Jaris was going to drop Chelsea off at home, then go to work at the Chicken Shack. As they neared the house, they saw Grandma Jessie’s little red convertible in the driveway.
“Uh-oh, chili pepper,” Jaris nodded toward the driveway. “Look who came to call. That can’t be good news.”
“Oh no!” Chelsea grumbled. “Now what’s she gonna complain about? I hope it has nothing to do with my opossums.”
Jessie Clymer was Mom’s widowed mother, and Mom was very close to her. In fact, Mom was always on the phone with her, sharing all the details of the Spain family life. Grandma Jessie had never liked Pop. When her daughter began dating Lorenzo Spain, she moved heaven and earth to try to break them up. Nothing worked. From time to time, she gently urged her daughter to end the marriage and find fulfillment with a man more suited to her. That kind of talk infuriated Chelsea and Jaris. To them, their grandmother was a meddling troublemaker, and they hated to see her coming.
Chelsea came in the front door, making a point of banging the door shut to express her displeasure with the visitor. “I’m home, Mom,” she yelled. “Hi, Grandma.”
“Oh, Chelsea,” Grandma Jessie said in a warm voice, “Your mother’s been telling me how you’re working with vermin now. I do hope you’ve washed your hands well with antibacterial soap. If not, I have a bottle in my purse—”
Chelsea went into the living room. Her mother sat on a straight-backed chair, and her grandmother was reigning from the best overstuffed chair in the room. That was the chair that Pop usually sat in. Chelsea deeply resented Grandma Jessie sitting in Pop’s chair. “I’m working with marsupials, Grandma, not vermin,” Chelsea replied bitterly. “Opossums, actually. They’re very cute, and I thoroughly washed my hands before I left the refuge. Shadrach made sure of that.”
“Shadrach?” Grandma repeated the name with clear distaste, glancing at her daughter. “Now that would be the poor disfigured man Chelsea is helping?”
Chelsea rolled her eyes. As usual, Mom had told her mother everything, not leaving out a single detail. Chelsea sent her mother a dark look. Mom looked guiltily away, concentrating on her lemonade and swishing the ice cubes. They made lovely little tinkling sounds.
“Shadrach is a war hero,” Chelsea announced, not knowing whether he was or not. “He got hurt in this war in Afghanistan, I think. I’m not sure ’cause those war heroes don’t like to talk about what they went through. That’s just the way they are.”
“You really don’t know how he became so severely scarred, do you, dear?” Grandma asked in a sickly sweet voice. “We don’t want to be making up stories, do we? Has he told you about his condition?”
“One of the opossums told me,” Chelsea snapped.
Mom looked up sharply. “Chelsea, don’t be insolent,” she scolded.
“I would imagine these creatures smell awful,” Grandma remarked, shuddering. “Be sure to take a nice hot shower, dear. You don’t want the stench sticking to you.”
“I didn’t notice any stench,” Chelsea replied. She wanted to add “until I got in here,” but didn’t say it. She knew she’d be in really big trouble if she went that far.
“So, sweetheart,” Grandma Jessie asked, “why do you want to save opossums? Isn’t the city trying to get rid of them? I mean, they have programs to rid the city of all kinds of vermin—rats, gophers, squirrels, whatever. I think there’s a vermin abatement program, and we pay our taxes into that. Yet you and this pathetic Shadrach character are trying to rescue them so that we are even more overrun with them. This neighborhood is already gravely afflicted with gangs and poverty and graffiti. Do we really need to encourage wild pests?”
Chelsea sat down in an uncomfortable rocker near her mother. She faced her grandmother, who was wriggling around to get more comfortable in Pop’s chair. Chelsea felt she had no right to be sitting in that chair anyway. But Chelsea had another question to ask.
“Grandma,” she began, “do you think we should wipe all the animals off the face of the earth? Who gave us the right to do that? Pastor Bromley said we got dominion over the earth, but we gotta protect it. I don’t think we should kill all the little animals. Opossums aren’t hurting anybody. They just want the chance to survive like everybody else.”
Grandma Jessie didn’t answer Chelsea. Instead, she turned and spoke to Mom in a distressed voice. “Monica, the poor child refers to the opossums as if they were people. Did you get that? They deserve to survive like everybody else. Did you hear that? Doesn’t that alarm you?”
