Sammy Keyes and the Sisters of Mercy

by Wendelin Van Draanen

  No one had to tell me to run along when school was over. I was down the steps and out the gate before the bell was done ringing. Holly and Dot came running up calling, “Hey, Sammy! Wait up!” but I couldn’t talk to them. All I could think about was Heather having my mitt—my father’s mitt—and how I might never see it again. I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to think about it. I just wanted to get it back.

  And all of a sudden my nose is running and my eyes are overflowing and I can’t see where I’m going, so I stumble over to the curb and sit down. And while I’m burying my face in my arms, Holly sits down beside me and says, “Sammy, what’s wrong? What happened?”

  I just shake my head and I can hear Dot whisper, “It’s her mitt. It was her dad’s.”

  I slap off the tears. “She’ll never give it back. Never.” Then I get up and run all the way to St. Mary’s.

  I guess I shouldn’t have used the side door, because Sister Mary Margaret jumped through the ceiling when I walked in. “Good heavens, child! Weren’t you taught to knock?”

  I’m in the middle of saying I’m sorry when I notice that what Mary Margaret’s doing is counting money. Lots of money. Not hundred-dollar bills or anything, just lots of kind of rumpled tens and fives and ones. And I’m thinking that maybe it’s money from Mass offering or something, but I’ve never actually seen anyone give a ten at Mass before. And there are lots of tens.

  So she’s standing there with her back against the table, spreading her arms out, leaning on her fingertips, trying to hide the stacks of money. And I’m trying not to stare or be too nosy, but it’s hard. I force myself to look away, and say, “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

  She blinks at me like she’s completely forgotten she was laid up with the flu. “Oh. Yes, thank you.” Then she sighs, “Oh, this is ridiculous,” and turns back to the table to gather the cash. “It’s my bingo winnings, Samantha.”

  I say, “Bingo winnings?” because Grams has played bingo before but she usually only goes up or down a couple of dollars.

  Mary Margaret stuffs all the money into an empty cracker box and whispers, “Indian bingo. It’ll be our little secret, all right?”

  I shrug and say, “Sure,” and in my mind I’m picturing Sister Mary Margaret with a fat wad of cash, putting on dark glasses and a big hat, sneaking over to the valley to play Indian bingo while the rest of her friends play quarter stakes at the parish hall.

  Mary Margaret clears her throat. “So, shall we get to work?” Then she notices the time. “You’re over thirty minutes early. No wonder you caught me off guard!”

  “I went over to the church, but it’s all locked up.”

  “Oh, that’s right. The Sisters.” She shakes her head. “It should be interesting, to say the least. Are they ready, then?”

  I shrug and say, “I guess so,” and as we’re going into the kitchen I kind of whisper, “You’ll be glad when they’re gone, won’t you?”

  Mary Margaret laughs. “It’s like the circus has come to town and they’re using our church as the big tent.” She smiles at me and says, “I know they’re here to help, but, yes, I’ll be glad when they’re gone.”

  We set up the food and clean up the kitchen, and when we’re all done, we still have about ten minutes to spare. Mary Margaret says, “Could you open the doors when it’s time, Samantha? I’ll be back shortly.”

  “Shortly” turned out to be five minutes before the kitchen was supposed to close. And since Brother Phil never showed up and Sister Josephine was nowhere to be seen, I had to run the whole show all by myself again.

  When Sister Mary Margaret finally does come back, she says, “Oh, Sammy, I’m terribly sorry! It was unavoidable. You run along—I’ll finish up here.”

  When I walk by the church, I notice that the main door’s propped open. So I go over and stick my nose inside, and there’s Brother Phil at a card table with a strongbox and a stack of tickets. It looks like he’s concentrating real hard on writing something so I walk up kind of quietly so as not to disturb him. Then I see that he’s not writing anything, he’s drawing, and what he’s drawing on is money. I clear my throat. “How’s it going, Brother Phil?”

  He jumps and practically breaks the table in two trying to cover up the beard he’d put on Andrew Jackson. When he realizes it’s only me, he rolls his eyes and says, “Give me a heart attack, why don’t cha?”

  I laugh. “Sorry.”

