Ellie, Engineer

  “Try it out on me!” Kit said, clapping her hands. “Please, please, please! And then we can both use it before my party and have matching hair!”

  Kit sat down in Ellie’s desk chair and folded her hands neatly in her lap, like she was at a beauty salon. Ellie pulled Kit’s hair behind her ears.

  “Madam! Welcome to the very lovely, very snooty, very famous Salon Bell,” Ellie said in a funny French voice (or what she thought might be a French voice—she didn’t actually know any French people, so she had to guess). Kit giggled. “Now, you are here for a french braid, yes? Lucky for you, this machine will french-braid your hair in no time!”

  Ellie split Kit’s hair into two pigtails, then looped them through the french braider. She then put her hand on the knob and began to turn it. The braider looped Kit’s hair back on itself, back and forth and back and forth, adding a bit more hair here and there and again and—

  “Ow,” Kit said.

  “What?” Ellie said, forgetting to use her French voice.

  “It pulled my hair. It’s okay, keep going,” Kit said, and sat straighter.

  Ellie kept turning the knob.

  “Ow!” Kit said, louder this time. “That time really hurt! Is it done now?”

  Ellie frowned and looked at Kit’s head closely. It was sort of hard to tell if it was done. Right now, Kit’s head just looked like a big lump of hair with some bits of metal sticking out in a few places. But braids usually looked like that—all messy and crazy and then suddenly at the end, poof, they looked great.

  “It isn’t done yet. Almost,” Ellie said nervously, trying to brush aside some of the hair to get a good look at the braid. She went to pull the french braider out of Kit’s hair, but—

  “Ow, ow, ow! It’s pulling my brains out!” Kit said, grabbing the top of her head and pulling away from Ellie. “What’s happening back there?”

  Ellie cringed. “It’s kind of in a big knot right now. All of it. The braider. Your hair. Everything is all knotty.”

  “What?” Kit said. She sounded like a talking piece of cake again, all high and squeaky. Ellie and Kit tugged and pulled and tried to sort out Kit’s hair from the french braider. It wasn’t working, not one bit.

  “It does look like your hair is french braided underneath the knots, though,” Ellie said as they walked downstairs to find Ellie’s mom and ask for her help.

  Kit didn’t answer. Ellie didn’t blame her.

  “Mom? Can you help with something really quick?” Ellie called into her mom’s home office.

  “I’m working right now, Ellie. Is it a real emergency, or is it a situation?” Ellie’s mom asked without looking over. This was something Ellie’s mom had discussed with Ellie a number of times. Real emergencies involved blood, bones, explosions, fires, floods, the car, and the good hedge clippers. Anything else was a situation and could wait until Ellie’s mom wasn’t working.

  “It’s a situation,” Ellie said glumly. “Come on, Kit. Maybe we can rub some peanut butter into your hair to unstick it.”

  “Oh no, you don’t!” Ellie’s mom shouted, springing to her feet. “What’s going on—oh! Kit! Is that a robot in your hair? What is happening?”

  “It’s a french braider,” Kit answered sadly.

  “A french knotter, mostly,” Ellie said, just as sadly.

  Ellie’s mom sighed. “Ellie—go get me a good comb and some hair conditioner. Kit, I’m going to call your mother, okay?”

  It took approximately one hour, one bottle of conditioner, two globs of butter, a screwdriver, and two grown-ups to get Kit’s hair unknotted from the french braider. The screwdriver was because Ellie had to take apart the french braider piece by piece as they picked through Kit’s hair (which was french braided underneath the knots, Ellie noticed, but she decided not to point this out because Kit’s mom was already looking very unhappy about the whole thing).

  “There we go! You’re free, Kit. And we didn’t even have to shave your head!” Ellie’s mom joked when they were finished.

  “You don’t know how afraid I was we’d have to,” Kit’s mom said not-at-all-jokingly, then turned to look at Ellie. “Young lady, I don’t want to see any engineering around my daughter’s hair ever again, especially just before pageant season! We will not be one of those cheaters using wigs to win!” Ellie didn’t really see how wigs were cheating, but she decided this was probably a bad time to mention that.

