Violet and the Pie of Life

by D. L. Green

  I looked away. McKenzie had wanted to play Dorothy so badly. If she ever found out what Ally just said, she’d call her a drama queen. She’d say, How dare Ally take the best part in the play and then act like it’s such a burden! She has everything and now she wants sympathy, too. And she’d be right.

  I narrowed my eyes and turned toward Ally.

  Oh no. She was crying. It was a delicate cry. She barely made a sound, but tears dripped down to her chin.

  I didn’t know what to say, so I just said, “Ally?” It came out like a question.

  “Sorry,” she murmured. “You must think I’m a spoiled, attention-seeking baby.”

  “I don’t,” I said, even though I sort of had been thinking that.

  She moved her hands away from her face. The tears trickled slowly now. “I don’t know how I can learn my part. There are so many lines. It’s too much. I’m not smart like you.”

  “Me?”

  “It takes me forever to memorize stuff. I’ll mess up the play, and everyone in the cast and my parents will be so upset. Except the mean people at school who love when other kids mess up.”

  “They’re just jealous,” I said. I couldn’t help picturing McKenzie when I said it.

  “They shouldn’t be.” Ally wiped the last tears from her cheeks. “And they shouldn’t act so mean.”

  I bit my lip. Was McKenzie mean? Was I?

  “Listen,” I said. “You should study the script extra hard, to show the jealous people that you deserve the part.”

  Ally slowly nodded. “Yeah.” But then one more tear dripped down her cheek. “I’m also scared that if I screw up, some people will say, ‘Dorothy was never supposed to have dark skin.’ ”

  I didn’t know how to respond. I hadn’t thought about what color Dorothy’s skin was or what color it should be. I’d figured Ally was the right person to play Dorothy because she sang “Somewhere over the Rainbow” the best and acted so well.

  “Hey, thanks for listening, Violet.” Ally’s sweet voice broke into my thoughts.

  “I feel bad,” I said.

  “You feel bad too?” Ally asked.

  “I mean I feel bad you have to worry about people saying bad stuff.”

  “Thanks. I should stop feeling sorry for myself.”

  I tried to think of something else to say. I wasn’t used to comforting people. Plus, it was hard to concentrate while my feet were throbbing. Finally, I just said, “Let’s continue where we left off,” which sounded like a teacher phrase.

  Someone knocked on Ally’s door, even though it was partway open.

  “What?” Ally said in the same irritated tone I used when my mom knocked on my door.

  The door swung open. Ally’s parents stood in the doorway, so close to each other they could have been a two-headed person.

  “How are you girls doing?” Ally’s mom asked. She and Ally’s dad wore identically dorky, eager smiles.

  “Fine,” Ally said.

  “We have Oreos if you want. Double Stuf. They’re in the kitchen,” her dad said.

  Ally sighed as if he’d just told her celery was in the kitchen. “We’re trying to work here.”

  After her parents left, Ally said, “They’re always checking up on me.”

  “My mom does that too,” I said.

  “My dad especially. He hovers over me, like he doesn’t trust me to take care of myself.”

  My dad trusted me. Why wouldn’t he? I never did anything bad.

  Maybe if I did something bad, my dad would come home. It would have to be very bad, so bad my mom couldn’t handle it herself.

  “I wish they didn’t butt in like that,” Ally said.

  I leaned toward her. “Why don’t your parents trust you? Did you do something really bad?”

  “I didn’t,” she said. “Their daughter did.”

  “One of your little sisters?”

  “Huh? Oh.” Ally shook her head. “Long story.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Not your fault.” Ally shrugged, but she was frowning.

  “It’s just that my dad is, like, the opposite of your dad. He moved out a few weeks ago.” Seventeen days ago, to be precise. “I haven’t heard from him, so I was wondering how to get him to act more like your dad.”

  Ally set down her script again. “Violet, I’m so sorry.”

  I was no longer in charge, no longer the line cue-er or comforter or advice giver. I was just my ordinary self again. Back to clueless, pathetic Violet.

