Hazel's Theory of Evolution

by Lisa Jenn Bigelow

  “Of course,” Mom said. “What was I thinking? Too fresh! Absurd.”

  She laughed, but it sounded too feathery. I shifted from one foot to the other, waiting for whatever was really on her mind. After a pause, she said, “There’s a lot going on these days, isn’t there? Starting at a new school. Mimi being pregnant.”

  There it was. I should have known.

  “Remember, you’re not alone. We’re a family. We’re taking this journey together.”

  “Not at Finley,” I said. “Want to know who I sat with at lunch today? Nobody.”

  “Nobody?” Mom sounded surprised, which went to show how naive parents could be. Had she forgotten what Osterhout was like before Becca arrived?

  “Technically two people, but we didn’t talk to each other, so it was the same as being alone.”

  “I’m sorry. Maybe tomorrow will be different. Just—”

  I rolled my eyes. “Keep an open mind. Stay positive. Everything will be fine.”

  “Well, yes! As for the baby—we’re crossing our fingers that it will be fine, too.”

  “I know it will be fine,” I said, so forcefully Kali stopped eating and twisted her neck to give me a look. “I told Mimi I’m not worried, and I’m not. Can we stop talking about this?”

  Mom sighed. “I won’t force you, but we’ve got months to go before Mimi’s due. There will be other conversations. And I don’t think I need to tell you how nervous she is.”

  “No, you don’t need to tell me.”

  “I am, too, frankly. We’re going to do everything right. But of course, we thought we did everything right before, too, and—well, Nature had other ideas, I guess.” Mom frowned. She handed me the pail. “Weigh that and pour it in the five-gallon, would you?”

  I was grateful for the job, but even more for the change in conversation. I took the bucket to the scale on the counter. “Five point eight five pounds,” I said, writing the figure in Mom’s notebook and pouring the milk into the larger bucket.

  “Nice work, Kali,” Mom said, releasing her to the loafing area and letting in Tiamat. “Hazy, want to do the honors?”

  “Not really.” I preferred Brigid, or Freya, who was almost as sweet. Tiamat, named after the Babylonian goddess of primordial chaos, was nearly as big a brat as her sister. She’d once head-butted a feeder to splinters just because dinner was a little late. In other words, her name fit.

  “It wouldn’t hurt for you to practice. Rowan will be taking on more farm duties once the baby’s here, but I’d like to have you as a backup. Just in case.”

  “Fine.” I sighed. “Move over and hand me some wipes.”

  Mom laughed. “Thank you.” Her eyes crinkled into deep creases at the corners.

  I lowered myself to the milking stand, thankful that Tiamat ignored me as I wiped her down and drew a couple of squirts from each teat into the strip cup.

  “Good,” Mom said, “good hands. You have such a positive energy. Firm but gentle.”

  “That’s me,” I said, making a face. “Ms. Positive.”

  Chapter 5

  The next day, at the end of lunch, Yosh ripped a page from his sketchbook and dropped it on my corner of the table as he rolled by. I was so startled that by the time I flipped it over, he was halfway across the cafeteria. Then I was startled all over again.

  He’d drawn a boy in a wheelchair, human from the neck down, but with a bird’s head. And not just any bird. It had a bright, bushy green mohawk of feathers. It was, without a doubt, a turaco. A speech balloon coming from its red beak said, “I go bananas for Britannica!”

  The Britannica reference was obviously for my so-called benefit. And turacos’ scientific name was Musophagidae, which meant banana eaters. Yosh had done his research. I gave him credit for that—and for being an excellent artist. But why had he drawn it at all? Was he making fun of me? Or was he being friendly, in some strange way?

  The girl across the table eyed me and the drawing curiously but didn’t say anything. Since lunch yesterday, I’d spotted her in my algebra and language arts classes. But though she’d sneaked more glances at me, neither of us had spoken to the other. Her familiarity felt like a mosquito bite that wouldn’t stop itching.

  “Do you go to the farmers’ market?” I asked abruptly. Maybe her family were customers. Maybe they worked at one of the other tables. Maybe I’d traded a bottle of lotion for a pair of fresh cranberry scones and her face was emblazoned in my memory forever . . . sort of.

  She blinked. “Uh, no.”

