Half a Chance

by Cynthia Lord

  When Dad’s away on a trip, not only do I get less of him, I get less of Mom, too. Mom and I have more chores to do, because someone has to do all the things Dad usually does at home.

  So I love the special things Mom and I do when he’s gone.

  “I’ll get the ice cream out of the freezer so it’ll soften up a bit. And the grocery store had fresh strawberries,” Mom said, taking boxes and cartons out of the refrigerator.

  After washing and cutting some strawberries, I peeled the bananas and cut them into spears. “Did you get maraschino cherries, too?”

  “Of course. What would banana splits be without cherries?” she asked. “We’ll put those in a bowl. But let’s be sure to leave some cherry juice in the jar, in case there are leftovers.”

  “Leftovers?” I joked. “Ha! Cherries are my favorite part!”

  Picking three bowls from the cupboard and two spoons from the drawer, I said, “I’m going with sixty percent vanilla and forty percent chocolate ice cream in my bowl. But first, Ansel gets a little scoop of vanilla.”

  I didn’t even get his ice cream to the floor before Ansel had his nose in the bowl. As he licked, his dog tags jingled against the side.

  “I thought I’d put some shredded coconut on mine,” Mom said, looking in the cupboard. “But I can’t find it.”

  “Oh, sorry. I took it hiking with me,” I said. “Nate and I made graham cracker sandwiches, and coconut was one of the toppings. I fed the leftovers to a chipmunk.”

  “You gave a chipmunk shredded coconut?”

  “I told Nate not to give him any of the Red Hots, though. I didn’t want the poor chipmunk to blow up.”

  She smiled. “Sounds like you had fun.”

  “I wish Nate and his family lived here year-round,” I said, dipping a spoon into the hot fudge and drizzling it over my ice cream.

  “You’ll make more friends,” Mom said. “You always do.”

  I nodded. It takes a while to sort out which kids really want to be long-term friends and which kids are just bored with their old friends, though. Sometimes kids want to be my best friend at first, because it’s cool to be friends with the new kid. But that wears off, and when it does, that kid and all her old friends turn on you. I didn’t want to explain that to Mom, though.

  “Nate and I made Grandma Lilah a present,” I said, to change the subject. “She can’t get to the top of Cherry Mountain anymore, so I asked Nate to bring an old photo of the two of them together on the mountaintop. I took a new photo of him holding the old photo at the same exact spot. So it’ll be like she came with us.”

  “What a thoughtful idea,” Mom said. “Nate seems like a nice kid. I’m glad he lives next door.”

  “Me, too.” Holding down the top of the whipped-cream can, I swirled and squirted a mountain. As I dropped several cherries on top, I thought about the contest. Maybe I could make this look “sticky”? I dipped my spoon into the edge of my whipped cream and dribbled some trails over the side of my bowl. I took a quick photo as Mom lifted her banana split toward me.

  “To our new home!” she said, and we clinked our bowls together.

  Everything began melting into smooshy deliciousness. We stopped talking, focused on eating. The tart strawberries made a nice change from the sugary sweet cherries. Halfway through, I added a new whipped-cream mountain.

  “Want another cherry?” Mom asked.

  “Of course.”

  Mom’s cell phone rang. “Hello?” she said, answering it. Her face brightened. “Hi! How’s everything in Arizona?”

  Maybe Dad had tried to phone me first? I checked my phone to make sure the battery wasn’t dead. Nope.

  Waiting for my turn, I swirled my spoon through my melting ice cream. At my feet, Ansel had vanilla all over his nose and face. His tongue moved as far as it could reach in all directions, licking his face to get every drop.

  Finally, Mom said, “Okay, here’s Lucy!”

  I grabbed her phone.

  “Hello, sweetie!” It’s always a relief to hear Dad’s voice sounding so close. “I climbed a mountain,” I told him. “I texted you from the top. And I’ve been kayaking.”

  “Wow!” Dad said. “See? Didn’t I tell you you’d love New Hampshire? Did you go with Mom?”

  “No, I went with Nate.”

  “A boy?”

