I pulled some sheets of paper out of my pocket and smoothed them flat. "This is our poetry assignment."
She looked at it and smiled. "That looks like fun."
"It is." I handed her another sheet. "This is math homework."
She frowned. "I hate math."
"Me, too."
Hope stirred sugar into her tea and smiled at me. "Can we go to your house after we finish our tea?" she asked me.
Daphne looked shocked. "Hope, you don't ask people things like that. And besides, you know we can't leave Grandmother here by herself."
Hope frowned. "Grandmother is a grownup, isn't she? We don't have to take care of her all the time." She twirled a long strand of hair around her finger. "Besides, I'm hungry. Maybe Jessica's mother would invite us to stay for dinner."
"We have our own dinner right here, Hope!" Daphne sounded very upset.
"Just cereal. I'm tired of cereal, Daphne. And we don't even have any milk. She fed it all to the cats." Hope got up and opened the refrigerator door. "See? There's nothing to eat."
"There's soup and tuna fish and Dinty Moore stew." Daphne's face was flushed.
"No, there's not." Hope climbed up on the counter and opened the cupboard. "One box of corn flakes, that's all. And some pickles."
"You don't have any food?" I stared at Daphne, horrified. Josh and I loved to complain to Mom that there was nothing to eat, but it was never really true. We meant there weren't any doughnuts or cookies or strawberry yogurt. But here I could see for myself there was nothing on the shelves or in the refrigerator.
"She must have fed it all to the cats." Daphne looked as if she were going to cry.
"My mother would be glad to give you dinner," I said. "When she comes to pick me up, you can just come home with us. Mom wouldn't mind a bit."
But Daphne shook her head. "We can't leave Grandmother. It upsets her too much."
"But what will you eat?"
"The cereal." Daphne shrugged. "I guess we should be glad that cats don't like cereal."
"I want a real dinner, like our mommy used to fix. I don't want cereal!" Hope started to cry. "And I don't want to live here anymore!"
Daphne scooped Hope up into her lap and tried to comfort her. "I'm sorry, Hope, but we have to stay here. We can't leave poor Grandmother all alone. Please try to understand."
"Do you have money to buy food?" I stared at Daphne, trying to understand.
"Grandmother gets Social Security checks, but she hasn't felt well enough to go to the bank to cash them. Right now all we have is what we get for the bottles and cans. I haven't got much more than a dollar."
"And soon we aren't going to have any gas or electricity," Hope said, "because she won't pay the bill. But Daddy's coming back soon, and then everything will be all right."
I looked at Daphne. "What's she talking about?"
Before Daphne could say a word, Hope continued, "Grandmother saw him in the woods yesterday, and he told her that he was coming home soon."
"Hope, I told you not to believe Grandmother. You know Daddy can't come back." Daphne shook Hope gently. "Grandmother imagined she saw Daddy. She didn't really see him."
"Grandmother wouldn't lie!" Hope's face was white, her eyes enormous. "Daddy is coming back, he has to! What will happen to us if he doesn't?"
Daphne shook her head. She was crying now. "Hope, Hope, please, everything will be all right. I can take care of us, I can do it. I won't let anything happen to you."
Just then Hope froze. "Grandmother's awake, she's getting out of bed."
All three of us looked at the ceiling. Sure enough, I could hear footsteps, slow and faltering, on the floor overhead. Jumping up from the table, I pulled on my parka. "Listen, I better leave before she comes down here. Do you all want to come with me?"
"We can't." Daphne hugged Hope, trying to keep her from running after me.
"Please come." As I fumbled with my zipper, I could hear someone walking downstairs. I didn't want to run away like a coward, but I was afraid to face Mrs. Woodleigh.
"No, we can't, Jessica." Daphne's eyes pleaded with me to understand.
"Well, good-bye, then." I hesitated, my hand on the door knob.
"Who's this?" Mrs. Woodleigh appeared in the doorway, clutching a soiled bathrobe around her thin body. "I thought I told you not to come here, girl!" She glowered at me fiercely.
"It's Jessica, our friend." Hope looked worriedly at her grandmother. "She wants us to have dinner at her house, but Daphne says we can't." Hope's lower lip trembled and her eyes filled with tears.
