More New Housemates
When I open my eyes on Monday morning, the first thing I see is Coral, already up, drinking her green tea across the living room. Seeing her there on the futon couch makes me think of when I was little, when she would wait for me to wake up. She’d beam her morning smile at me, and I’d crawl off my floor futon and into her lap, where I’d sniff her green-tea-and-flax smell. She’d sing me her corny songs about saving the earth and planting gardens, and I’d sing with her, giggling when she’d break into her animal chirpings and howls. But that was before I knew about naked bike riding, and drumming circles, and laughter therapy. Before I became Bongo Girl and Kalebrains and discovered all the things I was missing, the things that most kids my age had, like TVs in their homes and their own bedrooms and cars to ride in and computers.
“MacKenna! You’re awake. Today’s such a big day. Don’t worry about the chickens and eggs, Hank and Coho got up very early, and they handled it.”
I don’t like the way she’s looking at me, with that eyebrow-to-eyebrow grin on her face, like she really might burst into a Save-the-Earth song. “What’s going on?”
“It’s our summer plan reveal day. You’re going to be so surprised.”
I rub my eyes. I didn’t sleep well last night. All I could think about was that there are six days left to find seven clues. That’s approximately twenty hours per clue. My only focus for today is finding the smoothie cart so I can get the fourth clue.
“I really don’t want to be surprised. Please just tell me.”
“I can’t. I promised Hank. They should be back in less than an hour.” Coral continues to smile at me and sip her tea. “Let’s converse about your research. Tell me how it’s going.” She pats the futon, inviting me to sit next to her.
I straighten my bedsheets, pulling them tight. Coral is cramping my morning routine, but I ask, “Have you ever seen that guy who has the moving smoothie cart? He rides his bike around with the trailer and stops to sell the smoothies?”
“Yes, I have. It’s a fantastic environmentally sound business model, don’t you think?”
“I guess so.” I reach into my dresser basket for clean clothes. “I’m trying to find him today.”
“I have a friend in my bicycling club who knows him,” Coral says.
The shirt falls from my hand. “You do?”
Coral nods.
“Do you think your friend knows the smoothie guy’s schedule, like where he sets up his cart every day?”
Coral looks at me carefully, probably sizing up my rare enthusiasm. “I’ll see Marshaun on Saturday at the big bike ride. I can ask.”
Saturday?
I can’t wait that long. The hunt ends on Saturday. I need to find Smoothie Guy immediately, preferably in the next twenty hours.
“Can you call or text him and ask today?”
“Oh. I suppose, but I don’t know where I put my phone.”
I get up and go into the bathroom, and return with Coral’s phone, flipping it open and holding it out to her.
“You’re serious about your research, aren’t you?”
“Very.”
“Hank and I are so proud of your community spirit. You’re becoming just like that wonderful Joey Marino.” Coral stands up and hugs me.
A bubble of air lodges in my lungs. Coral’s not hugging me, the real Mac. Once again, she’s hugging who she wants me to be. This hunt has nothing to do with Hank and Coral’s community spirit. I glance at my coding poster above my island. Girls Are Supercoders. That’s my community spirit. That’s why I’m doing this hunt.
I pull out of her arms. “So, you’ll ask your friend today about the smoothie guy?”
“Yes.”
I return to the bathroom to dress and braid my hair when I hear Hank’s voice. “Coral, Mac! Come outside! They’re here.”
Coral lets out a squeal. I finish tying the hair band at the end of my braid, and I walk warily through the kitchen and out into the backyard where I see . . .
“GOATS!”
Coral throws her hands up and dashes toward one of the creatures, but it darts away from her, jumping in little circles.
“Whoa,” Coho says. “We all need to be chill right now while these little nannies acclimate.”
“Oh, Hank, Coho, they are so cute.” Coral claps her hands.
“What are you thinking?” I back up toward the kitchen door.
