All Four Stars (11 page)

EASY AS TIRAMISU

THAT FRIDAY, ON THE LAST DAY OF
school before spring break, Ms. Quincy made an announcement.

“You've all done so well on your assignments lately,” she said. “I know that I've been working you very hard. So I'm sure you'll be happy to hear that you have no homework over the holiday”—cheers erupted—“except for one very small project.” The cheers died.

“It's a fun one, I promise!” Ms. Quincy continued, passing printouts with details down the rows of seats. “I would like for you to interview one of your parents, or some other adult in your life, and write a report about his or her job. And if you're not going away for spring break, you can get extra credit by spending a day at work with whomever you've interviewed. You've all written essays about your ideas for the future; now you can get some firsthand experience as well.”

“A
report
?” Jake Wheeler groaned as he got his printout. “Aw, Ms. Quincy, why d'you have to torture us like this?”

Ms. Quincy smiled. “Actually, you have one of your classmates to thank for this assignment,” she said. “I found it in my suggestion box!” Just then, the bell rang; she wished everyone a good week off, and class was dismissed.

In the hallway, all of the kids were grumbling—all of them except for Charissa, who shrieked as she wove in and out of the crowd. “
Who
put this idea in the nerd box? Who?? I demand to know! I
demand
that someone confess!”

“Fat chance,” Gladys heard Owen Green mutter to Ethan Slezak, “unless they want Charissa to murder them right here in the hall.”

Gladys pulled the straps on her lobster backpack tighter and scooted along the lockers to get past her classmates. She definitely wasn't in the mood to get murdered—not when her backpack finally held the assignment that was going to get her into the city!

Gladys's dad was a tax collector and her mom was a real estate agent. Her dad took a train to New York City every day, where he worked in a large office building and often paid visits to other large office buildings to tell people how much money they owed the government. Her mom worked in a small office in East Dumpsford and often paid visits to small houses around town, where she tried to convince people that low ceilings were all the rage and that the smell in the basement was only temporary. Which job Gladys found
less
interesting was a toss-up, but when her parents came home that night, she knew immediately who she needed to talk to.

“So, Dad . . .” she said, slipping into the office where he was organizing some papers. “You usually travel all around the city for work, right?”

“That's right,” he said.

“Do you ever work near, um, 42nd Street and Ninth Avenue?”

Her dad barely looked up from his papers. “Sure. Why?”

“Oh, no reason,” she said quickly. “And you collect taxes, right? It must be really interesting.”

He frowned. “I'll tell you what it is, Gladdy,” he said, peering down at a spreadsheet. “It's not interesting, it's busy. April fifteenth is looming, but do you think everyone is going to pay their taxes on time? Of course not. I'm running around to five companies a day trying to get people to cough it up.”

“Wow, five companies a day? That sounds exciting.”

Her dad glanced up sourly, and Gladys quickly tried her hardest to look excited. “So I have this report to do for school where I'm supposed to go to work with a parent and write about it.” She passed him the assignment description. “Do you think I could go with you to some of those companies?”

Her dad looked the paper over. “Your teacher wants you to come tax-collecting with me?”

“Yeah, can I?”

“Wouldn't you rather go to work with your mom?”

“No! I mean, um, I'm really interested in taxes,” Gladys said in what she hoped was a convincing voice.

Her dad shook his head, chuckling. “That's just like you, isn't it? Always interested in the boring adult stuff. When I was your age, I would've thrown a fit if my father tried to drag me to the office.” He made one last mark on one of his papers, then stuffed them all into his briefcase. “All right, sure. You can come in on Monday. But don't expect it to be fun.” He rose from the swivel chair and started to walk out of the room.

“Well, maybe we can go for some dessert together after work?” Gladys asked. “You know, to make it more fun?”

Her dad turned back, looking at Gladys with what seemed like new respect. “Maybe there's a kid in you yet,” he said. “Sure, as long as you behave yourself in my business meetings, I don't see why we can't get a treat after.”

