He laughed softly. “Thank you.”
I wasn’t going to ruin the moment asking more questions about Wren.
The next day Grauntie came home with a caretaker named Lonnie, and Mr. and Mrs. Carlson left. Which was probably for the best. We were getting too comfortable, too happy with the Carlsons.
But when they left, it was like the world had turned to black and white. Grauntie had Lonnie close the drapes. She shut the stereo cabinet. She put away the candles.
Lonnie would be staying with us for a few weeks. She was nice and did most of the chores we used to do. But it was only temporary. Time was a-ticking until everything changed. New Hope’s Finest was my only hope. And I still had some questions for Joe. It was all I could think about as I tried to sleep that night.
The next morning, I marched right over to the Finest, right over to the tree house where he was working, and just came out with it. I was running out of time. I needed to know more about Mama and Wren and where he might be. “Why were you fighting over my mother?”
He closed his eyes and sighed. He waited a long time before starting to talk, like he had to roll his memory back to that day. “We were busy making plans for our future. Everything seems like a dream you can just snatch when you’re graduating, ready to take on the world. So we planned to go to college and start our own business someday. We also hoped that would keep us from getting drafted into the war in Vietnam.”
“What does my mom have to do with it?” I asked.
“He didn’t want to go off and leave her. He wanted to stay and take our chances fixing up the old orphanage.” He shrugged. “Course, I was mad as anything. It didn’t end well between us. Like I said, he left and we never talked again.”
I swallowed a few times before I could ask, “Did he know about us?”
He quickly shook his head. “He never mentioned a baby. Just that he was in love and wanted to stay here. I told him he was throwing away his life, throwing away our dreams. I asked him what would happen if he got drafted because he didn’t go to college.” Joe looked down, shaking his head. “But he reminded me that while the Clarks adopted me, and other kids had found new homes or foster homes, no one had chosen him. He was living on the couch in our basement. He had no one, and then he finally found somebody, and she was more important than anything to him. And if I couldn’t understand that, he said, then I wasn’t a true friend.” Joe closed his eyes. His face looked pained. “Then he got into his car and sped off.”
My heart was beating fast, knowing I was getting close to hearing the truth. “So what happened to him?”
Joe leaned against the tree and looked up at the sky. “He wound up joining the war in Vietnam.”
“That was a long time ago. Where is he now?”
He didn’t answer.
“Joe, where is he?” Even though I knew, thanks to Parker, that Wren was right here in New Hope, I couldn’t tell anyone how I knew. It was just too hard to explain.
“I don’t know. We never talked again. No more questions, please. I need to go home. This is too much hurt to dig up.” He pushed himself away from the tree and hurried off toward his truck.
I sighed. What was he hiding? I stood by the tree for a bit, hoping he’d cool down and come back. But he didn’t, so I walked around the yard.
At least work at the Finest was wrapping up; Wren would be hearing about it soon. Seemed like new things had sprouted up overnight. A garland made from bottle caps and plastic bottle designs stretched from tree to tree. That old rusty VW had been transformed into a stegosaurus. Someone had attached bicycle wheels to tall stakes and painted them to look like flowers with leaves. They grew up out of gardens Mrs. Gaiser had planted. The trees rustled, whispering secrets to each other, probably pleased with everything we’d done.
All the rooms inside the building were painted and decorated, each one different from the next. Even townsfolk who weren’t working stopped by sometimes to check things out. And everybody’s colors were glowing full blaze.
I couldn’t wait for the deadline. We had to get back on the map now. It was time to place the ad looking for a new owner.
CHAPTER 20
I went to town hall to get help placing the ad, and the secretary sent me right down to Miss Meriwether’s office.
She looked up and smiled. “What’s on your mind, Penny? I haven’t heard from the social worker yet, if that’s why you’re here.”
I shook my head. “I think it’s time to place an ad to find a buyer for New Hope’s Finest.”
