by Nancy N. Rue
Maggie wasn’t laughing, but her face finally had something in it. Something that made her eyes swim and made her hug her arms around herself. Something that made her look afraid.
“Stop, you guys,” Sophie said.
The Corn Flakes cut off their laughter in mid-giggle.
Sophie held out her hand to Vincent for the camera. “We’re through rehearsing for the day. See you guys tomorrow.”
“You don’t want to see the footage?” Vincent said as he handed it to her. “I got some great stuff — ”
“Come on,” Jimmy said. “I think this is some kind of girl thing.”
After Jimmy herded Vincent away, with Nathan several red-eared yards ahead of them, the Flakes huddled around their Maggie. Attempts at comfort flew out of every mouth.
“She was only acting — ”
“When she got really mad, it was about Eddie — ”
“You almost can’t blame her — he threw a big ol’ screwdriver thing at her!”
“Don’t be shook over her, Mags — ”
“You’ve got us.”
But Maggie stopped it all with just one sentence. “She hates me like that too.”
For a long moment, nobody said it wasn’t true. And when Willoughby tried, things began to fire out of Maggie — not in thuds, but in flaming cannonballs she’d obviously been storing up for a long time.
“When you aren’t looking she gives me hate stares,” Maggie said. “And when you can’t hear her, like when she gets me off away from you and tries to tell me how to act, she says other stuff too, like why do I always smell like beans and does my mother have a gun in our house and is my father in prison.” She took a breath. “And when she gets all in my face when we’re practicing and everybody says she’s such a good actor, that’s not acting. She means it. Just like she meant it when Eddie threw that thing at her. And now I’m scared because I know how bad she can hate. And I don’t even want to be in this movie, even if I have to take an F.”
Maggie sucked in another big gulp of air. Sophie knew that was a lot for her to say.
“Okay, that’s it,” Fiona said. “We are so not putting up with this anymore. I say we go to Miss Imes right now and tell her Phoebe has to go.”
“No,” Maggie said.
“We have to,” Sophie said. “Mags, this is so unfair.” She found herself shaking, and she knew even Liberty Lawhead would do the same. This was scarier than anything.
Dr. Peter had said that when Maggie started having trouble with it, it was time for a grown-up.
But Maggie was shaking her head so hard, her hair was slapping against her cheeks.
“When you try to stop people like her, they just treat you worse,” she said. “My mother said so. That’s why she left Miami when I was a baby and came here.” Maggie’s voice trembled. “I just want to stay away from that Phoebe girl.”
“But you can’t take an F, Mags,” Fiona said.
“Why can’t we just keep Maggie away from her?” Darbie said. “All the scenes she’s in with Mags are done. We can do the rest on the sly.”
“That’s sneaking,” Maggie said. “It’s against the Corn Flake Code.”
“It’s the only way to protect you if you won’t go to Miss Imes or somebody.” Fiona put her hands on Maggie’s shoulders. “You have to make a choice.”
“Come on, Mags.” Willoughby sounded like she was about to cry. “We’re the Corn Flakes.”
Whatever that meant to Maggie seemed to settle over her, and she nodded slowly. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll finish the movie. Just keep her away from me.”
Pinkies came out for a solemn promise.
Finally, Sophie thought. We can just get away from Phoebe and not feel bad about it.
But even as they linked fingers, Sophie felt something that wasn’t a squirm or a prickle or a squeeze. It was just a deep feeling that something was wrong somehow.
That feeling faded a little as they sat on the bleachers and made a plan for keeping Maggie safe from Phoebe. The only thing Maggie insisted on was that Sophie be with her all the time.
Darbie gave a soft snort. “Do you really think Sophie is the person to have with you if Phoebe starts scratching your face with her fingernails like she tried with Eddie?”
“I can keep her from hurting me outside by myself,” Maggie said. “But Sophie can keep her from hurting me inside.” She turned her frightened eyes on Sophie. “Stay with me all the time.”
