Drizzle (13 page)
Authors: Kathleen Van Cleve
“Exactly! The point is the process! You have a problem. In trying to solve it, you come up with a hypothesis, a theory. And then you test it out, to see if you are right. That’s all it is, scientific inquiry in a nutshell. Understand?
“Now, Miss Jong.” Owen spins around, catching Jongy and Joe whispering to each other. “Hello, Joe Josephs of the unfortunate name.” He moves over to Jongy.
“Miss Jong. I have a hypothesis for you. May I have that stick of makeup you thought was appropriate to apply as you spoke to your esteemed science teacher?”
Jongy looks around, unsure what she should do. Owen just stands there with a big smile on his face. She gives him the lip gloss. He takes it back to his desk, puts on a pair of reading glasses, and studies the small print.
“Hmmm.” He takes off his glasses and returns the lip gloss to Jongy.
“What?” Jongy’s worried.
“My hypothesis,”—Owen gives Jongy a reassuring smile—“is that your lip gloss may be dangerous to your health. Why do I say that? Because I suspect it flattens the natural protective layer of your lips, allowing rays of sunlight to penetrate directly through the skin, causing skin cancer and other non-cancerous disfigurations.”
“Disfigurations?” Jongy mutters.
Owen seems not to have heard her. “How do I test for this?” He continues,“I read the label. And sadly . . .” He looks over to Jongy. “I’m right.”
“English, please,” Jongy says, annoyed.
“Lip glosses without sun protection act like a magnifying glass to the sun.”
“What does that mean?”
“I think you should invest in some new lip gloss.With sun protection.You’ll thank me for it later, trust me.”
Jongy smirks, but then quickly uses the back of her hand to wipe off her lip gloss.
“So again,” says Owen. “Someone tell me. Scientific inquiry is . . . ?”
“Problem, hypothesis, testing, analysis,” says the blond kid in the back.
“Excellent, Charlie,” Owen says.
“My name’s Christopher.”
“Right. Of course it is.” He walks over to his desk. “Scientific inquiry is just a fancy way of describing what you already do instinctively, and putting names to all the steps. Now listen. We have a lot to get through this year. Some of it may actually be helpful to you.
“And some of it may not. Throw some spaghetti against the wall”—he lifts his right arm and pretends to pitch something against the back wall—“and see what sticks. Now. Let’s talk about our first assignment!”
As he continues, Margaret, the pretty girl who answered the first question, turns to me.
“Don’t worry about Jongy,” she says. “We went to camp together. I know how she is.”
“Thanks.”
I’m so nervous, I can’t really look at her. But I think she’s still staring at me.
“I’m sorry about your farm,” she says. “It sounds scary. Was it?”
I grip the edge of the desk. Nothing’s changed. “Uh, yeah.” I turn away from her and look out the window.
“Are you okay?” she says.
Exhibit A. Polly Peabody. Hypothesis: She’s a freak. Testing: Express concern at her farm’s condition. Conclusion: Freak.
It’s never going to go away.
I don’t speak the rest of class, staring so hard at my desk that I think I’ll burn a hole in it. When it’s over, I run away as fast as I can—so fast that I don’t even notice that I’m colliding into some classmates: Will, Joe, and Jongy.
“Hey!” Will says. “You’re Freddy Peabody’s sister.”
“Yes.” I try not to look at any of them. But Joe suddenly leaps toward me. Before I can move, he grabs my head and locks it in the middle of his elbow.
“Ow!”
“What’s that about?” Will asks Joe. “Leave her alone.”
But I know what Joe’s thinking, what he’s doing. I know what everybody’s been thinking since they’ve seen me on campus.
“I DON’T KNOW WHY IT ISN’T RAINING!” I yell, flailing my arms. “LEAVE ME ALONE!”
Joe releases me and they all take baby steps away from me, like there’s a lion loose in the hallway.
“Uh,” mumbles Joe. “I was just getting back at Freddy for hazing me last year. I didn’t mean to . . . uh, hurt you.”
Jongy smiles like the fake person she is.
