worst: it was time for the annual Presidential Physical Fitness evaluations. Harriet had already humiliated herself with her inability to climb a rope, do more than one pull-up, or swing herself into a long standing broad jump. Today she would get to be slower than anyone else at the shuttle run.
Why don’t they rate us on things that kids actually do, thought Harriet, angrily pulling on sweat socks. I’d be in the ninety-ninth percentile at sledding or bike riding.
Annie was changing her clothes in the corner, with her back turned to Harriet.
Marion and Carrie, who both took gymnastics and ballet after school, were yammering on about their gymnastics meets and the trophies they’d won. Harriet grimaced and tried to pretend they were inside an active volcano. Suddenly Marion’s voice changed.
“What’s that?” she demanded in mocking tones.
Harriet turned. On the floor underneath the bench was an object she recognized instantly: Annie’s sock monkey. Annie’s backpack had tipped over onto the floor and the toy must have fallen out. Marion snatched it, grinning, bobbing it up and down.
“What wittle baby bwought this to school?” Harriet caught a quick glimpse of the mortified, angry expression on Annie’s face and said quickly, “That’s mine.”
Marion turned. Her smile was enormous, as if she couldn’t believe her good luck.
“It’s yours? Wittle Welsch dwopped her toy?”
“It’s a treasured antique, if you don’t mind.” Harriet kept her voice even and held out her hand for the monkey. Marion cracked up.
“A treasured antique! Oh, in that case.” She handed the monkey to Harriet.
“You’re going to need this when you suck your thumb.” Carrie cracked up and high-fived Marion. They went out of the locker room in fits of giggles. Annie and Harriet looked at each other. “Here,” said Harriet brusquely, tossing the sock monkey to Annie and leaving the room.
Annie caught up with her on the starting line for the hundred-yard dash. Just before Coach Wiejazcka blew the whistle, she grabbed Harriet’s hand for a split second, whispering, “Thanks, H’spy.” The whistle shrilled, and they both charged for the finish line.
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“How are the Birdlip Twins?” asked Annie as they walked away from the Gregory School.
“Dull,” replied Harriet, glad that Annie was speaking to her again.
“Well of course they’re dull. They wouldn’t be Birdlips if they weren’t dull. How about Fabio and Naima?”
“She dropped him.”
“What?” Annie stopped in her tracks so abruptly that the second graders walking behind them nearly slammed into her. “What happened?”
“Fabio must have been cheating on her. I went up the fire escape to that window in back of the cleaners—the one that looks down on the tailoring section. Naima was cutting his jacket to pieces with pinking shears.” Annie’s eyes were enormous. “His motorcycle jacket?” Harriet nodded. “He dropped it off for a stain removal two days ago. I want to see his face when he comes back to pick it up.”
“Let’s go!”
“Sure,” said Harriet, smiling with deep satisfaction. Annie doesn’t mind spying when it’s not on her, she was thinking. “Let’s pick up a snack at the Koreans’. I still have some milk money.”
They riffled through bags of chips. Annie favored the oddly shaped, glazed Japanese snacks with small flecks of seaweed, but Harriet insisted she try plantanitos.
“They’re made from fried plantains,” she said. “They’re like a cross between bananas and potato chips, only better.”
“Fine,” Annie said, “but I get to pick out the drinks.” She went to the cooler and came back with two cans of papaya punch. Harriet narrowed her eyes. Had Annie developed a taste for papaya while meeting with P.’s kind-of-cute surfer bodyguard? She thought of him flashing that peace sign and saying, “Nice gloves,” and felt instantly dizzy, as if she’d been spinning in circles too long. I’ve got to find out who he is, she thought, but this was hardly the moment to ask. Annie had just started speaking to her; the last thing Harriet wanted to do was get her angry all over again.
She took the two cans of papaya punch and the bag of plantain chips to the front counter, where Myong-Hee was leafing through a copy of Vogue. Over the register, next to the dollar bill that had been taped up there ever since Happy Fruit Farm had opened, Harriet spotted a Christmas card with a photo of dozens of baby pines planted in rows, and the message Season’s Greetings from Whitaker Christmas Tree Farms. Underneath, someone had written with a red felt-tip pen, Happy New Year to Myong-Hee, from Zone Whitaker (and Sam).
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Harriet stepped on Annie’s foot. “Ow!” Annie yelped, turning indignantly. Harriet tilted her chin with a look of significance. She had to do this twice more before Annie got it and peered at the card. She read it through, took a step back, and said, “Sam?” Harriet stepped on her foot again.
“Stop that!” said Annie. Harriet paid Myong-Hee as fast as she could and trundled Annie out to the curb before she could say anything incriminating.
“You need some poker-face lessons,” she said.
Annie looked at Harriet, her face a mask of intense disappointment. “Douglas Fir’s name is Sam. What a dull, normal name. There’s no poetry in it. I can’t be in love with a Sam.”
“What happened to a rose by any other name smelling as sweet?”
“I can’t make the leap.” Annie shook her head.
