Rattled (3 page)

I must have watched Megan and Sam make a half a dozen trips to that van while I stood there chewing on a hangnail, safely hidden behind a curtain panel. They were working so hard, I almost thought that maybe I should go over and offer to help.

“Don't dilly-dally!” Mrs. Swicker hollered from the front step. “Sam, just get your violin. Megan can finish up. You should be practising.”

I saw Sam grab his violin case and go back inside.

A few minutes later, the faint sound of violin drifted in through my open window. It was beautiful. I could almost swear it was coming from a CD.

I got a little overzealous in my hangnail chewing and had to grab a Kleenex to wrap up my bleeding finger. I didn't want to leave the window to get a Band-Aid, I was too worried I might miss something. Good thing. It was Mrs. Swicker. She was carrying a box and heading towards their green bin against the side of the house.

My room was on the second floor, so I had a pretty good view of their whole yard. Mrs. Swicker set the box down in front of the green bin, glanced at our house, and checked behind her over one shoulder, then the other. Seemingly satisfied no one was watching, she bent down and lifted something out of the box.

I gasped. That was Mom's blue cake plate. That was Mom's cake!

Mrs. Swicker opened the lid and slid the cake in.

I don't know if I was more stunned or offended. I wanted to scream across the street, “Hey, you ungrateful troll!” But then what? I wanted to call Mom and Jilly to the window, but I knew it was too late, they'd already missed it. I could
tell
them what happened. Jilly might believe me. Mom would probably say something like I just
thought
I saw the cake, it could have been
anything
. Not to mention, she would consider all this to fall under the heading of jumping to conclusions. It was a lose-lose situation, so I did nothing.

I continued to stare across the street for a long time after the action died down. I got the distinct feeling this wasn't going to be the last time I would do this—stare across the street at the Swickers'.

Chapter 3

I
t had been a few days, and I was still wondering if I should have told anyone about what I saw in the driveway, about the dumping of the cake.
Might be kind of interesting when
Mrs. Swicker decides to return the plate, though. I'll definitely
have to make sure I'm home for that one.

More days passed, and still no sign of the cake plate. I can't explain it, but for some reason I was feeling very territorial about Mom's plate. It was turning into an obsession.

In the meantime, I managed to spend a bit of time with Sam and Megan. I was curious about them, wanted to get to know them. It was all small talk at first, mostly just speaking to each other from across the street. Like, “Is it hot enough for ya?” “Are you all unpacked?” “Is your cable working yet?” That kind of thing.

There was a basketball hoop mounted over their garage door, so one day I brought them over an extra basketball we had in our shed. Sam was grateful, and spent a lot of time shooting hoops. Sometimes I'd play with him, sometimes I'd lean against the stone wall with Megan, yak, and just watch. Yeah…the watching was good.

The bonus was it made Jilly mental. She wasn't so smug about her great job now. She was missing all these chances to be around Sam. I
did
notice she was suddenly a health nut—taking the Darcy kids for walks, biking, all right in front of our house.

“Uh…Jilly? You should take them biking over on Lynwood, it's perfectly flat,” I suggested one afternoon.

“No. This is fine,” she replied, twisting a piece of hair around her finger, eyes glued to Sam.

I raised my eyebrows and stared down the massively steep hill that was our street.

The Darcy kids were staring down it too, worried looks on their faces.

I discovered Sam and Megan both loved to read. So did I. We talked about books we liked and didn't like, books made into movies, and books that
should
be made into movies. I had the exact same opinions as Sam—go figure. It was obvious they travelled a lot, just from things they said. I found out they were originally from San Diego. But they never mentioned their father, and I didn't feel right asking.

Even as I was learning all these little tidbits about them, the cake plate was never far from my mind. So many times I wanted to say, “So…how was the coffee cake?” I didn't know if they knew the fate of the cake. They must have wondered what happened to it, though. Either way, it would be awkward. And anyhow, Mrs. Swicker always seemed to be around or would appear whenever we struck up a conversation that lasted more than five minutes. I've never seen anyone so dedicated to weeding the garden. If I didn't know better, I'd say she planted new weeds in the dead of night just so she could take them out the next day while she eavesdropped. I knew she was listening to every word we said.

Loads of times, I invited Sam and Megan to hang out at my place. Mrs. Swicker always said no, they had stuff to do. It made me nuts.

Between this mysterious
stuff
, and the cake plate, it was like I couldn't think of anything else. My mind wouldn't shut off at night. Every morning it felt like I'd slept for maybe two minutes and this morning was no different.

I finished making my bed and went down to the kitchen.

“Dad! You're back.”

“Hi, Pumpkin. Got in late last night.” He stood at the stove stirring a frying pan full of eggs. “Want some breakfast?”

“Did you put Tabasco in there?”

“Of course!”

“Uh…no thanks.” You'd think after fifteen years, he'd catch on that he's the only one who likes a half a bottle of hot sauce in scrambled eggs. “So how was your conference?”

“Great! Nothing says fun like a convention of dermatologists,” he chuckled.

I shook my head as he stood there in his Heineken T-shirt, boxers, and slippers with sport socks pulled up to his knees.

“I hear we got some new neighbours,” he said.

