After dinner I check the laptop for the weather tomorrow. Seventy percent chance of rain. I text Dodge.
Hit w Crash 2moro?
He texts back. Rain.
I reply. Not 4 sure.
This time he doesn’t answer.
Dakota sits on a kitchen stool, her furry pink slippers popping on and off her heels. With her right hand, she’s drawing. With her left hand, she’s trying to find her mouth with her spoon.
“Nice pictures, Dakota,” Mom says.
“They aren’t pictures, Kimberly. They’re diagrams.”
“Diagrams, of course. Silly me.” Mom smiles. “And since when did you decide to call me Kimberly?”
“I’m trying it out.”
“The name Mom has been around for thousands of years. I think it’s a keeper.”
“We’ll see,” Dakota answers.
“Put your bowl in the sink and get ready for bed,” Mom says.
“Look, I’m washing my bowl.” Izzy turns to Dakota. “I wash out your bowl?”
Dakota nods.
“That’s nice of you, Izzy,” Mom says.
“I nice,” Izzy says.
“I’m nice,” Mom corrects her. “Come on, nice girl, let’s get your teeth brushed.”
I take a peek at Dakota’s diagrams. I hate to admit it, but I don’t know what to do about Cupcake and I’m actually hoping one of Dakota’s crazy ideas will work. “How are you going to make the umbrella hover?” I ask her.
“Drones.”
“They’ll be expensive.”
Dakota shrugs. “My other idea is an exploding piñata. That way nobody has to hit it for the candy to come out.”
Mom comes into the hall. She hands Dakota her toothbrush. “No more explosions. Remember our deal?”
“How about quiet ones?”
“No such thing.”
Dakota hops to the bathroom, still holding her diagrams. A minute later she bursts out, toothpaste dripping down her cheek. “Mom—I mean, Kimberly. Will you promise not to give Cupcake away until after they award the money?”
“What money?” Mom asks.
“For the maker fair projects. We turn our projects in on Thursday, and then they tell us which will represent our school for all-county, but then it takes three weeks for the county to decide.”
“Is that true, Liam?”
I nod.
Dakota glares at me. “Why’d you have to ask him?” she says to Mom.
“Just making sure you both heard the same thing.”
“The words are the same. How could we hear them differently?”
“It happens.” Mom sighs. “Look, we can’t wait three weeks.”
“You always say I’m smart and I can do whatever I want to. Well, I want to wait three weeks,” Dakota declares.
“I know you do, but Torpse gave us three weeks, and that was almost two weeks ago—” Mom grabs Cupcake just as she’s about to pee and hauls her outside.
“Liam will talk to Mr. Torpse about it,” Dakota shouts.
I swivel on my heel. “Me? I will?”
“He likes you,” Dakota says.
“He doesn’t like me. He doesn’t like anyone.”
“You can make him like you, though. You know you can.”
“No I can’t.”
“Mr. Gupta likes you.”
I nod, a warm feeling rolling over me.
“How’d you do that?” she whispers.
I stare at her. Since when does Dakota care what other people think?
“I try to get along with people,” I say.
“That’s too hard.”
“Love”—Mom is back inside with Cupcake now—“we don’t know if you’ll be picked to represent the school and we don’t know you will win the all-county. Let’s not count our chickens before they hatch.”
“That makes no sense,” Dakota says. “Anybody with any brains would count their chickens before they hatch. Otherwise they wouldn’t know how many chickens they’d have. And then they’d compare before with after. They’d make two columns. Dead one. Live one. Dead one. Live one. Wouldn’t you make two columns, Kimberly? Wouldn’t you?”
Mom and I laugh.
Dakota struts around the plastic chairs and then she gives a big bow.