Uncovering Sadie's Secrets

by Libby Sternberg

  Kerrie came to the door in a few seconds, ushering me in with a kind of breathless excitement. I said hi to Mr. and Mrs. Daniels, Kerrie’s mom and dad, who were reading in the living room, looking as if they were posing for a magazine spread on peaceful parenting.

  We went first to the back of the house and the kitchen. There the smell of cider and pumpkin bread and other good fall things made me drool. While we had a quick snack, Kerrie went over her decorating schemes. Her mother briefly showed up to offer help, but Kerrie sweetly shooed her away.

  Then, it was up to Kerrie’s room for my hair treatment—a perfect time to share what I knew about Sadie with Kerrie and to discuss how to bring Sadie to whatever help she needed.

  All in all, it promised to be a perfect afternoon—filled with exciting anticipation, juicy gossip, and social responsibility all at the same time.

  Chapter Fifteen

  KERRIE COULDN’T have had a better day for her party if she’d ordered it up special. The afternoon was bright and warm, but not so hot that the evening wouldn’t be perfect.

  Halloween time was an iffy weather proposition in the Baltimore area. Well do I remember the years when Mom had made me a nice warm costume, and then I’d been forced to sweat through trick-or-treating under layers of bunny fur. Then there were the years when I was garbed in thinner fabrics during unpredictable cold snaps—I remember a really pretty princess costume I had to cover up with a ratty parka because of the chilly night air. That still brings a tear to my eye.

  Well, not really.

  It wasn’t Halloween night, of course, but I figured this gorgeous evening was kind of a compensation for all those Halloweens I’d suffered through because of Baltimore’s fickle weather.

  Kerrie decided to set my hair in pin curls, which we did in her room shortly after I arrived. Her room was a teenager’s dream. No fluffy pink pillows or bed sheets, no ruffled curtains and stuffed animals.

  Well, okay, so she had a few teddy bears (none imported from China or third-world countries using slave labor). But the rest of the room was in red and gold, her bed set beneath a canopy of filmy fabrics purposely suggesting an Arabian nights theme. Her windows didn’t even have curtains. Instead, she had dark maroon shades to keep out the light, and multi-colored beads strung above and around the window. She had her own TV and phone and computer, all set on pieces of furniture that looked like they’d been made just to house those items.

  Although it was small, Kerrie’s room felt comfortable. Everything had a place, and she kept everything in its place. Whenever I left Kerrie’s room, I always had an irresistible urge to redecorate (and clean up) my own humble space.

  While she fooled with my hair, I gave her the scoop on Sadie’s identity.

  Kerrie stood, slackly holding a hairbrush in one hand.

  “What in the world is she still doing in school if she’s eighteen? I mean she’s in our class. She’s a sophomore! Who in their right mind would want to repeat all that?” Kerrie asked, shrugging.

  “Good question,” I said, hoping the answer would come to me. I’d learned that sometimes just talking was a way to get at a question, so I thought I’d try that technique, and started babbling away. It worked in class sometimes when the teacher caught me off guard. Even moderately coherent rambling would eventually lead me to some sort of conclusion, usually with a few well-placed and helpful prods from the teacher. Maybe the same thing would happen here.

  “She could be hiding,” I said, “and high school is where she’d hide easiest.”

  “Bianca, if she’s hiding, high school kind of locks her in. She’d be better off getting a job or something.”

  “She doesn’t look like she needs a job,” I said, offering more details of Sadie’s living arrangements as far as I could make them out. “Unless, of course, she’s living on borrowed time.”

  Kerrie sucked in her breath and pulled tightly on a strand of hair.

  “Ouch.”

  “Well, that’s creepy,” Kerrie said. “You make it sound like she’s got some incurable disease.”

  “No, I meant maybe she only has a certain amount of money and she needs to make more.”

  “Right. So why isn’t she working?”

  “Because she wants to finish her education? Isn’t that what we’re all told—stay in school and get a better job, or have a better career, or be all you can be?”

  “That’s the Army. But yeah, you have a point.” Kerrie neatly twirled my hair into a perfect pin curl, securing it with a bobby pin. “Maybe she never finished high school.”

