Tiger in Trouble (2 page)

“Funny, Sarah, really funny.”

I walked across the room and took a seat at the edge of the couch. The rest of the couch was taken up by Laura, Mr. McCurdy’s cheetah. She opened one eye, lifted her head and then plopped it back on top of my leg, closing her eyes again. I rubbed her behind one ear, and she snuggled her head against me. I’d come to love this old cat.

Of course, I’d never do this with Buddha. Cheetahs weren’t like tigers, or any other of the big cats. Cheetahs you can trust. Tigers you can only trust a little, and only if you never turn your back on them. Mr. McCurdy had told me about the one time, when he was young, that he turned his back on a tiger. He said that the claws went through his jacket, through his shirt and into his back. Mr. McCurdy said if you were smart you only had to make that mistake once, and if you were smarter you never had to make it at all. I aimed for smarter.

I looked over at my brother, staring at the ape staring at him. “This can’t go on much longer, Nick. We have to go home for supper.”

“You can leave without me. I don’t quit until the chimp quits.”

“Maybe rather than outstare him, you should outthink him,” Mr. McCurdy said.

“Which one of them are you talking to?” I asked.

“Mainly your brother. Nick, ya gotta distract him.”

“How do you suggest I do that?” my brother asked.

“Easy,” Mr. McCurdy said. He strolled across the kitchen and opened the fridge. “Anybody want a Coke?” he asked, holding up a can of pop.

Calvin jumped up from his chair and hobbled across the room, taking the Coke from Mr. McCurdy. He popped the top and the can sang out a big pppfffttttt.

“There you go,” Mr. McCurdy said. “This way you both got something you wanted.”

“I’d rather have had the Coke,” Nick said.

Calvin extended his arm, offering Nick the pop.

“I think I’ll pass. Anyway, what I really want is not to have to go away tomorrow,” Nick said.

“I don’t understand what you two have against going away on a vacation,” Mr. McCurdy said.

“I just want to stay here.”

“I hope your mom doesn’t know how you feel.”

“Well …” I said.

“I think she sort of knows,” Nick agreed.

“Too bad. If you stop complaining, at least one person can enjoy your being away at camp.”

“Who?” I asked.

“Your mother.”

“Our mother?” Nick and I said in unison.

“Of course. She’ll have a well-deserved break.”

“A break from what?” I questioned.

“You two.”

“She doesn’t want to get away from us. She said she’d miss us — that she didn’t even want us to go,” I stated.

“I’m sure she’ll miss you,” Mr. McCurdy agreed. “But that doesn’t mean she won’t enjoy a little bit of peace and quiet.”

“We’re not that bad,” I said. “Well, at least I’m not that bad.”

Nick shot me a dirty look.

“Bad hasn’t got anything to do with it,” Mr. McCurdy said. “It’s just that it can’t be easy being a mother and a father to you two. When was the last time she had time away from the both of you?”

“She has time away. She goes out with her friends,” I said.

“And on dates, too, sometimes,” Nick added.

“That’s not what I mean. I bet she hasn’t had a night to herself since the three of you moved out here.”

“It’s a lot longer than that,” I said.

“How much longer?”

“Like forever. Since the time I was born.”

“Sounds like she should get a little time off every fourteen or so years, don’t you think?” Mr. McCurdy asked.

I suddenly felt bad.

“But if she needed some time away, why didn’t she arrange it herself?” Nick asked.

The week at camp had been arranged and paid for by our father, and given to us as an “end of the school year” graduation present. If he really wanted to give us something, he should have come out here and visited us, or arranged for us to go and see him. It had been over six months since we’d laid eyes on him, and that was only for a few hours as he was passing through town.

“My guess is that she doesn’t even know herself that she needs some time away,” Mr. McCurdy explained. “And even if she did, she’d feel too guilty to arrange it.”

“Guilty?” Nick asked. “Why would she feel guilty? I think we should just tell her we don’t want to go.”

“No, Mr. McCurdy’s right,” I said. “She does need some time to herself. Whether we like it or not, we’re going away to camp, and we’re not going to complain about it anymore. Who knows,” I said with a shrug, “maybe we’ll even have a good time.”

