Montgomery. Breath. Juneau. Breath. Phoenix. Breath.
She still had a ways to go when she got to Cheyenne, so she switched to French verbs. Then prime numbers. Then the periodic table of elements, which she hadn’t even learned in school yet, but which she’d memorized the summer before, just for fun. Then major events in global history. Around lap fifteen, when her muscles started to fatigue, she lightened things up with her favorite characters in American literature. Then classical composers, fashion designers, and exotic places she planned to visit when she was a millionaire. By the twentieth lap, she was on Will Ferrell movies.
Elf. Breath. Talladega Nights. Breath. Blades of Glory. Breath.
When she reached the rope for the last time, she was tempted to take a minute to rest before heading for shore, but didn’t want to give Erin any reason to fault her. She’d just met her, but Maggie could already hear her cool voice scolding, “Sure, you finished twenty laps—but you needed to relax afterward. There’s no time for relaxing when you’re responsible for hundreds of precious Sound View campers!” So, when she reached the rope for the last time, she immediately turned and paddled inland without breaking her pace. She even jogged through the water when it became too shallow to swim.
The first groups had arrived by the time she reached the beach, and the swim instructors were occupied with attendance and organization. Erin had been watching Maggie’s every move, but now talked and laughed with a group counselor as though she were far too busy to have been paying close attention. Happy for the moment to herself, Maggie grabbed her towel from her backpack and began drying off.
“Hey.”
Maggie glanced up to see Ben passing by, carrying one little boy and following a dozen others as they raced toward the water.
“I think you got the job.”
Maggie returned his smile and watched him hurry after his group. As the little boys bounded in the water, dunking, splashing, yelling, and laughing, Ben stood at the water’s edge, talking quietly with the little boy he still carried. If Maggie hadn’t sworn off cute boys forever, she might’ve appreciated Ben’s dark curly hair, his height (around six feet one, she guessed), and his sensitivity, which was obvious in the way he interacted with the shy camper clinging to his shoulders. But since she had, she pulled shorts on over her damp swimsuit, walked over to Erin, and waited for her to finish the school year recap with the group counselor.
“Your stamina’s decent and your form’s okay,” Erin finally said, flipping through pages on her clipboard instead of looking at Maggie after the counselor had rejoined her group.
Based on Erin’s reluctance to admit them, Maggie guessed those assessments were understatements.
“You don’t know anything about camp policies or procedures, and I for one don’t have time to teach you.” Reaching the last of her stack of papers, she flipped back to the beginning, hugged the clipboard to her chest, and eyed Maggie through dark sunglasses. “But your uniform’s in the main office. Don’t forget the whistle.”
7.
“How did we get here?”
“Well,” Arnie said, joining Maggie at the front of the Lakeview Elementary School classroom, “your mom dropped you off in a Toyota Camry, and my nanny—”
“I know how we got here physically.” Maggie patted his back in mock appreciation. “But how did we become weightloss role models?”
“You know that goofy guy in the SUBWAY commercials? The one who lost hundreds of pounds living on two sandwiches and diet soda every day?”
Maggie nodded.
“We’re the Pound Patrollers version of him. Minus the endorsement deal, tons of money, and a lifetime supply of chicken teriyaki on whole wheat.”
“We were so robbed.”
“Oh, goodie! You’re both here!” Electra burst through the classroom door, a blur of turquoise velour. “We have oodles to do before the kids arrive.”
“What’s all this?” Maggie asked as Electra unloaded posters, papers, vegetable cutouts, and DVDs onto a desk.
“Ammo.”
“Ammo?” Arnie repeated, amused. “That doesn’t sound very kid-friendly.”
“It’s not for the kids,” Electra said, unrolling an enormous food pyramid poster. “It’s for the parents.”
“Parents?” Always the good, responsible friend, Maggie’d never had a problem with anyone’s parents, but her pulse quickened, anyway.
“It’s the first meeting of a brand-new trial program. Good parents will want to make sure we’re doing our jobs and that they’re getting what they paid for.”