  Kit rubbed her head tenderly, then made a face when her fingers came away oily. “It’s okay, Mom. It isn’t Ellie’s fault. Besides, I asked her to try the french braider out on me.”

  “Well, perhaps Ellie can find someone with shorter hair to engineer with, then,” Kit’s mom said, gathering her things. “Perhaps give those neighborhood boys a call. They don’t mind getting soaked or dirty or having oily hair. Now, Kit, let’s get home—we absolutely have to wash that butter out of your hair.”

  What a wreck of a birthday present! Ellie thought, slomping up to her room after Kit and her mom were gone. Plus, since she’d had to take the french braider apart, now she had nothing for Kit’s birthday present on Saturday. How had this day gone from Water Empress to Miss Penelope to capital-“D” Disaster so quickly? She pulled out her notebook, drew a giant sad face over Project 60: French Braider, and then f lipped to a new page. It’d taken ages and ages to come up with the french braider, and now Ellie only had a few days before the party to come up with and build a whole new project. But would Kit even want a new present from Ellie now?

  She won’t if it has anything to do with her hair, Ellie thought, doodling some gears on the blank sheet of paper. She wondered if maybe her mom would take her to the store to buy a regular present, like a toy or some of those really nice markers that come in weird colors. Maybe a pretty collar for Miss Penelope. Or a Frisbee! Or—

  Ellie’s fingers got jittery, which happened a lot when she was getting an idea for a new project—it was like her fingers were just as excited as her heart. Why buy Miss Penelope a present when Ellie could build one herself? A present that would not get caught in anyone’s hair, require any butter or water balloons, or make Kit’s mom give Ellie a look. It was perfect, better even than the french braider would have been.

  Ellie would build the world’s best doghouse for Miss Penelope!

  The next day, Ellie woke up super early. She wanted to check out other doghouses in the neighborhood for ideas, but also, she was doing her weekly Fix-It Walk. Every Tuesday in the summer, she walked around the neighborhood to make sure there was nothing that needed touching up or nailing or tightening or repairing. She snapped her tool belt on over her favorite sundress (pink with crisscross straps and beads), then pulled down her sunglasses. It was so early that the neighborhood was all misty and foggy and cool. It had to be this early—she needed to make sure she got out before Kit saw her, since obviously she wouldn’t be able to invite Kit along. It was a surprise present, after all.

  Ellie took a right out her front door and started down the block. Her tool belt made a satisfying jingle-thud noise as she walked. She stopped just outside the Millers’ house. They had a dog—and a doghouse. She peered through the fence to get a better look.

  “Are you investigating them?” a voice said behind her. She spun around so fast that one of her screwdrivers fell out of her belt. It was Toby Michaels, standing there with his arms folded and chin up. He said, “Because if you’re going to investigate, you need an investigating hat. Like Sherlock Holmes has.”

  “You don’t need that to investigate. It’s just the hat a famous investigator wears,” Ellie pointed out, picking up her screwdriver.

  “So you are investigating them?”

  “No.”

  “Are you robbing them? That is called ‘casing the joint.’ If you’re robbing them. It’s what you do before you rob. You ‘case.’ ”

  “I’m not robbing them! Do I look like a robber?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never seen a robber—”

  “To
by Michaels, I’m researching doghouses,” Ellie snapped. “I’m building one as a surprise present for Kit. Which I shouldn’t have told you, since now you have to keep it a secret too. Promise you won’t tell her?”

  Toby shrugged. “Sure. But you’re the one who’s always telling Kit secrets, you know.”

  Ellie made a face at him, then looked back through the fence. The Millers’ doghouse wasn’t very interesting, but it did have a nice little border around the door. She sketched it quickly in her notepad, thinking about what sort of wood she’d need to use for that. Maybe instead of wood, she could put some nails around the door and then string ribbons . . .

  “You’re drawing their doghouse?” Toby asked.

  Ellie sighed. “I’m researching doghouses. It’s important to research before you build something.”