“Oh, Chelsea knows they’re not people, Mom,” Chelsea’s mother responded with a nervous smile, taking a quick gulp of lemonade. “She just feels sorry for them.”
“No,” Chelsea insisted, wishing to cause trouble. “I do think they are sort of people. I think opossums should wear little coats and trousers, and maybe little top hats or beanies. Once they’re educated, they could go to school too.”
“Chelsea,” Mom chided, “now you are being deliberately offensive.”
“Should we kill all the songbirds too, Grandma,” Chelsea asked. “Maybe we could spare the hummingbirds ’cause they’re so tiny.”
Again, Grandma Jessie ignored the girl. The woman finished her lemonade and said, “Monica, you have a problem. I am simply telling you that this child is going to give you grief. She is not even in senior high yet, and she is sarcastic and extremely rude. Not that this comes as any great surprise to me, with the father she has.”
Chelsea realized she had gone too far. “I’m sorry, Grandma,” she said. “It’s just that the opossums are so cute, and they don’t hurt anybody. It’s fun to be helping them. I’m keeping a journal about working at the rescue center too. I’m gonna get credit in my science class at school when I start at Tubman. I’m already friends with the teacher, and we get along real good.”
“Well, dear, just don’t let one of those horrible things bite you,” Grandma warned. “Rabies is no laughing matter, and everybody knows you can get rabies from those wild things.”
“Not from opossums,” Chelsea countered, digging into her backpack for the literature Shadrach gave her. “You can read it right here. Opossums can’t get rabies ’cause of their low body temperature.”
“Well, thank heaven for that,” Grandma Jessie sighed. “But there must be all kinds of other nasty things they can transmit. I mean, they are so ugly and dirty looking.”
The older woman cast a critical look in her daughter’s direction. “I’m really surprised, Monica, that you let the child get involved in such filthy business. There are so many nice activities for young girls in the summer—dance lessons, music lessons, sewing . . .”
“I really like working with the opossums,” Chelsea asserted.
Grandma Jessie took a final delicate sip of her lemonade. She then declared in an anguished voice, “Monica, the children are so like Lorenzo. It’s simply amazing. I see so little of you in them, and so much of him.” The loathing in her voice was only thinly veiled. “Speaking of your husband, how is the garage doing? I’ve been almost afraid to ask, knowing that your home hangs in the balance, hostage to this wild scheme of Lorenzo’s.”
“So far it seems to be going well, Mom,” Monica Spain replied. “Of course, it hasn’t been that long. But he has a lot of new business, and he’s hired a young man to help him. The new mechanic seems very good.”
“Mmm,” Grandma Jessie sniffed. She almost seemed unhappy with the positive report. She looked at the beautiful gold watch on her wrist. “I must be going I’m afraid,” she announced, “I am attending a board meeting at a children’s charity I have recently taken an interest in. We are helping children appreciate the arts.” She glanced at Chelsea and her daughter, “Of course that isn’t as important as propagating vermin, but then what do I know? I’m from another generation. We used to set traps for vermin, but now we have refuges for them. Our priorities are vastly different.”
As Grandma Jessie was about to leave, Chelsea said, “Bye, Grandma. I’d give you a hug, but . . . uh . . . you know, I’ve been with the opossums.”
“Yes, that’s considerate of you, dear. And do shower,” Grandma Jessie instructed as she hurried for the door.
They heard her engine coming to life and the little red convertible backed out of the driveway. Mom turned to her daughter and said, “Stop laughing.”
Chelsea was convulsed. She couldn’t stop. Every time she tried to stop, she laughed harder.
“Chelsea Spain, stop!” Mom commanded. Then she covered her own mouth with her hand and started giggling. “Chelsea,” she wailed, “look what you’ve done to me!”
The phone rang then. Mom answered it, and her face changed. She seemed troubled. “I’m so sorry to hear that,” she said. “When was this? Oh dear. Well let’s hope it all turned out all right. Let’s just hope for the best, yes.”
When she put down the phone, she frowned. “That was Nattie,” Mom explained. “She thought I’d want to know that Olivia Manley was drunk yesterday. So drunk that my son and his girlfriend had to practically carry her up the walk of her house. Nattie Harvey was, of course, enjoying every minute of telling me that. She is such a wicked gossip.”
