I squint at her. “Did you lure me over here just to do improv?”
“Maybe.” Cecily grins, and I grin back. “How about Five Things?”
It’s a game Miss Gwen taught us. She gave us an object, like shoebox. Then we’d have to name five things we’d find in a shoebox. “It doesn’t matter what you say,” she said. “Just say something. Even a sound. Nothing is wrong.”
Of course, my brain wanted to think of the perfect things you could find in a shoebox. I froze. But Ryan spit out, “Jolly Green Giant!”
“One!” we counted with a clap.
“Jolly Ranchers!” Ryan continued.
“Two!” we shouted, clapping again.
“Santa!” Ryan yelled.
“Three!” Clap.
Ryan grabbed his belly. “Ho-ho-ho!”
That made no sense, but nobody minded. “Four!” Clap.
“Coal!” Ryan howled.
“Five!” we screamed and clapped. Then we sang, “Fiiiiii-ve things! These are five things. Five things, five things, five things. THESE ARE FIVE THINGS!” After that, I’d say whatever came into my mouth, even if I was looking at the wall and said, “Wall.” Or, “Ummmmm.”
It’s not the worst game ever. I like that you can say anything and have it be right. I settle back cross-legged on the couch and nod at Cecily. “Okay.”
She gives me the word barbecue, I give her toaster. Then I get an idea. I smirk at her. “Five things about . . . Mr. Sukow.”
Cecily giggles. “Crazy.”
I clap. “One.”
“Tough.”
“Two.”
“Smells like lemons.”
“Three.” I chuckle.
“Secret farter.”
“Four.” I giggle harder.
“Chickendog,” she says, and I curl up into a ball, laughing.
“Five,” I manage.
We sing the song. “THESE ARE FIVE THINGS!” we shout at the end. I wonder what the neighbors think of us.
Cecily gets up and gathers some small beanbags that are sitting on the coffee table. She walks over to a rectangular plywood box that’s got three holes cut in it vertically and tosses one in. “I’m so glad you’re in improv. Everyone likes you.”
“Really?” An excited little jolt travels over my body. I go over to her and she hands me a beanbag. Normally I would say no thanks because I hate it when people watch me try out new things that I’m bad at, but today it’s okay because we’re alone. I try to toss it in like she does, but I overshoot it. “I thought . . . I thought everyone might be mad at me for not going to Fosters Freeze.” My heart does its thumpity thing, the way it likes to when I’m offering something a little raw.
“Of course not! We just figured you had to go.” Cecily laughs, and my heart smooths out its beats.
My hand shakes with relief as I try to throw it in.
“Oh my gosh, you really were worried, weren’t you?” She comes over and hugs me, putting her head on my shoulder. “You’d have to do something way worse than that for us to not like you, believe me.”
“Like be a stage hog?” We both giggle.
“Exactly.”
“Do you know which library they’re having improv at yet?” I try the beanbag again. And miss.
She shakes her head. “I wish they’d stop the whole redevelopment.”
I stop trying to throw beanbags. “I wrote a letter to the Port of San Diego.” I tell her about my nutty Nana Linda and all her activism, and everything I know about Navegando Point.
“I’ll do it, too.” Cecily busts out her phone and we find the email address to write to the commissioners. Then she taps out a note. To Whom It May Concern: This is a bad idea.
“Add in that it’s not fair for only the people with money to enjoy the harbor,” I say.
She does, then hits send before I can reread any of it. “Done. Now we can get the others to do it, too.” Cecily writes out a group text, copying the email address. “We just have to make sure they actually do it. Chad can be kind of lazy about writing.” She holds up her phone. “And Ryan says yes, but he says yes to everything and then forgets. Babel definitely will. Jonathan’s the wild card.”
I pick up the beanbags. When I was with Nana Linda it felt more like writing a fake letter to the Easter Bunny. Now that Cecily’s involved, it feels like we’re doing something real and important. “Have you known everyone for a long time?”
