Time for Andrew (12 page)

Neither one looked up. It was obvious they didn't see or hear him. Theo went right on aiming his ball at Hannah's, and she continued to threaten him with death and perdition if he hit it.

Andrew stared at me, his eyes shining with tears, and vanished. It had happened so quickly I wasn't sure I'd really seen him.

Hannah called to me. "Stop lallygagging and take your turn. A storm's coming."

I drove my ball through the last wicket, winning the game just in time. With thunder rumbling overhead, we raced for the house, anxious to get inside before the rain started.

When I went to the attic that night, thunder muffled my footsteps, giving me a chance to see Andrew before he saw me. Lit by the candle's glow, he crouched on the floor. His face was hidden, but his shoulders shook as if he were crying.

I stared at him. "What's wrong?"

Startled by my sudden appearance, Andrew leapt to his feet, sending his shadow dancing across the rafters toward
me. A flash of lightning lit his face, whitening it against the darkness behind him. For a moment, he seemed to hang in the air, as insubstantial as a ghost.

I touched his sleeve hesitantly. "You're real, aren't you? I'm not imagining you?"

For proof Andrew pinched my arm just hard enough to hurt. "You gave me a fright sneaking up here in that white nightshirt."

We gazed into each others eyes. Overhead, wind rumbled across the roof. Rain pelted the slates.

"Tarnation," Andrew said suddenly. "I never used to be afraid of anything. Now I'm getting as bad as you, jumping at shadows, scared of the dark. I swear I don't know what's come over me."

Scarcely listening, I studied the design on his pajamas. There was something familiar about the little shapes. They had a name, but I couldn't recall it. "Those things on your pajamas—what are they?"

Andrew frowned. "Are you daft? They're rockets."

"Rockets." I repeated the word slowly, searching my memory for more information. Slowly images emerged—shuttles, space probes, moon flights, astronauts, Cape Kennedy.

Andrew picked up the bull's-eye aggie and rolled it between his palms. Without looking at me, he said, "To tell you the truth, I'm beginning to forget things too. The more I learn about you, the less I recollect about me. It's as if your memories are crowding mine out, there's no room for them in my head."

I nodded, agreeing with him. "Every day I get more like you, less like me."

"Lord A'mighty," Andrew said solemnly. "I hope that doesn't mean I'll become a total pantywaist."

The thought of such a dreadful fate seemed to revive him. Giving me a cold-eyed stare, he said, "We'd better play marbles while we still remember who we are and what we're doing."

As usual, Andrew went first. Confident of winning, he knuckled down and shot. Click, click, click—one after another he sent seven miggles spinning out of the ring.

"Well," he said smugly, "at least I haven't lost all my skills."

"Don't you ever quit bragging?"

"You're a poor loser, Drew. A true gent congratulates the victor."

"You were so busy congratulating yourself I didn't want to interrupt."

Ignoring my sarcasm, Andrew swung his bag of marbles back and forth, back and forth, watching the shadow it cast on the floor. His mood had changed again. "There's something I've been meaning to ask you, Drew," he said slowly. "That old man in the wheelchair—who is he?"

For a moment, I didn't know what Andrew was talking about. Old man, old man, what old man? Closing my eyes, I thought hard till I conjured up a picture—a bent figure in a dark room, face like a skull, bony hands, threatening me, scaring me.

"He's Aunt Blythe's father," I said, "my great-grandfather."

"He knows me," Andrew said. "Not you, Drew—me." To make his meaning clear, he struck his chest with his fist. "He knows who I am."

I remembered a few other things about Great-grandfather. "He gets confused," I said, struggling to recollect more but drawing blanks. "He can't keep people straight, he mixes up the past and the present."

"How is he related to me?"

I shook my head. Everything Aunt Blythe had told me was a jumble, a blur of relatives—great-aunts, uncles, cousins both first and second, grandparents multiplying with every generation. Untangling the branches of the family tree was too hard for me.

Andrew stared into the candle flame as if he expected to find the answer there. "Well, whoever he is, he hates me. The first time he saw me, he said, 'Go back where you belong. Rest in peace and leave me be.' "

Goose bumps raced up and down my arms. Like Andrew, I folded my arms tightly across my chest and shivered. "Stay away from him," I whispered. "He's crazy."

