Welcome Home, Mary Anne

  “It was,” Sharon agreed. “But this place is okay too. Want to see your room?”

  “Sure,” Dawn said. “Lead the way.” She picked up her pack and followed Sharon, who gave a brief tour as we walked through the first floor.

  “Dining room,” she said, waving toward one end of the house. “Living room,” she added, waving the other way.

  Sunny laughed. “It’s gorgeous. Can I stay forever?”

  “I don’t think your par — your dad would like that,” Sharon said, catching herself before she said “parents.”

  I looked at Sunny to see if she’d noticed. She had. I could see it in her face. Suddenly, the fact of Mrs. Winslow’s death was right there among us.

  I saw Dawn reach out and take Sunny’s hand, just for one short moment. Their eyes met. Sunny gave Dawn a tiny half smile.

  This all happened as we were climbing the stairs, and it filled the space of about three seconds, total. But it had a big impact on me. I could see that, just as I’d imagined, Sunny and Dawn were closer than ever. I couldn’t help being glad for Sunny, that she had Dawn for a friend. She needed friends, and Dawn is a good one to have.

  I also couldn’t help the tiny jealous twinge I felt deep in my stomach.

  But I tried to forget it as Sharon and I led Dawn to her room. Sharon opened the door, but before she could say anything, Sunny ran into the room, pulling Dawn along with her. Sunny’s enthusiasm was back, full force. “Check it out!” she cried. “Look at that diamond-shaped window. Is that not the coolest thing you’ve ever seen?”

  She bounced around the room, showing Dawn all its special features. “Look at the built-in bookcase,” she said. “Isn’t it perfect? I can just picture some of your dolphins there.”

  I had thought the same thing. I’d even pictured some of the dophins arrayed on top of the bookcase. But it was too late for me to say so. Sunny had beaten me to it.

  Dawn stood in the middle of the room, turning slowly. “It’s nice,” she said. She stopped turning and looked directly at Sharon. “It really is,” she added. “Thanks.”

  “It’s not totally finished,” Sharon rushed to say. “Those curtains are just temporary, until you find some you truly love. And I want you to pick out a bedspread too, and a rug — just like Mary Anne did.”

  “Ooh, ooh!” Sunny jumped around like a kid waiting to be called on by her teacher. “I’ll help! I’ll help! I love picking out stuff like that.”

  “We can all go,” Dawn agreed, looking at me. “I’d love to have help.”

  “Great,” I said. “Maybe we can go to the mall soon?” I turned to check with Sharon.

  “Sure. Absolutely,” Sharon promised. She gave Dawn a quick hug. “Why don’t you unpack a little? I’m going to go check on Jeff.”

  Sunny had already thrown her duffel on one of the twin beds. “I choose this one,” she told Dawn after Sharon had left. “That okay?”

  “Definitely.” Dawn tossed her pack on the other bed. Then she unzipped it and started to pull out clothes and books. Sunny began to unpack her duffel too.

  I felt a little awkward. “I guess I’ll go,” I said. “You guys have stuff to do.” I watched for a second longer as Sunny pulled out a stack of old, worn-looking notebooks.

  She held them up for Dawn to see. Raising her eyebrows, she cocked her head toward the bookshelf. “Okay?” she asked.

  Dawn nodded. “Sure,” she answered. “Of course.”

  Suddenly, I realized what the books were. They were Mrs. Winslow’s diaries. I remembered Dawn telling me that Mrs. Winslow had given them to Sunny just before she died. They went all the way back to her school days. Sunny must really treasure them, I thought.

  Once again, I felt that twinge. Sunny and Dawn were communicating in shorthand. They didn’t have to speak in full sentences. That’s what being best friends is about. I eased myself out of the room. “Well, see you,” I said.

  I heard them start to talk again as soon as I had left. Were they talking about me, I wondered? Or were they talking about something else entirely, having forgotten all about me the second I wasn’t there?

  You know what’s funny? I honestly didn’t know which would be worse.

  “It’s going to be a scorcher, kiddies, so be cool and stay tuned to the hottest spot in Stoneybrook: WSTO, thirteen-thirteen on your dial!”

