Umbrella Summer (10 page)

We put the fish photo up at one end of the living
room, so you didn't see it right when you walked inside but you could still get a nice good look if you knew it was there. Mrs. Finch let me pick what one to put up, and I chose the big bright clown fish one because I liked his stripes.

Mrs. Finch smiled when I picked that one. “That was Nathan's favorite too,” she said.

I hammered in the nail at just the right spot. Mrs. Finch let me do it by myself because I told her my dad let me use his hammer all the time. That was sort of
a lie, but I didn't hurt my thumb or anything. When the picture was up, we walked to the other side of the room to make sure it wasn't crooked.

“You know, Annie Z.,” Mrs. Finch said, putting a hand on my shoulder, “that looks pretty nice. I'm glad you made me hang it up.”

“You think you'll ever put up the rest of them?” I asked her.

“Maybe one day I will. But for now one seems like enough.”

And I thought that made some sense.

“You feel your umbrella closing yet?” I said.

She thought about it. “Maybe just a smidgen.”

After that I went home, but I told Mrs. Finch I'd come back at two o'clock tomorrow for cookies. The whole way home I thought about how I could just keep reading that green book if I wanted, and not do my part of the deal. Mrs. Finch would probably never know, and then I could look up more diseases. But then when I got upstairs, I saw Jared's door across the hallway, closed tight as always, and I figured if I really did
have an umbrella like Mrs. Finch said, well, I might as well try to close it.

I found the big green book where I'd hidden it in my shorts drawer, and I got out a clean piece of stationery—the kind with the kittens on it that Rebecca had given me for Christmas—and I sat down on my bed to write a letter.

Then I tucked the letter inside the big green book so that just the
Dear Mrs. Harper
part was sticking out the top. And I walked next door and put the whole thing inside the Harpers' mailbox. It just barely fit.

After I closed the mailbox door, I stood on Mrs. Harper's lawn for a second with my eyes closed, trying to feel if maybe I had an imaginary umbrella that had gone closed a little bit. But I couldn't tell for sure. Then I tried to feel if I had real Ebola, but I couldn't tell that either.

Right about dinnertime the phone rang and I answered it.

“Hello?”

“Hey, sweetie.” It was Mom. “How are you doing?”

I shrugged, even though you weren't supposed to shrug over the phone. Mom usually got mad when I did that, but this time she didn't say anything.

“I just wanted to let you know that I have to stay at work late tonight. I probably won't be home until after you're asleep.”

“Okay,” I said.

“You'll tell your dad?”

“Sure.”

“Thanks. And sweetie?”

I tucked up the edge of my arm-scrape Band-Aid to see how my scab was coming. Still pretty scabby. “Mmm-hmm?”

“I love you, you know.”

There was a pause after that, but I didn't say anything. I couldn't think of anything I wanted to say. But just when I could tell Mom was getting ready to hang up the phone, I thought of something.

“Hey, Mom?”

“Yes, sweetie?”

“Can you take me to get a present for Tommy's birthday on Friday? He invited me bowling.”

She didn't answer.

“Mom? You still there?”

“You know, Annie,” she said after another second of waiting, “I just don't think I'm going to get a chance to do that before Friday. Why don't you make him a nice card or something?”

“But I think he wants walkie-talkies,” I said. My forehead felt hot. I put my hand up to feel if I had a fever from the Ebola, but I couldn't tell.

“We can talk about it tomorrow, all right?”

“Fine.”

“Night, sweetie.”

“Night.”

For dinner we had pizza. Dad ordered olives and pepperoni, even though I hated olives. I told him that, and he said he forgot, which didn't really surprise me much.

“Dad?” I asked, when there was mostly only crusts left in the box.

“Mmm?” he said, still chewing. He was reading a magazine while we ate, which Mom always said was not good table manners.

“Can you take my temperature?” I asked, picking the last four olives off my slice of pizza. “I think I have Ebola.”

Dad just nodded, so I ran upstairs to get the thermometer from the medicine cabinet, and when I got
back, Dad placed it under my tongue, just the way Dr. Young did.

“I'll be right back to check,” he said.

But when the thermometer beeped a minute later, Dad wasn't back yet. I kept it under my tongue for five whole minutes, watching the clock over the stove. Finally I took it out and checked it myself.

Ninety-eight-point-six. Exactly normal.

I found Dad in the living room watching TV.

“Dad,” I said from the doorway. My voice was pointy little icicles.

“What?”

I waved the thermometer at him. “You were supposed to come back and check my temperature,” I told him.

“Oh,” he said. “Sorry.”

I just rolled my eyes and headed back upstairs, careful to wipe off the thermometer with rubbing alcohol before I put it back in its case in the medicine cabinet. If I got swept away in an avalanche that second, Dad would probably forget to care.