  “It’s not like that,” I huffed, though maybe it’d be okay if it was a little like that. “And there was a thunderstorm the night you left. Ansel, Mom, and I hid under my bed.”

  “That would’ve made an awesome photo!” Dad said.

  I paused. Maybe I should’ve tried to shoot that moment under the bed? Ansel had been so scared that it hadn’t even occurred to me.

  “Just a minute! I’m coming!” Dad yelled to someone else. “Sorry, sweetie. I have to —”

  “Are you getting some incredible photos?” I asked quickly. Even when he’s busy, photography is a subject he’ll talk on and on about.

  “I have one that’s a real moment,” Dad said. “I can always shoot some good photos, but those real moments are as rare as almost never. But every now and then, something truly amazing happens at the very second you’re ready for it.”

  “What’s the photo of?” I asked.

  “A snake springing after a baby rabbit. It’s intense and beautiful. I didn’t even know how great that shot was, because it all happened so fast.”

  “A snake? Aren’t you supposed to be photographing some rare bug?”

  “I got some solid shots of the bug,” Dad said. “But developers want to build houses on this land, and not many people want to live in a house with snakes all around. So they want to get rid of them. But these snakes are almost as endangered as the bugs, and this photo would make an amazing cover for the magazine.”

  “Was the rabbit okay?”

  “The rabbit? Oh. No, but the snake has to eat. There are a lot more rabbits than snakes. He worked hard for it.”

  I didn’t want to argue with Dad, especially since I had barely gotten to talk to him at all. But I didn’t want to see that photo, because I like rabbits a lot. “I took some photos of the loons for you. Remember how you asked me to do that?”

  “Great! I have to go now, sweetie. Everyone’s in the van. They’re waiting for me. Give Ansel a pat for me, okay?”

  “Okay,” I said. “Love you.”

  “Love you, too.”

  My ice cream had turned soupy. How could I want to talk to him so much and then feel worse when I finally did?

  “He said it’s hot in Arizona,” Mom said. “But not humid.”

  “He’s taking pictures of snakes,” I told her. “In one photo, a snake is killing a rabbit.”

  Mom made a face. “Let’s hope he doesn’t want to put that one on the living room wall.”

  I moved my spoon through my ice cream, thinking of the photos I’d shot. They were all good or okay. But if I really wanted to win the money to help Nate get that raft, I’d have to do better.

  I’d need some “moments.”

  Most things get easier the more you do them. With each box I unpacked with Mom, there weren’t as many decisions to make. Now we just put things where they belonged: silverware here, pots there, mugs in the cupboard closest to the sink, books on the bookshelves, mail on the table next to the door.

  And every time I went on Loon Patrol, I felt surer about kayaking: how hard or gentle to pull on my paddle to avoid hitting the other kayaks, and the angle I needed to hold the paddle at to keep water from dripping on my legs.

  I wondered if by going on Loon Patrol so often, I was adding more reasons for Megan not to like me. But I wasn’t going to stay home just because of her.

  “At breakfast, Grandma Lilah put the teakettle on and then went into the living room and forgot all about it. The whistle made her jump off the couch. She thought it was a loon yodeling outside!” Emily laughed, dipping her paddle in the water next to mine.

  “Some days the loons feel like they’re part o
f our family,” Nate said.

  “Yeah, but if they were really part of our family, Mom would yell at them for waking us up so early,” Emily said.

  I reached down to lay my hand flat on the water. It felt like I was holding the whole lake under my palm. Mirrored in the water around my fingers, the blue sky was full of frail, stretched-long clouds. I pulled my camera out of my life vest and shot a photo of my hand, surrounded by water-clouds.

  I wondered what my fingers looked like to the fish underwater. Then I heard a splash at the shore. A snapping turtle? At the edge of the bank, trees leaned out over the lake; their roots, as big as my arm, snaked between the rocks, creating lots of hiding places. Whatever had splashed had ducked out of sight.

  Stay away from our baby loon! “Can the loon chick swim as soon as it’s hatched? Or do the parents need to teach it?” I asked.

  “It can swim right away,” Nate said. “But the parents teach it to dive and fish.”

