by Susan Lubner
“I was. It was the scariest thing ever. I just grabbed my bag and Smoky and ran. I didn’t even try to go out the front. I could see the fire was burning from that direction. I went through the kitchen and out the back door.”
Charlotte was lucky the back door hadn’t been boarded up like the front door had!
She had seen Joss and me outside when the fire trucks had shown up. We had been right. Charlotte had ignored us on purpose so we wouldn’t call attention to her. She had slipped away into the crowd, then hid in the bushes behind one of the other apartment houses on Greenleaf.
“That’s when Smoky took off. I’m glad that you found him,” she said. “Or, that he found you.” Charlotte explained that later on, once the streets had emptied out, she looked for a car or truck she could sleep in. She didn’t have to look for long. Dad’s truck, the Enterprise, was only her second try. East Thumb was the kind of town where most people never felt the need to lock their doors.
“I had a cute cat once,” she told me in a quiet voice. “And nice parents.” She had a sister and a brother, too, twins Molly and Ethan, who were seven. They were the reason she had left a note behind when she ran away. “Otherwise I wouldn’t even have done that. But I knew they would be scared, so I did. My little brother, especially. He’s scared of everything. He sometimes makes me sit at the end of his bed until he falls asleep.”
Besides the fact that my bedroom was dark, I couldn’t see Charlotte at all because the closet door was almost shut. But her voice sounded like it came out of a sad face. I wanted to ask her a thousand questions, but I was nervous to hear her answers, because if they were bad, I might not know the right things to say. So I waited for her to say more. And then she did.
“My dad is leaving us.”
“Where’s he going?” I asked.
“I have no idea. He doesn’t want to live with us anymore.”
“That stinks,” I said.
“I know. It’s mean, right? And the weirdest, most stupidest thing is my mom seems glad about it. Isn’t that dumb?” She stuck her head out the closet door. I sat up in bed and turned toward her shadowy face. “My parents fight a lot,” she said. “More than a lot. It’s always about stupid stuff. It’s so stupid!” She sniffed in, and I could tell that she was crying. “Right before I ran away, my parents told me that my dad was moving out. It just made me so mad that they both could think it was okay for him to leave us. What did we do wrong? So I left first.”
I sucked in my breath like I had touched something hot.
“Now my dad knows how it feels to have someone run out on him. Maybe he’ll change his mind. Maybe my mom won’t think it’s so okay.” She hiccupped as if she had swallowed too many tears and they had gone down the wrong way. “I even left my cell phone home so they couldn’t track me.”
Charlotte was, like, the bravest person I knew. It took guts to run away. More guts than I’d ever have. I sometimes got scared just walking in the dark to use the bathroom at night.
“I bet your dad will change his mind,” I said. “How long are you planning to stay away?”
“I’m not sure,” she said, yawning. Her head disappeared back inside the closet.
“How come you came to East Thumb?” I asked her.
“Twelve dollars.”
“Twelve dollars?”
“Yeah. That’s every cent I had. I bought the ticket that would take me the farthest away from Lewiston. And…” She stopped for a second. “And that’s how I ended up here,” she said.
But it sounded like she was going to say something else. I wanted to ask her more about the fire. I couldn’t get what Bibi had said about it being set on purpose out of my head. But I didn’t want to sound like I was thinking she had set it. The way she described what had happened sounded like she had been totally surprised, anyways.
I heard the sound of her breathing. There was a soft exhale every few seconds, and I knew she had fallen asleep.
I laid back down and pulled my quilt up against my face. Then I fell asleep thinking about the fact that one minute Charlotte had been hiding out in the closet of that burned down apartment house. And now she was hiding out in mine.
I woke up wondering how I was going to keep Charlotte a secret from my parents. Last night I hadn’t thought about things like how she would get to the bathroom without being seen or heard. Or what she was supposed to do when I was at school all day and my mom was home, at least some of that time, when she was taking breaks from the diner.
