Eager Star

by Dandi Daley Mackall

  I pointed to the clusters of kids around the cafeteria. “There! Zebras hang out in threes like that. Those six girls and one guy—a Przewalski harem—six mares to one stallion.” I bit into my sandwich. “I wish humans were as easy to understand as horses. Horses say more with their ears than most people do with their mouths. Nickers has 16 muscles that move her ears in all directions to let me know exactly how she feels.”

  “Cats have 32,” Catman said. He drank his chocolate milk in one gulp. He’d eaten everything on his plate, plus Lizzy’s lizard-shaped oatmeal cookies I’d donated.

  Summer and Hawk stood up in the center of their noisy group, which included Brian and Sal. Side by side, the two seventh-graders looked like opposites. Hawk was as dark as Summer was light, brown eyes and black hair to Summer’s gray eyes and blonde hair. But they had two things in common—both were lead mares, and every stallion in this herd was attracted to them.

  “That’s the group I have to break into,” I whispered to Catman as they walked past our table.

  “Grant!” Catman shouted.

  The peanut butter stuck in my throat.

  “Catman?” Grant sounded surprised.

  “Somebody here you ought to meet.” Catman waved his hand toward me.

  Run! Flee! It’s a horse’s natural response to terror, which is what I felt. I refused to look up.

  “Oh?” Grant sounded puzzled, cautious, as if he thought Catman might be tricking him.

  Catman scraped the last drop of tapioca from his tray. “Winnie Willis.”

  Nowhere to run. No place to hide. Face Grant right now. Take my punishment, the teasing. Get it over with. Move on. A do-over.

  I looked up, bracing myself to be mocked out.

  Grant waved to someone behind me. Then he studied me up and down as if checking my conformation, considering the purchase, rejecting me as unsound. “I’m Grant.”

  I waited.

  Nothing.

  No sign of recognition.

  I couldn’t speak. It felt like Grant could see through me to something more interesting on the other side of the cafeteria.

  “Come on, Grant!” Summer tugged his arm. Hawk walked ahead.

  “See you, Catman,” Grant called back.

  I stared at his back as he walked away. Everything I’d imagined he’d say, the ribbing I’d have to take—it hadn’t come. He hadn’t teased me because he hadn’t noticed me.

  Why should I worry about making a bad first impression? I couldn’t even make an impression!

  Afternoon classes dragged on. Social studies and keyboarding sounded like work. Art and gym weren’t so bad because we just talked about doing stuff and didn’t really do anything.

  After school, kids ran from the building as if it were on fire.

  “I switched into Pat’s class,” Barker shouted as we fought for our bikes. Kids jerked the rack, yelling across the street or down the sidewalk. “Pat didn’t even know she was subbing until yesterday. She said Mr. Scott needed time off for ‘middle-school syndrome.’”

  I didn’t know what it was, but I suspected I had it too. And I’d only been in middle school one day.

  Catman whisked through the masses on his back bike. “Stop by my pad? Say hey to Churchill?” Churchill is the father of Nelson, the cat Catman gave me. Catman named them after Winston Churchill and his wartime cat, Nelson.

  I was glad not to have to go home and face Dad. He’d want to hear about my new friends and their problem horses. Couldn’t hurt putting off his disappointment.

  A dozen cats ran out of bushes to greet us as Barker, Catman, and I left our bikes at the foot of Catman’s lane. Catman slid his glasses on top of his head so he could nuzzle three tabby kittens.

  Flat-faced Churchill plodded up to me.

  “How goes the war?” I asked, stroking his back until it arched.

  Catman stood up. “Keeeeee-y!”

  Cat Burglar, white with a black mask, darted past us. Wilhemina, the fat orange tabby, and a dozen others followed as we walked up the overgrown lane. A beautiful, longhaired, white cat threaded through my feet, almost tripping me. “Who’s White Beauty here?”

  “Haven’t you met Aussie?” Catman asked in an Australian accent. “Great cat lovers, them Aussies. Number one cat-owning country in the world. Canada’s second, U.S. third.”