For several minutes neither of us spoke. We sat side by side, shoulders almost touching, and listened to the rain patter on the roof. At last Andrew stood up.

"It's almost morning," he said. "I'd better go."

I watched him run down the stairs. At the bottom, he gazed up at me, his face a pale, featureless oval in the dim light. "This evening, when I saw you on the lawn..."

I waited for him to go on, but he seemed to have trouble finding words for his thoughts. "Hannah and Theo." He spoke their names hesitantly, as if they sounded strange to him. "They didn't see me, did they?"

I shook my head.

Andrew's sigh blended with the wind and rain. Giving me one long, sad look, he disappeared.

The next night and the night after that, Andrew beat me at marbles as usual, but he seemed to take less pleasure in his victories. Instead of boasting and bragging and carrying on like a conceited jackanapes, he began asking questions about his family—the color of Hannah's eyes, the smell of Papa's pipe smoke, the words to "Yip-I-Addy-I-Ay," his dog's name.

Although I knew those things, including every silly word of "Yip-I-Addy-I-Ay," I was beginning to forget other stuff. Chicago was a blur of noisy streets, jammed improbably with Model T's and Oldsmobiles. My apartment on Oak Street was a blank box, nothing but floors, walls, windows. When I struggled to picture my parents' faces, I saw Mama and Papa instead.

I was tempted to ask Andrew to let me win before we forgot everything, but the one time I had the nerve to hint at it, he shook his head sadly and said, "Homesick as I am, I'd rather be alive in your world than dead in mine."

The night before I was supposed to meet Edward on the trestle, Mama let Theo and me catch fireflies in the backyard. The bushes and tall grass glittered with them, more than I'd ever seen. We captured them two or three at a time. Holding them carefully in our fists, we felt their little feet tickle our hands. Green light glowed between our fingers and lit our faces.

When we'd each filled ajar, Theo and I lay down on the lawn and watched our prisoners crawl over the blades of grass we'd provided for them. Above our heads, Orion chased the Pleiades across the sky, Cassiopeia sat musing in her chair, and the Big Dipper poured stars that changed to fireflies as they fell.

Suddenly, Theo poked my side with his sharp little elbow. "You aren't worried about tomorrow, are you?"

"What do you think?"

He propped himself up on his elbows and studied my face. "You told me last spring it was the easiest thing in the whole wide world. You could hardly wait to jump. Why, even when you got sick you worried you'd die without having a chance to do it."

"I must have been a raving lunatic," I muttered.

Theo scowled, but the sound of a Model T chugging up the driveway stopped him from saying more. Its headlamps lit the trees and washed across the house.

"It's John again," Theo said. "Papa will start charging him room and board soon."

Hidden in the shadows, we watched John jump out of the car and run up the porch steps. Hannah met him at the door. From inside the house, their laughter floated toward us as silvery as moonlight, cutting into my heart like a knife.

"Hannah has a beau." Theo sounded as if he were trying out a new word, testing it for rightness. He giggled. "Do you think she lets him lass her?"

I spat in the grass, a trick I'd learned from Edward. "Don't be silly."

"What's silly about smooching? When I'm old enough, I plan to kiss Marie Jenkins till our lips melt." Making loud smacking sounds with his mouth, Theo demonstrated. Pushing him away, I wrestled him to the ground and started tickling him.

As he pleaded for mercy, we heard the screen door open. Thinking Mama was about to call us inside, we broke apart and lay still. It was Hannah and John.

"They're sitting in the swing," Theo whispered. "Come on, let's spy on them. I bet a million zillion dollars they start spooning."

Stuffing his jar of fireflies into his shirt, Theo dropped to his knees and crawled across the lawn toward the house. I followed him, sure he was wrong. Hannah wasn't old enough for kissing. Or silly enough.

We reached the bushes beside the porch without being seen. Crouched in the dirt, we were so close I could have reached up and grabbed Hannah's ankle. To keep from giggling, Theo pressed his hands over his mouth.

Sick with jealousy, I watched John put his arm around Hannah and draw her close. As his lips met hers, I felt Theo jab my side. I teetered and lost my balance. The bushes swayed, the leaves rustled, a twig snapped under my feet.

"Be quiet," Theo hissed in my ear. "Do you want to get us killed?"

We backed out of the bushes, hoping to escape, but it was too late. Leaving John in the swing, Hannah strode down the porch steps, grabbed us each by an ear, and shook us like rats. "Can't a body have a second of privacy?"