“Okay, I’m no expert—though I am a formerly chubby kid with parents—but there’s no way I’d want to come here if my parents were making me, and especially not if they were coming with me.”
Electra handed Arnie a picture of broccoli and a roll of Scotch tape and motioned to the blackboard. “No one said it was going to be easy.”
“Remember the T-shirts,” Maggie said quietly, holding the tape dispenser while Arnie hung the paper vegetable. She agreed with him, but this was their first meeting. They didn’t know what to expect, and even if she didn’t think it would work well, she was glad that Electra had a plan.
“Electra.” Arnie’s voice was alarmed as he turned away from the blackboard. “We love you, but I’m beginning to wonder if the stork dropped you to the ground already an adult.”
“He means that as respectfully as possible.”
Electra wheeled the tall metal scale behind the teacher’s desk. “It’s a weight-loss program. We have to chart their progress somehow.”
It was clear their opinions weren’t about to change the meeting’s agenda, so Maggie handed Arnie a pile of cardboard fruit and gathered enough cardboard vegetables to make a cardboard salad. They split up and began covering the classroom walls with produce. When Maggie reached the bottom of her stack, she returned to the front of the classroom and watched Arnie juggle a cluster of cardboard grapes and a cardboard orange. Since she’d sworn off boys she couldn’t really pay attention (not that Arnie really counted as a boy, since he was one of her best friends), but she couldn’t help but appreciate how cute he was. He’d always been cute, even when hiding in hooded sweatshirts and baggy pants, but Pound Patrollers had been good to him, too—at their last meeting he’d weighed in at 170, nearly fifty pounds less than when he’d started. And the summer heat probably had something to do with it, but he’d recently traded in his uniform of hooded sweatshirts and baggy pants for colorful polos and baggy shorts. Also, “Did you put stuff in your hair?”
Dropping the cardboard orange, his face turned pink. “Maybe.”
“You know the girls here won’t be older than ten.” She grinned.
“They’re coming!” Electra announced excitedly, emptying a Tupperware container of real, sliced fruit into a serving bowl and adding it to a table of healthy snacks.
Not wanting the kids to feel uncomfortable as they entered the classroom, Maggie focused on filling paper cups with water. Aunt Violetta had basically dragged her kicking and screaming into her first Pound Patrollers meeting, and once inside, she’d done her best to pretend she was anywhere else. It had even taken a few meetings of hiding in the back of the room before she’d actually joined the circle and participated. She was pretty sure these kids had been dreading today for weeks, and that they would prefer it if no one called attention to the fact that they were there.
“Welcome, welcome!” Electra sang as a mother-son team entered the room. “We’re so glad you’re here!”
“Want to make a bet on how many kids we make cry today?” Arnie whispered, coming up next to her.
“Are you wearing cologne, too?” she teased, suddenly surrounded by a cloud of woodsy scents and warm spices.
“Focus, please.”
Done filling cups with water, Maggie followed Arnie to the front of the room. They stood in front of the blackboard and watched Electra greet parents, smile too widely at kids, and hand them all sparkly PATROL THIS! butto
ns. After eight very frightened children and their cheerful parents took seats around the room, Electra closed the door and clapped her hands.
“Welcome, everyone, to the very first meeting of Patrol This, or Pound Patrollers for kids. We’re going to have tons of fun today, and will get right to it after completing just one small order of business.”
“What’s with the voice?” Arnie asked quietly. “And why isn’t she blinking?”
“More importantly,” Maggie whispered back, watching Electra tuck a clipboard under one arm and push the scale toward the center of the room, “where is she going with that?”
“Okay,” Electra said, consulting the clipboard, “it looks like Matthew’s up first.”
“Oh, no,” Maggie moaned quietly. A little boy with red hair and freckles, who couldn’t have been more than six years old, leaped from his seat, jumped in his mother’s lap, and buried his face in her neck.
“Don’t be nervous, little guy!”
