'Tis the Off-Season (6 page)

As soon as they'd deposited Charlotte at her house, and it was just Alex, Ava, and Mrs. Sackett, their mother cleared her throat.

“So. I understand you said we would host the party, Alex?” she asked.

Alex swallowed hard. “Right. About that. Didn't I mention it?”

“No, as a matter of fact, you didn't.”

“I thought I had.”

“You hadn't.”

“Oops, ha-ha,” said Alex. In the backseat, directly behind Alex, Ava was being zero help. She was probably staring morosely out the window, lost in thought. Alex didn't dare turn and look at her.

“I know it's the day we get back from Boston,” Alex said. Her words tumbled out quickly so her mother couldn't interrupt. “But, see, I was thinking we could do all the cooking before we leave—I'll help a ton, of course—and you could make your famous turkey chili and—”

“Alex.”

“—and Daddy could bake some Christmas cookies, and of course I'd help with those, too, because I know the decorating can be pretty time-consuming, and—”

“Alex!”

“—and it's a great group of kids, not too many, well, at least not
that
many, and—”

“Alexandra!”

Her mother's voice was sharp. Alex stopped talking.

They were pulling into their driveway. Mrs. Sackett parked and turned off the engine. Then she turned to face Alex.

“Alex, we cannot host this Christmas party,” she said.

“But I already told—”

Mrs. Sackett held up a hand to silence her. “We don't have the money to spend on throwing a party for your friends right now,” she said. “What with the holidays, and the expenses I'm incurring with this big pottery order, and—well, and lots of other things, we just can't manage it right now. You ought to have asked me, and you didn't. I'm sorry you're now in this predicament, but you have only yourself to blame.”

Alex thought her mother sounded more upset than mad. That was weird.

Mrs. Sackett's phone rang, and she frowned at the caller's number. She answered without even saying hello. “One second, I can't talk right now,” she said with a quick glance back at the girls. She collected her purse and exited the car before she resumed the conversation.

“Awesome,” said Ava dully.

“This is an unmitigated disaster,” said Alex.

“I thought you'd asked Mom's permission, Alex. How could you have neglected to mention the little detail that we were having the party at our house?”

Alex sighed heavily. “I thought I
had
mentioned it.”

“Mom sounded upset,” observed Ava. “Like there's something bigger going on and she doesn't want to tell us. Did you notice how she just answered that call? Like it's some mysterious person she doesn't want us to know about?”

“Maybe it's a loan shark,” said Alex worriedly.

“A what shark?”

“You know, one of those mean guys who lends you money and then kills you if you don't pay them back.”

“I highly doubt that,” Ava scoffed. “But do you think they're having money troubles?”

“How could they? Daddy's job can't be in trouble. He won State!”

Ava shrugged. “Something definitely seems to be up.”

Alex was too immersed in her own problems to hazard any guesses. Her mind was working overtime.

“So what are you going to say to everyone?”

Alex furrowed her brow. This called for some strategic planning, and strategic planning was one of her strengths. “I won't say anything,” she said simply.

Ava gave her a confused look.

“I'll just have to get Mom to change her mind.”

“Yeah, good luck with that,” said Ava gloomily. “Let's hope you have more success than I'm having convincing her to let me play basketball.”

Thursday afternoon, Ava followed Alex into the community college day-care center to report for duty. Considering how concerned her parents seemed to be about Ava's study habits, Ava thought it was odd that her mom should so readily volunteer her to work at the day-care center for the afternoon. On the other hand, Ava had to admit, it was only for two hours. And she liked little kids.

“Did you get your outline in today?” asked Alex.

“Yep,” said Ava glumly. “Now I get to try to come up with at least three ideas why we should have a longer lunch hour. It all seems so pointless.”

Alex frowned. “Maybe you should have picked a more interesting topic.”

Ava shrugged. “It's schoolwork. It's
supposed
to be uninteresting,” she said.

Alex gave her a pained look as they headed inside.

“Thank you girls, so very much,” said Mrs. Barnaby in a quiet voice that was just above a whisper. “Most of them are napping now, and then it will be snack time, so I don't think they'll be too high energy for you,” she said. “Just as long as Dougie stays asleep,” she added, more to herself than to the girls.

“No problem, Mrs. Barnaby,” said Alex. “We're happy to help out.”

She gave them instructions for snack time and showed them quickly around the different areas of the large, cheerful room.

Ava eyed the changing table. “I thought they were all potty trained,” she said.

“Oh, most of them are,” said Mrs. Barnaby, laughing lightly. “And those who aren't will let you know!”

Ava swallowed. Maybe this wouldn't be as much of a breeze as she'd hoped.

“And we'll be just down the hall in the college cafeteria if you need us,” said Mrs. Barnaby.

As soon as Mrs. Barnaby had left to join the other caregivers, Ava and Alex tiptoed over to the nap room, which was darkened and quiet. The shades had been drawn, and ten small children lay on cots, sleeping contentedly.

“This shouldn't be too bad,” whispered Alex. “In fact, they may nap the entire time.”

“There's an empty cot over in the corner,” Ava whispered back. “I wonder if—”

A sudden blast of a toy bugle near her left elbow caused her to jump a full six inches into the air. She whirled around. A tiny boy with sleep-tousled hair and a devilish grin emitted a peal of gleeful laughter, and then blasted the bugle again.

“Shh! You'll wake everyone up!” hissed Alex frantically. She lunged for the bugle, but the boy sidestepped her with surprising balance. He blasted his horn again.