• • •

The alarm went off bright and early on Monday, March 18, and Gladys was prepared. She had her journal and a pencil for writing—for both taking notes at Classy Cakes and pretending to take notes on tax-collecting. She also had a map of Classy Cakes's location printed out from the website and stuck carefully inside the journal (though she hoped she'd memorized the map well enough that she wouldn't need it).

Remembering Sandy's advice that she should dress nicely, Gladys put on her best corduroy jumper, white tights, and the patent leather Mary Janes her mother had bought her for special occasions. Then, instead of her usual puffy coat and woolly blue hat, Gladys put on the stiff black peacoat she had gotten for Christmas from Grandma Rosa and the lilac beret that had come wrapped around a pepper grinder in her last birthday package from Aunt Lydia.

When she looked in the mirror, Gladys hardly recognized herself.
I'm not a sixth-grader today,
she thought.
I'm a professional journalist.

Gladys's mom thought she looked so adorable that she insisted on taking pictures before Gladys left. She took one on the sofa and one by the front door, and was trying to convince Gladys to pose holding her father's briefcase when he pointed out that they were going to miss their train.

Gladys's dad usually walked to the train station in the morning, but with Gladys along he decided it would be easier to get dropped off. Gladys's mom drove them to the platform and waved good-bye as they mounted the stairs. The wind was blowing hard, so as soon as they'd bought Gladys a ticket from the machine, they rushed to the little shelter halfway down the platform where most of the commuters were huddling.

“Gatsby,” said a tall man once Gladys and her father had squeezed under the shelter.

“Robbins,” Gladys's dad replied gruffly, and the two men nodded at each other.

“Who's this?” said the man called Robbins.

“Daughter, Gladys,” said Gladys's dad. “Wanted to come to work today.”

“Ah,” said Mr. Robbins, and the two men continued to have a conversation using as few words as possible.

On the train, her dad let Gladys have the window seat while he read the
Dumpsford Township Intelligencer
and occasionally exchanged comments (“Those Knicks, eh?” “Embarrassing.”) with Mr. Robbins across the aisle. Gladys looked out the window and pretended to be fascinated by the towns blurring by, but really she was going over the plan in her head and trying to keep her nerves under control.

The story she planned to tell her dad was that a friend from school had gone into the city with her parents and said she ate the best piece of key lime pie ever at a place called Classy Cakes on 42nd Street and Ninth Avenue. Couldn't they go, too? Gladys knew that key lime was her dad's favorite, so she was hoping this part of the story would convince him.

The train pulled into Penn Station to a scene of chaos, unlike anything Gladys remembered from her midday arrival with her aunt. Men and women in business suits darted this way and that around the platform with grim expressions, clutching paper coffee cups and taking hurried bites from bagels or giant muffins.

“What's going on?” Gladys asked as they made their way down the aisle to exit the train.

“Rush hour!” her dad said, and offered Gladys his gloved hand. Even though she usually thought she was too old for holding hands, Gladys gripped it tightly as they stepped off the train and into the swirling mass of people.

Up an escalator, down a hallway, across a busy waiting room, through a turnstile, up a flight of stairs, and across a new platform, they stepped onto another train—a crowded subway train this time. There were no seats left, so Gladys's dad clung to a pole and Gladys clung to his other hand as the train lurched from station to station. Gladys determined that they were heading downtown from the descending street numbers, but then all the signs switched to street names instead. Finally, after she lost count of how many stops they'd made, her dad tugged her by the arm and they exited. They went through another turnstile, climbed some more stairs, and finally emerged into the sunlight.

“Where are we?” Gladys asked. She blinked as the light reflecting off the skyscrapers nearly blinded her.

“Wall Street,” her dad told her. “Come on, this way.”

Like the other men and women on the sidewalks around him, her dad walked fast, and Gladys struggled to keep up. Her Mary Janes pinched her feet, and she was starting to wish that she'd worn more comfortable shoes.