  Coolidge Castle loomed ahead, the roof shooting off in every direction, ending in a spire. Most of the windows were boarded up, and the whole house looked like it had waited 200 years for a coat of paint. Looking at it, nobody would ever guess that inside velvet furniture covered wood floors and chandeliers hung over a living room as big as a paddock.

  Mr. Coolidge appeared on the weedy lawn. He was carrying a plastic figure that looked a little like him—shortish, with plastic hair that resembled his hairpiece. “Sa-a-ay!” he called, setting down the statue. “What did the teacher say when I hammered my thumb?” He taped a hammer to the statue’s hands and lined it next to six other figures, some with shovels, others with brooms. “Smart, Bart?” Bart Coolidge laughed so hard it sounded like a draft horse whinny. Smart Bart’s is his used-car business. He must have dreamed of being a comedian because he’s got a million corny jokes, one for every occasion.

  “I like your seven dwarves, Mr. Coolidge!” Barker yelled.

  “For Labor Day,” Catman whispered. “Hi ho, off to work. Get it? My parents are very big on lawn ornaments.”

  “Stop on down to Smart Bart’s if you really want decorations!” Mr. Coolidge patted his hairpiece. “Sa-a-ay! What did one headlight say to the other?”

  I started laughing already. “I give.”

  “I’m brighter than you are!” He laughed so hard I stepped back. His Scooby Doo vest looked so tight. I didn’t want to be around when a button blew.

  We followed Catman inside.

  Mrs. Coolidge shouted from the winding staircase, “Calvin!” as if he’d been lost. She wore pink stretch pants, and her bright yellow hair was piled high as a beehive.

  She ran up to me and in one motion twisted my hair up off my neck. “I would give my right arm for this hair, wouldn’t you, Barker? I told the girls at the salon about your thick, wavy brown, dear. You have to stop in and prove Claire Coolidge is no liar!”

  She sat us at the mile-long table and fed us cookies and purple drinks in skinny glasses with paper umbrellas. Catman downed 14 cookies, eating the outside of each cookie first and then the filling.

  I leaned back in the carved throne chair and enjoyed how cool the house felt with the heavy, red curtains drawn and blocking out heat and light.

  Mr. Coolidge burst into the house and kissed his wife. Two of his vest buttons were missing. “I was talking with the boys at the Ashland business meeting about the future of our town. Calvin, did you declare a career today?”

  “A career?” I asked, trying to picture Catman selling used cars.

  “Eighth-grade project,” Barker explained. “They have to research a career all year for a big report.”

  Catman licked filling from his lips. “Telegraph operator.”

  “As in the Morse code?” Barker asked. “Dash . . . dash . . . dash?”

  “Yep.” Catman peeled two bananas at the same time.

  Mr. Coolidge frowned. “Sa-a-ay! I don’t think they have telegraphs or operators anymore.”

  Catman got his catlike grin. “Groovy. No competition.”

  “A person must make a name in this world!” declared Catman’s dad. “Isn’t that so, Mrs. Coolidge? We all need a reputation!”

  I had to agree with him. “I could sure use a reputation as a horse whisperer. I just don’t know where to start.”

  “Start right here, young Winifred!” He patted my head. “Join the Ashland Business Association!”

  Wow! “Would they let me?”

  “Decidedly not!” he admitted. “But what of your father? Getting the Willis name about town would serve your purpose. It would be my great honor to invite him to our luncheon!”<
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  “No kidding?” It was a step. Maybe Summer would stop making fun of Odd-Job Willis. “Thanks!”

  Later that afternoon Catman, Barker, and I took turns answering the pet help line at Pat’s Pets. I let Barker and Catman answer dog and cat e-mails first. I still wasn’t in a hurry to face Dad.

  As Barker wrote to someone called K-9, I read over his shoulder:

  I’ve tried everything to get my poodle to heel! I jerk the leash and drag her. I tried hitting her when she wouldn’t obey (not hard enough to hurt!) and shaking her to get her attention.

  —K-9

  Around us, birds squawked and dogs barked as Barker wrote his answer:

  Dear K-9,

  You AND your dog will get more out of this relationship if you praise your dog instead of punishing her! Find things she does right and praise her. Dogs are pleasers! I’ll bet yours loves you no matter what. Why don’t you do the same?

