Sunday broke blue-sky bright and dry. Our house had its delicious Sunday morning coffee smell, with a hint of cinnamon today.
“Want to come to the park with Zack and me?” Dad asked.
“Swing and slide!” shouted Zack.
Dad shifted his camera to one side and tucked my wiggly brother under his other arm. He was waiting for my answer.
I thought for a minute. Mom was still asleep, and Nick was at church. This would be the perfect time to try out those skates without anybody seeing how uncoordinated I was.
“No thanks,” I told him. “I’m going to stay here and skate.”
“Okay, but don’t forget,” Dad said. “Pads—”
“Pads, helmet, flat ground,” I recited.
“Always the perfect student,” Dad laughed. He shifted his grip on Zack and went out the door.
To everyone but Mr. Allen, I thought. Then I remembered the Spark I’d just e-mailed to the school office. I smiled a little. Mr. Allen was sure to change his mind about me after he saw that.
I sat on our front steps and pulled my hair into a ponytail. I put on the knee pads, then the elbow pads and the wrist guards. I had to shove hard to get my feet into the inline skates. My bike helmet was the only thing that felt normal. How was I supposed to actually move with all the rest of this stuff on? I glanced over at Brambletown—or where Brambletown used to be. It had all washed away in the rain. The street was completely dry now, though. Nick and I could draw it again, maybe this afternoon. I figured I’d have an even better idea of how to lay it out after skating around for a while.
I tried to push to my feet. The skates were stiff and clunky. And slippy-tippy. After a lot of unsuccessful starts, I teetered upright. The wrist guards pressed into my hands. I wobbled away from the house and tripped over the crack where the driveway met the street. I went down hard. No wonder Nick was sore.
I was never so glad that Nick’s house and mine were the only ones at our end of the street. When I finally managed to get myself back up again, my toes were pointing toward the corner, not the cul-de-sac. I decided to skate a few yards in that direction, just to get the feel of it, then turn around and skate back. On the first step my left skate hit a pebble and I tripped forward, landing on my hands and knees again. My knees throbbed right through the pads. Next time up, I tried to make more of a gliding motion with the skates. The wheels started to roll faster, helped by the cool breeze pushing at my back. I scoured the street just in front of me and skipped my feet sideways when I saw rocks.
At the corner I kept my skates together and leaned to the left, trying to make a U-turn so I could double back to my house. But I couldn’t make my turn sharp enough for a U. All I managed was a left turn onto Bayberry Street. No problem, I thought. Bayberry was perfectly level, just like Bramble Way. I knew I should probably move to the sidewalk, but I wasn’t sure I could make it up one of the driveways. Anyway, looking at all those sidewalk cracks convinced me that the street would be a lot safer for my aching knees.
Trying not to lose my balance, I looked both ways. I didn’t see a car in either direction. Sunday mornings were always quiet in the Shrubs.
I worked at trying to find a rhythm—push and glide, push and glide—and stayed as close to the curb as I could without bumping my skate against it. My legs were still wobbling, but I’d straightened up a bit. I still kept a close eye out for pebbles and sticks. Forget about trying to stop. My knees couldn’t take another fall.
I veered wide at the corners and looked both ways when I crossed the empty intersections. I was concentrating so hard I didn’t hear the car come up behind me. HONK! I jumped and my feet kicked out from underneath me. I windmilled my arms, trying not to fall backward.
When I caught my balance, I realized I wasn’t in the Shrubs anymore. I passed the back of our school, moving faster than I wanted to. I had never noticed that some of the roads sloped ever so slightly downhill away from our street. Why hadn’t I thought to practice stopping before I left my driveway?
The streets on the other side of the school were even less familiar to me and there were more cars. I thought I’d better try and go back. I made a right turn, and then another, but I didn’t recognize the names of the streets. One of them should have been the way back to the Shrubs. It was even hillier in this neighborhood. I rolled faster, I was breathing harder, and my heartbeats pounded in my ears. Now I really didn’t want to fall. The hill steepened and my arms shot out to the sides, grabbing at air. At this speed I knew I could never jump the curb the way Nick had done.
I hurtled past an old house. I can’t stop! I thought wildly. I could see the bottom of the hill rushing toward me. The street dead-ended in a tangle of dry scrub without a curb. I headed as far to the left as I could manage, then leaned right, desperately trying to veer into a U-turn. I wasn’t going to make it. I threw my arms in front of my face and crashed into the weeds.