Mrs. Woodleigh took a tottering step toward me. "I know what you want, you can't fool me. Your father's one of those fast-talking Adelphia real estate men, isn't he? He sent you out here to soften me up so he can get my property. Well, it won't work. I won't sell. Not for any price." She shook her fist at me, inches from my nose. "Now, go on home. Get out of here!"
"Jessica's our friend!" Hope shouted. "She doesn't want our farm. She doesn't even have a father!"
"Doesn't have a father?'" Mrs. Woodleigh looked at me, her face filled with sympathy. "Why do the fathers always go away? Is he over there in Vietnam too?"
"He's in California," I whispered.
"California?" Mrs. Woodleigh sounded confused. "Are they keeping them in California now?"
"He just lives there," I said. "He and my mother are divorced."
The old woman frowned. "I might have known. That's all Adelphia is. Divorce, alcohol, drugs, sex, crazy stuff." Sniffing loudly, she sat down at the table. "Well, where's my tea?"
Daphne grabbed a cup. "I was just going to fix it."
As she turned to the stove to check the kettle, I whispered, "I better leave now, Daphne."
"Oh no, not yet. You haven't finished your tea." Hope tugged on my arm. "And we haven't played mice. Please stay just a little longer, Jessica."
"Tea looks awful strong!" Mrs. Woodleigh scowled at the cup Daphne had set before her. "I bet it doesn't even have sugar in it." She took a sip and made a face. "When will you ever learn to do it right?" Dumping two or three heaping spoonfuls into her cup, she began drinking noisily.
"I'm going to walk partway down the driveway with Jessica," Daphne said.
"That's right. Leave me here all alone to drink my tea. What does it matter? I'll be dead and gone soon enough." Mrs. Woodleigh stared into her cup. "See my tea leaves? You don't have to be a gypsy to read them. Here's one little one all by itself. That's me. All the others are going somewhere together, leaving me all alone."
Hope bent over the cup. With one dirty little finger, she pushed the lonely tea leaf over with the rest. "Now you're with all the others, Grandmother. See?" Hope smiled at Mrs. Woodleigh.
"Humph." The old woman didn't return the smile. "Where are you going?" Her sharp tone stopped Hope as she started to follow Daphne and me out the door.
"With them," Hope said, her smile fading.
Mrs. Woodleigh's hand shot out like a claw and grabbed Hope's arm. "No, no, baby. You stay here with Grandmother. It's too cold out there for you." She drew Hope close to her. "You love your grandmother, don't you? You don't want to leave me all alone in the shadows with that crack running over my head."
Hope looked uncomfortable. "Can't I come?" she asked Daphne.
"Stay here, Hope. I'll be right back."
"You aren't going to play mice?"
"Not today," I said.
"Then here." Hope held Baby Mouse out to me. "Take him."
"You can keep him for a while, Hope. I'll get him next time." With relief, I heard Daphne open the door. I slipped out behind her, glad to escape from Mrs. Woodleigh.
"Are you sure you can't come home with me?" I asked Daphne as we walked down the driveway.
"I told you no!" She looked angry and unhappy.
"But what are you going to do? You've got to have food and electricity and heat!"
"I'll get the checks cashed. I can forge her name if I have to. And we have plenty of wood for a f
ire and candles for light. We can get along just fine!"
"But she's crazy!" I screamed at Daphne. The word came out without my even thinking. "She's crazy and you know it! How can you live with a crazy person?"
"Don't ever say that again!" Daphne's voice was tight and tense. "She's just old, she's not crazy." With tears running down her cheeks, Daphne glared at me. "Just go on home. I don't need you or anybody else!" Turning her back on me, she ran up the driveway toward the house.
I started to run after her, but Mrs. Woodleigh opened the door and peered out into the dusk. Seeing me, she shouted, "Go on now, girl, get out of here!"
This time I did what she told me to. As I ran down the driveway, stumbling on the rutted ground, I could see the lights of Adelphia twinkling through the dusk like stars. I ran toward them, anxious to reach the safety and comfort of my own house.
Twelve
WHILE MOM and I were cleaning up the kitchen after dinner, I decided to risk asking her a few things. Clearing my throat, I said, "Do all people get kind of crazy when they get old?"
