The Summer of Bad Ideas

by Kiera Stewart

  “Why are we eating so early?” I ask.

  “Well,” she says, “I’d like to make sure we have time to talk.”

  There’s something weird about the very careful way she’s speaking, but I just say, “Fine.” When she leaves, I say to Rae, “Sorry about that. Her bursting in here and all.”

  She shrugs. “No worries. What do you think she wants to talk about?”

  But before I can answer—safety rules, of course, knowing my mom; might as well brace Rae for it—we’re summoned downstairs, this time by my dad. “Eeeee-dith!” He sort of sings it. “We’re ready to blow this taco stand!”

  Rae laughs.

  I let out an exasperated sigh. “We’re coming!” I call down.

  We close the door to our room behind us—it feels good to already have something of ours—and head downstairs to our waiting families. I brace myself for whatever lies ahead.

  Chapter 4

  Endangered

  We are at the BEST Diner in Town. That’s not a description; it’s the name of the place. It shouts at us in neon—the word best in wide, all-cap letters on top, Diner in Town underneath.

  And, in Pinne, Florida, the BEST Diner in Town is also the ONLY Diner in Town. The parking lot is pretty empty except for a few old cars, including a yellow Corvette with a racing stripe, which turns out to belong to the waitress-slash-owner, Dani—an old acquaintance of the family. From a distance, her heavy face and her low ponytail of fading red hair make her appear old, but when she sees us and gives us a welcoming smile, she seems to become decades younger.

  There’s a little catching up, and some condolences. “Sorry about your mom,” Dani says. “I suppose she’s at peace.”

  “Yeah, that’s probably the last place she wants to be,” Uncle A.J. jokes, and the three of them share a laugh, although my mom’s is more like a little whimper.

  It feels strange to order drinks and burgers after that, but that’s what most of us do. My uncle orders a basket of fried pickles for the table, even though my mom shoots him a disapproving look. My mom tries to get away with a salad, but Dani won’t allow it.

  “A salad? Well, you’re going to waste away with just a salad. How about I make it burgers all around? Listen to me. You got to keep your strength up in times like this.”

  “Times like what?” Beatrice asks.

  “Times of grief,” Dani explains. Then she asks our parents, “Speaking of, I hear there’s not going to be a funeral?”

  Uncle A.J. speaks. “Petunia didn’t want a funeral. She just wanted—”

  “She gets to be part of a coral reef!” Henry interrupts, just bursting with excitement.

  “She wanted her ashes donated to the Neptune Memorial Reef. They have a man-made coral reef off the coast of Miami,” Uncle A.J. explains.

  “That certainly sounds like our Petunia,” Dani says, and sighs. “I sure do miss having her around.”

  “Can I please have my ginger ale?” Henry asks Dani.

  My parents both visibly cringe, and my dad starts to apologize for Henry’s tactlessness, but Dani just shoos it away. “It’s okay—I’m sure you’re all thirsty.” She goes off to get our drinks.

  My mom turns to Rae, changing the subject. “So, Rae, tell me about school. Are you excited about starting seventh grade in the fall?”

  “I’m not actually going into a grade, Aunt Hannah,” Rae answers. “I’m going into indigo.”

  Uncle A.J. explains, “Rae goes to an arts school. She’s studying theater and film.”

  “We’re not limited to numbers,” Rae adds.

  “There’s nothing limiting about numbers,” Henry says. “Have you ever heard of infinity?”

  “Henry,” my mom gently scolds.

  Uncle A.J. smiles at me. He’s got that kind of smile that makes you feel like you’re in on some private joke with him.

  “How about you all?” Uncle A.J asks. “Edith, you’re headed to a new school, aren’t you?”

  My mom answers. “Yes, Edith will be starting middle school—”

  Yeah. Where she will have no friends.

  “—and the twins go to the science-and-tech school. Henry’s concentration is biology—”

  “And documentary production,” Henry adds.

  “Yes,” my mom says. “And Beatrice is studying zoology.”

  “Animal science,” Beatrice says.

  Uncle A.J. nods. “Well, that’s awesome, guys. Obviously, you’re all really—”

  I suck in a breath.

  “—intelligent,” he says. The twins look satisfied, and I exhale.

