Rattled

by Lisa Harrington

  “Jilly’s right, Mom, it might be a waste of chocolate chips.” I grabbed a handful out of the bag.

  “Well, there is Sam and Megan…” Jilly passed Mom the eggs.

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  Jilly and I sat at the table, flipping through a pile of flyers as Mom whipped up her famous coffee cake. Soon the kitchen was filled with the smell of chocolate and cinnamon. In no time at all, the oven timer went off.

  “I’m going to change and let that cool a bit,” Mom informed us. “Then I’m going to take it over and welcome them to the neighbourhood.” She sounded a little angry, like her having to bake a cake at the drop of a hat was somehow our fault.

  “What’s her problem?” Jilly asked.

  “Didn’t you hear the ‘if you want something done right, you better do it yourself ’ tone in her voice?”

  “Ohhh,” she nodded. “Gotcha.”

  “You don’t think we have to go with her, do you?”

  Jilly pressed her lips together and squished them around, like she was reactivating her lip gloss. “I’ll go. I wouldn’t mind seeing Sam again.”

  That helped me decide. “Yeah, I guess I’ll go too.”

  Mom reappeared, hair all neat, clothes free of flour. “Are you coming with me?”

  “Yup,” we answered.

  Once again we trekked across the street. The coffee cake led the parade.

  Mom rang the bell. We waited.

  The door opened. It was the scary mother.

  “Welcome to the neighbourhood,” Mom said, holding out the cake.

  The scary mother put her hand to her throat. “Oh my, I don’t know what to say. How very lovely. Won’t you come in?”

  Jilly and I shot each other a look and followed Mom into the house.

  “Sam! Megan!” the scary mother called. “Those lovely girls from across the street are here.”

  I felt like I was in a parallel universe or something.

  “I’m Justine, Justine Tanner,” Mom said.

  “I’m Bernadette Swicker.” She reached out and took the cake.

  Scary mother now had a name.

  Sam and Megan arrived slightly out of breath. “Sorry, we were trying to get the TV working, but I don’t think the cable’s been hooked up yet,” Sam said.

  I nodded sympathetically, hoping he would sense how much I shared his frustration. I happened to catch a glimpse of Jilly doing the exact same thing. I wanted to kick her.

  “Shall I make some tea, Justine? And cut into this beautiful cake?” Mrs. Swicker asked.

  “No, no, we’re not going to impose, you’re trying to get settled in. I hope it turned out though, it was a bit of a rush job. We didn’t know you were coming.”

  “Oh, I don’t eat sweets, but I’m sure it’s perfect.” Mrs. Swicker handed the cake to Megan.

  I felt Jilly nudge me.

  “Oh.” Mom seemed at a loss for words.

  “Well, thank you for making us feel so welcome,” Mrs. Swicker smiled.

  I noticed her smile didn’t quite reach her eyes.

  “My pleasure. It’s nice to have some new neighbours on the street.” Mom ushered us towards the door.

  Jilly and I speed-walked home and impatiently waited for Mom. We practically pulled her in the door and both started talking at once.

  “Stop!” Mom put up her hands. “I can’t understand a word, but I’ll start off by saying, I thought Mrs. Swicker seemed perfectly fine.”

  “But Mom, she’s not. And what about the not eating sweets thing?” Jilly sputtered.

  “Well that doesn’t make her a bad person. I thought she was quite friendly,” Mom said.

  “Mom! She wasn’t like that this morning. She was all snippy-like.”

  “Lid’s right, Mom, she was looking down her nose at us the whole time.”

  “Let me tell you, she sure wasn’t all rainbows and puppy dogs, like you just saw,” I said.

  Mom sighed one of those giant mother-like sighs. “Girls, did it ever occur to you that she may have been tired, maybe she’d been driving for hours, maybe you didn’t catch her at her best moment?”

  A couple seconds of silence ticked by.

  “I guess,” Jilly mumbled.

  Mom turned to me for my response. She was trying to stare me down. “Lydia?”

  “Anything’s possible.” I knew it was just easier to give her the answer she wanted.

