Bummer Summer
Ann M. Martin
For GRANNY,
my favorite critic,
with love.
And for LOUISE COLLIGAN.
Thank you.
Contents
1. The Wedding
2. Moving Day
3. “I Can’t Stand It!”
4. Plan B
5. Camp Arrowhead
6. Trouble
7. More Trouble
8. The Case of the Missing Clothes
9. Ups and Downs
10. Three-Fingered Willie
11. More Ups and Downs
12. War on Susie
13. Starting Over
A Personal History by Ann M. Martin
Chapter 1
The Wedding
THE THING I’LL ALWAYS remember about the wedding is blue hair. That was the color Mrs. Samuels had dyed hers the week before. I swear it. Blue. I was standing facing Dr. Haber, our minister, in one of those church-in-the-round places where the pews are built in a circle around the altar so everybody can see what is going on. Mrs. Samuels was just a few pews behind Dr. Haber, trying to see over his left shoulder. Since I was told to hold still during the ceremony, I had nothing to do but stare at her new blue hair for thirty minutes.
Believe it or not, I was the maid of honor at my father’s wedding. No kidding. Not too many kids get to do that. Be at their own father’s wedding, I mean. But there I was, twelve years old, dressed in a hideous long pink flowered gown (when you’re in a wedding, you wear a gown, not a dress—that was one of the important things I learned from my step-grandmother-to-be), and carrying a pink and white floral bouquet (another wedding term, meaning bunch of flowers), which I was very allergic to.
My father was marrying Kate, who was going to be my stepmother. Yesterday she’d been Kate Parker. Today she would be Kate Whitlock. Kate Whitlock. I tossed the name around in my head while my uncle, who was the best man, read a poem about peace and joy and everlasting love.
Kate Whitlock. It sounded O.K. Not as good as Annie Whitlock, though. That had been my mother’s name. She died when I was four.
I never thought my father would remarry. He and I had been fine—just the two of us—with Mrs. Meade, our housekeeper. I thought we were very happy. But last fall Dad met Kate and that was that. You know how those things go. They liked each other, then they loved each other, then they decided to get married, and here we all were, in church.
Except it wasn’t that easy. Kate wasn’t unattached. She was a package deal. You got her, and you got Muffin and Baby Boy, too. Muffin was her three-year-old daughter. Her real name was Melissa. Heaven knows how Kate got “Muffin” out of that. And Baby Boy was her two-month-old unnamed son. (I called him Baby Boy because his hospital bracelet said Baby Boy Parker, and Kate hadn’t come up with a name for him yet. I suggested Joshua about a million times but nobody paid any attention.) We were going to be a great family, because my name is kind of weird, too. I am Kammy, short for Kamilla, which is a name that’s been in my mother’s family forever. Dad and Kate, Muffin, Baby Boy, and Kammy. Splendid.
Anyway, Kate was pregnant with Baby Boy when her husband picked up and left her last summer. Just like that. No note or anything. One day he was there, the next day he was gone. Several weeks later Kate met my father, and the rest is history.
Someone in the congregation was reading another poem. I never knew Dad and Kate liked poetry so much.
About ten minutes into the ceremony my eyes began to blur from staring at Mrs. Samuels’s blue hair. I wished I didn’t have to hold quite so still. Muffin was the flower girl and she was standing next to me. She’d been told to hold still, too, but so far she’d been craning her neck all over the place, standing on one foot and scratching her ankle with the other, patting her hair, and sniffing her basket of flower petals. (Floral petals?) At least she wasn’t crying, which was what she had been doing loudly and nonstop for about an hour before the ceremony. She was such a pain. I could not believe she’d be moving into my house in a week.
Pain or not, I had to admit Muffin was adorable. She was a storybook girl with soft blond hair, sparkly blue eyes, and a cherubic dimpled smile that she’d give to anybody whenever she wanted something. She gave it to the lady behind the candy counter at Bamberger’s last Tuesday and got a free root beer drop. (I smiled at the lady and got my change.)
