My heart pounded. I was rooted to my seat and couldn’t do anything but clutch my pen with trembling fingers. I wished Mom and Georgia weren’t at the store. “Daddy, what’s happening?” I whimpered.
He looked back at me, his mouth open, but no words came out.
Miss Genevieve barked and barked.
I had to do something. Finally I stood and yelled, “Get off him!”
“You’d better get your dog, girl,” the officer said to me.
“It’s okay, Roscoe,” Dad said in a choked voice.
It wasn’t okay. Nothing was okay.
“Let my dad go!”
“Relax,” the officer said. “We’re not hurting him.”
“It’s okay, Cleveland.”
But Dad’s voice told me it was anything but okay. What was happening?
Miss Genevieve barked again.
“I’m warning you,” the officer said to me.
That was when I noticed the gun on his holster and grabbed Miss Genevieve by his collar. I petted his head while watching the police take my dad out of our home. “It’s going to be all right,” I said more to myself than him. “It’s going to be all right,” I lied.
Then I left Miss Genevieve inside and shut the door so he couldn’t get out. He kept barking through the closed door. I hoped the officer wouldn’t get mad because I couldn’t stop him from barking.
The officer walked Dad to a police car as Mom and Georgia pulled up.
That was when I noticed another police officer. And another police car. Why? What did they think my dad did? This is a mistake, I wanted to scream. Let my dad go!
Mom leaped out of our car, followed by Georgia.
Relief flooded through me, because Mom and Georgia were finally here and would fix everything.
“What’s happening?” Mom’s eyes were wild as she ran up to the officer who was holding Dad. “What are you doing with him?” Then she looked at my dad and said his name in the saddest voice I’d ever heard. “John?”
Dad started crying.
The only other times I’d ever seen my dad cry were when he told us his sister, my aunt Annette, had died suddenly of a heart attack, and more recently, when the vet had taken X-rays of Miss Genevieve and told us that before we owned him, someone must’ve shot him with a BB gun, because he still had a BB lodged in his stomach. I understood why Dad cried then. But why was Dad crying now? Had he actually done something wrong? Georgia pressed next to me and squeezed my hand so hard I had bruises the next day. She had her other hand over her mouth.
Do something! I wanted to shout at her.
Neighbors stood outside their trailers now, watching. Ms. Welch wore slippers and clutched her flowered bathrobe closed.
Why weren’t they doing anything? Somebody needed to help my dad!
The officer read Dad his rights as he shoved him into the back of his police car.
“John!” Mom shrieked. She reached out with one shaky hand that hung there in the humid air.
But it didn’t matter.
None of it mattered.
Dad was in the back of a police car, and all he could do was look at us with a world’s worth of sorry in his teary eyes. Before he looked down.
Georgia let go of my hand and ran over to Mom, held her up because she was wobbling.
“Wha-what’s happening?” Mom muttered.
Georgia squeezed her tighter. I pressed my body close to Georgia.
The neighbors were whispering behind their hands and watching us as though what was happening to our family was some sort of reality TV show. I wanted to punch each one of them right in the face to make them stop looking at us like that.
I was glad when Georgia tugged on my sleeve and pulled me toward the trailer. “Come on, Cleve,” she said in a soft voice.
The three of us went inside, where Miss Genevieve was still barking.
Georgia and I bent to pet him. Mom paced the small space in our trailer, tapping her chin, like she was trying to figure out some kind of complicated puzzle.
Even though we were inside, I still felt the neighbors’ judgmental stares on my skin. I had a feeling they were continuing to peek out their windows as we left for the police station to find out what was going on with Dad.
I had thought the day the police came and took my dad was the worst day, but I was wrong. It turned out the real worst day came five weeks later, when Dad and his lawyer did something called a plea bargain, and Dad got seven months of jail time at Wayside. Seven months! Just for stealing a couple hundred dollars from Mr. Baker’s auto supply shop. I understood Dad shouldn’t have done that—of course stealing was wrong—but seven months in jail for a couple hundred dollars didn’t seem fair. Maybe he could have been required to work and pay it back, or even pay it back double or triple. But seven months of jail was such a long time to be away from everything you loved.