  “Or do you have a cousin at Osterhout Middle? You look familiar.”

  Her eyes went wider. I waited for her to offer an explanation, but she only shook her head and looked away. I frowned, whisking Yosh’s sketch off the table and into my backpack.

  When I slid into my seat in H&HD, I thought he’d mention it. But he didn’t even say hello or smile. He only raised his eyebrows as if to say, What are you looking at me for?

  I turned away. Fine. I’d rather be left alone anyway.

  When Mom dropped me off at the Blumbergs’ house Friday night, I felt a rush of joy and relief. It was like I’d gone so long without a drink I’d almost forgotten I was thirsty—but when I saw a trickle of water, I knew nothing would taste sweeter.

  I practically ran up the walk, my backpack stuffed with pajamas and a fresh set of clothes, and a bundle of freshly picked black-eyed Susans—one of the few flowers still in bloom in the pasture—in my hand. I didn’t have a chance to ring the bell before the door opened and Becca smiled out at me. “Hey! You’re just in time to help me set the table.”

  My feet were glued to the step. “You cut your hair.”

  “Oh. Yeah.” Her hand rose to brush the tips. Her hair, which in all the time I’d known her had hung nearly to her waist, was cut in a bob. “I was ready for a change. I went to the salon last weekend.”

  “I liked it long.” I felt sad, and a little betrayed, even though it was her hair. Why hadn’t she told me she was going to get it cut? I couldn’t remember her wanting to, and she certainly hadn’t mentioned it on the phone the other night. But then, we’d barely talked.

  “I can still put it in a ponytail.” She pulled it back to show me. When she let go, it popped forward, swinging just above her shoulders. “Besides, I donated my hair to one of those charities that makes wigs for kids with cancer, so it was for a good cause.”

  “That’s great,” I said, continuing to stare. Without all her hair, Becca somehow looked taller. Not only that, she looked older. How was that possible?

  Becca smiled a little uncertainly. “Anyway, come in! Let’s get a vase for the flowers. Black-eyed Susans, right?”

  “Even though technically their eyes are brown,” I said, pretending I wasn’t still weirded out.

  “Even though technically their eyes aren’t eyes,” Becca said with a giggle. “What’s the middle part called, anyway?”

  “That’s the disc,” I said. “It’s made up of dozens of tiny flowers called florets.”

  She grinned for real now. “I knew you would know.” She stepped back to let me inside.

  Becca’s house was big and old, like mine, but everything inside seemed a little nicer and a little newer. Plus, it had air-conditioning. Mostly, though, it was cleaner.

  The Blumbergs had moved here so Becca’s parents could teach at the community college. They had tons of books and papers, but they kept them shelved and filed in their offices. There were no teetering stacks of brown accordion folders, bulging with legal documents, on the kitchen table like at our house. No pyramids of soap on the counter, waiting to be wrapped in paper and tied up with twine. No sweaty teenage-boy socks hanging off the coffee table (Becca was an only child) or dog toys strewn everywhere waiting to be tripped over (no pets, either).

  I instinctively left my shoes pointed at a precise ninety-degree angle to the wall.

  Mr. Blumberg was taking two golden loaves of challah out of the oven as we walked into the kitchen. When I went to
Osterhout, I’d walked to Becca’s after school with her on sleepover days, and we’d helped her dad make the challah for Shabbat dinner, braiding the fat ropes of dough and brushing them with egg. I felt a pang. Those days were over, at least until next year. It took hours to make challah from scratch. If Mr. Blumberg waited to start until Mom or Rowan dropped me off, it would be bedtime before we ate.

  “Hey, Hazel.” Mr. Blumberg set down the baking sheet and came at me with his oven mitts. “Good to see you. I feel like it’s been ages.”

  “It’s been a whole month,” I agreed, letting him hug me. “Where’s Mrs. Blumberg?”

  “We ran out of tomatoes, so she went to pick up more. Would you kids please set the table? When Esther gets back, I’ll finish up the salad, and we can light the candles.”

  My family ate in our kitchen. The Blumbergs had an actual dining room, which made every meal seem fancier—especially Shabbat dinner. Becca retrieved a tablecloth and napkins from the linen closet. I got out four sets of the Blumbergs’ special dishes—white, with a silver edge, and absolutely no chips or cracks. Together we set the table, trying to leave space for all the food Mr. Blumberg was fixing. Becca put out two fresh white candles and the Kiddush cup, a silver goblet that had been passed down through her mom’s family.