Miss Meriwether walked to her window, looking at the building. Then she turned to me. “Sure, we can place it in a few different newspapers. What should we say?”
It was hard to come up with an ad since no one had ever been able to tell me for sure what New Hope’s Finest was supposed to be. But I thought about Sarah Breedlove Walker, the country’s very first female self-made millionaire. She had made her fortune coming up with beauty products for black women. She’d been real smart about marketing, getting ladies to sell her stuff door-to-door. I’d been excited after reading about her, and I’d added her to the tree right away. I tried channeling some of her smarts now. I’m the descendant of a great businesswoman.
I thought for a moment, then snapped my fingers. “One-of-a-kind, enormous building right in the heart of New Hope, North Carolina, is now cleaned up and ready for purchase for what have you. Sound good?”
“Sounds perfect,” she said. “I’ll add all the other information a buyer would need. I’ll let you know if we get a call.”
“Thanks, ma’am.”
“It’s really wonderful that you started this all, Penny. I hope you won’t be too disappointed if we can’t sell it, though. I don’t know if anyone would want to open a business in New Hope these days. But you brought the town together, and that’s what’s important.”
She was wrong. The Finest was going to sell. It had to. “Just place the ad, okay?”
She nodded. “We’ll keep our fingers crossed.”
I raced to the front porch the next morning to get the Asheville Citizen and see the ad in it. I read it over again and again, imagining all the interested people who’d be sitting up in their chair right at that moment, reaching for the phone to make an appointment to see New Hope’s Finest.
There wasn’t much more work left to do at the site, but people were there anyway when I showed up. Some of the kids explored the tree house. Carly’s mom and a friend sat on the tire chairs, drinking tea and chatting.
Around lunchtime, the mayor stopped by, all smiles. “Penny! We got a call. A businessman from Asheville wants to come and see it! He’ll be here in two days!”
I jumped in the air and shouted. New Hope was getting back on the map for sure. I could picture the words in small black type next to a tiny red dot: New Hope. I closed my eyes, smiling.
But how Parker and I were going to end up staying in that dot was beyond me. Grauntie couldn’t take care of us. The Carlsons didn’t want us. Still, my bones were telling me once New Hope was on the map, we’d be staying put. Somehow that would conjure a solution to keep us here.
Once everyone heard a buyer was coming to look at the building, the site cleared out. People ran home to cut their grass and wash their windows. Business owners swept their stoops and hung up welcome signs. Some even brought out flags and pots of flowers.
The next day, the one before the businessman was coming to inspect the place, Mr. Carlson set up a fire pit inside a ring of stones, and Mrs. Carlson brought hot dogs and hamburgers to roast over the fire. While we waited for dinner, Parker and I roasted marshmallows until they were brown and crispy.
Even Joe came, lugging along a watermelon. He’d shaved off his beard and trimmed his hair.
Mr. Gaiser patted the seat next to him, and Joe sat down.
“That tree house is something else,” Mr. Gaiser said. “I’ve been wanting to build a new shed in my backyard. Maybe you can help?”
Joe looked shocked. “
Yeah, I guess I could.”
Kids chased each other in the dusk with sparklers, laughing and shouting. A few fireflies blinked in the darkness, like they wanted in on the game.
I caught Miss Meriwether’s eye, and we shared a smile.
Mrs. Carlson put her arm around me. “This is how I always imagined The Finest would be.”
I smiled. I never knew how to imagine it. All that mattered was that it opened. Hopefully, that would happen tomorrow.
The next morning, I put on my newest jeans and my button-up shirt.
I hollered for Parker to hurry up. Soon he was dressed in his best, too.
“Ready?” I asked. He nodded, and we walked into town.
But something was wrong. I could feel it. My stomach kept turning, and my hands shook.
The first thing I noticed was the missing signs. No flags were flying. It was like people had rolled the welcome mat back up.
“What is going on?” I wondered aloud.