  —Barker

  Pat finished with a customer and joined us at the computer center. “You got me out of a pickle today, Winnie! Don’t know what I’d done if you hadn’t written my notes back up on the board! Lizzy said you had a photographic memory. I guess you do!” Her denim overalls made it hard to believe she was our teacher.

  While Catman took over at the keyboard, Pat talked with Barker and me. I’d been afraid that having her as a teacher would ruin her as my friend. But she was the same Pat.

  I waited while Catman answered a kid who was worried about his Russian blue cat having six toes, and another kid whose cat kept climbing his mother’s plants.

  Finally it was my turn. I love having people I don’t even know e-mail me at the help line and ask for my help with their horses. I’d probably mess it up if I had to give them advice face-to-face. I tackled the first e-mail:

  Dear Winnie,

  My horse is barn sour! He’s no fun anymore. I have to fight him, kicking and flicking the reins to get him to ride away from the barn. Coming back is great, as long as I don’t try to make him go anywhere but straight home. I’m tired of it. Should I get a new horse?

  —Tall in the Saddle

  Dear Tall in the Saddle,

  Don’t give up your horse! I’ll bet he hates disappointing you. When’s the last time you told him what a great horse he is? See, what you’re doing is punishing your horse (kicking, flicking) for heading away from the barn. (Would you want to go somewhere when you knew you’d get kicked all along the way?) And you’re probably rewarding him for racing to the barn by feeding him there. Instead, praise him as you ride away from the barn. Then feed him when you’re out there. Love him every step of the way!

  —Winnie

  As I left Pat’s Pets, I tried to think of something to tell Dad about my day. I’d promised this year would be different, and so far it wasn’t. Lizzy said new schools let you start over and be anybody you wanted to be. But it didn’t work that way for me. Every school was different, but I wasn’t. I still got the same quivering stomach when a teacher called on me, when I walked into the lunchroom, or when I stepped into the crowded hall. All I’d wanted to do was bolt like a Mustang.

  Instead of going into the house, I worked with Towaco for an hour. It paid off. Every time he did something right, I praised him. And that made him want to please me all the more.

  The sun had set by the time I finished a quick ride on Nickers. Lightning bugs signaled, flashing on and off as I finished mucking stalls.

  I was hurrying to the house when Lizzy stood up from behind a bush. “Look! I found a friend for Larry!” She pointed to a log, where her latest find—a skinny, reddish-brown thing—lounged side by side with her fence lizard. “She’s a four- toed salamander! I found her in the moss by the pond right next to that rotten log. The perfect ending to the perfect day!”

  What would the perfect ending to my day have been? Getting tarred and feathered?

  “Look! She’s waving her tail. That means she’s scared of you.” Lizzy finger-stroked it.

  “Feeling’s mutual,” I said, grossed out by the creepy toes.

  Inside the house, Lizzy set dinner on the table while she told Dad and me all about sixth grade. She loved the teachers, the students, the school—everything. During dinner she talked so much Dad barely had time to quiz us. I got away with “fine,” “uh-huh,” “don’t know yet,” and “okay” until dessert.

  “So, Winnie . . .” Dad twirled his fork, making lines in Lizzy’s lemon pie. “Meet any kids with horses?”

  I wished I could have told him I’d talked to even one kid about my horse business. But I hadn’t even talked to one kid about anything.

  “Towaco’s really coming along well, Dad,” I said, my stomach trying to shove the whole dinner back up.

  “Uh-huh,” Dad said, his lips twisting the way they do when he’s disappointed.

  The phone rang.

  “I’ll get it!” I scooted away from the table, never more saved by the bell. “Hello?”

  “Lizzy?” came the voice at the other end. “Didn’t it rock today when—?”

  “This isn’t Lizzy,” I interrupted.

  “Ohhh,” said the disappointed caller.

  “I’ll get her.”

  The phone rang all evening, each call for Lizzy. I stopped answering after the third call. I couldn’t stand disappointing anyone else.

  The next day, Thursday, I woke up determined to give school another chance. I arrived on Lizzy-time and took a seat in Ms. Brumby’s classroom.

  Summer made her entrance, flanked by three girls who laughed at everything she said.