  He straightens out the table and says, “They giving you a comp?”

  “A comp? What’s a comp?”

  “A complimentary pass.”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “I thought maybe after all the work you’d been doing for them they’d slip you a ticket. I don’t think they’re giving out any comps. What do they think? They’re gonna sell this place out?” He squeaks around in his folding chair a minute trying to get comfortable. “Ha! That would be a first.” He leans forward and whispers, “I think Mayhew’s giving me this job just to see if the drawer’ll come up short. Have I got a big surprise for him—every penny’s going to be there. Every single one.”

  Someone walks in the door to buy a ticket so I say, “You show him, Brother Phil,” and wave good-bye.

  He winks at me like it’s our little secret that he won’t be taking any money from the box, and then says, “Tonight, tomorrow, or Saturday?” to the man waiting to buy a ticket.

  I thought about Brother Phil and the rest of the St. Mary’s squad for maybe a whole block. Then I remembered Heather and her stupid meowing, and all of a sudden I just wanted to be home. Home with Grams.

  I get back to the apartment building as fast as I can, and after I sneak up the back steps and past Mrs. Graybill’s door, I toss my backpack on the couch and run into the kitchen to give Grams a hug. When I’m done hugging her, she holds me out by the arms and says, “My goodness, Samantha. What brought that on?”

  I kind of laugh, but she can tell what I really want to do is cry. She sits me down on the couch and says, “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that homeless girl.”

  “Her name’s Holly.”

  “Of course. Holly.” She sighs, then holds my hand and says, “Is she the reason you were asking me what would’ve happened if I hadn’t been here to take care of you?”

  I shrug and look down.

  “Samantha, listen to me. Your mother would never have abandoned you. She would have taken you with her. At the time she just thought it was better for you to stay here with your friends.”

  “Oh, right! This is all a big favor to me.”

  Grams rubs my hand. “She’ll come back, Samantha, and I don’t think it’ll be that much longer.”

  I jump up. “I don’t want her to come back. I never want to see her again!” I sit back down and say, “I just want my mitt back.”

  “Are you sure Heather’s got it?”

  I roll my eyes, “Oh, I’m sure.” Then I tell her about the meowing and how embarrassing it was, and how the thought of Heather putting on my mitt made me want to crush her into kitty litter.

  Grams sighs. “I suppose you don’t want me to interfere?”

  “It wouldn’t help. They’ve already checked her locker and Tenille’s locker, and since no one actually saw her take it, what else can they do?”

  Very quietly Grams asks, “Why do you think Heather wanted to take your mitt?”

  I shrug and say, “To get to me.”

  “And why does she want to get to you?”

  “You know why she wants to get to me! She hates me!”

  Grams gives me a little smile. “And why does she hate you?”

  I just shake my head. “I don’t know, Grams. I was trying to keep away from her. Really I was! I just want her to leave me alone.”

  Grams pats my hand and says, “Samantha, Heather hates you because you always come out on top. You are a winner in spite of her.”

  I let out a sound like a blown-out tire. “Oh, come on, Grams! Heather think
s I’m the world’s biggest loser.”

  Grams just keeps smiling. “That’s what she says, but in her heart she knows it’s not true. Think about it, Samantha—in all the run-ins you’ve had with her, who’s come out on top?”

  So I think about it and say, “I have. But she always seems to turn it back around.”

  “And that’s exactly what she’s trying to do right now. Don’t let her! I’m not saying stoop to her level—just get past Heather. And don’t worry about revenge. Things have a way of coming around all by themselves. Sometimes it takes longer than we want it to, but in the end it always does.” She pats my hand and says, “The way to rise above Heather is to play your best tomorrow despite what she’s done to you. You’re a winner, Samantha. Prove to yourself that she’s inconsequential in your life.” She gives me a mischievous little grin. “And if you want to hurt her more than she’s hurt you, that’s easy. Win tomorrow!”

  I think about what she’s said and it’s like Grams has just put a little pocket of sunlight inside me. And the longer I sit there, the warmer I feel and the brighter things look. When she smiles at me and says, “Ready to help me fix dinner?” I get up and say, “Sure.”

