Anna Was Here Page 7

  He said that as if four weeks weren’t a month—like the guy who comes on television and says, “All this for only one hundred forty-nine dollars and ninety-nine cents.”

  “Think about it,” I wanted to say. What kinds of mean things had Simon already spread about me?

  In Colorado Dad would have listened, but before I could open my mouth, he said, “I want you to get a good sleep tonight. In your bed.”

  When we got home, I sat in the stupid pink room. It felt like a bunch of sadness was stuck on me. Like flies.

  I already knew—because of the wildfires—that it was impossible to stop every bad thing. My dad’s changing. Simon’s dad dying. Hope, Faith, and Charity. The blizzard froze eyelashes shut, Morgan said, and plugged noses. Ice masks hung on their faces. Too fierce for even the bravest of girls.

  Tears came leaking out while Midnight H. Cat licked them off my chin.

  The real way to keep us all safe was to get us back to our very own house in our very own city. Too bad my call contradicted Dad’s call, but live by the sword, die by the sword.

  CHAPTER 24

  Make Haste to Get Us Home

  Safety Tips for Peace Protests

  1. Don’t come or go to a protest alone.

  2. Don’t wear jewelry that might get yanked or pulled.

  3. Look friendly to remind police officers you are a human being and they are, too.

  4. Sing. It’s good for courage.

  5. If necessary, assume the nonviolent position: head between your knees; elbows together in front of your eyes; hands over your head.

  The longer I sat in that pink room, the more determined I got. I was not going to go to school, the only new kid. With four weeks left, Simon could pop around any corner. A personal comment about my family could pop out anytime. And I had work to do to get us back to Colorado.

  I started to pray. “Make haste,” I said out loud. It sounded good and strong. “Make haste to save your people.” I put my two hands on my heart. It really did feel stronger. When Jericho and I were taking one of our famous exploring walks around the city—or Grandpa and I were hiking—a stronger heart would come in handy.

  I checked my Safety Notebook, got out a pencil and paper and wrote a note, and then crept down the hall to Mom and Dad’s bedroom and peeked in. Mom was in the bed, already asleep. I went over and touched her rumpled short hair. “Let my people go,” I whispered into her ear.

  That’s what Moses said. I thought about Moses in the Bible picture, all stern and commanding with his arm straight out.

  Mom smiled faintly. Even sleeping people could take things into their brains.

  I went back and carried my sleeping bag into the hall. I stretched out on it and wiggled to get it straight and smooth. I closed my eyes. Someone stepped right on me. “Ow,” I said.

  “Sorry.” It was Isabella.

  She creaked down the stairs. After a while I followed.

  In the living room Dad was in a chair with his eyes closed with Isabella and my cat in his lap. I sat on the floor beside them. A paw landed softly on my head. “Midnight H. Cat,” Dad said sleepily. “What a distinguished name.”

  “Can we put her name on our mailbox when we go back to Colorado?”

  “Maybe. When the cat runs for Congress.”

  Midnight yawned. “She likes you,” I said.

  “Sure. When I snore, she thinks I’m purring.”

  “Did you know God lives in our stomachs?” Isabella asked drowsily.

  I held in a giggle. Anyway, why not? It was like Dad had always had a different Micah Nickel living in his stomach, one that only thought about a church and didn’t play the guitar.

  “Dad?” I nudged his arm and held up my note for him to read: Remember Martin Luther King and Gandhi? “Sleeping in the hall is my silent protest,” I said. “Fighting injustice the peacemaker’s way. Like you’ve talked about.”

  Dad sighed. “All right, Anna.”

  “Also,” I said, “I should definitely come to the farm with all of you tomorrow.”

  His breath huffed out heavily. “One more day out of school then.”

  “Do you want me to take Isabella to bed?” I asked. “I’m strong enough to carry her on my back.”

  Dad lifted her toward me. I poked her soft middle. She yawned. “You just poked God.”

  All the way up the stairs I could feel change creaking in the air. The first thing I’d do when I got back to Colorado was buy goody bags for my birthday. Those toys mostly got broken or lost, but I loved them anyway.

