17
Green Hair and a Broken Plate

The smell of golden, crispy fried potatoes hung heavy in the kitchen air. Lily wasn’t sure if she could stomach another potato, but Carrie didn’t want last night’s dinner of salted raw potatoes to go to waste. Carrie began to scoop potatoes out of a skillet and pile them into a bowl. “Lily, go outside and find Joseph and tell him it’s time to wash up for lunch.”

Lily ran out to the sandbox, expecting to find her brother, but it was empty. If Joseph wasn’t in the sandbox, he would probably be on the swing. She ran around to the other side of the house. As she rounded the corner of the house, she stopped abruptly.

The barn had several long green streaks running down the front of it. She looked up and saw that the streaks started at the little loft door. The door was swinging back and forth in the breeze.

That could mean only one thing. Joseph was up to something.

Lily ran to the barn and went inside. As her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she heard footsteps in the hayloft. “Joseph! Lunch is ready.”

“Uh, I’m not hungry.” Joseph’s voice floated down the hayloft stairs.

Something was wrong. Joseph never missed a meal. “What in the world happened to the barn?” Lily asked. “Why is it turning green?”

“I . . . uh . . . had a little accident.”

“I’m going to go get Carrie!” Lily ran to the house to tell Carrie that there was an emergency in the barn.

Carrie looked horrified. “Is an animal hurt?”

“Oh no!” Lily said reassuringly. “It’s only Joseph.”

Carrie ran through the door and hurried to the barn. She called up the hayloft ladder. “Joseph, Joseph! Are you all right? Do you need help?”

Joseph’s foot appeared on the top rung of the ladder. Then the other foot on the next rung.

Joseph didn’t say a word until he reached the bottom of the ladder. Lily was stunned. He was covered, head to toe, in green paint. He stood there, blinking fast, looking at Lily and Carrie.

After a long, silent moment, Carrie snapped into action. She found an old washbasin and grabbed a towel that Papa used to wipe down Jim. She started to rub paint off Joseph. His face, then one arm, then the other.

“What happened?” Lily asked, as soon as she could find her voice.

“I thought I would paint a sign for the door to Papa’s woodworking shop,” Joseph started, spitting out paint. “I found just the right piece of wood and I used the paint Papa had left over from the Whispering Pines sign. When I was finished, I opened the hayloft door so it would dry, but when I turned around, I slipped on the hay and my foot knocked over the stool that held the paint can. The can tipped over and splattered all over me.”

“And down the side of the barn too,” Lily added. She thought it was important to point that out.

Joseph was close to tears and Lily’s comment pushed him over the brink. “I wanted it to be a surprise. A welcome back surprise.” One tear leaked down his cheek.

“Don’t cry, Joseph!” Carrie said, rubbing his green hair. “It will only make the paint run more.”

Joseph had to strip out of his green clothes and run to the house wearing only Jim’s wipe-down towel. At the kitchen sink, Carrie tried and tried to shampoo the paint out of Joseph’s hair, but it still had an eerie greenish tinge to it. It almost glowed. Joseph looked miserable. Pansy was mooing from the barnyard, wanting to be milked, sounding miserable.

Lily felt miserable, too. The crispy, golden fried potatoes were now cold and soggy and gray. Another horrible meal. “Two more days,” she thought to herself. At least, she didn’t think she said it out loud—until she heard Carrie echo, “Just two more days.”

Lily looked at Carrie, seated at the end of the table, rubbing the temples of her forehead like she was coming down with a frightful headache.

One more day. Just one more day and Mama, Papa, Dannie, and baby Paul would be home. Lily couldn’t wait! She wanted to kiss baby Paul’s fat cheeks and play hide-and-seek with Dannie. She missed hearing Papa’s deep voice say, “Bedtime for little lambs.” She had a long list of foods she wanted Mama to cook—nothing that included potatoes or bananas.

But she couldn’t deny one very pleasant thing: Carrie didn’t ask Lily to do any chores—no dishwashing, no garden work, no laundry. It was like a mini vacation for Lily.

After school, Lily settled into Papa’s comfortable chair to finish reading a book. Out in the barn, Carrie was trying to milk poor Pansy and Joseph was supervising. The house was quiet. It was very peaceful. Lily turned the last page and closed the book, sad to come to the end. As she put the book away, her eyes caught Mama’s pretty plate above Papa’s desk. She’d forgotten about those paints in the pantry! Now would be a perfect time to paint—no little brothers around to bother her.

An idea started to blossom. A fine idea. She was going to try to paint roses just like the ones on that plate. She climbed up on Papa’s desk and reached for the plate. She would have to be very careful with this plate. Papa had given it to Mama before they married. Mama said it was the most special plate she owned. She hardly ever used it as an actual plate. Mostly, it stayed on the shelf. Just for pretty, Mama said.

