by Bill Harley
And now they would both be leaving the big house. No more paper airplanes, no more balloons. Darius sighed and trudged up the stairs to his room.
Unable to sleep, Darius slipped into the hallway. The house was quiet. He tiptoed from room to room, counting the good memories about each one, as if each room were a book that held stories. At last, he came to his favorite—the Map Room. Several massive bookcases of rich dark wood were filled with atlases containing maps of every country, every ocean, every city, village, and hamlet ever known, as well as maps of stars, planets, and the moon. Three globes of different sizes stood on stands next to a heavy oak table. Maps covered the walls and the ceiling; someone had even painted a map of South America on the floor. A large grandfather clock in the corner ticked off each second and solemnly chimed every hour.
When Darius’s father was getting ready for a trip, he would call Darius and Miss Hastings into the Map Room, pull an atlas from the shelf, and open it on the table. Then together they would locate his next destination. Darius grew to love maps as much as his father did. The maps were flat and made up only of lines and squiggles and words, but when Darius looked at them he saw forests and oceans and mountains, and even bustling city streets. He liked to imagine that he was flying over the land, looking down at the world below.
“If you can read a map,” said his father, “you’ll never be lost.”
But that night, surrounded by maps and globes, Darius felt very lost. He wondered how he was going to find his way without his father or Miss Hastings.
As if summoned by his thoughts, Miss Hastings came in the room. “There you are, Darius,” she said.
Darius felt unspeakably sad. Miss Hastings walked over to a globe and gave it a spin. As it wobbled and squeaked, Darius closed his eyes and let his finger hover close to the spinning globe. This was a game that he used to play with his father and Miss Hastings, making up stories about where he would go when he was older. When the globe came to a stop, he opened his eyes to see where his finger was pointing.
“Vladivostok!” he said. “I’ll go to Vladivostok!”
“And I’ll go with you!” said Miss Hastings. She always said that.
They smiled at each other, but it wasn’t the same. Darius’s father wasn’t there to make it seem like it really might happen. His father would have said something like this: I have friends in Vladivostok! They have pet wolves! How would you like to play with a pet wolf? They don’t bite!
“Maybe you should pick out a book to take with you to Aunt Inga’s,” said Miss Hastings. “Your favorite map book?”
“I need a map for life,” Darius muttered.
Unfortunately, none of the books on the shelves had one of those.
“You will be fine, Darius,” Miss Hastings said.
Darius looked at her. “But what about you, Miss Hastings? Where will you go?”
“Oh,” she said, “I will find a place. Don’t you worry about me. I have some friends who I think will take me in.”
But Darius was worried. What would she do? Friends were fine, but as far as he knew, she had no family of her own; she’d spent her entire life taking care of the Frobishers.
“Miss Hastings, why didn’t you get married? Why didn’t you have your own kids, instead of just raising my dad and me?”
Miss Hastings slumped down in a chair by the globe. The clock ticked in the stillness.
Darius instantly wished he had kept his mouth shut. “I … I’m sorry,” he stammered. “I just meant …”
“I almost did once,” she said. A distant look came into her eyes, and she began to rub a small charm around her neck. It was a set of tiny silver wings. Even when he was quite young, Darius had noticed that Miss Hastings would reach for them when she seemed to be deep in thought.
“What happened?” Now Darius was too curious to keep his mouth shut.
“It didn’t work out,” she said sadly.
“Why didn’t it work out?” Darius pressed her. “What happened? What was his name?”
“Oh, I don’t want to talk about that,” she said. “It was a long, long time ago, but it still makes me sad. I got mad at him because he did something I didn’t like. I wouldn’t talk to him. And then he wouldn’t talk to me. And then he moved away.”
“Did you ever see him again?” Darius asked.
“No,” she said. “We went on with our lives, and, well, I was raising your father and taking care of the house, and both of us were proud. Too proud.” She was still rubbing the wings.
Darius reached out and touched the charm with his finger. “Are these angel wings?” he asked.
“Oh no, they’re just wings.”
