The Penderwicks in Spring (19 page)

W
HEN
B
ATTY GOT BACK HOME
from walking the dogs, there were teenagers lounging all over the place, some left over from the basketball game, some arriving for the birthday dinner, some who fit into both categories. For once, she hardly cared, too delighted to see that Oliver’s sleek car was no longer in the driveway. Hoping that he was gone forever, she rushed into the house and ended up in the kitchen, where dinner preparations were in full swing. Mr. Penderwick was chopping up vegetables for quesadillas, Rosalind was pulling a cake out of the oven, Jeffrey was shredding cheese, and Iantha was cooking up small, plain cheese quesadillas for Lydia, who was to be fed before the big dinner got rolling. Then there were the nonworkers: Lydia in her high chair, wearing both her crown and
her lamb bib, her new pink rabbit beside her; Jane sitting cross-legged on the floor, in everyone’s way; Ben, strutting around, showing off his new Celtics T-shirt; and Asimov, sticking close to Jeffrey, hoping for falling cheese.

Batty sidled up to Ben and whispered, “Where’s Oliver?”

“He left,” Ben whispered back.

“For good?”

Ben shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

Rats. But even for a brief time, it was a treat to have Rosalind on her own, just like it used to be. Batty nuzzled up to her, forgiving the earlier disappointments. “Maybe we can talk sometime before you go. Just the two of us.”

“I would love that, Battikins. We’ll find time tomorrow,” said Rosalind. “Honey, what?”

“Nothing,” said Batty, whose singing sprite had just made a mad breakout attempt. She grabbed a piece of cheese from Jeffrey and stuffed it into her mouth, hoping the sprite didn’t like cheese. “I mean, the cake smells yummy.”

Penderwick birthday cakes were always deliciously homemade and from scratch. Cake from a mix or, even worse, store-bought birthday cake, would have been a sign that the world was coming to an end. Each sibling had her or his own special cake, ritually chosen at the age of five, which the first Mrs. Penderwick had declared the age of reason, at least when it came to cakes. Rosalind’s was angel food with
strawberry icing; Skye’s, chocolate with raspberry icing; and Jane’s, lemon with lemon icing and chocolate sprinkles. Those three recipes were all carefully recorded in their mother’s handwriting. Batty’s recipe, in Rosalind’s round, thirteen-year-old handwriting, was for spice cake with cream cheese icing, and Ben’s, written down by Iantha, was double chocolate with vanilla icing. Lydia didn’t yet have a special cake, not having reached the age of reason.

“I’m starving,” said Skye, wandering into the room. “When’s dinner?”

“Go away! You can’t be in here!” Rosalind flapped her hands at Skye, sending her out of the room. Tradition had it that Skye shouldn’t see the cake until it was iced and decked out with burning candles.

She retreated to the doorway and leaned there, sniffing avidly. “Just pretend I’m not here.”

“Lydia,” said Jeffrey, energetically keeping up his cheese-grating. “Is Skye here?”

“Sí,”
said Lydia.

“Oh, no, she’s not! We can say anything we want about her.”

“Lydia,” said Skye. “Tell Jeffrey he’s a
cabeza de plátano.
”

“¡Cabeza de plátano!”
shrieked Lydia.

So Jeffrey must be behaving himself, thought Batty. Skye would be calling him something much worse than a banana head—in either Spanish or English—if he’d been talking love to her.

The back door opened and in strolled Nick,
holding a bunch of dandelions. Now, thought Batty, we’re
all
here, which she shouldn’t have, because it made her singing sprite want to pop out again. She grabbed something else to stuff into her mouth, this time a cherry tomato.

Nick kissed Iantha’s cheek, then Rosalind’s—but that was mostly an excuse to look at the cake—and waved cheerfully to the rest.

“Fresh supplies?” asked Mr. Penderwick, nodding at the dandelions.

“I thought Lydia might like to be spruced up for the party,” answered Nick. “What do you say, Princess Dandelion Fire?”

“Lydia loves Nick,” she answered.

“And me, too, right?” asked Ben, stopping in mid-strut.

“Of course you love Ben,” said Batty. “Don’t you, Lydia?”

“Okay.” But Lydia’s attention was now all on Nick and his bright new dandelions.

“So, Rosy,” he said while pulling old flowers from the crown and weaving in the new. “I noticed that the Oliver-mobile isn’t in the driveway. Have you sent him away?”

Batty nudged Ben.