  Toby’s mouth widened a bit. When he did this, she could see he was missing one of his back teeth. It must have just fallen out, because there wasn’t even a little bit of the new tooth showing. “So you’re going to build a doghouse. Like you built that water balloon launcher?”

  “Exactly. I’m an engineer,” Ellie said.

  “Like the kind that drives a train?” Toby asked, eyebrow raised.

  “No, like the kind that builds things and knows about wires and electricity and construction and stuff like that—like my dad,” Ellie said. “Or, at least, I’m going to be an engineer someday. So I’m practicing now.”

  “Oh, cool,” he said. “So, can I help research the doghouses?”

  “I thought you didn’t like playing with girls. You wouldn’t let us play soccer with you yesterday,” Ellie said, folding her arms and lifting her eyebrows, just like her mom did whenever Ellie was in trouble.

  Toby kicked at the ground a little. He didn’t say anything. If you knew Toby Michaels, you’d know what a big deal that was. Toby Michaels was the sort of kid who always had something to say.

  Ellie waited.

  Finally, Toby said, “We should’ve let you guys play. Dylan was a really bad goalie anyway.”

  “Uh-huh,” Ellie said.

  “Sorry.” He sounded like he really was sorry. And sort of embarrassed.

  “Uh-huh,” Ellie said.

  “So . . . can I help research the doghouses? I know all the neighbors, and their pets. It’ll go faster if I help. And then maybe in exchange, you can show me how you build the doghouse. I’ve never built anything before.”

  Ellie fiddled with the top of her hammer, spinning it around in its loop. She didn’t want to tell him no if he really did want to learn about building things. After all, she really loved engineering—it was fun to share that with people. Even Toby Michaels–type people.

  Besides, if he was a jerk boy about it, she’d just soak him again.

  “Okay,” she said. “Let’s go.”

  Now the jingle-thud noise of her tool belt was punctuated by the slap of Toby’s flip-flops on the ground. They came to another backyard.

  “Don’t bother. They don’t have a doghouse. The man who lives here is an executive. See the car? Executives have nice cars—”

  “We’re not researching doghouses in this yard,” Ellie said, cutting him off. “I’m going to fix the mailbox.” She pointed at the mailbox. The screw that held in the little flag had come loose; the flag was hanging limply, pointing to the ground. She looked closely at the screw holding the flag in, then chose a screwdriver from her tool belt.

  “Why that one?” Toby asked, pointing at the other screwdriver she had.

  “This is a flathead screw,” Ellie said, showing him. The top of the screw had one line right down the middle. “So I have to use the flathead screwdriver. The other screwdriver is called a Phillips head—it’s for screws that have a little plus-sign shape on the top.”

  “Huh,” Toby said. “Who is Phillips?”

  Ellie shrugged. She carefully put the screwdriver into the screw and turned it to the right. The flag tightened right back up. She stepped back to admire her work, then moved on.

  They saw three more doghouses. Toby knew just where to look, like he promised. One doghouse had a tiled roof. Another was really two doghouses in one. The last one had a single slanted roof instead of a triangle one. You couldn’t really see it from the road, but luckily, Toby knew the owner of the house. Toby seemed to know everybody. He’d knock on the door, and they’d say, “Good morning, Toby!” like he was the best thing to come around since the sun that morning. He even shook their hands, like an adult.

  Ellie was impressed.

  “So, where are you going to build this doghouse?” Toby asked as Ellie finished up drawing the one with the slanted roof.

  “Well, it won’t fit in my workshop. I guess in the backyard near the tire swing? That’s where I build bigger projects,” she explained.

  “But won’t Kit see it, since she lives right next door?”

  Ellie frowned. She’d been so focused on designing and building the doghouse that she’d sort of forgotten about this. Sometimes, her parents let her build in the garage, but it wasn’t much fun and it always smelled like lawnmowers.

  “I have an idea,” Toby said. “You can build it in my yard. My parents won’t care. And I promise not to mess with it when you aren’t there.”

  Ellie thought about this as she walked toward the next fence. There was a big doghouse in the backyard, one with a domed roof and a little built-in trough—for food, Ellie guessed. She began to draw it.

