Natalie Wants a Puppy (7 page)

I can still hear Samuel crying all the way through my bedroom door. I am crying too. Only nobody cares about that.

Except for Puppy 24. She hops on my bed and licks up my face.

“Percy ran away, Puppy. He thinks I love you and not him. Only that’s a lying thing. I love both of you!” I know this is for true. I know that adding Puppy made me love both of them more. “Adding means
more
!” I tell Puppy. “Not
less
!”

I put my face on Puppy’s back and cry. Only inside I’m asking God,
Please bring my kitty back.

Puppy squirms away. She hops off my bed and runs across my room. Her toenails
click, click.
She slips and bumps into my closet.

“Puppy! Come back!” I need her to be with me.

She doesn’t come back. She keeps
scratch, scratch, scratching
at my closet.

My bedroom door opens. In come Mommy and Daddy and Granny.

“Nat, we’re sorry,” Mommy says. “Let’s go look for Percy. Okay?”

I am crying very hard now. Mom sits next to me
and puts her arm around me. Daddy sits on the other side and puts his arm around me.

“Percy will be okay, Nat,” Daddy says.

“I…love…Percy!” I say between cryings.

“Percy knows that,” Daddy says.

“No he doesn’t! He thinks I love him less ‘cause of Puppy. But I love him
more!”
I feel arms tighten around me.

“Do you know
we
love
you
more than ever, Nat?” Mommy asks.

I don’t answer. But I am doing very hard thinking.

“Now we get to love Nat the Daughter and Nat the Big Sister,” Daddy says.

It feels good to be hugged on both sides of me. And I know I’m feeling that thing inside me that goes by the name of love.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Granny says. “But why is that dog scratching up your closet?”

I slide off my bed and go to Puppy 24. “Come here, Puppy.”

Puppy gives me a smiley face. Then she goes back to scratching.

Granny walks over to the closet. “I wonder…” She opens it just a crack. And out comes Percy.

“Percy! You’re here!” I pull Percy onto my lap. “You didn’t run away!”

Puppy’s tail is wagging very fast. She tiptoes up to Percy. I wait for my cat to run out of the room like he did a gazillion times.

Only he doesn’t. He stands up in my lap. But he doesn’t spit. Puppy moves in closer. Percy holds very still. Then they touch noses.

“Well, I’ll be,” Granny says.

“They love each other!” I shout.

Percy prances off my lap. Then he strolls to my bed, jumps up, and curls into a curly ball.

I love that Percy.

Saturday, there is more hurrying in my house than on going-to-church days.

Granny drives us to school in Charley the Chevy. Mom and Dad and Samuel ride in the backseat together. Only it feels okay now.

We walk into the gym, and it is filled with noisiness. I help Mom and Dad and Granny get seats in the way back, in case Samuel turns into a crying baby. Then I go sit with my kindergarten class on our stage.

Laurie has a saved seat for me. “Is that your new baby brother?” she asks, full of excitement.

“Yep.” I am a little full of excitement too. “You want to meet him after this?”

“Yeah! What’s his name?” Laurie asks.

I start to answer. But Miss Hines walks to the
middle of stage, and everybody gets quiet.

“Welcome to our kindergarten graduation!” she shouts. People clap like crazy. Jason
whoops.
Miss Hines goes on to say a bunch of nice things about us. Then she asks her big question. “Class, what’s the most important thing you learned this year?”

Katelyn has to go to the mike first. “Reading,” she says. Then she sits down.

The next four kids copycat and say “reading” too.

When it’s Jason’s turn, he shouts, “I learned not to eat hot lunch on Fridays!”

Laurie goes after Jason. “I learned that it’s okay to read at your own speed.”

I think this is a great answer.

Farah smiles at Laurie and me before she goes to the mike. “I learned about friendship,” she says.

Laurie and I cheer.

Peter says he learned he was “Peter-the-Even-Greater-Than-I-Thought-I-Was.”

Sasha’s answer is the longest: “I knew most of the things the other kids had to learn in kindergarten. So the best thing I learned was that I’m really good in math. And reading.”

I’m still thinking up my answer when I hear Miss Hines call my name.

“Your turn!” Laurie says, pushing me to get up.

It feels like a long way to the mike. I peek into the crowd and see Granny. And Mommy and Daddy. And Samuel.

When I get to the middle of the stage, Miss Hines asks what she’s asked every kid up here. “What did
you
learn this year?”

I don’t answer. On account of I don’t know what to say still. Chairs squeak behind me. Chairs squeak on the gym floor.

I know I should say something. Inside, I’m asking God what to say. Then the asking turns into thanking.
Thanks for kindergarten, God.
And I mean this. I liked kindergarten.

“Natalie?” Miss Hines says. “Can you tell us what you’ve learned?”

“I learned about adding,” I begin.

“That’s fine,” Miss Hines says.

Only I’m not done yet. “I learned that I don’t like subtracting much.” Everybody in the gym is a little laughing. “But adding can be a very good thing in life. And I know this for true, on account of at my house, we just added my brother. That’s what!”

Everybody claps. And claps even more. So I take a bow.

Miss Hines is laughing and clapping at the same time. “That’s wonderful, Natalie. Want to tell us your brother’s name?”

“Samuel,” I answer. Only that name isn’t fancy enough for my brother. I know that now. “Samuel 24.”

We finish being graduated. I go back and sit next to Granny.

“I thought that name needed a little something,” Granny says.

“Samuel 24 told me he wants his big sister to hold him,” Mommy says.

“I’d like to,” I say.

Mommy puts Samuel 24 in my lap. He fits. I give him a smiley face, and he gives me a smiley face back.

And guess what. I think I’m going to like being Not-Only-Natalie.

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