The Manny Files book1 (12 page)

India went to the other side, and we opened them together.

“Taa-daa,” I said.

Grandma’s eyes lit up when she saw the purples, pinks, and yellows.

“How beautiful,” she said, with her hands clasped together by her chin. Her eyes looked like Mom’s do when she chops onions.

Grandma ate breakfast and spent the rest of the morning looking at her new garden.

At lunchtime Grandma felt good enough to get into her wheelchair. Dad and Uncle Max rolled Grandma out onto the back porch, while
the manny and I pretended to be traffic cops. We waved Grandma in for a landing, until finally the manny blew on a shiny whistle and motioned her to stop.

I don’t know where he got the whistle, but I want one.

Dad and Uncle Max lifted Grandma and her wheelchair down the three steps so that she was in the yard. Lulu, India, and I took turns wheeling Grandma through the garden and telling her how we had gone to the nursery and planted everything in the dark while she was asleep. I even told her about the manny splashing Lulu with water at the river.

“Did she deserve it?” Grandma asked.

I looked over to see if Lulu was listening. She wasn’t. I turned to Grandma and nodded my head yes.

Grandma loved the garden. I could tell by the way she kept gasping and covering her hand with her mouth.

We ate a garden lunch.

The manny said it was very civilized to eat crustless tomato and cucumber sandwiches in the garden. We washed them down with lemonade.

While we were having shortbread cookies, I stood next to Grandma’s wheelchair and she put her arm around me. Uncle Max took a picture of
us with his Polaroid camera. We were next to the rosebush, just like in the picture of her and Mom when Mom was little.

“Say ‘cucumber sandwich,’” said Uncle Max.

“Cucumber sandwich,” we said, smiling really big. Grandma squeezed the back of my neck, and I got goose bumps.

I put the picture of Grandma and me in the Saks Fifth Avenue box in my top drawer.

We still planned a summer vacation, even though Grandma was living in our living room. June and the other canasta ladies said they would take turns staying over with her while we were gone. Virginia said she’d make a special trip to the liquor store. Mom didn’t like the sound of that. She left a list of rules for Grandma, the same way she does for us when we stay at home alone while she and Belly run to the grocery store.

1. Don’t let strangers into the house.
   
2. Don’t tell strangers that you are home alone over the telephone.
   
3. Be responsible.
   
4. NO WILD PARTIES.
   

Mom never puts the last rule on our list of rules, but she put it in all capitals on Grandma’s. Grandma told her not to worry, that she was looking forward to a quiet week of reading and resting. Then she winked at me when Mom wasn’t looking.

This year we went fly-fishing and camping on a river in the mountains. Dad says summer vacations are for introducing us to what the world has to offer. Last year we went to Disneyland and I threw up cotton candy on the teacups. He said that cotton candy and throwing up were two of the things the world had to offer. The year before that we went to Venice, Italy. Belly was a little baby, and Mom bought her a black-and-white-striped gondolier outfit. When we took a gondola ride through the canals, people pointed at Belly from the arched bridges above. They called her adorable and precious. I thought she looked like a tiny prisoner, except she needed ankle shackles. We wouldn’t have as many broken things in our house if Belly wore ankle shackles.

Uncle Max and the manny were invited to come along on the fly-fishing trip. I couldn’t wait. The manny
always
seems like he’s on vacation. I couldn’t imagine what he’d be like when he really was. A week before the trip I packed everything I would need into my backpack. Sunglasses. Shorts. My journal. I put the backpack in the corner of my room with a note on it
to myself. It said, “Don’t forget to pack your toothbrush.” The manny added “And razor and shaving cream” to my note.

Mom and Dad spent the evenings of the week before our trip packing sunscreen, flashlights, and life jackets and getting together medical kits in case of an emergency. Dad knew what he was doing. When he was in college, he spent his summers as a fly-fishing guide. He guided tourists in boats down rivers. Most of the tourists that he guided had never been fishing before. He said they were wild with their fishing rods, and he had to lie completely down in the boat sometimes so that they wouldn’t hit him with the hook. One time someone fell out of the boat as they floated through rapids. I must have looked worried, because Dad said, “Don’t worry. We’re only floating on calm water. Nobody will fall out of the boat unless they are pushed.”

