Azalea, Unschooled

by Liza Kleinman

  “That’s not it,” Dad told her. “Some kids got in with some spray paint, and we had to do some retouching.”

  Retouching? We’d spent the afternoon in there.

  Mom wasn’t fooled.

  “What do you mean, some kids got in? How do you know it was kids?”

  I didn’t like where this was going. I preferred Dad’s version of the story.

  “Anyway, he didn’t tell you what they spray-painted,” I broke in. I told Mom and Zenith about the jeering messages, the angry red paint.

  “That’s awful,” said Mom. She looked drawn and worried. “Why would someone do that?”

  “It was just someone’s idea of a joke,” Dad said, spooning brown rice onto his plate. “It didn’t mean anything.”

  “Wait a minute,” I said, putting my fork down. “How did they know we were new in town?”

  Somehow I imagined a “they,” not just one person. Maybe they were a sneaky spray-painting gang who moved through the shadows of the city in cartoonish burglar masks, making trouble.

  “Why did it say ‘Go home’ if it was just some random prank?”

  Everyone, even Zenith, looked at Dad, waiting for an explanation.

  “It didn’t mean anything,” he said unconvincingly through a mouthful of rice. He finished chewing and swallowed, then turned to Mom.

  “Weren’t you going to say something?” he asked. “Before we got on this topic?”

  Mom studied Dad for a moment, as though she couldn’t decide whether or not she was ready to move on from the subject of bus vandals. Then her face brightened a little.

  “Yes,” she said. “I have a piece of exciting news.”

  We all leaned forward to hear it.

  “When I was in the supermarket today, I found a lady crying next to the sweet potatoes.”

  No one said anything. Sometimes with Mom, you just had to wait it out.

  “She was having this sort of crisis, and no one else stopped to help her, but I did. I asked her if she needed to talk, and she did, and by the time we finished talking, she felt much better—like she could manage things again.”

  Mom beamed at us, and we glanced uneasily at one another.

  Finally Dad prompted her. “And the exciting part is . . .”

  “The exciting part is that I have decided to make use of the counseling degree I earned many eons ago, and start working with clients again,” Mom said. “Now that the girls are unschooling, they don’t need my time as much as they used to. I can see clients here in the house—just one or two at first, maybe, and then more. I’m going to be a life coach!”

  Zenith dug a little hole in her rice with her fork, like a six-year-old.

  “Don’t you need to be a good swimmer for that?” she asked.

  “Not a lifeguard,” Mom told her, as though Zenith didn’t already know. “A life coach. Someone who helps people strategize for their lives.”

  “This sweet potato lady,” Dad said. “Is she going to be your first client?”

  “Yes!” Mom told us excitedly.

  I knew the rest of us were all thinking the same thing: Mom had a history of getting mixed up in people’s lives and then regretting it. We all remembered Mrs. Briggs, who lived down the road from our orchard in Connecticut. Mom tried to reunite her with her long-lost brother, who turned out to be in prison for something too horrible to say.

  “And how will you help this woman?” Dad asked.

  “She’s going to advise her to stay away from sweet potatoes,” Zenith mumbled.

  Dad laughed. I felt jealous that Zenith had gotten him to laugh, but I didn’t think either of them was being very nice to Mom.

  “Ha ha,” Mom said, not smiling. “The great thing, of course, is that I will be working right here from home. Which means I need everybody to really pitch in to keep the house clean.”

  “How much are you going to charge your clients?” Dad asked. “Will they be paying you in root vegetables?”

  Mom gave him a sharp look and stood up.

  “Help me clear, girls,” she said, and though we weren’t quite finished eating, we did it.

  Later that evening, Zenith and I lay on our beds, reading. Mom and Dad hadn’t said too much after dinner was over, but they weren’t yelling, either, so things probably weren’t too bad.

  I put my book aside so I could think about the tour bus.

  “It was really scary,” I told Zenith. I knew she would know what I was talking about.