I rumbled across the uneven ground, a low uhhhhnnnnn coming from deep in my chest. Stickers ripped at my arms and tall weeds whipped my cheeks. The skates rolled me a lot farther than I would have thought possible. Just when I started to wonder if I’d go on bumping through the tangled brush like that forever, the skates got ahead of the rest of me. I landed on my back in the thicket with a whump that knocked all my breath right out. I stared up at the blue, blue sky and tried to gulp some air back in.
Then I heard something else crash through the weeds. It came closer and closer. The something else stopped right over me, blotting out the sun. It panted with its mouth hanging open, showing white fangs and a slobbery tongue. Oddly, the thing smelled like cats. A long string of drool dangled from its livery lips. I saw the drool dangle lower and lower until it fell off and landed on my neck. I closed my eyes and shuddered.
Maybe I was knocked out by my fall, I thought hopefully. Maybe I’m hallucinating.
I felt a tongue slurp across my face.
“To-by!” A voice called from somewhere in the distance. “Toby!”
More crashes in the weeds.
“Toby! What did you find?” That voice sounded familiar. “Toby, shove over.” There was more rustling and some grunting. The panting shifted to the side.
“Nadie? Is that you?”
I opened my eyes. So much for staying away from Summer Crawford.
“It’s good my dog Toby found you,” Summer said. “Your cuts don’t look too serious, but I don’t think these will do it.” She put a handful of plastic bandages back into her pocket. “You’d better come with me.”
I didn’t want to go anywhere with Summer, but I couldn’t think what else to do. It was like my brain wasn’t working after all of that jiggling. My arms and legs stung. I took off my helmet, wrist guards, and skates, and followed her out of the weeds. We walked up the street and stopped in front of the old house. My feet ached and stickers grabbed at my socks. The black Labrador retriever, Toby, nosed open the gate.
“My mom had to work today,” Summer said. “She’s the new manager at the paint and wallpaper store and they’re doing inventory. My big sister will be back soon.”
“Inventory?” I repeated, still suffering from brain-jiggle.
“It’s when they count up everything in the store. Sunday’s a good day for counting, since they’re closed for customers.” She opened her front door and motioned for me to go in.
The smell hit me full force. It was that part fishy cat food, part litter box smell I’d noticed on her sweater and on Toby. Two white cats watched me from the stairs. One had a bandage on its ear. A fat orange cat walked down the hallway. I could see at least three others in the living room, sitting on boxes. Six evil Francis-types and who knew how many more? The hairs on the back of my neck started to prickle.
“I’m okay, Summer, really,” I said, backing up. “I should probably just go home.”
“Come on,” she insisted. “Let me fix you up so you don’t bleed all over town.” She pulled me down the hall into the kitchen and sat me at the round wooden table covered with silverware and a pile of crumpled newspapers. “You can just put your stuff on the floor.”
I slowly set down my skates and helmet. A black cat and a Siamese with a wide bare spot on its back stared at me from the counter next to the refrigerator. I kept an eye on them while I pulled out my hair elastic, along with some weed stalks, and fixed my ponytail. A stack of boxes with Hill Street written on them in black Magic Marker leaned against the wall.
“Time to get down,” Summer told the cats. She cuddled each of them and put them on the floor. The black one skittered across the room. The Siamese arched its back, took a few steps, then slunk in my direction.
“Don’t give her any of this,” Summer said, handing me a glass of lemonade. “I’ll be right back. I think my first aid stuff’s in the basement.” She opened a door and disappeared down some steps.
The black cat immediately hopped back up onto the counter and sat facing me. The Siamese slipped under my chair and twisted its body in and out through the legs. I picked up my feet and stopped breathing. It walked a short distance away, then turned and sprang onto the table. I jumped up, knocking over my chair. The back door opened, and an older version of Summer with pink, spiky hair came in. She was wearing headphones.
“Hey!” She swatted the Siamese off the table. “Rats don’t drink lemonade!” The cat stalked out of the room. I just stood there. Summer’s sister looked at me for a couple of seconds, then shook her head and went upstairs.