“Where’d you get them?”
“Well,” said Miss Hastings, taking in a breath, “I got them from the person we were just talking about. When he gave them to me he said, ‘Remember, you can fly.’”
“So you still like him.”
“Oh no.” Miss Hastings chuckled. “Nothing like that.”
“Maybe you should look for him,” said Darius.
“I’m afraid it’s too late for that,” said Miss Hastings. “Now I’m just an old woman who throws water balloons and burns toast.”
“That’s why I love you, Miss Hastings,” said Darius. He usually didn’t say things like this, but he was very afraid that he wasn’t going to see her again, and he didn’t want to lose anyone else without telling them how he felt.
“I love you, too, Darius,” Miss Hastings said. She kept rubbing the silver wings.
The next morning Figby, Migby, and Zarnoff drove up bright and early in their shiny black sedan.
I’ll bet I know what you are thinking. You are probably wishing they had never come.
You are probably wishing that they’d had four flat tires and their car was stuck in a ditch somewhere. Permanently.
Or that a pterodactyl had dropped down out of the sky, picked them up, and carried them far away, never to be seen again.
But that would be another story, not this one.
No, I’m afraid they showed up at the front door looking more crow-like than ever before. Miss Hastings was still dressed in her bathrobe and was wearing one sneaker. She looked horrible, and Darius was terribly worried about her.
“Can’t I stay here?” said Darius, hoping the lawyers might change their minds.
“Of course not. Miss Hastings can’t take care of you. She is known for burning toast,” said Figby.
Migby opened up his briefcase and asked Miss Hastings to sign some papers.
“I don’t want to sign them,” she said. “I don’t understand what they say.”
“You wouldn’t understand them anyway, even if we explained them,” said Katrina Zarnoff. “Just sign. It’s what’s best for Darius.”
Miss Hastings was sweet and loving and a wonderful storyteller, but she was not strong. So, she signed the papers.
“Run get your bags,” said Katrina Zarnoff. “We don’t want to be late.”
Darius went upstairs to get his small suitcase. In it he had stuffed his most comfortable clothes and four books. Two were his favorite adventure books, which he had read many times. The third was the old book he had chosen the night before, the one containing small maps of every part of the world. The last was Bullfinch’s Mythology, a book about monsters, gods, and heroes from some other time. His father had read it to him once long ago, although Darius had never read it himself. He didn’t remember the stories as much as he remembered his father’s voice.
Darius would have liked to pack more books, but he knew he couldn’t take everything. He desperately hoped that if he only took one bag there would be room in the trunk of the car for one more thing: the bike his father had given him.
As Darius lugged the suitcase down the stairs, it bumped against every step as if it were trying to stay where it thought it belonged.
Figby led everyone outside and put the suitcase in the trunk of the car. Darius hesitated a moment, then dashed into the garage to
get his bicycle. When he wheeled it out, Figby, Migby, and Zarnoff all frowned.
“No bicycles,” said Figby.
“I have to take my bicycle,” said Darius. “My father gave it to me.”
“No room,” said Migby.
“But it’s the only thing I own that I care about,” Darius moaned.
“You poor dear,” said Zarnoff. “You can get another one … sometime … maybe.”
“Please!” begged Miss Hastings. “You can’t take a bike away from a child who has no parents!”
Figby, Migby, and Zarnoff looked at Miss Hastings like she had just landed in an alien spaceship.
“It’s just a bicycle!” they all said at the same time.
But a bicycle is not just a bicycle when your father gave it to you and then disappeared in a hot air balloon. It is a sad thing that these three grown-ups were too dull and blind to see that. I wish I could change them, but I can only tell this story the way it happened.
And what happened next was that Darius put his bike back in the garage and walked over to give Miss Hastings a hug. All his life, Miss Hastings had been bigger than he was, but as he wrapped his arms around her, he thought she seemed very small. She was crying. After they pulled away from each other, Miss Hastings reached back and undid the clasp of the chain that held the silver wings. She held it out to Darius. “I want you to have this,” she said, blinking the tears from her eyes.
