Take Charge

by Melody Carlson

  The other girls said “Amen.” Even Amy said “Amen.” She figured she should be able to do that much. Then they picked up their shovels and rakes and went to work leveling the ground that had been so badly torn up by the vehicles. Their goal was to get it ready for planting grass. Where they would get the grass turf was unsure, but they wanted to get it ready.

  “It’s too bad that Howard Hardware is against this project,” said Morgan as she pushed her glasses back up and wiped the sweat from her brow. “I’d hoped that we could ask them to donate some things.”

  “Like grass turf,” said Carlie.

  “Yeah,” said Morgan. “But I guess we get to trust God for that. We’ll just take it one day at a time.”

  “How many days do we have left?” asked Chelsea.

  “Twenty-three,” said Amy. “But that’s if you start from the day the vandals hit. If you start from when Miss McPhearson got her letter, it could be more.”

  “Good that we have the math whiz working for us,” said Carlie.

  “What’s going on there?” called a man’s voice from the nearby sidewalk. The girls looked up to see Mr. Howard from the hardware store looking on with a frown on his face.

  “We’re working,” called Amy. “Fixing this place up.”

  “Who said you could do this?” he asked.

  “The owner,” Amy shot back as she scooped another shovelful of dirt into the wheelbarrow.

  “You expect me to believe you really talked to Viola McPhearson?” he asked as he walked over to where they were working.

  Amy stood up straight and looked him squarely in the eyes. “Yes.”

  “Viola McPhearson had a conversation with you? And she gave you permission to work on this land?”

  “That’s what I just told you,” said Amy.

  He scowled. “Well, I just find that difficult to believe.”

  “Look,” said Chelsea, coming over to stand by Amy. “Amy went to Miss McPhearson’s house and talked to her. She even has a witness, and it’s a fact. We’ve got work to do here and, unless you plan on helping, why don’t you leave us alone.”

  Amy blinked and stepped back. “Yes,” she said in a nervous voice. “That’s the truth. If you don’t believe me, go talk to Miss McPhearson.”

  He sort of laughed, but not in a nice way. “That’s a good idea, little lady. Maybe I’ll do that.” Then he walked away, and the girls went back to work. They worked quietly for about half an hour, and suddenly Amy thought of something.

  “What if he does do that?” said Amy as she drove her shovel in again.

  “Who does do what?” asked Morgan.

  “What if Mr. Howard goes to see Miss McPhearson?”

  “So what if he does?” said Chelsea. “She won’t see him, will she?”

  “Probably not,” said Amy. “But what if she does see him?”

  “It’s not like she’s going to tell him he can have his stupid parking lot, is it?” asked Morgan.

  “Probably not,” said Amy. “But she is kind of a strange lady.”

  “Or …” began Emily in a suspicious tone. “What if Mr. Howard tells everyone that he spoke to Miss McPhearson and that she told him she never gave us permission to work here?”

  “That could get messy,” said Amy as she turned her dad’s ball cap around backward. “It would be his word against mine. And he’s friends with the newspaper.”

  “And all the other business owners in town,” added Chelsea. “At least the ones who want this park turned into a parking lot.”

  “You might have to go see the Dragon Lady again, Amy,” said Carlie.

  Amy swallowed hard. She had no desire to go see the Dragon Lady again. Especially not without Mrs. Watson by her side.

  “Well, we don’t need to think about that now,” said Morgan. “Right now we have work to do. And like Jesus said, we can only live one day at a time. We don’t need to worry about tomorrow.”

  “We just need to keep praying,” said Emily.

  The others agreed and went back to work. They worked long and hard until noon. Then Chelsea offered to treat everyone to lunch.

  “But we’re a mess,” said Amy.

