All the Answers (22 page)

“Next month is a long time to wait, isn't it?” Marcus said.

Emma's forehead wrinkled. “Can't they make you better sooner?”

“It's actually okay,” Ava said, and reached over to put a hand on Emma's shoulder. She figured she'd had longer to get used to this whole cancer thing; she could help now. She looked at Marcus. “I was reading some stuff, and the kind of cancer Mom has doesn't spread fast at all, so nothing's going to happen in a month. And the treatment has an incredibly high success rate.” She turned back to Emma. “That means it's easier for the doctors to help her get better.”

“You need to thank your health teacher for me,” Mom told Ava.

“What?”

“Your health teacher? The one who gave you the homework to ask about doctor visits?”

“Oh!”

“I might have put off that appointment for the field trip if you hadn't been so adamant about it.” Mom poured some dressing on her salad.

“Yeah.” Ava felt a flood of relief. She'd been wondering when her mom would ask why she'd been so freaked out about the appointment, how she could have known about the cancer before the doctors or mammogram technician. But Mom had no clue. She thought Ava was just being her usual neurotic,
Boston Med
–obsessed self. Like the time she'd been sure the bug bite on her knee was really flesh-eating bacteria. “For once, I worried about the right thing.”

“Well, you can stop worrying now. We're taking care of this, and I'm going to be
fine
.”

“Are you going to be in the hospital?” Emma-My-Name-Is-Turpentine asked.

“For a day or two, yes,” Mom said.

“Can I come see you there?”

“Definitely.”

“Will they have Jell-O? In my book about hospitals, there's Jell-O.”

Mom laughed. “I can ask about that.”

“Good. And I'll make you a name tag so the nurses know
who you are.” Emma nodded as if that took care of everything and started digging out canals for the gravy in her mashed potatoes.

“So …” Mom sat down and started cutting her chicken. “What else is going on with everybody this week?”

Marcus talked about his egg-drop challenge in physics class, and Emma talked about how somebody stole Nebraska out of the fifty states puzzle in their classroom—“There's a HUGE hole in the middle and it's never going to be finished now”—and Dad said he was thinking about baked goods again.

“They've got this world-famous six-pound cinnamon roll in Longview, Washington,” he said. “I was thinking we could have a foot-long chocolate-chip cookie or something.”

“Yeah, but cookies are round,” Marcus said. “It'd have to be the world-famous chocolate-chip cookie with a one-foot diameter.”

“Hmm.” Dad took a bite of his chicken and chewed thoughtfully. “That's a lot to say. It doesn't have the same ring to it as foot-long. What do you think, Ava?”

“I … I don't know.” She'd been staring—just staring at them all, sitting around the dinner table eating mashed potatoes and wiping gravy off their mouths and talking about everyday things as if the cancer wasn't sitting there with them.

How were they supposed to get through this when Emma was going on and on about missing Nebraska and Marcus and Dad were arguing over geometric measurements?

“Personally,” Mom said, “I'd rather see a five-pound brownie.”

“Yum!” Emma squealed, and everyone laughed. Even Ava.

The world was still turning. Mom had cancer, and it was awful and scary, but there were still dinners to eat and dishes to clear and math tests to take. And this—all this talking about world-famous baked goods and eating and laughing together, just like always—was exactly how they were going to get through it. Ava couldn't imagine any other way.

The world kept on turning, through Tuesday night when Sophie came over for cookies and Ava told her the news. Sophie promised to be there no matter what. Ava didn't need to check with the pencil to know that was the truth.

The world turned right into Wednesday morning, so Ava got up and got ready for school. When she went down for breakfast, she found her parents with serious faces in the kitchen. Emma wasn't downstairs yet, and Marcus had left early for a math club meeting.

“What's wrong?” Ava asked.

It was a dumb question, she realized.
Cancer
was wrong. “Sorry, I mean—”

“Grandpa's not doing that well,” Dad said. He looked at Mom. “We're going over to see him this morning before work.”

Ava looked at the calendar. It was family night. “Aren't we all going later?”

“We are,” Dad said, “but we wanted to check in this morning, too, just for a little while. I'll still be at the store when you get home.”

“What's wrong with him?”

“Nothing new,” Mom said and put a plate of toast in front of Ava. “He's old, and his heart has been failing for a long time.”

Ava picked up her toast and scraped a burned edge off the crust. “Is it failing more now?”

“It seems that way.” Mom pressed her lips together and started peeling an apple.

“Should I go with you?” Ava felt like she should, like she should play that song for him. It was all he'd wanted when she'd asked the pencil, to hear Johnny Hodges in concert again. Ava knew she was no Johnny Hodges, but she was getting better.

“No. We just have to check in with him.” Mom sounded impatient, like it was Grandpa's fault his heart was failing. She cut the apple into perfect, equal slices and put them on Ava's plate. “And you need to go to school.”

Ava looked up at her mom's strained face. And suddenly, she remembered what else the pencil had said about Grandpa. What he wanted even more than he wanted to hear Johnny Hodges.
He wants your mother's forgiveness
.

“You shouldn't be mad at him,” Ava said quietly.

“What?” Her mother made a face. “I told you before, I'm not mad at Grandpa.” She sighed. “I just have a thousand things to do today. This wasn't in my plans, but obviously, we need to stop by and we're doing that.”