She looked a little surprised by my question. I guess she couldn't imagine what had prompted it. "No, of course not, Jessie. Think of your grandmother. She goes to Europe every summer, she does volunteer work at the hospital three days a week, she has lots of friends. Why, she actually has a more active social life than I do."
"Yes, but she's not really old." I thought of my grandmother, her hair nicely set, well dressed, always ready to share a joke or a good story. And then I thought of Mrs. Wood leigh in her shabby bathrobe, her hair wild, talking about dead men coming back and houses falling down on her head.
"Your grandmother is seventy-three years old, Jessie. She's not exactly a teenager." Mom took the last cup out of the dishwasher and set it on a shelf.
"Well, she doesn't look that old. Or act it."
"That's because she takes good care of herself. She exercises, she watches her diet, she keeps herself busy."
"But some people get crazy when they're old, don't they?"
"It's called senility, Jess-o." Josh opened the refrigerator door, surveyed its contents and shook his head. "Nothing to eat," he groaned.
"How do you get it?" I stared at Josh, the boy genius and walking encyclopedia.
"It's caused by hardening of the arteries. Arteriosclerosis." He dragged the word out, glorying in its many syllables, showing off his awe-inspiring vocabulary. "Your arteries get all clogged up with animal fat and your brain can't get enough blood, so your brain cells start dying. Zap, zap, zap."
Mom frowned. "You make it sound like a video game."
"I didn't invent it." Josh bit into a huge peanut butter and jelly sandwich, dribbling strawberry jam down the front of his shirt.
Trying not to look at the jam on his chin, I asked him if there was a cure for senility.
He shook his head, his mouth stuffed with bread. Swallowing noisily, he said, "Brain cells can't be regenerated. Once they die, that's it. So you just get worse and worse."
"That's awful," I said.
"Maybe you better cut down on the cholesterol," Mom said, watching him pour a glass of milk.
Josh shrugged. "The world will have ended in a nuclear war long before my arteries get a chance to clog up."
On that happy note, Josh left us. In a few seconds, I could hear his video game beeping, bipping, and zapping. Picking up Snuff, I told Mom I was going upstairs to study.
Friday night Josh called me to the telephone. It was almost ten-thirty, and the four of us were watching an old Alfred Hitchcock movie on television. Grabbing a handful of Ed's special hot buttered popcorn, I left the room reluctantly, hoping I wouldn't miss too much of the movie.
It was Daphne.
"Are you at McDonald's?" I pulled the phone as far away from the living room as the cord would stretch.
"Yes. I had to wait till Hope fell asleep before I could sneak out." She paused, and I could hear cars and voices in the background. "I wanted to apologize for shouting at you yesterday." Her voice sounded small and faraway. "I was upset."
"That's all right. I shouldn't have said what I did, either."
"Are you coming over tomorrow? I'll understand if you don't want to."
"Of course I'm coming." I glanced at Mom and Ed, but they were too interested in the movie to eavesdrop on my conversation. "Did they turn off the gas and electricity yet?"
"This morning. But it's not too bad. We have a big fireplace in the living room, so we moved our beds down there. It's cozy with the firelight and the candles."
"How about food? Did you cash her checks?"
"Not yet, but Hope and I collected a lot of bottles, enough to buy hot dogs and bread and milk. You don't have to worry about us, Jessica." Her voice was getting an edge to it, and I was afraid she was going to get mad again.
"Besides," she went on, "winter is hard on old people. Grandmother will be better in the spring."
I thought about what Josh had said about arteries and brain cells, but I didn't say anything to Daphne about it. Instead I said I'd see her at two o'clock on Saturday.
"I'll meet you at the mailbox," she said. "We'll go for a walk. I found a wonderful place, Jessica. It's a long way, but it's worth it."
She paused again while a car drove past. "I have to go now. If Hope wakes up and finds I'm gone, she'll be terrified."
"Be careful walking home, Daphne. It's so late."
"Don't worry. I can take care of myself."
After she hung up, I stood there in my warm, safe kitchen. Josh, Mom, and Ed were laughing at a commercial on television, Snuff was rubbing round my ankles, hoping for a handout, and the cuckoo clock over the sink was striking eleven. I was glad that I wasn't walking along a dark road all by myself, and I hoped that Daphne really could take care of herself.