  “Hey! We could find out, couldn’t we? Now that we know her name. If she’s eighteen, she would have graduated from one of the schools in Salinas, right? And a lot of schools post their graduates’ names, right? Maybe on their web sites?”

  “That would take a lot of digging.” Kerrie pulled yet another strand and did the curling routine.

  “That’s what investigative work is all about, Kerrie. It’s not all glamorous, Nancy Drew stuff.”

  “Nancy who?”

  I said nothing, waiting for the moment she finished with my hair. When she did, she immediately logged onto a search engine and I stood in back of her, directing her through various web sites. Man, oh, man this was luxury. Unlimited time on the computer. No half-hour rules. No fear of the executioner’s axe coming down on your neck. And a screaming fast line, too.

  We managed to find a few schools, including the one from which Sadie ostensibly “transferred.” No Sarah McEvoy was listed in the “We’re proud of our graduates” pages.

  “She’s a drop-out,” Kerrie said firmly. She turned around and looked at me with wide, serious eyes. “And she’s getting her high school diploma by pretending to be younger than she is.”

  “This kind of jibes with something I’ve felt about Sadie for awhile.” I sat on the edge of Kerrie’s bed and grabbed one of her teddy bears to hold in my lap. “She always seems to me like she’s starting over, like she’s got a second chance at things and she does-n’t want to blow it. I’m not exactly sure why.”

  “I’m in a bunch of classes with her,” Kerrie said. “She always gets her work in on time, and it’s good from what I’ve seen of it in oral presentations. And another thing—she actually gets stuff done early. If we have two weeks for an assignment, Sadie’s done in a couple days. I’ve seen her hand in papers that have been typed and ready for weeks.”

  “Wow, Kerrie. Since when did you turn into Ace Snooper?”

  Kerrie hit me good-naturedly with a feather by her desk. “I’m just observant, that’s all. But I agree with you. I get the impression she wants to do really well, and not to please the teachers or parents or anything like that. She wants to do well for herself.”

  “She’s coming tonight, right? You’re sure?”

  “As sure as I can be. Why?”

  “I think we need to confront her. I can’t think of one good reason why she’d be running this scam. I think she’s in trouble. I think we should offer to help.”

  To my surprise, Kerrie didn’t immediately agree. She cocked her head to one side and twisted her mouth as she thought about it. “What if we mess it all up for her?” she said at last. “I mean, what if she is starting over? Maybe we should let her finish her studies and get on with her life. If we confront her, we might scare her away.”

  “I have a feeling she’s scared about something to begin with. And I think she might like a helping hand. We won’t rat on her. Just encourage her to seek help. And maybe I’ll think of a way to do it so that she won’t be afraid we’ll tattle. Okay?”

  “Okay. It’s a deal.” Kerrie stood. “Come on, we have to start decorating.”

  BY THE time we were done, the house looked like it was ready to be featured on a Martha Stewart Halloween Special. Kerrie had thought of everything. She had twinkly orange and white lights strung up in the dining room, kitchen, and the small yard. She had a shrieking, movement-activated, spider hanging right outside the front door. She
had candles and balloons and lights set in paper bags that were cut out with pumpkin designs.

  And yes, she had pumpkins—scads of them, in all sizes, some cut into fantastic faces, some plain. And corn husks and stalks, and even a couple of bales of hay to sit on in the yard.

  Her father helped us wire the stereo so it could be heard both inside and outside. Her mother helped mix up a special punch, and set out soda, cider, cups, and plates on a picnic table.

  Our planning may have been fantastic, but we had so much fun decorating that we lost track of time. Only thirty minutes were left until zero hour and my hair was still in pin curls and Kerrie was still in jeans and t-shirt. Well, so was I, but the hair is the important thing.

  Kerrie’s mom shooed us upstairs while she finished with the food. There wasn’t much left to do anyway. We were ordering in pizzas.

  In a few breathless minutes, we were both shrieking and screaming as we donned our costumes and put on make-up. Kerrie’s costume was as spectacular as mine. Layers of muted chiffon covered her legs, while a red beaded top with little cap sleeves edged in gold came to her midriff. She pulled her hair up in a bun and capped the whole thing off with a tiny hat adorned with veils that draped becomingly around her face.

