It’s been five days. I know Opa likes to take his time with the Lucky Stories, but I can’t wait for the next one. “Are you ever going to tell me what happened to Lucky? It’s keeping me up at night worrying about him!”
Opa has a mischievous look on his face. “Maizy, you must be patient. Like a game of poker, eventually all the cards will be revealed.”
Patience is not something I am good at.
Opa’s silver hair glistens in the sunlight. The doctor gave him permission to go out a couple hours a day as long as it doesn’t cause too much stress. To my grandfather, the only place worth going out for is the Golden Palace.
“Is this as fast as you can go?” Opa shouts as I push his wheelchair down Main Street. Today he is full of energy.
The colorful ribbons on his wheels whirl around, making it look like he’s riding on giant pinwheels. Everyone who sees us smiles and greets Opa by name. Lazy Dog trots after us, wagging his tail. A couple of people applaud.
“I’ve always wanted a parade,” Opa jokes as he waves back.
“Bud!” my grandfather greets his old friend. Once inside, Oma acts like she hasn’t seen him in ages, when it’s only been about twenty minutes. Daisy squeals and waves, and Mom says, “Welcome home, Dad.”
For a moment, my grandfather looks like a young man. He reminds me of Lucky. I feel like I’ve gone back in time, until I hear someone yell, “C’mon, Maizy, the worms aren’t going to wait forever!”
“What’s the smell?” Logan holds his nose. There are two big empty buckets on the back of his bike.
“I may have overdone it with the bug spray,” I confess.
When we near the lake, he draws an X in the dirt with a stick and we each lug a bucket of water over to it. Putting on a game show host voice, Logan announces, “It’s worming time!”
I shake my head. “I can’t do this.”
“Why not?” Logan unzips his backpack. “We earn four cents per worm! There are about a thousand worms in a pound, so say we get half a pound—that’s twenty dollars!”
“I don’t care how much we make, it’s disgusting!”
Logan’s too busy squeezing liquid soap into the water to listen to me. He swirls it around with the stick, then dumps it on the ground.
“What are you doing?!”
Logan just stares at the mud. It’s amazing what you can hear when you’re still. Birds singing, leaves rustling…me screaming. Dozens of fat, slimy worms are wiggling out of the wet dirt, like the dead coming alive in the graveyard.
“Don’t just stand there, Maizy,” Logan says as he tosses them into a bucket. “Pick up the worms!”
Reluctantly, I attempt to pick up a worm with a stick. When that doesn’t work, I reach for a second stick to use like chopsticks, only it’s like big, fat noodles…that wiggle. To my shock, by the end of the morning, I’m gathering worms with my fingers just like Logan. Ginger isn’t going to believe this. I’m not sure I do.