Searching for Candlestick Park

by Peg Kehret

  Hank was dead. Foxey was gone. I had lost my two best friends in the whole world, and I would have no choice now but to go back and live with Mama. I felt dizzy, and reached for the card table to steady myself.

  “I think you need to sit down,” Byron Mills said. “This has been a shock.” He took my arm and led me to a white Lincoln that was parked just down the street. “Sit in here,” he said, as he opened the door. “I’ll bring you a drink of water.”

  I sat in the front seat, leaned my arms and head against the dashboard, and wept.

  I should have stayed with Hank, I thought. If I had been here, I could have called for help sooner. The doctors might have been able to save Hank if they had more time. And I would have shut Foxey in my bedroom before the ambulance came. He would have been safe in there, hiding under my bed, and I would have been here to calm him down after they took Hank to the hospital.

  I felt a hand on my shoulder. I took a deep breath, and looked up.

  Mr. Mills held out a glass of water. He took a handkerchief out of his pocket and handed it to me.

  I wiped my eyes and nose, and drank the water.

  “There is business we need to talk about,” Mr. Mills said. He got in the driver’s seat and started the car. “I’m going to take you to my office. Your letter from Hank is there, and I need to call your parents.”

  I didn’t argue.

  When we got to Mr. Mills’s office, he opened a file cabinet and took out a white envelope. “Here’s the letter,” he said. “I opened it, since I did not know how to contact you.”

  I took the envelope. Across the front it said, “Spencer Atwood.” There was a single sheet of notebook paper inside.

  Dear Spencer:

  A few hours after you left, I began having chest pains. They aren’t too bad but I decided to put my affairs in order, just in case. I’ve rewritten my will. With Lois gone, and no children or other family, I had planned to leave everything to the Cat Rescue Society, where we adopted Butter. They will still get my house, but I’ve decided to leave my personal belongings and my savings to you. I want you to have some security so that you can afford to keep Foxey, whether you’re with your dad or back with your mother.

  Wherever you live, finish school, and then follow your dreams. You are a bright, kind boy, and I’m glad to be your friend.

  Hank

  I put the letter in my lap, and closed my eyes. Oh, Hank, I thought. I’m so sorry I didn’t stay with you.

  “Even though it is handwritten, the change he made to his will is legal,” Byron Mills said. “He had two of his neighbors come over to witness his signature. I will manage your money in a trust fund until you’re twenty-one, unless you need some for living expenses now or for college, if you choose to go.”

  Right then, I didn’t care if I had inherited 10 million dollars. I just wanted Hank and Foxey back.

  CHAPTER

  FOURTEEN

  I need your address and phone number,” Mr. Mills said.

  I wrote down Aunt May’s address and phone number.

  “It’s my aunt’s address,” I said, as I gave it to him. “Mama’s staying with her.”

  “And you live with them?”

  I hesitated a moment. “Yes,” I said. “That’s where I live.”

  “I’ll call your mother and make arrangements to get you home.”

  “Is it okay if I stay in Hank’s house for a day or two?” I asked. “I want to try to find my cat.”

  Mr. Mills looked doubtful.

  “Please?” I said. “I promise I won’t leave.”

  “I’ll have to make sure it’s all right with your mother,” he said. “Would she be at work now?”

  “Wednesday’s her day off.”

  Mr. Mills had a speaker phone in his office, and he explained that both of us could hear and talk.

  Aunt May answered.

  “This is Byron Mills, an attorney in Grafton, Oregon. Spencer Atwood is with me, and I’d like to speak to his mother, please.”

  It was no surprise to me when Aunt May started screaming, but Mr. Mills jumped about six inches.

  “Spencer’s in jail!” Aunt May hollered. “I knew it! I knew that boy would end up in trouble! He’s in jail and some lawyer wants to talk to you!”

  Mr. Mills turned down the volume on the speaker phone.

  In the background, I heard Buzz and Cissy asking, “What did he do? What did he do? Did Spencer rob a bank?”

  Finally Mama’s voice, sounding scared, said, “Hello? This is Leona Atwood.”

