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Kathryn Magendie (4 page)

BOOK: Kathryn Magendie
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“P-p-please s-s-stop.”

“—and that woman who called late—”

“—here we go again—”

“—just like the last time—”

“—novels don’t write themselves—”

I shot air down my lungs and rushed it back up, raised my voice just above theirs. “I want to do the dishes. It helps me think.” I gave Father a pleading look to let it go.

Father wiped his mouth. “I’ll be in the study.”

Mother smoothed her perfectly smooth hair. “I’ll be in the living room.”

And I cleared the table, glad to be alone with my thoughts. Just what did Sweetie want to show me? What was her secret? Nothing as exciting had ever happened to me before. Torn pinky fingers on laughing girls. Secrets. Burning notes.

I stared into the bubbled suds. Some suds had rainbows while others were clear, and beneath the suds were unseen things, some sharp enough to cut.

FOUR

 

I woke up with a throat so raw that when I swallowed, I had to make a scrunchy face against the pain, and I hated pain of any kind. I tried not to make any spit, so I wouldn’t have to swallow it down, but the more I thought about not swallowing, the more spit I made. When I rose out of bed and went to the kitchen, my legs were wobbly and my head felt like a balloon on a string. I tried to pretend everything was normal, for if I stayed home sick, I couldn’t go with Sweetie so she could show me the secret she promised.

Mother had a No School, No Fun Rule:
if a kid’s too sick to go to school, it doesn’t matter if the kid gets better later, no school, no going outside, no exceptions, too bad, get used to it, period, the end
. Peter was the cause of rules Mother made solid forever, even if I never did the naughty things Peter had.

Father looked up from his cup of coffee. “You don’t look so good, love.”

I leaned my head on his shoulder. “I have a little sore throat, but I’m okay to go to school.” It hurt to talk and I sounded like an old woman who smoked ten packs a day, but I pretended I was fine.

He put his hand on my forehead and shook his head. “Fever. Your white blood cells are like an army, marching towards your infection to destroy it. That’s their job, but the side effect is you have increased body temperature. Get back in bed and rest today. We’ll have to see whether this is viral or bacterial. Those bacteria are—”

“I
need
to go to school.”

“—What? Oh, no, sorry, Princess. Back to bed you go. The teacher will understand.” He stood and turned me towards my room, followed behind me, and when I climbed back into bed, he tucked the covers around me. “I’ll go make you some hot lemonade. It won’t cure you, but your brain will feel my sympathetic mothering, or, I should say, fathering, and respond to it positively, and that’s not a bad thing, is it?”

“I guess not.” I fell asleep before he was back. When I woke up, sitting on a tray on the bedside table were the lemonade, three baby aspirin (
baby
aspirin!
), and a note with squiggled drawings that must be cells or molecules or whatever, and the words,
Drink this up, take your medicine, and soon those white blood cells will calm down their marching and you’ll feel better. Love, Pop
.

I’d never seen or heard him call himself Pop before, but I liked it.

Later, when I awoke again, Mother checked on me, holding a tray with chicken soup. She stood over the bed and looked down at me. “Goodness, you really
are
sick, aren’t you?” She set down the tray. “I know how bad you feel, but would you mind if I didn’t get too close? I have a club function and I simply can’t afford to be sick—they made me president of the decoration and food committee and it’s for an important cause.” She smiled a glowed smile, straightened my covers. “If you really need something, of course I’ll be right in the living room.”

All I wanted was for her to brush back my hair. Or make me more of the hot lemonade. And even though I was twelve years old—too old—I wouldn’t have minded her reading to me. Instead, I said, “Okay. Thanks for the soup.” It still hurt like the dickens to talk.

She patted the covers over my feet, squeezed and wiggled my big toe, and left.

I tried to eat, but it hurt too much, so I gave up.

That evening when I again awoke, there was another weird drawing and words about germs and science and whatever from Father, along with more lemonade and aspirin. I drank the lemonade and took the aspirin, even though they burned going down, and fell back to sleep.

Later that night, when my parents and the neighborhood were quiet and sleeping, I lay burning up, sweating on my pillow and sheets, my white cells still mad and marching. I’d take off the covers, and then I’d get too cold and put them back over me. My hair plastered to my head, and my throat was as if it had razors in it. I looked at my clock and it read

At one-thirty a.m. there was a tapping at my window:
tap
tap tap tap tap
 . . .
tap tap
. I turned my head and there, with her grinning face pressed against the pane, was Sweetie. I laughed at how comical she looked, slipped out of bed, and opened the window. The night breeze flew in and cooled the sweat. I shivered, and croaked out, “You came to see me!”