“Just Ryan and Chad—they went to my elementary school.” She hesitates. “Interesting story about Ryan.”
I run over and collect the beanbags. “Oh yeah?”
“He used to be the class bully. He was so mean to me. But then his parents put him into improv. I was not happy to see him in class.” She squints. “It like . . . calmed him down, I guess. It made him think about other people. And it made me stand up for myself.” She shrugs. “He apologized to me. Now we’re friends.”
I never thought of anyone being able to change. I think of Ty and me. Maybe he needs to do improv. But I’m not going to be the one to suggest it to him.
Does that mean I can change, too? I won’t always be this Ava, the one who wants to do stuff but is scared about it. Maybe future Ava will be different.
It’s weird to think about. Mind-blowing, like the time I saw Mr. Sukow in a McDonald’s and realized teachers actually existed outside the classroom. It was like seeing a dog drive a car or something.
Cecily’s phone pings. “They’re all in,” she reports. She types back, holding it for me to see. Write it right now, before you forget, she types.
My eyes fill up for some reason. I wipe the tears off my cheeks. Cecily touches my arm. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.” I shake my head, thinking about why the whole group saying yes to me is affecting me like this. Then I finally get it. “They’re all saying yes, and to me.”
“Sure. We got your back, Ava. That’s what a team does.” Cecily pulls me into a side hug, and I put my head on her shoulder.
“I never had people doing that for me before,” I whisper. “I mean, besides my family. And excluding Luke.” This is the first real team I’ve ever been on. I didn’t know it could be like this. Other people supporting me, with pretty much no questions asked.
“Well, you do now. So don’t worry, Ava.”
People say that to me all the time when my anxiety ramps up. For probably the first time in my life, I do stop worrying. At least for now. “Thanks.”
Cecily’s phone pings.
Email sent! Ryan says.
“That was fast!” I peer at the screen.
“They promised to do it right away.” Cecily hands me her phone while she tosses more beanbags.
Done! Done! Done! The rest of them reply.
“Wow,” I say. “That’s amazing.”
Cecily takes the phone back. “Your turn.”
These emails could be the thing that will actually change the Brancusi Group’s mind. I toss the beanbag again. Finally, once, I throw it kind of right, and it slips into the hole. “I did it!” We high-five each other.
Chapter 16
My happiness only lasts for two seconds once I get home. Luke’s standing outside my room, arms crossed. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
Now why is he mad? What did I do wrong? My heart does a weird hummingbird thing. “Because I took your extra pencil lead? I’m sorry. I ran out.”
“You took my pencil lead? Ava!” he sputters. “Okay. That’s another issue. But this is why I’ve been waiting.” He bends over, picks up a bunch of cleaning products, thrusts them into my hands. “For you to clean the bathroom the way you were supposed to last week. I’m not picking up your slack. Even though I didn’t call you out on it the way I should have.” Luke nods. “You can thank me for not getting you into trouble with Mom.”
Fair enough. I wouldn’t have blamed him if he’d told. “Thanks,” I say. “I’m sorry I didn’t clean the bathroom right. But maybe you guys could help keep it clean in
between?”
“If you fish all your hair out of the drain,” he says. “We’re all responsible for the mess.”
I sigh. I guess he’s right. I go into our disgusting bathroom and open the window.
Later that afternoon, I get settled in the reading space Dad made for me by the window. I always wanted a window seat, but there wasn’t enough room to build one in my tiny space, so he got me this upholstered bench with bookcases on either side and lots of pillows. It’s my fake window seat.
The window faces the back patio, which is both good and bad. Good when nobody’s out there. Bad when my parents have friends over late at night.
I also like it because there’s a tree outside that Jīchan and Bāchan gave us when we moved in. Or so I’m told—I wasn’t born yet. But when my parents bought the house, back when Luke was little, they came over with a flowering orchid tree. It has large hot-pink flowers. Mom calls it a dragonflower tree. I like to stare at it while I’m thinking.