  When I was in my sleeping bag, I said a prayer full of Gratitude Attitude. While I was at it, I prayed that maybe Simon could disappear.

  CHAPTER 25

  Powerful Prayer

  The next morning, when I got downstairs, Mom was sitting at the table, staring at her coffee cup. Brown, round things were sitting on a plate. Mom used to say, “I’m a great history professor, not a great cook.”

  “What are those?” I asked.

  “Potato pancakes.” Mom nodded her coffee cup toward the plate. “You remember potatoes?”

  I’d sure seen enough of them come into this house. “I remember potato chips,” I said. “I remember baked potatoes with Dad’s special sauce.” I looked at her face and added quickly, “Now I’ll try potato pancakes.”

  While I nibbled, I told Mom, “I changed my mind—I do not want to go to school in Oakwood.”

  Her eyebrows stayed calm. “What will you do all day?”

  Oh, I had plenty to do. But all I said was “Help with Isabella.”

  “How do you plan to make friends?”

  Mom and Dad didn’t believe me no matter how many times I said I didn’t really need friends. “I think Isabella misses preschool,” I said.

  She reached out and combed the ends of my hair with her fingers. “How about you? Do you miss school?”

  “Mo-om.” Isabella’s voice floated down from upstairs.

  While Mom squeaked up to get Isabella, I thought about it. I missed the tiger salamander and the caterpillars and my safety poster with the gold ribbon on it. I missed the same-sames the way they were before. But not school in general.

  Too bad I couldn’t be Morgan in her tree house school.

  While Mom showed Isabella yummy ways to eat potato pancakes, I made illustrations for one of my favorite pages in my Safety Notebook: How to defeat Egyptian Chariots:

  1. Choose a rocky terrain.

  2. Attack the driver.

  3. Don’t bother to try damaging the wheels because they are too strong.

  After a while Isabella came and stood by my chair. “You can use my markers,” I said. “As long as you don’t massacre any of them. And if you’re quiet.”

  We worked quietly, giving Mom the gift of silence. I liked it that Mom was trying to care about potatoes, but it worried me, too. Dad poked his head in. “Ready to rock and roll?”

  I looked up. “Where’s Mom?”

  “Writing time for Mom.”

  Good, I thought.

  Dad helped us put things away and then swung Isabella onto his shoulders. “By the way, Simon’s grandmother called to apologize for the egg on our door. She’s taking him away for the weekend to see if a vacation will help.”

  Wow. Prayer was powerful. I imagined Simon’s bike coming toward me and I was standing there frizzy with light, shouting, “I’m not just a girl, you know. The angel Gabriel is basically my best friend.”

  God was making haste.

  CHAPTER 26

  Farm Food Forever

  All the way to the farm Dad made only one noise—when he rolled down the window and whistled to a hawk sitting on a fence post.

  We drove up to the Lavender Fields Forever sign. “Wow,” Dad said. “Well, farm lunch will still be the same.” He smacked his lips. “Knepp and bohne beroggi and mak kuchen.”

  “What are you talking about?” I said. I always thought he loved Grandma Campbell’s cooking.

  The car stopped. “Fun,
fun, fun,” Dad sang. He helped Isabella out and put his arms around both of us. “Wow.”

  “What?” I asked.

  He turned us until Isabella and I were face out. “The farm used to be a quarter section. That’s one hundred and sixty acres—small even in those days and really too small to farm now. But I thought it was huge.”

  “I still think it’s huge,” I told him.

  “It’s twenty acres now.” He moved us in a slow circle. “My grandparents planted those trees to keep the north wind from blowing snow into the yard. Look how big they are!”

  I couldn’t wait to tell him about Morgan’s tree house. I couldn’t wait to be up in Morgan’s tree house.

  “Clotheslines in the barnyard?” Dad said. “That’s not right.”

  “Did the barn have horses then?” I asked.

  “Yes. And cats who hid their kittens there. Also”—he laughed—“your grandma’s favorite. Turkeys.”

  “The barn is closed up now,” I told him.

  “Sad.” He kept turning us. “Wait. This is that house that I tried so hard to throw a ball over? I guess I was skinnier than I thought.”

