Katy Kelly_Lucy Rose 01 (10 page)

Today I got a package from my dad and I took it to my room so I could open it in privacy and it is exactly the thing I need.

Since it's the last day of the year Jonique and Melonhead and I all walked to school together without
any parents because that is one thing you can do when you are a fourth grader which we practically are. Jonique brought Mr. Welsh zucchini bread that was made by herself and Mrs. McBee, and Melonhead brought him a $10 gift card from the Politics and Prose bookstore and I brought a red bag but I was not wanting to tell what's in it until later.

At school we ate donuts and we packed up our lockers and got our report cards and was I ever surprised because Mrs. Washburn wrote the comment of “Reading and classroom behavior are much improved.”

Then at the last minute of the last day, I gave Mr. Welsh the red bag and a card made by me. And this is what the card said:

Dear Mr. Welsh,

This is for you. You don't have to eat it.

Love,

Lucy Rose

And he gave me an oddball look and reached right in and got out his present which was a
baseball cap that has the Ann Arbor Aardvarks team on the front of it.

“I love it,” Mr. Welsh said and he tried it on. And it fit perfectly.

“It came by FedEx,” I told him.

“It's from my dad's school.”

“You know, I've been needing a hat,” he said.

“I figured that out,” I told him.“I'm glad your year got better, Lucy Rose,” Mr. Welsh said.

“First it got better and then it got mostly good and now it's pretty great, actually.”

“Do you still want to go back to Ann Arbor?” Mr. Welsh asked me.

“For visiting,” I told him. “But not for keeps.”

I was almost asleep when I thought of something and I got up and ran down to the kitchen and I turned on the computer and I typed a new e-mail and here is what it said: “Dear Lucy Rose, Thank you for all the advice. Signed, The Person Who Has Your Same Name.”

And the answer came back right away: “Dear Person Who Has My Same Name, Was I any help? Love, Madam.”

“Sometimes,” I wrote back.

“Did you always know it was me?”

“Yes,” Madam wrote.

“How?” I asked her back.“How could I not?” she said. “You are my dear Lucy Rose.”

That gave me a good feeling.“And,” she said, “I know your and your mom's e-mail address.”

I had never thought of that.

This morning my mom and I had a fruit plate breakfast at Jimmy T's for the first Sunday of summer and on the walk home my mom held my hand and she said, “A lot has changed in one year, hasn't it?”

“Yep,” I said. “For one thing, I used to be a suburb girl. Now I'm a city girl.”

“That's true,” my mom said.

“And I like it,” I said.

“I'm glad,” she told me.

“And I made a true friend,” I said.

“That's very valuable,” my mom said.

“And I made a friend from my enemy,” I said.

“That's quite important,” she told me.

“And I learned about telling the truth.”

“Extremely important,” my mom said.

“And I figured out that sometimes things that seem bad work out okay,” I said.

“Like Daddy and me being separated?” she asked me.

“Exactly like that,” I said.

Then we walked for a block and I remembered some more things. “I learned to e-mail,” I said.

“That's useful,” my mom told me.

“And to sing most of the songs from
The Music Man
.”

“That's entertaining,” my mom said to me.

“And to refinish,” I said.“

Lucky for me,” she said.“And to be responsible, at least when I am taking care of a guinea pig,” I told her.

“And I learned to like a guinea pig,” my mom said.

“That's important,” I told her.

Then she said, “You should be proud of yourself, Lucy Rose.”

And I said, “I am one person who agrees with that.”

Tonight we had a cookout in Madam and Pop's backyard and Mrs. McBee brought green Jell-O salad with baby marshmallows to go with Madam's soyburgers and Mrs. Melon brought corn on the cob and my mom brought the greatest thing which was chicken fingers. We all had sidewalk sundaes even the grown-ups and Mr. McBee went wild with the hose afterwards and when it was all dark and we were sitting on the porch watching for fireflies Pop told Melonhead, “I have a good summer job for you.”

And Melonhead said, “What is it?”

And Pop said, “We need to clean the chimney and the only way I can think to do that is to tie a rope around a small boy's ankles and lower him down from the roof.”

And Melonhead said, “All right!”

And then Madam looked at Pop with those Madam eyes she has and we all laughed our heads off except for Mrs. Melon who only laughed a little.

When the McBees were leaving, Jonique and I made a deal that we would go straight to the Parks & Rec center the first minute it opens for summer so I could learn to make a gimp key chain for my mom's birthday and Jonique could make a pot holder because she always has wanted to.

And then, while we were waving goodbye to the McBees, Melonhead reached in his pocket and pulled out a little piece of paper and gave it to me and he said, “This is a present for you and your grandmother.”

We looked at it and it said: MADAM I'M ADAM.

I was thinking it was one crummy present but Madam was smiling like crazy.

“Read it backwards,” Melonhead said.

I did and I couldn't believe it.

Excerpt copyright © 2005 by Katy Kelly

Published by Delacorte Press

an imprint of Random House Children's Books

a division of Random House, Inc.