“No,” said Darius, “I can’t. It’s yours.”
“It’s so you’ll remember me.”
“I’ll always remember you!” said Darius.
Miss Hastings put the necklace in his hand and closed his fingers over it.
Darius slid the silver charm into his pocket, then kissed Miss Hastings on the cheek and gave her another tight hug.
“Ahem,” said Figby.
“Ahem,” said Migby.
“I’m sorry, but we’re late,” said Katrina Zarnoff, pulling Darius away. “It’s not good for this poor boy to stay any longer.”
“I’ll write,” called Miss Hastings.
Darius waved one last time before Katrina Zarnoff pushed him into the backseat of the shiny black car. As they drove away, Darius pressed his face against the car window and watched Miss Hastings grow smaller and smaller. When the car turned the corner, the housekeeper and the house disappeared entirely.
“What will happen to her?” he asked.
“She can take care of herself,” said Katrina Zarnoff.
“You’re wrong,” said Darius. “She needs me. And I need her.”
But no one answered, and the car drove on, leaving nearly everything Darius loved behind.
Ahead, unfortunately, was Aunt Inga.
3
Hello, Aunt Inga
Now it is time to say a word or two about Aunt Inga, even though it is an extremely unpleasant task.
Aunt Inga lived by herself in a town half a day away by car. Darius had been to her house a few times when he was very young. He didn’t remember much about the visits except the disagreeable smell of boiled cabbage. Darius had never seen boiled cabbage in the house, which made him wonder if it weren’t Aunt Inga who smelled that way.
The raw truth is that Aunt Inga was a miserable person. She made herself miserable and she made other people miserable, too. In Aunt Inga’s mind, nothing was ever right, everything was always wrong, and things were only going to get worse. Her favorite saying—although she didn’t know it—was, “I just knew that was going to happen.” Aunt Inga always expected the worst, and she was never surprised when bad things occurred.
As great-aunts go, she wasn’t terribly old, but her face was withered and worn. She wore her hair pulled up on top of her head, so her large ears stuck out like two cauliflowers.
So many things irritated her that it was hard to know what Aunt Inga did like. The only thing she didn’t complain about was a special brand of little sandwich sugar cookies that came packed in a small white bag. She especially liked the chocolate filling in the middle. Every afternoon she sat in her overstuffed armchair and watched television while she ate cookies and drank tea. Her guests, on the rare occasions when she had any, had to fend for themselves.
Why was Aunt Inga so unpleasant?
I don’t know.
Her niece, Darius’s mother, hadn’t been like that at all. It doesn’t make much sense, but it’s true. Even in the same family, people can be very different. Maybe, in your family, you are wonderful and perfect, while your brother or sister is the complete opposite. It’s a strange world.
This all explains why Darius got more and more depressed as Figby, Migby, and Zarnoff’s sleek black car carried him closer to his destination.
When they arrived at Aunt Inga’s that afternoon, she was standing on the porch in a boldly flowered pink-and-green housecoat.
Katrina Zarnoff got out of the car and said in a cheery voice, “You must be Darius’s Aunt Inga.”
“I’m afraid so,” Aunt Inga said with a frown.
Darius climbed out of the car. Aunt Inga shook her head as she looked at him. Her thin eyebrows, drawn on with a brown pencil, creased and uncreased. “Going to eat me out of house and home,” she muttered.
“We will send you a check every month for expenses.”
“You think this is just about money?” Aunt Inga groused. “Money’s not enough to make up for all the trouble this will be.”
“No, of course not,” said Katrina Zarnoff.
“Of course not. I never planned on having any children. Didn’t want them. What use do I have for children? Don’t you think I have enough problems already? Don’t you think I have enough on my plate?”
No one responded to her. There were no right answers. Figby, Migby, and Zarnoff handed over Darius and his suitcase as quickly as possible and made their getaway.
“Good luck, Darius,” Katrina Zarnoff chirped as she backed the car out of the driveway.