“Uh huh.”

“But it’s one-thirty in the morning.”

“Teacher said you got a throat full of thorny-haired frogs so I brung you something.”

 
“You could’ve brought it to me during the day.”

“Nope.”

“What if your mother wakes up and sees you gone?”

“She’s sleeping good.”

“But what if she does and she’s so worried she calls the police and you get in trouble?”

“She will not and I will not.” She leaned on the windowsill. “You sure talk a lot for somebody got a bad throat.”

“But mothers all the time worry, especially at night.” I coughed, shivered.

“You can’t stop talking even when you hurt to do it, can you?” She shook her head, and then handed me a thermos. “Drink it all up, you hear? And stop asking about things none your business.”

“What’s in here?”

“Magic tea.”

I opened the thermos and sniffed. “Eeeww. Nasty smelling.”

“My nerves are wore up with you. Drink and get better so I can show you something inneresting.”

I tipped the thermos, took a sip. It burned a little going down, but wasn’t bad. “It’s sweeter than I thought it’d be.”

“Licorice root and sourwood honey what make it sweet.”

“How can something sour be sweet?”

She rolled her eyes, then reached for a leather pouch she’d hung from a thin leather strap around her waist, opened it, and pulled out another rolled up piece of paper. “This here’s a map. Follow it just how I drawed it, else you get lost forever more on the mountain.”
 
She grinned.

“A map? Why can’t you just show me where to go?”

“If ever-body shows you ever little thing, then how you get learnt?” She placed the map on the windowsill and put her palm flat on it. “Now drink up so’s you can get better.”

I drank the rest down. When I finished, I held out the thermos, but Sweetie wasn’t there. The map was left on the windowsill. I grabbed it, stuck out my head and looked around. Not one trace of her, not even a footprint on the ground. I hid the thermos in the hole in my mattress, went back to bed with my flashlight, studied the map until I was too tired, and then hid the map, too. Before I fell asleep, I wondered why Sweetie said it was none of my business when I asked about her mother.

I woke late the next morning, at
, later than I ever had before. I tested with a swallow. My throat was still sore, but not as much. Father came in with a pill bottle and a glass of water. “Sometimes germ armies need stronger attacks. Germs have been around a long time, since before we were here. In fact they—”

“I already feel better.”

He placed his palm on my forehead, nodded. “You do feel cooler this morning.”

“I can go to school today.”

“No, you need to rest more and let the antibiotics do their job in your body. I brought you a book to read all about how it works so you can understand it better.” He put one of his science books on the bed. “Since today is Friday, that gives you the weekend to completely recover.”

“But, I
want
to go.”

“That’s admirable, but no argument.” He opened the bottle, shook out a pill, and held it out in the palm of his hand. “Here, take this and lie back down.”

I took the pill into my mouth, swallowed a bit of water, even though I wanted to tell him that Sweetie’s magic tea would do the trick. I knew he’d start a lecture on medicine and magic—how medicine was science and really magic was also science—he loved finding out how the magicians did their tricks, and said there was an answer for everything.

When Father left the room, I spit out the pill, hid it under my pillow, lay my head down, and waited for what would come next. I slept most of the day, and that night Father gave me another pill that I spit out and put under my pillow. Later, I flushed it away as I’d done the first one. When the moon shined on my face, and everyone was again in bed asleep, I searched the night for Sweetie, beyond my yard, out over to where the mountains made shadows on the valley. I wanted to climb out of my window and find the place on the map she’d circled, where she’d drawn a big boulder with the name Whale Back Rock. On the drawing of Whale Back Rock sat two figures. I wanted to see what she saw, see where she lived and who her mother was and why she could run around in the middle of the night without being afraid, what her secret was.

Right then, everything about my life was boring and plain, and everything in the
Haywood
County
mountains was exciting and wonderful. Somewhere out there, Sweetie was waiting for me. I shivered with impatience, with the thought of how everything was about to change.

FIVE

 

I sat with my back against the sun-warmed Whale Back Rock, glad the no-see-ums weren’t around to sting and itch me like crazy. I’d called them gnats until Sweetie set me straight on how since people could see gnats, and could not see no-see-ums, that’s why they had their own name. I checked my watch for the fourth time. Any happy feeling I had with myself for finding the place she’d drawn on the map was chased away by worried feelings. Maybe it had been a trick all along. Maybe she and some other kids were hiding and laughing at me, at how silly I was for thinking anyone would want to let me in on their secrets and be my one true friend.