Lily held the plate carefully with both hands and turned around to get off the desk. Normally, she would jump off the desk. But not with Mama’s special plate. Instead, she stepped carefully on Papa’s swivel desk chair. When she put her weight on it, the chair seat twisted. The chair went rolling across the floor and Lily lost her balance. The plate flew out of her hands as she tumbled onto the floor. A terrible shattering sound made Lily cringe.

Slowly, Lily sat up and opened her eyes. Mama’s beautiful plate had smashed into hundreds of little pieces.

As Lily started to pick up shards of ceramic, she heard Carrie and Joseph come into the house. Joseph stopped abruptly when he saw what she had done. “Oh Lily, you are going to be in so much trouble.”

She scowled at him and his glowing green hair. But he was right. How could she tell Mama about the plate? Maybe Mama wouldn’t notice. If only she hadn’t touched it in the first place.

Carrie set the half-filled pail of milk on the floor and went to get a broom and dustpan from the pantry. As she bent over to sweep the plate into the dustpan, Lily thought she heard her mutter, “One more day. Just one more day.”

Out in the barnyard, Pansy let out a sorrowful moo.

Throughout the day, Lily glanced at the clock on the wall at the back of the schoolhouse. She did it so often that Aaron Yoder stuck his tongue out at her each time she swiveled her head around. She ignored him, as usual, because he was invisible to her. But the clock wasn’t! Every hour that passed meant that Mama and Papa would be that much closer to home. When three o’clock came and Teacher Rhoda rang the dismissal bell, Lily and Joseph dashed out the door and raced down the road.

As they tore around the corner and up the driveway, Lily’s heart leaped. Papa and Mama were home! She saw Papa crossing the yard with a big pail of milk in his hands. Dannie was trailing behind him, swinging a little pail. Mama was standing on the porch, baby Paul on her hip. It looked like any other day at Whispering Pines, but it wasn’t! It was a very special day.

Papa scooped up Lily and Joseph for a big hug. Mama came down the porch steps to meet them. Baby Paul reached out for Lily when he saw her, which made her especially pleased. He hadn’t forgotten her! And somehow, he looked bigger. Mama handed Paul to Lily and reached out to hug Joseph, accidentally knocking his black hat off. She looked shocked. “What happened to your hair?”

Dannie pointed to the barn. Long streaks of dried green paint ran down the front of it. “Your hair is the same color as the barn!”

“Where’s Carrie?” Joseph asked, trying to steer the conversation away from green paint.

“She said she needed to get home and left very quickly,” Papa said. “What exactly went on while we were away?” He was peering curiously at Joseph’s green hair.

Joseph and Lily exchanged a look.

“I made a sign for you, Papa,” Joseph said, pointing to the woodshop door. His sign was leaning on the top of the door, a little crooked.

PAPAS WUDWERK SHOPP

Lily cringed. Green paint dripped off the letters. Each word was spelled wrong. Joseph was a terrible speller. The worst speller in third grade.

Papa smiled. “It’s a fine sign. Any chance the paint spilled while you were painting it?”

“Maybe,” Joseph said quietly. Lily nodded.

“Anything else happen while we were away?” Papa said.

“Carrie had trouble milking Pansy,” Lily volunteered.

“Yes, she told me about that,” Papa said. He held up Pansy’s pail—only half full. That was a worry. Cow’s milk dried up quickly.

“And then Lily broke—” Joseph started, but Lily nudged him with her elbow, hard. This was her news to tell.

Mama was smiling, then her smile faded. “What did Lily break?”

Lily swallowed the lump in her throat. “I broke your pretty plate,” she whispered.

Whispers grab hold of your attention like nothing else. Now Dannie was interested. He sidled between Mama and Papa so he could be closer to Lily.

“Which plate?” Mama asked. She got a strange, tight look on her face—the same kind of look Carrie had yesterday.

“The one on the shelf above Papa’s desk,” Lily said. “I wanted to try to paint roses just like the ones on the plate. I dropped it when I tried to get down.”

Papa and Mama exchanged a look. “I think we’ll have to put those paints away until you can be trusted to use them wisely,” Mama said.

Later, Lily watched sadly as Mama packed up the paints and brushes that were tucked on a pantry shelf. For now, the box was going into the barn.

Lily thought Mama was being unfair. Joseph’s green paint down the side of the barn and in his hair didn’t seem to bother her as much as the broken plate. Lily hadn’t meant to break the plate. But that was the trouble, right there. Lily never stopped to think of all that might happen until it happened.

Papa told Mama that he would find someone to paint another plate just like the one that was broken. Lily hoped he might also say that she could still use the paints and brushes, that it was a case of special circumstances since they had gone off to a wedding for a few days and were having fun—whereas Lily and Joseph were home with a babysitter who didn’t know how to cook well and didn’t know how to milk a cow—but he supported Mama’s decision.

The happy homecoming had screeched to an abrupt halt. Still, Lily was glad her parents and little brothers were home and everyone was together again. And that night, there were no sorrowful moos out of Pansy.