•

“I’m really going to miss you two,” my mother said.

Nick gave me an “I told you so” look. I tried to ignore him.

“We’ll miss you, too,” I said. “Could you pass me the fried rice?”

My mother picked up one of the half-dozen little cardboard cartons that sat beside her — the Chinese food she’d brought home for supper — and passed it to me.

“You certainly brought home a lot of food,” I said.

“I ordered a meal for four. I was hoping Angus would be joining us tonight.”

“I tried to convince him to come,” I said.

“I guess it won’t just be the two of you, but Angus I’ll be missing for the next week.”

“You can always invite him over,” I suggested. “I know he’d like that.”

“I don’t think that would work,” she said. “I was thinking it would be pretty lonely around here with you two gone.”

“That’s even more reason to invite Mr. McCurdy over.”

“Well …” my mother said. “I really wasn’t planning on spending any time around the house, either.”

“You can’t just work the whole time we’re gone. You spend too much time at the office already!” I protested.

“That isn’t what I mean. I guess this is the perfect time to tell you something — a surprise.”

“What sort of a surprise?” I asked anxiously. I’d stopped liking surprises when they started becoming things like “your father and I are separating” or “we’re moving.”

“I was thinking that since the two of you were going to be gone, anyway, that maybe I should take a trip, too.”

“You’re going away?” Nick asked. He sounded as if he couldn’t believe his ears.

“Yes, I’m very excited!”

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“I’m going to the Bahamas.”

“The Bahamas?” I gasped.

“I’ll be leaving tomorrow. I’ll be flying off in one direction while you two are flying off in the other. Isn’t that exciting?”

“Yeah … really exciting,” I mumbled, too stunned by the news to know what else to say.

“I’m going to a resort on a tiny little island. It’s advertised as an escape island.”

“What does that mean?” I asked, thinking maybe it was like Mr. McCurdy had said and she was escaping from us.

“It means it’s very isolated. You can only get there by boat, and it’s very rugged. For example, there are no televisions, radios, computers, Internet and even telephones don’t work there!”

I thought she could probably get the same effect if she lived in our barn for the next week.

“Why would anybody want to go someplace that had none of those things?” Nick questioned.

“There’ll be other things, like clear skies, warm weather, tropical fruit and a warm blue ocean!”

I guess the barn didn’t have those things going for it.

“But who are you going with?” Nick asked.

“I’m going by myself. Do you know how long it’s been since I had time to myself?”

I had a pretty good idea it was at least fourteen years, but I didn’t answer.

“It was before I met your father, my second year of university. Since then I’ve always had somebody else to care for or look out for, or their feelings to take into account. This time I’m going just for me and doing what I want.”

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen her this excited.

“So, while the two of you are having a wonderful adventure, I’m going to be having one of my own!”

“But what if something happens?” Nick asked.

She reached over and put her hand on top of his. “That’s so sweet, Nicky, but nothing’s going to happen to me. There’s a hospital on the main island and —”

“I mean to us!” he said. “If there’s no phone, how can we get in touch with you if something happens to us? It isn’t like we can get hold of Dad!”

Mom scowled. It was that look she almost always had when Dad was mentioned. Of course we couldn’t get in touch with him, because his whereabouts kept changing. Ever since he left us he’d been living out of suitcases, travelling across the country and around the world. He’d always wanted to be a photographer instead of a businessman, and for the past year that’s what he’d been doing. And, like where my mother was going, a whole lot of places where he travelled were so far “off the grid” that there wasn’t even cell phone reception.

“You’ll be fine,” Mom said reassuringly. “If you really need to get me, they can always send a boat over from the big island. I’ll give you a number to reach me that way. I’ve already spoken to your Aunt Elaine, and she’s agreed to be your emergency contact. There’s nothing to worry about.”

I wanted to say something, ask something, comment, question, protest or complain but, of course, there was nothing I could or should say.

“That’s great,” I finally mumbled, trying my best to sound enthusiastic.

“How long have you known about this trip?” Nick asked. That was a good question, something that I was wondering, too.

“I’ve been thinking about it for a few days, but it didn’t all fall into place until this morning. I guess I could have called, but I wanted to tell you in person.”