When I stood up and paced around in a circle, trying to decide if I should leave, sure enough, just as I feared, I heard laughing. I craned my head and looked around, even though I really wanted to run home like the fraidy cat I was. There was always a chance things weren’t as bad as they seemed.

I heard from above me, “Haw! You sure are funny when you get antsy in the pantsy.”

I looked from tree to tree, trying to spot Sweetie. “Where are you?”

“Up in this here walnut tree.” She rattled branches. “See me?”

I sniffed, acted like I didn’t care. “Yeah, I see you now.”

“You been blowing out mad breath, ready to stomp something.” Sweetie laughed.

“How long were you up there?”

“Since before you got here.” She swung her legs back and forth from where she sat on a limb. “I just set and watched you.”

“Well, thanks a lot. Some friend.” I turned from her to walk back home.

“Lissa, wait!”

I smiled to myself and kept stomping down the trail. I heard her scrambling down the tree behind me.

“Don’t go off all mad.”

I waited until I heard her footsteps right behind me before I turned around to face her. “Ha! I just wanted you to have to chase after me for a change.”

“Huhn.” She wore a sly look. “Well, then. Guess you changed your mind about seeing something inneresting?”

I shrugged.

We stood there, each of us waiting for the other to give in. I knew I’d give in first, and so did she. When I couldn’t stand it anymore, I said, “I give.”

She didn’t even crow about how she’d won, just said, “Come on.”

We walked back to Whale Back Rock together, our arms swinging, but not touching.

“I forgot your thermos, Sweetie.”

“Wasn’t my thermos anyway.”

“My father wanted me to take antibiotics, but I spit them out and flushed them. Your tea did the trick, all right.”

“Yup.”

She climbed onto the whale’s back first. I sweated and grunted. Sweetie held out her hand and pulled me up the rest of the way.

When we were settled, I asked, “So, what’s the secret?”

 
“Can’t tell ’til you double dog damn swear you will not tell my secrets when I let them loose.”

“Okay. I won’t tell.” I pulled a loose pebble from under my behind.

“Double dog damn swear, Pooter Head.”

“Well . . . ” I picked at the hem of my shirt, a pale yellow thing with pearl buttons, and at the edges of the hem, Battenberg lace sewn in. It was one of Mother’s favorites, worn with the hideous cabin boy pants she’d also picked out in pale blue, with yellow flowers embroidered all over them. “. . . Father said swear words show a person’s ignorance.”

“Nothing wrong with a swear word if it got to be done.”

“I don’t know. I guess.”

“No secrets get let loose until you swear to keep them safe in your brain.”

 
“I don’t know who I’d tell your secrets to, anyway.”

“You might slip up and tell accidental. Somebody might loosen your tongue, like a secret agent does. Maybe that cat lady might pry secrets out your brain using cookies as bait.”

“Why would I tell the cat lady?” The cross the street neighbor cat lady told me stories about growing up on the farm, milking cows, picking peas, and churning butter. She was nice, but she was a
grown up
. As if I’d tell her
secrets
. I was insulted. “I wouldn’t dare tell her or anybody else your secrets.”

“You wear me out. Just get to it.”

I held up my right hand. “Okay, I swear.”

“No, you got to say it all out.”

“I don’t get why it makes a difference.”

She rolled her eyes. “For ever-thing on earth’s sake you are stubborn.”

“All right; all right. I double dog damn swear.”

“Now you got to swear on a head you love the most. I swear on my mama’s head.”

“But I just double sweared. Isn’t that enough?”

“Why you got to make a fuss out of ever-thing in the wide world?”

I sighed big and loud, just to show her I thought it was stupid, but I’d do it anyway. “I swear on my mother’s head.” I changed my mind. “Wait; can I swear on my grandmother’s head?”

“Uh huh. If that’s a head you love.”

“I swear on Nonna’s head.” I missed Grandmother Rosetta so much, I thought I couldn’t stand it. She smelled like paint and paint thinner, mixed in with vanilla and honey shampoo. Whenever I visited her, we’d paint her burning barns. She showed me how to make pottery on her pottery wheel. She could cook things most people bought in the store, like her own pasta, and at Christmas, we’d bake anise cookies. After we mixed up the flour, butter, and other ingredients, we’d roll the cookie dough into long snake shapes, then we’d flatten the snakes out, and cut them into slanted pieces. While the cookies baked and we rolled and sliced the next batch, Grandmother Rosetta told me stories about
Italy
until I thought I’d die if I couldn’t go there. She said one day she’d take me, but Mother said I had to lose ten pounds first, since, she said, I was sure to gain ten pounds once I got around my father’s relatives.