Parker gasped. “Look!” He pointed at the Finest. And even though we were still down the street, I could see it.
The whole building had been covered with paint.
Squiggly lines of paint.
New Hope’s Finest was one gigantic doom painting.
“No, no, no, no, no!” I shouted. “Why did you do that, Joe?” I ran toward it for a closer look. My heart felt like a stone in a lake—falling, falling, falling to the bottom. All that work for nothing. We’d never get back on the map now. Not with a building like that.
People would never forgive Joe. Maybe I wouldn’t, either.
Parker and I trudged to city hall. We had to talk to the mayor before the businessman showed up.
The secretary, Mrs. Tuttle, gave me a sad smile. “I’m sorry, Penny. I know you had your heart set on that reopening. We all did.”
I nodded, wanting to run back to Grauntie’s and dive under the covers and never come out. To curl up and give up. But I couldn’t imagine any of those fine people on my family tree doing something like that.
I put my hands on my hips, thinking about all the people on my family tree who’d run into roadblocks. I imagined them all around me, urging me on. Don’t give up! Fight the fight! That’s all this was—a roadblock. I wasn’t ready to quit. We’d turned the Finest into something spectacular, and I was sure anyone with any sense could see beyond the painting. Besides, the businessman wouldn’t know it was a doom painting. “We’ve got an appointment with a buyer, and we should keep it. Is the mayor ready to go?”
“Let me call her,” Mrs. Tuttle said, reaching for the phone.
Miss Meriwether looked pale as she walked down the hall. Mrs. Tuttle was fading, too.
“Parker, why don’t you stay here with me? I brought in some celebration cookies to share later, but I suppose we should just eat them now,” Mrs. Tuttle said.
Parker settled into a chair and grabbed a cookie.
“Don’t eat them all! We might need them later.” I was holding hope in my heart as hard as I could.
Parker examined the plate of goodies and grabbed a few while I walked outside with the mayor.
“What a shame,” she said, staring up at the wild, colorful building. “It’s too late to cancel our meeting now.”
“Everything’s going to be fine. This is an incredible building. I bet he’s never seen anything like it.” I marched toward the Finest, and Miss Meriwether had to hurry to keep up, even with those long legs of hers.
When we opened the gate, Joe was there with a can and a brush, slopping white paint over the colorful swirls and squiggles in the bottom corner of the building. He turned to look at us, tears streaming down his face. “I’m so sorry. I don’t even remember doing this.”
I walked up to him and set my hand on his shoulder. “It’s going to be okay.” But it was hard to believe my own words. I’d learned firsthand that doom paintings were bad luck.
“The businessman is here,” the mayor said, walking toward the gate as car tires crunched along the gravel drive.
I crossed my fingers. “Make a wish, Joe. Make a wish that this is going to work.”
“Wishes don’t work, Penny,” Joe said. “I have a lifetime of proof to know for sure.”
A man with thick, black hair and a dark-blue suit walked in with the mayor. He pushed his glasses up his nose with one finger. Then he stopped walking and put his hands on his hips, looking everything over.
He wasn’t smiling.
“Penny, come meet Mr. Henderson,” the mayor said. “Penny spearheaded the campaign to clean this place up. You should have seen the mess back here before work got underway. Nearly everyone in town turned out to help. She’s a spitfire, this one.”
My cheeks felt hot, hearing Miss Meriwether talk about me like that. I walked over and held out my hand. “Pleased to meet you, sir.”
“You, too, Penny,” he said, gripping my hand. “This is quite … interesting. What is it, exactly?”
I took a deep breath. “Well, that’s a mystery, really. No one knows for sure what New Hope’s Finest was supposed to be. But all of us have worked together to make it an incredible one-of-a-kind place.” My heart raced.
He nodded. “Electric and plumbing all current and up to code?”
“Yes. We had some folks working on that,” Miss Meriwether said.
“The outside paint job was a mistake. We’ve got someone working on that right now. It’ll be covered up before you know it,” I said.