“She’s stressed,” she says to the guys.“Leave her alone. Her farm’s going kaput.” She puts her arm around me like we’re best friends.
I try to duck out from under her, but her hand grips my shoulder tightly. A crowd has gathered around us, including all the people I don’t know yet.
“You know, I can’t wait for our class trip.” Jongy grins.
I groan. Every year, Mom insists that our classes take a trip to our farm so that they can learn about “responsible farming.”
Jongy keeps going. “Maybe we can take that great Umbrella ride.You know, the one that tosses its passengers all around?” She’s
pinching
my shoulder. I wrench myself free of her just as she’s snarling through her smile. “If it ever rains again, that is.”
pinching
my shoulder. I wrench myself free of her just as she’s snarling through her smile. “If it ever rains again, that is.”
“It will rain again,” I say weakly.
“What does your aunt say? Mom says she saw her leave on a private plane today. Pretended she didn’t know her, like she always does.” Jongy smacks her lips, smearing her lip gloss. She must not be too afraid of disfigurations after all, since she’s obliviously reapplied it. “I guess she’s getting out before it gets any worse?”
I’m confused and she can tell.
“Okay, show’s over.” Owen steps out of the stairwell and crosses over to where I’m standing. “Give her a break.”
“But she’s the Rhubarb Princess!” yells Joe. “Let me just ask one—”
Owen flicks his eyes over both of them. His face is harder: He’s no longer the goofy guy from the classroom. Now he’s a grown-up—with long hair and a Hawaiian shirt—who seems pretty mad.
“I expect more from you guys,” he says quietly. “Don’t behave like this again.”
“I didn’t do anything,” Joe says. “She’s crazy.”
Owen glares at him. “Go!”
“Okay, okay,” says Joseph. Before she goes, Jongy winks at me, which causes me to feel even more sick.
“Polly?” Owen asks. “Everything all right?”
I nod.
“Because the ambassador and I can lay down the law, right, Ambassador?”
He winks at Basford. Basford smiles faintly.
“Now listen, Gregor Mendel,” he says to me.
“Who?”
“Don’t you listen? Father Mendel, the pea plant guy. You want to be literal? Okay. I can do literal. Now listen, Polly Peabody.” Owen leans against the wall, his head turned so he can look me in the eye. “From what I know, your farm is a really cool place that gets a lot of attention and does good things. So maybe people just bring it up because they’re genuinely interested in it.” He cracks a crooked smile. “And maybe, maybe possibly, they’re genuinely interested in you too. Right, Ambassador?”
Basford nods. But he has to be interested in me. He’s living at our farm.
Anyway, I know what Owen’s trying to say. But adults must get some mist of their own in their brain, making them forget what middle school is like. I come from the weird farm with the weird rain. Plus I’m weird, I’ll always be weird. If I could kill this part of me, if I could strangle it, I would. Genuine interest in me from people my age means only digging into my weirdness. I wish it weren’t true, but it is.
“Thanks,” I tell Owen, and then I run away from him and Basford as fast as I can. St. Xavier’s is a big place. There’s got to be some places to hide.
SAME DAY, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2
Scraped Knees
After school, I tell Mom that she has to cancel the class trip.
“Nonsense,” she says.
“Mom, they’re just coming to gawk at everything.”
“No. They’re coming to learn. I have a whole plan. We’re actually going to use your class for help with the Transplanting!”
“What if doesn’t rain? Will it be fun then?”
“Yes,” Mom says stubbornly. “Honestly, Polly. We’re not doing it to torture you. We’re doing it because, hard as it may be for you to believe, some of your classmates may actually care about responsible farming practices.”
I’m sure Jennifer Jong really cares that our rhubarb is organic. It’s probably tops on her list after “Find out what they sacrifice at the midnight rituals” and “Look for the cauldron where they burn their newts.”
I give Mom the meanest look I can muster.
“School will get better,” she says.
“Can I go to my room?” I answer.