“Are you someone different when you’re Rosarita?”
“I think I am,” Annie said. “Sometimes that’s all you can have.” She reached for the bag of plantain chips and set off down the sidewalk, angling her feet so she’d leave unusual footprints.
Harriet hurried to catch up and walked by her side, angling her feet in just the same way. “Twin clubfeet,” she said.
“Ballet victims,” Annie replied. “Third position for life.” They limped side by side to the corner of East Eighty-seventh Street. Suddenly someone stepped out from between two parked cars.
Harriet’s heart leaped. It was the surfer guy, and he was wearing his fingerless gloves. He laid a hand on Annie’s arm.
“Come with me,” he said, in a low, urgent whisper. “Right now, before anyone sees you.”
Annie turned wide eyes to Harriet. “Don’t tell,” she begged.
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Harriet didn’t know what to do. It didn’t seem like a kidnapping—Annie had gone of her own free will, and Harriet knew she had met the same man at least twice before—but something about the way he’d approached her felt wrong. She kicked herself mentally for not asking Annie more questions about the two men she’d been meeting.
The cute guy always brings her to meet P., she thought. If I just had a clue who P. was.
She decided to stake out the Feigenbaums’ house. Annie’s rendezvous usually didn’t last more than a couple of hours, since she didn’t want to be caught by her uncle and aunt. So the Feigenbaums must not be in on the secret, Harriet realized as she thought back—Annie had set up both meetings with P. while they were away from their house.
But now they were home, seeing patients. And this wasn’t a meeting that Annie had planned—she had looked just as surprised as Harriet when the blond guy approached her.
This made Harriet even more anxious. Annie might be in danger, she thought. I have to tell someone.
She went upstairs, hauled the phone into her bedroom, and closed her door.
Luckily Sport was at home.
“Hi, Spy. What’s up?”
Harriet didn’t waste words. “Remember when your mother kidnapped you?”
“That isn’t exactly the sort of thing you can forget,” said Sport, whose horrid moth
er had once kept him prisoner in, of all places, the Plaza Hotel.
“I think maybe Annie’s been kidnapped.”
“Yolanda?” Sport yelped. Harriet gave him a rundown of what she had witnessed, and Sport agreed that it sounded awfully fishy.
“Let’s meet at the Feigenbaums’,” Harriet said.
Barbara and Morris sat them down on the couch of the waiting room. Their last patients were gone, and the doors to both offices stood open. Harriet could see Morris’s couch in one room, across from a huge leather chair and a low table with one box of Kleenex. Across the hall, she caught a glimpse of Barbara’s examining table, with a long roll of sanitized paper and stirrups. It gave her the shivers.
“What did he look like?” Barbara demanded.
“He’s probably in his twenties. Shaggy blond hair with a little goatee. He wears 70
fingerless gloves,” she added significantly. Sport looked at her and she felt herself blush.
“And one of those woven jackets from Central America. He’s probably—how tall are you, Sport?”
“Five foot six,” said Sport.
“He’s maybe an inch or two taller. And he has a dimple right here,” she said, placing her finger on one pink cheek.
Barbara and Morris looked at each other, bewildered.
“And you’ve seen him with Annie before?” Morris asked.
Harriet nodded. “Twice. She met him both times at the Papaya King, and he took her to meet with the other man, P.”
“Other man?” Barbara demanded. “What other man? What do you mean by ‘P.’?” Morris set a calming hand on her arm. “Describe him, please, Harriet.”
“Older,” said Harriet. “Sandy brown curls and a long nose, like—” Barbara jumped off the couch. “I knew it!” she shouted. “I knew he was going to sneak down here and see her. Oh, his goose is cooked. He’ll be lucky if he gets a weekend. I’m going to call Jackie this minute!”
“Not till we find out—” Morris bellowed, but Barbara was already out of the room. “Who is he?” said Harriet. This was all going too fast.
Morris sighed. “Annie’s father.”
The police had been called, as had Harriet’s parents. Morris Feigenbaum told the Welsches that Harriet was an important witness and would have to stay with them until the detectives arrived. Detectives, thought Harriet, frightened and secretly thrilled. She would get to be interrogated by a team of professionals. She wondered if there would be one who was hard-edged and mean and one who was pudgy and kinder, with a reassuring soft baritone, as there always seemed to be on TV shows.
Barbara came back in, babbling so quickly that Morris went into his office and got her a tranquilizer. It seemed to have no effect. Harriet and Sport kept their seats on the couch, watching her pace on the waiting room carpet, nervously touching her earrings and ranting about Annie’s father. “I told Jackie the first time she went on a date with him,” Barbara said. “Once a shark, always. I knew he would leave her in tatters.”
“You’ll make yourself crazy,” said Morris.
“If he harms one hair on her head …,” Barbara threatened.
“He’s not going to harm her. He just wants to see his daughter.”
