The Vanderbeekers and the Hidden Garden

by Karina Yan Glaser

  The street outside was dark and quiet. It was the kind of dark and quiet where bad things could happen, things like words being said that could never be taken back or a neighbor dying in a hospital. Oliver sat there so long that the images of the street turned to a blur.

  A rustle of bedsheets and a happy yelp from the other side of the room startled Oliver so much that the chair rolled out from underneath him and he crashed to the ground, his chin hitting the windowsill on the way down.

  “Isa!” Jessie ran over to Oliver’s crumpled body. Then, “Oh,” she said, realizing her misidentification. Her voice turned flat. “It’s you.”

  “Don’t worry; I’m fine,” Oliver retorted, rubbing his chin. “No need to help me up or anything.”

  “Okay,” Jessie said before blinking three times and stumbling back to her bed.

  “What happened?” Hyacinth asked as she and Laney burst into the room, with Franz skidding in behind them. “We heard a crash. Did someone get hurt?”

  “Just me,” Oliver called out from the spot by the window.

  Laney skipped over. “What hurts? Do you want me to kiss it and make it feel better?”

  “No,” Oliver said.

  Jessie sat up in her bed. She looked a lot more awake now. “Why is everyone in my room at eleven thirty-seven p.m.?”

  Laney jumped onto Isa’s bed and rolled around on the fluffy pillow pile. “I’m not tired,” she announced. “I’ve been up for hours. How many dots are on a dice? Why do we call baby cats kittens? What makes a pig’s tail curly?”

  Oliver ignored her. “I’m waiting for Mama. She’s not home yet.”

  Jessie glared at him. “I don’t want you guys in here. I’m trying to sleep.”

  “But you have a window,” Oliver protested.

  “Nope,” Jessie said, grabbing his shoulders and turning him around to face the door. She marched him out into the hallway, then did the same to Hyacinth. Laney was the only one left.

  “Can I sleep in Isa’s bed?” Laney asked, hugging Isa’s one stuffed animal, a fuzzy wombat, close to her heart.

  “Nope, nope, nope,” Jessie replied. She removed the wombat from Laney’s arms and threw it back on Isa’s bed, picked her sister up, carried her out to the hallway, and deposited her next to Oliver, Hyacinth, and Franz. Then the door closed firmly.

  Hyacinth looked at Oliver. “Are you sure Mama’s not home yet?”

  “I’ve been waiting up for her. Papa went to bed an hour ago. I heard him talking to her on the phone. Mr. Jeet is staying in the hospital overnight.” Oliver walked over to the top of the stairs that led down to the ground floor. He sat down on the top step. It had a perfect view of the front door. Laney, Hyacinth, and Franz squeezed onto the step on either side of him, and Oliver was comforted by the company. Tonight was one of those rare nights when he wished he shared a bedroom. He wanted the sounds of someone else in his room.

  “Will Mr. Jeet be okay?” Hyacinth asked Oliver, leaning into him.

  “Of course he’ll be okay,” Oliver said quickly. “Why wouldn’t he?”

  “He looked so sick,” Hyacinth said, putting an arm around Franz and rubbing behind his ear.

  The door to Jessie’s room opened, and Jessie came out. “Now I can’t sleep,” she grumbled. She nudged Laney’s hip with her foot. “Move over.”

  Three

  Laney snuggled closer to Oliver on the step, and Jessie squeezed in between Laney and the handrail. George Washington emerged from the living room and leaped up the stairs, curling his big cat body at Oliver’s feet.

  “So I’ve been thinking,” Jessie started at the same time Oliver said, “Do you think—”

  “You go first,” Jessie and Oliver said in unison.

  Oliver suddenly felt silly. “It’s stupid. Just an idea I had.”

  “There’s no such thing as a dumb idea.” Hyacinth said the phrase exactly the way Miss Josie did.

  Oliver rubbed his eyes. “I don’t know . . . I was just thinking about what Miss Josie said earlier. Maybe we should, I don’t know, do that thing she suggested?”

  There was a long silence.

