Sarah's Legacy (12 page)

My one fear is that I, along with the entire community, must appear hopelessly behind the times and unsophisticated to a man such as Mr. King.

Although I cannot help but believe that his interest in me goes beyond friendship, he did not speak of a second visit, nor issue an invitation to my family to attend at the home he is letting from the Butlers.

My interest in Great-Aunt Sarah was getting stronger and stronger. From the last entry I'd read, it seemed that she and Mr. King might be falling in love with each other. It was exciting. On the other hand, I knew she never married. Something must have gone wrong between them.

When we'd first come to live in Miramichi, I'd only seen her as a kind of batty old woman with a house full of animals. Now I found myself wishing that her life had turned out differently, as though wanting it could make it so. It was obvious that she could have married (if not Mr. King, then someone else) and had a family, but she hadn't. Why had she ended up alone in a rambling house?

That thought jumped to others and ended up reminding me that I hadn't been what you could call nice
to Ashley and Jamie the last time I'd talked to them. If I didn't watch it, I was going to end up as alone as my great-aunt.

Or my mom. My insides felt all weird every time I thought about how I'd busted things up between her and Stan. I have to admit that the sickish feeling I got was partly because I was sorry for what I'd done and partly because I was worried she was somehow going to find out. But then, it didn't look like Stan was going to call her again, so maybe she never would.

There was also a lot of guilt, not only because she'd told me about being lonely, but also because I'd wanted to get rid of him at the beginning.

I tossed and turned for a long time before I fell asleep with the usual pair of intruders beside me on the bed.

Plunk was at the door pawing to get out of the bedroom and going on something terrible the next morning, which woke me up. I mumbled for him to knock it off a couple of times and then got up when it was clear that he had no intention of stopping. My bedside clock told me it was barely after six.

“What's the big idea?” I asked him crossly. “I could have slept for another hour.”

He kind of bounced in one spot, wagging his tail furiously and giving a little “ruff.”

“You're nothing but trouble,” I grumbled. He
jumped up against the door again, apparently unconcerned with his bad behaviour.

I let him out, showered, then tiptoed downstairs and filled the dishes as the other animals came wandering in from various parts of the house. It's amazing how well they can hear! They could be in the deepest sleep possible, but the second that food hits the first dish, they're right there.

I took the dogs outside for few minutes, too, going over their names in my head. There was Plunk, of course, and Dusty, an old shepherd called Steinbeck, and a beagle of some description named Boothie.

Steinbeck was the biggest of them and yet I'd seen Inky — a tiny black cat — washing his ears a couple of times. It was comical how the big dog just lay there kind of whimpering and allowed it, even though it was plain to see he didn't much care for the treatment.

When the dogs had all had a chance to run for a bit we went back into the house, where I discovered an orange and white female cat named Sprinkle shoving against Arthur the Fifth, vying for a place at his dish. I scooped her up and moved her to a bowl that wasn't occupied, then went back and gave Arthur a quick pat. Instead of showing a little appreciation, he gave me a look that seemed to ask why
I
was bothering him.

Mom came into the kitchen when I had just finished a bowl of cereal. She looked as tired as I felt.

“You're up early.”

“Plunk woke me up,” I said. “He's such a pest.”

“Well, at least you haven't had the pleasure of Rosie's company in the night,” she said, a trace of a smile flitting across her face and then disappearing.

“You have?” I asked.

“Well, not by design,” she said. “I didn't make my bed yesterday, and when I went to get into it last night, I almost screeched to find Rosie snuggled in under the comforter.”

I laughed at the thought but then saw the sad look in Mom's eyes and knew she was thinking of how Rosie had scared Stan that time.

Mom changed the subject and we kept up a conversation for a while, both of us trying to sound normal and cheerful. I wondered if she could see through me as easily as I could see through her. Normally, Mom can sniff out anything phoney inside of three seconds flat, but I don't think she was all that tuned in to what was going on with me at the moment. If she noticed that anything was wrong, she didn't mention it.

It was a relief when the time came to leave for school. I made my way there feeling miserable and only half awake. It wasn't promising to be a very good day!

At least Ashley and Jamie didn't seem to be upset with me over yesterday. Another girl joined us at lunchtime too.

“Hi, I'm Jenna. I'm in Mr. Bittner's class. My brother Jonah is in your class, though.” Jenna popped a fry into her mouth and then added, “We're twins,” while she chewed it.

“I'm Sarah.” That seemed a bit unnecessary. In a school this size, everyone knew who I was.

“Jonah thinks you're cute,” Jenna blurted next, watching carefully to see my reaction.

Since I had no idea which of the boys in my class might happen to be Jonah, it was a bit hard to know whether I should be pleased over this announcement or not.

“He sits beside you,” Jamie offered helpfully. She held both hands out and glanced at each for a second, concentrating. “On your right.”

I could barely picture the boy they were talking about, though I had a vague idea he had dark hair.

“So, you wanna go out with him?” Jenna asked through more fries. I could see them mashing in her mouth, mixed with ketchup and all gross-looking.

I felt like saying that if his manners were anything like hers, I'd pass. Instead, I said, “I don't even know him.” I thought that would settle it.

“So, you'll
get
to know him.” Her eyes narrowed as she spoke and I could see she wasn't pleased that I hadn't jumped at the chance.

“Well, the truth is,” I lied, “I already have a boyfriend. In Ontario.”

She shrugged then and let it drop. I thought I'd handled it pretty well, until Ashley cornered me later on.

“Why'd you lie to Jenna?”

“What do you mean?”

“About having a boyfriend in Ontario.”

“What makes you think I was lying?” I felt myself squirm as she looked right at me.

“I asked you that the first day you got here. You said no.”