Ava looked back at the nap room inhabitants and groaned. “I'm guessing that's Dougie,” she said. “They're all awake now.”

Someone tugged on her T-shirt. She looked down. A little girl in pigtails gazed up at Ava with big brown eyes, and then pointed at her diaper. “Change?” she said.

Another tug from her other side. A little boy stared up at her and pointed to his diaper too.

Ava groaned. “This is going to be a long two hours, Al,” she said, but if Alex replied, Ava couldn't hear her over the sound of the blasting bugle.

Two hours later, their father picked them up. Ava staggered into the car, exhausted. She'd changed three diapers, had a full cup of juice spilled in her lap, and had picked up about a million wooden blocks. Alex looked a little the worse for wear too.

“How did it go, girls?” asked Coach, as they headed for home.

“Awesome,” said Alex, who was trying to get orange finger paint out of her hair with a tissue.

“Remind me never to have children,” added Ava.

Their dad grinned. “Well, it was nice of you to help out,” he said.

“I am so ready for Christmas break,” said Alex with a little groan. “And for seeing all our old friends in Massachusetts,” she added.

Ava nodded. She had been thinking about some of the people she was really looking forward to seeing again. Like her old teammate and sort-of ex-boyfriend, Charlie Weidner. And a bunch of the kids from her sports teams, kids she'd grown up with and had known as long as she could remember.

She heard her sister gasp and shook herself out of her reverie. “What?” she demanded. “What's the matter, Al?”

Alex seemed too shocked to be able to respond.

“What did you just say, Coach?” asked Ava. “I missed it.”

Her father took a deep breath. “I just said that I'm sorry to say, we aren't going to be going back to Massachusetts after all. At least not right now, not for Christmas,” he said. His jaw twitched, as though he were bracing himself for Ava's outrage.

Which was not long in coming.

“What?” she nearly shouted. “I thought we had our tickets! You can't be serious!”

By now they were back home in their driveway. “Girls,” said Coach. He turned off the engine and swiveled around to look at them. “Your mother and I discussed this, and we decided to postpone the trip. Now please help me carry in the groceries.”

“But
why
?” wailed Alex, as the two girls followed their father up the driveway, laden down with shopping bags. “It's so not fair! I thought—”

Their father stepped to the side and held the door open so that the girls could go in ahead of him. Then he followed them inside. “We can talk about it later,” he said, plunking his bags down on the table. “For now, I need to put away groceries, and then I have some things I need to work on in the shed. Your mother will be home soon. You girls can go start your homework.”

And that seemed to be the end of the conversation.

Up in her room, Ava tried, without much success, to get started on her essay. Her mind kept wandering. She heard a lot of banging and clanging outside and went to the window. Coach was carrying tools and workbenches out of the shed and piling them on the lawn. Why on earth was he cleaning out the shed when they had just moved all their stuff into it? He probably wouldn't tell her. Both her parents were being so weird and secretive. She shrugged and flopped back down on her bed to try again with her essay.

Dinner was a gloomy, quiet affair. Obviously Tommy had heard the news about their trip, because he barely spoke. Mr. and Mrs. Sackett did most of the talking—to each other—and if they noticed that all three of their children were giving them the cold shoulder, they pretended not to.

When they finished the dishes, the three Sackett kids convened in Tommy's room.

He paced back and forth and clutched his hair with both hands. “I had this meeting lined up,” he said. “With this guy from the music industry that Jaden's dad knows. We had it all planned. I was going to come to their holiday party, and he was going to introduce me, and I was going to hand the guy Trio Grande's demo and—!” He trailed off but continued to walk around the room.

“Yeah, our parents aren't exactly winning parents-of-the-year awards,” said Alex bitterly. “Saying no to my party, for one.”

“And not letting me play basketball,” said Ava.

“And now Boston,” finished Tommy. “What is
up
with them?”

No one answered. The two girls sat side by side on Tommy's bed and watched him pace. Finally Alex stood up.

“Well, I don't know about you two, but
I
see these challenges as merely a jumping-off point for us to start negotiations,” said Alex.

Ava and Tommy exchanged a look. “What is she talking about?” Tommy asked Ava.

Ava shrugged.

“I'm trying to look on the positive side of the situation,” said Alex. “It sounds like there's not much we can do about not going to Massachusetts.”

Tommy groaned.

“But maybe now that they've told us we can't go, they'll feel so guilty about disappointing us that I should be able to talk them into having my party!” she said brightly.

“How nice for you,” said Ava. Sometimes Alex could be so self-involved.

“And Ava, maybe you could even discuss their basketball decision and get them to change their minds,” said Alex. “I mean, after I've talked them into letting me have the party,” she added hastily. “We don't want to make too many demands at the same time.”

Ava sighed. “They've got Mrs. Hyde in their corner, telling them sports are bad for kids with ADHD,” she said. “No amount of convincing from me is going to talk them out of an expert's opinion.”

“Well, Tommy, I'm sure we can figure out a way to make staying here in Texas over the holiday okay,” said Alex.

“No, we can't,” he said flatly. “That was my career you just heard getting flushed down the toilet.”

“What about Cassie? You'll be able to spend some quality time with her at least.”

“She's going to Kansas with her family, to visit relatives,” said Tommy.

That finally seemed to dampen Alex's positive attitude. She sat back down on the bed next to Ava and put her chin in her hands. “And now we won't even get to see any snow this winter. Yeah, they definitely are not winning parents of the year,” she repeated.

Friday morning Lindsey caught up with Alex before they walked into Mr. Kenerson's homeroom.