  “Are you talking about cleaning your room?” Jessie ventured.

  “No, listen,” Oliver said, his words coming out in a jumble. “A garden. That’s what we can do for Miss Josie and Mr. Jeet. Miss Josie never asks for anything, but she’s been hinting about that garden for years. And I know Mr. Jeet misses being outside and seeing his friends. It’s the perfect thing for us to have ready for him when he gets back from the hospital.” Oliver didn’t mention the fear that lodged itself in his brain, the one that said if he gets back from the hospital.

  Oliver waited for his sisters to tell him how brilliant his idea was.

  Hyacinth’s eyes grew round. “I’m not going near that haunted place.”

  “Me neither,” Laney commented. She looked out the darkened windows and shivered. “Plus there’s a sign that says No Pass on there. That means if you pass the gate, you’ll turn into a gremlin.”

  Oliver rolled his eyes. “I’ve never seen a sign there. Anyway, you can’t even read.”

  “I can too!” Laney said. “That’s what it says!”

  Jessie spoke up. “That gate is locked up tight. I doubt the church will let us in. Who knows what’s inside?”

  “Miss Josie can help us convince them. She’s been going to that church for a hundred years,” Oliver said, undeterred.

  “A hundred years?” Hyacinth exclaimed.

  “He’s exaggerating,” Jessie told her. “But she has been going there for a long time.”

  “If we start working on it right away,” Oliver continued, “we can have a big garden extravaganza.” Oliver loved saying the word extravaganza. It was the same word the library used for its annual used-book sale, and rolling the word on his tongue never failed to thrill him. “We can do it in a couple of weeks, the day after Isa gets home!”

  Jessie was still skeptical. “That’s only eighteen days away. Plus, we don’t know anything about gardens.”

  “Mama read The Secret Garden to us,” Oliver said. “Gardening doesn’t sound so hard. Anyways, you’re the science person. A garden is a perfect place to do scientific experimentation, right?”

  “That would be botany, which is not one of my scientific interests,” Jessie pointed out.

  “C’mon, Jessie. Do it for Mr. Jeet and Miss Josie.” Then Oliver then he played his ace: “Stop acting like Herman Huxley.”

  “Herman Huxley!” Jessie exclaimed. Her voice lowered. “How dare you.”

  Oliver bit back a smile. “So? Are we muskrats or men? Wingbats or women? Ravenclaws or Hufflepuffs? Are we doing this or not?”

  Jessie sighed. “You know, that did not even make any sense. But fine. I’ll do it, but only because I love Miss Josie and Mr. Jeet.”

  Oliver looked at Hyacinth and Laney, who looked as if they’d rather face Voldemort than venture into the haunted garden. “So we’re doing this?”

  “Nope, never, no way,” Hyacinth said, burying her face in Franz’s neck.

  Oliver sighed, then looked at Laney. “C’mon, Laney. We’ll have so much fun. We can be just like Mary and Dickon and Colin in The Secret Garden—you love that book. And think of a garden full of fresh food for Paganini!”

  Laney shook her head, her pigtails bouncing across her face. “Paganini doesn’t like gremlins either.”

  * * *

  It wasn’t long before Laney and Hyacinth fell fast asleep, their heads nestled in Jessie’s and Oliver’s laps. After a long period of silence, Oliver sighed three times in a row, glancing at Jessie each time.

  Jessie looked at him. “What’s wrong with you?”

  Oliver hesitated. “I feel bad about what I said to you today,” he finally said.

  Jessie was surprised. Her brother rarely apologized for anything.

  Oliver grimaced. “You know, that thing I said? About Isa having a great time this summer without you?”

  Jessie ra
ised her eyebrows. “Oh, that.”

  “Well, I’m sorry, okay? That wasn’t very nice of me.” Jessie’s mind immediately rewound to April. She remembered sitting around the dinner table while Isa shared the good news about getting accepted to orchestra camp with a full-tuition scholarship. She had waved the acceptance letter in the air and bounced excitedly on her feet, actions that were very out of character for reserved Isa. Mama and Papa were quiet as they reviewed the rest of the paperwork, and Jessie remembered glancing at the bill over their shoulders and seeing that the tuition was paid for but the room and board was not. A week later, Mama had picked up a part-time night job doing some accounting work for the local coffee shop.