“Goat yoga. That’s what we’re thinking. It’s our new addition to the festival this year,” Hank answers. “Coho helped us get these beauties. He met a farmer just out on Foster Road where his new land is, and we biked out and picked them up this morning. All three fit in our bike trailers plus a bail of timothy hay.”
Coral inches toward one of the goats. It’s brownish with some white patches around its face. “See why we needed the fence, MacKenna? We can’t have these precious girls eating my vegetables.” She reaches a hand out slowly and touches the animal’s back.
“You. Can’t. Have. Goats,” I say. “We don’t live on a farm. We don’t even live in the country. This is an inner-city neighborhood. There. Are. Restrictions.”
“Mac.” Hank moves toward me and sets his hands on my shoulders, attempting to calm me down. “We’re only keeping them for two weeks. One week to get to know us all, and one week for the festival.”
“But . . . do you even know anything about goats?”
“Coho knows a little,” Hank says.
“He does?”
What could a former information technology professional possibly know about goats?
“These are Nigerian Dwarf goats,” Coho states. He points to the brown animal that Coral is now petting and kissing on the ears. “That’s Ziggy, and the other brown one is Marley. The gray one with the white belly patches is Emmylou. They’re all just over a year old.”
“Goat yoga is popular now,” Hank says. “I’ve been dying to try it.”
“It’s weird,” I add. “No. It’s worse than weird because you’re breaking city rules!” A scream wells up inside my chest like a balloon about to burst.
“They say goats enhance your yoga experience,” Coho says. “Their presence and natural curiosity emits a calm energy, allowing you to hold the asanas and breathe.”
“They could pee on you! That’s gross.”
Emmylou hops up onto a lawn chair and then pops right onto Coral’s planting table against the side of the house. The Ziggy-Marley twins bounce over to me, but I back away. I will not pet these goats. I don’t want them here. They shouldn’t be here at all.
“I’m not taking care of them,” I say. Ziggy and Marley continue to pursue me. I’m walking in circles to keep them away.
Emmylou jumps off the table, knocking three of Coral’s pots onto the grass. The terra-cotta breaks into pieces, but Emmylou just prances toward Ziggy and Marley, and they all tail me now.
“They like you, Mac,” Coho says. “See how naturally curious they are?”
“Well, I don’t like them or their natural curiosity.” I stretch out my palms, frantically attempting to push them away.
“They perceive your energy. Use eye blinking to calm them,” Coho tells me.
“What are you talking about?!”
“Eye blinking, Mac,” Coho instructs again. He steps toward me and quietly squats down near the trio of goats. Emmylou drops some poop pellets right in the middle of the lawn.
Gross!
“I’m not taking care of them,” I repeat. “I have my food cart research, remember?”
I spin away and open the back door to escape to my island.
If only I could completely escape.
Chapter Sixteen
Never Enough Money
I flop down on my belly, my face into my pillow.
Yoga goats.
Brie would tell me to relax and brush it off.
Willa would tell me to stand up and dance because dancing makes everything better.
They have no idea.
I can’t just dan
ce away or brush off Hank and Coral’s weirdness. It won’t ever go away. What will my classmates think now? I’ll be Goat Girl . . . or worse.
I bang my forehead into my pillow again and again.
“MacKenna?” Coral whispers. “We should have asked you first about the goats. Hank and I are remorseful for that, but we’re hopeful that you’ll bond with them.”
She speaks sincerely, but I keep my face on my pillow and don’t answer or forgive.
“Well, I’m going to help spread some of the hay for them, but I want you to know that I heard back from my friend Marshaun. He told me his smoothie cart friend is going to be at the zoo today.”
I lift my head and see Coral wave before she leaves the living room.
The smoothie cart is at the zoo! That means the fourth clue is at the zoo!
I tap out a text to Willa and Brie right away.
Brie responds first: Got a doctor’s appointment after swim practice. Maybe tomorrow.
I can’t wait until tomorrow. Smoothie Guy won’t be at the zoo tomorrow.
A few minutes later, my phone buzzes again. It’s Willa: Can’t today. Stuff is happening.
