Counting Thyme (12 page)

“Mom, can you turn it down?”

“I can barely hear it!” Val said, making a pouty face at me. I knew he was just cranky and worn out from having had a fever, but I felt so frustrated all of a sudden.

“Maybe you should turn your ears up,” I said, like I was saying something perfectly reasonable instead of being mean.

Mom cut her eyes at me. “Thyme. That's not very nice.” Something snapped inside me. It was like all my frustrated feelings poured out at once.

“He
can
turn them up, you know. Then the rest of us don't have to go deaf, too.”

“Thyme!”

“What?” I knew I shouldn't have said it, but sometimes, it was all too much—the noise from the TV, the waiting, the missing out. I was tired of not counting.

Dad came back into the room, and my crabby feelings drowned in a fresh wave of guilt.

“No news yet,” he told us. Then he glanced at the TV. “Can we turn that down?”

“Really, Michael?” Mom said. “Val, you're going to have to adjust your hearing aids. Apparently, the TV
must
be turned down.”

Dad put his hands up. “What did I do now?”

“
Nothing,
” Mom and I said at the same time.

Of course, Mr. Lipinsky chose that exact moment to bang on the ceiling from below. I wanted to reach through the floorboards and smack him. Instead, I tried to focus on the game. If I won, then everything was going to be okay. Val would get better, and I would get to go back home. Somehow, it would all magically work out the way I wanted it to.

Dad's hand wavered over one of his pieces. Then he spotted the bait. “Looks like I got you this time.” He hopped my piece, and I swooped in with my king, hopping his two remaining players in a flash. “Or not,” he said, and we laughed.

Then the phone rang, and the color drained out of his face.

“I'll get it!” Cori shouted from our bedroom.

“No!” Dad called. “I've got it.” He left the room, and Mom stared hard at the TV like she wasn't listening for Dad's voice with every fiber of her being. Val seemed oblivious,
cheering for his beloved Transformers as they crashed into planets on the screen. Cori came in and joined them on the couch, snuggling next to Val.

As the seconds ticked by, I stacked the checkers into two neat rows. Three even stacks of black. Three stacks of red. I centered each stack perfectly on a single black square. Like soldiers lined up for battle, but hovering, unsure if they were really going to war or not.

Then Dad walked back into the room. We all looked at him. My heart beat faster. “The HAMA test was negative,” he said. “It's just an infection. He's okay.”

Mom burst into tears, and Val crawled into her lap and patted her face.

“Don't worry, Mommy. I'll get better. Promise,” he said, and she just wrapped her arms around him. Then she reached for Dad, too, and they clung to each other like their lives depended on it. Mom made a little choking noise, and Dad squeezed her harder. Then he waved for me and Cori to join in, and we all just clumped up together in a big, sappy group hug.

When we broke apart, Val pointed at the screen and laughed. “That guy's died like ten times already! How can he
do
that?”

“He's just really lucky,” I said. But not as lucky as my brother. That afternoon, he was the luckiest kid in the world. He could continue his treatment. He still had a shot. And just like that, all the frustrations I'd been feeling melted away.

“Is it time for presents yet?” Val asked, for the hundredth time that day.

Mom's shoulders started shaking. When we pulled away from her, she wasn't crying anymore—she was laughing. “What the heck! We'll all open one, for Christmas Eve. You too, girls!”

I went over to our little fake tree (because ironically, a real tree could increase Val's chance of infection if he didn't have one already), oddly decorated with construction-paper loops and popcorn (because all of our other ornaments were in storage), and scanned the small pile of presents circling the tree skirt (because there wasn't so much money for presents this year), and Mom called out, “Who wants cookies? I feel like baking!”

That's when I knew Christmas wasn't going to be so bad after all.

FAVORITE THINGS

WHEN GOOD THINGS HAPPENED WITH VAL, THE HAPPY FEELINGS
stuck to us for days, like a coating of invisible fairy dust—but even fairy dust runs out of power eventually.

By halfway through winter break, we were all tired of each other. Dad ended up going to a meeting for his freelance work, but Mom was playing it safe with Val, keeping him home so he didn't pick up another bug. Which meant Cori and I were stuck there with them.

“I'm so sick of this apartment,” Cori said, flinging the remote into the couch cushions. She was impatient to hang out with her friends. They were planning a sleepover for New Year's Eve.