  “No problem,” said Chelsea with a grin. “My mom is going to deliver it to us.” And at 12:30 Mrs. Landers pulled up with a six-foot-long sub sandwich and drinks and chips for everyone. They cleaned off a beat-up picnic table — one of the few that were still in one piece — and sat down. Morgan said a blessing over the food and they all ate hungrily. Then they went back to work, and by the afternoon it actually looked as if they were accomplishing something. Together they had piled all the broken pieces of equipment over in a corner of the park. They hoped that these things could either be fixed or carried away, but putting them in one area helped to make the rest of the park look less hopeless.

  “At least this will be ready for some grass,” said Amy as they stepped back and looked at the nicely smoothed field where kids could kick a soccer ball around.

  “And maybe we can get some of that free recycled mulch from the dump,” suggested Carlie. “I’ll ask my dad if —”

  “Hey!” called a girl’s voice from the sidewalk. “What d’ya retards think you’re doing anyway?”

  “Yeah, aren’t you a little old to be playing in the park?”

  Amy stopped raking long enough to observe a couple of girls from their school. And she immediately knew this wasn’t good.

  “It’s Andrea Benson,” said Morgan in a hushed tone. “And Jennifer Wagner.”

  “So?” said Chelsea, who was still new enough in town not to realize that these were two of the meanest girls at Washington Middle School.

  “Andrea and Jennifer aren’t very nice,” Amy whispered to her.

  “And that’s an understatement,” said Emily as she leaned on her shovel and watched. Then a few more girls from school joined Andrea and Jennifer. They had soda cups and stood there looking at the hardworking girls as if they were sideshow freaks.

  “Let’s get back to work,” said Morgan. And the girls turned their backs on their little audience and started shoveling and raking again.

  Soon they began taunting them and calling them names.

  “Pigs in the park,” yelled Jennifer. “You guys are so pathetic.”

  “Don’t you know that no one wants this stupid park?”

  “Hey, park pigs,” called out Andrea. “Do you guys have any idea how stupid you look right now?”

  “Why don’t you get down on your hands and knees and use your snouts to dig in the dirt?” called the other girl.

  “Why don’t you get a life?” yelled Chelsea back.

  “Just ignore them,” said Morgan loudly enough so the mean girls could hear. “They just wish they had something worthwhile to do too.”

  “Yeah, right,” yelled Jennifer. “Like we’d want to come out there and dig in the dirt like a bunch of retarded park pigs.”

  Emily held out her hand, pointing to her bracelet to remind her four friends of their secret Rainbow Rule. “Thanks for stopping by,” she called out to their spectators in a cheerful voice. “We so appreciate your encouragement.”

  Then the mean girls just laughed and walked away.

  “Way to tell them, Emily,” said Morgan.

  “Rainbows rule,” Emily shot back at her.

  Of course, Amy was still fuming. She’d be happy to throw out the Rainbow Rule right now. More than anything, she would’ve liked to have given those stupid girls a piece of her mind. Who did they think they were anyway? But she suppressed her anger, putting the energy into her raking and shoveling. They’d show them!

  Finally the work day was coming to an end and all five girls were exhausted. Amy had three blisters, and despite wearing garden gloves she didn’t know if she’d ever get the dirt out from under her fingernails.

  “We made some good progress,” said Morgan.

  “I guess …” Amy sighed as she looked around the park. “But there’s so much to be done.”

/>   “It sort of feels like just a drop in the bucket,” said Emily.

  “I just don’t see how we can finish this on our own,” said Carlie as she loaded the tools into the wheelbarrow. “I mean, even if we get the grass in and some new shrubs planted there’s still the broken playground equipment and the lampposts and picnic tables. That’s going to cost a lot.”

  “And no one really seemed to care much about what we were doing today,” added Emily. “Not like we’d hoped they would.”

  Amy felt worried now. Were her friends getting ready to give up? Sure, she was discouraged too, but they couldn’t just give up. “We still have three more weekends to finish this,” she said stubbornly.

  “And we still have prayer,” added Morgan.

  Amy studied their leader. She wished she had the nerve to ask Morgan about how that really worked. Like, how did Morgan know how to pray? Who had taught her? Where did she get her faith to believe these things? And how did she know that God really listened to prayers? Amy just didn’t get it. Maybe she never would.