  “You know what, Hannah?” Uncle A.J. says. “Know what I just realized? Edie’s got Petunia’s eyes. Same exact shade—that stormy gray. Don’t you think, Hannah? She kind of takes after her grandmother.”

  The fact that he notices it makes me feel hopeful in some way.

  “Takes after Mom?” my mother says, like it’s a crazy suggestion. “I’m not sure I see it.”

  “Actually, Hannah, I can see it too,” my dad says.

  My mom glances over at me. “Just a tiny bit, I guess. Twins, why don’t you tell Uncle A.J. and Rae about your summer project?”

  “Oh, okay.” Beatrice sits up in her seat. “We’re working on a documentary—”

  “—about Vermivora bachmanii,” Henry interrupts.

  My dad laughs gently. “You might want to explain what that is.”

  “Oh. It’s Bachman’s warbler,” Henry says, like that makes any more sense to a normal person.

  “It’s a bird,” Beatrice says.

  But Henry jumps back in. “It’s not just a bird, Beatrice! It’s an endangered bird. The last confirmed sighting was 1988!”

  I look at Rae and roll my (stormy-gray) eyes for her benefit.

  Uncle A.J. asks, “You sure it won’t be a wild goose chase?”

  “No, it’s a warbler, Uncle A.J. It’s not a goose,” Beatrice tells him.

  “No, what I mean is, if it’s that endangered, it’s going to be hard to find in the first place, let alone film.”

  Henry and Beatrice become silent. My dad clears his throat. Amazingly, I don’t think it’s something that any of the geniuses have really ever considered.

  Dani brings our burgers, and while we all start in on them, I notice my mom has barely touched hers. I guess my dad notices too, because he asks her if she’s okay.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. I just wish . . .” She shakes her head.

  “I wish she was here with us now,” Rae says.

  “In her leopard-print pantsuit,” my dad adds, smiling. My mom smiles a little too.

  “With Herbie wrapped around her shoulders,” Uncle A.J. says, and laughs. My parents and Rae do too. I try my best to laugh along, but all I can really do is smile stiffly, horrified at the very thought.

  “Had to ask her to leave one time,” Dani says as she refills our water glasses. “She was scaring off some Miami-bound tourists. The husband pitched a fit, and the wife nearly collapsed on the floor, just seeing this crazy old lady—well, I mean that in a good way—this crazy lady with a snake wrapped around her shoulders.”

  That gets another good laugh.

  “What happened to the alligator she had?” Beatrice asks. “You know, the one with no teeth?”

  “Oh, Louis,” my mom says. “He died a while ago.”

  “Yeah, she had him taxidermied too,” Uncle A.J. says. “Just like Herbie the snake. And Albert the dog.”

  “I think I miss Petunia,” Beatrice says.

  “You can’t miss her,” Henry says. “You can’t miss someone you never met.”

  Beatrice scrunches her forehead. “Oh.”

  It may not be possible to actually miss someone you never met, but I do feel a little empty inside too. I reach out under the table and squeeze Beatrice’s fingers.

  My mom announces a sudden need to wash her hands and leaves the table. Rae starts talking about Petunia and her surfing trip out west, and I decide to follow my mother. />
  I find her drying her hands with a paper towel. “Oh, hi, honey,” she says, a smile flickering on her face.

  “Are you . . . okay?” I ask.

  “Yes, I’m fine. Just needed a moment.” She looks over at me. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing, it’s just . . .”

  I hesitate. As much as she annoys me sometimes, I really don’t like upsetting her.

  “Honey, what?”

  “Well, why didn’t we ever get to meet Petunia?”

  She starts to talk about how busy we’ve been. It’s like she forgets that I was actually on all those educational vacations we’ve had time for—or, well, eduvacations if you’re a Posey-Preston. The Smithsonian museums, the Library of Congress, the Hayden Planetarium.

  I must have a look on my face that tells her I’m not exactly buying it, because she says, “Okay, I’ll admit that my mother and I clashed quite a bit when I was growing up.”

  “How long have you been mad at her, then?”

  “It’s not that I’m mad at her, honey. It’s just that we never did see eye to eye, and maybe because of that, I didn’t make visiting her a priority.”