Mom made a hushing sound. “Keep it down.” Val was having quiet time in his room. His fever was gone, but Mom said he still needed rest.

Cori snatched up her cell phone and started texting with quick, furious clicks.

“Maybe when your father gets back we can go iceskating,” Mom said. She was in the kitchen, scrubbing a
cookie sheet in the sink. She'd been on a baking streak since Christmas. “That is, as long as you can stop texting that boy long enough to finish your thank-you notes.” Thank-you notes were a big deal with Mom. Every birthday, every holiday, no matter what—we sent thank-you notes.

Cori moaned. “I don't want to go ice-skating.”

“I do!” My cards were spread out across the dining table. Letters, envelopes, stamps: an assembly line to get the job done quickly.

Mom smiled at me. She'd given me time for Christmas—two fresh slips of paper, wrapped in a pretty painted box. Two whole
days
of me time that she said I could use for something special, like a day at the zoo or the circus. “Something fun, something we can do together,” she'd said. But I'd just added them to the Thyme Jar and thought,
Well, going back to San Diego definitely qualifies as something we'll have to do together.

“For your information, Liam is in charge of the posters for our protest,” Cori told Mom. “We have, like, thirty-three signs we need to make, and zero time to get them done. I should be at his place right now helping with everyone else. Not that anyone cares.”

“We've talked about this. You can't go by yourself. When Dad gets back—”

“Why not?” Cori said. “I've been taking the subway on my own every day.”

“This isn't every day,” Mom said.

“It's the
exact same train
,” Cori shouted, and I cringed.

Mom stopped scrubbing her cookie sheet. “That can easily change. If you'd like, I can ask Mrs. Ravelli to take you to school from now on, before she takes Thyme.”

“I don't want to take the subway,” I said, but they both ignored me.

“It's not
fair
,” Cori said.

“Your brother is still
recovering
,” Mom said.

Cori stood up and faced Mom. “I shouldn't have to stay here just because he does. I'm not the one catching germs and getting fevers and ruining everyone's lives.”

“Coriander Owens, you better fix that attitude fast or you'll be on house arrest for real. I mean it. No New Year's Eve sleepover, no drama club, no
nothing
.”

Cori's face went this way and that, like different parts of her were fighting for control over her mouth. But she must have really wanted to go to that sleepover, because she finally swallowed, her cheeks flaming, and muttered, “Fine.”

“Good,” Mom said. “Now go finish your thank-you notes.”

Cori caught my eye. Normally, she would've taken a crack at me or rolled her eyes, but this time she just stomped off without another word. Which was actually pretty nice for a change.

A few minutes later, Mom walked up to me with a stack of pretty red-and-white cookie boxes in her arms. “Thyme, can you take a break and run these to the neighbors for me?”

She set the boxes on the table. The top one was addressed to Mr. Lipinsky.

“Why are we giving cookies to him?”

“Everyone likes homemade cookies,” Mom said. “And some people need them more than others. It's the right thing to do.” That was what Grandma Kay said when we spent Christmas Eve working at the soup kitchen instead of playing games and watching movies like everyone else. According to Grandma, nothing worth doing was easy, and that was why we
had
to come to New York, even though she was spending Christmas alone for the first time ever.

“But Christmas is over.”

“Christmas isn't over till I say it's over! I'll give you an hour of time, okay? Now get your butt out that door before I make your sister go with you.”

It was no use arguing. Plus, it was another hour added to the pile. I decided to start at the bottom of the building and work my way up.

First was our landlord, who looked so surprised to get a gift that I felt like Santa Claus. Then the family in 2A with their little baby who never cried because he was the best baby on earth—I know, because that's what the mom said when I handed her the cookies. “Look at the pretty cookies, Henry!” she said, and the baby cracked a grin, sending a river of drool down his shirt. The mom beamed at me. “Isn't he just the best baby in the whole wide world?” Then the woman in 2B, who was some kind of actress. She had a voice like a frog. When she took her box, she croaked a raspy
thank you
, like the frog was especially stuck that morning.

Then it was time for the third floor.

The man in apartment 3A didn't answer. I'd only seen him once. Cori had Val convinced that he was a ghost. I left the ghost's cookies in front of his door and looked at apartment 3B, debating whether or not to knock. I could just drop the cookies and run. But Mom would ask if everyone had been home.

I knocked.

No answer.

I tried again, smacking the door hard with my fist.