  But Morgan’s grandma pulled up then, honking the horn of her car as she waved to the girls. They lugged their tools and things over to her car. It took three of them to load the wheelbarrow into the back of the station wagon, and they had to leave the window open.

  “You girls look like you’ve had a long day,” said Grandma as she drove them back to the trailer park.

  “And only twenty-five more to go,” said Amy in a discouraged voice.

  chapter seven

  “I don’t know about you guys,” said Chelsea at lunchtime, “but I’m getting sick and tired of being called the park pigs by girls like Andrea and Jennifer.”

  Morgan held up her bracelet. “Just remember rainbows rule and try not to let them get to you.” She put a straw in her milk and took a sip.

  “That’s easier said than done,” said Amy as she opened her sack lunch and peered inside. She, for one, was fed up with the taunting and teasing that only seemed to be getting worse. Just then a girl walked by their table and loudly snorted like a pig.

  “Wow, that’s original,” said Chelsea in a sarcastic voice. “We haven’t heard that sound before.”

  It was Wednesday, and everyone at school was fully aware of the park controversy by now. Yesterday’s newspaper had another article criticizing the girls’ efforts to “save a park that didn’t need saving.” The article pointed out how Boscoe Bay had suffered economically over the past twenty years and how the only way to grow was to “allow more development.” Amy wondered how they considered a parking lot to be development, but according to her own parents it was the only way to grow.

  Anyway, it seemed clear that the line had been drawn, and not only the adults were taking sides. Kids had quickly taken sides too. And, unfortunately, it seemed that the kids with the biggest mouths — the so-called popular kids — were solidly on the side of development. It was only the quieter kids — many of them “geeks, freaks, and nerds” — who supported the Save Our Park project.

  “I think we’re being persecuted for righteousness’ sake,” said Emily.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” asked Amy.

  “It means we’re getting picked on for doing a good thing,” said Morgan. “Our pastor preached about it in church on Sunday.”

  “But that’s so wrong,” said Chelsea. “Why should we get picked on for doing a good thing?”

  “Because most people think it’s the wrong thing,” said Amy. “Did you read what Mr. Howard from the hardware store said in the paper yesterday?”

  “Yeah,” said Morgan in a sad voice. “He thinks you made the whole thing up about Viola McPhearson.”

  “Isn’t that slander?” asked Emily.

  “Good question,” said Chelsea.

  “Well, it’s made me realize that I need to write Mrs. Watson and ask her to help us,” said Amy. “And …” She took in a deep breath. “I think I should go to visit Miss McPhearson again.”

  “The Dragon Lady?” said Chelsea. “You’re going to go see her again?”

  “It seems like the only way,” said Amy.

  “When?” asked Morgan.

  “Today, after school,” said Amy. “I already asked my sister An to drive me up there.”

  “So she’ll go with you, then,” asked Emily with concern, “to talk to the Dragon Lady?”

  Amy shook her head. “No, she’ll just drop me off. She has to work at the restaurant.”

  “We’d go with you,” offered Morgan, “except we have soccer practice, and there’s a game tomorrow, so we can’t miss it.”

  “That’s okay.” Amy forced a brave smile. “I’ll be fine.”

  “But you’ll be there all by yourself?” said Carlie, clearly alarmed at this. “Just you and the Dragon Lady?”

  “I’ll have my cell phone,” Amy said quickly. “And Cara should be there working. I can call An if anything goes wrong, and she’ll come pick me up.”

  “What do you think could go wrong?” asked Morgan.

  Amy shrugged. “Probably nothing. But I have to admit the place is kind of creepy and spooky, and the Dragon Lady is a little strange. But she may just be eccentric.”

  “You’re so brave,” said Emily.

  Amy thanked her, but the truth was she didn’t feel so brave. Still, she felt this was something that needed to be done. And since she was the one who made contact with the Dragon Lady in the first place, it only seemed right that she should contact her again. She just hoped the old woman was in a better mood than last time.