92 is a lot of days. That is how many we have from the end of 3rd grade which was yesterday until the beginning of 4th grade which is on September 1. I know it is 92 days because I counted them on my Shiralee's Beauty Spot calendar. My grandmother who is named Glamma and lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan, sent it to me in the mail in a big brown envelope that said Lucy Rose Reilly, Queen of Capitol Hill and Washington, D.C., and also had sparkling rose stickers on it. Anybody who is not an absolute infant could tell that I am not a queen, but Glamma likes to act royally and so do I. She got the calendar for free because Shiralee is her sister and also the owner of the Beauty Spot. It came with a card that said: “Dear Lucy Rose, Put your plans on this. Love, Glam. P.S. I already marked one V.I.D. That means Very Important Date.”

I wrote a thank-you note that instant because my other grandmother, that is also named Lucy Rose only I call her Madam, says that whenever I get a present I have to write a letter right away that very day if I'm going to have any manners at all. I pay attention to that recommendation because Madam is one who knows an extremely lot about living plus she is the writer of a newspaper column that tells people what to do if they have the kind of kids who won't behave.

Here's what I said: “Dear Glamma. Thank you! I needed a calendar like mad because one thing I am big on is plans even though at this minute I only have 3. Love, Lucy Rose.”

One of those plans is to write down what happens in my almost never boring life in this journal that my grandfather who is called Pop gave me for an end-of-school present which I seriously needed because I already filled up the 2 books he gave me last year. When I got this one I said, “Yippee-yi-yo, cowgirl! This book is a beaut.”

And it is because it has a swirl design that's the
same as on my cowgirl boots. Plus it's red and they are too.

Here is what Pop said to me: “A beaut for a beaut.”

My second plan is to go to Parks & Rec with my greatest friend who is Jonique McBee, and make a lanyard key chain out of Gimp for my mom's birthday that's on July 13 while Jonique makes a pot holder out of stretchy circle things for her mother only she is making hers just for love because Mrs. McBee's birthday doesn't come until January. I do not want to make a pot holder because I have done it before and most of the time just when you are getting finished with the weaving, it pops off of the pokey plastic thing and you can't get it back on no matter what you try. Plus I have never seen one of those pot holders that is not ugly but I am not telling that to Jonique because that would be rude which is one thing I am not.

I wrote PARKS & REC OPENS on the square of Monday, June the 8th, which is the Beauty Spot
month for getting Carefree Hair which I already have. July is for Permanent Curls which are another thing I got automatically when I was born. August is when you're supposed to Get Romantic Hair, which I don't have and don't want. It's also where I found giant letters that say: “LUCY ROSE'S 9th BIRTHDAY ADVENTURE WITH DAD!” That is my top V.I.D. for the whole summer.

Jonique and I are feeling desperate for it to be June 8. For now, we are 2 girls waiting, mostly at my grandparents' house. I spend a lot of my days and some of my nights at Madam and Pop's because it's 3 blocks away from my house and because my mom has to go to her job which is being an artist at a TV station and because I can't stay with my dad on account of he lives in Ann Arbor, which is where I lived before we got a separation last summer. Staying at Madam and Pop's house is A-OK because it's usually a pretty hilarious place to be.

My mom, who has the name of Lily, agrees with that because she lived there for her whole childhood with her sisters and brother who are all grown-ups now and live far away. My Aunt Marguerite lives so far away her house is in Japan.

Once I asked Pop, “Are you and Madam rich?”

And he said, “Rich in kids.”

“My mom and dad are not because I'm the only one they've got,” I said.

One extremely excellent thing about my grandparents' house is that there are lots of rooms plus lots of porches and Pop thinks it's fine for kids to climb out the bathroom window and walk across the breezeway roof to pick apricots which is our third big plan once they are ripe. My mom says she gets queasy thinking about it but Pop says not one body has fallen yet and Madam says she needs the apricots.

Another thing about their house is it's old like you can't believe. The ceilings are made of metal called tin that have patterns on them. In my room on my tin ceiling there is a big fan that makes it very breezy and refreshing. My regular room has red
walls and a pink dotty bedspread and a mirror that I love like anything that is covered with jewels that are fake but look real and I made it with my mom and not from a kit, either.

The only not-so-hot thing about staying at my grandparents' is that Madam does not believe in cable TV even if it's the kind that is appropriate for kids and she does believe in health so she is big on soybean foods which are not the best tasting but she is also big on desserts which is pleasing to me and to Jonique.

Here's what happened at my mom's job: One of the other artists had a baby which my mom says is good for the lady and good for us because my mom will make overtime, which means extra work for extra money. “How do you feel about that?” my mom asked me.

“Excellent-O, because I am a fan of money,” I said. “How about we use your overtime to buy a DVD player?”

“How about we fix up the living room instead?” she said.

Which I have to say is a good plan because it needs it.

That idea made us go straight to Frager's Hardware store to get paint sample cards, which you're allowed to take home because they are free. We taped them to the living room wall which right now is a color I call tan and my mom calls depressing. My color cards are Sunset which is orange, Caribbean which looks like toothpaste, and Lemon Meringue that is so yellow my mom says it's electric which I say is a big compliment. I also got Raspberry which is jazzy pink, and Conch Shell which is light pink. My mom's colors are 2 greens called Sage and Celery, Periwinkle which is blue, Cream and Ivory which are dull, and Banana Frappe which is actually the color of butter. “We are going to look at them every day until we know which one is the winner,” I said.

Then my mom had to go to work so we walked to Constitution Avenue and she kissed me and kept walking to Union Station to get the subway
which she says is the greatest thing about city living. I hopped the whole way to Madam and Pop's because I am one person who believes in exercise.