  “Thank you both for being so open-minded,” Mom said. “We wouldn’t want to jump to any wrong conclusions.”

  She might as well have added, “would we, Lydia?” I knew that was what she was thinking.

  I tilted my head, smiled sweetly, and took off to my room. With the door safely closed, I went to the window, opened it wide to let in some breeze, and stared across the street. I watched Megan walk to the van, lift out a suitcase, and head up the driveway. Sam met her halfway, took the case from her, and returned to the house.

  I must have watched Megan and Sam make a half a dozen trips to that van while I stood there chewing on a hangnail, safely hidden behind a curtain panel. They were working so hard, I almost thought that maybe I should go over and offer to help.

  “Don’t dilly-dally!” Mrs. Swicker hollered from the front step. “Sam, just get your violin. Megan can finish up. You should be practising.”

  I saw Sam grab his violin case and go back inside.

  A few minutes later, the faint sound of violin drifted in through my open window. It was beautiful. I could almost swear it was coming from a CD.

  I got a little overzealous in my hangnail chewing and had to grab a Kleenex to wrap up my bleeding finger. I didn’t want to leave the window to get a Band-Aid, I was too worried I might miss something. Good thing. It was Mrs. Swicker. She was carrying a box and heading towards their green bin against the side of the house.

  My room was on the second floor, so I had a pretty good view of their whole yard. Mrs. Swicker set the box down in front of the green bin, glanced at our house, and checked behind her over one shoulder, then the other. Seemingly satisfied no one was watching, she bent down and lifted something out of the box.

  I gasped. That was Mom’s blue cake plate. That was Mom’s cake!

  Mrs. Swicker opened the lid and slid the cake in.

  I don’t know if I was more stunned or offended. I wanted to scream across the street, “Hey, you ungrateful troll!” But then what? I wanted to call Mom and Jilly to the window, but I knew it was too late, they’d already missed it. I could tell them what happened. Jilly might believe me. Mom would probably say something like I just thought I saw the cake, it could have been anything. Not to mention, she would consider all this to fall under the heading of jumping to conclusions. It was a lose-lose situation, so I did nothing.

  I continued to stare across the street for a long time after the action died down. I got the distinct feeling this wasn’t going to be the last time I would do this—stare across the street at the Swickers’.

  Chapter 3

  It had been a few days, and I was still wondering if I should have told anyone about what I saw in the driveway, about the dumping of the cake. Might be kind of interesting when Mrs. Swicker decides to return the plate, though. I’ll definitely have to make sure I’m home for that one.

  More days passed, and still no sign of the cake plate. I can’t explain it, but for some reason I was feeling very territorial about Mom’s plate. It was turning into an obsession.

  In the meantime, I managed to spend a bit of time with Sam and Megan. I was curious about them, wanted to get to know them. It was all small talk at first, mostly just speaking to each other from across the street. Like, “Is it hot enough for ya?” “Are you all unpacked?” “Is your cable working yet?” That kind of thing.

  There was a basketball hoop mounted over their garage door, so one day I brought them over an extra basketball we had in our shed. Sam was grateful, and spent a lot of time shooting hoops. Sometimes I’d play with him, sometimes I’d lean against the st
one wall with Megan, yak, and just watch. Yeah…the watching was good.

  The bonus was it made Jilly mental. She wasn’t so smug about her great job now. She was missing all these chances to be around Sam. I did notice she was suddenly a health nut—taking the Darcy kids for walks, biking, all right in front of our house.

  “Uh…Jilly? You should take them biking over on Lynwood, it’s perfectly flat,” I suggested one afternoon.

  “No. This is fine,” she replied, twisting a piece of hair around her finger, eyes glued to Sam.

  I raised my eyebrows and stared down the massively steep hill that was our street.

  The Darcy kids were staring down it too, worried looks on their faces.

  I discovered Sam and Megan both loved to read. So did I. We talked about books we liked and didn’t like, books made into movies, and books that should be made into movies. I had the exact same opinions as Sam—go figure. It was obvious they travelled a lot, just from things they said. I found out they were originally from San Diego. But they never mentioned their father, and I didn’t feel right asking.

