The Penderwicks at Point Mouette (18 page)

B
Y DINNERTIME
, Jane had gone two entire hours without crying. Then she made it through dinner, too, despite her tuna noodle casserole—she’d insisted on taking her turn at cooking, although everyone offered to do it for her—which was mysteriously soggy in some places, burned in others, and boringly bland overall. After cleanup, she thought she might have a relapse when Aunt Claire, Jeffrey, and Skye got ready to leave for movie night at Alec’s house, with a rented movie and lots of popcorn, but Jane managed to hold back her tears. After all, she told herself sternly, it was her own choice to stay back with Batty and Mercedes. They were having their first sleepover together and were practically expiring from the thrill of it.

“Jane, are you sure?” asked Skye, lingering after Jeffrey helped Aunt Claire and her crutches out the door.

“Yes,” she answered nobly, trying to ignore the hysterical laughter coming from Batty’s room.

“There’s a thunderstorm coming. You won’t let anyone get struck by lightning, right?”

“No.” It was a ridiculous question, but Jane knew she deserved to be treated as a near imbecile after all the havoc she’d caused that day.

“Or blown up, right?”

But even in her current mood of deep humility and penance, this was too much for Jane. “Skye, no one except you believes in the possibility of Batty blowing up.”

“You saw it on the list,” said Skye. “It was right there.”

“Just go watch the movie and have fun. We’ll survive.” Jane pushed Skye out of the house and shut the door behind her.

Now that Jane was alone, would she cry again? She blinked experimentally and, when no tears came, decided she might be safe for at least a few more hours. Maybe if she could make it through the whole evening without crying, she would be safe altogether. As long as she didn’t think too much about Dominic or that he’d sent back her precious “Ode to a Kiss”—that was the title she’d given it after much deliberation—or
mostly if she didn’t think too much about the note he’d scribbled on the back of the ode.

There! Already she was thinking about it. To distract herself, she decided to visit Batty and Mercedes. She could pretend it was an official visit.

“Any trouble in here?” she asked brightly, swinging open the door.

“No,” said Batty. “We don’t need you.”

“We’re making signs for the sale tomorrow,” added Mercedes more politely, showing Jane a large piece of paper with
GOLF BALLS
scrawled across it. “And Batty’s been telling me about how Jeffrey is going to show her the moose babies someday and how he’s going to marry her when they grow up.”

“Batty, how do you know you want to marry Jeffrey?” asked Jane, snatching a red marker out of Hound’s mouth just before he bit it in half.

“I just know.”

Her certainty dug into Jane’s unhappiness. “I should have given
you
my Love Survey.”

Batty ignored her, but Mercedes’s sensitive heart reached out. “I’m sorry about my brother,” she said. “But your hair looks beautiful, Jane.”

“Thank you, Mercedes. Yours looks beautiful, too.” Jane left them alone and went outside onto the deck, to breathe in the salty air and not think about Dominic.

She had no illusions about beauty, for either her or Mercedes, but Jane was pleased with her new haircut.
Alec had taken them to a salon called Marilyn’s, where the actual Marilyn gave Jane the best haircut of her life, a soft mop of curls that framed her face. Everyone liked it so much, they ordered up exactly the same for Batty—and then Skye got her own version, one more suitable for straight hair. And last, while Alec’s beard was being shaved off, Mercedes was given a cut identical to Skye’s. Hairwise, the day ended triumphantly, with everyone improved, especially Alec, who they all agreed looked quite handsome without his beard. A few of them also thought that he reminded them of someone they’d seen before, but after Jane came up with a lot of movie stars as possibilities, Alec told them to please stop before his ego exploded.

So the haircuts were a good result of the treachery of Domi—the person Jane couldn’t think about. Nevertheless, they could barely balance out the bad results. For example, Sabrina Starr. What Jane now knew about love—that it was all a sham, or at least it was if you fell in love with a skateboarder who cared nothing for you—wasn’t anything she wanted to write down.
Sabrina Starr Has Her Heart Broken
? No. That book wasn’t going to take its place beside
Sabrina Starr Rescues a Boy
and
Sabrina Starr Rescues an Archaeologist
. But a book had to be written. Jane would feel like a failure if she went back home without a new Sabrina Starr book. This was past writer’s block.

