by Lisa Graff
Easier? Francine thought. Easier for who? She looked at her mom, and she looked at the house.
Francine stretched her leg back outside the car.
“Francine!” her mom called again. But Francine didn’t care. She loped across the driveway and opened the front door. “Dad!” she cried into the living room. “We’re back!”
She didn’t get any farther than the doorway.
Boxes. There were boxes everywhere, half packed, with newspapers sticking out of them, and garbage bags stuffed with clothes. Her father was sitting on the couch, sorting through a towering stack of CDs.
“Hi, pea pod,” he greeted her, rising to his feet. “I didn’t think I’d see you until tomorrow.”
Francine could feel a lump forming in the back of her throat, and she didn’t like it. If she was smarter, this never would have happened. If she knew how to fix things, like those girls in The Parent Trap, this would all go away.
“Hey,” she choked out.
Her mother appeared in the doorway behind her and draped an arm across Francine’s body, her car keys jangling against Francine’s shoulder. “Donald,” she said.
Francine’s father darted his eyes back to the stack of CDs. “Cecily. Nice to see you.”
And then they stood there. They stood there, the three of them, in their own house, with the door open, for a good two minutes, not talking. Like they didn’t even know each other.
When the phone rang, Francine raced to answer it, thankful that finally something in the house was making noise.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Francine, it’s me!”
“Huh?” Francine didn’t recognize the voice at first. She was too busy staring at her mother, standing stiff as a plank in the doorway, studying her keys like they were rubies.
“It’s me, silly, Natalie! Can I come over now?”
Francine’s father was tossing CDs into a box so fast you’d think he was going for the world record. Clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack! He’d probably broken thirty cases already.
“Francine?”
“Uh, now’s not really a good time. I have, um, chores.”
“I could help you,” Natalie said. “I’m a good vacuumer. Ask your parents. I’m sure they’ll say yes.”
“I just—”
“I really want to give you a makeover. I found lots of good hairstyles on this website. You’re gonna look so good, no one’ll even notice your hair is green.”
Francine’s mother was sorting through the mail on the table by the door. She still hadn’t moved five feet into the house. Francine’s father had his head buried so far into the box of CDs he looked like he might suffocate.
“My mom already fixed it,” Francine said. “My hair.”
“She did?”
“Yeah. It looks really good. I’ll show you tomorrow at school, ’kay?”
“But—”
“I gotta go. I’ll call you later. Bye!”
And Francine hung up the phone.
Francine and her father spent the whole rest of the afternoon packing up his stuff, while her mother went on an impromptu shopping trip. Shirt by shirt, magazine by magazine, it all went into boxes—books, shaving cream, the diploma off his office wall, everything. In the end, it wasn’t as bad as Francine had thought it would be. She and her dad had banana sandwiches and chocolate milk shakes for lunch, and Francine’s father put on all his favorite CDs, and they danced their best tooshy-shaking dance moves as they taped up all his boxes. It wasn’t fun, exactly, dividing a house in two. But it wasn’t awful, either.
No, Francine realized after her mother returned late that afternoon with nothing to show for her shopping trip but one bottle of expensive-looking hand lotion, the sad part was realizing that her parents were really only her parents anymore when the other one wasn’t around.
14.
THREE GOLF BALLS
“Does it look level?” Mr. Muñoz called down from the ladder. He was holding the basketball hoop over his head, against the front of the garage, while Kansas steadied the ladder. Kansas was worried Mr. Muñoz was going to fall off and bite it on the pavement, but Mr. Muñoz had insisted he do it.
“It looks good!” Kansas hollered back at him.
Kansas had finally given up and let Mr. Muñoz put the hoop in his driveway. It would be nice to have somewhere to shoot, and anyway, it seemed like Mr. Muñoz really needed something to do while his wife and Ginny were at their yoga class.
“Great, thanks!” Mr. Muñoz marked where to drill the holes with a pencil, then carefully climbed back down the ladder and set the hoop on the driveway. He picked up his power drill and nodded toward the toolbox. “I need a nine-sixty-fourths,” he said.