My grandparents have one, too. Mom says it was my grandmother’s favorite tree because the hummingbirds love it and she loved hummingbirds. There are always a few that come around, dipping their needle-beaks into the blooms, their wings ablur and their feathers gleaming red and green.
I saw one stop once, going so still I thought it had died. Mom said they go into a “torpor state” when they sleep, so completely motionless it’s hard to tell if it’s alive. “How do you tell?” I’d asked her.
“If they get up in twenty minutes or so, they’re alive. Otherwise, they’re not.”
One buzzes by the window now, but it doesn’t stop. It looks in at me and I wave. It’s probably looking at its own reflection, to be honest.
I lean my phone against the ICD monitor machine I have on my nightstand. There’s a person symbol, a phone symbol, and a doctor symbol. Every few months, the ICD sends a report to the doctor and tells them if the device is working right and whether I’ve had any issues. If I have an “incident,” as Dr. White, my cardiologist, calls them, I’m supposed to hit the button above the phone. That sends him a transmission.
It actually makes me feel more secure. If my device doesn’t work right, they’ll know about it right away. And it does make a handy nightlight, with the glow from the symbols on it. I open up my English journal for the first time since Mr. Sukow shared it. I read it over and chuckle a few times. It’s not the worst thing I ever wrote. I don’t know why I was afraid to have anyone read it.
“I am a writer,” I say. It sounds weird out loud.
I think about the Five Things game Cecily and I played. Now, on my blank page, I write, These are five things you’d find in . . . Ava.
Daydreaming. One.
Ice cream. Two.
ICD. Three.
Anxiety. Four.
Writing. Five.
I sing the song in my head. THESE ARE FIVE THINGS! I write in big block letters. Yes. These are me.
I’m kind of surprised that none of them are negative. I guess maybe anxiety is, but that’s also just a part of me. Like my arm. Or my ICD.
Then, because I’m avoiding working on the napkin project, among other homework things, I start looking up things to do in Maine. Blueberry picking, yes. Lobster fishing—probably not. Lobster eating—yes. I’ve never had a lobster, but that seems like a thing people do there.
A knock on my door surprises me. Everyone in my family has a unique knock. This one’s regular. “Who is it?” I close my journal.
“Nana Linda,” a muffled voice says.
I cringe as I glance around my room at the socks and pajamas I should have picked up earlier. I’m slacking on my chores. Well, that’s nothing new. I seem to leave a trail of stuff wherever I go, without meaning to. I kick a sock and a pair of underwear under the bed. “Um, come in!”
Nana Linda opens the door. She doesn’t seem to notice the mess. “Hey, Ava. Jīchan and I are on the way out to dinner at the Sweet Salad Buffet, so I wanted to see if anyone wants to come.” She sits down on the floor, tossing aside a sock without making a face like I would have, and leans forward so her elbows are resting on the floor.
I do like the Sweet Salad and their all-you-can-eat soups and salads and muffins. I look at my Chromebook, wishing I’d done my homework instead of thinking about Maine and stuff. “I want to, but I’ve got this English project I’m working on.” I sit next to her and imitate the pose. “Hey, my friend and I made the whole improv team write to Navegando Point.”
She chuckles. “Made them?”
“Convinced them.”
“Wonderful! That’s the hardest part, getting people to do something. Unless there’s a huge public outcry, the developers will just proceed as normal. And it seems like nobody who lives in San Diego really cares about a touristy place like Navegando Point. Or if they do, they’re not speaking up.” She bends her head low so her face is hidden. “Ugh. I sat too long today and I’m all sore.”
“But, Nana Linda—there’s a public meeting. What about that?” I tell her what I heard. Nana Linda straightens and looks it up on her phone.
“Ah-ha!” She nods. “It’s tomorrow night.”
“They didn’t give much notice—like less than two weeks?” I shake my head.
“That’s a common tactic. They wait until it’s almost too late for people to organize. Though they probably did advertise it somewhere—just not anywhere people could see.” She brushes back her hair.
My heart thumps, but it’s not anxiety I’m feeling. It’s something different. The same thing I feel when people cheat at video games or things like that.