"Who called you so late?" Mom asked as I snuggled up next to her on the couch.
"Oh, it was just Tracy." I bent my head over Snuff, petting her to avoid looking at Mom. I hated lying to her, but I couldn't imagine what she would think of Daphne's being out alone this late at night. Snuff rewarded my attention by growling and struggling to escape. "How did the movie end?"
"Oh, it was great, really great," Josh said. He launched into a detailed description of everything I'd missed, making Mom forget all about the telephone call.
On Saturday, I walked out to Daphne's, glad that the sun was shining and the wind wasn't blowing. As she'd promised, she was waiting by the mailbox, alone this time.
"Where's Hope?" I asked.
"I didn't tell her you were coming. She thinks I'm out looking for bottles, and she's keeping Grandmother company. Come on." Daphne ran off across the field, and I followed her into the woods.
Talcing a winding path, she led me through trees and around boulders, climbing uphill steadily. It was lovely in the woods. High up in the bare branches the wind blew gently, and underfoot the ground was soft and rustly with leaves. Squirrels scampered about, and bluejays and crows exchanged cries overhead.
At last we reached the top of the hill and stepped out of the woods. We were standing on the edge of a cliff. Down below us, the Patapsco River wound its way through a narrow valley, glittering in the winter sunlight.
"Isn't it beautiful?" Daphne swept her arm across the sky.
I nodded. "I feel like Daniel Boone exploring the wilderness."
Daphne smiled and sat down on a shelf of rock. Dropping down beside her, I rested quietly, letting the sun warm my back.
"Look, Jessica!" Daphne pointed at a bird circling above us, wings spread. "It's a red hawk."
I watched the hawk drifting up and down on gusts of wind, high above the river and the valley.
"It must be wonderful to be a bird, to be able to fly like that." Daphne sighed. "If people really get reincarnated, I'd like to come back as a bird. A hawk or a sea gull. Something wild and free."
"I think I'd never come down to earth," I said. "I'd sail on the wind forever."
We sat in s
ilence then, watching the hawk until it veered away from us and finally vanished, a tiny speck in the sky.
After a while I remembered the sandwiches I'd made before I'd left home. "Are you hungry?" With a flourish, I presented the sandwiches and a couple of apples.
"You didn't have to bring food." Daphne looked embarrassed instead of pleased.
"I know, but walking makes me hungry." I bit into a peanut butter and banana sandwich that Josh himself wouldn't have found too small. Gesturing at the other one, I said, "Go on, Daphne, eat it."
She shrugged and picked it up. "I am pretty hungry," she admitted. "Grandmother gave the rest of the hot dogs to the cats."
"You better get those checks cashed."
Daphne nodded. "If the weather stays like this, Grandmother might get to the bank next week. In the cold, her rheumatism bothers her, and she can hardly walk."
I shook my head sadly, thinking of my own grandmother. If only Mrs. Woodleigh were like her. Life seemed so unfair sometimes.
As we were finishing our apples, I asked Daphne where she'd lived before she came to her grandmother's house. It was something I'd been wondering about. She'd never really said anything about her mother or her earlier life, and I was curious.
Without looking at me, Daphne gazed off into space. "In Boston," she said.
"With your mother?"
She nodded.
"Did you like it there?"
She nodded again. Looking more closely at her, I realized that she was crying.
"I'm sorry, Daphne. Did I say something wrong?" Ashamed of myself, I huddled on the rock beside her, wishing I hadn't given in to my curiosity. I should have realized that Daphne would have mentioned her past before now if she had really wanted to talk about it.
Daphne shrugged and tried to wipe her eyes. "My mother was driving home from work. It was raining. There was this truck—the driver didn't see her car." Daphne took a deep breath. "She never came home."
My stomach felt quivery just thinking about it. Suppose something like that happened to my mother? I couldn't imagine what it would be like never to see her again. To say good-bye to her in the morning, never dreaming it was the last time. A sharp lump rose in my throat and tears stung my eyes. Silently I stared at Daphne, but she sat, her face turned away from me, looking at something I couldn't see.