“And my sister doesn’t?” raged Barbara. “I’ll tell you who I’d like to sue, is that judge who came up with this nonsense. The nerve of him, yanking that poor child away from both parents until they determine her custody. Heartless!” She was still bouncing 71
back and forth, from one side of the room to the other. It was like watching a tennis match, Harriet thought, but with much better dialogue.
“We’ve been through this a million times,” Morris was saying. “Jackie and Chris are behaving like wolverines.”
Chris? Harriet wondered. Why would someone named Chris be called P.? But there was no more time to wonder since Morris was still talking. “It’s better for Annie that she’s been away from all that.”
The front door had opened. “Away from all what?” said a voice from the hallway.
“What’s better for me?”
“Annie!” Barbara screamed. “Thank heavens you’re safe.” She launched her lean body at Annie as she appeared in the arch of the waiting room. Annie sidestepped her aunt, accusatory eyes landing on Harriet.
“You promised you wouldn’t tell.”
“I was worried,” said Harriet. “I thought you’d been kidnapped.”
“Wrong,” Annie said, her voice icy.
“You’ve got some explaining to do, young lady,” said Morris. “We’ve called the police.”
“The police?”
“We didn’t know where you were! How dare you make plans with your father!
You know what the judge said!” shrieked Barbara. Morris tried to restrain her.
“Don’t you dare try to shut me up!” she screamed, whirling on Annie. “What were you doing with him??”
“Eating Chinese food,” said Annie. “Papa bought me an egg roll. Is that such a crime?” Papa, thought Harriet. P.
“The only good thing about this,” Barbara said, her eyes flashing, “is that that man will never get custody now.”
Annie glared at her aunt. “That’s what he drove here to tell me. The judge has decided that it’s up to me.”
Barbara staggered as if she might faint. “What?” she gasped. “How can he do that?”
“The law,” Annie said, “is the law.”
“Does your mother know about this?” Morris asked.
Barbara pushed him impatiently, stepping toward Annie. “Who are you going to go with?” she asked in a tremulous voice.
Everyone’s eyes were on Annie. She surveyed the room slowly, then reached down to unzip her backpack with slow and deliberate drama. “I haven’t decided as yet,” she pronounced. “I need to consult with some people I know: Cassandra D’Amore, Yolanda Montezuma, and Rosarita Sauvage.”
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She took out her sock monkey and swept from the room with elaborate dignity, just as a voice called from outside, “Police!” It was late by the time Sport and Harriet were finally sent home. “I wonder which parent Annie will pick?” said Sport.
“If her mother is anything like Barbara Feigenbaum, I’d go for P. He looked all right,” said Harriet. She was dying to get home and write about the detectives; Captain Siri and Officer Wolford had not been at all what she’d pictured.
“Who would you pick?” asked Sport, stopping on the sidewalk in front of Harriet’s house. “I mean, it’s no contest for me—my mother is nuts, and I’d go with my father and Kate in a heartbeat—but who would you live with if you had to choose?” Harriet searched her mind for an answer. Her father was more easygoing, and certainly funnier, but he was always at work. And she couldn’t imagine not coming home to her mother’s warm smile. What would it be like to live with just one of her parents? “I don’t know,” she said finally. “I’m glad I don’t have to decide.”
“Anyway, it doesn’t matter,” said Sport, sounding gloomy. “Annie’s mother and father both live in Boston.”
“That’s true,” Harriet said. “I didn’t think of that. As soon as she makes up her mind, she’ll be moving away.”
They looked at each other a moment. Sport looks just as sad as I feel, thought Harriet, and without even thinking about it, she reached for his hand. “But we’ll still have each other. As friends,” she hastened to add, letting go of his hand.
“Of course as friends,” Sport said. “What else would we be?” The following weekend, Harriet went to the Feigenbaums’ to help Annie pack her belongings into the trunk of their Volvo for the long drive back to Boston. Before Harriet left her room, though, she took out her notebook. Through assiduous spying on her mother and Barbara Feigenbaum, who had somehow become thick as thieves, Harriet had learned several important things, all of which she wanted to get down on paper.
FIRST OF ALL, ANNIE WAS LYING. SHE DOES NOT HAVE TO CHOOSE
BETWEEN HER TWO PARENTS. THE JUDGE HAS ALREADY DECIDED T
HAT
THEY’LL HAVE JOINT CUSTODY. SHE WILL LIVE WITH HER MOTHER ON
WEEKDAYS AND P. (WHOSE NAME IS CHRISTOPHER SMITH) ON
ALTERNATE WEEKENDS AND SUMMER VACATIONS.
ANNIE ALREADY KNEW ALL THIS WHEN SHE GOT BACK TO THE
FEIGENBAUMS’. THAT’S WHAT HER FATHER WAS TELLING HER OVER THE
EGG ROLLS AT MING MOON. SHE WAS JUST TRYING TO GIVE HER AUNT
BARBARA A HEART ATTACK (WHICH WOULDN’T BE HARD, FROM THE
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LOOK OF HER).
Harriet paused for a moment, then wrote, I BET ANNIE’S RELIEVED NOT TO
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