The Blossoming Universe of Violet Diamond (8 page)

W
hat'd the letter say?” I asked as we drove home. “Can I read it?”

“It's about grown-up things,” she answered.

“But you could tell me some of it, couldn't you?”

“Part of it talked about a letter she'd written to me a long time ago, apologizing for how she'd acted toward me, especially for not coming to the wedding, and how she was so excited about the baby. How she had wanted to reconcile.”

Reconcile?
Another new one for my word book. “What's that mean?”

“She wanted to become friends.”

“So where's the letter? Do you have it?”

“No, she never mailed it,” Mom said.

“Why not?” I asked.

“The day she wrote it was the day of the accident,” Mom replied sadly.

“Oh,” I replied. What else could I say?

So, that's why she's letting me go to Los Angeles with Roxanne.

• • •

We'd only been home for an hour, and I was busy cleaning out Hazel's smelly litter box, when Athena came over.

“So?” she asked as she plopped on my bed.

“So I'm leaving this coming Saturday to go to Los Angeles to stay at her house for a week.”

“No way. Are you flying alone?”

“Not. Mom's driving me back to Seattle and Roxanne and I are taking the plane together.”

“Why are you calling her Roxanne? Isn't she your grandma?”

“Yep,” I replied, “but I didn't decide what I should call her yet.”

“Are you gonna go see the Hollywood sign and the Walk of Fame and go to Malibu and Disneyland and Universal City? Because if you are, you have to take me with you.”

“I don't think so—not this time, Athena. I mean, I don't really know her at all, but I don't think she'd say yes.”

Athena poked out her lip and frowned.

“I promise to take lots of pictures, though.”

“Okay, and then when we're old . . . like, eighteen . . . we can go there together, promise?”

I grinned and nodded.

We went to the kitchen to raid the fridge, and Daisy and Wyatt were already there. They were speaking French to each other. When they do, both Athena and I wonder what they're saying, but we figure it's mushy stuff because of the way their eyes get that dreamy-romantic look. When it happens when I'm alone it's just plain embarrassing, but when Athena's there she starts clowning around, making it funny.

“
Bonjour, petites
dude-ettes, good to see you,” Wyatt said.

“Hey, Wyatt,” Athena and I replied at the same time.

When Wyatt kissed Daisy on the tip of her nose, Athena began making imaginary kisses into the air, and said, “Ooh-la-la, lovebirds!” I tried hard to keep the giggles inside my mouth, but they came out anyway.

Daisy rolled her eyes at us. “
Petits enfants.
I forgot there were such
little children
here,” she said.

Wyatt put two fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. “Chillax, females!” We all cracked up.

Daisy joined Athena in the refrigerator raid and asked, “So how was the art show, V?”

“Fine,” I told her. Later, when we were alone, I'd tell her the whole story, but not now. “Plus we went to Serious Pie.”

“Lucky Violet,” Daisy said.

Right then, Athena, with her big mouth, broke my big news. “And she's going to Los Angeles on Saturday and Disneyland and Hollywood and maybe even Malibu,” she blabbed.

“What!” Daisy shrieked.

“Awesome, little dude-ette!” Wyatt shouted.

Part of me didn't want to straighten this out, but I knew I had to. Otherwise, the story was going to get bigger and bigger and bigger. “I never said we were going to Disneyland or Hollywood or Malibu, but I am going to Los Angeles for a whole week.”

“No way! I wanna go,” D whined like a kid begging for a toy.

I never got to go to Connecticut with Daisy. Now everyone wants to have a piece of my excitement. It's my turn.

“Maybe next time,” I said with a big grin.

“C'est la vie,”
Wyatt said to Daisy.

And with that, the four of us began to devour the food.

Day by day, like the food on the table, the boring pieces of my life were being swallowed up.

T
hat night, Daisy came into my room and sat in one of her yoga poses on the floor. “So tell me.”

“Everything? It's a lot.”

“Everything.”

After I'd rattled off the whole story, Daisy shook her head as if she couldn't believe her ears. “And after all that, you still want to go to her house?”

“She apologized, D. And she was crying,” I said in Roxanne's defense. “I thought you'd be happy for me.”

Daisy got up and sat close beside me on the bed. “I am,” she said. “Really.”

I can't say why at that moment I wondered if Daisy knew the truth about the accident, but I suppose that's why it's called wondering, because it kind of comes unexpectedly, the same way curiosity does. “Did you know Mom was driving when they had the accident?” I asked.

“Yeah, I knew.”

“But did you know that Mom made a—”

Daisy finished the question for me. “A U-turn?”

“Yeah, a U-turn.”

Daisy nodded.

“How come you never told me?”

Daisy shrugged. “Seemed like it might weird you out.” She paused, then asked, “Did it?”

I picked nervously at my fingernails. “Yeah, it did.” And that was when I cried.

Daisy hugged my shoulder and nuzzled me. “Try not to think about that stuff, V. Try to think about having a good time in LA, promise . . .
promets
?”

I leaned into my sister's shoulder. “Okay, promise.”

• • •

Once Daisy was gone, I pulled out my notebook of
Places Violet Diamond Will Travel to Someday.