  “We’ll be praying for you,” said Morgan suddenly.

  “Thanks,” said Amy. “Maybe it will help.”

  “Maybe?” said Emily. “Of course it will. God can do anything, you know.”

  Amy nodded. But she didn’t really know that. She didn’t even know how anyone else could know it.

  It seemed that school got over very quickly, and soon Amy was walking into the restaurant, and then she and An were driving up to the McPhearson house.

  “Wow, this place looks like a haunted house,” said An when she pulled up and parked in front. “You sure you want me to just leave you here?”

  Amy swallowed hard. “Well, how about if I go ring the doorbell first, just to make sure that the Dragon Lady’s —”

  “The Dragon Lady?” exclaimed An. “What kind of place is this?”

  “Sorry,” said Amy. “I shouldn’t call her that. But that’s what Cara called her, and it kind of fits.”

  “Good grief, Amy,” said An. “I don’t like the sound of this.”

  Amy forced a laugh. “Really, it’s okay. But just let me be sure that Cara’s here, okay? And then you can go.”

  “You’re sure?”

  Amy tried to appear braver than she felt. “Sure. I’ll be fine.”

  “Okay. You wave to me if you want me to go.”

  “Right.”

  “And then call me on your cell when you want to be picked up. I’d stick around, but Mom will have a cow if I don’t get back and prep for dinner. Ly won’t be back from the dentist until five.”

  “It’s okay, An.” Then Amy got out of the car and walked up and rang the doorbell. Like before, she waited several minutes, but then Cara appeared. And although she looked surprised, she didn’t seem nearly as shocked as last time. In fact, she almost seemed pleased to see Amy.

  “I wondered if I could talk to Miss McPhearson?” Amy asked politely.

  Cara nodded. “I think so. Come in.”

  Amy turned back and waved to An, smiling big so that An wouldn’t worry. Then the little red car drove away.

  “I’m sorry to disturb her,” said Amy as she followed Cara inside. “And I would have called, but I don’t have her phone number.”

  “No one does.”

  Amy nodded.

  “Go and sit in the library,” Cara instructed her. “I’ll go find Miss McPhearson.”

  So Amy found her way to the dimly lit library again. But instead of sitt
ing down, she walked over to where some heavy red velvet drapes were hanging and she peeked out between them. To her amazement there was the ocean, big and bright and blue. She wondered why Miss McPhearson didn’t open the drapes and enjoy this amazing view. In fact, she was tempted to open them herself, but she had a feeling that could cause problems.

  “Snooping, are you?” came a deep voice from behind her.

  Amy jumped then turned around. “Sorry,” she said quickly. Her eyes hadn’t adjusted from the brightness outside to the dark in the room, but she knew by the sound of the raspy voice that it was the Dragon Lady. “You have a beautiful view from this room.”

  “Harrumph.”

  “I would think you’d want to open the curtains and enjoy it,” continued Amy as she walked over and waited as the Dragon Lady sat down, positioning her feet on the footstool again. Today she had on the same gray skirt, but her cardigan sweater was a plum color.

  “Well, go ahead and sit down,” snapped the Dragon Lady. “Don’t just stand there with your mouth hanging open.”

  Amy sat down and suppressed the urge to point out that her mouth was NOT hanging open.

  “So what is it today?” asked the old woman. “Why are you here, Amy Ngo?”

  Amy was a little surprised that she remembered her name. “I wanted to speak to you again,” she began, “about the park.”

  “The park, the park … why all this concern about the silly park?”

  “Well, do you read the local newspaper, Miss McPhearson?”

  “Of course not. Why would I bother with such nonsense?”

  “Some people in town don’t believe that I really spoke to you. They think I made the whole thing up and —”

  “That’s ridiculous,” she snapped. “Of course you spoke to me. What’s wrong with those foolish people anyway?” Then she laughed, but in that mean way. “Oh, of course, I know what’s wrong with those foolish people — they are complete fools!”