The next afternoon Mrs. Finch opened her front
door with a big smile.

“Right on time!” she greeted me. One of the buttons was open on her ugly blue grandma sweater, and I could see her stripy blue-and-green blouse peeking out from underneath, but I didn't tell her. I sort of didn't want her to fix it. I liked her that way, one button off. “Did you keep your part of the bargain? Are you ready for cookie baking?”

“Yep,” I said with a nod. “I'm ready.” Ever since I'd written that letter to Mrs. Harper telling her I'd stolen
her book, I kept waiting for her to yell at me about it. Probably she'd storm over to my house angry as a scorpion and tell me I was out of the troop for good, and make me hand over my outfit and my three measly badges too. But that hadn't happened yet. Maybe she was out of town.

“Well, come on in,” Mrs. Finch said.

She led me through the house to the kitchen. But when I got there, I froze still as a statue. Because Mrs. Finch wasn't the only person in her house.

“I don't think there are any ghosts in here, Mrs. Finch.” It was Rebecca, and she was closing the lid on the fish-shaped cookie jar. “It's probably safe to put cookies in there.” Then she looked up and saw me. “Oh,” she said. And just the way she said it, I could tell she hadn't been expecting me either.

Mrs. Finch looked at me and then looked at Rebecca. “Yes, I suppose I should explain, shouldn't I?” She bent down and started rummaging around in a bottom cupboard. “You see, I just happened to be talking to Rebecca's mother on the phone yesterday, and
I remembered that Rebecca was a big fan of haunted houses. And as you know, my house may very well be haunted. Aha!” she cried, pulling out two baking sheets. She stood up. “So I thought she might like to come over and bake cookies in one. I suppose I forgot to mention that you would also be here, Annie Z. I do apologize to both of you.”

I rolled my eyes at her. It was a good thing Mrs. Finch wasn't a professional spy, because she was a terrible liar.

“Now that we've cleared that up”—she clapped her hands together like we were having a sleepover party—“let's get baking, shall we?”

Rebecca was chewing hard on one of her braids, and I would've bet ten whole dollars she was trying to decide which was worse, baking cookies with me or leaving the haunted house once she finally got in it.

She stayed.

“Okay,” Mrs. Finch said, handing Rebecca the bag of chocolate chips. “Rebecca, why don't you read the ingredients, and Annie, you can make sure we have everything we need. I'll get out the mixing bowls.”

Rebecca did an eyeball glare at me for a full twenty seconds, but then she started to read off the back of the bag. “Flour,” she said. She sounded like she was reading the ingredients for rat poison.

I sighed and monkeyed up onto Mrs. Finch's counter to dig through her top cupboard. I wondered if Rebecca would ever stop hating me.

“Careful now, Annie Z!” Mrs. Finch cried just as I located the flour.

“Sugar,” Rebecca read.

“Brown or normal?” I asked.

I could tell she didn't want to answer me, but probably she figured that if she didn't tell me the right kind of sugar, the cookies wouldn't taste good. “Um…both,” she said.

When we found all the ingredients, we started mixing everything up in bowls. I let Rebecca break the eggs, even though that was my second favorite part, because I knew she liked doing it too. I caught her glancing at me sideways when she was cracking the last egg into the bowl, but when I tried to smile at her,
she looked away real quick.

“So, Rebecca,” Mrs. Finch said while Rebecca started dumping the flour mixture into the bowl with the eggs. I stood there pretending I was helping. “How long have you been a paranormal enthusiast?”

“Huh?” Rebecca said. Which was exactly what I was thinking.

“How long have you been interested in ghosts?”

“Oh.” Rebecca whacked the bowl with a spoon to get out the last of the flour. “I dunno. A long time, I guess.”

“Personally,” Mrs. Finch went on, “I'm not sure I believe in any of that, but I suppose you never know. Which are the most interesting to you, ghosts or poltergeists?”

Mrs. Finch was doing a good job trying, but I could tell that Rebecca was busy figuring out in her brain how long cookies took to bake so she could go home. She was staring at her spoon real hard. “I don't know,” she said slowly. “They're both good, I guess. I think we add the chocolate chips now, right?”

While I was wrestling the bag of chocolate chips
open, I tried to shoot Mrs. Finch a just-give-up-now look, but she ignored me.

“So then, Rebecca, what are your hobbies?”

Rebecca didn't answer for a while, just watched as I poured in the chips. Probably it was only a couple seconds, but I couldn't stand the quiet anymore.

“She does ballet!” I said. It came out a little louder than I wanted.

“Well, that's lovely.”

“And piano playing too!” For some reason I couldn't stop being loud. Rebecca's face was turning red as she watched me pour the chips into the cookie dough, so I tried to make my voice more quiet. “She's a real good piano player,” I told Mrs. Finch.