Sophie nodded until she could get some words out. “I won’t leave your side at school when we’re not in class, Mags,” she said.
As Liberty Lawhead followed her Civil Rights for All team toward their building, with the terrified senorita at her side, she tried to raise her chin and straighten her shoulders and draw up to her statuesque height.
But there was a deep feeling. Something she had never felt tugging at her insides before. If she hadn’t known herself so well, she would have thought it was doubt.
Willoughby gave Sophie a tiny push toward the open bus door.
“Where’s Maggie?” Sophie said.
“Boppa’s giving her a ride home,” Darbie said. “She’ll be safe.”
Liberty Lawhead sighed as she stepped into the backseat of her limo. She must get her confidence back. They had made a decision, and they must follow through —
But as Sophie turned her face to the bus window, she saw herself reflected there, not Liberty Lawhead. Her own brown eyes were as frightened as Maggie’s.
She closed them and tried to get Liberty back. But there were only the kind eyes there.
“I think we better talk when I get home,” she whispered to Jesus. “Or there’s gonna be big trouble.”
Ten
Sophie decided to go straight to her room when she got home and imagine Jesus. She was way too confused to do anything else.
But when she walked into the kitchen, Daddy was home, and he had that face on that Lacie always said was like the coach’s at halftime when the team was losing bad.
And Zeke was the player he was blaming.
Zeke sat on the snack bar, legs swinging and eyes lowered. Daddy leaned over him so that their faces almost touched. Lacie stood just inside the open pantry closet like she was looking for the perfect snack to go with watching their little brother get busted. But Sophie had a feeling she was just trying to stay out of sight.
Sophie joined her.
“Now, buddy,” Daddy said. “Mama tells me you didn’t behave like a big guy while I was gone.”
“Ya think?” Lacie whispered to Sophie.
“You want to tell me what you did?” Daddy said.
“I did some stuff,” Zeke said. Sophie could tell he was hardly opening his mouth. “I don’t remember all of it, though.”
“Did you write all over Sophie’s math paper?”
“No. Spider-Man drew webs on it.”
“Did you lock Lacie in the bathroom?”
“No,” Zeke said again. “Spider-Man locked his main enemy in jail.”
“Did you flush the ultrasound picture of the baby down the toilet?”
Sophie and Lacie stared at each other. Lacie looked as surprised by that one as Sophie felt.
“Spider-Man did that too,” Zeke said. “He had to.”
“Why?” Daddy said.
“I don’t want to talk about that,” Zeke said.
“Does Spider-Man want to talk about it?” Daddy said. “Because Spider-Man’s dad does.”
Sophie was even more surprised by that.
Daddy’s voice got softer. “So what’s the problem, superhero?”
Zeke launched into a long explanation of Spider-Man’s latest attempt to save somebody from something. Lacie nudged Sophie with a bag of pretzels.
“He gets that from you,” she whispered. “You used to blame everything you did wrong on your imaginary characters.”
“Only Daddy never believed me,” Sophie whispered back.
“Well, go figure,” Lacie said.
“Why are we in here whispering anyway?” Sophie said.
“Because I’ve already figured out why Z-Boy’s been behaving like the Tasmanian Devil, and if Dad starts to punish him, I’m stepping in.”
The only sound coming from the direction of the snack bar now was the thump of Zeke’s tennis shoes as he swung his legs.
“Let me ask you this, Spider-Man,” Daddy said. “Do you think there’s a new invader coming in? Somebody that people might listen to more than they do you?”
“There you go, Dad,” Lacie murmured.
“There is gonna be one,” Zeke said. “And I don’t want it ’cause everybody’s already forgetting about me.”
The tears in his voice made Sophie want to cry too.
“Then I think Spider-Man’s mom and dad need to make sure he knows he’ll never be replaced,” Daddy said. “What do you say we go upstairs and get to work on that?”
“Is Spider-Man gonna get a punishment?”
“Not if I have anything to do with it,” Lacie muttered.
“I’m with ya,” Sophie muttered back.