“Good idea, Dad,” I said as Lulu walked through the room, modeling her new rain gear.

He didn’t hear me.

The day we left for the mountains, Wanda, Thelma, Virginia, and June came over to see us off. They had luggage with them. Thelma told Mom that they all had decided to stay over with Grandma until we returned. She told Mom that
it would be like a slumber party. Mom looked worried but shrugged her shoulders and continued putting our backpacks, tents, and life jackets into the back of the Eurovan.

The manny whispered in my ear, “I bet they put June’s bra in the freezer while she’s sleeping.”

I whispered back, “I don’t think it will fit.”

The manny snort-laughed.

When Dad and Uncle Max were finished securing the boat to the top of the Eurovan, the manny yelled, “All aboard.” We ran into the house to give Grandma and the canasta ladies hugs. Grandma kissed me on the forehead. It left a wet mark, but I didn’t wipe it off. When we ran back outside, Mom and Dad were already in the front seats of the Eurovan. Lulu and India got in the back, and Belly got into her car seat. I rode with Uncle Max and the manny in Uncle Max’s Honda Accord. It’s much cleaner than our Eurovan, which has lollipop sticks from the bank stuck to the ceiling. It was a day’s drive to the mountains, five days of camping, and a day’s drive back home.

Uncle Max drove all morning, and Mom drove the Eurovan. Uncle Max and the manny sang along to the radio. They competed to see who knew the words to the most songs. I kept score
in the backseat. The manny won. He even knew the words to some country songs. Uncle Max said that he didn’t want to win if it meant that he had to listen to country music. The rest of the day the manny tuned the radio to a country station and sang with every song, while Uncle Max groaned.

The manny wailed, “‘I’ve got friends in low places, where the whisky drowns and the beer chases my blues away.’”

Uncle Max said, “If you don’t stop singing, I’m going to drive this car into oncoming traffic.”

The manny said that if he was going to record a country album, he needed the support of his friends. Then he laughed and started singing louder.

When it was time for lunch, Mom pulled into a little burger place where you ordered from a window and then ate outside at picnic tables. Uncle Max pulled the Honda Accord in right next to the Eurovan. Belly did a blowfish against the window at us. Uncle Max did one back. It left lip marks on the window, but he wiped them off with his shirt. Belly didn’t wipe her lip marks off the Eurovan window. They will probably be there until she’s twelve.

We ordered our burgers and sat at the picnic table and ate them. It was so warm that Belly
took her shirt off. She looked like a street urchin because she had eaten her cheeseburger straight through the middle, and it left a ketchup stain from the corners of her mouth all the way up to her ears. We watched
Oliver
last year in music class. Oliver was a street urchin, but even he somehow managed to stay cleaner than Belly does.

Lulu finished her lunch first and opened her backpack to find her walkman to listen to. When she unzipped her backpack, I noticed the corner of “The Manny Files” sticking out of the top. I couldn’t believe that she had brought it along on a camping trip. I guess some things you just don’t take a vacation from.

When we had all finished lunch, Mom stood up and stretched her arms over her head. Her shirt came up, and I could see her belly button and her scar from where they had to take Belly out of her. It’s next to her belly button, and she calls it her Belly zipper. We got back into the cars, only this time Dad drove the Eurovan and the manny drove Uncle Max’s Honda Accord.

Belly gave us one more cross-eyed blowfish against her window, and then the Eurovan pulled out and led us down the highway. The manny followed Dad, while Uncle Max and I
played a drawing game. One of us would draw a squiggle on a notepad, and then the other had to make a picture out of it. I turned most of Uncle Max’s squiggles into boats, and he turned most of my squiggles into faces. After a while Uncle Max fell asleep. The manny put in an Andrea Bocelli CD and kept driving. He called it the “soundtrack for the landscape.”