I picked up my chair, keeping my eyes fixed on the black cat. When I sat down, the two white cats came into the kitchen. My heart was thump-thumping. There was no way to keep track of all of these cats.
Summer burst back into the room waving an old Sesame Street lunch box. “Got it!” she announced.
I didn’t think even Big Bird could help me now.
“I’m always patching up my cats or Toby, so I’ve got all kinds of good stuff in here.” Summer opened the box and took out antiseptic wipes and bandages of every shape and size. She found a pair of tweezers and got to work on the collection of prickers in my arms. She bit her lower lip, concentrating hard.
“This is a lot less gross than when my cats get into stuff,” she said. “You should see some of the things they come up with. They could teach Owen a thing or two.” She laughed.
I pulled my arm away and looked at Summer. “You know,” I told her, “Owen isn’t joking around with you. Boys and girls don’t joke around much with each other in fourth grade. They don’t sit on the same side of the cafeteria. There are rules. Boys and girls aren’t friends.”
“Oh, you mean like you and Nick, for instance?”
My mouth dropped open.
“I guess some rules are for following, and some aren’t,” Summer said with a shrug.
Just one big gash in my arm needed bandaging. At home I liked to do my own bandages, but there was no way I could fix myself up and keep watch on all of those cats at the same time. While Summer swabbed my cut, I thought about what she had said about rules.
“Phewf!” she said finally, pushing her hair behind her ears. “There. You’re almost as good as before.” She snapped the lunch box closed.
“Thanks,” I said. “Thanks a lot.” Right at that moment I wasn’t at all sure how good I’d been before. I’d been blaming Summer for everything that had happened. But deep down I knew she hadn’t tried to get me in trouble. And she didn’t know about my job for the Spark or that I might lose it.
As she swung the refrigerator door shut, she caught me eyeing the giant turkey carcass on a platter inside. “Want some?” Summer asked. She swung the door open again.
I looked at the places on the turkey where hunks were missing and the full parts that were left. It was funny, how Summer did just whatever she wanted to do, no matter what anyone thought about it.
“Yes,” I said.
“Mayo?”
I thought for a minute. “Okay,” I said.
After we put the turkey away, I asked Summer if I could use her phone to let my mom know where I was. I told Mom I’d been out skating and was on my way back.
“Where are you calling from?” Mom asked.
“A friend’s house.” Summer smiled when I said that, the same shy but open way she had when I’d given her the carrots in the lunchroom on Friday. I smiled, too.
“Okay, then,” Summer said when I hung up. “Let’s get going.” She headed out the back door and went into the garage. In a few seconds she came out wheeling a rickety old bike. One of those kiddie trailers, like a little tent on wheels, was hooked onto the back.
“Good thing you’re you, Nadie,” she said. “You’re probably just at the weight limit for this thing. We’ll have to walk it up the hill, though. Then you can get in.”
Summer held one handlebar and I held the other and together we pushed the bike up the street. I carried my skates. The pavement felt cold through my socks. At the top, she pointed to the blue and yellow trailer.
“Better sit right in the middle,” she said. “You can move the blanket if you want.”
I climbed in and set my skates on one side.
“Contact!” Summer yelled.
The big orange cat bounded out of the house, ran up the street, and leaped into the trailer right next to me.
“Contact loves to come for rides,” Summer told me. “Don’t worry, she won’t hop out or anything.” Contact’s hopping out wasn’t even on the same planet as my worries. Summer started pedaling.
The orange cat looked me over. She put out her paw and swatted my thigh. I gulped. She swatted me with her other paw.
“Don’t let Contact bother you,” Summer called over her shoulder. “She thinks she should get all of the room just because she’s having kittens.”
Great, I thought. I get through all of this and now I’m going to get slashed to death by a pregnant orange version of Francis.
Then Contact leaped right into my lap.
“Eep!” I squeaked.
Summer didn’t hear me. Contact prodded my legs with the pads of her paws, turned around in two circles, and curled up in my lap. It was hard work to sit perfectly still in a moving bike trailer. The cat was big and lumpy, and parts of her shifted as we rode. I felt, more than heard, a noise I’d surely never heard Francis make—a continuous, quiet sort of rumble. I picked up my hand very slowly and ran it along her soft fur. I scratched her behind her crooked orange ears. Contact’s noise got louder.
Purring, I decided. This cat is purring.