Maggie looked at Arnie. She knew Electra meant to be encouraging, but she sounded more like a doctor with poor bedside manners about to give a shot. Even worse, the nervous tension in her voice and lack of blinking made her seem like Dr. Jekyll with poor bedside manners about to give a shot.
“Sweetie,” Matthew’s mother coaxed, “it’s okay. We just have to find out how much you weigh so we know exactly how much you need to lose.”
“Wow,” Arnie muttered. “Parents should really have to take some kind of test before they get the keys to the stroller.”
“Why don’t we start with someone else?” Electra suggested brightly. “Lucy, would you like to step on the pretty scale?”
“And weight-loss counselors should really remember who they’re dealing with,” Maggie marveled. Pretty scale? The gray metal contraption was more intimidating than the Camp Sound View obstacle course.
When Lucy’s eyes filled with tears, Electra continued down the list of eight children. Not surprisingly, no one wanted to step on the pretty scale.
“Maybe we should all get to know each another first,” Electra suggested. “Who here likes candy?”
Maggie grabbed Arnie’s arm. What was Electra doing? Had eight years of leading adult Pound Patrollers taught her nothing about overeaters? And these kids weren’t dumb. Their parents had signed them up for weight-loss meetings instead of swimming lessons, tennis lessons, or some other form of summer fun. They already knew why they were there, and Maggie didn’t understand why Electra thought calling even more attention to that fact was a good idea.
When no one admitted to liking candy, Electra moved on to a fact-filled lesson about food groups and the very important roles they play in our lives.
Maggie leaned against the blackboard, crossed her arms over her chest, and watched Electra’s audience. Her extensive knowledge of complex carbohydrates had already won over the parents, who nodded and squinted as they listened, but it was completely lost on the kids. Of the eight, half sat in their parent’s lap, quietly staring out the window, and the other half squirmed in their seat, waiting for the chance to bolt.
Where was Electra’s gentle humor? Her encouraging words that motivated without embarrassing? Her ability to make you feel comfortable no matter how uncomfortable the circumstances? Was it the pressure of a completely new program? The fact that she seemed more concerned with pleasing the parents than affecting the kids?
Maggie wasn’t sure, but one thing was becoming very clear: Patrol This might have started as a great college application addition, but now, after just ten minutes, it had turned into something much bigger. Like Maggie not that long ago, these kids were uncomfortable in their own skin. And if their parents and Electra couldn’t reach them, then she and Arnie were no longer just pretty faces behind Pound Patrollers’ success stories.
These kids needed them.
8.
“I think I’m underdressed.” Maggie watched her mother lean toward the bathroom mirror and put on a second layer of mascara. She wore crisp white pants, a navy blue camisole, and matching navy blue heels. On the counter lay a lightweight white jacket. In the summer, the only things her mother ever wore outside of work were khaki shorts and T-shirts. It wasn’t like they were going to Target for cleaning supplies, but the coordinated outfit still came as a surprise.
“You look fantastic,” her mother said, glancing at Maggie’s reflection in the mirror.
Standing in the doorway, Maggie looked down at her denim skirt, red polo, and flip-flops.
“You don’t have to convince anyone that you’re a serious potential buyer.” Her mother grabbed the jacket from the counter, turned toward Maggie, and kissed her forehead. “That’s my job. Your job is to give me your honest opinion every step of the way.”
“Let Operation House Hunt begin,” Summer announced, squeezing next to Maggie in the doorway. “I’ve got notebooks, pens, highlighters, a digital camera, and an extensive P.A. checklist.”
“P.A. checklist?”
“Preferred Amenities,” Summer clarified. “Fireplace, hot tub, stainless-steel appliances, in-ground pool, central air... you know, the basics.”
“Let’s go, girls,” their mother said, waving them from the bathroom doorway. “Wilma has a lot lined up for us today, and we can’t be late.”
“I wish Dad was coming,” Summer said, sliding her backpack of house evaluation materials onto her shoulders.
“So do I,” their mother called as she hurried to the kitchen for her purse and car keys. “But if he was coming that would mean he wasn’t working, and right now, working is more important. He trusts us to narrow down the choices, and then he’ll see the best of the best.”