  At dinner I ate all my rice and peas and didn’t even try to slip Dorito any of my fish. And when bedtime rolled around I snuggled up on the couch and lay there in the dark, thinking about the things Grams had said. Then I reached over and pulled up my backpack, and just sat there for the longest time with it in my lap.

  Finally, I zipped it open and took out Brandon’s mitt. At first I just stared at it, thinking. About my dad, about my mitt. About where in the world both of them were while I was sitting up in the middle of the night thinking about them.

  Then I thought about Brandon and how getting goose-bumps over his mitt was the stupidest thing my arm had ever done. Well, except for the time it went and waved at a guy stealing money out of a hotel room, but that’s another story.

  I mean, Brandon had probably just tossed Marissa the mitt and said something like, “Here, she can use mine,” without even thinking about it. He’d probably lent it out lots of times—it was no big deal. Especially to a hotshot swimmer like Brandon.

  Then I thought about the first game and about how maybe, with Marissa’s secret play and a little luck, we could pull it off again.

  So I got down to business. I put on Brandon’s mitt. I pushed and flexed and tightened it until it felt really comfortable. And I guess I fell asleep working the mitt because when I woke up in the morning, I was still wearing it, only I was using it more like a Teddy bear than a softball glove.

  And for once Grams didn’t have to beg me to get up. I knew it was time. Time to go to school. Time to look the beast square in the eye.

  Time to play ball.

  On the one day you’d expect Marissa to do the McKenze dance nonstop, she didn’t do it at all. Not once. And any time Dot or I would say something like, “Hey, maybe Emiko’ll come down with the flu,” or “I hope the field’s dried up some,” she’d say, “It doesn’t matter. Either way, we’re going to win.”

  And if Dot or I would laugh and say, “Right, Marissa,” her eyes would pop open and she’d say, “Get this through your heads—we are going to win!” so that by the end of the day we weren’t wishing for a dry field or a sick pitcher, we were feeling kind of giddy. Like we were going to win.

  Of course, that was before we were lacing up our cleats and Heather got her whole team to meow through a verse of “Where, Oh Where, Has My Little Dog Gone?”

  Marissa whispers, “Ignore them, Sammy. They’re trying to psych you out.”

  Now, I’m trying. But there they are, across the locker room, tossing their gloves in the air, meowing away, laughing. And it’s hard. Real hard.

  Finally, Ms. Rothhammer comes out of her office and says, “What’s going on out here?” and you can tell from the way her hands are on her hips that she knows Mr. Vince’s team’s not just warming up for Cat Choir.

  Everyone gets busy retying their cleats and pulling up their socks—everyone except Marissa. And she’s about to step forward and tell Ms. Rothhammer what’s been going on, but I grab her jersey and give her a shut-up-or-you’re-dead look, and after a minute Ms. Rothhammer says, “Well, get out there and do something useful. Go warm up.”

  On the way out to the field Ms. Rothhammer corrals all of us away from Mr. Vince’s team. “Okay, girls, listen up. I’ve checked out Marissa’s play, the Fake, and she’s right—it is legal. The signal I’ll use when I want you to do it is this.” She crosses both arms over her chest with her fingers touching her collarbones.

  Marissa says, “Great! This is going to work, guys. They won’t know what hit them.”

  Now, Dot and I are excited, but the eighth graders just kind of grumble and start walking again. Marissa catches up to them and says, “Hey, you guys, come on. I know you don’t think we should be on your team, but—”

  Before she can finish, Dawn Wilson says, “Darn right. You guys choked last game. If it wasn’t for you—”

  I’m sure Dawn thought Ms. Rothhammer was far enough away that she couldn’t hear what was going on, but she was wrong. Ms. Rothhammer makes a beeline straight to Dawn and says, “I have had enough of this. If it weren’t for these three, you eighth graders would never have won the first game! They’re on this team because they’re good. They’re real good. And I’m tired of seeing the rest of you ostracize them just because they’re seventh graders!”

  Becky Bork kind of mumbles under her breath, “If they’re so good, why’d we get slaughtered last game?”