Ava looked up at her mom. She was biting the skin around her thumb, the way Ava did when she was anxious. “I know,” Ava said quietly. “I know about the gambling and the college money.”

Mom's face shifted. Her eyes filled with surprise, then sadness. “Where did you hear that?”

“Marcus.”

Mom nodded slowly. She took a deep breath, and her shoulders deflated when she let it out. “Grandma Marion left that money for you and Marcus, for your education. I still can't believe he didn't respect that. To take that money and gamble with it …” She shook her head. “It didn't help that he won like crazy at the blackjack tables for a few weeks. That just made him hungry for more. It was like he had the magic touch when he was in Las Vegas. And then he lost it. And lost nearly every penny in that account, too.”

Ava's breath caught in her throat. Mom's words were knocking into her brain.

Magic touch
.

Lost it
.

Magic!

Could Grandpa have been using the blue pencil to gamble? If he had—and he'd lost it—then it would explain why he started losing. But it was crazy. The pencil only answered questions. It didn't make some blackjack dealer give you all the good cards.

“I'm so sorry.” Mom sighed and put a hand on Ava's shoulder. “About what happened and about not telling you why things are tough with Grandpa and me. I guess I just wanted to let you
keep thinking he was the same Grandpa who gave you butter-scotch candies and played old records for you when you were little.”

“He hasn't been that Grandpa for a long time,” Ava said. It was true. At least on the outside. But what if that Grandpa was still inside somewhere? He still loved Johnny Hodges, just the way Mr. Ames still loved baseball and Mr. Clemson still wanted to put out fires. Ava looked at her mom. She thought about the pencil. It just didn't seem likely. And it didn't matter why he'd done it anyway. “You know, Mom … there are scholarships and loans and stuff to pay for college. It's okay.”

“Ava, you ready?” Dad called from the door. “Sophie's waiting.”

“Yep.” She turned to Mom. “You know, Mrs. Galvin has a quote on her wall: ‘The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.' ”

“And?” Mom tipped her head and looked at Ava.

“And I think you're strong. That's all.” Ava gathered up her last three apple slices, kissed her mom on the cheek, grabbed her backpack, and headed out into the cool November sun.

The blue pencil went to school in Ava's backpack, like always. But today, it stayed there, even during the math quiz. She actually had a voice in her head now—if she studied, anyway, and she had—that did the pencil's job more quietly. When Ava turned in her quiz, she was pretty sure she had every answer right.

“How's your mom?” Sophie asked as they walked to the cafeteria.

“She's fine.” Ava stopped at her locker to get her lunch. “I mean, she's not fine. But right now, she just feels normal. The surgery's not for like a month and a half.”

“That must be weird for her,” Sophie said, as they started down the hall again. “I mean, knowing that you have cancer inside you and waiting … I think I'd rather not know until the day I had to have the surgery, you know? So there wouldn't be all that time to think about it.”

“I know.” Ava sat down at their usual cafeteria table. Boy, did she know. She'd thought about that and about how much easier it would have been for her to find out her mom had cancer when Marcus and Emma did, instead of getting the pencil's secret news and then waiting and waiting. Certain kinds of information just made you worried and sad. That's why Ava had never told Sophie what the pencil said about her dad. Sometimes, it was better not to know.

“Can I sit with you guys?” Jason Marzigliano smiled down at them, holding his tray full of pizza and milk.

Sophie giggled. “Sure!”

“Absolutely. But I just remembered I was going to help Mrs. Galvin shelve books.” Ava stood up. “I'll see you in gym, Soph.”

Ava didn't feel bad about leaving. Sophie would be happy to have Jason to herself—he couldn't very well ask her out with Ava hanging around—and Ava didn't need any more reminders that the pencil was always right. The library was a good place to eat lunch anyway. Mrs. Galvin would have cookies out for her helpers.

“Ava! Thank goodness you're here. I just processed a whole pile of nonfiction titles that need homes. And there's chocolate chip macadamia today.” Mrs. Galvin nodded to a plate on the counter.

Ava took a cookie and read the quote next to Mrs. Galvin's computer.

A ship in harbor is safe, but that's not what ships are built for. —John A. Shedd

Below the quote was a picture of a ship sailing out to sea, with storm clouds off in the distance. Ava sighed. She sure wasn't in harbor anymore.

She took the first few books, headed for the 500s, and put two whale books where they were supposed to go.

“How's life?” Mrs. Galvin called over. It wasn't club day, so they were the only ones there.

“Good.” Ava slid a book about honeybees onto the shelf. “Well … kind of good and kind of bad.” She went back for more books. “We just found out my mom has breast cancer.”

“Oh, Ava! I'm sorry to hear that. How is she doing?”

“She's okay. She feels fine, and it's … it's early, so she's going to be fine.” Saying so out loud helped Ava believe it, too. “She's having surgery after Christmas.”

Mrs. Galvin nodded. “I'll send lots of white light your family's way.”

“Thanks.” Ava wasn't sure what that was—maybe Mrs. Galvin's version of Grandma's CNN prayers—but if it was coming from Mrs. Galvin, she was sure it was good.

Ava finished shelving the nonfiction and looked for a book to check out. Mrs. Galvin had asked if she wanted one about cancer, but Ava decided she'd probably feel better if she read something funny, so they found one about a girl who's forced to join a marching band even though all she really wants is to play in this super-serious orchestra.