  I snapped off the radio. I can’t stand the morning DJ on WSTO. He’s so loud and obnoxious. He does play good music, though, which is why I keep my radio turned to that station. Anyway, the only real alternative is EZ-Lite, the station my dad listens to. It plays all these dopey songs from when he was a teenager. Sometimes I’ll catch him singing along with this goofy smile on his face. I love my dad, but I have to say it can be downright embarrassing to see him mouthing words to some “groovy” tune.

  Anyway. Even though I can’t stand Morning Mack (the DJ I’d just silenced), I had to admit he was probably right about the day’s weather. I hadn’t moved a muscle yet, unless you count flinging my arm toward the radio, and I was already hot. My new bedroom had felt pretty cool so far. But this morning it felt stuffy.

  I sat up in bed and looked out the window. The sky outside was that milky white color that means it’s going to be humid. “Ugh!” I said, flopping back onto my pillow. I can’t stand that Triple H weather: Hot, Humid, and Hazy.

  I heard giggling from down the hall. Dawn and Sunny must be awake too. I wondered what was so funny. Should I find out? Or would the giggling stop when I walked into the room? I rolled onto my back and put my pillow over my head. “Cut it out,” I told myself. Sunny and Dawn were friends, and that was good. I didn’t want to dwell on feeling left out.

  In fact …

  I jumped out of bed and pulled on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. Then I headed for Dawn and Sunny’s room and knocked lightly on the door. “It’s me,” I called.

  “Come on in!” said Dawn.

  “Good morning.” Sunny rubbed her eyes and yawned as I walked into the room.

  So much for feeling left out. I plopped down on Dawn’s bed. “I heard you guys laughing,” I said. “What’s so funny?”

  “Oh, I just had this silly dream,” said Sunny. “I was telling Dawn about it.” She glanced at Dawn and the two of them cracked up again. When she caught her breath, Sunny went on. “It was about this old teddy bear I once had. His name was Oogy. In my dream, I married him. I was wearing a white dress and everything. Dawn was one of my bridesmaids.”

  I giggled. “Hmmm,” I said, stroking my chin. “Very interesting. And what do you think this means, Ms. Winslow?”

  Sunny grinned. “I don’t know, doctor,” she said. “Do you think I have a strange fixation on stuffed animals?”

  “We’ll have to explore this further. Can you come three times a week from now on? And can you bring Mr. Oogy with you?”

  Sunny threw a pillow at me, and we all cracked up.

  Just then, there was a knock on the door. “Girls?” It was Sharon.

  “Come on in, Mom,” said Dawn. “We’re up.”

  “I could hear that a mile away.” Sharon smiled around at us from the doorway. “So, I had an idea. How would you like to spend today at the pool? I could drop you off, and Richard could pick you up at the end of the day. It’s going to be hot, hot, hot.”

  “Sounds excellent!” cried Sunny. “How soon do we have to be ready to go?”

  Sharon checked her watch. “How does half an hour from now sound?”

  “No problem!” Sunny bounced out of bed.

  Sharon laughed. “Well, no problem for one of you,” she said. “How about you two? Can you be ready?”

  “Sure,” said Dawn. “I’ll just whip up some smoothies for our breakfast.”

  She’d apparently forgotten that I wasn’t as crazy about smoothies as she was. “I’ll have toast,” I said. “But I guess I can be ready too.”

  “Great,” said Sharon. “I’ll be downstairs, then.” She closed the door.

  “Coo
l!” said Sunny. “The pool will be the place to be today. Won’t it?”

  I shrugged. “Probably,” I said. I like the pool, but I don’t necessarily love spending a whole day there. Still, it would be fun to go to the pool with Dawn and Sunny.

  “You don’t sound psyched,” Sunny observed. She looked at me closely. “Are you worried that Logan will be there?”

  Whoa. I hadn’t even thought of that. But as soon as she mentioned it, I was a little worried. I hadn’t spent much time at the pool since Logan and I had broken up. What if he was there — with some other girl? Sunny was right. That could be awful. “I — I hadn’t thought about it,” I said.

  “It’ll be fine,” said Dawn. “I doubt he’ll be there.” She jumped out of bed and started rummaging through her bureau drawers. “Now, where did I put my suit?” she muttered.

  “I better find mine too,” I said, getting up to head out the door.

  “We’re going to have a blast!” I heard Sunny say as I walked down the hall. “Are there usually cute guys at the pool? Maybe we can find one for Mary Anne.”

