Nekomah Creek (21 page)

“The thing is,” Orin went on, “the teachers think I did it.”

“You couldn’t of,” I said. “You were … you weren’t at the school when it happened.”

“Yeah.” Orin’s face went pink. He couldn’t look me in the eye, remembering about my diorama. “But they caught me with this water pistol, see. It was in Mrs. Perkins’s desk and Nathan must’ve swiped it along with the money. Then he gave it to me.”

“But Cody knows you weren’t at the school.”

“Huh. Cody’s on Nathan’s side. He told them Nathan was at the bridge with him.”

“But that’s a lie!”

Orin snorted. “Great pals, huh?” He threw another rock. “Looks like you’re the only one who knows
I
was at the bridge.”

“Yeah, so?”

“So will you tell them?”

I frowned. “It would just be my word against Cody’s.”

“Yeah, but Robby …” Orin looked at me. “Your word …” He shook his head. “I mean, the teachers would believe you.”

I blinked. Would they?

Orin looked at his feet. “ ’Course I couldn’t blame you for not sticking up for me. Not after what I did …”

His words hung there. I waited for him to come out with it, say he was sorry about my diorama. Then it hit me—this was as close to an apology as Orin knew how to give.

“The thing is, if they call my dad in and tell him I took that money …” He sucked in his breath and opened his eyes real wide, like he needed to blink off tears. “He’ll whip my butt.”

I thought about that. Orin deserved it, maybe not for this, but for every other crummy thing he’d done. I’d been wanting to whip him myself, right? But somehow … well, when I pictured his dad actually doing it, I just got this sick feeling in my stomach.

“So could you—Come on, Robby, will you tell them the truth?” He looked right at me. “Please?”

Funny, for a moment there he reminded me of Freddie when he was watching me fix his Buddy Wabbit. So hopeful, so kind of desperate, like he was really depending on me.

I glanced back up the road. Dad had disappeared around the bend. I still didn’t trust Orin any farther than I could throw him. I’m not stupid. I could get him out of this pickle and he might be making my life miserable again the very next day.

But maybe that didn’t matter. The truth was the truth. Like Dad says, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.

I guess a kid does too.

“I’ll tell them,” I said. “I’ll tell them you were at the bridge with me.”

Now I won’t try to convince you Orin and I became best buddies because of this. I’d be surprised if we ever get to be friends at all. But he did quit giving me a hard time at school, and since the day I stuck up for him in the principal’s office, he has never said one bad thing about my dad.

  20  

“Notice anything different?” Rose asked me before school Friday morning.

“About you?”

“Yeah. Something new.”

I finished locking my bike to the stand, stood up, and checked her over.

“Oh. New shoes, huh?”

She nodded, lit up like she was standing there in her own personal sunbeam instead of the gray morning mist. “And that’s not all. I’ve even got some money for books. You know, for Powell’s tomorrow.”

“Oh. Yeah. That’s great.” I didn’t have the heart to tell her the trip to Powell’s might not happen.

Actually, I was having a hard time picturing tomorrow
at all. I was too worried about Dad’s gourmet dinner for Mrs. Van Gent tonight.

Now it’s easy enough to say,
Oh who gives a rip what other people think, I know my dad is great
. But let’s face it—my opinion was not the only one that mattered. This dinner had to be perfect.

“Robby, what’s the matter?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“You look … sad. Aren’t you excited about tomorrow?”

“Sure.” I sighed, thinking. Could I trust her with this? “Rose, you know about Amber Hixon getting sent to a foster home? And your mom thinks it’s so unfair?”

“Well … did I say that?”

I looked at her. “Yes, don’t you remember? You said your mom told you the government took kids just because they didn’t like the way people lived.”

“Yeah …” Her eyes slid away from mine. “But she sort of changed her mind about that. After all, we haven’t been here that long. She didn’t really know the Hixons. When she heard the stories about them, she said the social workers probably did the right thing.”

“What stories?”

Rose lowered her voice so the kids walking by wouldn’t hear. “Mrs. Lukes says they used to ask her to baby-sit for a couple hours and then they
wouldn’t come back for days. One time they’d gone all the way to Las Vegas!”

“You’re kidding.”

“No, really. After a while they quit doing that but it turned out they were just leaving Amber all by herself. All night!”

“Wow, They shouldn’t do that.”

“I know, but they did.”

“It doesn’t make sense, though. Why would parents nice enough to buy a kid a pony be so mean in other ways?”

“Oh, Robby, Amber doesn’t have a pony.”

I looked at her. I thought about the toy pony with the rhinestone bridle. “I guess not.”

“One of my sister’s friends lives next to them. She says Amber makes up all kinds of stories.”

Hard to know what to believe, hard to imagine someone lying so easily. That string of fibs I’d told Mrs. Van Gent had knotted my stomach like a pretzel.

“Wouldn’t you feel kind of sick inside,” I said, “if you told lies all the time like that?”

Rose thought for a moment. “Maybe she doesn’t think of them as lies. Maybe to her they’re more like wishes.”