  Even as I was learning all these little tidbits about them, the cake plate was never far from my mind. So many times I wanted to say, “So…how was the coffee cake?” I didn’t know if they knew the fate of the cake. They must have wondered what happened to it, though. Either way, it would be awkward. And anyhow, Mrs. Swicker always seemed to be around or would appear whenever we struck up a conversation that lasted more than five minutes. I’ve never seen anyone so dedicated to weeding the garden. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she planted new weeds in the dead of night just so she could take them out the next day while she eavesdropped. I knew she was listening to every word we said.

  Loads of times, I invited Sam and Megan to hang out at my place. Mrs. Swicker always said no, they had stuff to do. It made me nuts.

  Between this mysterious stuff, and the cake plate, it was like I couldn’t think of anything else. My mind wouldn’t shut off at night. Every morning it felt like I’d slept for maybe two minutes and this morning was no different.

  I finished making my bed and went down to the kitchen.

  “Dad! You’re back.”

  “Hi, Pumpkin. Got in late last night.” He stood at the stove stirring a frying pan full of eggs. “Want some breakfast?”

  “Did you put Tabasco in there?”

  “Of course!”

  “Uh…no thanks.” You’d think after fifteen years, he’d catch on that he’s the only one who likes a half a bottle of hot sauce in scrambled eggs. “So how was your conference?”

  “Great! Nothing says fun like a convention of dermatologists,” he chuckled.

  I shook my head as he stood there in his Heineken T-shirt, boxers, and slippers with sport socks pulled up to his knees.

  “I hear we got some new neighbours,” he said.

  “Yup.”

  “According to your mother, the young man’s quite a ‘hottie.’”

  “Ewww, Dad!”

  “What? Am I not hip to your jive?”

  “Dad! Stop!” It was like fingernails down a chalkboard.

  Dad rolled his eyes. “So what do we know about these people?”

  “Not a lot. The mother’s kind of…well…too hard to describe. The parents must be divorced or something. The kids are nice. They’re kind of quiet, though. But anytime we get talking or I ask them a question, poof, there’s Mrs. Swicker, sticking her nose in.”

  “Maybe she’s just the overprotective type.”

  I didn’t comment.

  “You’ll just have to win over this Mrs. Swicker. You know, kill her with kindness.”

  “I dunno…”

  “Where’s your sister? I haven’t seen her this morning.”

  “She slept over at Ellen’s. She was going to the Darcys’ from there.”

  “Oh?”

  “It’s okay. Phase One of her grounding ended yesterday.”

  Dad nodded but didn’t look very pleased.

  A few weeks before, Jilly had gone to an end of exams bash. It had been the party all future parties would be compared to. The number of groundings that were handed out the morning after broke a new neighbourhood record. Vicki, William, and I actually managed to crash the party for all of twelve minutes. That was until some of Jilly’s friends spotted us. We weren’t officially in high school yet, so there was no way we were allowed to stay. The party thrower and quarterback of the West football team immediately escorted us to the door.

  Then later that night, Vicki’s dad had been out walking the dog and found Jilly, arms wrapped around the stop sign, puking her guts out. He brought her home. Man, I would have donated a kidney to have been awake for that one—you can’t put a price on entertainment like that.

  “What’s Phase Two again?” Dad asked.

  “Hour off the curfew. Then comes probation, then maintenance.” If I didn’t know better, I’d think Mom consulted Weight Watchers when she developed her punishment pyramid. Come to think of it, she is a lifetime member.

  “Must keep an eye on that girl,” Dad said to himself, then looked at me. “So…speaking of summer jobs…”

  I narrowed my eyes. “We weren’t.”

  “Mom said you’re bored, might be looking for work.”

  “Ummm.”

  “I’ll need someone when Kelley goes on vacation. It would just be answering phones, taking appointments, that kind of thing.”

  I tugged on my lower lip, trying to think of a response. I had kind of always hoped when I landed a summer job it would be a bit more glamorous, not working in my dad’s dermatology clinic where the only boys I’d meet would, let’s face it, have complexion issues.