I vaguely remembered the onslaught of questions she and Jamie had asked that day.

“I didn't know what else to say,” I admitted. “She seemed pretty determined, and I didn't want to say I'd go out with someone I don't know at all.”

“You still shouldn't have lied.” Ashley seemed really angry.

“I'm sorry. I felt, you know, pressured and stuff.”

“At the pool the other day,” she said, apparently determined to keep me on the hot seat, “when you said that guy wasn't your mom's boyfriend. Was that a lie too?”

When she asked me that, it seemed that everything from the past few days came crashing down around me. I tried to fight the tears, but they started to come anyway.

“Hey, now,” Ashley said, her voice softening, “don't do that. Here, come to the washroom before someone sees you.”

When we got there, I found myself telling her the whole story, how I hadn't wanted Stan around at first, and how I'd changed my mind about that and then ruined everything without even meaning to.

“See, lying just causes trouble.” Ashley seemed pretty stuck on that theme. “If you'd been honest, none of this would have happened.”

I had nothing to say to that. She was right.

“I
hate
lying.” Ashley seemed to have drifted off as she spoke. “My mother has a big problem with it. She lies continually, about nothing and everything. Dad says it's a form of mental illness.”

“I've heard of that,” I said quickly, glad she'd switched to talking about someone else. “It's like some sort of compulsive thing, right?”

“You have no idea. She can't keep a friend because everyone sees what she's like in no time. And imagine what it's like for me and my Dad. We're her own family and we can't believe a word that comes out of her mouth. It's awful.”

I understood why she'd reacted the way she had then, though I didn't think there was any similarity between me and Ashley's mom.

All afternoon, I kept thinking about what it would be like to have a mother like that.

The rest of the week hurried past, and by Saturday Mom seemed to be getting back to normal. She never mentioned Stan, so I guess she must have accepted that was the end of anything that might have been developing between them. I noticed, though, that she spent a lot of time talking about how busy she was going to be with the Hope Chest and how she wouldn't have much time for anything else. Seemed as though she was persuading herself that she didn't have time for him anyway.

David came over at five on Saturday morning to help us with the yard sale, which was advertised to start at seven. He'd already been by on Friday evening and we'd set up tables in the driveway, so it was just a matter of lugging everything out and organizing it. Mom had put price tags on everything with squares of masking
tape. We started with the furniture — old-fashioned tables, dressers, wardrobes, and some strange pieces I didn't even know the names for. Then we brought out bags and boxes of smaller stuff.

Our first customers arrived before we were even ready for them, so I got put in charge of the cash box while Mom and David finished getting things set up. By seven o'clock, our official opening time, we'd already had a few dozen people and had sold almost a hundred dollars' worth of small items as well as two pieces of furniture that brought in $350 between them. I was amazed at how excited folks got over some of the things.

The morning flew by in a blur of activity. I couldn't believe how many people came to our sale or how fast the enormous piles of stuff on the tables went down.

By noon, the onslaught of customers had slowed to a trickle and we finally had time to count the money. We'd made almost two thousand dollars! I couldn't believe it, but Mom said she wasn't surprised.

“A lot of the furniture pieces were antique,” she explained. “We probably could have gotten more for some of them, but I just wanted to get rid of it all.”

Even though we'd sold a tremendous amount of stuff, there was still quite a bit left. Mom was trying to decide what to do with it when a young woman came along pushing a baby in an old-fashioned stroller. It
was obvious from the way they were dressed that she was poor.

She walked in slowly and looked over the tables, peeking shyly at us once in a while. A few times she picked something up, but she didn't hang onto anything the way people did when they were going to buy it. She paused for a long time, looking at a big old blender — the kind with a glass top.

“Those are very handy for making baby food,” Mom said helpfully.

“Is it really only three dollars?” the woman asked in a tiny, timid voice.

“What's your baby's name?” Mom asked, instead of answering her question about the price.

“This here's Ginny” — a hint of pride crept into her face — “and I'm Allison.”

“Well, Allison, I'd love it if you'd take anything you want as our gift to Ginny.” Mom smiled. “She's the cutest baby I've seen since my Sarah was that size.”

Allison's face flushed with surprise and she didn't speak for a moment. When she did, it was to murmur a hushed thank you. Then she picked up the blender and said she'd like to take it, if Mom was sure it was all right.

“Oh, there must be some other things you could use,” Mom said. “I don't think many more people will be showing up, and I just want to get rid of as much stuff as possible. You'd be doing me a favour, honestly.”

By the time Mom was finished, Allison had a couple of boxes of things, which we packed and put to one side. Mom got her address and told her we'd send it all over to her place in a taxi.

“That was really nice of you,” David said, as we all started putting what hadn't been sold back into boxes.

“You know, David,” Mom said, “a few months ago I couldn't afford to give anyone anything. Sarah and I were poor as church mice ourselves. It feels really good to be able to help someone else.”

“Stan's like that, too,” David went on, unaware of what had happened. “My dad says he's always doing things for people. He said Stan doesn't talk about it, either, just goes and does things. Dad says that counts more than if you help someone and brag about it.”

David didn't seem to notice that Mom had gone kind of still and quiet or that she didn't answer. He just went on, talking about a few things that he'd heard Stan had done. I finally caught his eye and shook my head just enough for him to notice. He understood right away and stopped in mid-sentence.

“So, where did you want to put all this stuff?” His voice was awkward as he changed the subject.

“Well, it can't go back where it was,” Mom said. “Let's see if there's enough room in the shed out back.”

The shed was already half full of garden tools and a bunch of odd-looking junk, but we managed to
squeeze the boxes in there. Then Mom paid David for helping, passing him an envelope with money in it. He thanked her and stuck it in his pocked without counting it.