Those bad days happened before Dad stole my money. And it was a lot more than he took from Mr. Baker. When Dad stole my money right before he went to jail, he also took my dreams. My trust. How can I ever believe in my dad again?
And yet, it was hard to stay angry with him for what he did, because I kept feeling sad. Sad that he was stuck in such an awful, scary place. Sad that Mom and Georgia had to work so many more hours. Sad because I was lonely and missed him.
I rubbed Miss Genevieve’s silky ear. Do you miss Dad too? I wish we could take you to the video visitation center. Everyone would love you there, especially Dad. I bet he misses the heck out of you, sweet boy.
Georgia tapped the top of her computer with a pen. “Did you know they offer weirdly specific scholarships?”
I shook thoughts of Dad from my mind, but the sadness lingered. The paper bag beside me reminded me of what had happened at Miss Delilah’s school today. “Do they have scholarships for lousy dancers from Sassafras who want to go to Paris?”
Georgia squinted at me, like she was trying to figure something out. “You have to hear some of these, Cleve.” She pulled her hair back into a wild ponytail, dark curly strands pointing in every direction. Maybe Georgia’s hair could never be corralled into a perfect ballerina bun. “They have scholarships for people who want to be clowns, for people who are natural redheads, and for left-handed people. But here’s the best one: the National Potato Council gives away a ten-thousand-dollar scholarship to a graduate student who is studying something to benefit the potato industry.”
“Maybe you should study potatoes,” I offered helpfully.
Georgia put her hands flat on the table on either side of the computer. “Maybe I should. Why is it so hard to find money for college when it seems like so much is available?”
I bit my bottom lip. The reason Georgia needed money for college next year was because Mom had to spend the money they’d saved toward my sister’s college tuition to pay for Dad’s bail and his lawyer. Mom explained that things would have been much worse for Dad if they didn’t hire their own lawyer. Georgia was applying for academic scholarships through the University of Vermont, plus private scholarships wherever she could find them. Her deadline was fast approaching: January 15. I knew that because Georgia had written the date on a sticky note, circled it with red pen, added a few hearts, and stuck it on the fridge.
I wanted to say something to make her happy. “Mom got your money back from Miss Delilah.”
Georgia tilted her head. “Why would Mom—”
“I got kicked out.”
“Wh–what?”
I nodded, because if I tried to talk, I might cry again. Too much had happened today, plus I was tired.
Georgia closed her computer and pushed it out of the way. “Oh, Cleve, what happened?”
There was so much kindness in Georgia’s voice. A few hiccup-y sobs erupted. It felt good to let them out, but I was glad Mom was in the shower so she couldn’t hear me; she had enough things to deal with, like having to clean fancy people’s toilets all day instead of traveling to cool places around the world, like she wanted to.
“Cleveland?” Georgia asked gently.
“Those girls… those girls…” My words got stuck after that.
Georgia stood and scooted next to me on the bench. She wrapped her arm around my shoulders and said in a fierce voice, “You’re better than those girls, Cleveland Potts.” Resting her chin on top of my beret, she whispered, “Way better.”
Hiccup. “Thanks, George.” Hiccup.
My sister knew when I needed extra love.
I told her everything. Even the part where the girls laughed about Dad and made me so angry and, if I’m being totally honest, embarrassed. It was the same feeling I had when the neighbors came out to stare when Dad was put into that police car. The feeling that made my cheeks burn and my eyes look downward. The feeling I got when Mom and I walked through the market and some women would mumble about us as soon as we passed and I’d see Mom’s grip tighten on the handle of our shopping cart. The feeling I was sure Georgia got right after Dad was sentenced and a customer in her checkout line told her he’d read about our dad in the newspaper, then glared at her like it was Georgia’s fault.
Shame.
The Best Way to Say Sorry
GEORGIA MARCHED TO OUR FREEZER and returned with an ice-cream sandwich. “This situation calls for way more than a tuna-salad sandwich, Cleve. You need dessert.”