Theo and I begged her to forgive us, but Hannah's dander was up. If she hadn't noticed the fireflies under our shirts, I don't know what she would ve done to us.

Snatching my jar, she gazed at my captives. The flickering glow lit her face. I wanted to tell her she was beautiful, I wanted to tell her I'd love her forever, but all I could say was "These are for you, I caught them just for you, Hannah."

"Poor things," she said softly, her temper gone without a trace. "I'll have to let them go, Andrew. They'll die if I don't."

Before I could stop her, she removed the lid and held the jar high over her head. "Fly away, fly away," she cried. Like sparks from a bonfire, the fireflies escaped in a sparkling green mist.

Theo handed his jar to Hannah. "Set mine free too."

In moments, Theo's fireflies rose and scattered across the dark sky.

"They're going to the moon," Theo shouted. "They're going to the stars!"

"I wish I could send the pair of you with them," Hannah muttered. "Maybe I'd have some peace and quiet then."

We crossed the dew-soaked grass and climbed the front steps. Theo darted into the house, but I sat on the railing near the swing. There was a pitcher on the table, and I was hoping Hannah would offer me some. / lived here, John didn't. Surely I had a right to a glass of that lemonade.

From the shadows, John smiled at me, but I pretended not to notice. Hannah was sitting beside him. A little too close, I thought. Surely Papa wouldn't approve.

"Have you been practicing your boxing?" he asked.

I nodded but I kept my eyes on the huge moth fluttering against the window screen. Plock, plock, plock—it wanted to get to the light in the parlor.

"It sure is hot," I said. "A glass of lemonade would really taste good."

Hannah laughed. "Andrew is known all over Riverview for his subtlety."

I scowled at her, angered by the simpery way she spoke to John, but Hannah just laughed again. "Run along, Andrew. It's way past your bedtime."

"Yes," John agreed. "Growing boys need their rest."

Before I could think of a fitting reply, Mama appeared in the doorway. "Stop pestering your sister, Andrew," she said. "It's time you were upstairs in bed."

I looked at Hannah, hoping she'd rescue me, but all she said was, "Good night, Andrew."

John raised his hand in a farewell gesture, and at the same moment, Mama stepped outside and collared me. "When I tell you to do something, I expect to be obeyed." Giving my bottom a swat, she sent me upstairs.

Theo was waiting in the hall. Puckering his lips, he threw his arms around me. "Oh, John, John," he squealed. "Kiss me, darling, kiss me."

While we scuffled, Papa's voice rolled up the steps like thunder. "Stop the horseplay, boys, and go to sleep!"

Scared to risk a whipping, Theo and I sprang apart and ran for our beds. Under my pillow, the hard lump of the marble bag reminded me I'd soon climb the attic steps. If I beat Andrew, I'd be safe from Edward, but I'd never see Hannah and Theo again. For the first time, I felt a pang of regret at the thought of returning to my own world.

***

I needn't have worried. Although I won the first turn, my fourth shot went wide of its target. Aiming carefully, Andrew knocked out six before he missed.

"I can't believe this," he said glumly. "If I keep getting worse and you keep improving, you may beat me after all."

Holding my breath, I shot my aggie at one of the four marbles left. To win, I had to knock all of them out of the ring, not an easy feat. Thinking of rockets and TV's and computers and other things I couldn't remember the names of, I watched my shooter roll right past my first target.

"My turn." Andrew picked up his bull's-eye and sent a cat's-eye spinning across the floor. He sighed and sat back on his heels. "That's seven. I win again."

Too disappointed to speak, I watched Andrew tighten the knot on his bag of marbles. His face was calm, his fingers deft, his body relaxed. Raising his head, he looked at me. "Is tomorrow the day you meet Edward?"

"You know perfectly well it is." Giving in to my temper, I leapt to my feet and kicked the remaining marbles so hard they scattered in all directions. "It's not fair.
You
should be jumping off that trestle, not me!"

Andrew's eyes widened. "I told you, there's nothing to be scared of."

"Prove it," I yelled. "Switch places with me—be yourself for just one day. If you jump, I'll do anything you want, I swear I will. I'll be you forever if I have to."

Andrew backed away. "We made an agreement," he whispered, "a gentleman's agreement. It would be dishonorable to break it."