Dog Daze (5 page)

The three girls swung around toward her. Aneta flushed. Had that been her voice sounding so…bossy?

“You actually can talk when you want to, can’t you?” Sunny’s warm smile took any sting out of the words. “You’re right. We’ll find her and bring her to justice.” Sunny pulled her usually smiling face into a fierce frown. “She’ll be sorry she messed with us.”

Now that Aneta had spoken, she was at a loss. How would they find a woman of whom she had only caught a glimpse and noticed she wore the same kind of shoes Gram did? Those plastic Crocs Gram had in rainbow colors. In the intervening moments between the shock of hearing the puppy yelp, Aneta had noticed only a hat and the beige Crocs. Not much to go on.

“Finding her might be a bit hard since we didn’t see her face.” Vee set down her notebook, pulled the ponytail holder from her hair, and plunged her fingers through it. Then she drew in a sharp breath, checked her phone again, and yanked her navy backpack onto her back. “I’ve got to go. We are going to get in trouble if we don’t come up with a plan.” She glared at the group and took off at a run through the library toward the glass doors.

“Guess this meeting’s over,” Sunny said, smiling like it didn’t bother her. “Frank is not going to like this.”

“He is definitely in a learning mode with you girls. He’s coached basketball and taught kayaking and river running, but you four…” Nadine shook her head. “I’m sure you’ll all figure out a plan in the end.”

Plan? Aneta now had a plan. The plan had jumped from her heart into her head the second she’d seen Wink rolling on the carpet. Bring Wink home. Forever.

Aneta called her grandmother, and then the three remaining girls walked outside and spied Vee just disappearing off to the right.

Esther squinted. “I wonder where she’s going. She sure didn’t want to say where.”

“I will adopt Wink,” Aneta said suddenly then covered her mouth with her hands.

At that moment, a pink scooter zipped into the turnaround at the front of the community center.

“A scooter!” cried Sunny and Esther in unison. And then, looking at each other, they laughed together for the first time.

“I love scooters,” Esther said. “They’re so cute.”

“Eco-friendly, too.” Sunny’s eyes glowed. “Look, the driver is taking off her helmet.” In another moment: “It’s a grandma lady!”

Indeed, the woman who stood up, still astride the bright pink, shiny scooter, had short gray hair that curled over her head. Or rather, as Aneta knew, that
would
have curled over her head if the helmet hadn’t squashed the curls into helmet hair. Her grandmother ran from her house, five miles away, to Aneta and Mom’s house and back regularly. She could beat Aneta in the pool easily. And that was just the beginning of her activities. Days with Gram meant Aneta fell into bed at night, nearly asleep before she pulled up the sheet.

Now the woman was moving toward them.

“When I get my driver’s license, I’m going to have a scooter.” Esther talked more to herself than anyone else. “That way only the person
I
invite can be with me.”

“Annette, darling!” Gram’s familiar greeting. She picked up her pace. Aneta was pretty sure no one in the world could walk faster than Gram.

Two heads swiveled toward Aneta.

“That’s your grandmother?” Sunny turned, open mouthed, toward Aneta. “She rides a pink scooter? How cool is that?”

“So, what is it? Annette or Aneta?” Esther folded her arms across her T-shirt, which showed a brilliant sun and dancing children above the words T
HIS
I
S THE
D
AY THE
L
ORD
H
AS
M
ADE
and bored her gaze into Aneta. “You never said.”

Because I do not know
.

She stepped forward, hugged her grandmother, and gestured toward the girls who were watching her expectantly.

“And the meeting was for?” Gram prompted with a grin.

“These are the other girls who won the poster contest for Oakton Founders’ Day. Vee had to leave.”

“Yeah,” Esther said quickly, “and she didn’t want to tell us where she went.”

Sunny jumped in. “We won Friday, but finding Wink kind of stopped our brainstorming.”

Gram shot Sunny a quick look before applauding the girls. “Congratulations, winners! I didn’t know”—another glance at Aneta—“the awards were Friday. The Fam would have been there for sure. I know your mother would have liked to come.”