  “It’s funny to watch them feed it,” Emily said. “The adults catch minnows and give them to the baby, beak-to-beak.”

  “I hope we get to see that,” I said.

  “They’ll stay near the nest until the second egg hatches or until they give up on it,” Nate said. “After that, they’ll leave the nest for the summer and swim all over the lake.”

  “The cutest thing is when they teach the babies to make the different loon calls,” Emily said. “Sometimes we’ll hear tremolos or yodels and think the loons are in danger. But when we look through the binoculars, there’s no danger. Grandma Lilah says they’re teaching their baby what the different calls mean and how to make them.”

  “We call it loonsong lessons,” Nate said.

  I grinned. “I love that.”

  Sitting forward in my kayak, I pulled my life vest backward to let some air circulate. Crossing the lake, there was no shade, and my back was getting sweaty under there.

  An ant walked across the nose of my kayak. He must’ve climbed on when the kayak was back on the sand and now found himself at sea with me, hitching a ride. I pointed him out to Emily. “When we get back, he can go home and tell his ant friends about his big adventure on the high seas. I hope he —”

  My voice was drowned out by a speedboat zipping across the lake, pulling a kid on an inner tube. The waves from their wake rushed toward me, rocking me sideways.

  “I wish the motorboats would be more careful,” Nate said. “The loons get scared when they come too close.”

  “And it doesn’t just scare them,” Emily said. “If the parents spend too much time watching out for boats, they don’t bring up enough food, and the chick starves.”

  How awful. It was bad enough that other animals wanted to eat our chick, but at least that was understandable. “Maybe we could make some signs?” I suggested. “Because boaters might be more careful if they knew that.”

  “That’s a great idea!” Emily said. “We could put a sign at the boat landing so people who are launching their boats will know to be careful.”

  “We could hang another at the marina. They rent boats to people who are visiting,” Nate said. “Let’s walk down to the store when we get back and buy some supplies.”

  “I can take photos of the loons with the chick to put on the posters,” I said. “So people will know what to look out for.”

  Now I had two ways my photos might help! Maybe they could help Grandma Lilah see the loons, and maybe they could help the loons be safe. As we entered the cove near the loons’ nest, water streamed along the sides of my kayak, and my paddle kept picking up the long strings of the lily pads. A swarm of spidery bugs swirled along on the surface, like they were skating in a wild hockey game.

  A dragonfly landed on my shorts, a stick of neon purple. I was used to seeing the electric-blue ones, but this was the first purple one I’d seen.

  I worked my camera slowly out of my life vest and managed two close-ups of the dragonfly before he suddenly zipped off into the air, hurrying to who-knows-where.

  “Look!” Emily said. “Both of the adult loons are in the water. And there’s the chick!”

  The two adults were swimming close to the nest, the baby riding on one parent’s back. The nest looked lonely without a bird on it, one egg left behind.

  “Maybe the second egg is a dud,” Nate said.

  “At least they have one.” But my joy for that fuzzy, busy little chick had a center of sadness inside. Is this how it ends? Just half-good?

  “It might still hatch,” Emily said. “Though I wish one of the adults would get back on the nest. The egg will cook in the sun.”

  One of the adult loons hopped awkwardly onto the nest and turned the egg over with his bill. He settled himself carefully down on the egg.

  “Oh, good!” Nate said. “They’re still taking care of it.”

  The chick struggled to follow the adult up onto the nest. It wasn’t a high jump for the adults, but the chick was so small, he had to try several times before he finally wiggled up the side.

  Emily laughed. “He’s too cute!”

  A sooty puffball with a white belly, he walked like a floppy puppet. It’d be hard for people to ignore something as adorable as that baby loon. I zoomed in and took photo after photo as he climbed around the nest and over his parent’s back, and then dropped back into the water. He scrambled up onto the swimming parent’s back and cruised by the nest.

  “It’s hard to get a good shot of him, because he doesn’t stop!” I clicked and clicked, hoping my photos wouldn’t be blurry. Maybe one would even turn out to be a “moment” and surprise me.