Mom reaches out, as if she’s going to touch my shoulder, but her hand stops in midair and she simply nods. I run up the stairs as fast as I can and shut the door behind me. Even though it’s a sunny day, I feel like everything’s turning rotten. A school like St. Xavier’s can give refuge to someone like Jennifer Jong. Aunt Edith has gone somewhere on a private plane. I may have killed Harry.
And it didn’t rain.
I stare at the Tupperware container where Harry’s leaves and stalks float in water. Did I think they were going to miraculously reattach themselves? Well, they haven’t. They’re just scattered pieces of Harry, floating apart from each other. This is how they’ll be tonight, tomorrow, and next year unless I figure out a better plan.
In seconds, I’m clutching the Tupperware container under one arm, and holding my water bottle in the other. I run to the lake, dunking the water bottle inside, letting it fill up to the top. Then I jog over to the chocolate rhubarb field, eighteenth row, thirtieth column. Harry’s home.
It’s empty, of course, although I dive to the ground and start pawing at the dirt with my hands, the soil warm under my touch. I calm down just a little when I see it—Harry’s lone root, the skinny little white string, barely long enough to poke out above the ground. Carefully I pour the water over his root. Then, very solemnly, I kneel and again make the sign of the cross.
I’m not going to give up on you. I promise. And, if you’re listening, please don’t give up on me either.
I walk back to the castle slowly, kicking the dirt as I walk. I can’t figure out how to feel about school or Harry or the fact that it didn’t rain yesterday. My brain is stuck, and I guess the truth is, I just want the answers
now
.
now
.
“What is going on?” I find myself blurting out to my cherry blossom tree. Instantly teardrops form on its petals.
“Sorry,” I say quickly. “I’m sorry.” The tree often cries by itself, but there are times—like now—when I’m the reason it starts to weep, which makes me feel awful.
I reach out and grab one of the drooping limbs.The petals are stunning: pink and lacy, cascading from the top of the tree down to my toes. I’m pretty sure the tree is attached to me in some way, which is why I always feel so comfortable coming here when I want to read a book or just be alone. But I wonder for the first time whether this attachment is a burden to the tree. It would probably be much easier for a tree to have an attachment with someone always happy, like Freddy. He’s never prickly. And he’d never, ever make anything or anyone cry.
I raise the branch quickly and duck underneath it. The mist has risen as high as the tree itself and it’s filled every spare space. Now that I’m really focusing on it, I can see it isn’t ugly at all. It’s actually pretty—individual strands of water, green and sparkling, spun together in some kind of magic net. I reach up and try to pinch some of it off, but it’s woven too tightly and again, I just get green drops of water on my hand. There must be a million dragonflies working furiously on this mist—they are at least as disciplined as ants.
“What are you doing?” I yell, hoping that Spark or one of his friends may answer me. “Why are you making this?”
I wait for a second, and then sit on the ground, under the mist, leaning against a big rock on the edge of the lake. I want to take a nap, right here. Maybe I could be in a fairy tale, and when I wake up, the mist will be gone and Aunt Edith—
my
aunt Edith, not the stranger who wants to sell the farm—will be in front of me, ready to teach me about, say, the Aztecs.
my
aunt Edith, not the stranger who wants to sell the farm—will be in front of me, ready to teach me about, say, the Aztecs.
“Spark?” I try again.
I’m focused on the mist, so I’ve forgotten the basic annoying fact that mosquitoes think our lake is their playground. I’m an easy target, so when I get bit on my lower neck, I slam my hand against my collarbone, nailing it.
Sorry, Beatrice
. I jump up, angry, just as something whizzes by me, a fast, flying, colorful bug. Spark. I watch as he dives under the lake’s surface, zooming back up again.
Sorry, Beatrice
. I jump up, angry, just as something whizzes by me, a fast, flying, colorful bug. Spark. I watch as he dives under the lake’s surface, zooming back up again.
Spark doesn’t know yet about Harry. The only person who does know for sure is Basford, even though he hasn’t said anything to me about it. But I know he saw the empty space in the field yesterday, when they had all come running to tell me it wasn’t raining. Even as I was absorbing what was happening, I was able to watch Basford glance from the ground back to me, his face solemn, a surprised look in his eyes. I had to turn away.
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