Navegando Point is basically going to close right in front of us unless we do something. Nana Linda was right. We do need to try. Dad always says that if you do nothing, nothing will happen. “One hundred percent of zero is zero,” Dad likes to say. “Better to at least try.”
“I want to go,” I say, surprising myself. I wait for the anxiety again.
Nothing. My palms are a little sweaty, but that’s it. “I won’t have to talk, will I?” I ask her.
“I’ll talk this time.” She smiles at me, tousles my hair. “But I want your help. We need to get people to care.”
Once again, I wish Zelia were here. She’d be full of ideas. “There’s a cemetery full of Spanish sailors underneath Navegando Point,” I say. “Will people care about that?”
“I don’t think so because there’s already a historical plaque.” Nana Linda sticks her leg out into another stretch.
I deflate like an accordion. “Oh.” That was the most interesting historical thing about Navegando Point.
“Sorry, but let’s think about what people care about besides historical stuff.”
What do I care about? My family. My friends. My house. My school. My community.
“People should care about Navegando Point,” I say slowly, “because it should belong to everyone. And it seems like there aren’t many places like that anymore.”
“Bingo!” Nana Linda acts like this is the answer she’s been waiting for. “It’s called gentrification. That’s when an area gets redeveloped with more expensive real estate and prices out the people who used to live there or use it.”
“Like what happened with Dad’s Cotillion and all those businesses,” I say. The unfairness of that hits me again. Maybe some progress can’t be helped, but can’t they do it so they don’t just kick everyone out?
She stretches her arms. “So. Step one. We go to the Port of San Diego public hearing. See what they have to say when we point this out. Then make our plan based on what happens. Who knows, maybe they’ll see it our way.”
I like plans, I realize. Just having one about the theater makes me feel like I’m doing something. Like there’s at least a possibility of some good thing. And it’s a lot better than doing nothing all the time. I smile at Nana Linda. “Can we do corpse pose?” That’s my favorite because all you have to do is lie there.
“Only if you don’t let me fall asleep.” She lies on her bac
k, with me beside her, our hands at our sides. Just breathing in and out.
After Nana Linda leaves, I FaceTime Zelia. I haven’t talked to her since she showed me her pink-and-blue hair and put down improv. Just the texts. I’ve been hoping she’d realize she was wrong and call me and apologize. But that never happened.
I decide to be mature and move past it. I mean, we’ve texted since then. She answered me, even though she was weird about Fosters Freeze. She might have been trying to make me feel better. Dad always says we should assume people mean no harm until proven otherwise—another Cotillion lesson. Besides, I want to know what she thinks.
She answers, sticking her face too close to the camera. “Hey.”
“Hi.” My heart skips a little, and suddenly I’m a little shaky. Like my body thinks she’ll say something else about improv. “How’s it going?”
“Ugh. Lots of homework. I can’t talk long.” She moves away from the camera so I can see her book-covered bed. “I’m going to be up until ten.”
“I’m sorry.” Now I feel kind of bad for calling.
“So what’s up?” She scratches her nose.
“I . . . I wanted to ask you something about . . . about . . .” I hate how my voice is suddenly small and stammering. I swallow.
“About what?” She’s writing something in a notebook.
Suddenly I don’t want to risk making her mad. And I realize I don’t know what to say because who would have predicted improv would make Zelia mad? “What did you think about the new She-Ra episodes?” I ask her instead because we used to watch that together.
Zelia sets down her pen. “Oh, I loved them! Did you see . . .”
And then, finally, we have a nice conversation. Though I didn’t get to talk about what was really on my mind. It’s fine, I tell myself. Maybe we’re at the stage of our friendship where we just talk about TV shows and weather and never anything important.
After we hang up, I have to press the heels of my hands into my eyes so I don’t tear up. I miss Zelia so much. The old Zelia, who I could talk to about anything in the world. What happened to her? I take out the notebook I use for sketching.
Five Things About Ava Andrews Page 9