  “Now, on to you!” she said with a flourish, removing my pin curls as I sat in front of her vanity.

  I was scared. Hair styling was serious business. When Kerrie pulled her brush through the mass of curls, I became even more scared than any scary movie could make me. All of a sudden, I felt like I’d made a big mistake. My hair was like a giant frizz ball, standing out a good three inches from my head in a white girl’s Afro.

  It was a veritable hair explosion, and I could swear there were casualties.

  “Kerrie,” I said softly, trying hard to hide my dismay. “Do something. Maybe flatten it with some water.”

  Kerrie was unruffled. With a deft pull on the brush (that nonetheless made me cry out in pain), she started smoothing my hair down. She grabbed a can of styling mousse and squirted on some foamy stuff, then brushed and brushed and brushed again until I thought she was trying to calm the frizz by brushing the hair out of my head. Literally. As in “pulling the hairs out with the brush.” It certainly felt that way.

  I couldn’t look. I closed my eyes and let her do her best. If all else failed, I was going to run into the shower, smear the whole thing down with water, and then hide it all under the cloche hat. Skillful make-up would have to bring out my other features.

  I thought maybe she had the same idea because after awhile I felt her pulling the tight little hat on my head and securing it with a few pins. The pain stopped. Kerrie was finished.

  “Open up, Bianca. It’s not that bad.”

  I held my breath, and cautiously opened my eyes.

  Not that bad? Not that bad? It was gorgeous! I didn’t recognize that girl in the mirror.

  Gone was my “sorry, I didn’t mean to give the impression I thought I was pretty” look, complete with mussed hair and pale features. In its place was someone sophisticated and suave, someone who combed her hair.

  With her constant brushing, Kerrie had made my hair fall into neat shiny waves that bustled out from under the cloche hat in a charmingly soft cloud. With the make-up and the dress, I looked pretty. Not “maybe I am but I’ll just pretend I’m not” pretty. Really pretty. Pretty as in “I know I look good and I don’t care.”

  This was a whole new experience for me. I was going to start paying more attention to my hair and dress after this night.

  “Well?” Kerrie put the hairbrush down on the vanity and stared at me in the mirror.

  “Well, it’s great! Thanks.” I reached up and touched it to make sure it was real. “Do you think you could come over every day and do this before school?”

  Kerrie laughed. “You come over here. And you set it every night.”

  “Hmm. . . I don’t know about that.” Staring in the mirror, I was beginning to think that pin-curls every night really wasn’t all that steep a price to pay for this kind of loveliness.

  “We better get moving.” Kerrie picked up a fan to go with her costume and opened her bedroom door. “Want to get my CDs all lined up. And the candles lit.”

  Kerrie’s mom and dad oohed and aahed over us when we went downstairs, but there wasn’t much time for soaking up compliments. The CD organization alone occupied a great deal of thought and discussion. Then we had the candles to light, punch to put out, tables to arrange. Time passed quickly, which was a good thing because there’s nothing worse than pre-party jitters. Well, some things are worse. But pre-party stomach flips are no fun either.

  In fact, we were occupied with a major restructuring of the backyard party space when the first guests started to arrive. Kerrie decided, at the last minute, that her tiny backyard would probably end up as the most popular gathering spot. In order to make more room there, she wanted to move the family’s gas grill into the basement and replace it with some more chairs. Her dad obliged after trying to talk her out of it, and she and her mom dusted off some old lawn chairs from the basement. The first guests helped us set them up against the high wooden fence that walled in the Daniels’patch of yard.

  The music was pulsing away and folks were actually laughing when Doug arrived. True to his word, he was dressed as an FBI agent. Wearing a suit that looked a tad too big for him, he sported dark sunglasses, a phony laminated ID that would have fooled anybody in the dark yard, and a grim countenance that broke into a wide and fanciful grin when he saw me.

  That’s right. Doug really lit up when he saw me. He even said, “Bianca, you look fantastic!” It was as if the air had been knocked right out of me. Really.