  “It’s not your fault your dad’s acting like that,” Ally continued.

  “I know.” I tried to shrug but couldn’t even do a fake one. “It’s my mom’s fault for nagging him too much.”

  “He could still call you, right? Or pick you up from school.”

  “Look, it hasn’t actually been a few weeks. It’s only been a couple of weeks, just two weeks plus a few days.”

  Ally stared at me like I was a real estate agent trying to explain away mold damage on a house.

  “He might be out of town. And maybe he lost my cell number.”

  Ally raised her eyebrows. “Couldn’t he email you? Your dad shouldn’t, like, ghost you.”

  I put down my script and crossed my arms. “He didn’t ghost me. You don’t even know him. Just because your parents totally dote on you all the—”

  Ally interrupted me. “You don’t know my parents either. You have no idea.”

  “Oh, please.” I rolled my eyes. “I saw them at dinner. And they acted all lovey-dovey in your doorway, like…like Batman and Robin, or Hansel and Gretel.”

  “What?” Ally glared at me. “Isn’t Batman Robin’s guardian? And Hansel and Gretel are brother and sister. They’re not lovey-dovey.”

  “Whatever.” I glared back at her. “Can your parents drive me home now? Or should I call my mom for a ride?”

  “You can stay,” Ally said. But her arms were crossed now too.

  I crossed my arms tighter. “I want to go.”

  * * *

  My mother opened the front door about a tenth of a second after I knocked, as if she’d been waiting for me with her hand on the doorknob. She bombarded me with questions right away: “How was it? Did you have fun? You had dinner there, right?”

  I hurried past her and threw my backpack on the couch, which I knew she hated because she was a freaky neat freak, but I didn’t care. “Where’s Dad?” I asked loudly.

  Mom frowned. “Did something happen at Ally’s house?”

  “Don’t change the subject!” I shouted.

  “Violet!” Mom snapped.

  I took a deep breath and said very slowly, “Where. Is. My. Father.”

  Mom stared at me, wide-eyed.

  “I’d like to know why he hasn’t answered my emails.”

  Mom’s eyes got wider. “You emailed him?”

  “Is he mad at me because I acted bratty when he told me he was leaving?” I plopped onto the couch.

  “No, Violet.” Mom sat next to me and took a deep breath like I had done. “None of your father’s actions are your fault. Not his leaving, not his…It has nothing to do with you.”

  I hated how her voice got all pitying, as if I were a starving orphan, even though I was much better off than a starving orphan, and even better off than McKenzie, whose dad was dead and who’d been cast as a monkey in the school play and whose very best friend in the world had totally betrayed her tonight.

  “You emailed him?” Mom asked again, but not in a shocked way this time. She asked it like my emailing Dad was the saddest thing she’d ever heard, confirming her opinion that I was as pathetic as a starving orphan. She scooted closer to me on the couch. “When did you email him?”

  “Stop asking questions!” I screamed. “Not until you answer mine!”

  “Oh, Violet,�
�� Mom said, still not telling me anything about Dad.

  I stood and hurried upstairs, my aching feet throbbing on each step.

  Once I made it into my room, I closed my door and sat with my back against it to keep my mom out. Then I took off my boots and rubbed my feet. My feet didn’t stink after all. At least I couldn’t smell them. But maybe that’s like a fart situation, where your own never smell as bad as other people’s.

  I shouldn’t have told my mom I’d emailed Dad. I shouldn’t have told her anything. Not when she refused to tell me the one thing I needed to know. And I shouldn’t have told Ally about Dad or gone to her house in the first place behind McKenzie’s back.

  Ally acted like my dad was the worst, but she didn’t know anything about him, about the fun we had together. A few times last summer when Mom was holding open houses, Dad and I had snuck into the swimming pool of the Shoreham Arms, a giant apartment complex nearby. The pool was always crowded, but it was amazing on hot days. We’d jump into the water, doing cannonballs, and then sit on ratty lounge chairs to play poker. Mom had told Dad that trespassing set a bad example for me. Plus, she got mad when I came back sunburned.