  I set the vase of black-eyed Susans in the center. They were the most ordinary thing on the table, but when Becca stepped back, she said, “The flowers are perfect.”

  While we waited for Mrs. Blumberg, we took my backpack upstairs to Becca’s room. My feet sank into the familiar plush rug with its pattern of pink roses. Becca flung herself across the bed, and I plopped down beside her. I loved her room—not just its queen-size bed we could both sleep in without elbowing each other, but its paintings of soft, cream-colored things: kittens, horses, ballet dancers. Becca didn’t have a kitten or a horse, and she’d never danced ballet, yet somehow, hanging on her walls together, they all meant Becca to me.

  “So,” Becca said, “how are the Flying Fish?”

  I made a face. “Fighting Fish. And blech.” The worst of the week’s events at school tumbled out of me, from getting lost on the first day, to the earthworm fiasco, to the Island of Misfit Toys, to Yosh’s weird drawing.

  Becca said all the oh my goshes and that’s horribles I could hope for. “What about you?” I asked. “How was your week?”

  Becca nibbled a strand of hair as she thought. A haircut hadn’t changed that habit, at least. “Pretty good. Same kids. Same teachers. Honestly, you haven’t missed anything.”

  I knew she meant to make me feel better, but instead my heart hurt. If I wasn’t missing anything or anyone, they probably weren’t missing me, either. On the contrary, they were probably glad I was gone. They were probably thinking, Hey, you know who’s not here? Goat Girl. Oh well, no great loss! In fact, the air smells cleaner already.

  “Hey,” Becca said, “guess who’s in every single one of my classes.”

  “Is it a good someone or a bad someone?”

  “Kirsten Von Hoorn.”

  I groaned.

  “She showed up with a brand-new phone on the first day of school. Mr. Brouwer confiscated it before we even said the Pledge. It had to be a new record.”

  “Did Kirsten threaten to call her parents? Oh wait, she couldn’t. She didn’t have her phone!”

  Becca cracked up, but only for a moment. “Mr. Brouwer locked it in his desk and said she could pick it up at the end of the day. She was so mad. I felt bad for her, though.”

  “Why?” I asked. “She’s Kirsten.”

  “I know, but I kept thinking if it had been me, I would’ve been so embarrassed.”

  “That’s because you’re you. You actually care about things like rules and respecting your teachers. Kirsten doesn’t care about anyone but herself.”

  Becca didn’t say anything. Then she said, “You aren’t the only one missing this year.”

  “You mean other kids were banished to Finley?” I asked. “I haven’t seen any of them.”

  “No, not that I know of. Not from our grade, anyway. But people are saying Randy Bates’s parents split up and he moved down to Indiana. And Squishy’s gone, too.”

  It took me a moment to picture Squishy—a small kid sitting in the back of the classroom, shaggy bangs hanging in his eyes, face buried in a thick book with a dragon on the cover. Getting called Goat Girl was nothing compared to what he got. Mean names and whispers and spitballs and kids tripping him every single day, and the teachers never able to stop it completely.

  I’d once seen him coming back from the restroom, crying, with wet hair and a wet shirt because someone had shoved his head in the toilet. His shoes squished when he walked. That was what got him the nickname.

  “Nobody’s sure what happened to him,” said Becca. “The rumor is his family’s still around but he’s homeschooling.”

  “Poor Squishy,” I said, jealous in spite of myself. I wouldn’t have minded spending every day at home with Arby and the herd, helping my mom and hanging out in the half-ton reading Grzimek’s.

  “Poor Squishy,” Becca echoed. “Hopefully he’s happier wherever he is now.”

  From downstairs, Mrs. Blumberg called, “I come bearing tomatoes! Cucumbers, too.”

  “Come on,” Becca said, scrambling off the bed, “let’s go make that salad. I’m starving.”

  Everything about Shabbat dinner at the Blumbergs’ was special, from the table settings to the prayers to the food. It felt like a holiday celebration, which it technically was. As the sun went down, we wished each other a peaceful Sabbath by saying Shabbat Shalom, Becca put some of her allowance in her tzedakah box where she was collecting money for the food pantry, and Mrs. Blumberg lit the candles.