  “What’s going on out here?” a voice asked. The lady who owned the house was standing at the door, looking confused. “Who are you?”

  “Oh—hello. I’m Ellie, neighborhood engineer. I was just drawing your doghouse,” Ellie said, feeling a little worried about the look on the lady’s face—it wasn’t a mean look, but it wasn’t a friendly look either.

  “Mrs. Carter! You look great this morning. Is that a new haircut?” Toby said warmly, and then he shook her hand. “Listen—didn’t you have someone come work on your deck last week? Is there maybe some wood left over that Ellie could have? She’s building a doghouse.”

  “Oh!” Mrs. Carter said. “You know, I think there is. Just go around back and grab whatever you see.”

  Toby gave Ellie a look that said, See? I’m helpful!

  He had a point. Ellie let herself and Toby in through the side gate and started toward the pile of wood, which was near the doghouse Ellie had just been drawing. There were some really good pieces! They gathered them up and started back toward the gate.

  “Muffintop!” Mrs. Carter shouted, startling both of them.

  This was a very weird thing for someone to yell for no reason. But when Ellie looked, she realized that Mrs. Carter actually had a very good reason for shouting, “Muffintop!” It was the name of her fluffy black-and-white dog. The dog that had just jetted out through the gate Ellie had left open.

  Ellie and Toby dropped all the wood in their arms and sprinted for the gate. Where did that dog even come from? Ellie wondered as Muffintop sidestepped and sniffed and stopped to pee on some flowers.

  “Muffintop! Here, boy! Come back!” Ellie called. Toby whistled loudly. Mrs. Carter tried shouting tricks: “Come back, Muffintop, and we’ll go get a treat!”

  Muffintop was not fooled. He pranced back and forth outside the gate, then turned and ran, pink tongue lolling out of his mouth, grinning toothily like this was the best day ever.

  “You have to catch him!” Mrs. Carter said to Ellie and Toby, looking frantic. “He never stops running if you don’t catch him!”

  Ellie dashed after Muffintop. Toby was right behind her, trying to whistle and run at the same time.

  “Border collies are known for being an extremely high-energy breed of dog!” he said, panting.

  “No kidding,” Ellie called back.

  Muffintop dashed down the street, looking over his shoulder to see if they were still chasing him. When he saw they were, he cut hard to the side and darted around a flowerbed, then a house, then—


  “Look out!” Ellie called, but it was no use. Muffintop dove into a rack of clothes that someone was just wheeling out for a garage sale. The garage sale lady screamed and flailed her hands around, but it was too late to stop the dog. Muffintop barked and emerged from the other side of the clothes with a pair of flowery pants wrapped around his neck like a scarf. His pants-scarf fluttered as he leaped into the air, clearing a table of Santa figurines, only to crash-land into a pile of books.

  Muffintop clambered to his feet, upsetting the neat piles of books. He was still wearing the pants-scarf. He shook, and hair went everywhere. Muffintop looked pretty happy about this. He drooled on the nearest book.

  “Get out of here, dog!” the garage sale lady shouted, brandishing a broom in Muffintop’s direction.

  Muffintop leaped to the side, like he thought even this angry lady was just playing a game with him. The lady swung the broom again and again, and Muffintop nearly backflipped in delight. Then, he started running again.

  Ellie threw her hands in the air. “Ugh. We’re never going to catch him like this!”

  “What if we had help?” Toby asked as they watched Muffintop stop and snatch the tomatoes off one of their neighbor’s bushes with his teeth. He crunched each of them, like he expected the tomatoes to be toy balls; when they smashed in his mouth, he spit them out, then tried another and another and another.

  “Help would be good. I could go get Kit,” Ellie said.

  “You and Kit live on the other end of the neighborhood—Dylan and the McClellan twins live right there! I’ll go get them,” Toby said, and sprinted away before Ellie could argue.

  The neighborhood boys? Hanging out with Toby was one thing, but Ellie didn’t really want to hang out with the rest of them.

  It’s not just hanging out—it’s work! You’re trying to catch that dog, she reminded herself. And, if it was work, that meant she probably should see if there was anything she could build to catch Muffintop faster.