  She didn’t understand Dad either.

  I turned my phone back on. McKenzie had texted three separate times:

  5:03 p.m.: Wanna see a movie?

  6:15 p.m.: Where R U?

  6:41 p.m.: R U ok?

  I texted her back:

  Fell asleep. Sorry. Dumb rehearsals are so tiring. Ally is so annoying. Movie tomorrow?

  And then, because maybe I really was the most pathetic person in the world, I checked my email again.

  Nothing from my dad.

  Of course not.

  THIRTEEN

  MATH PROBLEMS

  1. If x = the lucky girl who won a leading role in the school play, and y = the 40 disappointed girls who tried out for the play but didn’t get the leading role, then what is the ratio of x to y?

  2. How many times more obligated is x to learn her lines than someone in the y group?

  3. If x doesn’t learn her lines, should she feel 40 times guiltier than anyone else?

  ANSWER KEY

  1. 1 to 40.

  2. 40 times more obligated.

  3. Definitely.

  I’d gotten through rehearsals on Monday and Tuesday without saying one word to Ally, except in character as the Lion. I wished I’d been cast as the Wicked Witch so I could yell at her.

  But after Tuesday’s rehearsal, as I hurried through the auditorium to get out of there as quick as possible, while pretending not to care that Ally was sitting in an aisle seat right next to Diego and probably flirting with him, my backpack slipped down a little and hit Ally’s arm.

  “Sorry,” I blurted out.

  I was sorry as soon as I said it. I didn’t want Ally to think I was apologizing for how I’d acted at her house, or for anything else. So I added, “But your arm was dangling in the aisle.”

  “Blame the victim, why don’t you?” Diego said with a laugh.

  Ally and I glared at him. Usually he was funny, but not that time. He didn’t even look very cute.

  I hurried out of the auditorium, into the parking lot, and into Grandpa Falls-Apart.

  Mom began interrogating me. How was rehearsal? How did school go? How was lunch?

  “Fine. Fine. Fine,” I said through gritted teeth. Though I smiled inside on the third “fine” when I thought about lunch. McKenzie and I had acted super silly, using carrot sticks and raisins to make stick figures we named Sammy Squarehead and Black-eyed Bob. We reassured them that even though they were made of food, they wouldn’t be eaten. No one ever actually ate carrot sticks or raisins.

  Grandpa Falls-Apart groaned mysteriously through the school parking lot.

  Mom groaned too. “Oh no.”

  But we made it out of the lot and down the street with no more groans from the car or my mother.

  “Violet,” Mom said. “Do you want to help me get my new listing ready for the open house?”

  “No,” I said.

  “It’s a beautiful house. And I’ll be baking cookies and arranging fresh flowers. Tempted?”

  “No. I’d only be tempted by baking pies.”

  “Remember when we did that for the townhouse listing in Fullerton?” Mom shook her head. “Someone got peach filling on the ivory couch. And there were pie crumbs in every room. How about coming with me to the open house on Sunday?”

  “No,” I said as Grandpa Falls-Apart sputtered up our driveway.

  “Are you sure things are fine?” Mom asked.

  “No,” I said. “I mean, yes. They’re fine. Everything’s fine.”

  She turned off the ignition. “Do you—”

  “Mom!” I interrupted. “I’ll tell you if school or rehearsal or lunch or anything else isn’t fine!” I flung open the car door. “And you’ll be the first to know if I ever become interested in real estate, which I’m not! So you don’t need to ask!” I got out of the car and slammed the door shut.

  Then I rushed into the house, right to my room, and slammed my bedroom door shut too. I sat on my bed with my laptop and checked my email for the quadrillionth time, so I could make my awful day even worse.

  O.M.G! Dad emailed me!

  Hello, Violet. I’m sorry I didn’t respond sooner. I’ve been traveling a lot.

  I’m very proud that you have a big part in The Wizard of Oz. I know you’ll do a wonderful job. Unfortunately, I doubt I’ll get to come to your play. I will be out of town that week.