  Then came the blessings. There were blessings for everything: blessing of the candles, blessing of the wine, blessing of the challah. There was even a special blessing for Becca and me, just because we were kids. The prayers were in Hebrew, but I’d been friends with Becca so long I knew them by heart. I loved my family, but Shabbat dinners made me feel like an honorary Blumberg. Somehow it didn’t even matter that I was iffy on God.

  After the blessings, it was time to eat. Mr. Blumberg arranged his teaching schedule so he had Friday afternoons off to prepare an amazing meal. Tonight, there was roast chicken on a bed of rice, layered with thick slices of lemon. There were little bowls of lentil soup, thick slices of challah, and the salad Becca and I had made from fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, and parsley. Mrs. Blumberg had made her mom’s cinnamon-raisin noodle kugel.

  “So, Hazel,” Mr. Blumberg said, maneuvering a chicken breast onto my plate, “how’s the new school? Finley, isn’t it?”

  “It’s all right,” I said. “It’s . . . a school.”

  He laughed. “Ain’t that the truth.”

  Becca rolled her eyes at me as she passed the kugel. “No kid in the history of the universe has ever wanted to talk about school at the dinner table,” she told her father.

  “What are you talking about?” said Mrs. Blumberg. “You always have.”

  “Maybe when I was six,” Becca said. “Since then I’ve only been appeasing you.”

  “Fine. Your mother and I will talk about school,” Mr. Blumberg said. “We always have plenty to say about it.”

  “Ugh, no.” Becca covered her ears. “You always say the same stuff. Half your students must’ve thought they were signing up for underwater basket-weaving. The other half don’t know the meaning of a good night’s sleep. And the administration is a bunch of blowhards.”

  “Becca!” Mrs. Blumberg said.

  “I don’t know, Esther,” Mr. Blumberg said. “I think she’s got the spiel down pretty well. Fair enough. What would you like to talk about, Becca?”

  “We haven’t seen Hazel in ages. We should talk about her.”

  “We don’t have to talk about me,” I protested. “Actually, I would rather not.”

  Becca’s eyes flickered with concern, but sh
e nodded. “Then how are your moms? How are the animals? How’s Rowan?”

  “Everybody’s fine,” I said. “Everything’s business as usual.”

  I hadn’t even meant to lie. That’s how quickly the words slipped out. Business as usual? Mimi was pregnant, Rowan was home instead of at Stanford, I was all alone at a new school, and Mom was pretending everything would magically be okay through the power of positive thinking. Only Arby, Pax, and the goats were unaffected, the lucky things.

  Now my lie hung over the table, as cheery as a party balloon. I didn’t want to pop it. If the Blumbergs knew about Mimi, the rest of dinner we’d be talking about due dates and ultrasounds and everything else that went with pregnancies. And the whole time, lurking in the corners of the conversation, would be the ghosts of Lena and Miles. Guiltily I left the lie alone.

  By the time we finished dessert—crunchy, crumbly slices of chocolate-chip mandel bread—I felt like I wouldn’t need to eat again for days. But I knew the next morning I’d be stuffing my face with Mr. Blumberg’s French toast made with leftover challah, as Becca and I lounged in our pajamas, watching Animal Planet.

  After washing up, the four of us played two games of Clue—Mrs. Blumberg, who had a master’s in logic and computation, won both, as usual—and then Becca and I went up to her room. When we’d changed into our pajamas and climbed into bed, Becca said, “The thing that was bothering you earlier this week—was it just the school stuff we were talking about before dinner, or something else? Is everything really okay, or did you just say that to get my parents off your back?”

  I should’ve known Becca would see through me. I hesitated. I ought to tell her about the baby. She would want to know, and besides, it was the sort of thing best friends told each other. It was the sort of thing I’d always told her before.

  But the words stuck in my throat. Mimi’s pregnancy was impossible to avoid at home. My moms barely stopped talking about it. School didn’t have the baby issues, but it was stressful in other ways. This sleepover was supposed to be plain, simple fun. Bringing up the baby would ruin that. Was it wrong to want time for just Becca and me?