“Huh?” Kansas asked.
Mr. Muñoz looked up from where he was loosening the tip of the drill. “You know about drill bits?” he asked Kansas.
Kansas kicked his toes against the driveway. Was that something he was supposed to know? “No. Not really.”
“Bring them here. I’ll show you.”
So Mr. Muñoz told Kansas all about drill bits—different sizes and how to know which one you needed—and showed him how to screw them into the drill and how to engage it so you could drill stuff and how to lock it so you didn’t accidentally drill your eye out, that sort of thing.
“Cool,” Kansas said, pressing the button on the drill to make it whirrrrrrrrr. It vibrated in his hand. “You know all this stuff from being a carpenter?”
Mr. Muñoz scratched his beard. “That’s right. Been working with tools for a long time. You know, I’m always looking for help on projects, if you’re up for it.”
Kansas shrugged. Drilling and hammering and stuff sounded cool, but he knew from experience that when grown-ups said they wanted your help, they didn’t really mean it. Every time his dad had asked him to help with something around the house, he’d just ended up grumbling that kids didn’t know a hammer from a hole in the wall and then taking it over himself. “I’ll think about it,” Kansas said.
“No problem.” Mr. Muñoz handed the drill back to Kansas. “You want to drill the holes?”
“Really?”
“Sure. Just make sure you hit the pencil marks. I’ll hold the ladder.”
Kansas started up the ladder, one careful step at a time, gripping the drill in his right hand. When he got to the top, he looked down at Mr. Muñoz.
“Go ahead!” Mr. Muñoz shouted, both hands on the ladder. “I’ve got you!”
Kansas found the topmost pencil mark on the left and aligned the drill bit with it, at a right angle, just like Mr. Muñoz had showed him. Then he made sure the power button was engaged, and he started drilling.
Whirrrrrrrrr!
The drill only made a dent at first, the wood coming out in tiny spiral slivers. But then all at once the drill powered through with a jolt. Kansas put it in reverse and pulled the bit out.
“I made the first hole!” he hollered down.
“Aces!” Mr. Muñoz called up to him.
Kansas grinned to himself. Aces, he thought.
And he was aces for the second and third hole too. Just one more left and then they could attach the hoop with the screws, and Kansas would be able to dribble and shoot like a real basketball player again. He was almost sad he hadn’t signed up for Basketball Club after all. Almost.
Kansas was halfway through drilling the last hole when there was a loud honk from the street behind him. Kansas ignored it. It was rickety up on that ladder, and he needed to stay focused.
Honk! Honk!
Kansas kept drilling—whirrrrrrrrr!—as Mr. Muñoz addressed whoever it was in the car. “Can I help you?” he called.
Whirrrrrrrrr!
“I’m looking for Grove Street!” came a voice from below. “You know where it is?”
Whirrrrrrrrr!
“Well, you’re on Grove,” Mr. Muñoz shouted back, still holding on to the ladder. “Which house do you want?”
Whirrrrrrrrr!
/> “I forgot to write down the number,” the voice said. “But maybe you know the family I’m looking for? Susie Bloom? Two kids, Kansas and Ginny?”
Kansas stopped drilling and whirled around on the ladder. Could it be? No.
But it was.
Kansas dropped the drill with a terrible clatter, just missing Mr. Muñoz’s head.
The man in the car was Kansas’s dad.
“Okay, I’ve got a red, an orange, and a blue,” Kansas’s dad said.
“Orange!” Ginny squealed.
Kansas’s father tossed Ginny the golf ball. “Kansas?” he asked.
Kansas rammed his golf club into the ground. “I don’t care,” he grumbled.
“Red it is.” His father handed him the red ball, and Kansas shoved it in his jacket pocket. It was too cold to go miniature golfing. Who went mini golfing in the middle of December?
Ginny clapped her hands together as they walked toward the first hole. “I get to go first, ’cause I’m the youngest, right?” she asked.