“Good luck, Darius,” Aunt Inga mimicked in a nasty tone. “I’m the one who needs good luck, and I haven’t had any yet. Not one ounce of it.” She looked Darius up and down disapprovingly. “Well, what am I going to do with you now?”
Darius had left home hours ago. It was now midafternoon and he hadn’t had lunch. His stomach was grumbling and growling.
“Do you think I could have a little lunch?” he asked politely. “We didn’t eat on the trip.”
“I knew it! I just knew it!” Aunt Inga groaned, throwing her arms up in the air. “Hasn’t been here five minutes and wants to eat me out of house and home. Well, you’ll have to wait for dinner. I can’t be preparing you food every half hour. I just won’t do it.”
Darius tried to explain. “I just wanted a little something—”
“I know what you wanted,” Aunt Inga interrupted, shaking her bony finger in Darius’s face. “You wanted to turn my whole life upside down, and you’re going to do it one little snack at a time. Well, nosiree Bob. You’ll just have to wait and eat at suppertime like a normal human being, not like some spoiled little child.”
“I’m not spoiled,” said Darius.
“Oh no? Not spoiled? Of course not! Father running around the planet, bringing you whatever you please. A servant to entertain you whenever you want. Not spoiled? No, spoiled rotten is what you really are! But that’s all going to end here and now. I can’t help that your parents are both gone. But I can help straighten some things out, and you’re about to learn that life is not just about you. Nosiree Bob, I don’t have time to wait on you hand and foot all day.”
Darius stood there, thinking things couldn’t get a whole lot worse.
And just at that moment, Aunt Inga looked up and smiled.
Darius turned to see what she was smiling at. A very large woman as big as a tank was trundling across the street. Riding in circles around her, slouched over a bicycle much too small for him, was a teenage boy. He wore a sour expression on his face.
“Hello, Gertrude,” said Aunt Inga. She grabbed Darius by
the arm and held him out in front of her. “Do you see what I mean?”
The woman looked at Darius and grimaced. “You’re right. He’s not much,” she answered. “He’s not anything at all like my Anthony.” The boy on the bicycle came to a stop beside the woman. She stroked his arm.
“Anthony’s home from military school for the summer,” she purred. “Doesn’t he look wonderful?”
He didn’t look wonderful to Darius. He looked like a mean, pimply, skinny teenage boy hungry to do something horrible to anyone smaller than he was.
“Darius, these are our neighbors, Gertrude Gritbun and her son, Anthony. Say hello to them.”
“Hello,” said Darius.
“He doesn’t look like much to me either, Mother,” Anthony sneered. Little bubbles of drool formed at the edges of his mouth as he spoke. “I’ve learned so much at military school. I’m sure I could teach him a thing or two this summer.”
“Anthony, that’s a wonderful idea,” Aunt Inga said. She poked Darius in the ribs with her elbow. “Don’t you have anything to say to Anthony’s nice offer?”
Darius looked down at the ground. No words would come out of his mouth. Darius was an excellent judge of character—he knew he had been right about Aunt Inga, and he was not impressed with Anthony. What he wanted to say was, “You are both terribly, terribly mean.” But he knew that would not help matters. Instead, he stood there without speaking, staring down at his shoes.
“I just knew it,” Aunt Inga said. “Spoiled and rude, too. Oh, the burdens I have to carry, Gertrude.”
“You poor dear,” said Gertrude Gritbun. “It’s good you’re strong.”
While his mother and Aunt Inga weren’t looking, Anthony rode the front wheel of his bicycle over Darius’s foot.
“Ow,” said Darius. But the two women didn’t seem to notice.
“Yes,” said Aunt Inga, “and it’s the strong that have to suffer. We’ll see if we can’t do something about him, won’t we, Gertrude?”
“We certainly will,” sniffed the stout woman. “Let’s go, Anthony.” As they turned to go, Anthony rode his bicycle over Darius’s foot again and leaned toward him. Darius could smell Anthony’s hot, bad breath as the bigger boy whispered in his ear.