Still no answer, so I dropped the cookies in front of Mr. Lipinsky's door and turned for the stairs, relieved that I wouldn't have to face him after all. But then his door creaked open, and I stopped.

“That's littering, you know. You can't leave things in the hall like that.”

I turned around. Mr. Lipinsky was spying through the crack in the door like usual.

“They're cookies. For Christmas. Or the holidays, or whatever.”

He opened his door a bit wider and eyed the box like it was full of candied rats. “Any
hamantaschen
in there?”

I shrugged, confused. He sighed. “Little triangle-shaped cookies with jam.”

“No. Sorry.”

He looked up. “You believe that, Ada?” he asked the ceiling. “She doesn't even know what a
hamantaschen
is.” He picked up the box and looked at me. “Stay there,” he ordered in a no-nonsense voice. Then he disappeared inside his
apartment, while I wondered if he was not just weird, but completely crazy. Who was this Ada person? And why was he looking at the ceiling to talk to her?

With his door open, I could see the posters on his wall:
Evita
,
The Wiz
,
Peter Pan
 . . . all Broadway musicals. Despite the horrible cooking smells coming from inside, I crept a little closer to see what the rest of his apartment looked like. When I peeked through the door, a burst of whistling made me jump. His bird was right there in the living room, perched on a metal stand.

That's when Mr. Lipinsky reappeared, carrying a small, square casserole dish. He shuffled up to the door and shoved the dish into my hands. “
Chag Semeach.
”

The edges of the white ceramic were coated in burnt black smears, and whatever was filling the inside didn't look much better: squiggly and green and charred in places.

“I was planning to take that to the potluck at the VA, but I can make another,” he said gruffly. Then he started to shut the door.

“Wait. What is it?” I held the dish as far away from my body as possible, in case it turned out that the casserole really was full of overcooked brains. It definitely reeked badly enough to be something gross like that.

“It's a kugel.”

“A what?”

He huffed. “Don't you know anything?” He glanced at the ceiling again and murmured something about
stupid
this and
moron
that, but then he seemed to come to some kind of
a decision. “A kugel brings luck. Share it with your family on the holiday, and you will be blessed.” He cleared his throat and stared at me, his gray eyes piercing, but not angry. Not like the day we moved in. “Back in my day, we used to say thank you when someone gave us a gift.”

My skin flushed hot, even though I didn't think his definition of the word
gift
matched with mine. I preferred gifts wrapped in crisp, colorful paper that smelled, well, not rotten.

“Thank you,” I said, putting on my best thank-you smile.

“And thank you. Now do me a favor and stay off your heels on the stairs. You walk like an elephant.” I must've looked confused again, because he said, “A proper step involves the ball of the foot as well as the heel. You people seem to have forgotten how to use your toes. You thump around like elephants all day, making it impossible for the decent people in this building to take a nap.”

With that, he shut his door, and I went upstairs, walking on my toes the whole way.

A few minutes after I got back from delivering cookies, the locks turned on our apartment door.

“I'm home!” Dad called as the door sprung open. There was a huge box on the floor in front of him, just outside. Val came running from his room, and Dad handed him an armful of mail from on top of the box, which Val carried inside and dumped on the floor.

“Avalanche!” he shouted, diving into the pile.

“Looks like someone's feeling better,” Dad said. He picked
up the enormous box and tried to angle it through the door, but one tattered corner kept catching on the door frame. I grabbed the other side, and together we managed to get the box inside.

“Thanks,” Dad puffed.

Mom popped in from the kitchen. “What's this, a mail explosion? I'd help, but I'm in the middle of cookies for Val's support group.” She looked at Dad. “How was the meeting?”

He gave her a thumbs-up. “Don't worry about the mail. I've got it covered.” He handed me an envelope from his back pocket—a letter from Grandma Kay! “When you're done reading that, you can take care of this box, too.”

“Why me?” I wanted to go skating, like Mom had said.

Then I saw the label on the box. The address was in Shani's handwriting! I'd sent her a collection of cool metal hair clips shaped like ladybugs and dragonflies, but when nothing came for Christmas, I'd figured she was so busy with her family trip that she'd forgotten about me. But she hadn't.

An hour later, she surprised me again with a FaceTime request. So I didn't get to go ice-skating after all, but spending time with Shani was worth the trade.

“How did you find a box of strawberries this time of year?”