“Writer’s boulder. Writer’s skyscraper. Writer’s
Great Wall of China,” she said, and was exasperated to find herself crying again.

The storm that Skye had predicted was beginning to show itself. No thunder or lightning yet, but the wind had already picked up, tossing the trees and blowing away the day’s heat, and huge clouds, black giants, were sailing in from the horizon. Jane was pleased—there was nothing like a glorious thunderstorm to make you stop crying and realize how silly you were being. She climbed onto the seawall, drinking in the intoxicating smell of the coming rain. And now a distant foghorn was blowing, reminding Jane of battered ships and drowned sailors.

“In the old days,” she told the wind, “women walked the shoreline, fearful for the men who were struggling through the storm in frail wooden boats, buffeted by powerful and angry waves. Rats, this isn’t cheering me up.”

She forced her imagination to go in a different direction and started over.

“I am the opposite of Samson—when my hair was cut today, my strength returned.” This was better. Pleased with herself, Jane raised her hands high, commanding the elements. “I am the All-Powerful Jane Letitia Penderwick, Queen of the Storm. Bow down before me!”

A rumble of thunder greeted her, which Jane thought a nice touch. The black clouds were coming
fast now, racing toward the setting sun. For a last few moments, pale gleams of light picked out sea froth; then even that light was obliterated and the ocean became a seething gray mass. A bright stab of lightning flickered across the clouds, the thunder rumbled again, closer this time, and the first fat drops of rain splattered down. Several of them landed on the nose of the Queen of the Storm.

“Jane, Jane, come inside! You’re going to get struck by lightning!”

Batty and Mercedes were at the screen door, wide-eyed and fearful, with Hound adding his barks to their shouts.

“For heaven’s sake,” said Jane, but the rain was coming faster now, and even the Queen of the Storm wasn’t in the mood to get soaked. She gave a final imperial wave to the sea, then ran back inside.

“Close the door!” cried Batty.

Jane shut the sliding glass door against the rain, then shook the water from her curls. “Why are you upset, Batty? We have plenty of thunderstorms at home.”

“Home is not beside the ocean.”

“It’s just as safe here,” said Mercedes bravely.

“What about New Jersey?” Batty asked. “Is it safe where Rosalind is?”

“Yes, of course,” said Jane.

“Then we should be in New Jersey.” Batty was
pulling Hound to shelter behind the couch. “Besides, I’m scared for the seals.”

“She thinks they might drown,” added Mercedes.

Instinctively, Jane turned to stare outside at what was becoming a tempest of wind, waves, and driving rain. It certainly wasn’t going to be a pleasant night for the seals.

“But they won’t drown,” she said.

“How do you know?”

“Because they’re sea creatures. Sea creatures don’t drown!”

Jane knew she wasn’t convincing anyone. Batty had that stubborn expression she got when determined to be right against all logic, and Mercedes looked as off-balance as when she rode her bicycle. It was time for a different tactic, Jane told herself, or they would start crying, and there’d already been too much crying for one day.

“Let’s play seals on the island,” she said, “having fun in the storm.”

Without waiting for an answer, Jane started pushing furniture into the center of the room, creating an island out of chairs and the table and couch. It didn’t take long for Batty and Mercedes to join in, and before long there was an impressive pile to clamber onto, which they did, and so did Hound, who loved being on furniture, island or no island.

“I am Janilopilis the seal,” said Jane encouragingly.

Batty and Mercedes crouched on the rocks—also known as chairs—and waggled their elbows like flippers.

“I am Mercedilopilis,” said Mercedes.

“I am Battilopilis,” said Batty.

Hound barked and knocked a cushion onto the floor.

“We sea creatures love rain and thunder and lightning.” Jane was warming to being a seal. “The Queen of the Storm would never let us come to harm. So say we all.”

“So say we all,” repeated Batty.

“I think I see a face at the window,” said Mercedes, then screamed, “I do see a face at the window!”

She was pointing at a small window on the side of the room. By the time Jane looked, there was no face or anything else, but Batty had caught Mercedes’s panic, and the two of them and Hound were scrabbling off the island and falling into the deadly sea.

“He’s over there!” shouted Batty, pointing to the sliding glass door, and this time when Jane looked, she did see a face.