  “It was just paint,” Zenith said, not taking her eyes from her book.

  “You weren’t there,” I pointed out. “You don’t know what it’s like to get on a bus and see these giant letters, threatening you.”

  “They didn’t threaten you, exactly,” said Zenith. “They said to go away, but not that anything would happen if you didn’t, right?”

  I opened my mouth in a show of disbelief.

  “Well, what do you think it meant?” I asked. “Go home now, or we’ll throw you a nice party?”

  Zenith pretended to read.

  “Anyway,” I told her, “I’ve been thinking about it. I don’t believe this was just some random prank, like Dad says.”

  I paused, so that Zenith would get the full effect of what was coming next.

  “I think I know who did it.”

  Now I had her attention.

  “Remember what Mom said about Dad’s friend who sold him the bus? How she found out about the unschooling meeting through him, because his niece is an unschooler?”

  “Yeah?” Zenith had a look on her face like I was crazy. Like I was the kind of person you would find weeping in the produce department.

  “I met his niece at the party. Nola? She was that girl dressed completely in pink?”

  “So?”

  “So, she hated me. She’s good friends with that girl, Gabby, and she saw that Gabby and I became friends right away, and she hates me for it. She wouldn’t let me dance with them.”

  Now that I’d said it aloud, it sounded sort of stupid. I was glad I’d left out the part about the Secret Squid Sisters.

  Zenith folded her pillow in half and stuck it behind her head to prop herself up higher.

  “So you think this Nola zipped home from the party, bought some red spray paint—probably because the store was out of pink—asked her mom for a ride to the garage, climbed onto our bus, spray-painted it, and then told her mom she was ready to go home?”

  “Yes,” I said firmly. “That’s what I think. More or less. Unless you have a better theory.”

  “Not a one,” said Zenith, lifting her book in front of her face to signal that the conversation was over.

  But I wasn’t giving up that easily. I wanted this tour bus business of ours to work. I wanted us to finally, finally stay in one place. And if I was unschooling now, that meant I was in charge of what I learned.

  And I planned to learn who vandalized our bus.

  Chapter 4

  Unschool Playground

  A few mornings later, Dad made his famous whole-grain pancakes. I ate many of them, and quickly.

  Gabby and her mother were coming over, and they were going to take me to the park and then back to Gabby’s house. It was my first time getting together with Gabby since we had met at the unschool meeting, and I was sure we were going to be good friends.

  “So, today,” I asked Mom, cramming in a bite of pancake, “are Gabby and I supposed to be playing, or, you know, unschooling?”

  “That’s just it!” Mom said. “There’s no distinction. Or there shouldn’t be. Children learn in all sorts of ways. Playing can be learning, and learning can be playing.”

  “Oh,” I said, pretending that this cleared things right up.

  It didn’t much matter, anyway. Mostly, I just wanted to tell Gabby about the tour bus. I wasn’t sure if I should tell her that I suspected Nola. They were friends, after all, as hard as it was for me to believe. Still, Nola was my number-one suspect, and if she was the guilty party, Gabby would
find out eventually. It might even be an act of kindness to tell her now, rather than later.

  Dad took a final swallow of coffee and pushed his chair back from the table.

  “I’m off,” he said. “I’m doing the first practice run today.” He held up his map of the city.

  A week ago I would have been disappointed that I couldn’t go along, but I was so happy about seeing Gabby that I didn’t care very much.

  “Good luck,” I said. “Don’t get lost!”

  Zenith hit me with one of her famous eye rolls—it was surprising how much contempt she could pack into one—and turned to Mom.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “Of course,” Mom said. She set down her coffee mug and waited.

  “You know how I like math?” Zenith asked.

  “Yes?”

  “I want to go to school to learn it better.”

  Mom sat up straight.

  “I don’t understand. Why would you want to do that?”

  Zenith waved her hands, explaining. “I’m using these books you got me, and they’re not that great. I mean, they’re okay, but I need a person who can explain it to me. Better than you and Dad, I mean,” she added uncharitably. Zenith had long ago surpassed their comfort level with math.