I pulled the shade away from my window. The sun sucker punched me in the face. In the bright daylight, the burned apartment house looked even worse. Half of the building was still standing. Part of the roof still covered some of the top floor, but the front of the house had been completely burned away. I could see the walls and rooms inside like a giant ruined dollhouse.
There were large blackened pieces of floor that arched down toward the ground like charred waterfalls. Chunks of broken house covered the sidewalk. The big tree that just yesterday was full of faded leaves was black in several places, its branches completely bare. Everything looked dark and doomed. A police car and a red car, probably from the fire department, were parked near the curb.
I flung my covers off. It was after nine o’clock. Working at the diner on Sundays was optional for me. Today, I had more important things to do than bus tables. Joss and I were picking out yarn for the cat sweaters. And of course there was the matter of Charlotte. And keeping her out of sight.
I walked quietly to my closet and peeked into the small gap of space.
Charlotte was curled up on her side in a ball, the blankets tucked under one arm and pushed against her nose. At some point in the night, Smoky had slipped in. He was snuggled next to her, a paw resting against her knees. Waffles was sprawled out on the floor sleeping by the closet door.
I found the girl she’s in my closet asleep, I texted Joss.
JK? Joss texted back.
No I’m not kidding I’m serious
????????????????????
I found her hiding in my dad’s truck. I snuck her in when my parents were sleeping
WHAAAAAATTTT?????
BTW my parents don’t know OBVI so shhhhhhh
How’s that gonna work?
IDK
Did she say anything about the fire?
Yes she smelled smoke and ran
Mom was up. I could hear her moving around in the kitchen. I set the phone down and checked Charlotte one more time. She was still sound asleep. Being a runaway had to be exhausting. Plus, we were up most of the night, too.
In the kitchen, Mom measured coffee into the coffee maker.
“Hi,” I said.
“Hi, love,” Mom said to me over her shoulder. “You coming to work with me today?”
“Nah. I’ve got stuff to do.”
“Homework?”
“Sort of.” If working-on-hiding-a-stranger-in-your-home equals homework.
Mom leaned against the counter while the coffee brewed. I sat down at the table.
“Elle is taking Joss and me to the Yarn Barn in Portland today,” I said.
“That’s right.”
I had told Mom this already, but pregnancy makes you forget stuff. Still, Mom’s face seemed brighter, and she looked more rested than usual. Lately, she looked tired most days even when she had just woken up, since her big belly made it hard for her to sleep soundly sometimes. Maybe Charlotte’s good luck had kicked in already!
“You be sure to let me know when a couple of sweaters are available for Fudge and Smoky. You know Reuben won’t want to wear a sweater, so…”
“I know,” I said.
“Dad and I are happy to help you girls raise some money. We’re so proud of you, Lizzy.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Can you believe the apartment house? Did you see what’s left of it? It’s ruined.”
“I saw. It will have to be torn down. There’ll be a big empty lot over there now,” she said. “Gosh.”
> “What do you think happened? Last night I heard Bibi say it was set on purpose.”
“Oh.” Mom looked surprised that I had overheard their conversation, but then seemed to not care at all that I had. “Well, she didn’t really say that. She said the police are wondering if it was set on purpose.” Mom poured herself coffee and stirred in some milk. She wore a dark gray sweater that stretched across her tummy like she was hiding a basketball underneath.
“Why would someone start a fire on purpose?” I asked.
“If they wanted to cause some trouble, I guess. Or, maybe they did it for money.”
“Money?”
“It looks like the owner of the house hadn’t taken care of those apartments in quite some time. They weren’t in any condition to be rented out.”
“What does that have to do with burning a house down on purpose for money?”
Mom explained about houses having insurance. Like cars. If you get into a car accident, insurance pays to fix your car. Or gives you money to put toward a new one.
“Did they do that for our accident?” I asked. And then I was sorry I did. Mom didn’t like to talk about the car accident. None of us did.
She nodded. “And if something happens to a house, like a fire, insurance will cover that, too.”