I looked up at the ridgeline, a jag of treetops sticking out of the fog. I guess my situation and Amber’s weren’t as alike as I’d thought.

“Or maybe she
did
feel sick inside,” I said.

Rose stooped to rub a smudge off one of her new
shoes. “Did I tell you we saw her at the Douglas Bay Safeway?”

“Yeah? How did she look?”

“Fine, really. She was pushing a shopping cart for this lady—I think maybe it was her new foster mother.”

“And she didn’t look miserable?”

“No. At least she didn’t throw herself at our feet going ‘Save me! Save me!’ or anything. She said hi friendly enough.” Rose stood and glanced toward the school building. We were the last kids left outside. “And also, about my mom … well, it was a social worker in Douglas Bay who finally tracked down my dad. Now we should be getting money from him, regular. The first check just came. That’s how I got new shoes. And book money.” She smiled—almost an apology. “So you can see how my mom wouldn’t be so down on social workers anymore.”

I nodded. I was having trouble taking all this in.

“Come on. We’ll be late.” Rose reached the door ahead of me, pulled it open, and looked back. “Are you
sure
Amber wasn’t your girlfriend?”

All I could think about all day was the dinner, even while I played soccer at recess. One thing I’ll say for sports, when you’re too worried to make sense out of the words on a page, you can still run up and down a field. So all the time I was chasing the ball, trying for a good, satisfying kick, I was
worrying about whether or not Dad was right this minute cleaning the house like he was supposed to.

Because even if social workers did help people who really needed it, I still didn’t see how they could be anything but a hassle for us Hummers if they got the wrong idea.

After school I pedaled home as fast as I could and shoved open the front door.

“Wobby! Hi, Wobby!”

I sagged against the doorjamb. A scene straight out of my nightmares—the house a world-class wreck, Freddie and Lucy still going strong.

“Dad!” I dropped my backpack and ran across to the kitchen. “Did you forget? The gourmet dinner’s tonight!”

“Hi, Robby.” He was whistling while he cut up vegetables. “No, I didn’t forget.”

“But the
house
, Dad. You were gonna clean it all up.”

“It’s not too bad, is it?” He went to the edge of the big main room and blinked like somebody just waking up.

Oh, for Pete’s sake! Why waste time even talking to him? I dropped to the floor and started tossing toys into the wicker basket.

Freddie and Lucy started tossing them out.

“Come on, you guys. Please don’t.” If only they understood how serious this was.

Then I heard the truck on the gravel. I ran out onto the porch.

“Mom! Quick! You’ve got to help!”

She slammed the truck door and rushed up the steps, her face white. “What? Tell me! Is somebody hurt?”

“No, no, everyone’s fine. It’s the house, Mom. It’s a wreck!”

She braced herself on the doorjamb, hand over her heart. “Robby, don’t you ever scare me like that again.”

“Sorry,” I said, more miserable than ever.

But then after a deep breath, she walked in and looked around. “Oh, my gosh!” She slapped a hand over her face, then peeked out between spread fingers, maybe hoping she’d got it wrong on the first glance. Nope. Pit City. “Bill!” She aimed herself toward the kitchen.

“Hi, Honey.” Dad wiped his hands on a dish towel, all smiles.

“It’s about this”—Mom pointed, sharp and accusing—“this … trash heap we call our home.”

Dad’s smile got guiltier. He shrugged. “Not much use picking it up until we get the kids out of here, is there?”

She glanced away, then turned back. “Darn it, Bill! This is supposed to be your dinner. You’re going to be busy cooking. You know very well who that leaves to straighten all this up. Yours truly.”

Dad looked offended. “Is that so unfair? I can’t do everything around here by myself, can I?”

Mom sucked in her breath. “Of course not. Not when you’re always so busy being Mr. Fun.”

“Huh?”

Mom glared at him. “Didn’t you ever stop to think that I might be a lot more fun myself if I wasn’t always having to clean up after
your
fun?” She yanked her jacket zipper down. “You
promised
to do this and you’ve been putting it off for days. Every time I mentioned it you acted like, oh, don’t be a nag.”

I threw myself on the sofa and pulled a pillow over my head. This was great. Not only would Mrs. Van Gent see our house messy, she’d also find my folks yelling at each other.

“Now wait a minute,” Dad said. “I never called you a nag.”

“Well, you rolled your eyes. You made me feel like one.”

“Hey, I can’t be responsible for the way you interpret my eyeballs every time they twitch!”

“I must have been out of my mind,” Mom said, “trusting you’d have this place shoveled out by the time I got home.” She pulled her jacket zipper back up. “I have half a mind to just walk out and let you stew in your own juice!”

I pulled away my pillow and rolled off the sofa at Mom’s feet. “No, Mom, don’t!”

“Don’t worry, Robby. Mom’s not going anywhere.”
Dad aimed his best apologizing smile at her.

Mom wasn’t having any of it. “Don’t you
dare
try to cute your way out of this.”

“Oh look, the food’ll be so good nobody’ll even notice what the—”

“And don’t give me that either! Anyone with eyes can see this is a pigpen! Maybe I should just bundle up the kids and take them all to Burger King.”