Mrs. Finch nodded at me but didn't say anything.

I sighed.

Mrs. Finch was stirring the dough up with a wooden spoon, but it was too thick and the chips weren't mixing in. “Looks like we'll have to go in with our hands,” she said. “Anyone feel like getting a little messy?”

I almost said I'd do it, because that was my number-
one favorite part of baking cookies, when the dough got up in the in-between parts of your fingers and you couldn't even get it out with washing—there was only one way to clean it up, and that was licking. But I decided better and didn't say anything so Rebecca could do it instead.

But she didn't say anything either.

“Really?” Mrs. Finch said. “Neither of you wants to do it? I always thought that was the best part when I was a youngster.” She looked at both of us, but we only stood there, silent as weeds. “All right then,” she said, rolling up her sleeves. “I guess I'll have to go in myself.”

“Wait!” Rebecca hollered, just as Mrs. Finch had the tippy tip of her pointer finger aimed for the dough. I figured she finally came to her senses and was going to volunteer. But I was wrong. “Annie should do it,” she said.

Mrs. Finch still had her hands stuck like frozen fish sticks over the bowl. “Oh?” she said. She looked at me, but I didn't say anything.

“Yeah,” Rebecca told her, and she said it soft. “That's her favorite part.”

Mrs. Finch smiled at me and wiped her hands on her apron, even though they weren't dirty. “Well then,” she said, and she scooched the bowl across the counter in my direction, “I suppose Annie should be the one to do it.”

I looked at her, my hands tight around both sides of the bowl, and then I looked at Rebecca. And even though she blinked real quick and looked down the instant her eyeballs met mine, I thought she didn't look quite so mad as before.

“Thanks,” I said. I stuck my hands deep in the cookie dough and felt the squishy way it oozed between my fingers.

While the cookies were in the oven baking, I asked Mrs. Finch if I could take Rebecca on a tour of the house. “Just to see if any of the haunted things are still left,” I said.

“Sure thing,” Mrs. Finch said, setting the timer on the oven. “Feel free to snoop around wherever you like. Oh, and be sure to check the hall closet, will you? The door squeaks horribly. It's probably an enraged spirit.”

So I showed Rebecca all over the house. She was more excited than a mouse in a cheese factory. She peeked her nose between the coats in the hall closet, stuck her head under the bed, even lifted up the toilet seat in the bathroom.

“What are you looking for in there?” I asked her, sitting on the edge of the bathtub.

Rebecca shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe water ghosts. They like to haunt the pipes, you know.”

“Oh.” I thought about that for a second and then turned on the tub faucet to check in there. I couldn't see anything that didn't look like water. I turned it off. “Rebecca?”

“Yeah?” She was looking inside the medicine cabinet.

“I'm sorry about Fuzzby.”

She stuck her braid in her mouth and chewed, still peeking into the medicine cabinet. “It's okay,” she said after a while, plopping her braid out. She didn't look at me, though. “You were right. He was just a hamster. It wasn't like when Jared died. I shouldn't have got so mad at you.”

“But I liked him,” I said. “Really. You still want to have a funeral for him? I'll help you, I promise.” I didn't really want to do that, but I figured sometimes friends had to do things they didn't want to, especially if they'd said mean things and maybe hosed the other friend too.

“My mom helped me,” Rebecca said, lifting up a jar of face goop to peek underneath. “With the funeral, I mean. It was okay.”

“Oh,” I said.

“I'm getting a new hamster. Next week.” And finally she looked over at me. “Want to help me pick it out?”

I didn't. Not really. I didn't want to pick out a new hamster for Rebecca when there was no new Jared for me. But it was different, I knew it was, and I could tell Rebecca knew it too. “Sure,” I said. “I'll help.”

“Cool.”

When we got back to the kitchen, Mrs. Finch was just pulling the last batch of cookies out of the oven. “Well?” she asked us. “How's my house look? See any spirits?”

Rebecca shook her head, so her two blond braids whipped across her shoulders. “I didn't see anything,” she said. “But I'm pretty sure I felt their presence.”

While we were eating the cookies, Mrs. Finch and I taught Rebecca how to play gummy rummy, only without the gummy part. We played for about an hour until Rebecca's mom called and said it was time for Rebecca to go home. After Mrs. Finch packed her up with extra cookies, we walked Rebecca to the door while she strapped on her bike helmet. “Well!” she hollered at us. “I'm going home now!”

“Okay!” I said, shouting loud like I had a bike helmet on too. “I'll see you later!”

And Rebecca didn't say “maybe” or “I'll think about it” or “don't hold your breath.” She said, “Yeah! Call me later!”

And she biked off down the street.

It wasn't until I got all the way back to my house that I realized something. I hadn't worried about Ebola or gangrene or
E. coli
or poison oak once all afternoon.