“So they set their own house on fire to collect the insurance money?”
“I really don’t think that’s the case.” Mom sipped her coffee. “That’s a very bad thing. Illegal,” she continued. “But… desperate people do desperate things. Sometimes bad things. There. Now you have a lesson in arson and ripping off insurance companies.” She gave me a goofy smile as if she had told me too much about something I didn’t need to know. “But Lizzy,” she said, tucking her hair behind her ear, “that’s just based on gossip. The real truth is probably something else—an old wire, or maybe as Dad said, someone burning leaves too close by.”
That reminded me of the dried-up leaves that blew around our feet yesterday while Joss and I stood on the porch. Trouble was swirling, I had thought at the time. Um… yeah! You think??
“Since you’re not working with me today, let’s have breakfast together,” Mom said.
“What do you feel like?” I asked. “I’ll make something.”
“Why do that when we can have someone else cook and clean up?”
Because there’s a stranger in my closet and I’m not sure I should leave right now. “We don’t want to hog two diner seats on a Sunday morning,” I said.
“Of course we do. You and I? Go get dressed,” she told me. “I’m craving one of Dad’s veggie omelets.”
Back in my room, Charlotte still slept. I pulled on my jeans and dropped a sweater over my head. I grabbed a pen and scribbled a note to Charlotte, explaining how long I’d be gone, when Mom and Dad would be home, and to help herself to something to eat.
I placed it next to her and got a close-up look at that four-leaf clover on her hand.
I thought about all the ways Charlotte had been lucky even if she probably didn’t think so. Lucky that Joss and I had gone looking for that cat. Lucky that she had escaped from the fire. And lucky that Smoky and Waffles woke me up last night so that I could sneak her inside my house.
Charlotte twitched lightly, but she kept on sleeping.
I hoped she would stay for a while. Long enough to spread lots of luckiness around here. Maybe even long enough for a baby to be born.
CHAPTER
9
IT WAS CLOSE TO ELEVEN WHEN JOSS AND HER sister, Elle, picked me up outside the diner. As soon as I got into the car, Joss sent me a text, even though I was sitting in the back seat right behind her.
What’s up with the girl?
Her name is Charlotte and that tattoo on her hand is a 4 leaf clover
Really?
It’s such a total sign! She’s good luck!
Cool but it’s not a real tattoo
Duh. But it’s still a 4 leaf clover! That’s always a sign of good luck no matter what
I guess
In the ten minutes it took to get to Portland, I texted Joss pretty much everything I hadn’t had a chance to tell her yet about Charlotte.
Elle found a parking spot in the Old Port. “I’ve got a bunch of stuff to do. Mom said to feed you guys,” she said. “Want to meet at Butter & Jam Café in an hour? We can get croissants, or whatever.”
“Sure,” I said, even though I had just eaten a stack of pancakes.
“Cool,” Joss told her sister.
“Okay, I’ll see you in a little bit.” Elle crossed the street, and Joss and I walked the three blocks to the Yarn Barn.
“So what’s the rest of Charlotte’s story?”
“I texted you everything I know. She was still asleep when I left this morning.”
“You don’t think she’ll be gone when you get home later, do you?”
I stopped walking. Suddenly, I felt like I needed a deep breath. “Why would she leave? She just got here.”
“I don’t know.” Joss shrugged. “Maybe she’ll have second thoughts about hiding out in your house. Maybe she wants to go home. I mean, I know she’s mad at her dad, but you made it sound like she feels pretty bad leaving her brother and sister.”
I stood on the sidewalk in a kind of mini trance. A lucky charm comes into my life and quickly disappears. That would be an awful sign.
“Quit trying to analyze everything all the time,” Joss said as if she was reading my mind. She grabbed my arm and pulled me along. “Even if she is gone when you get home, nothing bad will happen, okay? You’re going to drive yourself nuts trying to figure out how to control everything before it happens.”
“I’m not.”
“Nuts? Or trying to control everything?”