What stuff could be happening? What good are teammates if they never show up for the big game?
I’ll just have to go on my own. I’ll bus downtown to the MAX station and take the train to the zoo. I pull out my hunt folder, looking at my three clues. Without Willa and Brie, I’ll have to pay for the smoothie on my own. I don’t know how much it will cost. Maybe five dollars? Maybe as much as eight dollars. After sharing the tagine, I only have $11.10 left.
And then I realize something else. I’m going to have to pay for admission to the zoo to get this clue.
That’s twelve dollars and ninety-five cents!
Why do things have to cost so much?
I head back to the kitchen to find some breakfast, hoping food will give me ideas. The morning eggs are still on the counter in the basket, so I put them in the refrigerator and grab the carton of soy milk.
Out the window, I watch my parents and Coho and the three new housemates. All the goats are now standing on Coral’s planting table. Coho’s trying to coax the animals down, probably with his eye blinking, but Ziggy and Marley and Emmylou don’t seem to want to move anymore.
They can stay on top of that table the whole two weeks as far as I’m concerned.
Coho’s duffel bag sits on top of the kitchen table, unzipped with a couple of shirts hanging out. I shove it aside to make room for my breakfast when I see a wallet.
I stare at it. Thinking. Wondering.
Outside, Hank drops the hay bale next to the new fence they built. The goats are still on Coral’s table.
I look at the wallet again . . . and touch it. It’s old leather and very soft.
Outside Coho’s back is turned. He’s helping Hank rake the hay now, spreading it over the grass.
I pull his wallet out of his bag and open it, slowly. There’s a library card, a couple of credit cards, and a driver’s license for the state of California. And tucked in the length of the wallet are some bills. Lots of bills. Sifting through them, I count six ones, three fives, three tens, and two twenties. Ninety-one dollars touching my fingertips. No coins, just crisp, green, American bills.
No. This is wrong.
I shouldn’t be touching this.
I toss the wallet back in his bag and look out the window again.
Coho continues to rake. The bale of hay grows smaller as he spreads it out across the grass. I was counting on cousin James, I mean Coho, to help me. He was supposed to be my ticket to the computer camp, my ticket to becoming a supercoder. But he’s nothing like he used to be. He brought us a mean, hand-stabbing, Rhode Island Red chicken. He goes biking naked with Coral. He sleeps in their bed, eats our food, plays his guitar, sings horribly, and now he brings in three yoga goats.
Doesn’t he owe us for our hospitality?
I grab the wallet again and count his bills. It would be so easy to slip a few out. I wonder if he even knows exactly how much he has.
I slide out one ten and three ones, then tuck the others back neatly.
Thirteen dollars right here in my palm.
This is so wrong.
So wrong.
So wrong.
But, yet . . . it’s only thirteen dollars. It’s not like I’m taking all his money. It’s kind of just a tiny loan to get me by, just so I can enter the zoo. I’m going to use my coins to buy the smoothie, to receive the next clue, to continue the hunt, to find the remaining clues, to win the grand prize, to go to computer camp, to . . . be a supercoder.
I fold Coho’s bills and shove them into my pocket.
This is wrong, wrong, wrong.
But I’ll pay the goat man back, after I win.
I will.
Chapter Seventeen
The Bus Ride
By the time I hop on the bus to head downtown it’s nearly ten in the morning. I find a seat near the back and fold my shoulder bag with my hunt folder, coins, and flipper phone on my lap. I reach into the front pocket of my jeans for about the hundredth time to assure myself that I still have the thirteen dollars I stole to get into the zoo. Coho’s money gnaws on my mind—have I turned into Hippie Thief Chick? I keep reminding myself that I’ll pay it back, just as soon as I win the prize money. I only need five hundred dollars for coding camp. I’ll have plenty to spare.
I close my eyes and try to focus on the hunt and the clues, not the stolen money or the goats or any of the other daily weirdness.
I sense motion next to me as someone sits down, but my eyes stay closed, still attempting to focus.