  Please understand that the reasons behind my leaving have nothing to do with you. Also, the reasons I haven’t been in touch the last few weeks have nothing to do with you and everything to do with me.

  I love you very much.

  Love,

  Dad

  I knew he’d write me back!

  I read the email again, nodding at my laptop as if my dad were on the other side of the screen. He said he loved me very much! He said he was proud of me!

  I read it again. It was a perfect email. Okay, he couldn’t come to my play. And he hadn’t asked to see me, hadn’t told me he’d call. But, still.

  I read it again. Couldn’t come to my play or wouldn’t come to my play?

  “Violet! Dinner!” Mom yelled from the kitchen.

  “Coming!” I yelled back. But then I read Dad’s email three more times. All my work memorizing lines came in handy, because I could recite my father’s email by heart.

  Dinner was heated-up canned pea soup and frozen fish sticks with lots of ketchup. Maybe if Mom were a good cook like my grandmother and Aunt Amber, who made delicious food every Thanksgiving, Dad would have liked being home more. Or if Mom treated our house like one of her open houses, making sure every room smelled perfect, Dad would want to live here.

  At dinner I acted like my usual self, giving one-word answers to Mom’s questions and mostly ignoring her chatter about new trends in paint colors, flooring versus carpeting, and other unfascinating topics.

  But I faked my poutiness tonight. Every time I thought about Dad’s email, especially his I love you very much, I had to fight off a huge smile.

  FOURTEEN

  Dear Dad,

  It was great getting your email!

  I’m sorry you can’t come to The Wizard of Oz. In case your plans change, you can buy a ticket at the door. The drama teacher thinks I’m really talented!

  My best friend, McKenzie, kept asking Mom where you are. Mom wouldn’t tell her. She (Mom) said you should tell her (McKenzie). So please let me know where you’re living so McKenzie will stop asking about it.

  Also, in case you lost my cell phone number or something, it’s 555-0475.

  Love,

  Violet

  “I told you he’d email you,”
McKenzie said the next day at lunch.

  “You were right.” I handed her a chunk of my brownie across the table. “Too bad he can’t see the play.”

  McKenzie shrugged. “Not his fault he’ll be out of town. And it’s not like the play is on Broadway.”

  “Yeah. I should have quit when you did.”

  “You should have,” McKenzie agreed.

  “Ally is so annoying.”

  “Really?” McKenzie leaned toward me.

  I wanted to tell her about Ally’s parents and her freak-out about memorizing lines and the mean things she’d said about my dad. But McKenzie could never, ever know I’d been to Ally’s house.

  “Does Goldstein still act like Ally’s the best actor ever?” McKenzie asked.

  “Yeah. Even though she’s totally not. Her parents fawn all over her too.” I bit my lip. “I mean, I bet they do.”

  “I bet she has a huge bedroom and a walk-in closet for all her clothes. And one of those beds with a pink ruffled canopy. Her parents probably call her icky nicknames like Princess and Sweetheart.”

  None of those things were true. But I nodded and said, “She’s no sweetheart, that’s for sure.”

  NICKNAMES WE CAME UP WITH FOR ALLY

  1. Alleycat

  2. Alleytrash

  3. Allison No Fun

  4. The Snob

  Before rehearsal that day, I walked up to Ally in the auditorium and said, “My dad sent me a really great email.” Because I was mature, I did not add, “Told you so.”

  Ally grinned. “That’s awesome, Violet!”

  I frowned. I hadn’t expected that reaction. I’d figured she’d make a snide comment or shrug or ignore me. I’d been so mad at her all week, but she didn’t seem mad at me. She never seemed mad at anyone, not even Diego, who called her Shorty.

  Why would she be mad at Diego though? Ally was easily in the top 20 percent for height for seventh-grade girls at our school. She was probably even in the top 13 percent. It wasn’t like last year when Isabelle Noonan had called me mouse, which hurt because I was probably in the top 20 percent for mousiness. (Although McKenzie had cheered me up by calling Isabelle a rat, and saying mice are cute and run really fast and get to eat cheese all day.)