Yoo hoo
. Lissa’s talking inside her head again.”

With my thighs spread across Whale Back Rock, I picked at the moss with my fingernail. “No, I’m not.”

“Are, too. Eyes looking inside instead of outside. I set here and watched.”

“I was thinking about my grandmother. I miss her a lot.”

“Is she dead?”

“No! She lives in
California
. She just hasn’t visited us in a long time.”

“How come?”

“For one, we move a lot. For another, my mother and grandmother sometimes don’t agree on things.”

“Well, huh.”

“But she’s coming in October. I can’t wait.”

“My grandpaw said my grandmaw run off to
Mexico
, never to be seen again.”

“Wow. All the way to
Mexico
. Nonna’s taking me to
Italy
.”

“I would go to
Mexico
one day and find Grandmaw, but not without Mama.”

“Your mother can take you, can’t she?”

“You ready for me to show you something inneresting or keep blabbing?”

“I don’t see why we can’t do both.”

Her face pinched in. “No talking, for frog’s sake.”

“For what’s sake?”

“Lissa, I am getting the nerves bad, dammit all.”

I laughed with my hand covering my mouth.

“You are a stinker.” She grinned.

I said, “How about we pinky swear?”

“Pinky what?”

“Pinky swear. We hook pinkies and that makes the promise stronger.”

“Well, I’ll be.”

I hooked my pinky around hers, the one that wasn’t still a bit scabby from the jungle gym. I said, “Now, we make the promise.”

“This here day we double dog damned sweared to keep our secrets secret, so it cannot be unsweared.”

“Our secrets secret, forever and a day.” I shook our pinkies like shaking hands, then let go. “Okay, tell me.” I leaned towards her.

“I got to do one last thing.”

“What now?”

“You are bothersome as fleas biting. Just hush.” She put her hands together as if she was praying, closed her eyes for two seconds, and then opened them. She looked off in the distance. “Mountain Spirit, you can see me even if I cannot see you. You got magic and your own secret ways. I am asking you to take away my pain. Fly it out to the wind and beyond.” She looked at me without smiling, put the pinky she’d caught on the jungle gym bar flat on the rock, and asked, “Ready rock steady?”

“Ready rock steady for what?”

She wiggled the finger. “Get up and stomp on it with all you got.”

I stared at her. “What?”

“Stomp on my finger, Loosey Goosey. That’s a inneresting thing I got to show you.”

“Are you nuts?”

 
“Come on. Stomp hellfire out of it.” She said hellfire like hell far. “It will not hurt me. I have special powers.”

I pushed up my glasses, crossed my arms over my chest. “No. I’m not going to.”

“Are you a scaredy cat?”

“I’m not s-scared. I just don’t want to stomp your f-finger. It’s m-m-mean.”

“Why you bumping on your words? Means you’re scared.” She scrambled over the side of Whale Back, picked up a rock the size of my palm, and climbed back up. “Watch, Miss Fussy Britches.” She tossed the rock and caught it, tossed and caught it. “What I got to show you is a wonderment.”

I
was
scared to see what she’d do. My head spun around and I thought maybe I wanted to go lie down.

She raised the rock.

“Wait!”

She looked full into my eyes. Her cat’s eye marble eyes flickered with a strange light, like the sun was in the pupils.

“What’re you going to do, Sweetie?”

She whispered with a graveled voice, “Secret magic.”

I looked away from her strange eyes and to the rock in her hand.

She raised the rock. “I am magical from the mountain spirit!” Down whooshed the rock. There was a nasty crunch sound and a scream tore out of my throat, hurting it all over again. She laughed, her head thrown back so far her throat showed white. She wiped her eyes, and said, “You should see your face, Lissa! You look like a scalded cat.”

I climbed off the big rock and ran down the trail, with Sweetie after me calling out, “Lissa! It don’t hurt a bit. Come back here.”

But I didn’t want to go back. Everything was weird. She was weird. Her eyes that turned fiery, her scars from who knew what kind of hurts, the pinky worm in the jungle gym then her smashing that same pinky with the rock.

BOOK: Kathryn Magendie
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