  Yikes. That was all I needed. Sunny as matchmaker. Then I thought of something and stopped short, right there outside my room. How did Sunny know that Logan and I had broken up anyway? Dawn must have told her. But how much had Dawn told her? Did Sunny know every detail of my personal life? I certainly didn’t like that idea. Sure, I knew a little about what she’d gone through with her mother’s illness. But I didn’t want her knowing all kinds of private things about me.

  I found my suit and threw it into a bag, along with a towel, a hat, some high-SPF sunscreen (I burn easily and never tan), a couple of magazines, and my water bottle. Ready or not, I was headed for the pool.

  Sunny and Dawn were draining their smoothies when I walked into the kitchen. “Excellent!” Sunny said, finishing the last sip. “Super energy for a super day.”

  Did I think Sunny needed extra energy? Don’t ask. But I had to smile at her. It was wonderful to see her acting so upbeat after everything she’d been through. Maybe this trip really would be good for her.

  Fifteen minutes later, Sharon dropped us off at the pool. Jeff had come with us, but he immediately ran off to find the Pike boys and we barely saw him for the rest of the day. I think he spent most of his time in the Ping-Pong room.

  Sunny took charge at the pool. “This looks like a good place,” she said, staking out a spot for us by throwing down her towel. “Not too far from the refreshment stand, yet close to the lifeguard chair. That’s where a lot of action goes on. At least, that’s true at the beach.” She gazed around. “Not many boys here yet,” she said. “But it’s early. I bet they’ll show up when it gets hotter.” She eyed me. “That suit looks great on you. Can you take that hat off, though? Your hair’s so pretty.”

  I wasn’t about to risk a sunburn by taking off my hat to impress boys. “Haven’t you ever heard of skin cancer?” I said without thinking.

  She stared at me. “I’ve heard of every kind of cancer,” she replied quietly. “I’ve heard enough about cancer to last me a lifetime.”

  I felt about one inch tall. “Oh, Sunny,” I said, “I’m so sorry. I really am. How could I say something like that?” I wanted to crawl under my towel. It’s not like me to blurt out the wrong thing. That’s Kristy’s way, not mine. “I’m really, really sorry,” I said again.

  “No biggie,” said Sunny, waving a hand. “I’ve heard it all before.”

  “But it must make you feel horrible when people mention cancer.” Oh, no. I covered my mouth.

  “Mary Anne,” said Sunny impatiently, “don’t worry about it. Really. It’s no big deal. I’m not likely to forget that my mom died of cancer. So it’s not as if you’re reminding me of something I don’t already know.”

  Dawn met my eyes and gave me a nod, as if to say, Sunny’s right. Don’t worry.

  I didn’t want to keep apologizing, so I gave it up. But I still felt terrible.

  I guess that’s why I went along with Sunny when she started flirting with Cole West — on my behalf.

  Normally, I don’t flirt with guys at the pool — or anywhere else. I’m just not the flirting type. But Sunny sure is. And she spotted Cole the second he walked out of the changing rooms.

  “Ooh, he’s cute,” she said, following him with her eyes. “What do you think, Mary Anne?”

  “I think he’s a little old for you,” I said. “He’s in ninth grade.” I knew who he was because he’s on the high school junior varsity basketball team. Logan and I used to go to their games. Incidentally, I do think he’s cute. Everybody does. He’s tall, with black curly hair and dark brown eyes.

  Sunny laughed. “First of all, a ninth-grader would be young for me, if anything,” she said. “I happen to like older guys. And second of all, I asked what you think. You need a new boyfriend, and I think this dude looks like a good prospect.” By then, she’d caught his eye. I saw her smile at him.

  He smiled back.

  Then he sauntered over to our towels.

  “Whoa,” I heard Dawn say under her breath. “Sunny’s good, isn’t she?”

  I could hardly answer. She was so good it was scaring me. I could have spent every day for a month at the pool without a guy approaching me. But all Sunny had to do was smile and make eye contact. It was as if some force field were around her that drew guys in.

  “Hey,” said Cole, sitting down next to Sunny.

  “Hey,” Sunny replied. “What’s up?”

  “The sun.” Cole grinned.

  “Funny you should mention that. That’s my name. Sunny.”

  “I’m Cole.”