For the wedding, Muffin was wearing short white socks, black patent leather Mary Janes, and a yellow checked dress with a white apron that had daisies on it. You should have seen what we went through getting that dress. We went to the Quakerbridge Mall, and after two hours of fussing and complaining from one end of Saks’s children’s department to the other, Muffin finally liked a dress. (I didn’t know a three-year-old could tell a dress from a diaper.) Unfortunately, the only one in her size had no daisies on the apron. When the salesman said they’d order one in her size with daisies, but it would take a week, Muffin burst into real tears, complete with a fire engine wail, which set off Baby Boy in his Snugli carrier. (This was the main reason I was wearing the ghastly pink gown. We found it in five minutes, it fit, and we were able to buy it and get it out of Saks before Muffin was arrested for disturbing the peace.)
Luckily we didn’t have to buy anything for Baby Boy to wear to the wedding. He’d been christened the Sunday before, so he just wore his christening outfit again. Kate said probably no one would notice. I said I didn’t think anyone would care even if they did notice. Dad said that was not a nice thing to say.
By shifting my eyes very slightly to the left I could see Baby Boy in the congregation. He was on the lap of Kate’s mother (the Wedding Queen) and he was sound asleep. I guessed that was O.K. As long as he wasn’t squawking. Last week when the minister put the water on his head, he arched his back and shrieked so loudly he practically caved the church in. Kate’s face got very red. I had been glad I was sitting in the back.
Suddenly I noticed the church was quiet. Everyone was seated expectantly on the red-cushioned pews. Dad and Kate were standing very solemnly. That meant the poetry readings and all the weird stuff were over. The real wedding part could begin.
Of course, all the dumb parts were Kate’s. She gets some very strange ideas, and Dad always seems to give in to them. Like the time last month when Kate decided we needed some exercise. I thought, fine, we’ll all take a little walk, and Muffin can ride her tricycle. But no, Kate had roller skating in mind—for everyone, including Muffin and Dad. We went to this sports store in town where you can rent the good kind of skates, and we took them to a road behind our house where there is very little traffic.
Dad and Muffin were terrible. Kate was pretty good, and I go skating a lot, so I was O.K., too. But I didn’t have any fun. It was embarrassing to watch my father edging along the curb, grabbing out for Kate or trees or anything, and falling down every few feet, but laughing the entire time. All I can say is it’s a good thing we were on that unused road, because we live in one of those tiny New England towns where everybody knows everybody, and if any of my friends had seen us, I would have been mortified.
It was things like the roller skating that made me hate Kate. Really. She was impossible. For the last six months she and Dad had spent every second of their spare time together. I never got to see Dad by himself anymore. Kate was always hogging him. Plus, every other sentence out of Dad’s mouth began with “Kate says.” “Kate says we shouldn’t eat so much red meat.” “Kate says you don’t get enough sleep.” Couldn’t he think for himself anymore? I was so sick of it I could have killed her. And Kate always tried to sic Muffin on me. Actually, I think she just wanted Muffin and me to be friends, but as I’ve mentioned, Muffin was a three-year-old pain. Besides, Muffin was so busy trying to wrap
my father around her chubby little finger that she hardly had time for me. Then there was Baby Boy. Before he was born, Kate had tried being really palsy-walsy and friendly with me, always bringing me little gifts—barrettes and earrings and stuff—but I wouldn’t fall for that. Because then Baby Boy came and she changed, just like I knew she would. After all, he and Muffin were her real children, but who was I? I was almost glad when she stopped paying so much attention to me.
The silence in the church was broken by a resounding organ chord. It made Muffin jump. I saw her screw up her face, and for one horrifying moment I thought she was going to cry right in the middle of everything. Then she looked up at me and I gave her a little smile to let her know it was O.K. She gritted her teeth and smiled back. At that moment, as much as she annoyed me, I felt kind of proud of Muffin. She was trying very hard to be good.