  “I saw online that the high school has summer classes, and I want to take one.”

  Mom put her hands on the table and tried to look reasonable. I knew she didn’t feel that way. Neither Zenith nor I had ever been to school, and Mom thought that was for the best. She had hated school as a kid. She thought the whole idea of it—a bunch of kids being led by a teacher, told what to learn and how to learn it—was all wrong.

  “It would just be one class,” Zenith explained. “I wouldn’t really be in school. I would still be homeschooling. Unschooling.”

  As Mom worked on a response, the doorbell rang. I hopped up and ran to answer the door.

  It was Gabby and Spirit.

  “Come on in!” I yelled, opening the door wide. Gabby rushed in and threw her arms around me.

  “Hey, Squid Sister!” she said. She stepped back, and I said hi to Spirit.

  “Hello, hello!” Spirit said, spreading her arms to include everyone in the room.

  There was something funny about the way she and Gabby looked, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Then I realized: they were wearing matching scarves, large hairy ones swirling with rich shades of blue and purple. It was a bit late in the season for scarves, I thought. Maybe these were more for decoration than bad weather.

  “What beautiful scarves!” Mom said, a step ahead of me.

  “Thank you,” Spirit replied. “We made them ourselves last year.”

  “We had a textile phase,” added Gabby.

  “It’s such a fascinating journey,” murmured Spirit.

  Mom nodded as though she agreed.

  “My journey is going to include a math class at the high school,” Zenith announced. She looked Spirit in the eye and smiled, waiting to see her reaction.

  “My!” Spirit told her. “What an interesting choice. I’m sure it will be eye-opening.”

  She tucked one end of her scarf behind her shoulder.

  “Well, we haven’t quite finished discussing that,” Mom said. “Anyway,” she continued in a loud, bright voice, “it’s wonderful to see you. Would you like to sit down and have some tea before you head out? Coffee?”

  “I wonder what the teacher will be like,” Zenith continued.

  “The coffee is all ready, but I can make some tea in about three seconds.”

  “And the other students,” Zenith said. “I wonder if it will be helpful to have a large group learning at the same time as me.”

  “Or maybe something cold?” Mom went on. “Some iced tea?”

  “You can’t ignore this,” Zenith told her.

  Spirit glided over to Mom and gave her a small, one-armed hug.

  “I’ll have to take a pass on that lovely offer of tea. We have too much learning to do! We’ll just take Azalea and be on our merry way.”

  She headed to the door and Gabby and I, relieved, followed her out into the fresh morning air.

  We slid into the backseat of Spirit’s car and pulled on our seat belts. The car was different from ours. It was very, very clean on the inside. And riding in it felt very smooth and quiet. I wanted to think this over, but Gabby spoke.

  “You know, there are all kinds of ways to unschool. You can tell your mom. It’s not like there’s a rule that Zenith can’t take a class if she wants.”

  “I’ll tell her,” I said. “We’re totally new at this. I think she’s afraid we’re already doing it wrong.”

  “There’s no wrong way, Azalea,” Spirit called from the front seat.

  I tried to think of something to say for an answer, but we’d arrived at the park.

  Spirit pulled the car over in front of the playground and we climbed out.

  “Come on,” Gabby said, and led me down a small hill to the play area. There were no other kids there. Spirit settled herself with a book at a picnic table.

  “Let’s go on this thing.” Gabby climbed up a small staircase. It was on the little structure meant for young children.

  “I think we might be too old for this one,” I said.

  “Only if you accept society’s strict and arbitrary designations for how people of different ages should behave. Explore the world however you see fit, Azalea!”

  She tucked her scarf behind one shoulder, and I realized she was deliberately, accurately imitating Spirit. I laughed, and so did Gabby.

  “She’s right, though,” Gabby continued, her face turning more serious. “I mean, who says eleven-year-olds can’t play on a small slide? Or, for that matter, play in sandboxes, or learn Latin, or design bridges?”