A laugh bubbled out of me. I ate the whole ice-cream sandwich, while Miss Genevieve snuffled at my feet, probably hoping I’d drop a piece for him. But chocolate wasn’t good for dogs, so he didn’t get any. Plus, I was super hungry and the ice cream tasted so good.
Georgia poked him with her toe. “No ice-cream sandwiches for you, Mr. Roscoe.” She dropped a few pieces of kibble into his bowl, though. “Come get a treat, buddy.”
Georgia, I realized, was always feeding everybody.
After my real dinner of tuna-salad sandwiches and sliced oranges, I cleaned up the few plates so Georgia could keep searching for scholarships. “They have a scholarship for high school seniors who participate in a duck-calling competition,” she said.
“Duck!” Mom yelled.
This for some reason made Georgia and me bend down low, as though something was going to hit us in our heads.
Mom cracked up. She had a high-pitched laugh that startled you when you first heard it and always made Miss Genevieve bark.
Miss Genevieve’s barking made me laugh, and then Georgia lost it, and somehow, we all ended up laughing so hard, we were wiping tears from our eyes.
When Mom came up for breath, she said, “I love you girls so much. You know that. Right?”
“All for one!” Georgia yelled.
“And one for all!” I replied.
Me and Mom raised our arms in solidarity.
It was really hard without Dad sometimes, but other times it was nice being just the three of us and Miss Genevieve. I wondered what it would be like when Dad came back home. One thing I knew for sure: I was going to find a better way to hide the money I earned from my dog-walking business. No way was I leaving that much cash unprotected around him again.
Better safe than sorry. Mieux vaut prévenir que guérir.
“It’s been quite a day,” Mom said. “I’m zonked. Off to bed for me.” She grabbed a couple of travel magazines that she’d bought at last year’s library sale. (Magazines were ten for a dollar and books were twenty-five to fifty cents each, even hardbacks, so that was when we always stocked up on reading material for the year. Mom got travel magazines, especially National Geographic and Condé Nast Traveler. Georgia looked for books of essays by women writers and poetry collections. I searched for graphic novels, books about animals, everything I could find about France, and cool cookbooks for Declan. He got more excited about a new cookbook than Miss Genevieve got about a new bone. And Miss Genevieve got pretty excited about his bones.)
After Mom went into her room with Miss Genevieve, Georgia leaned toward me. “She looks exhausted.”
I worried it was my fault for making Mom leave work to deal with my problem at the dance school. “She does,” I admitted. What I didn’t say was that Georgia had dark circles under her eyes and looked exhausted too.
Georgia and I headed into our bedroom, which had twin beds across from each other and not much else. There wasn’t space for much more. Most of the stuff we needed went under our beds or in the set of plastic drawers Mom had bought for us at the Target in Winter Beach. I didn’t have many clothes—just some shorts and T-shirts mostly, so one whole drawer of mine was filled with books, comics, magazines, my tiny Eiffel Tower pencil erasers, and fourteen shiny postcards from Declan. It was my favorite drawer.
Georgia sat up in bed, with her computer on her lap. “Don’t worry about those girls today, Cleveland.”
“I won’t.” But I was thinking about them and what happened, remembering Jenna Finch’s purple eggplant toe and feeling rotten about it. I hadn’t meant to trip her. Jenna would have a perfectly normal-looking toe right now if I hadn’t been in that class.
“Really, Cleve. Don’t.”
“I won’t,” I lied.
“They’re not worth your time.”
“I know.” But something about all this was bothering me. Something was missing.
Georgia snapped her computer closed and put it in a box under her bed. “Tomorrow’s a new day,” she said in a tired voice.
My heart gave a squeeze. Dad used to say that to us if we were feeling down. Tomorrow’s a new day.
It was supposed to make us feel better, more hopeful. Right now, it made me miss him. I could hardly remember the sound of his voice when he said it.