  “Your son is not in trouble,” Mr. Mills said.

  “Is he all right?”

  “Yes.” Mr. Mills told Mama his name. “Spencer is with me,” he continued, “because I represent the estate of Henry Woodworth, and Spencer was named in Henry’s will.”

  There was a moment of silence. “Who’s estate?” Mama said.

  “You don’t know him, Mama,” I said. “He was a friend of mine.”

  “Mr. Woodworth has left your son some money and personal property here in Grafton,” Mr. Mills said.

  “An inheritance?” Mama said. She sounded incredulous, and Spencer smiled.

  “The personal property is being sold,” Mr. Mills said. “The proceeds will go into a trust fund for Spencer. I will administer the trust fund.”

  “How much money are you talking about?” Mama asked.

  “Approximately twenty-five thousand dollars.”

  There was a clattering sound, as if Mama had dropped the telephone.

  Aunt May screamed. Then she shouted into the telephone, “She’s fainted! What did that boy do, to make his mama faint dead away on the floor?”

  “When she comes to,” Mr. Mills said, “tell her I’ll call back later.” He hung up.

  “Do you see why I wanted to stay with Hank?” I said.

  He laughed. “You and your mother will be able to have a place of your own now,” he said.

  He made a copy of Hank’s letter and put it in the file. He smiled at me. “Since I didn’t make arrangements for you to go home,” he said, “I guess you’ll have to stay at Hank’s house tonight.”

  “Thanks.”

  “The sale goes until four o’clock today,” Mr. Mills said. “We plan to hold another sale on Saturday. We’ll have an ad in the paper for that one; today we just put out signs. In a small town like this, sometimes the signs are enough to draw a crowd.”

  I nodded. Mama often followed Yard Sale signs in Seattle, hoping to find bargains.

  “If I had known you would show up so soon, I would have waited to have the sale, even though Hank’s instructions said to do it immediately. There may be some things of Hank’s that you want to keep.”

  “The cat carvings,” I said. “He carved some cats out of wood; they were on the windowsill.”

  “You’re in luck,” Mr. Mills said. “We didn’t put those in the sale because we wanted to have them appraised first. Most of Hank’s belongings were ordinary used household items, but the wooden cats seemed to be authentic folk art. I have them at home; I’ll see that you get them.”

  “Thanks,” I said. I liked this man. I was glad Hank had chosen Mr. Mills to handle his affairs. And mine, I realized.

  “Do you have any questions?”

  “What happened to Hank?” I asked. “I mean, is he buried somewhere, or what?”

  “His will requested immediate cremation, with the ashes to be scattered in the Cedar River. Those wishes were followed.”

  The tears filled my eyes again. I didn’t say anything. What was there to say?

  “Do you have any money?” Mr. Mills asked.

  “Two dollars and sixty-five cents.”

  He took out his wallet and handed me a twenty-dollar bill. “Let me know if you need more,” he said. “I put my home phone number on the card I gave you.”

  We drove back to Hank’s house, and I sat in the car until four o’clock. I watched Mr. Mills’s helpers carry the leftover sale items inside, and fold up
the tables.

  When they were ready to leave, Mr. Mills gave me a key to Hank’s house. “I’m trusting you to stay here tonight, Spencer,” he said, “because I trust Hank Woodworth’s judgment. Let me know if you need anything, and call me in the morning.”

  “I will.”

  “I hope you find your cat.”

  I walked slowly into Hank’s house. Much of the furniture was gone. The closet by the front door stood open; the closet was empty.

  “Here, Foxey.” I didn’t think he was in the house, but I called anyway.

  I went into Hank’s bedroom; it contained only a stack of old National Geographic magazines. I went in the other bedroom, my bedroom. The dresser and chair were gone, but the bed was still there. I looked under the bed. No cat.

  In the kitchen I found a half-full bowl of cat crunchies on the floor. A small saucer of water rested beside it.

  I circled through the house twice, calling. When he didn’t come, I went around the outside of the house.