  Ms. Rothhammer leans in. “That’s in the past. Today is what matters, and where these three are concerned you’ve got nothing to worry about. Sammy’s got a good mitt, she’s focused; Marissa’s one of the best pitchers I’ve ever seen; and if Dot were any faster, they’d want to haul her off to do some bio testing.”

  That makes everyone chuckle, and when we’re all done laughing, Ms. Rothhammer smiles and says, “Winning isn’t everything, but in this case I think it’s pretty important.” She glances over at Mr. Vince laughing it up with the girls on his team. “For a lot of reasons.” Then she says, “Look, you’re a team. Individual effort is important, but no one player can win or lose this game. It’s up to all of you. Now, get out there and warm those bodies up!”

  So we start trotting around the field, the eighth graders in front and the three of us bringing up the rear. Marissa says, “Pick an eighth grader, any eighth grader.”

  I say, “Why?”

  “Just pick one.”

  I say, “Okay—Jennifer.”

  Dot says, “Kris.”

  Marissa says, “I’ll take Xandi. Catch up and run with them. Talk about anything. Just be nice!”

  Dot and I look at each other and shrug, and then put on the steam to catch up with our eighth graders. When Jennifer figures out that I’m running with her, she gives me a what-are-you-doing-weirdo? kind of look, and rolls her eyes at Cindy Salazar who’s beside her.

  I just say, “Hi,” and keep on running alongside them. I mean, I don’t have any idea what to say to them—they’re snotty eighth graders. But as we round the first bend, I try, “I’m sorry about Wednesday’s game. I know I really blew it, but don’t worry. It’s not going to happen again.”

  Jennifer kind of eyes me like, Right, but Cindy pops her head out a bit and calls over, “What happened, anyway? Everyone said you freaked out because you had to play with one of the school’s mitts. What’s the big deal?”

  I say, “The mitt that got stolen was my dad’s.”

  They both look at me like, So what? and since I don’t want to go into the whole thing about how I don’t even know who my dad is or where he is, I tell them something that’s almost the truth: “It’s the only thing of his I had. He’s dead.”

  They both look at me like, Ohhhh, and when we round the second bend, Jennifer says, “Well, maybe you should tell everybody that. Maybe you’d get it back.”
>
  I say, “She’s not going to give it back. She’d rather eat worms than give it back.”

  Cindy laughs, then says, “You’re talking about Heather, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “She doesn’t seem so bad. Why don’t you just—”

  Jennifer cuts in, “Oh, Heather’s no saint. She kisses up to us, but she’s the one that Amber about killed for trying to steal Jared away, remember?”

  Cindy says, “Heather’s the one that did that?”

  Jennifer says, “Yeah. And Amber probably never would’ve known if they hadn’t played that tape over the PA system.”

  We’re coming around the last bend and Jennifer says, “What I never figured out was, Who played the tape? Everyone kept telling me to look for a girl in green shoes, but I never saw her.” She looks at Cindy. “Do you know who it was?”

  “I just know it was some seventh grader.”

  Jennifer looks at me. “Do you know?”

  Maybe I should’ve just lied, but I couldn’t help it, I nodded.

  By now we’ve stopped running and we’re lining up for stretches. They both look at me like a couple of owls. “Who?”

  I reach for the sky with the rest of the team while Miss Pitt counts off. “It was me.”

  “You?”

  I nod, and the whole time we’re stretching they keep looking over at me, shaking their heads and grinning. And the minute we get to throw the balls around to warm our arms up, the two of them run off to Kris and Dawn and Becky to spread the juice.

  And the funny thing is, by the time Ms. Rothhammer comes back with the news that we’re up first, we’re like a different group of people. Becky Bork makes me give her a high-five and says, “I can’t believe that was you!” Dawn says, “Yeah, and you couldn’t have done it to a better person—that Heather is such a snot. She thinks she’s the hottest shortstop in history.”

  I laugh and say, “That’s what everyone says about you, Dawn,” which a week ago would’ve gotten me blacklisted for life. Instead, what happens is Xandi and Cindy start laughing and say, “Yeah, Dawn, take it down a notch, would you?” and pretty soon we’re all laughing and calling each other names. And for the first time since we started playing together it doesn’t feel like I’m just a splinter on an eighth-grade bench. I feel like part of the team.