The Last Grand Adventure

by Rebecca Behrens

  I laughed too, but Amelia’s excuse reminded me of something I once read in a book, a prank in which a girl told her friend to wait patiently on the playground for a boy who never appeared. After that many years—decades, even—wouldn’t Amelia be dying to see her sister again? What in the world could possibly make her take so long?

  “However, I received one last letter before your father whisked me to California,” Pidge said, holding up the crispest-looking one in the stack. “It’s time for us to reunite. Amelia said so. On her seventieth birthday—thirty years after she left us all.” She smoothed the surface of the letter with her hand, clearing her throat. “Finally, I’ll see her again.”

  “Wow,” I said. “When’s her birthday?”

  “July twenty-fourth. Four days from now.” Pidge had a faraway smile.

  “Wait.” I frowned. “How will she know to find you here? You just moved. What if she goes to Boston?”

  “Smart girl! That’s exactly why I didn’t want to come out here. Now I’m stuck in California, without my car—a prisoner in this old-fart’s paradise.” Pidge clucked her tongue. “But it’s not Boston where I need to be. Remember what she wrote in the letter? About reuniting on the banks of the Missouri?”

  I nodded, remembering that part. I took my last bite of the fluffernutter.

  “In this letter, she gave me instructions to meet her at our grandparents’ old house, in Kansas. She was born there, and Atchison always felt like home for Meelie and me. It was where we were the closest. I suppose we’re going back to where we started, and there we’ll start anew.”

  “But how are you getting there?” Dad and Julie hadn’t said anything about Pidge taking a trip—and I was supposed to stay with her in Sun City for the next two weeks.

  “How are we getting there, you mean.” Pidge placed the letters back in the valise and stood up, brushing dust off her dark slacks. “Remember how I told you to pack that bag?”

  “We’re going? My dad actually said that’s okay?” I crossed my arms over my chest. I’d asked him if I could go to San Francisco to meet up with my mother. But he told me that was no place for a kid, and he didn’t want me to travel alone. Weren’t Pidge and I both too young and too old to go all the way to Kansas? A new thought popped into my head, as welcome as a splatter of raindrops appearing at a parade. Perhaps my father hadn’t okayed it.

  “He doesn’t exactly know we’re going.” Pidge’s eyes sparkled, unable to contain her glee. All this time, I thought my grandmother in Boston must be so proper. I had based that on the Bostonian grandmother in my favorite movie, The Parent Trap. I figured that if I ever visited mine there, it would be just like when the Californian twin in the movie shows up after the switcheroo. (I’d even bring my grandmother a birdcage of Popsicle sticks to see her look of confused disdain.) Pidge was already surprising me with her sneakiness.

  I thought about the way Pidge’s hands shook, and how sometimes she’d get a glazed, tired look in her eyes. And I thought about Julie asking me to stay alert for any forgetful or unusual behavior. Well, I don’t know what could be more unusual than this turn of events. A knot tugged itself tight in my stomach. Perhaps a secret cross-country trip was not the world’s greatest idea. Maybe I should telephone my father and let him know what was going on.

  Pidge could sense my unease. “Don’t tell me you’re an Earhart who isn’t up for a little adventure,” she clucked at me.

  Truthfully, I was the girl who sneaked away from Tomorrowland. I left my adventure journal empty and worry journal full. I never ran with scissors and always looked both ways before crossing the street. I liked to hole up in my room and stare at National Geographic photos—rather than see the real thing. I preferred my adventures in books and on the television set. Maybe my mother was the true Earhart heir—she was the one off gallivanting in the name of news.

  But if we went and found Amelia—that would be news. Big news. What would my mom think of that?

  She might be mad about how we’d run off without telling anyone—but I just know she’d also be proud. I’d have things written in my adventure journal, finally, to show her. In that letter, Meelie said that she and Pidge were lucky to have a mother who encouraged them to be rambunctious and knew they were happier with freedom. That’s exactly the kind of thing my mom would agree with. She was always egging me on to try new things: foods, books, ways of seeing the world around me. If I was certain my mother would love an adventure like this, wasn’t that kind of like having permission?

