Franny Parker Read online

  “Better keep the water buckets full,” Dad told Ben and me. “It’s gonna be another scorcher.” He set the Monday paper on the table, gulped his coffee, and kissed us all goodbye. “Try to stay cool. I’ll see you after work.”

  “Well, don’t count on me to fill buckets,” Sidda informed us. “I’m meeting Marilee at the pool. We have to get there early to get the good lounge chairs.” Sidda had been in a foul mood all weekend, on account of the crickets. Now she wanted even less to do with Ben and me, or the animals.

  “Drop your brother off at camp?” Mama asked, clearing the dishes.

  “But it doesn’t start until nine!” Sidda argued.

  “Perfect!” cheered Ben. “I’ll have time for a swim.”

  “But, Mom . . .” Sidda complained, her blue eyes wide with offense.

  “Or,” Mama continued, “you could always help out here.”

  Sidda huffed away from the table, snatching her beach bag from the closet. “He’s got five minutes,” she said, slamming the screen door. “And don’t even think about bringing those turtles!” she yelled toward his room.

  After I’d filled Snort’s water trough and watered all the animal patients, I found Mama seated at her art desk in the family room. She rifled through her paintbrushes, a small can of red paint in one hand.

  “Working on your portrait?” I asked, glancing at the woman on the easel.

  “Nope, working on the mailbox today. Grandma Rae suggested a new coat of paint. Says it’s so faded she can’t read our name anymore.”

  I rolled my eyes. “We wouldn’t want Grandma Rae to go to the wrong house.”

  Mama smiled. “Come help, so we’ll be sure she doesn’t.”

  I sat on a patch of dry grass at the end of our driveway, watching Mama swirl the red letters of our name, “Parker,” the “P” large and cheerfully potbellied. As bossy as Grandma Rae was, I had to admit it looked real nice when Mama finished.

  “What about Lindy’s?” I asked, looking over at the Dunns’ plain black box.

  “Mmm,” Mama said, examining the box. “It does look a bit dark and serious.” In no time she’d spelled out “DUNN” in large block letters, adding a little flower at the end.

  “Much more handsome,” she said with a laugh.

  “Dashing!” I agreed.

  “Excuse me.” It was Lindy, hurrying out to the road. “What are you doing?”

  “Oh, hi,” Mama said. “We were sprucing up our mailbox. Figured we’d do yours, too. You don’t mind, do you?”

  Lindy forced a smile, but it was an uncomfortable one.

  “Oh, you don’t need to bother,” she said, stuffing her hands awkwardly in her back pockets. I looked at Mama.

  “It’s no bother,” Mama said. We stared at the new box, still wet with fresh paint. “I’m sorry,” Mama added suddenly. “I should’ve asked you first.”

  Lindy shook her head. “No, no, it’s real nice. It is. I just hadn’t planned on putting our name on it. Out here for everyone to see.” She looked around nervously.

  “I can change it if you like,” Mama said, holding up her brush.

  Lindy sighed, then shook her head. “No, no, it’s okay. I guess I’m being silly. I should be thanking you.”

  “You sure?” Mama asked. Now she looked as uncomfortable as Lindy.

  “I’m sure,” Lindy said with a nod. “Now, how about some iced tea? You girls must be hot.”

  Mama accepted, clearly relieved, and they headed off to the cabin.

  “You coming, Franny?” they called.

  “Right behind you,” I answered. But instead I studied Lindy’s mailbox. The letters were straight and sharp, pleasing to look at. What didn’t she like about it?

  Plentiful Seasons

  Afternoons were the worst. There just wasn’t any escape from the heat. The animals drank up the water as fast as we could drain it from the barn pump. I put my lips to the nozzle, gratefully swallowing the cold water that came from the deep dark ground. Jax wiggled between my knees, his pink tongue lapping at the faucet. Suddenly he turned, and a deep woof worked its way up from his throat. I turned, too.

  “Is the doctor in?” Lucas Dunn leaned against the door as if he’d been doing it all summer. Jax wagged right up to him, slobbering away at his open hands.

  “Hey!” Ben waved. “Where you been all week?”