Finally, after walking through a maze of streets, they entered the lobby of a tall brown building. Gladys's dad flashed his badge at the security desk, then they rode a creaky elevator up to the twenty-eighth floor and exited into a huge room filled with rows and rows of desks separated by little walls.

“These are the cubicles,” her dad said, guiding Gladys quickly around several corners. “And here's mine.” He tossed his fedora onto his desk, and Gladys did the same with her beret.

They didn't stay at his office long; her dad just needed to check his work e-mail, drop off some papers, and pick up some new ones for that day's meetings around town. “You wouldn't believe which companies try to stiff us on their taxes!” he exclaimed as he led Gladys back out of the building. “Famous places, big names! Everyone's trying to get one over on the government. Just wait until you see some of the businesses we have to visit today.” Gladys nodded and hurried to keep pace with her dad as he sped down the street.

Their first stop was a building just a few blocks away, but much grander-looking than the building where Gladys's dad worked. Its outside was all shiny steel and glass, and the lobby had marble floors and a large pool with a bubbling fountain shaped like two golden lions in the center.

“Sackville Morganstern, can you believe it?” Gladys's father muttered. “I mean, if these guys can't afford to pay their taxes, who can?” Then he looked down at Gladys, as if he expected an answer.

“Right!” Gladys responded, perhaps a bit too forcefully. She had never heard of Sackville Morganstern in her life, but she thought she should at least try to sound interested.

Sackville Morganstern turned out to be some sort of huge bank. Once they received their visitors' badges, Gladys and her father were directed upstairs to a big room with a table, where they were joined by several more men and women in business suits.

All of the adults seemed delighted to meet Gladys, then equally delighted to completely forget about her as they spent the next two hours arguing over something that involved a lot of numbers. Gladys pretended to take notes in her journal at the beginning, but once it became clear that no one was paying attention to her, she stopped. It was probably the most boring two hours of her life, and if a young man that everyone referred to as the “intern” hadn't brought her a watery hot chocolate to sip, she would have surely fallen asleep.

At the end of the meeting, the head of the Sackville Morganstern group grumpily told Gladys's father that he would send the IRS a check. Then he called a security guard to escort the tax collector and his daughter out of the building.

“Well, that went pretty well!” Gladys's dad said as he led Gladys toward the subway entrance on the corner.

“Oh, yes,” she replied. “Very good auditing, Dad.”

They took the subway a few stops north to a neighborhood where her dad had a short appointment at the headquarters of a famous Italian fashion designer. “If they think that just because they're European they don't have to pay American taxes, they've got another think coming!” he announced as he and Gladys walked into the colonnaded building. This time, he left her downstairs in the designer's flagship store while he went up for his meeting. Gladys found herself staring at a mannequin in a low-cut dress that looked like it was made out of plastic wrap.

“Sorry, we don't carry children's sizes,” said a haughty voice.

Gladys turned and saw a very skinny salesgirl standing next to her.

“That's okay,” Gladys said. “I don't think it's really my style.”

“Well, not everyone can wear Gianella,” the salesgirl responded in a huff. “Our clientele is very exclusive. That's why we're the toast of Soho.”

Soho . . . the neighborhood name made Gladys's mouth water. Why was that? Oh, yes—she had read a review of a delicious-sounding Middle Eastern restaurant in the
New York Standard
just a few months back.

“Are we near Salaam Soho?” Gladys blurted, just as the salesgirl began to step away. “I read that they make the most delicious pita bread in Manhattan.”

The salesgirl looked blankly at Gladys for a moment, then shrugged a bony shoulder. “I haven't eaten carbs in two years,” she said. “No one at Gianella does.” And she walked off.

Gladys was relieved when her dad came back a few minutes later, fastening the clasp on his briefcase.

“Easy as pie,” he said as they walked out of the shop.

“Or maybe you should say ‘easy as tiramisu,'” Gladys suggested. “You know, because they're Italian?” Gladys got such a look of confusion from her dad that she decided to keep her food jokes to herself after that.