“Of course not. He’s just gone on an errand. I think he’s picking up a gift for Skye.”

“A car just like his, I hope,” said Skye. “That would be a good present.”

“Nick, do you think Rosy
should
send Oliver away?” asked Jane from the floor, her gimlet eye expression taking over her face.

“Don’t encourage Nick, Jane,” said Rosalind. “I don’t care what he thinks.”

“I care,” said Mr. Penderwick. “Nick, would you like some pretzels?”

“Daddy!” Rosalind elbowed her father, protesting.

“Nick, if you’re done with that crown,” said Iantha, coming to the aid of her eldest, “give this quesadilla to Lydia.”

Nick put it on Lydia’s tray. “Here you go, Lydia-McBydia-Bob, eat, eat, it’s good for you.”

“Gracias,”
said Lydia, and took a big chomp.

“But back to Oliver,” said Nick. “I think he’s a show-off.”

“What?” Rosalind exploded, and Skye and Jane exploded with her—the three were a team for this.

“
You
, Nick Geiger, dare call someone a show-off?” Jane asked while Skye howled with laughter.

“I am not a show-off,” he replied. “I simply can’t help being good at everything. A show-off is—”

Skye had abruptly stopped laughing and was waving her arms frantically at Nick, trying to shut him up. Not just Nick, but the entire kitchen went silent, staring at her, because she seemed to have gone mad without any obvious explanation. And now she was flattening herself against the doorjamb, making way for a tall copper vase loaded with—it took a while for
Batty to identify
what
the vase held. Bare branches, several plumes of dried grass, a peacock feather, and was that a bird’s nest on one of the branches?

“A still life for Skye’s birthday,” said Oliver, handing over the gargantuan thing to Skye, who disappeared behind it. “I was going to get her flowers but wanted something less ordinary.”

“That’s very thoughtful of you, Oliver,” said Iantha, stomping on Nick’s foot to keep him quiet—Batty saw her do it—and putting her arm around Rosalind, who had gone a bit red in the face.

“I have two more in the car, one for you, Iantha, because you’re such a kind hostess, and one for Rosalind, because she’s Rosalind.” Oliver left again.

“I don’t understand,” said Ben.

“It’s supposed to be like art,” explained Jane. “Sort of.”

“I mean the part about Rosalind being Rosalind.”

“Later, son,” said Mr. Penderwick.

“Jeffrey, are you laughing at me?” Skye was trying to peer around the peacock feather, but the branch kept jabbing her in the face.

“Never,” he said, though he had been. “Would you like help with your present?”

“It’s just that this feather—” Skye blew on it.

Which was a mistake, because the resultant fluttering caught Asimov’s attention. He made a flying leap across the kitchen and onto Skye, attempting to scale her to get to the—wait, a feather
and
a bird’s
nest? Asimov had never experienced such riches here in his own kitchen. When Skye’s yelps of pain didn’t discourage him, Jane and Jeffrey raced across the room to peel him away, but only after they’d bumped into each other. Using the uproar as cover, Ben stole a fingerful of the cake icing, and Batty blocked Lydia, just in case Asimov came flying in a different direction this time.

But Lydia was undisturbed by the bedlam.

“Another quesadilla,” she said.

“Say please,” replied her mother automatically, plopping one onto Lydia’s plate. “The rest of you, pull yourselves together. Ben, stay away from the icing. Jeffrey, help Skye put that down in the dining room, then go with Oliver to bring the other … still lifes inside. Martin, looks like we’ll need yet another leaf for the dining room table to make space for them, and, Nick—”

“Yes? Anything, Iantha.”

“Please don’t tease Rosalind anymore tonight.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And help Martin with the dining room table. Rosalind, you and I can figure out how to organize the table. Go, all of you. Jane, Skye, go.”

As all the grown-ups and teenagers scattered, Iantha herding them ahead of her like a flock of naughty chickens, Batty sent out a silent apology to Ginevra for ever considering her a show-off. Even fifty book reports—even one hundred—wouldn’t be
as obnoxious as three massive and probably expensive bunches of weird stuff.

“Do
you
understand that part about Rosalind being Rosalind?” Ben asked Batty.

“I think Oliver was saying how much he likes her.”

“Yuck.” Ben swiped another taste of icing to get over that bad news. “I wish she would send him away, like Nick said.”

“I know.”

“Uh-oh,” said Ben.

“What?”

