Nekomah Creek (22 page)

“No, Mom, you can’t. Please!” I was on my knees now. “It was so awful last week when Mrs. Van Gent came. If she finds the house like this again, and then if she gets the idea you’re not here because you guys are fighting …”

Mom and Dad turned from each other and stared at me.

“Robby, what is it?” Dad said.

Concerned Looks! For once I was glad.

Mom pulled me up. “Honey, try to calm down.”

“I can’t.” I was ready to cry. “I can’t because—you guys just don’t understand. This is our last chance. If you can’t show that counselor we’ve got a good home, they might—” My dumb voice trailed off to a squeak … I gulped hard. “They might ship us kids off to some stupid foster home!”

“What kids?” Dad said.

“Us! Me and Lucy and Freddie!” Then it all came pouring out. About Amber being put in a foster home, about me worrying the counselor
thought our family was strange. How Dad had been doing such a super job of proving it.

“And Mom,” I said, “remember when we were goofing off right before Mrs. Van Gent showed up last week? You said yourself about police officers at the emergency room and all that.”

“Oh, Honey, I was just kidding. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“And what about that stuff on TV, Dad? All those people trying to get their kids back?”

“But that hasn’t got anything to do with you.”

“Well, it might if we’re not careful. I don’t want to be sitting in some stranger’s house, watching you and Mom on TV crying to all those government people about losing us.”

Dad and Mom gave each other sad, guilty looks. This sure had put a lid on the house-cleaning fight.

“Robby,” Dad said, “I don’t know why those people lost their kids, but I
do
know that’s not going to happen to you.”

I sniffed. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. This is a happy family, isn’t it? Aren’t you happy?”

“Well, I was. Before all this.”

“When kids get sent to foster homes, it’s because their parents aren’t taking care of them. We take care of you, don’t we?”

I nodded.

“We’re talking about parents who may even be beating up on their kids.”

I cringed. I didn’t even want to think about that.

“You know,” Mom said, “Amber’s parents must have been incredibly young when they got married. They’re still just like kids themselves.”

“Maybe if they do some growing up,” Dad said, “she can come back. In the meantime, she’s probably better off with someone else.”

“But Dad, that’s just how
you
are. Even Mom’s always saying you’re just like a kid.”

“Oh, but Honey, that’s different,” Mom said. “It’s okay to be like a kid when it comes to having fun.”

“It is?”

“Sure. Just as long as you act grown up about the grown-up stuff. See what I mean?”

“I guess so.” I wiped my hand across my eyes to catch a couple of tears that had sneaked out. “But you know what? I was so scared when I talked to the counselor that … well, I lied. I told her Dad was getting a job. They don’t like it when dads are unemployed.”

“Oh, Robby,” Dad said, “I think you misunderstood. They’re just hoping all the families have enough money to take care of their kids right. They probably don’t realize I’m staying home for a couple of years because I want to.”

“Well, I tried to tell Mrs. Van Gent that, but she doesn’t believe me.”

“I’d be glad to talk to her, if it’ll make you feel better.”

I nodded, and right then I had kind of a weird, guilty thought. “You know what, Dad? Sometimes I kinda wish you
did
go off to a job. Just to be like other dads.”

“Well, I’ll probably go back to teaching in a couple of years.”

“The thing is, Robby,” Mom said, “this is such a precious time for us, having you kids. We don’t want to miss it. We don’t want to be working so hard at our jobs that we wake up one morning and say, ‘Hey, what happened? They all grew up on us!’ ”

“That’s right,” Dad said. “I won’t get another chance to be a daddy. That’s the main thing I don’t want to blow. Even if we do go into debt.”

“What do you mean, go into debt?” Mom said. “We’re going to make a fortune in greeting cards!”

“Right!” Dad said. “So. Robby, are we clear on this? That you don’t have to worry about being taken away?”

“Well … if you say so.” I let out a huge sigh. Then I looked around the room again. “But Dad? Even if she isn’t going to ship me to a foster home, could we still try to make things nice for Mrs. Van Gent, just so that, you know, we won’t feel so … embarrassed?”

“I’m all for that,” Mom said. But she didn’t seem mad at Dad anymore. “Come on, I’ll drive you kids over to Mrs. Lukes’s and your dad and I’ll get to work.”

“No way,” I said. “I’m staying right here. You guys need all the help you can get.”

“So what are we waiting for?” Dad said. As Mom herded the little guys toward the door, he put on the zippiest record we have and started throwing pillows here, tossing toys there. I pitched in at breakneck speed, filling a wastebasket with half-eaten snacks and trashed junk mail.

Zydeco housekeeping!