Her face might as well burst into flame and be done with it. Belonging to The Fam meant every occasion was a group occasion, complete with loud cheering. They would always attract attention. You’d think by now she would be used to it. Maybe even say her opinions loudly, like The Fam. Laugh a lot, like The Fam. Get in trouble with their mouths, like her cousins. But she didn’t. She liked staying out of trouble. It was easier that way. If she didn’t get in trouble, well, they wouldn’t send her back.

Gram stuck out her hand toward Sunny. The redhead took it and then squeaked. Aneta winced. Gram had a crusher grip.

“I’m Sunny.”

Gram shook Esther’s hand. “You’re the winners then?”

“Wow,” Esther said. “You make us sound important. And we don’t even have a proj—”

“We don’t have a fund-raiser yet!” Sunny shrieked, clapping her hands to her head. “You guys!”

Out of the corner of her eye, Aneta had seen Esther glance between her and her grandmother when her grandmother called her “Annette.” Time to get out of there before any
more
questions. Like about her adopting Wink. That had slipped out.

“Hi, Gram! I am ready.” She turned to the others. “Good-bye.”

“Wait—Aneta—” Esther placed a hand on Aneta’s arm. “We have to meet to get a plan. Melissa already has hers. And for finding…you know who.” She gripped Aneta’s arm. “What’s your phone number? We need to set up a time to get our project!”

“Aneta?” Gram’s brows shot up. Aneta didn’t dare look at her. Gram turned expectantly to Aneta.

“Uh…uh…” It was happening too fast. When Gram nudged her, however, Aneta quickly spilled out her address.

“What about meeting tomorrow at Aneta’s? After Aneta’s mother gets home, after dinner? I’ll call her.” Gram patted her pocket.

Aneta wanted to get out of this group, not have it come to her house. If these girls came tomorrow, they would get in the way of Mission with Mom that was growing brighter and brighter every time she thought of Wink.

“The Gates?” Esther asked, eyebrows shooting upward. “Vee told me her mom lives right around the corner from there.” Jamming her fists into her pockets, she added. “We’re on Aspen Grove.”

“Aspen Grove? That’s the street where my brother’s piano teacher lives. It’s like a block away from our house,” Sunny said.

“Is Mrs. Nissen your brother’s piano teacher?” Esther asked, hands on hips. “My brother walks to his lesson every week. Where do you live?”

Sunny’s eyebrows shot up. Then she began to laugh. “We all live within a block of each other.”

“And we’ve never met,” Esther added. “Vee bragged she was gifted and talented at Oakton Elementary.” She pointed to herself. “I go to Oakton Victory Academy, same Christian school as C.P., that boy from the community center. Anyone else a Christian?”

“I am,” Sunny said with a smile. “My parents are home-schooling us. We call our school Quinlan Christian Academy.”

Aneta remained silent. Gram nudged her.

“I go to The Cunningham School,” she said softly then added, “where Melissa goes.”

“Oh, you poor girl!” Esther cried, rolling her eyes.

Aneta couldn’t wait to put on her helmet and swing her leg over the scooter to get away. Any plan to get out of the group was not going to work now that Gram knew about it. In addition, Aneta would have to come up with a second plan—the plan to convince Mom that Wink needed a home with them.

A Not-So-Great Start

T
he next day, Aneta sat by the pool, deep in thought. Mom was coming home today, so she had to have a plan for Mission: Make Mom Love Wink.

“You’ve got a problem,” said a voice across the patio. Aneta looked up to see C.P. hanging over the six-foot fence. He was so short. How did he do that? One of these days, she was going to go into his yard and find out.

“How do you know?” she asked. Sometimes C.P. said puzzling things. Life as Aneta Jasper—Annette?—had suddenly gotten very complicated. She desperately wanted a few turns in the pool to relax. But Rule for the Pool: No pool when there isn’t an adult. Plus her plan had to be finished before Mom came home from work. A quick glance at her watch showed she had about an hour from the time Mom’s plane landed and she arrived home.

“You want Wink to have a forever home with you.”