  “And this is Dawn, and this,” Sunny said, pausing significantly, “is Mary Anne.” She gestured toward me as if I were some precious jewel she were showing off.

  “I know you.” Cole gave me a closer look. “Don’t you go out with that guy Logan Bruno? He’s a pretty good ballplayer.”

  “I used to,” I said.

  Cole nodded. “Cool.”

  Sunny gave me a Look.

  Cole hung around for a while. And by the time he left, he’d asked if the three of us wanted to go to a movie that weekend, with him and two of his friends. I would have hesitated, but Sunny? She said yes before I could say a word.

  And I didn’t want to put a damper on her enthusiasm. After all, she was here to heal and move on. If that meant I had to go to the movies with a bunch of boys I hardly knew, who was I to say no? I wanted Sunny to be happy.

  At least on Tuesday I wanted Sunny to be happy. But by Friday I was beginning to wonder. A happy Sunny was, well, exhausting.

  Sunny seemed to have endless energy. She woke up early and bounced out of bed with a smile. And she kept going full steam ahead until we all collapsed into bed at night. Sunny seemed to need to be in constant motion. She never sat still. She talked and laughed and kept Dawn and me — and Sharon and Richard and Jeff and everyone else who happened by — entertained.

  On Wednesday Sunny made a humongous breakfast for our family, filling the kitchen with activity, piles of dirty dishes, and splotches of flour. Then she cleaned up just as fast, and began to clean the house as well. “I love to vacuum!” she insisted, grabbing the machine from Sharon and dashing around the downstairs with it. She plumped up couch pillows, straightened the dining room chairs, even scrubbed the bathroom sink.

  “She’s making us look bad,” Dawn muttered to me at one point. “I think she’s done more chores this morning than I’ve done in the last year!”

  “Can’t you make her stop?” I asked.

  Dawn shook her head. “Once Sunny gets in this kind of mood, there’s no stopping her.”

  “So what do we do?”

  Dawn shrugged. “What’s the old saying? If you can’t beat them, join them? I guess we might as well follow her example.”

  After she’d cleaned the house from top to bottom (I’m exaggerating, but only barely), Sunny talked us into riding our bikes to the pool. That’s a longer ride
than I’m used to, and Dawn hadn’t been riding much at all and felt out of shape, but Sunny insisted. She borrowed Jeff’s bike, which was too small for her, and pedaled faster than either of us. We could barely keep her in sight.

  Instead of spending her energy flirting with boys, Sunny decided we needed to practice diving. The Stoneybrook pool complex has three pools: the Olympic-sized one we’d been sitting near the day before, a little wading pool for young kids, and a diving pool with three boards. One of the boards is low, one is mid-height, and one is scary-high.

  Guess which one Sunny spent her time on?

  She climbed up the ladder over and over. “Check this out!” she’d yell from the high board. Then she’d attempt a jackknife or a back flip. Some of them were pretty good. Sunny’s had some experience and some lessons, I guess. I was impressed. But I wasn’t tempted to join her. Dawn tried the high board a couple of times, then moved to the medium one. I stuck with the low board.

  “Come on, chickens!” Sunny taunted us. “Those boards are for babies.”

  “Goo-goo,” said Dawn, sticking her thumb in her mouth. “Then that’s what I am.”

  “Me too,” I said. Dawn seemed to understand how to handle Sunny’s energy. You couldn’t fight it; you just had to work around it.

  I don’t want to make it sound awful. In fact, watching Sunny zoom around was fun at times. And she certainly made things interesting. But keeping up with her wasn’t easy.

  On Thursday, after another huge breakfast, Sunny asked Sharon if we could do some gardening for her. Naturally, Sharon was thrilled.

  “Of course!” she said. “Come on outside and I’ll show you what needs to be done.”

  While Sharon and Sunny toured the garden, Dawn and I finished cleaning up the kitchen. At first, we didn’t say much. We just concentrated on clearing away dishes, putting pots into the sink, and wiping counters. Finally, I spoke up. “Sunny sure is — ” I couldn’t figure how to say it.

  “Energetic? Peppy? Full of beans?” Dawn grinned at me. “I know. I’m kind of used to it, but I can tell she’s tiring you out.”

  “It’s fine,” I said, waving a hand. “But isn’t it just a little weird? I mean, because of her mom and all?”