  As we paddled home, I looked backward at the nest and the adult loon patiently waiting there. “Maybe we shouldn’t put a photo of the loon on the nest on our posters?” I said. “Because people might go looking for the nest. And that might disturb the loons.”

  “I think it’s okay,” Emily said. “Because if that egg doesn’t hatch in the next day or so, it probably won’t. And then they’ll leave the nest area until next year. It’ll take at least a couple days to make the posters and hang them up around town.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Before we go to the store, I just have to go home and tell my mom.”

  But when we got back from kayaking, Grandma Lilah was on the dock with Nate’s little cousins, Morgan and Mason. The twins had been making mud pies on the dock. Piles of sand, decorated with sticks and rocks, plastic buckets and shovels, were everywhere.

  “We can go swimming now!” Mason yelled.

  “You could’ve gone,” Grandma Lilah said. “I’m right here to watch you.”

  “Mama said we had to wait for Nate and Emily and the other girl,” Mason said, jumping off the side of the dock.

  I blushed at “the other girl,” but he hadn’t said it mean.

  “Sorry,” Nate said to me. “I thought we could go, but I guess we have to help watch the little kids. Do you want to go swimming?”

  I opened my mouth to tell him I had to go home to change, but then I realized Nate was going in with his clothes on.

  Why not? I was really hot, so I took off my life vest and left my camera and my phone on the dock next to Grandma Lilah.

  When I stepped into the water, the bottom was so sandy, it gave way under my feet, heels first, almost to my ankles. But as I walked out farther, the bottom turned gooey and gucky with rocks and old slippery leaves and pine needles and I-don’t-even-want-to-know-what. I pushed off quickly into a breaststroke so I wouldn’t have to touch.

  “It’s freezing!” I said, my teeth chattering.

  “Nate, pretend you’re a shark!” Mason said. “Say ‘I’m gonna get you!’”

  “Me, too!” Morgan said. “But don’t really grab me, okay?”

  “Okay. I’m gonna get you!” Nate dove under, but I let myself float. The water cooled my skin and lapped against my ears. It’s funny how cold lake water always feels when you first get in and how warm it becomes as you get used to it. I felt so relaxed, like I could fall asleep r
ight there, except I could hear Emily talking to someone. “And Lucy took some photos of it!” I heard her say. “We’re going to make posters to tell the speedboaters to stay away a safe distance.”

  I rolled over in the water to see Megan pick up my camera from the dock. “I want to see the chick, too. How does this work?”

  “I’ll do it!” I didn’t want her touching my camera. As I swam toward the dock, she said, “That’s okay. I have it on now. Cool! I want to help with the posters, too.”

  When I got out, my hair was wet and clumpy and my shorts stuck to my legs. I pulled my T-shirt out in front so it wouldn’t be clingy and embarrassing.

  I took my camera from her and picked up my phone. “I’m heading home to change,” I said to Emily. I didn’t want to leave, but I couldn’t hang around in wet clothes.

  “Bye, Lucy,” Emily said. “I’ll let you know when we go to town. It may not be today, though. Morgan and Mason can swim forever.”

  “We’re gonna swim until there’s ice on the lake!” Mason yelled.

  On the walk home, I texted Dad.

  The loons have a baby! SOOO CUTE!

  Then I clicked on my camera’s screen to look at my loon photos, but the first photo that came up was the purple dragonfly. Where were my photos of the baby loon? I clicked and clicked, but the dragonfly was the last photo on my card. My photos of the chick were gone.

  Every last one.

  “I hope the Baileys like potato salad,” Mom said the next night as we crossed our driveway toward their cottage.

  “That spoonful we tested tasted good to me.” I’ve always wanted to live someplace where the neighbors invited us to cookouts. So when Mrs. Bailey came over to ask us, I stood behind her and nodded my head fast at Mom. I’d been wondering when would be a good time to give Grandma Lilah the photo I’d taken on Cherry Mountain, and a cookout seemed perfect. Nate had carefully returned the old photo to its spot on their cottage wall, and I’d made a print of the new photo and put it in a frame. Wrapped up, it looked like a real present.

  “I hope Grandma Lilah doesn’t mind that the only wrapping paper I could find was birthday paper,” I said to Mom.