“Yes.” She leaped up from the chair and ran through the patio door and up the stairs two at a time. In her bedroom, the oak desk stood by the large bay window overlooking the pool. Aneta took a deep breath, telling herself that if she continued to shake, she wouldn’t be able to hold the pencil. That would not help Wink come home. She yanked open the middle drawer on the right. Once armed with a medium-sized sketch pad and current favorite pencil, she pounded down the stairs again and sat down at the patio table. C.P. still hung over the fence.

Now. To steady her hands. And draw. She took in a deep breath. The pool lay next to her, blue and with just the tiniest ripples from the fake clown fish moving through the water. She smiled. C.P. had given it to Mom after she said if The Fam was over, he could join them in the pool. That kid loved their pool.

“A forever home,” she said, rolling the words around in her mouth. They sounded safe.

“My mom calls God that,” the boy said matter-of-factly, as though he were sitting next to her instead of hanging over a fence. “Someone who never goes away.”

A forever home
. Yes.

“That is what I want,” she said. Back to the mission: Bring Wink Home. Step One: Artwork. How to start? When Aneta had drawn the poster, every line and shading reminded Aneta of her previous life. The pencil had seemed to move on its own. Now she wanted the pencil to do the same.
Think
. Why had a soaking-wet little basset puppy captured her heart?

Her pencil lay still in her hand, acting as though it had never encountered a sketch pad. Wink was an orphan, like her. Little droopy Wink. The sag of the good eye and the squint of the bad eye. How he really did wink. The pencil began to scratch, slowly at first as she retraced each moment of the afternoon—from the first sight of the woman flinging the bag into the water, to how her lungs had nearly burst reaching for Wink as the bag sank, to Wink’s weak hurl on Nadine. Her pencil began to speed across the paper.

She’d completed his eyes and had just begun the broader strokes of both his ears when she heard Mom’s familiar greeting through the intercom connected to the front gate of The Gates.

“Honey, I’m home!” Mom said it every night.

Aneta jerked her head toward her watch. Early! With a desperate glance at the half-finished portrait, Aneta leaped to her feet, dropping the pad and pencil. One step toward the door then two leaps back toward the patio chair. Stay and finish? No, she always greeted Mom at the door to the mudroom. She scooped up the paper. She had to do everything right tonight. If she could show Mom how responsible she was, tell her about winning the contest—that Mom made her enter—and then show her Wink’s portrait, surely Mom would see Wink needed to come home.

At the threshold of the patio door, she stopped short. Oh. There was the Aneta/Annette thing. The telephone rang, but thinking about this was more important. Maybe the Annette/Aneta thing would be tomorrow night’s project. Suddenly so many projects. This was summer vacation!

“We must adopt Wink. He is an orphan like me. He is so cute. You will love him.” She began to practice what to say to Mom as she skipped toward the garage door. Every workday she would meet Mom in the mudroom by the garage. Mom’s blond hair might be falling out of the low ponytail and her blue eyes might be tired, but they would brighten when she saw Aneta.

“My girl!” she would say, extending her arms for a hug. The Fam was big on hugging. Aneta found she liked it very much. After a quick stop at the fridge for sparkling water for Mom and Mom’s special lemonade for Aneta, the two of them would walk arm in arm out to the pool in nice weather. This is where Aneta would complete the simple Step Two: Wink’s story. Step Three would be easy: Mom says yes.

As Aneta rounded the corner of the mudroom, however, she saw Mom standing by the washer and the open door to the garage. Standing with a pile of wrinkled clothes in her hand, a frown creasing her forehead. Aneta could smell the clothes from where she stood. Lake stink. Dog vomit. Six days of sitting. Her gaze traveled up to Mom’s face. Most of Mom’s hair had escaped her ponytail. Her eyes were more tired than Aneta had ever seen when she looked up from the clothes in her hand.

Uh-oh
.

“I—I—” began Aneta. Suddenly she didn’t know where to start. The long list of what had transpired since Friday tied her tongue. The paper in her hand crinkled and she looked down at it. Wink. Yes, Wink. “You are home early.”