“Either,” I said. “You just think about things differently than I do. It’s hard for you to understand.”
“It’s not that hard. Trust me.”
“Well, you know what’s hard?” I asked. We stopped walking again, and Joss looked at me. “Finding a four-leaf clover. I searched it on the Internet, and it’s like a one in ten thousand chance.”
“Um… hello… Charlotte’s tattoo didn’t grow out of her lawn, Lizzy.”
“Exactly. Finding one on the lawn is just plain lucky. But finding one on someone… that’s something else. It means something. It’s a sign that if she sticks around she can bring me good luck. Plus, I didn’t just find her once, I found her twice. What are the odds of that?”
Joss didn’t say anything. She started walking again.
“Maybe Charlotte will stay until the baby is born,” I continued, catching up with her. “Do you think she’d stay away from her family that long? I mean, she really seems angry at her dad. Not just a little bit.”
Joss sighed. “Lizzy, your mom—I mean, the baby—it’s all going to be okay this time.” She reached up and adjusted my scarf, which had started to unravel. “And you really can’t control everything. I don’t just mean you; I mean, no one can. Otherwise there would never be anything bad happening in the world, right?”
“I think we can control some things sometimes. We just need to pay closer attention.”
“To…?”
“Everything.”
“Well, you can pay attention, I guess, but you still can’t control your whole life. Even if there are… ‘signs.’” Joss pumped her fingers like quotation marks. “I mean, if you really honestly believe that… but they can’t tell you everything you want to know. That’s just impossible.”
We’d had this conversation more than a few times.
“You be you and I’ll be me, okay?” I said. “You think what you want. But I don’t always have to agree.”
“I know,” Joss said. Which is how this topic always ended.
At the yarn store, picking colors was hard. There were so many to choose from. Some had flecks in them or different shades of the same color all in one ball.
“In this bin over here, you’re going to get your best
price,” the lady told us. “I suggest you choose from that lot. Cats aren’t going to care if they’re wearing wool or acrylic, are they?” She laughed.
“I guess not,” Joss told her. “But our customers might.”
“Well, those yarns are soft enough for a baby’s blanket. They should work very nicely. You can choose what you want. I’m just saying, I can offer you the steepest discount on those acrylics, understand?” she said, before walking away to help another customer.
“Joss, I think those will work. We can’t afford expensive wool. And she’s giving us a big break on the price of this stuff.” I pointed to the bin piled high with yarn.
“I know, but wool is nicer.”
“Wool is itchy. And a homeless cat has enough problems, don’t you think? Plus, the idea is to raise money. And the less expensive the yarn, the more we make for the Lodge.”
“Okay. I guess.” She sounded borderline grumpy about it.
“I know you’re the knitting expert here,” I said, trying to butter her up. “But I know a thing or two about running a business.” That really wasn’t true exactly, but with all the time I spent in the diner helping out and all the conversations I’d overheard about profit margins, and operation expenses, it felt true-ish. “You stick to production and I’ll stick to the money side of stuff, okay?”
Joss nodded.
“And let’s stay away from pinks and baby blues, because some people are funny about what they’ll dress their boy or girl cats in and we don’t want to knit more of one color than it turns out we need or can sell,” I added. I was impressed with how much sense I was making. Maybe I had more business savvy than I thought.
“You’re right,” Joss agreed, and her smile was back.
I grabbed one of the metal carry baskets and dropped in some green and gray yarns.
“What about knitting needles?” I asked. Joss was going to reteach me how to knit.
“I have plenty of extras at home,” she said.
“Okay. Maybe you can show Charlotte, too? It will give her something to do while she hangs out in my closet.”
“Sure.”
Joss’s grandmother had taught her how to knit. After Joss had given me lessons, I made an afghan with some extra holes in it, and a few pairs of mittens with super huge thumbs. Joss told me that knitting wasn’t my forte. I had to Google what forte meant, but basically, it meant that I stunk at it. So I was a little nervous to pick it up again, because I didn’t like not being good at something.