Her father grinned and hoisted her onto his shoulder, singing at the top of his lungs, “Come on, come on down, sweet Virginia!” Ginny squealed and flailed her golf club around wildly as her father tickled her behind the knees. “Come on, come on down, I beg of you!”
Kansas rolled his eyes and ducked out of the way of Ginny’s golf club. Ginny always loved when their dad sang that song to her.
“Are we gonna play or what?” he asked.
Kansas’s father swung Ginny down from his shoulder and planted her feet firmly on the ground. “Yes, sir!” he said, giving Kansas a salute. Ginny giggled.
Kansas did not exactly want to be spending his Sunday afternoon at the Barstow Putt-Putt with Ginny and their father. He’d rather be anywhere else in the world, really. But no one had asked him what he wanted.
“Mom didn’t even tell us you were coming, you know,” Ginny said as she lined up her first shot. Kansas could already tell that there was no way her ball was going to make it up the ramp to the windmill. She was aiming too far left.
Kansas’s dad stood behind Ginny and inched her golf club more in line with the shot. “She didn’t know,” he said, holding Ginny’s arms as she took a practice swing. “I didn’t know myself, actually. I was just sort of driving around last night, nowhere in particular to go, and I thought, hey, I miss the munchkins. I should go see them. And here I am.” Together he and Ginny swung the club, and the ball flew—smack!—straight up the ramp into the windmill.
“That’s a twelve-hour drive without stops,” Kansas said. He knew it was twelve hours because when he and his mom and Ginny had moved he’d timed it, smooshed up in the U-Haul with all their pillows and blankets and winter coats, and Ginny singing “Coming ’Round the Mountain” in his ear until she finally passed out.
“Ten the way I drive,” his father said with a grin. “Anyway, it was worth it.” He ruffled Ginny’s hair. “Aren’t you glad I’m here?”
“Totally,” Ginny said.
Kansas didn’t answer.
“You’re next, champ,” Kansas’s dad told him. “You remember how I showed you to line it up?”
“I remember,” Kansas grumbled. He pulled the ball out of his pocket, lined it up, and got it through the windmill in one.
“Nice!” his dad exclaimed.
When they were all on the main part of the first hole, putting into the cup, Kansas’s dad asked him, “So, how’s the new school going so far, champ? You up to anything exciting?”
What Kansas wanted to say was that his dad would know exactly what he was up to if he bothered to call, like, ever. But what he did say was, “No, not really.” He putted his ball into the hole and marked two strokes on the scorecard.
“Nothing at all?” his dad asked as Ginny lined up her shot. “You must be doing something fun.”
Ginny swung and missed, then missed again. “He’s in the newspaper club at school,” she told their father. “Aren’t you, Kansas?”
“Newspapers?” their dad asked. “That sounds pretty boring, doesn’t it?”
“It’s Media Club,” Kansas replied. “And I think it’s awesome. It’s the best club in the whole school, and everyone wants to be in it. I’m going to be the news anchor next semester.” Well, he probably would be. After last Friday’s dare, he was ahead four to three.
Ginny swung her sixth stroke and finally gave up, picking up her ball and plunking it in the hole. “I got six,” she told Kansas. He marked it down.
“News anchor doesn’t sound so bad,” Kansas’s father said as they walked to the second hole. It was the one with the swinging log in front of the hole. Kansas hated that kind. “But newspapers?” He scrunched up his face. “I thought you were going to do basketball again this year. You were always pretty good at basketball.”
“This school doesn’t have basketball,” Kansas told him.
“Yes they do,” Ginny said. “’Member? Mom kept telling you to sign up, but you picked newspapers instead.”
“I didn’t have anywhere to practice,” Kansas replied.
“But Mr. Muñoz—”
Kansas poked her in the stomach.
“You know what we should do?” Kansas’s father said suddenly. “Tomorrow I’ll take you to the park. Huh, champ? I saw one near here, when I was looking for your house, and it had a great basketball court. Then you and I can get some practice in. And we can show Ginny here a couple moves too.”
