Seeing Orange (5 page)

At our next class, I show Pamela my drawing. “What
are the colored things?” she asks.

“Bits of plastic,” I tell her. “That neon-orange thing
is a Play-Doh lid. That's the handle of an old beach
shovel, and that's the top from a peanut-butter jar.
I don't like them.”

“Why?”

“Because they don't move. They don't change. They just…” I can't find the right words.

“They stand out,” Pamela says. “Plastic is stubborn. It's kind of selfish, isn't it? It doesn't really join the world.”

“Yeah! That's what I feel!” I say.

“I know,” Pamela says. “Your drawing showed me.”

Mr. Carling moves between the desks on crutches. We're supposed to be writing about rain. Angela's hand moves across her page so quickly, it's as though her fingers
tell
the page her story. I write:
Rain knocks
the last leaves from the trees. Puddles are mirrors.

“You'll have to stay in for a while,” Mr. Carling sighs when he sees my story.

I sigh too. But then Delilah growls, and I start to feel hot. My heart pounds in my head. I'm angry. Really angry. This must be what Mom calls
seeing
red
. I can't see anything, just red air.

The recess bell rings, and everyone leaves except me. Mr. Carling stays at his desk. I look at him for a long time, the way I looked at the fireplace and the cobwebs under the stairs. I see him. He's like a little bird, half busy, half nervous.

“Are you mad at me because you hurt your foot?” I ask.

Mr. Carling looks up. He raises his eyebrows. “I
was
,” he says. “But it was mostly my fault. I'm clumsy on rough ground.”

“I like rough ground,” I say.

“I like to stick to the path.”

“I like it
off
the path,” I say. “I love the woods. Almost as much as I love drawing—”

“And daydreaming?”

Delilah growls and bares her teeth.

“I don't daydream,” I say. “I think about stuff.”

“Listen, Leland. You're at school to learn,” Mr. Carling says. “You have lots of time to play and daydream, or
think
, before and after school, all evening and all weekend. You only need to be on the path during the school day.”

“On the path?” I ask.

“Focused. On your work.”

“Mr. Carling?”

“Yes?”

I take a deep breath, like I did before I looked under the back stairs. “I don't like it when you keep me in at recess,” I say. “It doesn't make me write faster. It just makes me sad.”

“I see,” Mr. Carling says. He bites his lip and looks at the ceiling. “I guess it's like me being stuck on crutches just because I'm a little clumsy,” he finally says. “I've always been clumsy. Why should I be punished for it? You have a wandering mind. I know you're clever, Leland. And creative. I'm not that creative.”

“Oh, you probably are,” I say. “You just need to take some lessons, maybe.”

“How about we make a deal?” Mr. Carling asks. “I'll be more patient.”

“And I'll try harder to do my work,” I say.

“If I see that you're trying, I won't keep you in.”

Mr. Carling puts his hand out. I put my fist out. Mr. Carling closes his hand and knuckle-bumps me. Then Delilah unfolds herself from my cubby, shakes herself out and wanders right out of the room with a little bark. She is saying goodbye. She is telling me that I don't need her anymore.

“You can go out now, Leland,” Mr. Carling says.

I dash outside. I climb to the top of the jungle gym and jump off, making deep footprints in the sand, like brushstrokes on canvas.

Chapter Ten

Pamela and I are at our easels in front of different windows. We are to paint every single thing we see.

“Think of the window as a painting that we are copying,” Pamela says. “Remember: look, watch, stare, peer, study, observe.”

My window is filled with Mr. Gloomy Rooms's backyard. I paint the old rowboat lying upside down in long grass. I copy every slat of wood on his old garage. I'm working on the garage window when I see something move. Something orange. It's waving. It's a tail!

“Pumpkin!” I shout.

Pamela runs over, paintbrush in her hand. “Where?”

“In that garage!”

Pamela leaps into her rubber boots. I grab my sweatshirt. We run to Gloomy Rooms and peer into the garage. It's her! Pumpkin! She's so thin! She meows like a kitten. Pamela yanks on the shed door. It scrapes against the ground. Pumpkin jumps into my arms. She is bony and some of her fur has fallen out.

“What a cutie!” says Pamela.

“She's not usually so skinny,” I say, crying. “Oh, Pumpkin!” I'm happy and sad at once.

“What is going on?” Mr. Gloomy Rooms is at the back door of his house. He's got a bristly beard and is wearing full-body long johns.

“This cat has been in your garage for a while, Geoffrey,” Pamela says.

“Must have snuck in last week when I fetched a can of paint.”

“Didn't you hear her meowing?” I ask.

“What did you say?” Mr. Gloomy Rooms shouts.

“Geoffrey doesn't hear too well,” Pamela says.

“What's that?” Geoffrey asks.

“We should wrap her up,” Pamela says.

“Yes! Good idea. Come in, come in.”

We follow Mr. Gloomy Rooms—Geoffrey—into his house. It's dark inside but tidy. We sit at his kitchen table, which is turquoise and flecked with golden stars.

Geoffrey wraps a tea towel around Pumpkin, who purrs on my lap. Then he heats a pot of milk on the stove.

“Can I phone home?” I ask.

“I don't have a phone,” Geoffrey says. He laughs when he sees how shocked I am. “I don't need one. I've got no kids or relatives to check on. I never married.”

“Do you have email?” I ask.

Geoffrey laughs. “Lord, no!” He looks into my eyes as if he's looking for something deep inside.

“I'm eighty-six years old,” he says. “I used to deliver coal, the same as you and your brother deliver newspapers.”

He pours milk into a saucer. Pumpkin laps it up.

“Poor girl,” Geoffrey says. “She'll be all right. Probably caught a few mice in there to keep her engine running. How did you know she was in there?”

“I was looking,” I say, “really, really hard.”

We eat a special supper to celebrate Pumpkin's return: sardines on toast. Pumpkin gets to eat at the table.

“So, does Leland get the reward?” Silas asks.

“I think Geoffrey should,” Mom says.

“But he didn't do anything!” Liza says.

“No, but he feels really badly that he locked Pumpkin in, even if it was an accident,” Mom says.

“He's doesn't need an iPod cover,” I say. “He doesn't even have a phone.”

“How about yard work?” Silas says. “His grass sure needs a trim. I could do that.”

“I could weed,” Liza says.

“I could borrow Mikel's oil can and oil the hinges on his gate,” I say.

After supper, Mom shakes out the tablecloth, and Silas lets Pumpkin out the back door for her evening roam. “Don't go far,” he warns her.

I sit at the dining-room table with my paints and brushes. I work on a picture of an old man wearing white long johns in a tidy kitchen, pouring warm milk into a dish for a golden-orange tabby cat. On the way to school tomorrow morning, I will tuck it under Old Geoffrey's door.

I will make sure my name is on it.