  She looked at Oliver. “I’m sorry I compared you to Herman Huxley.”

  Oliver shrugged. “It’s okay.”

  They sat in silence for a long time before Mama returned. She looked as exhausted as Jessie had ever seen her. Her clothes were wrinkled, there was a coffee stain on her shirt, and dark circles hung underneath her eyes. Mama glanced up the stairs and smiled wearily at her kids in pajamas all squeezed together on the top step with Franz and George Washington.

  “He’s doing fine,” Mama said quietly before anyone could say anything. She made her way up the stairs and kissed each of her kids on the cheek. “The doctors are doing a lot of tests. Miss Josie is staying with him tonight. The nurse set up a cot in Mr. Jeet’s room for her.”

  “What happened?” Oliver whispered.

  Mama sat on the next stair down, beside a purring George Washington. “He had another stroke.”

  “Is it affecting his left side again?” Jessie asked.

  “Yes. There was a blood clot that led to a vessel in his brain, which is why he got dizzy and fell. He isn’t talking yet. But he had medical help right away, so that’s really good.”

  “What caused it?” Oliver asked. His voice had none of the confident swagger Jessie was used to hearing from her brother.

  “Oh, lots of things,” Mama said. “He was already at high risk because of his previous stroke. Once he’s out of the hospital, we need to help him get lots of exercise and healthy food, like vegetables and fresh greens. He’s a little too fond of Miss Josie’s fried chicken. I should probably stop bringing him so many cookies.”

  Mama did not look pleased about that development. She believed it was her job to supply everyone in the neighborhood with cookies.

  “When does he come back home?” Jessie asked.

  “The doctor wants Mr. Jeet to have three really good days in a row before he’ll get released. He’ll also need to do physical therapy at the hospital.”

  Oliver moved Hyacinth’s head off his lap and leaned her up against Laney. Jessie watched him get up, edge past Mama and George Washington, and go down the stairs to where a large picture frame hung by the front door. The area inside the frame was painted with chalkboard paint. The Vanderbeekers used it to write reminders and draw pictures. Under the area where Laney had drawn Paganini, Oliver made a chart.

  When he returned to the top of the stairs, he sat in his original spot and fiddled with the hem of his pajama leg. “How is Miss Josie?”

  Mama smiled wearily. “She’s okay. I tried to get her to come home to sleep, but she’s not budging from his side.”

  “Can we call her?” Jessie asked.

  “Maybe tomorrow,” Mama answered. “We’ll see.”

  A door opened down the hallway, and Papa emerged from the darkness in his gray sweatpants and an old college T-shirt full of holes.

  “Why is everyone on the steps?” he asked, squinting.

  Mama stood up. “They were waiting up for me. We’re going to bed.” She picked up a sleeping Laney and went down the hall. “Can you grab Hyacinth?” she asked Papa.

  His grizzly chin brushed against Jessie’s cheek as he leaned over to pick Hyacinth up. “Go to bed now,” he told Oliver and Jessie, then disappeared into Laney and Hyacinth’s room behind Mama.

  Jessie’s body was stiff from sitting on the hard step for so long. She stood up and walked to her bedroom, already looking forward to sinking into her bed. Before she closed the door, she looked back down the hallway and saw her brother’s silhouette. The headlamps of a car going down 141st Street flashed against the walls of the ground floor, and for one split second Jessie could see her brother’s face. He looked wide awake, as if he planned to stay on that top step for a very, very long time.

  Four

  ISA: Why didn’t you tell me Mr. Jeet was sick?

  JESSIE: Who told you?!?

  ISA: I’m coming home right now.

  JESSIE: Oh no, you are not. You need to stay right where you are. He’s fine.

  ISA: Laney told me that he’s in the hospital! Is he dying?