  I lifted my foot to the top of a tiny slide. I felt like a giant. I pulled the other foot up, and stood tall.

  “I don’t think I’d want to cross any bridge designed by me,” I said. “I think I’d rather cross a Zenith bridge.”

  “Come this way!” Gabby said, racing across to another part of the playground and leaping up to grab a horizontal bar. She hung suspended for a minute, and then dropped down.

  I could see she was a little awkward on the bar. I didn’t want to show off, but I couldn’t help myself. I grabbed hold and swung my feet up, then let them drop behind my head. Maybe Gabby knew all about unschooling, and lived in a big house with a yard and had a quiet car, but I was good at gymnastics.

  “Skin the cat,” I explained to Gabby, as the blood rushed to my head. That was the name of the move I was doing. I didn’t know why a perfectly good move had such a disgusting name.

  “Wow,” she said. “I totally cannot do stuff like that.”

  “Sure you can,” I told her. “I’ll show you.”

  Gabby was right, though. She really couldn’t do stuff like that. She struggled for a while, trying to kick her legs backward, until finally she rested, dangling from the bar. I dangled beside her.

  “Don’t worry about it,” I said. “I bet you’ll get better with practice.”

  “That’s what I told myself about modern dance,” Gabby said. “I’ve been doing it for two years and I’m still the worst one in the group!”

  “So why do you do it?”

  “Because I love it!” Gabby said happily. Sunlight streamed down around us, and I decided that if this was unschooling, I liked it.

  Then I remembered about the bus. Here I was, acting like unschooling was one big day at the park, when I was supposed to be solving a mystery. I needed to tell Gabby about the tour bus, and maybe my idea about Nola.

  It was a risk, though, the part about Nola. I didn’t want Gabby to get angry with me. But I also didn’t want Nola ruining our tour bus business so that we had to move away. Maybe Gabby would remember some little thing Nola had said about the bus, some clue that might point to her as the culprit.

  Before I could say anything, though, Gabby dr
opped down off the bar.

  Spirit got up from her bench and walked over to us.

  “Lovely!” she called. “Gabby, this reminds me of how you first learned about gravity!”

  I dropped to the ground and looked at Gabby.

  She shook her head. “Bicycle. Crutches. Don’t ask.”

  A preschooler shot in front of us, the first kid we’d seen at the playground, besides us.

  His mother followed close behind. She looked at us and sized up the situation: two big girls at the playground in the middle of the day.

  “No school today?” the mother asked.

  “We don’t go to school,” Gabby said.

  I glanced at Spirit, who smiled broadly but said nothing.

  “You must be homeschooled,” the mother suggested.

  Her son slid down the tiny slide and threw his arms up in triumph.

  “No,” I told her. “We unschool.”

  I glanced at Spirit, who was still watching us, beaming. She caught my eye and her smile widened. The little boy gave up on the slide and edged over to our bar, stretching his hands toward it.

  The mother still wanted to get to the bottom of this.

  “What does it mean to unschool?” she asked.

  Spirit trilled her fingers at the preschooler, who was looking at her scarf.

  “It means we learn on our own, not in school,” Gabby offered.

  “Oh,” the mother said. “So, homeschooled.”

  She glanced at her son, who had turned to stare at Gabby’s scarf. Gabby held out the end of it for the child to touch.

  “No. Homeschool is a type of school,” I explained to the mother. “Your mom or dad is the teacher, and you do lessons and stuff. Unschool is different.”

  I felt like there was more that I was supposed to say. I pretended I was Gabby, imitating Spirit.

  “It’s a natural, child-driven exploration of the world,” I finished.

  Spirit, watching, gave a tiny nod, and I felt pleased.

  “I see,” said the mother. The little boy took off across the playground, and the mother scooted after him.

  “Bye, girls,” she called. We waved.

  “That was weird,” I said.

  “Get used to it,” Gabby replied.