Mom sat down and for a moment put her face in her hands. Then she looked up, “Did you know about this, Chelsea?” she asked.
Chelsea didn’t want her mother to be hurt. She couldn’t admit that Jaris was confiding in his little sister but not his mother. So she said, “I heard it today. It’s all over, Mom. Some kid who lives next door to Mrs. Manley is texting everybody. I guess it got to Nattie Harvey, and now she’s making sure the whole world knows.”
“Poor Sereeta,” Mom moaned. “I don’t know where this is going. Olivia Manley is like a runaway train. I shudder to think of the future for Sereeta. I worry about Jaris too. He’s so involved in this, and it’s so sad. I mean for a teenaged boy to have to bring his girl’s intoxicated mother home at night. It’s so awful.”
“Maybe Sereeta’s mom’ll join some group,” Chelsea suggested. “They help people, don’t they?”
“Only if they want help,” Mom responded sadly.
Much later, that evening, Chelsea went to her room to start her journal. She was so glad that Athena, Heston, and Maurice were with her. It made everything more fun and interesting. Besides, she was starting to build her little group of friends, as Jaris did. Chelsea really liked Heston. He wasn’t really handsome or anything, but he was sweet and nice. And he liked Chelsea. She could tell.
Chelsea flopped on her bed and took her journal in hand. But she was too excited about her upcoming freshman year to write her entries.
A lot of the girls going into the freshman class at Tubman already had boyfriends. Now that Chelsea knew a boy who was sort of interested in her, she didn’t feel so left out.
Chelsea turned again to her journal. After writing a while, she texted Athena. “My journal’s going gr8t, Athena,” Chelsea texted. “It was fun today, right? GTG.”
Athena texted back right away. “Heston and me worked on our journals 2gether. He used my computer. He’s 2 poor 2 go online. TTFN.”
Chelsea was surprised and a little upset. Why didn’t Heston come over and work on Chelsea’s computer? What was he doing at Athena’s house? Chelsea didn’t live any farther from Heston than Athena did. What was the deal? Pop was nice to Heston when he came over here, so that wasn’t a problem.
In her mind, Chelsea replayed the day at the opossum refuge. Had she said something that made Heston mad? Or did Heston just discover all of a sudden that he liked Athena more than he liked Chelsea? He and Athena did seem to be working together a lot. Maybe Heston was jealous that Chelsea and Maurice were talking a lot. Maybe Heston felt humiliated when he refused to hold the opossum and Maurice took Magic right away.
It was too early to go to sleep, but Chelsea lay there looking up at the ceiling. Why was she getting so upset over something this stupid, she wondered? Heston was just a friend. He wasn’t a boyfriend, not yet anyway. Chelsea wasn’t crazy about him or anything. But she thought it’d kind of cool if they’d hang together at Tubman, and she would feel good about it.
Now maybe he was Athena’s boyfriend. Athena came to the opossum refuge wearing a real pretty tank top. Her jeans were so tight they looked like they were painted. Chelsea thought she was prettier than her anyway. Chelsea just wore a baggy old T-shirt and roomy jeans. Maybe Heston got caught up in how pretty Athena looked.
Chelsea called Heston on her cell phone. “Hi,” she said, keeping her voice light and breezy. “I finished writing in my journal. You too?”
“Yeah,” Heston replied. “I wanted to do a good job and get credit from Ms. Colbert.”
“That’s really nice of Ms. Colbert to give us credit and to be working with Shadrach like that,” Chelsea remarked. “I think Athena had fun today too. Don’t you think so, Heston?”
“I don’t know,” he answered.
Chelsea exchanged a few words with him, but she wasn’t paying attention. She was thinking that he wasn’t going to tell her about going to Athena’s house and working with her on her computer. “If he didn’t have a guilty conscience about it,” she told herself, “he would’ve told me. He’s got a crush on Athena! Pop was right. She’s bad news. It’s Athena’s fault we all got in that Mercedes and rode at a hundred miles an hour with the Yates boys. It’s Athena’s fault I got busted. Now she’s stolen Heston Crawford, who used to like me. I hate her so much. I’m not going to be her friend anymore.”
Chelsea said a cold good-bye to Heston and slumped back on her bed.