  Just because he didn’t come didn’t mean he wasn’t there. Foxey has never come when I called him, unless he felt like coming. More than once, back in the old house, I walked through the yard calling and calling, only to discover him under a bush, watching me. It always made me laugh when Foxey did that because I knew he was behaving like a cat. But I never laughed until I found him, and I sure didn’t feel like laughing now.

  I looked in Hank’s maple tree. I searched the old storage shed at the back of Hank’s yard. I walked around the block, calling and looking.

  When I didn’t find him, I went downtown and bought two pieces of poster board, a wide black marker, and a roll of package tape.

  As soon as I got back to Hank’s house, I made LOST CAT signs. Hank’s telephone had already been disconnected so I put his address on the signs. I also put “REWARD!!” I taped the signs to telephone poles, two blocks apart.

  By then I was hungry. It was a shock to realize I could buy food without worrying about what it cost. Thank you, Hank, I thought, as I sat in the Corner Cafe, eating a big baked potato with cheese sauce.

  It seemed odd, when I went back to the house, to slip the key in the lock and let myself in. I wandered through the rooms for awhile. The TV was gone, and the bookshelves were empty.

  I wondered where the bicycle was. I looked in the shed and around the yard, but it wasn’t there. Probably it had already been sold. That gave me an idea.

  I had been wondering how to make up for stealing the bike, since I didn’t know who it belonged to or how to contact him. I decided the next time I saw a good bike at a yard sale, I would buy it with my lawn-mowing money and donate it to the Toys For Tots drive. That wouldn’t help the boy whose bike I took, but it would get a bike to some kid who couldn’t afford one. It was the best way I could think of to cancel my debt.

  I unloaded the boxes of items that hadn’t sold yet. At the bottom of the first box, I found a leash. I wondered if it had been Butter’s, or if Hank had bought it for Foxey. I removed the price tag, and put the leash in my backpack.

  After I went through all the boxes, I walked around the block again, looking for Foxey. Then I sat on the front porch steps. Every few minutes I called, “Here, Foxey!” just in case he was within earshot.

  The sun set, the stars came out, and twice my chin dipped to my chest before I jerked awake again.

  I did not want to go to bed. What if Foxey came back in the night and I didn’t hear him? If I wasn’t awake to let him in, he might run off again, and never return.

  But the day’s events had exhausted me. I dragged the mattress off the bed and pulled it into the living room, right beside the front door.

  There was a chain lock on the inside of the door. With the chain fastened, I could open the door about four inches. That was plenty of room for Foxey to get inside. I put one of my shoes in the opening, to be sure the door didn’t close. If Foxey came back and looked in the door, he would see me.

  I lay on the mattress and thought about Hank, and about what Mr. Mills had said, that I could use Hank’s money for college if I wanted to. I get good grades (except for the rat business in science) but I had never considered going to college, since I knew Mama could not afford to pay tuition.

  Now it was different. Follow your dreams, Hank had written, and I planned to do what Hank suggested.

  I vowed not to waste a penny of his money. I would make it last as long as possible and only pay for important things like rent. As soon as I was old enough, I would still get a part-time job, and maybe I really would go to college. Wouldn’t that be something? No one in my family had ever done that before.

  I began imagining signs:

  Spencer’s Pet Store

  Spencer Atwood, Veterinarian

  Spencer’s Vegetarian Restaurant

  No, I thought. If I ever own a restaurant, I’ll call it Foxey’s Place. Or Hank’s Place. Or simply Hank’s.

  Still planning possible signs, I fell asleep.

  I dreamed that I was trying to walk to Candlestick Park but I couldn’t move my legs. I struggled and struggled, and finally woke up. I really couldn’t move my legs—because Foxey was on top of me, stretched from my knees to my ankles.

  I picked him up and hugged him. Foxey purred and rubbed his head against my shoulder. I put my face next to his, and he licked my cheek. I held him for a long time, and then I shut the door. I was determined never to lose Foxey again.

  The next morning I went out for breakfast, and took down the LOST CAT signs.

  At the pay phone by the drug store, I dialed the home number on Mr. Mills’s card. Much as I wished Foxey and I could live alone in Hank’s house, I knew it wasn’t possible.