Ginny was already jumping up and down with excitement. You’d think going to the park was the most amazing thing that had ever happened to her in her whole life.
Their father laughed. “Well, it’s settled then. I’ll pick you two up after school, and we’ll go to the park and shoot some hoops.”
“But Mom—” Kansas started.
“I’ll work it all out with your mother, don’t you worry. All right, who shoots first on this hole? Kansas?”
After they’d finished all eighteen holes, their dad went inside to buy churros and soda while Kansas and Ginny waited at the tables outside. Kansas folded an old straw wrapper into an accordion, and Ginny bounced in her seat.
“Hey, Kansas, guess what,” she said.
“What?” he grumbled. She was rocking the bench so hard, Kansas felt like they were about to blast off into space.
“Dad’s gonna move here.”
Kansas looked up. “To the Putt-Putt?”
“No, silly. To California. Right near us.”
Kansas went back to his straw wrapper. “No he’s not,” he said.
“Yes he is. He said so.”
“No,” Kansas said, “he’s not.”
“He told me. When you were in the bathroom. He said the weather was really nice here and he missed us and he was gonna move here. And then we’ll see him all the time and—”
“Ginny!” Kansas shouted. He couldn’t take it anymore. “He’s not gonna move here. He’s gonna leave again soon, just like before. So don’t get too used to having him around.”
Ginny narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re mean,” she told Kansas. “He is too gonna move here, you’ll see. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Kansas let out a puff of air so strong that it blew his straw-wrapper accordion across the table. “Fine,” he told Ginny. It wasn’t worth the fight. He could see their father across the patio, walking toward them with their churros and sodas. He’d bought nachos and ice cream too. “I’m sorry.”
“You better be,” Ginny replied, just as their dad sat down beside them.
Kansas had known their dad a lot longer than Ginny—three years longer—and he knew that he wasn’t going to move to California, not ever, no matter what he said. Ginny was dead wrong for thinking he would. Kansas knew she was.
But, just for a second, Kansas wished he didn’t know it.
15.
Eighty-seven packets of ketchup
The bucket at the end of the lunch line in the school cafeteria held eighty-seven packets of ketchup.
Francine knew that for a fact, because every last one of them was currently piled in front of her in an enormous heap.
“You gotta hurry,” Alicia said from across the lunch table. “You only have till the bell rings.”
Francine picked a packet off the table. “All of them?” she asked, hoping no one else could hear the quiver in her voice.
“That was the dare,” Luis replied. He frowned, as though he was starting to feel bad about his vote. I double dog dare you to eat every single ketchup packet in the bucket in the cafeteria, that was the dare Brendan had given her that morning. And everyone in the Media Club had voted on it, unanimously. Even Natalie. It was totally unfair, Francine thought. All Kansas had to do was howl like a wolf every time someone said his name.
From the corner of the lunch table, Kansas folded his arms across his chest and grinned at her. “You ready to give up yet?” he said. “Because then you’d lose another point and it’d be five points to thr—”
Francine scowled at him. “You haven’t earned your fifth point yet,” she said, “Kansas.”
Kansas scowled right back at her, then opened up his mouth and …
“Aaaaaaaah-OOOOOOOH!”
Howled like a wolf.
Francine allowed herself a tiny smile. Maybe the dare they’d given Kansas was a pretty good one after all. She ripped off the corner of her ketchup packet.
She held it up to her mouth.
And she squeezed.
“That’s one,” she said after she’d swallowed all the ketchup down. She slapped the empty packet on the table. “Give me another one.”
Luis quickly ripped open another packet and handed it to Francine. “Two,” he said as she gulped.
It turned out that getting the ketchup dare wasn’t the worst thing to happen to Francine that day. The worst thing was that Natalie wouldn’t even look at her, wouldn’t even glance at her. Natalie hadn’t spoken to Francine once since they arrived at Media Club that morning, even when Francine had tried to explain about uninviting her to her house yesterday. And at first recess, Natalie had given Alicia her pudding cup. Alicia. She even let her have the plastic spoon.