  As Isabella and I ran up the ramp to the front door, I discovered that farm lunch smelled like vinegar and yeasty bread. Inside, I discovered that Great-aunt Dorcas had gone off to Mary-Martha Circle at the church. Great-aunt Lydia called, “Is that you? Welcome.”

  We sat down at the loaded-up table, and Dad said the blessing. My hand felt sweaty in Great-aunt Lydia’s hand.

  Then Great-aunt Lydia filled our plates with bohne beroggi and knepp and pickles and green beans grown from seeds that came all the way from Russia. “Every year Mama dried beans in the upstairs room,” Great-aunt Lydia said. “One day Katherine decided they were in the way of her paper dolls and she should move them onto the roof to dry.” She chuckled. “Ach, we had to run after those beans.”

  “Was it always this hot?” I asked.

  “Usually not until summer.” She poured iced tea for everyone. Dad gave me a nod to say I could drink it this time. “My mother sat by our beds with a bowl of cold water and fanned the air to help us sleep.”

  I wanted to be a good example for Isabella and taste everything, but I whispered to Dad that it wasn’t exactly savory to eat sweet mashed-up red beans. “Why not?” he said. “Das schmecht gut.”

  Morgan banged through the screen door with Cousin Caroline right behind her. “Mom wanted to bring you lavender honey,” she said. “Did you know one of the Spanish Hapsburgs could touch his nose to his chin?”

  “What?” I said.

  “I read it this morning,” Morgan said. “Also, only two kings of England died in battle. Harold and Richard the Third.”

  “Welcome to our school day.” Cousin Caroline moved a piano bench close to the table and sat on it. “Don’t worry about us. We’ve eaten.”

  “Too bad for them those kings weren’t our ancestors,” I said. “Our ancestors would have refused to fight.”

  “Our ancestors were the total opposite of kings.” Morgan leaned over my chair. “They were martyrs who died for their faith.”

  Isabella tugged my arm. “I want more pickles.”

  I helped her and myself. Morgan swiped a roll. She said, “Before we lived here—when we visited—my cousins always played a game they called persecution. My dad said it got old hearing that Mom’s ancestors suffered and were martyred by sword, rope, fire, and water.”

  The words my dad hung in the stiff air. Where was Morgan’s dad?

  One of the dogs barked outside, making everyone relax. I looked at Dad and raised my eyebrows. “Why didn’t you tell me about persecution?” I asked.

  Cousin Caroline said, “Our ancestors moved from Switzerland to France to Russia trying to stay ahead of rulers who insisted the young men had to serve as soldiers. Believing in ‘Blessed are the peacemakers’ and ‘Love your enemies’ didn’t make them very popular.”

  “Russia is a long way from Kansas,” I said.

  Dad chuckled. “A new czar decided to force the young men to go to war. So whole villages packed their bean seeds and wheat seeds and blue and golden poppy seeds and got on a ship. They felt God was telling them to go to Kansas.”

  Cousin Caroline held up the bowl of beans as if to say ta-da. “Some women wore all their petticoats to make room for the seeds. Bean seeds. Blue and golden poppy seeds. Also red winter wheat. The wheat was a lucky success here.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t luck,” I said. “Maybe God rewarded them.”

  Great-aunt Lydia didn’t look like she agreed. I remembered what Dad said about her and church.

  “I need another pickle,” Isabella said.

  “You really are farming?” Dad asked Cousin Caroline. “Isn’t that doomed?”

  She gave him a look. “I’m keeping a few steps ahead of failure.”

  I felt sad that Grandma was the reason not enough acres were left for lucky wheat.

  Dad’s phone rang. Couldn’t the church leave him alone for a minute? He went into a bedroom to take the call.

  Dad, actions speak louder than words.

  “Hey.” Morgan poked my shoulder. “Want to see something interesting?”

  “Me, too,” Isabella said.

  “You stay and eat more pickles.” I hopped right up and ran out after Morgan.