“You two mother hens in the pantry can relax,” Daddy said as his voice and Zeke’s faded out of the kitchen. “Spider-Man’s safe with me.”
Lacie grinned. “You rock, Dad,” she called to him.
When Sophie got up to her room, she pulled the gauzy curtains closed around her bed and settled against the pillows. As soon as she shut her eyes, she could imagine Jesus. But it was Dr. Peter’s voice she heard.
“I don’t think any kid is just naturally mean,” he’d said. “Usually a girl acts mean because she’s angry or scared. ”
Sophie’s eyes came open. Wasn’t that what Daddy had just figured out about Zeke? That he was acting like the Terminator because he was afraid everybody would pay more attention to the new baby than him?
So was Phoebe afraid of something? Or somebody?
I’d be afraid of Mr. Karnes if he was my dad, Sophie thought.
But it still didn’t make sense that Phoebe would take it out on Maggie.
What else had Dr. Peter said?
Sophie stopped a minute to remember that she was supposed to be mad at Dr. Peter. But she snorted right out loud. When had he ever told her the wrong thing? She closed her eyes and remembered.
“If Maggie is having trouble with it, you need to bring in some grown-ups.”
“We have to,” Sophie said out loud. “No matter what we said the plan was before.”
In fact, it seemed like every part of their plan was just like Dr. Peter had said: not the right thing to do. They weren’t helping Maggie stand up for herself. They were just protecting her, and they weren’t even doing it the way Dr. Peter expected — the way the Corn Flakes always do — with honesty and respect and all that good Code stuff. Not when they planned to sneak rehearsals without Phoebe.
And they sure weren’t helping Phoebe understand that some of the things she did were heinous. They were just shutting her out.
Down the hall, Zeke giggled in that insane little-boy way. Sophie didn’t see how anybody could laugh that hard and not barf.
I guess they convinced him he isn’t being replaced by New Baby, Sophie thought.
Sophie tried to get a picture in her mind of Phoebe’s skinny, gap-toothed father explaining something to her the way Daddy had talked to Zeke that day, but even she couldn’t imagine that. All she could imagine him saying was that all Cubans were good for was hijacking planes and mooching off people.
“Think of Phoebe as a lost lamb instead of a bossy girl who doesn’t like Cuban people. Isn’t that what Jesus was trying to tell the Pharisees in that story?”
Sophie grabbed her Bible off the night table where it rested in the light of her princess lamp. Luke 15 —
With the bed curtains draped around her like a learned man’s robe, Sophie sank herself in. As she read, she saw the kind eyes and heard the voice in the verses.
“Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them.”
“I’d leave the rest and go look for it and bring it back,” Sophie/the Pharisee said.
That was just what the man named Jesus was saying. “Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me. ’ ”
I would do that, Sophie/the Pharisee thought. She closed the Bible on her finger. What I wouldn’t do is decide the lamb was just heinous and say, “Serves you right for being so evil.”
Especially if the lost sheep just did it to get attention because it was scared.
“But sometimes a little Pharisee-itis can sneak in — ”
“Then it can just sneak right back out,” Sophie said out loud. “Right along with our plan.”
She scrambled off the bed and headed for the phone in the kitchen, already planning what to say to each of the Corn Flakes. What she didn’t plan was how to answer Fiona’s arguing, Willoughby’s skittish little yip, and Darbie’s stubborn Irish silence. She finally said they all had a case of Pharisee-itis. Nobody seemed to get it.
Maggie was the hardest one of all.
“I’ll just take an F on the project then,” she said.
“You don’t have to,” Sophie said. “We just have to come up with a different plan.”
“What if she’s still mean to me? I don’t want to do this anymore.”
Sophie wished Dr. Peter were there to help Maggie get it. She wished she really was Liberty Lawhead so the right words would fall from her lips like silk.
But she knew none of that would happen. The only thing making her try to convince Maggie were the kind eyes —
“Mags?” Sophie said suddenly.
“Yeah.”