  Was I up for an adventure? I didn’t know. Honestly, I hadn’t planned on anything more daring than learning to play shuffleboard.

  I slid off my chair and stood up. Pidge made a “Well?” face at me. I glanced toward the phone on the kitchen wall. I glanced back at Pidge, and the valise of letters at her feet.

  “I just unpacked my bag,” I said. Her mouth sagged downward, and her head started to shake in disgust. “But,” I quickly added, with my best attempt at a brave smile, “it won’t take me long to toss it all back inside.”

  FOUR

  A Joyride with “Snooky”

  After dinner, Pidge made three phone calls. The first was to my house in Burbank, where Julie answered. I could hear her voice percolating even from my spot at the kitchen table, feet away from the telephone. In the background, Sally was whining about something. Then I heard Julie shush her, saying maybe she could talk to me later.

  “We are getting on just fine. Thank you so much for stocking the pantry—that was very kind of you.” A pause, then, “Yes, Beatrice had the noodle casserole and some Jell-O for dinner.” Only the Jell-O part was true. I’d eaten it straight out of the mold with a big serving spoon.

  “Why I called? Oh, to check in and say hello.” Pidge’s response wasn’t very convincing, given how infrequently she had called before I showed up at her house. “Also, after you all left a repairman came about the telephone wires. Apparently, squirrels have been chewing on them outside. They will need to be replaced.” She paused again. “No, there’s nothing you need to do—just letting you know in case you try to call us down here. I wouldn’t want you to worry your pretty little head.”

  I smiled. Dad and Julie had made it seem like Pidge couldn’t take care of herself out in Boston, but she was proving to be pretty capable at everything from sandwich-making to excuse-crafting. Although I did have to help her open the peanut butter jar. “Blasted arthritis,” she’d said, staring at her long, knobby fingers like they were traitors.

  Pidge ended the call before I had to get on the line to talk to Sally or my dad. That was probably for the best, considering. She dialed another number and after a few seconds asked, “Yes, I was wondering if there are any tickets left for a train—the Super Chief, eastbound, departing tomorrow.” A pause. “I see. Only roomettes? No double bedrooms?” Another pause. “Well, I will have to mull that over. Thank you for the information.”

  Pidge hung up the phone, then riffled around in the top kitchen drawer for something. With a quiet “aha!” she pulled out a worn red address book. She licked her index finger and flipped through to the end, then squinted at the page. “Let’s hope this is still right,” she said, before sticking her finger in the dial. She leaned against the wall as we waited for the call to go through. “Cross your fingers, darling.” I did as told, without knowing why.

  Someone picked up. “Neta Snook, please?” A pause. “Oh, of course. Neta Snook Southern.” Another pause, during which she turned to me and said, “I forgot her married name.” Then, with a smile on her face, “Hello, Snooky! It’s a real blast from your past—Muriel Earhart on the line.” I could hear excited noises through the phone. “Yes, yes—it’s so good to hear your voice too. I’m in California, in Sun City, of all places. Say, do you think you could do me a favor? Tomorrow I need a ride to Los Angeles, to the train station. By seven thirty in the evening.” A pause, as she glanced at the wall clock, which showed it was already past nine at night. “I suppose this is short no
tice. But I seem to remember you loved a joyride. Come on, won’t you do an old friend a big favor?” Another pause, then, “Thatagirl!” It occurred to me that Pidge hadn’t mentioned me to this “Snooky” person, but I tried not to let that bother me.

  After Pidge got off the phone, she told me that we’d be heading out around lunchtime tomorrow. “It’s going to be a long trip. So get a good night’s sleep, Beatrice.”