  I’d been wondering the same thing. It was Wednesday afternoon, and we hadn’t had a visit from Lucas since the pancake incident over the weekend.

  “Been working,” Lucas said. “Got me a job down at Harland’s Market.”

  So that’s where he was.

  “Well, come see Speed Bump,” Ben said. “She’s almost fixed.”

  Lucas followed him into the stall. “Nice work, guys.” He ran his hand gently over the tape, tracing the rough surface of her shell, his fingers following the patterns and grooves. “Do you ever wonder if turtle shells are anything like fingerprints? You know, how no two are ever alike?”

  “Like snowflakes!” Ben shouted, growing excited.

  “Yeah. They tell a story,” Lucas said.

  “What about rings on a tree?” I wondered out loud. Lucas looked over the stall door at me, and our eyes locked.

  “What about them?” he asked.

  “Well, rings on a tree tell a story,” I explained. “They tell you about its seasons, if they’ve been plentiful or not. The rings show how much water the tree’s had, how much nourishment, that sort of thing.”

  Lucas gazed past me for a minute, nodding thoughtfully at the hills beyond the barn. I began to feel uncomfortable, like maybe I’d said something silly, but he smiled at me.

  “Plentiful seasons,” he finally said. “I like that.”

  Lucas stayed through the afternoon, scrubbing buckets and cleaning out cages. He answered every one of the hundred questions Ben threw at him, from what armadillos eat for breakfast to where stars go when they fall. I wasn’t so sure about his answers, but he never lost patience, or told Ben to stop. I realized I liked him best for some of the things he didn’t do.

  When the work was done, Ben went inside to cool off and Lucas and I plopped ourselves on the edge of a hay bale, sinking gratefully against the wall. Jax settled at our feet, resting his chin quietly on his paws. The scent of dry grass rose into the air around us. It was sweet and dusty, like the day.

  “Oklahoma always this hot?” he asked.

  I’d forgotten he was still a newcomer.

  “Hotter than a flapjack,” I said, borrowing Izzy’s line. “We sure need rain.” We sat like that awhile, Lucas chewing on a piece of hay, me counting the wild beats of my heart, hoping Sidda wouldn’t spy us from the window, or Mama call for dinner just yet.

  “What do your rings say?” he asked, reaching suddenly for my hand.

  “What?” It startled me when he wrapped his fingers around my wrist, turning my palm up so he could see it.

  “The lines on your hand. What do they say about your seasons?”

  I thought about the old elm tree outside my window, how it creaked on windy nights all year long. About Speed Bump’s rough shell, marked by turtle seasons; laying eggs, having babies, hibernating. And the rings of my life: Mama and Daddy, Ben, Sidda, and Grandma Rae, the farm, this dusty little town. All of it rising inside me over the years, so familiar, yet as new and strange to Lucas as he was to me.

  Lucas’s fingers were cool against the heat of my hand, and he moved them gently over my palm as he studied it. I tilted my head and took him in. His hair, the same color as the hay we sat on, his skin freckled and brown. He smelled like summer, like grass and sun and earth.

  “What does it say?” I whispered.

  “Well, for starters it says you’ve had plentiful seasons. Good family. Great dog.” He nudged Jax with his toe. “And you’re at home in the outdoors. You’re no scaredy-cat.”

  “I’m not?” This surprised me, my heart pounding harder in my chest, as if to say, “Oh, if you only knew the
truth!”

  “No scaredy-cat I know would run a hospital for wild animals!” he said, motioning to the cages and stalls.

  I smiled proudly and withdrew my hand reluctantly from his. “What about yours?” I asked, feeling brave.

  He hesitated, but let me take his hand. “So?” He raised his eyebrows playfully.

  “Hmm, it says you also like animals. And the outdoors. That you come from lots of places. And a nice family.”

  At this he pulled his hand back.

  “What?” I’d said something wrong.

  “Nothing,” he muttered, his hand twisting in his lap. He turned to me. His face was so close to mine that our noses almost touched. “You’re wrong about something.”

  “What part?”

  “The family part. My family, well, it’s different from yours.”

  “But your mom is great,” I said.