“Have you talked to Jesus about this, the way Dr. Peter says to?”
“It didn’t work. Phoebe’s still mean.”
Sophie would have made Dr. Peter king of the Corn Flakes if he’d been there, just for giving her the silken words she’d been wishing for.
“Just because it doesn’t look like it’s working doesn’t mean it isn’t,” she said. “We’re not gonna, like, make Phoebe a member of the Corn Flakes. But we did say we’d work with her on this project.”
“I didn’t know it would be this bad.” Maggie’s words thudded right through the phone.
“It doesn’t have to be.” Sophie closed her eyes as she said the rest, just to be sure Jesus’ eyes were still there. “We have a Good Shepherd, Mags. We’re not lost. We’ll be okay after this. But Phoebe doesn’t have one.”
“I thought only God could save her.”
“But we can at least show her that we’re not Pharisees.”
There was a silence so long Sophie was afraid Maggie had put down the phone and walked off. But finally, some words plunked down.
“I hope Jesus gives you a different plan before Monday,” Maggie said.
I hope he does too, Sophie thought as she hung up the phone.
And then she did more than hope. She prayed — long and hard, with her chin in her hands on the snack bar and her eyes squeezed tight. When she opened them, Mama and Daddy were standing there.
“That was some pretty serious daydreaming,” Daddy said, roughing up her fuzz with his hand.
“I was praying,” Sophie said. “And it was serious. I’ve got a major problem.”
The minute it was out of her mouth, Sophie shook her head. “I’m sorry. I’m not supposed to get you upset, Mama.”
“Stop right there.” Mama tried to get up on the stool next to Sophie’s, and Daddy gave her a boost. “I’m pregnant, but that doesn’t make me a piece of glass everybody has to tiptoe around. I want to know what’s going on with you.”
“And we always will,” Daddy said. “No matter how many kids we have.”
Sophie looked into their eyes that were almost as kind as the ones she’d seen in her mind. Suddenly, she wanted to cry.
“Okay, dish, Soph,” Daddy said. “Are you worried about this baby taking over too?”
Sophie swallowed down a guil
ty lump. “I haven’t even hardly thought about the baby!” she said. “I’ve been too busy being a Pharisee!”
Daddy pulled up a third stool. “I think I’ll sit down for this one.”
Sophie told them everything, including the Corn Flakes’ plan and how she needed a new one.
“You’ve come to the right place,” Daddy said. “Your mother and I are in planning mode. We just came up with a killer one for dealing with Z-Boy.”
“Let us help you,” Mama said.
So Sophie did. And when they were done, she felt like Liberty Lawhead herself, chin raised, shoulders straightened —
Except that Liberty Lawhead didn’t have a mom who sat with her on the couch and let her feel her tummy until the baby inside fluttered against her hand.
“That’s your little sister,” Mama said. “We found out today.”
“A girl?” Sophie said.
“A little Corn Flake,” Mama said.
And for the first time, that tiny flutter of a baby seemed real.
Part of the plan Mama and Daddy helped Sophie form was for her simply to hang with the family over the weekend and let the other Corn Flakes talk to God themselves. They watched movies and took turns feeling for baby moves and played endless games of Chutes and Ladders with Zeke. Since he didn’t stuff any of the game pieces up his nose or scream that the whole world was cheating, Sophie actually got into it.
But on Sunday at church, Sophie wasn’t sure any of the Corn Flakes had spoken even the first word to God. Willoughby wouldn’t look at her. Darbie and Fiona chattered about everything except what they really needed to talk about. Maggie didn’t say anything.
“I have a plan,” Sophie said.
“So did we,” Fiona said. “And I personally think we should stay with it.”
“At least let her tell us what it is,” Darbie said.
Fiona grunted and gave Sophie a jerky nod.
Sophie told them what she and Mama and Daddy had come up with. “It’s way more like a Corn Flake thing than our other plan,” she said at the end.
“What if Phoebe just wants to get revenge then?” Willoughby said.
“It could make things worse,” Darbie said.