  “So why didn’t you ever invite her to come visit us?”

  “Oh, Edith . . .” She shakes her head. “I couldn’t even have begun to imagine what she’d do if she came to visit. She’d have gone stir-crazy.”

  Right. I’m getting the picture. She was a zing. Like Rae. We, on the other hand, are thuds. All thuds.

  “So we were too boring for her,” I say.

  “Oh, now, Edith. That’s not what I mean. I am sorry that you never got to meet her.” She smiles at me, but I don’t smile back.

  Then she takes a breath and says, “Anyway.”

  Anyway, at least in my mom’s language, is the equivalent of “conversation over.” It’s like hitting a dead end. You can try to keep talking, but it’ll quickly turn into a monologue. She throws away her paper towel, and I follow her back to the table.

  “Everything okay?” my dad asks when we sit back down.

  I shrug.

  Dani comes over to ask if my mom meant to leave half her burger on her plate, or if she’s still working on it.

  “Oh, thanks, Dani. I’m full; you can take it. Guess I’m out of practice eating this kind of— I mean, food this good.”

  “You know, after a few weeks, you probably won’t even miss your city food.” Dani takes the plate and walks away.

  “After a few weeks?” Rae scoffs. “Good thing we won’t be here that long.”

  But my mom looks at my dad, and then over at my uncle, and says, “Well, A.J., Walt, I suppose we should tell them now.”

  “Tell us what?” Rae asks, looking first at her father, then at my parents.

  My dad clears his throat and asks if anyone wants more pickles.

  My uncle takes in a breath and lets it out slowly. It seems to take forever. “So Petunia’s house is in a lot worse shape than we expected.”

  “Okay, so?” Rae says, her eyebrows pulling together.

  “Well,” says my mom, “Petunia’s will requires that we all stay here together, fixing up the house and getting it ready to sell. We knew it was going to be a major cleanup, but it looks like the house needs quite a bit of repairing too.”

  Rae says, “But my dad knows how to fix everything, so—”

  “Hey, sport, listen,” Uncle A.J. says. “What we’re trying to say is that it’s going to take us a little longer than we thought.”

  “Um, how much longer?” I ask.

  “We think it’ll take about six weeks,” my mom says. She takes a fried pickle.

  “Six weeks?” Rae and I both exclaim. Two weeks was bad enough with Sophi Angelo trying to lure Taylor away from me! Now, six weeks? Six weeks apart will turn our friendship into toast!

  My mom only gives us an apologetic tilt of her head.

  But Rae sounds almost panicky. “Dad? You said two weeks! What about Shakespeare camp? Just send me back to California now. I can stay with Mom until camp starts.”

  “She’s . . . not available,” Uncle A.J. says, rubbing his neck.

  “Yes, she is. She told me if I ever—” Rae’s voice cracks.

  “She can’t, sport. She’s got her hands full at the moment. I’m sorry.”

  “Can you believe this?” Rae turns to me. “We’re stuck here all summer? This is a disaster.”

  And it does sort of feel that way. Will Taylor be best friends with Sophi by the time we go home? Has Sophi already replaced me?

  “Six weeks is good,” Henry says, oblivious to the fact that it’s bad timing for such a comment. I try to shut him up with a glare, but as usual, he’s clueless. “We’ll definitely find a Bachman’s warbler in six weeks.”

  “Yeah, six weeks is a long time,” Beatrice says happily. “That’s enough time for three generations of fruit flies.”

  “It’s enough time for a tadpole to change into a frog,” Henry adds.

  “Errrrrr!” Beatrice presses the imaginary button again. “Wrong, Henry. Maybe a tadpole to a toadlet, but not a tadpole to a frog.”

  Henry ignores her. “In six weeks, a young snake can shed its skin three times.”

  “Snakes don’t molt that much,” Beatrice says.

  “I said a young snake, Beatrice! They grow faster, so they shed their skin every couple of weeks!”

  I get another creepy chill just thinking about snakes again. My mind goes back to the photo of Petunia holding the snake, and Petunia’s list of good ideas. But good ideas? Most of them seem like bad ideas. Reckless. Foolish. Unnecessary. Unsafe. I mean, sneaking into a hurricane? Crossing a swamp at night? Kissing a charmer? CATCHING A SNAKE?