  He nodded. “Yeah, I know. It’s just that my seasons haven’t been so plentiful.”

  “You mean your dad?”

  He looked away. “I don’t have a dad,” he said firmly. “He’s dead.”

  Neither of us said anything for a long time. We just sat in the doorway of the barn, letting the heat press lazily against us. The barn felt both peaceful and sad, the animals in their stalls with no mothers, Lucas sitting on the hay with no father. He sighed before covering my hand with his.

  “I’m just glad to know you, Franny.” He looked at me hard, his eyes like the river outside the barn, watery and hopeful.

  “Dinner!” Mama yelled from the porch. I jumped then, reclaiming my hand, stuffing it nervously in my pocket. Lucas hopped up, dusting himself off, and we hurried out of the barn. We walked together partway up the yard, to where the path split just beyond the garden, returning us both home. Him to his quiet little cabin, me to the busy farmhouse, the coiled rings of my plentiful seasons turning noisily inside me.

  Invitation

  The kitchen table was a mess of purple tissue paper and sparkly stationery when I headed in for dinner. I’d brought in the box of baby mice to show Mama, but from the looks of Sidda’s project there wasn’t a sparkle-free space to put them.

  “Marilee turns fourteen next Saturday,” Sidda announced. “And I’ve been elected her official party planner.” She licked an envelope dramatically and sealed it with a kiss.

  “Birthday cake!” Ben whooped, punching the air with his fist.

  “You,” Sidda told him, pausing to lick another envelope, “are not invited.”

  “Aww, Mom,” Ben wailed.

  I picked up a purple invitation.

  “No rodent fingers on the cards, please,” Sidda said, snapping the card out of my hand.

  I stuck out my tongue.

  “Sidda, perhaps you can move your work off the table so Franny and Ben can set it,” Mama suggested, putting salad fixings on the counter. “How’re the patients?” she asked me, pointing at the mouse box.

  I set it on the counter and opened the lid so she could peek. The five babies stirred in their sleep, their little pink paws stretching. The littlest guy in the bunch yawned.

  Mama beamed at me. “Wow, their fur coats have come in, Franny. Well done!” She was right, the mice looked great. But one was smaller than the rest. Ben called him Runty.

  “I’m worried about Runty,” I told her.

  Mama nodded. “I know, honey. Mice are hard. He just needs a little extra attention.”

  Runty may have been the smallest, but he had become my favorite. I picked him up and settled him in the front pocket of my shirt. I could feel his tiny mouse warmth as he curled up to sleep.

  “Hey, Mom,” Sidda interrupted. “What’s the Dunns’ address?”

  “Number four, I think.”

  “Why do you want it?” I asked, turning to look at her.

  “Because we’re inviting him to the party,” Sidda said, inspecting her list and checking off Lucas’s name with a flourish.

  “But you barely know him!” I said.

  Sidda dismissed this. “We’ll be in the same class at school.”

  “Oh, I think it’s a nice idea,” Mama said. “Introduce him to some new people.”

  “Besides,” Sidda said, “just because he likes your animals doesn’t mean he’s your friend. He’s only being polite.”

  “Now, Sidda,” Mama scolded, pointing a cucumber at her.

  I was not prepared for the lump in my throat that came with Sidda’s words. Suddenly I wanted to grab her invitations and tear them up. Instead, I turned away, pretending to busy myself with the mice. Sidda was wrong. Lucas was my friend.

  After dinner, Mama found me at the kitchen stove. The mouse formula was just warming, and I stirred it lazily around the pan as Runty slept on in my pocket.

  Mama sat down and studied me carefully. “You look tired,” she said, pulling me gently onto her lap. It was something she did often with Ben, something I was embarrassed to admit I still longed for myself. I folded into her arms and closed my eyes. “Why don’t you let Daddy and me do the late shift tonight?”

  “But you said it was my job.”

  “I know, but everyone needs a rest now and then.”

  I thought about that, about how tired Mama herself looked some mornings, rushing around the house, her hands always full with breakfast plates or backpacks or bills. When was the last time I’d offered to help her?

  “You don’t mind?” I asked, getting up to take the formula off the stove.