I fell asleep too.

When the manny woke us up, we were parked next to the Eurovan again. This time Belly was pressing her bare bum against the window at us. Mom got mad and made her quit. I saw Lulu saying something to Mom. I bet she was telling her that the manny let Belly moon other cars through the window of the Eurovan. He doesn’t.

We were parked in a pullout where our camping trip would end. Uncle Max, the manny, and I got out of the Honda and into the Eurovan. We left Uncle Max’s car there so we would have a car at the end of the trip. I dashed over to Mom and whispered that the manny didn’t teach Belly how to moon people.

“What are you talking about?” said Mom.

“Never mind,” I said. Lulu must have been talking about something else.

We had ten miles until we reached the spot
that Dad planned on launching our boat. We weren’t floating very far each day because we wanted to fish and swim. Mom needed to relax. She had just finished hosting a show at the museum where she had to ask people to donate money so they could get new carpets. I had given her six dollars.

In the Eurovan we were one seat belt short, so the manny and I double-buckled. Mom said that normally this wouldn’t be okay, but Dad was going to drive very carefully and it was only ten miles. She worries about teaching us bad things. Dad didn’t drive as carefully as Mom wanted him to. She kept telling him to slow down.

When we got there safely Mom told us again that double-buckling wasn’t something we should do. It was three o’clock, and the river was a short walk from where we parked the Eurovan. Dad and Uncle Max got the boat off the top of the van. Mom and the manny began unloading the ice chests and backpacks and carrying them down to the river. I helped them. India was in charge of Belly. Lulu didn’t help. She sat on the rocks by the river and wrote in “The Manny Files.” The manny had started throwing rocks into the river and saying to Belly “Did you see that fish?” She stared at the river
but never saw a fish. I guess Lulu thought it was mean and needed to be documented.

When the boat was loaded and the Eurovan was locked up, we put our life jackets on and chose our spots in the boat. I sat up front next to India and Belly. Dad was right in the middle where the big oars were so he could guide us to our first camping spot. Uncle Max and the manny shoved us away from shore and then jumped into the boat.

Lulu squealed, “Wait! My notebook!” and pointed at “The Manny Files,” which was lying on the rocks right where she had been writing in it.

The manny quickly jumped out of the boat and into the knee-deep water. He ran on shore, grabbed the notebook, and bolted back for the boat. Dad tried to keep the boat close to shore, but it was still waist deep by the time the manny got close enough to hand Lulu her manny slam book. She didn’t even thank him until Mom pointed out that she hadn’t.

“Thanks,” she said without even looking at the manny, who was now sitting in the boat in his wet shorts. Uncle Max grabbed a towel and dried off the manny’s legs.

Even though she had said thanks, I knew she didn’t mean it. She must really hate the manny
(or in Mom’s words, the manny must really bug her). I don’t know why she doesn’t like him. He must like her, or he wouldn’t have saved “The Manny Files.”

We didn’t fish on the first day. Dad said that we were not going very far and we should just enjoy being outside. The water was cold. India and I dragged our hands in it as the boat slowly wound through the canyon. The river was walled in on both sides with tree-covered mountains. The trees were great big Douglas firs and looked like they were a hundred years old. Above the trees was blue sky with fluffy white clouds that looked like floating marshmallows. Belly lay on her back and looked up at them, before the gentle rocking of the boat put her to sleep. Everyone was quiet. Instead of talking, we just looked around. There were no power lines, no buildings, and no other people. I felt like I do right before I fall asleep, when I know I’m drifting, but I also know I’m still awake. I swayed back and forth like drunk people do in the movies. I snapped out of it when I saw a deer at the edge of the river getting a drink. Dad stopped rowing, and we floated by it silently. It watched us just as much as we were watching it.

After a couple of hours we reached our first campsite. There was a designated spot for tents
and a big metal box to put our food in so the bears wouldn’t get it.