  And then I recognize the force behind these thoughts: the Posey-Preston practicality reflex, which automatically responds to the possibility of fun by questioning the purpose, plausibility, and peril of said opportunity. The reflex that will ensure that I’ll stay nice and boring all my life, while people like Sophi steal away my best friend.

  Beatrice turns to Uncle A.J. “We made a monarch butterfly in science. It only took thirty-eight days!”

  “Wow. Sounds like a lot can happen in six weeks,” Uncle A.J. says.

  “You didn’t make a monarch butterfly,” Henry chides Beatrice. Then he turns to Uncle A.J. “Did you know that to become a butterfly, a caterpillar first has to digest itself? It becomes like a caterpillar soup—”

  I suddenly know what I need to do.

  Rae glances over at me, distraught. But when I look at her, I feel a flicker of hope. Because, yes, a lot can happen in six weeks.

  A lot can change.

  A lot.

  Chapter 5

  Oh, Boy

  “Hey, Rae?”

  “Hmm.”

  “You okay?”

  “No.”

  We are in our room. In our beds. Okay, so mine’s not really a bed—it’s the old olive-colored couch. The lights are off, and it feels like Rae is in another world. I’m getting a little worried, because I need her to be in mine.

  “I’m really sorry that we’re going to be here all summer,” I say.

  “Yeah, same,” she says.

  “But maybe it won’t be so bad.”

  “O, never shall sun that morrow see!”

  “Um, Shakespeare?”

  “Macbeth,” she says, as if that explains it all.

  I try again. “And sorry you can’t stay with your mom.”

  “You mean my momster.” Her voice sounds a little like it’s breaking apart. The room gets quiet, and the darkness and silence start to magnify every sound—every rustle, every shift, every blink.

  “I’m sure she, you know, misses you.” I’m not sure, not really. But it’s her mom, so she’s got to miss her daughter, right? Doesn’t that come with the territory?

  “Well, whatever,” she says, drawing in a breath. “Anyway, it’s not her I’m going to miss. It’s my besties.”

  I can’t help but notice that i
t’s a plural.

  “Vivian, Alexia, Mattie. But mostly Leo. My boyfriend.”

  Oh. Her boyfriend. Of course she would have one.

  “I can’t believe I’m going to be stuck here all summer, sweating my skin off, while he’s off rehearsing with someone else. This sucks.” She picks up her phone, checks it, sighs again, and puts it back down. “No one seems to get it.”

  “Actually, I might,” I say. “Get it, I mean.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah.” I take in a breath and prepare to tell her about Taylor. How I’m possibly losing her to someone else, just like she’s worried about losing this boyfriend. But—

  “So you have a boyfriend too?” She seems to perk up at this idea.

  “I, uh . . .” Somehow telling her that no, I meant my only friend—a singular bestie—doesn’t seem like the thing to do. So instead I say, “Yeah.”

  Her voice brightens with interest. “What’s his name?”

  “Klaus,” I blurt.

  Oh, my. Gosh. What is coming out of my mouth? Who is this knee-jerk boyfriend? Oh, why couldn’t I have invented a Drake, or a Max, or an Axel? It’s like my subconscious is out to get me.

  “Klaus?” she asks, in this baffled way. “Is he—?”

  “German, he’s German.”

  “German? How did you meet him?”

  “Oh, I go to school with him.”

  “So is he like an exchange student?”

  “Yes, uh-huh,” I say.

  Yikes. I imagine a blond boy in lederhosen, knees exposed. High white socks. A green hat with a feather. At this point I’d do anything to remove Klaus from either one of our imaginations, but even in the dark, I can see her smiling at me, like we’re on the same team.

  And I need her on my team, because with her, all things seem possible.

  She flops back on her bed. “Oh my god, how are we going to deal, Edie? I mean, the whole summer? I have no idea how we’re going to get through it. No idea.”

  Here’s my chance. “I think I have an idea.”

  “You do? What?”

  With Rae’s help, maybe I can do all the things on the list, and I won’t seem so boring. And maybe Sophi won’t look so fun and exciting when I tell Taylor about my own adventures. In Florida. With my almost-famous cousin.