  I had trouble speaking. I didn’t know what to say. I mumbled something like “Thanks.” Or maybe it was “Tanks.” Or “Yanks.” My mouth wasn’t working right. All I know was that my world started to swirl when he came over and grabbed my elbow and led me to one of those recently dusted lawn chairs, and then asked me if I wanted a soda or something.

  “Yes. That would be great. There’s going to be pizza,” I managed to say.

  Doug was back in a few minutes with a cola for me and a root beer for him and before you could say “trick-or-treat” we were actually talking and finally getting to know each other. It was great. I hadn’t realized what a really cool guy he is. He wants to be an engineer, he told me. And maybe work for NASA or something like that.

  “Have you thought about what you want to study in college?” he asked me.

  “Um, law, or uh justice, prosecuting. . . things,” I said, “although I wouldn’t mind doing what my sister does. Private investigating.” I was just about to tell him about my sort-of investigation of Sadie when the pizzas arrived, and right after them came another crowd of partygoers.

  To my surprise and Kerrie’s delight, almost everyone wore costumes. There were presidential masks, French maids, apes, soldiers, and animals. There was even a ghost or two.

  As Doug and I ate a piece of pizza a few minutes later, I noticed a thin, dark wraith standing alone, near the gate to the alley. It was Sadie. She had come.

  Despite my growing closeness to Doug, I couldn’t resist. I had to find out.

  “Sarah,” I called out just loud enough for her to hear. “Sarah McEvoy.”

  She turned and looked, her eyes wide with fear, her mouth slightly open.

  Chapter Sixteen

  A SECOND later, Sadie turned and started toward the kitchen. She was going to leave! I couldn’t let her. Not now. Not after coming so far, and getting so close.

  “Doug, would you get me another soda? I want to say hi to Sadie.” I jumped up and ran after Sadie while Doug dutifully went over to the refreshment table.

  The party was really going well by this time, which meant it was crowded. Wall-to-wall people. Hard-to-get-through. Lots of “excuse me’s” just to travel a few feet. By the time I’d pushed my way into the warm kitchen, I was sure Sadie would be long gone.

>   She wasn’t. She had been hampered by the same throngs of teeming humanity that had stopped me. Caught between a vampire and a goddess, Sadie was desperately trying to make her way into the living room and out onto the street.

  (Good grief. That was Brenda Watson in the goddess outfit. Only Brenda would come up with an idea like that. Not only did she look spectacular with her creamy skin showing off under the artfully draped—and very thin—white fabric. She got to explain to everybody exactly which goddess she was, which meant she had looks and small talk all rolled into one tidy package. But I digress.)

  Sadie sensed movement behind her and turned to see me coming after her.

  “Wait!” I yelled over the thumping music, giggles, chatter, and Brenda Watson’s lecture on goddesses in Greco-Roman history.

  Her mouth opening again, a perplexed-looking Sadie didn’t move. That was good. I managed to push my way past a giant spider, a Batman (boy, was that costume ever a mistake on scrawny Bobby Lagusta), and two Zorro’s. I gently touched Sadie’s elbow and directed her back through the kitchen.

  “Why were you leaving? The party’s just getting started.” We stood on the tiny porch that overlooked the tiny yard.

  “I—I don’t know. Tired, I guess.” Her face was white as a sheet and not because she’d smeared make-up on it either. This was the real thing. This was scared white. “I thought I heard someone— what did you call me?” She looked right in my eyes and I suspected she wanted me to say “Sadie.” So I did.

  “Sadie. Sadie Sinclair,” I lied. Then genius struck. “Sadie Mauvais Sinclair.” I nearly whispered it, but she heard it all the same and whitened again. “You stole her name. The artist who lives in the part of California where you’re from. Sadie Mauvais Sinclair.” I spoke rapidly as inspiration took hold. “You took her name as your own.”

  “I did not steal her identity.” Sadie pounded her left fist on the railing for emphasis. “I didn’t. You can’t accuse me of that. I didn’t do it.” Tears started to come to her eyes. Exactly what Pandora’s box was I opening here? (For an explanation on “Pandora’s Box,” please consult Greek expert Brenda Watson.)