Coffin Black

I DIDN’T REALIZE HOW HARD IT would be to wait to read the journal—and not even peek. The next day, I found myself walking up to Palace Beautiful again and again, but not going inside. I thought about Helen. I thought about influenza. I thought about the singing Zuzu heard in the attic, and I couldn’t wait any longer. I just had to know what had happened to Helen. After dinner, I went up the attic stairs. I opened the door and jumped so violently, I nearly fell over.

“Zuzu!” I said in a kind of shout-whisper. “What are you doing here?”

“Nothing,” she said. “What are you doing here?”

“Nothing . . . too.”

We stood silently, waiting for the other to confess.

“Fine!” Zuzu said, throwing her arms in the air. “I was going to have a little teeny peek at the journal. Go ahead, lecture me.”

“I was going to have a peek, too.”

“You were?”

“Yes.”

“Sadie! How could you?”

“What!? You were going to, too!”

“Don’t change the subject!”

“I . . .” Just then, we heard a tapping sound. Zuzu and I turned to the sound. We looked out the east window and saw Bella in her attic tossing pebbles out her window to get our attention. The pebbles tapped the glass and then fell to the yard below. We went to the window and opened it.

“Here,” said Bella, tossing something bigger than the pebble from her window to ours. “I gotta go.” She closed the window and turned out her attic light.

Zuzu picked up the little bundle. It was a bunch of red-bird-red crochet squares with a coffin-black ribbon tied around it.

Zuzu took the squares to Palace Beautiful and I followed. She laid them in the journal’s box.

“We better go before we get too tempted and accidentally start reading,” said Zuzu.

“Yeah.”

Just as we were about to crawl out of the little room, we heard the attic door creak open. Zuzu and I froze. I heard footsteps walk across the threshold. They were Dad’s. I could tell by the clomping of his shoes. He started to hum and we heard boxes shuffling.

“He doesn’t know we’re here,” mouthed Zuzu.

“Shhhh!” I mouthed back.

The humming stopped. The footsteps stopped. We held our breath, puffing out our cheeks and covering our mouths in case any breath escaped and we would be discovered.

It seemed like we stayed that way for hours. It was probably only seconds, but our cheeks turned bang-smash red from lack of oxygen. The humming started again and we knew if we just stayed quiet for another few seconds, we would be safe.

I heard Dad’s shoes clomp to the attic door. It creaked behind him and clicked shut.

“Whoa!” said Zuzu, still mouthing the words. “That was close!”

When we were sure he was downstairs again, we crept out of the little room and left the attic.