The organ struck a softer chord and launched into “Amazing Grace.” Everyone stood up and began singing. I knew parts of the hymn, so I sang along when I could, but I didn’t have a hymn book. From over Dr. Haber’s shoulder I could hear the lady with the blue hair. She sang in one of those high, wavery, extremely loud voices, but she wasn’t quite on key. That really bothered me because I like to sing and I happen to have perfect pitch. It was my turn to grit my teeth.
I tried not to look at Mrs. Samuels. Instead I glanced over at Dad. I thought about how he and my real mother must have stood at the front of a church once. That would have been three years before I was born. I wondered what my father looked like then. Now he had thick, curly hair, a tickly mustache, and laughing brown eyes. Probably he looked the same fifteen years ago but with no gray hairs. (I would give anything to have wavy hair like Dad’s. But no, mine is straight and fine like my mother’s, and the same honey color. That’s one of the few things I remember about her.)
Kate must have stood in front of an altar another time, too. Maybe five or six years ago. She would have been about twenty then. Pretty young. She is nineteen whole years younger than my father. She could be his daughter, for heaven’s sake.
I remembered the first time I met Kate and Muffin. It was last Thanksgiving. Dad and I always did something special and different at Thanksgiving. Once we went to Williamsburg, Virginia, for a colonial meal. Another time we spent four days at Disney World. I looked forward to planning a new trip for the two of us every year. But last year Dad didn’t say anything about the holiday until sometime after Halloween—long after we usually started planning. When he suggested that we “just stay at home,” I knew something was up.
I was wondering if we could invite anyone over for the meal, like maybe our cousins in Trumbull, and he said slowly, “Yes, I did think someone might share dinner with us, but the people I had in mind are fairly new in town. You haven’t met them yet. They’re Mrs. Parker, a biology professor at the university, and her little girl. Melissa is three, I believe.”
“That’s all?” I asked. “Just two people, one of them possibly in training pants?”
“Well, there’s a little more,” he said. “You see, Kate—Mrs. Parker, that is—and I have been spending some time together recently.”
No joke, I thought to myself. You think I didn’t notice how little you’ve been around the last month or so?
“Her husband left her recently,” Dad went on, “and she’s been lonely. We’ve gotten to know each other quite well, and I’d like you to get to know her, too. I thought Thanksgiving dinner would be an ideal time for everyone to get acquainted.”
There was an uncomfortable silence.
Finally I said, “I don’t think I really have a say, do I? You’ve already made the plans, right?”
“Well, I—”
“Forget it,” I sputtered. “Sure, sure, dinner with the Parkers is great.” I stormed out of the room then, with big plans for cutting out on the meal. Maybe my cousins would invite me to their house. Or I’d hurt myself the night before and land in the hospital instead. But underneath it all I knew I’d be there, and somehow I also knew my life would not be the same afterward.
On Thanksgiving Day, Dad and I were busy all morning. Once I got used to the idea of who was coming for dinner, the preparations were fun. Sort of.
Mrs. Meade, who would be spending the holiday with her sister’s family, had cooked up a storm for us the two days before Thanksgiving. She made two pies, one kind I hated (pumpkin) and one kind I loved (apple cinnamon), and let me help with the crust. She also concocted all these vegetable dishes. She never used recipes. She just walked around the kitchen grabbing carrots and onions and parsley and turnips, and chopping and peeling and boiling and frying. All very calmly. Neatly, too.
Anyway, by Thanksgiving morning, the dishes were carefully labeled and stored in the freezer and refrigerator. The only things Dad and I had to do were defrost the stuff, set the table, and, of course, handle the turkey. This was not so easy.
The night before, Dad had said to me, “I’ll get up at five to start the bird.” (He always calls chickens and turkeys “birds.”) “Don’t you worry about a thing, pumpkin. Just get up when you feel like it.” I said O.K., but giggled to myself, knowing what would happen.
At five o’clock I heard Dad’s alarm go off. It sounded like a factory whistle. Sometimes I sleep through it; sometimes I don’t. That morning I didn’t. I woke up with butterflies in my stomach. Not just a few. A whole flock.