“Let’s take a look inside,” Mr. Henderson said.
We walked into the front room, which was decorated like we were under the ocean, with murals covering the walls, and real seashells stuck on them, too.
“Looks like a lot of recent work has been done here,” Mr. Henderson said.
“We all brought our ideas to life.” Beads of sweat slid down my back.
Mr. Henderson walked into the back room and scratched his head.
“We had a bunch of paint to use up. You should’ve seen all the stuff that was dumped back here, but we found a purpose for everything.” I gulped. Mr. Henderson wasn’t nodding and smiling and praising me like I thought he would be—like everyone else in town had done.
We climbed the stairs, and I admired the mural Carly had created around my spilled yellow paint. She had painted a sun shining at the top of the stairs, and the paint running down the stairs looked like the reflection over water. It was amazing.
But Mr. Henderson said nothing. And he was silent as we toured the rooms upstairs.
“This one’s my favorite.” I led him into the rainbow room. “Each room is different.”
“There are two floors of bedrooms, ten on each floor,” Miss Meriwether said. “Perfect for a hotel or office space. And there are four whole acres here, should you need additional building space or a parking lot.”
We went outside, and I couldn’t help but smile, looking at all our work: the tree house; the bottle cap murals and paintings on the fence; the Carlsons’ tire chairs and sculptures; my giant critters. All the crazy wind chimes hanging from the trees.
Mr. Henderson frowned.
I cleared my throat. “You could change all this, of course, if it’s not what you like. It’s just better than it was with piles of junk everywhere.”
“Actually, piles of junk would be easier to clean up than all this. I’m afraid all the changes and customization you’ve done here would just be too costly to fix to make this a viable venture. Do you have any idea how much it would cost just to remove the paint from the brick building? And to dismantle the tree house?” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. This isn’t going to work for me. Thank you for your time.”
Miss Meriwether nodded sadly and walked him to his car, while I stood there, my eyes hot with tears and my throat tight.
Joe stopped painting and came over to me. “I’m sorry. This is all my fault.”
“No. It’s my fault, Joe. We turned this into something no one will ever want, and …” I sucked in a deep breath, my voice
trembling. “It was all my idea.” What had seemed magical to me just a few moments ago now looked like a ridiculous jumble of nonsense. No one would want it now. Mr. Henderson was right. How had the buzzing in my head and the humming in my bones been so wrong?
I wrung my hands in front of me, wishing someone would wrap their arms around me and tell me everything was going to be okay. Wishing Mama was still alive so I could bury my face in the crook of her neck. Wishing I wasn’t all alone trying to figure everything out for me and Parker.
But like Joe said, wishes don’t come true.
Carly and her mother walked through the gate, followed by Chase and Mr. Smith. No one said a word. I watched their colors drain as they stood there.
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to do.
Miss Meriwether returned and set her hands on my shoulders. “Maybe we’ll get another interested party who can see beyond all the objections Mr. Henderson raised.”
I nodded, but I knew she was wrong. This place was special only to us, and only because we made it.
“It looks a lot better than it used to,” Carly’s mom said.
“Even with the doom painting?” I asked.
She pursed her lips.
More people from town joined us, crossing their arms and muttering in sad tones.
Joe set down his brush and put the lid on his paint can. He came over to me, his eyes fixed on the ground. “I shouldn’t have agreed to work here. I should have known something bad was going to happen.”
Part of me was mad at him for doing it, but a bigger part was flooded with sadness for him. “You don’t know what your paintings mean. You didn’t know you were going to paint the building.”
“It’s clear I make bad things happen. I should have seen it coming. I just should have known better than to hope.” Joe sighed. “I’m going home. I’ll get back to this tonight when everyone clears out. It’ll probably take me a few days, but I’ll get it covered in a coat of white.”
I nodded, and he trudged off. I felt horrible now, for dragging him down here to work on this project and getting him hurt all over again.
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