Batty turned to follow her brother’s gaze—and there was Oliver coming back into the kitchen with a handful of roses. What was he doing
now
? With only the three youngest Penderwicks in the room, who would he be giving—

“For the crown,” said Oliver, advancing determinedly on Lydia, who looked up from her quesadilla, startled.

“Non,”
she said.

Both Ben and Batty overcame their distaste for Oliver enough to grab at him on his way to Lydia, but he easily shook them off and kept going.

“Roses are better than dandelions.” He brandished them like a sword.

“Non, non,”
yelped Lydia, stuck there in her high chair, unable to get away from the unwanted roses.

Batty and Ben went for Oliver again, and Jane, attracted by Lydia’s cries, rushed back into the room,
but no one was quick enough to stop the first of Nick’s dandelions from being yanked and dropped to the floor.

“No me gusta, no me gusta,”
sobbed Lydia, ducking and weaving. And when she couldn’t avoid Oliver, she fought back with the only weapon she had, smashing the remains of her second quesadilla onto his heretofore spotless shirt.

Pandemonium erupted, with people running in and out of the room, some trying to clean up Oliver, who could only stare down in disbelief at his cheese-smeared shirt, and some trying to calm Lydia, who was now wailing about both the insult to her crown and the loss of her quesadilla.

Batty was not one of the people concerned with Oliver’s shirt. If she had disliked him before, now she loathed him.

“Maybe I should take Lydia upstairs,” she told Iantha.

“Batty, Batty,” wailed Lydia, holding out her arms to her sister.

“Would you, honey? That would be very helpful.” Iantha was hauling Lydia out of the high chair. “Shh, sweetheart, you’re safe. Oliver didn’t mean to upset you.”

Batty thought that was much too generous. Oliver may not have meant to upset Lydia, but he didn’t seem to care that he had. But then Iantha hadn’t seen his attack on the crown.

“Mom, I’ll put her to bed and stay with her,” she said.

“And miss the dinner? You wouldn’t mind?”

Batty would mind. She’d planned to find a quiet corner from which to watch the crowd and the gaiety—and Jeffrey. But her loyalty was to Lydia, whom she should have better protected from Oliver and his roses.

She retrieved the fallen dandelion from the floor, tucked it into the crown, then took Lydia from Iantha. “No, I don’t mind.”

“Thank you, sweetheart. I’ll bring some dinner for you when I come up to say good night to her.”

The part about not minding became truer when Rosalind ran into the hall to catch Batty and Lydia before they could start up the steps.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, kissing Lydia.

“The man hurt Lydia’s crown,” sobbed Lydia.

“I know, honey. He doesn’t understand little girls, because he doesn’t have a Lydia at home to help him.” Rosalind kissed Batty, too. “What a good big sister you are. We’ll talk tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay. I mean,
yes
!”

Next came Nick, who wrapped his arms around both Batty and Lydia, told them they were the best of the bunch, and that Lydia would always be his princess.

“And, Batty, you’re a champ,” said Nick.

“I know,” she answered. “Even without a sport.”

“No, you still have to get a sport.”

Then, just as Batty was unlatching the bottom baby gate, Jeffrey appeared bearing Lydia’s new pink rabbit, rescued from the high chair.

“Little Bunny Foo Foo,” he sang.

“Little Bunny Foo Foo,” Lydia wailed back at him. There was no cheering her up.

“Don’t forget our breakfast tomorrow morning,” Batty told him.

“Never.” He put his hand on his heart. “Penderwick Family Honor.”

“And, Jeffrey,
musica anima mea est.
”

“I know, I know.” He kissed the top of Lydia’s head, then did the same for Batty, and as he went back to join the others, Batty decided that missing the dinner was nothing after all—the last few marvelous moments had made up for it.

Getting a sobbing two-year-old ready for bed was no easy task. The removal of each piece of daytime clothing was a misery, as was the putting on of each piece of nighttime clothing. But all of that was nothing compared to what happened during face-washing and teeth-brushing. Batty, however, patiently persevered, and eventually Lydia was clean and in her polka-dotted pajamas. And still hiccoughing with occasional sobs.

Batty plumped her down onto the big-girl bed. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Lydia doesn’t like the man.”

“Neither does Batty, and neither does Ben. We’re all in this together.” Batty held up her hand for a high five, which Lydia managed in between sobs. “Did you know that I’m going to sleep in your big-girl bed tonight?”

“
Batty’s
bed?” Lydia’s last sob dried up at the possibility that the new bed had after all not been meant for her.