  “I like those furry critters as much as you do,” she said.

  “Maybe one night off would be good. I’ll do it tomorrow,” I promised her.

  “I know you will. Go tuck them in, then get yourself to bed.”

  I grabbed the formula bottles and was halfway out the door when Sidda caught me.

  “Pop these in the mailbox for me, will you?” she asked, her hands full of the party invitations.

  I nodded and stuffed them under my arm.

  “And don’t spill any rodent food on them!”

  At the mailbox I sorted through the stack of purple envelopes, holding each one up to the faded light from the porch so I could read the addresses. Lucas’s was almost on the bottom. It looked like the others. I held it a long time before I lifted the red flag of the mailbox and stuffed the envelopes inside. All except one. I tucked Lucas’s safely in my back pocket. I didn’t plan to keep it. Not really. I needed more time to think about it. It wasn’t just a party, after all. Once Lucas started hanging around with Sidda and the others, would he still be my friend?

  After all, Lucas’s mailbox was right there next to my own. I could just pop it in when I was ready. The other invitations would take at least a day or two to get to everyone. And I’d be saving the mailman a delivery.

  With that decided, I slapped our mailbox shut. It was then that I noticed the Dunns’. Their box was black. Plain black. The letters of their name were washed clean away, Mama’s red handiwork just a faint smear on its side.

  The New Member

  Lindy was a real hit with the Busy Bees that Friday, just like Mama and I knew she would be. She arrived with a loaf of lemon bread tucked under her arm and planted herself smack in the middle of the old women, like she herself was one of the Bees. She surveyed the quilted scene before her.

  “What a magnificent tree!” she said.

  Grandma Rae offered her a tiny brown square, a beginner one like mine. Lindy stitched the shapeless cotton into a graceful tree branch, and the tree took life before our eyes.

  “My,” said Grandma, sliding her glasses down her nose to admire the work. “Looks like you need another.”

  I noticed she reached for a tricky leaf pattern this time.

  “Thank you all for inviting me,” Lindy said. “We’ve only been here a couple weeks, and it’s nice to feel a part of things already.” Lindy glanced at the ladies.

  “Oh, be careful ’bout thanking us too soon. You don’t exactly know what you got yourself into!” Izzy exclaimed with a hoot.
r />   “Speak for yourself,” said Grandma Rae, patting the Bible that I knew was in her sewing bag. “This is an upstanding group,” she proudly informed Lindy.

  “I believe it,” Lindy said, smiling.

  “So how’s our library?” Izzy asked. “There must be an awful lot of news down there!”

  Lindy had started working part-time at the Aubree Library. After work she’d drag home an armload of books for Lucas.

  “Oh, we have all kinds of news,” Lindy said.

  The Bees jerked to attention. “Such as?” they asked at once.

  “Well,” Lindy answered, “we get newspapers from three counties, not to mention the Internet. You should stop by. I’d be happy to help you surf the Web if you haven’t already.”

  The ladies wagged their heads.

  “No, no, these bodies are too old to surf anything,” Izzy said. “Besides, current events are not what I meant. I’m referring to the town news you must be exposed to there.”

  The ladies nodded in unison.

  Lindy looked confused.

  “Izzy means gossip.” There, Mama said it.

  “Oh, Celia, we do not gossip,” Grandma Rae corrected. “Gossip burns the ears. We share.”

  “Ah, yes.” Lindy nodded. She studied the group carefully and leaned forward. “Well, I may have heard a little something about the mayor’s wife.”

  No sooner had Lindy opened her mouth than did every head bow faithfully in her direction, the quilt set aside for a “breather.” Never mind what Grandma Rae said. Those ladies’ ears were on fire! Mama winked at me from her easel.

  “You certainly seem to have settled right in,” Dotty said after Lindy finished, fanning herself with a napkin. The ladies were slumped in their chairs, plumb wore out from all their sharing.

  “Your pots are quite the talk in town,” Faye added. “Harland’s can hardly keep them on the shelves.”

  Lindy smiled.

  “I don’t suppose you’ve attended Sunday service yet?” Grandma Rae asked, raising one eyebrow. We held our breath.