Three clues. The fourth to come. Six to go.
Coho won’t notice the money missing. Will he?
Does your head ache, or is it your feet?
If Coho does notice, will he say anything to Hank and Coral?
The sunshine tropics will be felt in your seat.
The next clue is so close.
The bus brakes squeal as it slows for a stop. My eyes open and, “AHH!” I startle, slapping my hands onto my bag so it doesn’t fall to the bus floor.
Sitting at my side is Joey Marino.
“Sorry!” Joey scoots away from me just a smidge. “I—I didn’t mean to scare you.”
I pull my bag into my belly. “What are you doing here?”
Joey doesn’t answer me right away. He fidgets and swallows. “Um . . . I’m riding the bus?”
Uh-huh. Right. I happen to know that the statistical probability of running into the exact same person three times in four days in a city of more than six hundred thousand people is extremely low.
I clutch my shoulder bag. “Where are you going?”
Joey clears his throat. “Downtown.”
The sound of his voice surprises me again, the lowness, the softness.
“Where are you going?” he asks.
“To the—” But I stop myself before revealing the truth, because Joey is in this hunt too. He has at least two clues. He’s my competition. I should be careful.
“Downtown,” I say.
He just nods.
The bus rumbles over the Hawthorne Bridge.
Joey begins pulling items out of his backpack, and I observe his every move, pretending to be looking straight ahead. First, he takes out a granola bar, then a bottle of water, then a brown wool scarf, which he rolls into a tidy spiral. He grabs some change, appears to count it (three dollars in quarters, I quickly calculate), then slips the coins into a side pocket. He reaches deep into the pack and pulls out more quarters (five, I think). His backpack is seemingly bottomless. He takes out a T-shirt and folds it, then a paperback book called The Bluest Eye, and finally some more coins, dimes and nickels.
The bus squeals to a stop at 6th and Main just as every item is returned to Joey’s pack.
I stand, and Joey rises, letting me pass, then he gets off the bus after me.
I make my way down the street toward Pioneer Place and the MAX
train stop that will take me out to the zoo. I don’t look to see if Joey is following me, but I sense that he is.
Two blocks later, I’m in front of the stop.
Joey is too.
There’s a teen leaning against a trash can. Her hair falls across her face. Her arm has a tattoo of an alligator with a tail that wraps around her bicep. I wonder if she’s homeless.
Joey and the teen make eye contact. The teen motions with her head across 5th Avenue. Joey looks in that direction, and then he crosses the street.
I start to move too, but I catch myself and stop. What am I doing? I’m not following Joey Marino.
All I’m doing is waiting for the train.
To go to the zoo. To find the smoothie cart. To get the next clue.
But I can’t help watching him.
He walks toward someone who’s leaning against the brick wall of a bank. It’s a woman in a heavy wool jacket. Her head is hunched over, and she seems to be quivering, looking in all directions, like every movement catches her attention for nanoseconds of time.
Joey steps closer to her. I step closer to the edge of the sidewalk to see better.
Joey approaches the woman with a hand stretched forward. It seems like he says something to her, then he reaches into his backpack and hands her the book, The Bluest Eye.
He’s a—a librarian for the homeless? Is this his newest community project? Coral would eat this up.
Then, surprisingly, the woman reaches for Joey and grabs his shoulders, pulling him toward her. Joey’s arms flare out, like he’s startled, like I would be if some strange person suddenly grabbed me.
Is he okay? My heartbeat sprints. Should I do something?
Without another thought, I bolt across 5th Avenue, ignoring the Do Not Cross sign, knowing there’s just enough time before the lines of traffic move.
“Joey!” I yell, paying no attention to the fact that his hands are now touching the woman’s coat.
Joey flinches when he hears my voice. I’m only four feet from him now. The woman still holds his shoulders.
“Hey!” I holler again. “Let him go!”
The woman lets Joey go, but she looks piercingly at me, and I shiver.
I can’t read her eyes, but I see that they’re stonelike gray.
Worse Than Weird Page 7