  Hawk trailed them silently, with barely a glance at me.

  “Honestly,” Summer was saying to her adoring crowd, “if anyone ever saw me without makeup, I swear I’d transfer right out of this school!”

  Note to self: Do everything within your power to see Summer Spidell without makeup.

  Ms. Brumby led a discussion on the purpose of nursery rhymes as groundwork to our study of Shakespeare and the world’s great poets. I was determined to make a comment. Twice I raised my hand, but she called on Grant. And he gave an answer that sounded 10 times as smart as mine would have.

  We moved through the cat and the fiddle, the mouse up the clock, and the spider beside her.

  Come on, Winnie. You have to say something. Time’s running out.

  “At last . . .” Ms. Brumby checked her gold watch that matched everything else she had on. “We come to ‘Humpty Dumpty.’”

  Kids picked up notebooks and backpacks, waiting for the buzzer.

  “Now, class, don’t disappoint me,” coaxed Ms. Brumby. “‘Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall. Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.’ Anyone . . . ?”

  Grant slipped on his backpack.

  Now was my chance. I might not get another one. I raised my hand.

  “Winifred?” Ms. Brumby’s head moved slightly side to side, as if warming up for being shaken no.

  I had to say something. “I think he was pushed!” I blurted.

  A couple of kids laughed out loud.

  Why did I say that? But now that I had, I had to back it up. “Yeah. Humpty Dumpty . . . he didn’t fall. He was pushed! By all the king’s men. And that part about the horses putting him back together? That’s a cover-up, because how would horses do that?”

  Summer giggled. Someone groaned.

  Barker leaned over and whispered, “I thought that was good.”

  Ms. Brumby’s face looked like she’d eaten a rotten hedge apple. “These rhymes have survived throughout the ages, class. We shouldn’t waste valuable time making fun of them.”

  The buzzer rang, and I got out of there as fast as I could.

  Pat’s class was the only decent hour in the whole day. She brought up eternity again and got everybody trying to define life. Then she gave us an assignment to write a paper defining success in life.

  Our math teacher gave out assignments like he thought his was our only class. After math, red-haired Sal introduced me to none other than Grant . .
. again. And again he showed no sign of recognizing me.

  After school I watched Catman answer e-mails, typing twice as fast as I can. And he only used his thumbs and pinkies.

  Dear Catman,

  My cat fell off the back of my chair and broke her hip! I thought cats always landed on their feet. Is my cat stupid?

  —Feline2

  Catman’s answer came fast, with no mistakes:

  Peace, Feline2,

  No, man! Cats can’t handle short falls. They dig long falls—more time to pull up the head, flip over, flatten, and use that tail for balance. Be careful with your feline, Cat!

  —The Catman

  His last e-mail read:

  Hey, Catman!

  My kitty thinks she’s an alarm clock! She pounces on me at five every A.M. And she won’t stop yowling until I get up and feed her. You gotta help! I fell asleep in school today!

  —Kittykid

  Far out, Kittykid!

  You got yourself one smart kitty! She’s trained you to feed her on command. Better stop feeding her at five. Praise her later when you do feed her. Tell your kitty to let sleeping cats lie!

  —The Catman

  I answered three quick questions about bridling a fussy horse, horse dieting, and giving a horse bath to a water-hating Tennessee Walker.

  Pat read the screen. “Lands, I’d never come up with that in a month of Sundays! God was looking out for me the day you walked into this pet shop, Winnie!”

  I bit the inside of my cheek. It felt good to have somebody think I did something right.

  The bell announced a customer. Pat squinted toward the door, then strode to the front. “Well, will you lookie here what the cat dragged in, no offense! How’s life treating you, Chubs?”

  The tall, parent-aged man in gray slacks and a white shirt didn’t look chubby. He grinned down at Pat. “Nobody’s called me Chubs for a long time, Pat.” They fell into easy conversation, and I went back to e-mails.

  I’d almost finished when Pat put her hand on my shoulder. “This here’s Winnie Willis! You’re in luck, Chubs! Good horse gentlers are scarcer than hens’ teeth, no offense!”

  The man looked disappointed. “How old are you?”