Then I heard a thump and Dad hissed, “Darn it.” He may have broken another toe. He breaks about a toe a year stubbing them on things. He is not the world’s most coordinated person. I heard him fumble his way into the bathroom and later fumble his way downstairs. I knew that behind him would be a trail of stuff he had dropped or tripped over.
So I got up and followed the trail downstairs. It consisted of a hand towel, a sock, a Kleenex, his glasses, and an overturned wastebasket. I picked up the glasses and brought them to him in the kitchen. He was staring into the oven, looking confused.
“Dad?” I said. “Good morning. Happy Thanksgiving.”
He looked around sleepily. “Morning, sweetie.”
“Here are your glasses,” I said, holding them out to him. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to remember the temperature.” He put his glasses on.
“The temperature to set the oven to? Wait, here are Mrs. Meade’s instructions.” I pulled an index card out of his bathrobe pocket.
“Oh, good…good girl,” he mumbled.
We got the turkey all straightened out, and Dad went back to bed for a couple of hours. I fixed breakfast for us. It’s my best meal. I’m a whiz with a toaster.
Around eight-thirty Dad came to life. By eleven o’clock we were ready to start setting the table.
“O.K., Kams,” he said with relish, “what do you think? The white linen tablecloth or the green holiday damask?”
What? You’re giving me a choice? Does it matter what I want? “How about the green damask?” I asked slowly, watching him out of the corners of my eyes. He loves the white linen.
“Okey-doke,” he said. Not a glimmer of hesitation.
We bustled around, getting out all the stuff we never use—butter dishes, silver, pie servers, creamers.
“Time for the finishing touches,” Dad announced, just when I thought the table was really ready. “Let’s go upstairs and I’ll show you something.”
We trooped up to the third floor, Dad leading the way. When we reached the end of the hall, I stood and looked out the little round window there, while Dad fiddled with the pole and ceiling ring for the attic stairs. It’s my own private window. I happen to know that if you stand exactly four inches from the glass and narrow your eyes properly, the oak limb outside turns into a reaching hand. And if the wind blows just right, the fingers beckon you to…
“Oof. Here we go.” Dad had pulled the trap door down and unfolded the stairs.
We climbed up.
Ordinarily I am not allowed in the attic because the floor isn’t finished and Dad says if I ste
p on the wrong spot I will fall through the ceiling and land in the third floor bathroom. I do not know if this is true, but I don’t care to test it.
Dad came to a sudden halt at the top of the stairs and I ran into him, almost causing him to break another toe.
“Here,” he said. “This box.”
I peered around him and could just make out the words printed on top of a large cardboard carton: TABLE—HOLIDAY.
Dad stepped on into the attic. I hoped he knew where the unfinished places were.
“I’ll just sit here on the top step,” I said as he settled himself on that dangerous floor.
Dad smiled at me and opened the box. Mostly it looked like wads of tissue paper inside.
“Your mother was a great organizer,” he said quietly, unwrapping a white bundle. For a few seconds he just kept unwinding layers. He was far away. “We haven’t used this stuff much. I don’t think you’ll remember seeing it, but you have. All of it.” He carefully placed the tissue paper in the box and held something out to me.
It was a flat piece of china—a little white rectangle with yellow and pink roses around the border, but nothing in the middle.
“What is it?” I had to ask.
“It’s a place card, sweetie. See, you write in your guest’s name with water colors. Then you can wash it off later.”
“Oh, what a neat idea!” I cried. “Are there more?”
“There should be sixteen.”
“What else is in here?” I asked, pawing carefully through the little white mounds.
“Lots of things,” said Dad. “All the fancy things for holidays. We used the place cards at every holiday meal—Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas. One year we used them for your birthday.”
“My birthday?”
“Yes. Your mother threw a huge party when you turned four.”
I was surprised. I didn’t remember ever having a birthday party. That was not how Dad and I did things. We would spend the day at the beach (my birthday is at the end of August), or go to the state park, or see a movie. Then we’d go home to a special dinner prepared by Mrs. Meade (menu chosen by me), and I’d open my cards and gifts, and then we’d talk a little while and go to bed. It was lots of fun and very special. But I did not recall a single actual party.