And while it wasn’t at all a scary face, Jane’s stomach turned over inside her and she wished she could hide behind the island with the others. Instead, putting on her best Queen of the Storm attitude, she climbed down as gracefully as she could and slid open the door.

“Hello, Dominic.” He was soaking wet, and Jane could think of no earthly reason for him to be at Birches. “What do you want?”

He handed her a toothbrush. “Mercedes forgot this.”

“Mercedes, it’s just Dominic and he’s brought your toothbrush,” Jane said over her shoulder.

“Thank you.” This came from behind the couch.

Jane thought that Dominic would leave, but he just stood there in the rain, staring at her.

“You look different somehow,” he said after a while.

“So do you.” It was true. He didn’t look like a prince anymore. “Well, good night.”

“I could come inside.”

They’d been happy without him, and he would only upset her all over again. Jane knew this but wavered—it was raining so hard, and he was so wet, and maybe she should let him come in. Would Sabrina Starr let him in? No. But I’m not a hero, Jane thought desperately, and it would be only polite to rescue him from the storm.

“Maybe you can …” But, wait, something was happening—something extraordinarily wonderful—Jane’s writer’s block was shattering into a billion pieces. Hallelujah and glorious days. A miracle had come, and finally she knew how to write her book.

“Now you really look different,” said Dominic.

“Dominic, now I really am different. Thank you
and good night.” She shut the door in his face and turned back to the living room. “Time for bed, you two! I have a book to write!”

Next door at Alec’s, the movie had turned out to be scary indeed. The very real thunderstorm, with its crashing and flashing, had added to the atmosphere of fear, and Skye wasn’t the only one to cling helplessly to whoever was sitting nearest her—even if it was Hoover—especially during the scenes with the sheep inhabited by evil spirits. Skye had never realized how frightening sheep could be, and she was glad that Batty wasn’t there to see them.

But now the movie was over, the lights were back on, and evil sheep seemed much less likely. Alec and Jeffrey were already at the piano, playing out bits of the movie soundtrack and arguing over when it had and hadn’t overwhelmed the plot, which led somehow—Skye stopped paying attention for a few minutes—into a demonstration of the elegantly simple melody line for “The Best Is Yet to Come,” which seemed to be about to lead into something else that Skye didn’t understand.

“I should go see how Jane is doing,” she murmured to Aunt Claire.

“What?” Aunt Claire was listening to all the music talk. “Oh, good idea. Make sure everyone still has the same hairstyle they had when we left.”

The thunderstorm was over and gone, with nothing
left to show but fresh seaweed tossed up from the depths by the rough surf and, above, wisps of clouds scudding across the moon and stars. Skye gazed up, found Arcturus, then Spica, and wondered how many black holes were lurking unseen between the two. But even so interesting a conjecture couldn’t keep her lingering long. She was too anxious about what she’d find when she got back to Birches. Obviously it hadn’t burned down, but Skye fully expected Jane still to be crying, and that was bad enough.

Here is what she found instead: all the furniture in the middle of the room, and Jane lying on the floor, writing in her blue notebook. Skye was glad that Jane wasn’t crying, but it was hard to be glad about the furniture.

“What happened?” she asked.

“I’ve finally figured out how to write my book. Listen:
Here was a terrible moral dilemma. Should Sabrina Starr rescue the loathsome boy who had stomped on, mutilated, wrecked so many hearts? Or should she leave him to the brutal fate his own actions had brought on?
” Jane scribbled a few more words and looked up. “Do you think
mutilated
is too heavy-handed?”

“Yes, but I meant what happened to the room?”

Jane seemed just now to notice the furniture. “We were playing seals on an island. I’ll move it back.”

She popped up and began shoving things back where they belonged, while Skye peeked into Batty’s
room. Never had she seen a bed so jam-packed. Batty, Mercedes, Hound, and Funty and Ellie the elephants were all jumbled together—along with several sheets of cardboard with
SALE
and
GOLF
written on them, plus one that said
TIGHTWAD
, a word that Batty had learned from
Ivy + Bean
. The desire to tidy up the mess was strong, but Skye controlled herself. The little girls were peacefully asleep, despite the crowding. She quietly closed the door and helped Jane with the last few chairs; then the two of them sat on the couch. It was nice to spend time together with no one being heartbroken or frantic.