  “I thought I might check up at Northcliff Tennis Club.” I’d always thought that would be sort of a glam place to work.

  “Well, Pumpkin…you don’t play tennis,” he said gently.

  “There’s always Kearney Lake. They might need lifeguards.” Another awesomely glam job.

  “I think you have to have lifeguard training,” he pointed out.

  “Right,” I nodded. I was running out of glamorous job options. “Okay, Dad. Guess I’m your girl.”

  He beamed. “Great! You can make your own schedule, a couple mornings, maybe an afternoon, still lots of time to do your own thing.”

  That wouldn’t be so bad. And I was going to be needing a whole new wardrobe for starting high school. I should have been grateful. “Thanks, Dad. I’m psyched.”

  Chapter 4

  I kept Dad company while he ate his eggs. I tried not to laugh when he gasped for water on the last bite.

  “Too much salt,” he puffed, slamming his empty glass down on the counter. He’d burst into flames before he’d admit he made the eggs too hot.

  “Sure, Dad,” I smirked. “Where’s Mom?”

  He flipped open the dishwasher. “She forgot it was Nana Mary’s birthday, so she’s out in the driveway spray-painting some old planters. She’s going to throw in some plants from the garden, pass them off as new. Is it any wonder I love that woman?”

  I smiled. Dad totally cracked me up.

  I went outside to check on Mom’s progress. “Those look great!”

  “Thanks. Let’s face it, she’s ninety-six, she probably won’t even be able to see them clearly.”

  I heard the smack of the basketball hitting the pavement and looked up. Sam and Megan were playing one-on-one. I waved and walked over.

  “Hey. Who’s winning?”

  “Me, for once,” Megan said, pushing the hair out of her eyes.

  “I’m letting her,” Sam whispered.

  “Sam.” Mrs. Swicker magically appeared, as usual. “I told you, I’m not too crazy about you playing so much basketball. Your hands, your fingers. Maybe you should just return the ball to Lydia.”

  “Good morning, Bernadette!” Mom yelled from across the street.

  Mrs. Swicker jumped, startled. “Oh, hello, Justine.” She gave a weak wave.

&
nbsp; Mom dusted off her hands and joined us in the driveway. “All settled in now?”

  “Yes, thank you,” Mrs. Swicker answered stiffly.

  I sensed there was some kind of shift, something had changed. A tiny voice in my head urged me to invite Sam and Megan over, again. I knew I should be taking advantage of the fact that Jilly was babysitting all the time. I could have Sam all to myself. Oh, and Megan too. I stepped around Mrs. Swicker. “You guys want to come over and play some Ping-Pong?”

  “Can we, Mom?” Sam asked.

  Mrs. Swicker’s eyes darted around the circle of people awaiting her answer. “Fine. Just for a while.”

  Miracle of miracles. You could have knocked me over with a feather. It took me a second to put it all together, but the shift was that Mom was there. I think Mrs. Swicker didn’t want to say no in front of her.

  “Come on.” I didn’t want to give Mrs. Swicker a chance to change her mind.

  We hurried across the street and downstairs to the rec room.

  I picked up the paddles. “Do you know how to play?”

  “No. We’ll learn as we go,” Sam said.

  “Okay,” I said. “How about we do a rotation?”

  Sam and I started, hitting the ball back and forth to each other as I gave him some instructions and a few pointers.

  “So…how long have you played the violin?” I asked. If trashy teenage TV dramas have taught me anything, it’s that boys are impressed if you show interest in things they’re interested in.

  His face lit up. “For as long as I can remember. Someday I’d love to play with a real orchestra, maybe even write music.”

  “Wow. My big goal is to get through all five seasons of Lost before the end of the summer.”

  He laughed.

  “Do you play anything, Megan?”

  “She’s a fantastic piano player,” Sam said proudly. He went on to explain how there had been a piano at one of the houses they’d rented, and Megan had taught herself to play.

  “That’s amazing. I think I must be tone deaf or something. No musical talent whatsoever,” I said as I rubbed the back of my head. I’d banged it on the corner of the table picking up the ball for the umpteenth time. Sam wasn’t very good at Ping-Pong.