  I headed into the small guest bedroom, where I plopped down on the stiff twin mattress. I was bone-tired, but no matter how hard I squeezed my eyes or how many sheep I counted, sleep wasn’t coming to me. I missed the familiarity of my room. My heart and my mind pulsed. I’d never taken a long train trip before. What was it going to be like? Was Pidge packing food for us, or would there be enough to eat on board? What if I got train sick? Rides at amusement parks—like Disneyland—sometimes made my stomach flip and flop and my head spin. Even the gentler ones. On the way to Pidge’s, after watching Sally scream with joy as she spun around in the Disneyland teacups, I had felt so embarrassed. That was a baby ride, but it still made me feel dizzy.

  And even though I didn’t particularly want to be back in our ranch house in Burbank, I wasn’t sure how I felt about hurtling hundreds of miles away from my dad, Julie, and Sally. I’d only just gotten to Pidge’s—I wished I could settle in before we had to take off, even though I understood why time was of the essence. I reached into my knapsack and pulled out my worry journal, then started scribbling down all the things bouncing around in my head.

  What if we get lost or sick or hurt on the way?

  What if my father and Julie go bananas when they find out?

  What if my mother isn’t that impressed?

  What if I AM the only Earhart who isn’t brave?

  What if Pidge’s whole reuniting-with-Amelia plan is crazy?

  But at the same time, what if it wasn’t and we did find Amelia? I paused to chew on the edge of my pencil.

  What if I like being on an adventure?

  And what if this changes my life?

  If I flipped through my journal, so many of the worries written down would be related to change. I never liked it. From little changes, like switching desks in the classroom, to big changes, like my mother moving out—they all had the same effect, making me feel unbalanced and blue. When the world is full of confusion and conflict, it doesn’t really help for things to be all mixed up at home, too. My worry journal kind of helped me handle my fears, but it didn’t erase those feelings. Sometimes I wished I could freeze everything around me, not forever, but long enough to let myself catch my breath. Especially after Julie and Sally moved in, and I struggled to get a quiet moment alone, except in the bathroom. And even then sometimes one or both would barge in.

  After zipping the journal back inside my knapsack, I turned and shoved my face into the hard pillow, which smelled like dust, and tried to sleep. I imagined flying, up high in the air, like I was in Amelia’s plane. That’s the last thing I remember before Pidge came into the room and started poking me.

  “Rise and shine, Beatrice.” When I didn’t budge, she jabbed harder with her index finger. “Come on. Up and at ’em. We haven’t much time before we have to go. You’re sleeping away the whole morning.”

  I groaned, sitting up. “You told me to get lots of sleep!”

  Pidge was already dressed in fresh clothes. An excited smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “That I did, but you’ve had plenty!”

  My grandmother puttered around the house, making sure the windows were shut and giving extra water to the houseplants that Julie had bought to “spruce up the place.” I don’t know how long they’ll last because she watered the ones in the living room twice—she must’ve forgotten that she’d already doused them. Pidge hummed a song to herself, some jazzy tune. She went into the bathroom and fussed with her thin silvery hair, arranging and rearranging the chignon in a way that she seemed satisfied with, but I couldn’t see any difference between before and after. It was interesting—in all the snapshots I’d ever seen of Pidge, she had long hair. Sometimes pulled up in a ponytail or woven into a braid, and as she got older often pinned into a low bun. But she never cut it short. Otherwise, she and Amelia looked a lot alike. I wondered if Pidge kept her hair long on purpose, to make the sisterly resemblance less uncanny.

  I stayed put on the sofa, nibbling cinnamon toast. Pidge didn’t care if I ate away from the table and without a plate, which was a nice change. Sometimes I felt like Julie was always chasing me around the house with napkins and coasters and doilies for whatever snack I had in hand. She was so particular, unlike my mom. My mother had tried to keep a clean house, but usually lost interest halfway through dusting or vacuuming. I’d find her in the living room, one hand reluctantly pushing the Electrolux and the other turning the pages of a book.