  CHAPTER 27

  Maybe I Will Miss This Place

  Safety Tips for Bees

  1. Bees sting when they’re frightened, so don’t swat them or run around. Be calm.

  2. Even a dead bee can sting. Wear gloves, and hold the dead bee by the body.

  3. If you get stung, stay calm to keep the venom from zinging through you.

  4. Scrape the stinger out with your fingernail so it will stop pumping venom.

  5. Remember that a bee doesn’t want to sting you because then it will die.

  When we got outside, Bob-Silver was in the yard with his nose down, sniffing wildly. “Leave it!” Morgan shouted to him. “Probably a rabbit,” she said to me.

  “Is that the interesting thing?” I asked. “Because I’ve seen rabbits.”

  “Nope. But first we get to feed the chickens.”

  She grabbed a carton of stale cottage cheese sitting on the steps. We ran through the trees to where the hens were in the fenced yard, popping straight up into the air like Ping-Pong balls and pecking at a tree branch. When they saw us, they rushed toward us as if we were famous and this were their chance for autographs. They gobbled the cottage cheese and wiped their beaks on the grass.

  Morgan and I laughed so hard we almost fell over.

  “Sasha has the best sense of humor.” Morgan pointed to a black-and-white hen. “If she gets to know you, she’ll rub against your leg. When they were chicks, Mom and I decided to give them a celebration. You should have seen them! Puff balls with beaks and legs and party hats.”

  I wanted to hear more, but the wind started up, sending empty egg cartons bouncing around and hurtling toward the trees. As we scrambled after them, I heard the odd faint booming sound. “Is that the interesting thing?” I called.

  I predicted I was right, but Morgan hollered, “Next stop, lavender. Soon as I stick these cartons in the chicken house.”

  We raced back toward the great-aunts’ house. Morgan leaped over a ditch, so I followed, almost kicking a rosy flower. “Hollyhock,” Morgan called as she started to climb the hill by the barn. “The heat must’ve fooled it into blooming early.”

  In the heat and wind, I could feel my face turning radish red.

  She didn’t pause until we were in the middle of the plants lined on the hill—three thousand of them so far, Morgan said proudly.

  Lavender didn’t boom, but it definitely did buzz. “Did you plant an air conditioner?” I asked.

  “Bees.”

  Uh-oh. The Safety Club had talked about bees that went wild and started stinging people. But I didn’t want Morgan to think I was babyish, and luckily, Cousin Caroline was probably prep
ared for anything.

  “Mom and I weed and mulch and prune and harvest lavender all by hand,” Morgan said. “In June we’re going to have our first Lavender Festival. Want to help?”

  Yes—except I’d be back in Colorado. “Was your mom really a cop before she was a farmer?” I asked.

  “Search and rescue cop and trainer of K-nine dogs to help.” Morgan picked a bud and held it up to my nose. “The lavender is blooming early, too.”

  “By the way,” I said into her hand, “where is your dad anyway?”

  “That’s private.” She turned and kept climbing.

  Divorce? Died? I hiked after her to the top of the lavender hill.

  For a minute we let the breeze at the top cool us. Then we plunged down the steep slope of the other side, pushing through woody bushes that grabbed at us. “How do you keep from getting lost?” I was panting.

  “You haven’t even seen our part of the farm yet. Ow!” Morgan slapped a branch that had smacked her.

  What had Cousin Caroline been like as a girl running with Dad chasing her? I almost bumped into Morgan’s back. “Sorry,” I said. “Didn’t realize you stopped.”

  “This used to be pasture, but it got overgrown.” Morgan stood on her tiptoes. “See that fence? It’s the end of the Stucky land now.”

  At the bottom we were suddenly in grass and dandelions, and then I saw the pond! “North Emma Creek wanders through this pasture,” Morgan said.

  “The same North Emma Creek in Oakwood?” I asked.

  “Of course.” She twirled around, arms out. “Most of the creek isn’t on our land anymore. But one of our ancestors made this pond. A long time ago.”

  We splashed our hot faces. I turned over a rock, hoping for a salamander.

  “Look,” Morgan said. A bird was picking its way gently through the water as if it were trying to show off its S of a neck. Its narrow beak was yellow, and it had a splash of feathers like a ponytail.

  “Wow,” I said. “Is that the interesting—”

  The bird leaned forward. Its wings opened, and it lifted into the air and sailed away with its snaky neck out and long, gangly legs dangling behind.