After
Los Angeles, California,
which I'd written in months ago, I added:
And sooner than I thought.
Then I numbered 1–7 for seven days.

Places I'd like to go to while I'm in Los Angeles, California, with Roxanne Diamond, also known as RC, also known as Grandma, or maybe even Kamaria.

1. Disneyland, of course
   
2. Universal Studios, possibly
   
3. Santa Monica Beach, I think
   
4. Hollywood, definitely
   
5. Malibu
   
6. ?
   
7. ?
   

Because I figured there were places other than the ones I'd thought up where she'd want to take me, I left two days with question marks. I closed my notebook and climbed into bed. I was really tired, and lucky for me, I nodded off fast.

I
t was my day to golf with Poppy, but he had a dental appointment. And as far as I knew, Athena was still getting daily cooking lessons and I wasn't in the mood to spend all day in anyone's kitchen, but I didn't want to stay home, either, so I asked Gam to drop me off at the rink.

There are days when Gam gets quiet. She calls those her moody days, and I thought maybe this was one of them, because she was hardly talking as we drove. But I wondered if it had something to do with Roxanne and what happened in Seattle. Everyone seemed a little different since Mom and I got back.

“What's the matter?” I asked.

“Nothing. Everything is fine. Just a lot on my mind.”

“With your online business?”

Gam nodded.

I knew Mom had told her about my trip to Los Angeles, but I decided to talk about it anyway. “I'm leaving on Saturday for Los Angeles with Roxanne.”

“Your mother told me. I expect you'll have a wonderful time.”

“I hope so. You're not mad about that, are you?”

She gave me a side glance. “Of course not. I'll just miss you.”

“Oh, Gam, it's only a week. I'll be back before you know it.”

“She's a very interesting person, isn't she?”

“Yep, unconventional.”

Gam chuckled. “Not like boring old me.”

So that was it. “You're not that boring,” I told her. “Plus you're extremely nice.”

That made her smile. “Not that boring, huh?”

“Most grown-ups are boring, Gam, not just you. Mom is boring, especially when she talks doctor talk. Even Poppy's boring. I bet even Daisy'll be boring and Wyatt will be double boring. I mean, he's already boring.”

“But you probably won't be boring, right?” Gam asked.

“Probably not,” I replied.

That made her giggle.

When we reached the rink, Gam took my hand in hers and said, “I suppose when you don't know about the other part of your family, it feels like there's something missing. Like all of the pieces of the puzzle aren't there.”

Gam had put my feelings into words.

“Exactly,” I told her.

She squeezed my hand tightly. “I really hope you find those pieces, V. And I especially want you to have a good time.”

“I'm not gone yet,” I reminded her.

“I know, but I just needed to say that. Pick you up at three. Wait inside, promise?”

“Yep,” I said. I kissed her on the cheek, grabbed my skates, and climbed out of the car.

A
s expected, Yaz was on the ice, practicing jumps and spins. Watching her glide, I hoped she would actually make it to the Olympics someday or at least go to Nationals. Yaz Kilroy really is amazing. As soon as she saw me, she waved and zoomed toward me.

“Where've you been? I called your house on Saturday and Daisy told me you were gone for the weekend,” Yaz said as she came off the ice, slid on her plastic blade guards, and joined me on the bleachers. Her smile revealed shiny new braces.

“You got braces!” I shrieked.

“Do I look ugly? Tell me the truth,” she demanded.

Yaz was so extremely cute, she could never look ugly, and that's what I told her.

“You'd better not be lying, V,” she warned, then questioned me again. “So where'd you go?” My friend Yaz not only badgers—like a detective, she asks a lot of questions.

“I went to an art exhibit in Seattle.”

“Oh, I thought maybe you went somewhere exciting.”

“It was my grandmother's art show and I got to meet her for the first time and on Saturday I'm going with her to Los Angeles for a week and to Disneyland, I hope,” I rambled.

“Your black grandma?”

“Yep.”

Yaz scrunched up her face and said, “That's weird.”

“What's weird?” I asked.

“That you're eleven years old and you never met her. Where's she been?”

Right then, I was happy and I really didn't feel like talking about the embarrassing Roxanne Diamond story, so I just answered, “Living in another country.”

Of course that wasn't enough of an answer for Yaz the interrogator. “Where?”

I blurted out, “Paris.”

“Paris isn't a country, V. There's even a city called Paris in Texas.”

I squinted at her out of the corner of my eye. “Paris, France, and Berlin and Africa, too.”

That seemed to satisfy Yaz, and when they started to play music in the rink, she ordered me to put on my skates and dragged me off the bleachers. Onto the ice we sailed and did some ice dancing to the rhythm.

Later, when Yaz's mom, Mrs. Kilroy, showed up, Yaz blabbed to her about my grandma from Paris, France, and something in the way Mrs. Kilroy looked at me made me wonder if she knew the whole story. She and my mom do talk now and then.

But lucky for me, Mrs. Kilroy didn't give me away. She just smiled and said, “How nice that you
finally
got to meet her.” It seemed like the only word I heard was
finally.