I peeked over and saw that Georgia was sleep-reading—that was when she kept trying to read even after her eyelids fluttered closed. The book in her hands teetered toward falling onto her face. It was funny to watch. Finally the book plopped onto her chin—luckily, it was a paperback, so it didn’t hit her with too much force. Georgia startled, pushed the book away, and rolled over. She’d have to find her place again tomorrow. This happened every night. I couldn’t understand why she didn’t put the book on the little table between our beds with a bookmark in it and go to sleep. One day a hefty hardback would smash her right in the nose. Books could be dangerous like that.
I turned off the lamp on the table between our beds and switched on the book light Declan gave me last year for my birthday. I grabbed my notebook and a pink pen from the table. I thought Jenna might like pink since it matched her duffel bag.
Then I proceeded to write a really nice sorry note to Jenna, because the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was my fault. I was sure Jenna’s purple toe hurt like a son of a snickerdoodle right now. I wanted to feel what Jenna might be feeling. I pressed my pinkie toe into the wall, but it didn’t hurt at all, so I banged it a little, but I didn’t want to make noise and wake Mom or Georgia. I guessed I’d have to imagine what Jenna was going through tonight. I figured she was having trouble falling asleep because of the pain and being mad at me. I didn’t blame her. I’d be mad at me too. I only wanted to get some culture and a little closer to being able to go to Paris.
I pulled the blanket tighter under my chin and listened to the frogs croaking outside. Nothing had been the same since Dad went to jail. My old friends weren’t my friends anymore, and I was upset that Jenna’s mom had spoken to me like I was evil. No one deserved to be talked to like that, even if they did accidentally hurt someone’s toe pretty badly and made it a very unattractive shade of purple.
I was hurting too, even if no one could see it from the outside.
I also wrote the note to prove Jenna’s mom wrong. Even though my dad was in jail, I still tried to do the right thing. Just because my dad had a gambling problem didn’t mean I would. Just because he stole money from people he cared about didn’t mean I would.
There was no way I’d ever do something like that.
I reread what I’d written to make sure it was good enough to give Jenna Finch tomorrow at school.
I’m really sorry about what happened in dance class. I didn’t mean to trip you and make your toe bang into the barre so hard. It must hurt so much.
I’m really sorry. Did I say that already? I am!
I hope your toe isn’t broken, but if it is, I hope it gets better fast.
My mom told me it takes about seven weeks for a broken toe to get better. I know that sounds like a long time, but I bet it will go quick. And you can ask people to bring you things, like Pop-Tarts and Oreos. Pop-Tarts are my favorite (as you know), especially the strawberry ones with frosting. I promise to give you a Pop-Tart to go with this note. I hope it will help you feel better, Jenna.
Also, I hope you become a ballerina when you grow up. You already look like one.
I was going to write something about her perfect ballerina bun, but the way Mom had talked about ballerinas and their buns, I decided to leave that out.
Once I finished, I couldn’t decide how to sign it. Jenna and I used to be best friends, but now she barely acknowledged I existed. “Your acquaintance, Cleveland” didn’t sound very nice.
I reached for the French dictionary I kept on our crowded bedside table. I liked to look through it sometimes when I needed a special word. This was one of those moments. As usual, my French dictionary didn’t fail me. I found the perfect signature.
Cordialement,
Cleveland
That Didn’t Go Well
IN THE MORNING THE FIRST thought that floated through my mind was, Tomorrow’s a new day. Those words were supposed to fill me with hope and happiness, but instead a wave of sadness washed over me. I thought of how much more time Dad had in jail; he wouldn’t get released for five more months and several days. That meant he’d miss all the good holidays, except Valentine’s Day. At least he’d be home in time for that one. Mom and Dad were totally mushy on Valentine’s Day.
What was he thinking when he woke up this morning? Every day must feel the same to him—waking in a horrible place that wasn’t his home, without Miss Genevieve curled up by his feet. There must be scary sounds in jail instead of nice frogs croaking outside. Did they have ice cream in jail? Was he allowed to watch Jeopardy!, his favorite TV show? Dad and Mom couldn’t dance in the kitchen, like they sometimes did when they were in good moods or when Dad won money at the dog park. Ugh.
The Paris Project Page 5