  I fanned myself with a magazine from the coffee table. Sun City was far enough from the coast that it was hot—not surprising, considering sun was in its name. The house had air-conditioning—a big selling point of any old-folks’ community—but Pidge left it off, offering a box fan to cool the room. I sipped some juice and reached for the newspaper on the coffee table. Every column on the front page was full of bad news. The headlines shouted about a jetliner crashing in North Carolina and the aftermath of the riots in Newark. That’s what my mother went to report on. After the riots in Los Angeles two years ago, she’d explained to me that black people were often treated unfairly and had to fight for their rights, for their voices to be heard. “It’s about stopping injustice,” she said. The article about Newark said that twenty-six people had died and a lot of businesses were destroyed. I swallowed hard. Sometimes I just wished the world were better.

  The least scary article was about the hippies up in San Francisco, but even that was laced with worry about the fact that not a lot of the people there had jobs. Which wasn’t true—my mother wasn’t a hippie, but she had been at the Be-In and she had a job, writing about everyone and everything she saw. The last time I spoke with her on the telephone, though, she joked, “I think I might’ve actually seen more reporters from Life and Time than hippies.” She promised to send me a copy of her article once it was finished.

  I set down the paper, trying to blink the headlines out of my mind. Being inside with the news was like wearing too-tight clothing, and I couldn’t breathe deep. I didn’t want to think about the situation that my mom was running off to. I stood up to take my juice outside, and that’s when I noticed the valise of letters, next to Pidge’s armchair. I opened the flap and took out the next one in the stack. Pidge had said I had a right to know what I was getting into, so it was fine for me to read them all. I also figured it made a lot of sense for me to know the instructions from Amelia about where to meet her. Just in case anything happened along the way.

  Holding that and my juice glass, I walked out the front door and sat down on the white bricks of the stoop. I was wearing another shift Julie had picked out, still too short but not as bad as some of the others. Barbara would tell me not to complain about the shortness—she was always begging her mom to let her buy a miniskirt. But I felt exposed. The stoop was hot underneath the backs of my legs. I stared out at the rows of identical pastel ranch houses. Despite all the Sun City ads showing old people golfing, gardening, walking, and happily waving to one another, no one was outside other than me, at least as far as I could see. It was a ghost town. I carefully unfolded the letter.

  December 28, 1943

  My Dear Pidge,

  This whole mess started on this day back in 1920, thanks to ten dollars and a ten-minute flight.

  My life opened up as soon as I went into the air. I wore a helmet, funny-looking goggles, and my best brown-on-brown outfit. (I’m still wearing brown exclusively, thanks to the muddy terrain where I am now.) I was in the front of the biplane, and the pilot was in the back. The forces pinned me in my seat as we took off, but I pushed myself forward to drink in the view. We flew over Los Angeles, the cit
rus groves ringing the city, and then out over the ocean. I could glimpse Catalina Island and sailboats bobbing below me. Heading back toward the city and the mountains beyond, I spotted cars inching below us. They looked like the insects I loved to examine as a child. Our landing was smoother than many rides I’ve had in automobiles. I didn’t want to climb out, but eventually I did, into swirls of dust on the runway. I pulled back the goggles and wiped at my face. I couldn’t find the words to describe my exhilaration. I had just found the love of my life: the feeling of being up in the clear smooth air.

  As soon as we left the ground, I knew I myself had to fly. I’d die if I didn’t.

  (Funny to think of that now, with the whole world believing I died because I did fly.)

  To my surprise, Mother and  Father didn’t object when I told them that next I wanted to learn to fly. Perhaps they knew that I was restless and a bit jealous of you, attending college. Of course, I couldn’t be taught by a man—sharing all those hours in a tight space wouldn’t have been proper. That’s when I found Neta Snook.

  I asked her to teach me, and she said that for a dollar a minute in the air and payment daily, she happily would. Thanks to “Snooky,” a great flier and an even greater friend, I learned to pilot my own life as well as a plane.