“Yup.”

“According to your mother, the young man's quite a ‘hottie.'”

“Ewww, Dad!”

“What? Am I not hip to your jive?”

“Dad! Stop!” It was like fingernails down a chalkboard.

Dad rolled his eyes. “So what do we know about these people?”

“Not a lot. The mother's kind of…well…too hard to describe. The parents must be divorced or something. The kids are nice. They're kind of quiet, though. But anytime we get talking or I ask them a question,
poof
, there's Mrs. Swicker, sticking her nose in.”

“Maybe she's just the overprotective type.”

I didn't comment.

“You'll just have to win over this Mrs. Swicker. You know, kill her with kindness.”

“I dunno…”

“Where's your sister? I haven't seen her this morning.”

“She slept over at Ellen's. She was going to the Darcys' from there.”

“Oh?”

“It's okay. Phase One of her grounding ended yesterday.”

Dad nodded but didn't look very pleased.

A few weeks before, Jilly had gone to an end of exams bash. It had been the party all future parties would be compared to. The number of groundings that were handed out the morning after broke a new neighbourhood record. Vicki, William, and I actually managed to crash the party for all of twelve minutes. That was until some of Jilly's friends spotted us. We weren't officially in high school yet, so there was no way we were allowed to stay. The party thrower and quarterback of the West football team immediately escorted us to the door.

Then later that night, Vicki's dad had been out walking the dog and found Jilly, arms wrapped around the stop sign, puking her guts out. He brought her home. Man, I would have donated a kidney to have been awake for that one—you can't put a price on entertainment like that.

“What's Phase Two again?” Dad asked.

“Hour off the curfew. Then comes probation, then maintenance.” If I didn't know better, I'd think Mom consulted Weight Watchers when she developed her punishment pyramid. Come to think of it, she
is
a lifetime member.

“Must keep an eye on that girl,” Dad said to himself, then looked at me. “So…speaking of summer jobs…”

I narrowed my eyes. “We weren't.”

“Mom said you're bored, might be looking for work.”

“Ummm.”

“I'll need someone when Kelley goes on vacation. It would just be answering phones, taking appointments, that kind of thing.”

I tugged on my lower lip, trying to think of a response. I had kind of always hoped when I landed a summer job it would be a bit more glamorous, not working in my dad's dermatology clinic where the only boys I'd meet would, let's face it, have complexion issues.

“I thought I might check up at Northcliff Tennis Club.” I'd always thought that would be sort of a glam place to work.

“Well, Pumpkin…you don't play tennis,” he said gently.

“There's always Kearney Lake. They might need lifeguards.” Another awesomely glam job.

“I think you have to have lifeguard training,” he pointed out.

“Right,” I nodded. I was running out of glamorous job options. “Okay, Dad. Guess I'm your girl.”

He beamed. “Great! You can make your own schedule, a couple mornings, maybe an afternoon, still lots of time to do your own thing.”

That wouldn't be so bad. And I
was
going to be needing a whole new wardrobe for starting high school. I should have been grateful. “Thanks, Dad. I'm psyched.”

Chapter 4

I
kept Dad company while he ate his eggs. I tried not to laugh when he gasped for water on the last bite.

“Too much salt,” he puffed, slamming his empty glass down on the counter. He'd burst into flames before he'd admit he made the eggs too hot.

“Sure, Dad,” I smirked. “Where's Mom?”

He flipped open the dishwasher. “She forgot it was Nana Mary's birthday, so she's out in the driveway spray-painting some old planters. She's going to throw in some plants from the garden, pass them off as new. Is it any wonder I love that woman?”

I smiled. Dad totally cracked me up.

I went outside to check on Mom's progress. “Those look great!”

“Thanks. Let's face it, she's ninety-six, she probably won't even be able to see them clearly.”

I heard the smack of the basketball hitting the pavement and looked up. Sam and Megan were playing one-on-one. I waved and walked over.

“Hey. Who's winning?”

“Me, for once,” Megan said, pushing the hair out of her eyes.

“I'm letting her,” Sam whispered.

“Sam.” Mrs. Swicker magically appeared, as usual. “I told you, I'm not too crazy about you playing so much basketball. Your hands, your fingers. Maybe you should just return the ball to Lydia.”

“Good morning, Bernadette!” Mom yelled from across the street.

Mrs. Swicker jumped, startled. “Oh, hello, Justine.” She gave a weak wave.

Mom dusted off her hands and joined us in the driveway. “All settled in now?”

“Yes, thank you,” Mrs. Swicker answered stiffly.

I sensed there was some kind of shift, something had changed. A tiny voice in my head urged me to invite Sam and Megan over,
again
. I knew I should be taking advantage of the fact that Jilly was babysitting all the time. I could have Sam all to myself. Oh, and Megan too. I stepped around Mrs. Swicker. “You guys want to come over and play some Ping-Pong?”

“Can we, Mom?” Sam asked.

Mrs. Swicker's eyes darted around the circle of people awaiting her answer. “Fine. Just for a while.”

Miracle of miracles. You could have knocked me over with a feather. It took me a second to put it all together, but the shift was that Mom was there. I think Mrs. Swicker didn't want to say no in front of her.