I believed what she was saying, but it still felt as if this had all been sprung on us, that she sort of snuck up with this plan so we wouldn’t have a chance to protest. But, really, what right did we have to protest? She deserved a break, too.

“I think that right after supper we should clean up the kitchen, pack our bags and get a good night’s sleep,” my mother suggested. “We have to be up very early tomorrow to get to the airport, and I think I’m so excited that I’m going to have a lot of trouble getting to sleep tonight.”

I couldn’t argue with what she was saying. I knew I’d have a whole lot of difficulty getting to sleep myself. Excitement had nothing to do with it in my case, though.

“Since I made supper, you two should clean up the kitchen,” Mom said.

“Made supper!” Nick protested. “You only carried it through the door!”

“Yes, but I made the money that bought the supper,” she said with a laugh. “Besides, while you’re cleaning up I’ll go down to the basement and get out our luggage … unless one of you two would like to do that?”

“Not me!” I cried, holding up my hands. “The kitchen sounds just fine to me. Come on, Nick, give me a hand.”

He got up from his chair. “Okay, what do you want me to do?”

I shook my head. “Figure it out, Nick. This isn’t brain surgery. Start off by closing the little cartons. We’ll bring them over to Mr. McCurdy tonight. There’s no point in leaving leftover Chinese food here for a week. It’ll be bad before we get back,” I explained. “I guess he was wrong … he will end up sharing our supper.”

“I think that’s the only thing he was wrong about,” Nick said as he started doing what I’d told him. “It sounds like Mom isn’t going to miss us that much.”

“Everybody needs a break, and we’ll be back soon enough,” I offered, as I put the plates into the soap-filled sink.

“I just hope it’ll be soon enough.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean it’s hard to be away from people for that long … I just hope they don’t change the way they feel, that’s all.”

“Nick, you are totally insane! We’re only going away for a week, and Mom will still feel exactly the same way about us!”

“I wasn’t talking about Mom,” he said softly.

“Then who?”

“My friends.”

“Your
friends
?”

Nick suddenly turned red and looked at the ground. “My girlfriend.”

“Girlfriend! What are you talking about?”

“I sort of have a girlfriend.” He turned redder with each word.

“You do?”

“Yeah. Her name is Tori. You’ve even spoken to her on the phone.”

“You have lots of friends who call.”

“She’s the only girl who calls.”

“I’ve got news for you, Nick. Half your friends sound like girls.”

“They do not!”

“Almost all eleven-year-old boys sound like eleven-year-old girls. Besides, what exactly does ‘having a girlfriend’ mean?” I questioned.

“It means that she likes me and I like her, and that sometimes we go places with each other, or eat lunch at the same table at school, or talk on the phone.”

“That sounds like things I do with my friends who are boys, but that doesn’t make any of them my boyfriend.”

“Of course not,” Nick said. “That would involve somebody wanting to have you as a girlfriend, and that’s a long shot … unless maybe the boy was blind, or stupid, or desperate, or maybe he was feeling sorry for you, or he lost a bet or —”

“Are you two fighting again?” Mom asked as she came back into the kitchen carrying two suitcases.

“I’m not fighting!” I protested.

“Good. That’s not how we should be spending our last night together.”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Nick said. “This is only the last night the three of us are spending together. Sarah and I are going away together.”

That was just like Nick: always finding a way to make a bad situation even more irritating for me. I didn’t know who this Tori girl was, but she must be really, really tolerant.

•

Some people counted sheep. Others counted their blessings. I had even heard of people who counted the number of little holes in the ceiling tiles over their beds. Me, I counted things I was worried about.

We were going away to a place I didn’t know. My mother was going away to another place I didn’t know. My brother was going with me, so that meant I was in charge of him. My brother didn’t like my being in charge of him. He was always looking for ways to get into trouble and was good at finding those ways. We were all going away in airplanes. Two airplanes, which meant there were twice as many chances that one of them might crash. Sure, they say airplanes are safer than cars, but if a car’s engine dies, all that happens is that it slows to a stop. It doesn’t plunge from the sky and explode. Or for that matter it doesn’t crash into the side of a mountain or drop into the ocean — were the Bahamas inside the Bermuda Triangle?