  “I found my cat,” I told Mr. Mills.

  “I’m glad. Are you ready to go home?”

  “Yes.” What else could I do?

  Home would not be near Candlestick Park, after all. It would probably be years before I saw another Giants game in person. Home wasn’t going to be with Hank, either, who understood how I feel about animals because he loved them himself. Home was going to be with Mama, just like it’s always been, and I wasn’t at all sure she would let me keep Foxey, even if we moved out of Aunt May’s house and into a place of our own.

  “I’ll come and get you,” Mr. Mills said. “We can make travel plans from my office and then call your mother to let her know when to expect you. I’ll take you and Foxey to the plane.”

  He said it casually, as if Foxey and I got on an airplane every day of our lives.

  He arrived at Hank’s house half an hour later and gave me a box containing all of Hank’s wood carvings. I locked Hank’s door, and handed the key to Mr. Mills.

  We stopped downtown and bought a sturdy cat carrier that was small enough to fit under the seat of the plane. “That way Foxey can ride with you,” Mr. Mills explained, “instead of with the cargo.”

  Foxey objected loudly to his new carrier, yowling all the way to Mr. Mills’s office. We had to let him out in order for Mr. Mills to hear on the phone while he got my plane ticket and called Mama.

  This time Mama didn’t faint, even when he told her to pick me up at SeaTac Airport instead of the bus station. Maybe by now, nothing I do surprises Mama. All she said was, “I’ll be glad to see him.”

  The flight was great, especially looking down at buildings that seemed like houses in a Monopoly game. Foxey’s carrier had to be under the seat for takeoff and landing, but the rest of the time the flight attendants said I could hold it in my lap. Once they let me open it and they all took a turn to pet Foxey.

  They gave me little packs of peanuts and a Coke, and when we approached Seattle, I could see Mt. Rainier from above.

  Only one thing marred the trip. I kept wondering what Mama would do when she saw Foxey. What if she said he had to go straight to Animal Control? I couldn’t run away again; I had no place to go.

  Maybe Mike’s mother would let him have Foxey, and I could go to Mike’s house to visit him. I blinked
back tears at the idea of Foxey living with someone else, even Mike.

  When I walked from the plane into the airport, Mama was waiting. I was glad she was alone. I didn’t want to face Aunt May just yet, even though I had fourteen dollars folded together in my shirt pocket, all ready to give her.

  Mama hugged me for a long time and I hugged back, surprised by how glad I was to see her. She looked at the cat carrier, but she didn’t say anything about it and I didn’t, either.

  We went into the parking garage. “You got our car back!” I said.

  “Mr. Mills called me again yesterday afternoon,” Mama said. “He told me all about Hank Woodworth and explained how the trust fund will work. He also wired me money from the sale of Hank’s household goods.”

  After we left the airport, we ordered milk shakes at a Dairy Queen drive-through. Mama parked, and we sat in the car for almost an hour.

  I expected Mama to yell for awhile, and tell me what my punishment was for running off and scaring her half to death. The worst punishment I could think of would be to give up Foxey.

  Instead of yelling at me, Mama asked what had happened to me since I left Aunt May’s. I told her everything and for once Mama listened and did not interrupt me. She smiled a little when I showed her my debt journal, but most of the time she looked sad and worried, especially when I told how the boys robbed me and about hitching a ride with the tattooed man and how I ate leftover food at McDonald’s.

  When I finished, she said, “You were wrong to leave, Spencer. A dozen disasters could have happened. What if Hank had lured you to his house by promising you cat food and then he turned out to be a maniac? That truck driver could have been an ax murderer. You are lucky to be alive instead of lying in a ditch somewhere.”

  “I know,” I said. And I did know. Until Hank, no one I cared about had died. Mama’s parents were killed in a car wreck when I was three but they lived in Florida, and I had never met them. At the time, I had wondered why Mama cried so hard.

  Hank’s death showed me how permanent death is. Hank is gone forever. Gone. I don’t want my life to end for a long, long time so I won’t hitchhike anymore, or ride a bike without a helmet, or go home with strangers.