Chapter 6
Stacy Ann’s Great Idea

 

I’ll eat fast, Andy told himself at breakfast the next morning. I’ll eat real fast, so before the bus comes, I’ll have time to check the Perlmans’ house.

Andy spilled some cereal into his bowl. He poured on some milk and quickly ate the cereal, stuffing one spoonful after another into his mouth.

Rachel said, “There’s milk and cereal dripping down your chin.”

Andy looked down. He tried to see his chin, but he couldn’t.

Rachel stood by the toaster oven. She had put two slices of bread in and set the timer for two minutes. Now she was waiting for the bell to ring. Then she would put American cheese on each slice of bread and put it in the toaster oven again, this time for exactly one minute.

“You shouldn’t rush breakfast,” Rachel told Andy. “It’s the most important meal of the day.”

“Did you hear that?” Andy asked his spoonful of cereal. “Rachel says you’re important.”

Tamika came into the kitchen for breakfast. Andy told her why he was in such a hurry. “I’ll eat fast, too,” Tamika said, “and I’ll meet you outside.” Andy finished his cereal. He put the bowl and spoon in the sink and wiped his chin.

“Have a nice day at school,” Andy’s mother said to him as she walked into the kitchen. “And don’t worry about the Perlmans’ house. The police checked it out.”

And I'll keep checking it out, Andy told himself.

Andy grabbed his backpack and lunch and hurried outside. The street wasn’t so quiet now. People were on their way to work. The Belmont girls, who lived down the block, were already at the bus stop.

Detective Andy Russell is on the job again, Andy thought as he stood in front of the Perlmans’ house.

The house looked the same to him. The door was closed. The lights were off. The shades downstairs were down, and the ones upstairs were up.

Andy walked slowly to the side of the house. The shades in the study were still up. Andy walked quietly to one of the windows. He got on his toes and looked in. He saw his reflection in the mirror again, but this time he wasn’t frightened by it. He looked around the study. Everything looked the same.

“Hey,” someone said.

“YIKES!” Andy shouted.

He dropped his books and very slowly turned. It was Tamika.

“You scared me,” Andy said.

Tamika looked through the window. Then she said, “Let’s hurry. Let’s check the rest of the house before the bus gets here.”

The lights in back were off, too, and the shades were the way they were the day before. Andy lifted the lid off the garbage can. There was still just one bag in there. The torn box of Oat Bran Toasties was still on top.

Toot! Toot!

“That’s the bus,” Tamika said.

Andy and Tamika ran to the front yard. They looked both ways and then quickly crossed the street. When they got to the bus, they both thanked the driver, Mr. Cole, for waiting.

“I’m used to waiting for you,” Mr. Cole said. Then he asked, “And do you know how long bus drivers should wait?” Mr. Cole waited. When neither Andy nor Tamika answered, he said, “Long bus drivers should wait the same way short bus drivers wait.”

Mr. Cole laughed.

“Oh,” Andy said, and looked at Tamika.

Tamika smiled and rolled her eyes.

During the ride to school, Andy kept thinking about the Perlmans’ house. He imagined a onelegged pirate hopping up and down the Perlmans’ stairs, turning lights on and off, and laughing.

When Andy got to class, he opened his notebook, copied the homework assignment, looked up at his teacher, Ms. Roman, and waited. The first lesson was history, something about the Revolutionary War. Andy wasn’t sure what Ms. Roman said. He wasn’t really listening. But he looked like he was listening. Throughout the lesson, he stared straight at Ms. Roman. He even pretended to take notes. But he really had no idea what she was talking about. All he could think about was the Perlmans’ house.

Stacy Ann Jackson, the girl who sat right in front of Andy, closed her notebook, so Andy did, too. She folded her hands and looked up at Ms. Roman, so that’s what Andy did.

I’m getting good at this, Andy thought. Ms. Roman actually thinks I’m listening.

Some days Andy was so deep in his own dream world that he didn’t hear the lunch bell ring. But this time he heard it.

In the cafeteria Andy bought a container of chocolate milk. Then he sat with Tamika and their friends Bruce Jeffries and Stacy Ann Jackson. Andy unwrapped his jelly sandwich and bit into it.

“What are you writing about?” Stacy Ann asked Andy.

“I’m not writing. I’m eating,” he answered.

“Well,” Stacy Ann said, “I’m writing about a kitten in the Revolutionary War. It’s going to meet everyone—George Washington, Paul Revere, Molly Pitcher, and Thomas Jefferson. It may even help write the Declaration of Independence. And I’m calling the cat Cobalt, just like our Cobalt.”

 

 

Andy and Stacy Ann took care of a kitten that lived in the school yard. The kitten had dark gray, almost silver, fur. Andy named it Cobalt, after the silvery metal. They brought food for it.

Bruce said, “I’m going to write about a talking dog named King that thinks it’s a lion, the king of the beasts. The dog will even try to roar.”

What are they talking about? Andy wondered.

Tamika said, “I’m writing about a girl who can’t be with her parents for a while, so she lives with different families. She’ll be happy and unhappy, all at the same time.”

“What are you talking about?” Andy asked.

“Weren’t you listening?” Stacy Ann asked. “Ms. Roman said that tomorrow in class we’ll be writing stories. She wanted us to think about what we’ll write.”

“Oh,” Andy said. “Was that what she said?”

“You were there,” Stacy Ann told Andy.

“Only his body was there,” Tamika said. “His mind was somewhere else.”

“It was?” Bruce said in wonderment. “You can do that? If I could, I’d have my mind at the beach, making a sand castle.”

“I was thinking about the Perlmans’ house,” Andy said. Then he and Tamika told Stacy Ann and Bruce about the garbage, lights, and police.

“That’s so strange,” Stacy Ann said. She wrote on her empty lunch bag, Mysterious garbage and a light that goes on in the middle of the night.

“And the shade in the study,” Tamika added, “which was down and now it’s up.”

“Hey,” Andy told Stacy Ann, “that’s a great idea. Make a list of clues.”

“But those are the only clues we have,” Tamika said.

“Oh no. We have the garbage clues.” Andy told Stacy Ann and Bruce what he and Tamika had found in the garbage.

Stacy Ann wrote those on her lunch bag, too. Then she looked at the bag. “Skim milk!” she said, and gave the bag to Andy. “That tastes bad. And purple stockings, that’s bad taste.”

Tamika laughed and said, “Andy thinks there’s a thin, one-legged man living at the Perlmans’.”

“I just got a great idea,” Stacy Ann said. “You could make that your story. You could write what you imagine is going on there.”

Andy thought for a moment. Then he smiled and said, “Thanks, Stacy Ann. That is what I’ll write. I imagine all sorts of weird things are happening at the Perlmans’.”