  21  

Well, Dad was right about the kerosene lamps. In the soft glow that lit the room, Mrs. Van Gent would never notice that he’d decided to skip dusting in favor of giving me table-waiting lessons. And she’d never guess that behind every closet door was an avalanche of stuff waiting to bury anybody thinking to be tidy and hang up their coat.

Or anybody thinking to spy.

Right on the dot of seven the doorbell rang.

I hung back while Mom opened the door. Mrs. Van Gent was standing there in her trench coat, her husband beside her. I saw her eyes flick past Mom, a quick once-over of the house.

“Mrs. Van Gent,” Mom said. “Come on in.”

“Oh, please, call me Heidi.”

Heidi? Whoever heard of a spy named Heidi?

“Well,” she said, stepping inside. She looked relieved. “This is my husband, Steve.”

Mom nodded at him. “Dr. Van Gent.” He was a dentist, see.

“No, Heidi’s right. Make it Steve.” He smiled. Big white flashing teeth. Probably helped him get patients.

Dad came out and we all got introduced to each other.

“Here, let me take those.” Mom helped them get out of their coats. She headed for the closet.

“I’ll do it!” I grabbed the coats and detoured to the hall tree.
Whew
. Guess Mom forgot we were on avalanche alert.

Mrs. Van Gent—er, Heidi—shook out her hair. Good grief! It went all the way to her waist. She was wearing a thick white sweater and jeans tucked into tall boots—a lot more relaxed looking than at school.

“Your house is gorgeous!” she said.

I glanced at Dad. He winked.

“I just love what you’ve done with the recycled wood.” She turned to her husband. “Wouldn’t it be fun to redo your waiting room like this? The Country Look is so popular now.”

The Country Look? I thought this was the Picked-Up Look.

“Well, we like it,” Dad said. “It’s home.”

“It’s a
great
home,” I said to Mrs. Van Gent, hoping she’d know I wasn’t just talking woodwork and stained glass.

She nodded without looking at me. “Are the twins here?”

“If the twins were here,” I said, “believe me, you’d know it.”

“Oh, too bad.” She smiled at Mom and Dad. “I’ve heard so much about them, I was really looking forward to seeing them.”

“Well,” Dad said, “I don’t think we’d have a prayer of pulling off a nice dinner with them around.”

They all laughed these funny little heh-heh laughs. Then it was quiet. Dr. Van Gent coughed.
Dad went into his headwaiter act. “Table for two?”

Heh heh. They all looked like they felt silly, pretending this was a restaurant. Dad pulled out a chair for Mrs. Van Gent and seated her at the table he’d set up in front of the wood stove.

“Isn’t this nice?” she said, but watching from the kitchen, I thought she seemed stiff. No wonder. She and her husband couldn’t really talk like in a real restaurant, not with us hearing every word.

Next Dad sent me in with a bottle of wine and a dish towel hung over my arm like he’d showed me.

“From the Nehalem Winery,” I said in my snootiest voice. “Nineteen eighty-eight. A very good year.”

“Sounds fine.” Dr. Van Gent smiled. Those teeth!

Dad had already loosened the cork for me, so I took it off and poured a little in a glass.

“Really the waiter’s supposed to drink this,” I said, “to make sure you don’t swallow any little cork gunkies. But Dad told me not to.” I fixed a meaningful look on Mrs. Van Gent. “My dad would never, ever let any kids drink wine.”

“I’m sure he wouldn’t, Robby.”

“I just wanted you to know. I wanted to make sure you understood that my folks take good care of me.”

Now she really looked puzzled. “Well, of course they do.”

Dad hustled in from the kitchen. “So.” He clapped his hands together and looked from Mrs. Van Gent to her husband. “How’s it going?”

“Oh, fine, fine,” they both said.

“Fine,” Dad said.

“I’m just getting ready to pour the wine,” I told him. “This is the glass with cork gunkies.”

“Oh, well, I’ll take care of that.” Dad picked up the glass and drank. “Say, I’ve tasted some cork gunkies in my time, but these are truly outstanding!”

“Da-ad!” I poured wine in the other two glasses. “You’re supposed to sniff it,” I told Dr. Van Gent.

“Whatever you say.” He sniffed. “Smells okay to me.”

Pretty clear this guy didn’t take his wine too seriously. I glanced at Dad. That was fine with him.

He passed his own glass under his nose and breathed deep. “Ah! Such a wonderful bouquet. Playful, yet dignified. Unself-conscious and yet somehow … silly.”

“You’re
silly!” I said. “Mo-om? Dad’s getting goofy again!”

Mrs. Van Gent’s elbow was on the table, her hand covering her face. When she took it away I could see she was grinning. She looked at Dad.

“Wouldn’t you just like to forget this romantic-dinner-for-two business and join us?”

Dad put his hand on his chest. “Who, me?” He
looked around like maybe she was talking to somebody else.