“I don’t need any friends!” Chelsea told herself bitterly. She stared at the ceiling again. She suddenly popped up and took her raggedy old teddy bear from the top of her bureau. She flopped back on the bed, hugged the teddy tightly, and felt about seven years old.
Chelsea knew Tubman was a big school, bigger than Marian Anderson Middle School. She dreaded that first day, walking onto that large campus and not knowing anybody. She depended on Athena, Keisha, and Inessa, but especially Athena. Athena—darn her!—was so much fun. Chelsea had relied on having her and Heston. It wouldn’t be the same with just sour old Inessa and Keisha. Watching Athena and Heston slobbering over each other would just ruin everything for Chelsea.
Then Chelsea thought that Shadrach was smart. It was better to hang out with opossums rather than with people. Opossums weren’t treacherous like people.
Chelsea heard Pop coming down the hall. As he usually did, he stuck his head through the doorway. “Bedtime pretty soon, little girl,” he reminded her.
“Okay, Pop,” Chelsea mumbled.
Pop’s head disappeared, then reappeared.
Pop studied his daughter for a second and then came into the room.
“So,” he asked, “what’s with layin’ here huggin’ the old teddy bear? I thought we retired him. Somethin’ bad happen today at the opossum place?”
“Oh no, Pop, it was great,” Chelsea answered. “I loved it.”
Pop came closer and sat on the edge of the bed. “Come on, baby. I see somethin’ shiny on those cheeks. You been cryin’. Wassup, little girl?”
Chelsea picked at the teddy’s worn ear. Then she spoke. “It’s just . . . pretty soon I’ll be going to Tubman, and it’s such a big school. I don’t know hardly anybody, and I’m scared I’ll be all alone.”
“You been lookin’ forward to goin’ to Tubman, Chelsea,” Pop remarked. “What happened?”
“Well, Athena was my best friend, and I don’t like her anymore,” Chelsea explained. “She’s hangin’ with Heston Crawford now, who I thought liked me. That dirty rat of an Athena stole Heston at the opossum refuge. Pop, she’s so sneaky. I didn’t even see it happen. She was all dressed up in cool jeans. I guess Heston went crazy, ’cause now he’s hangin’ with her.”
Pop sat there for a long moment without saying anything. Then he spoke to his daughter. “Lemme get this straight, little girl. So this is about a big romantic triangle? One person is my little fourteen-year-old girl, who has no business having a boyfriend anyway. Then there’s this twit of an Athena Edson without a brain in her head. And finally the Romeo is that tall, gangly string bean dodo Heston Crawford. Now he’s hooked up with the airhead Athena. Is this what I’m hearing?”
“You make it all just sound stupid, Pop,” Chelsea whined. “But I liked Heston, and I thought he liked me and I’m hurt.”
“Heston Crawford is an idiot, little girl,” Pop told her. “You will go to Tubman High School. By ten in the morning, you will have so many friends you won’t know what to do with them. You will smile that big beautiful smile you got, and they’ll gather around you like bees to a flower.”
Pop reached over and took his daughter’s hand in his. “Everybody loves you, Chelsea,” he told her softly. “You don’t have to worry about having friends. It’s been that way all through school, little girl. It won’t be no different at Tubman.” Then his voice grew gruff, and he bulged his eyes for comic effect. “Your pop ever lie to you, baby?”
“No,” Chelsea admitted.
“He ain’t lying now either,” Pop affirmed. He reached out and took his daughter in his arms in a big bear hug. Chelsea smelled all “his smells.” His shaving lotion, a little whiff of oil from his pickup he fixed today, the gel he put on his beautiful black hair. A feeling of love and hope surged through her. She felt safe and happy.
“Want milk and a little something ‘fore you get ready for bed?” Pop asked.
“No, Pop. I’m fine,” she responded. “I’m feeling tired all of a sudden.”
“Well, good,” Pop said, “’cause it’s time anyway. You have a good night’s sleep, baby.”
The father went down the hall, whistling.
Chelsea reread her work on her journal. She had planned to share what she’d written with Athena, and Athena had promised to do the same. They wanted to make sure they both had covered the main points and got all their facts straight. Now, of course, that wouldn’t happen. Chelsea wasn’t sure whom she’d miss most, Heston or Athena. She was pretty sure it would be Athena.