Hurrying after them, Maggie thought about how she, too, wished their dad were coming. It had been a rough year for them, and when he was unemployed and watching television instead of trying to find another job, they were either not speaking or fighting. But just like Maggie had come a long way in the past few months, so had her dad. Even before his most recent promotion, he’d already earned several bonuses at Ocean Vista Pools. He seemed happier now than she’d ever seen him—he actually took their mother to the movies every now and then, and occasionally brought home small gifts for Summer (crayons and coloring books) and Maggie (CDs and regular books). They were like a real family now, and since house hunting was a rather family-like thing to do, it really was too bad he couldn’t join them.
“I’m surprised you didn’t rent a car for the day,” Maggie joked when they reached her mother’s decade-old rusty Toyota Camry. As their financial situation had gradually improved, her mother had talked about buying a newer car, but they’d decided to save all extra money for a house down payment. The Camry drove fine, but with its rustlined doors, dings, scratches, and peeling paint, it looked like a pre–Pimp My Ride project.
“Your father talked me out of it,” her mother said seriously, sliding in the car carefully to avoid dirtying her white pants.
As they pulled out of the driveway, Summer took a notebook from her backpack and uncapped a pen. “So let’s go over a few things before we get started. What should we be looking for today? What sorts of things will affect our decision?”
Their mother smiled at Summer in the rearview mirror. “Do you know how cute you are?”
“Mom. We really don’t have time for that.”
“Sorry.” Shifting her eyes back to the road, their mother took a deep breath. “Well, as a salesperson, Wilma will tell me everything she thinks I want to hear. She’ll point out every good thing about the house, but might not mention its flaws, or things that need work.”
“Salespeople can be so slimy,” Summer said, shaking her head and taking notes.
“You two will be my eyes, ears, and hands. When Wilma’s telling me about the kitchen’s ideal proximity to the living room, I want you opening cabinets, checking appliances, and testing the kitchen sink faucet. When she’s going on and on about the spaciousness of the master bedroom, I want you inspecting the closet. When she
’s raving about the bathroom tile, I want you looking for mold. In every room, I want you checking the carpet for stains or pulls, ceiling for water damage, and windows for functionality.”
“Wow.” Maggie turned slightly in her seat to see Summer scribbling furiously.
“But most importantly, I want you to think about how the house feels, and whether you could picture yourself coming home there every day.”
They drove for twenty minutes before turning onto a pretty, tree-lined street. As they followed the road to a small cul-de-sac, passing several big, new houses with lush green lawns and colorful gardens, kids riding bikes and families playing soccer and catch in front yards, Maggie found herself smiling. This neighborhood was completely different from their current one, where their closest neighbors were some very nice, but very quiet retirees, and you were likelier to see a Buick Le Sabre than a bike. Their current neighborhood also consisted of an odd assortment of dated houses in various states of disrepair and maintenance. Something was always going wrong in their own house—gutters collapsing in heavy rain, the back door getting stuck shut—and it usually took the landlord days to fix anything.
But the houses in this neighborhood were new, gorgeous, and needing only families to fill them.
“Whoa,” Summer said when they stopped in front of a two-story, blue Colonial with a wraparound porch.
“Is this just a meeting spot?” Maggie tried to keep her hopes in check as she rolled down the window to smell the nearby rosebushes. “Was Wilma showing this house to other people?”
“Maybe I have the address wrong,” their mother mumbled, pulling a piece of paper from her purse. “Nope. This is it.”
Summer was out of the car before her mother had a chance to turn it off.
“Don’t forget your gear.” Maggie reached in the backseat for Summer’s backpack.
“This is it.”
Maggie and her mother climbed out of the car and stood on either side of Summer.
“We don’t have to look anywhere else,” Summer continued. Her eyes were wide, as though hypnotized by the delicate silver wind chime dangling from the porch roof. “We’re home.”
Maggie Bean Stays Afloat Page 6