  JESSIE: He’s NOT dying! Do not leave Ferris Lake! It will make him feel worse if you leave now.

  Pause

  ISA: Fine. I won’t come back. But PROMISE to keep me updated.

  JESSIE: I promise.

  ISA: Say this out loud: I promise to keep Isa updated daily about anything that happens at the brownstone on 141st Street.

  Pause

  JESSIE: Okay, I said it. Happy?

  ISA: Yes.

  * * *

  Laney was lying on the fluffy rug in the basement, and Mr. Beiderman was supposed to be giving her a drawing lesson, but instead he was on his phone, talking to someone about saving a building from being torn down. Princess Cutie rested around his neck like a scarf.

  “It has architectural significance,” Mr. Beiderman was saying into the phone, “as well as historical importance. You don’t want to get into another situation like the Dakota Stables. I know you’ve never forgiven yourself for that.”

  When he hung up, Laney had lots of questions. “Who were you talking to? What were you talking about? What are the Dakota Stables?”

  Mr. Beiderman reached up to stroke Princess Cutie’s forehead. “That was an old college friend of mine. She works at the Landmarks Preservation Commission, and she was asking my opinion about a building that’s being considered for landmark status. When a building gets landmark status, that means it can’t be changed without approval. It also means it can’t be torn down.”

  “What about the stables?” Laney asked.

  “The Dakota Stables used to be on Seventy-Fifith Street and Amsterdam, but it was made into a parking garage when horses stopped being the main form of transportation. It was being considered for landmark status when the garage tore down all the historical elements that made it special, so it was no longer worth considering for architectural significance.” He pulled up an old stable photo on his phone and showed it to Laney.

  “I wish there were still horses,” Laney said. “That’s sad about the building. It’s really pretty.”

  Oliver ran down the basement stairs. “Laney! Why are you still in your pajamas? We’ve got to get over to the church!”

  Laney looked up at her brother as she bit into a green breakfast cookie her mom had given her. Mama had experimented with adding spinach to her cookies this morning, and Laney had collected a whole pile of them. Each one of her siblings had given her theirs, which had never happened before. Laney loved green things: shamrocks, those lamb’s ear plants that were as soft as Paganini’s nose, and green M&M’s, which Papa insisted were lucky. Laney had been saving green M&M’s in a small jar since school had ended last week; she was very good at persuading her family to give the green ones to her.

  Jessie came down the stairs behind Oliver. “I think we should wait until ten o’clock.”

  “I’m not going,” Laney announced. “I don’t wanna be turned into a gremlin.”

  Papa had just read Laney a book called The Gremlins by Roald Dahl. Gremlins were little, about as tall as Paganini when he stood up on his hind legs, and had horns coming out of their heads. They were known to be Up To No Good, and Laney did not want to meet one.

  “You’re not going to be turned into a gremlin,” Oliver said impatiently
. He was tugging at his hair; Laney knew he did that when he was stressed. He had yanked out a whole hunk of hair once when Mama accidentally washed his favorite white basketball jersey with Laney’s flamingo Halloween costume and turned the jersey bright pink.

  Hyacinth came down the stairs next, trailing a rope of yarn behind her. “I’m not going either. I don’t want those vines to grab me.”

  “The garden is not haunted!” Oliver shouted. Then he took a deep breath and looked at his watch again. “The church should be open now, right?”

  Mr. Beiderman interjected. “Why is it so important to get there early?”

  “You know how Miss Josie always talks about making that empty land next to the church into a garden?” Oliver said. “It’s been abandoned for years, so we thought we’d try to do something to it. We just need their permission.”

  Mr. Beiderman’s face paled, and he abruptly stood up, turned away from the kids, and stomped up the stairs, disappearing from sight.

  “Mr. Beiderman!” Laney called out. “I thought you were going to give me a drawing lesson!”

  The Vanderbeekers looked at one another.

  “His face looked like Mama’s when she sees a mouse,” Laney reported.

  At the sound of the word “mouse,” Franz pricked up his ears.