The Summer of Moonlight Secrets Read online

  Once, after Allie Jo left, she’d scooped up some of the black shells for herself. They were crunchy, like winkles, her favorite snack.

  6

  Allie Jo

  “Jinx, look, they’re taking him away.” I lean closer to the window frame of the fifth-floor nanny quarters, in the part I call the garden room. I’m hidden by the jacaranda tree; its ferny leaves are the perfect camouflage.

  A bunch of tornadoes in the sixties knocked out all the windows up here. No one uses this floor, and no one has replaced any of the glass, which I think is actually an improvement to the place, since now the kudzu vines have crawled in and wrapped themselves along the walls and the ceiling. Sitting here is like sitting in an arbor. When the kudzu blooms, butterflies follow the vines right into the room and flit from flower to flower.

  Leaning forward, I hear the paramedics’ voices, but I can’t make out what they’re saying. When they were on the third floor, though, I heard everything they said. They asked that boy a whole bunch of questions, like “What year is it?” and “Who is the president?” That’s how I know his name is Chase—it was the first question they asked him.

  Chase looks small on the white gurney. Some kind of spongy thing is fitted around his head. “Where’s his dad?” I say. I’d be scared to go in an ambulance alone.

  Jinx is not curious about any of it, which is strange for a cat. She lies in a patch of sunlight hitting the strip of carpet I brought up here, holds up a black paw, and licks it. She’s as comfy in this room as I am.

  The walls of the floors below, the ones meant for tourists to see, are dressed in burgundy wainscoting with cream-colored chair rails a third of the way up. On top of the chair rail, the walls are covered in a striped wallpaper, cream and burgundy.

  The wood is all original; that means it’s the same wood they pulled up here on steam trains and horse-drawn wagons in 1887. Heart of pine and cedar—you’d learn that on the tour if you took it. The wallpaper has been replaced, but it’s accurate for the time period. That little tidbit is straight from the tour too. People run their clean fingertips along the wallpaper, and after so many years, the oil from all their fingers ruins the wallpaper. It’s kind of gross if you think about it.

  There is no wallpaper up here in the nanny quarters. There’s no chair rail either. No carpet. No glass. It sounds like this would be the worst place in the world, but it’s actually the best. Downstairs is all dark and elegant; up here is all sunny and happy. There’s a pink room, a yellow room, and a lavender room, and the hallway is painted green. Two window seats face each other on opposite ends of the quarters, and, boy, you can really get a nice breeze up here—you know, since there’s no glass.

  Wham! Wham! Paramedics shut the ambulance doors and slowly drive away. A little silver car follows close behind. I watch until I can’t see them anymore.

  “Well,” I say, “they’re gone.” I breathe in, let out a big sigh. I’ve never seen an arm bent like that. “Maybe I shouldn’t have chased him.” I didn’t want him to break his arm; I just wanted him to stop trespassing. I sure didn’t expect to see him rolled out into an emergency vehicle. “Wonder why they don’t put the sirens on?” I say out loud.

  Jinx stares at me with her big, green eyes. The first time she dropped in from the window, I watched her sniff the kudzu. I didn’t move a muscle; I didn’t want to scare her away. When she kept coming back, I needed to call her something besides Here, kitty, kitty. I thought about names like Smoke or Shadow, but everyone with black cats uses those names. Not that I actually own Jinx. She started showing up here last summer, so I started feeding her.

  I lean over and stroke her back. Her fur’s warm from the sun. Closing her eyes and stretching, she purrs, and it’s like a little motor rumbling inside of her. It rumbles into me and makes me feel good.

  I haven’t seen her for a couple of days. She comes and goes, but I always leave her something from breakfast and fill her water whether she’s here or not.

  She lifts her head and licks my hand with her scratchy tongue. Suddenly, she leaps up and swipes at a yellow butterfly moving lightly along the kudzu. A couple of monarchs flutter overhead.

  Peaceful as it is, I keep seeing Chase flipping off that skateboard, the way it flew out from under his feet. Now that I replay it, I’m sure I heard a crunch when he snapped his bone. A little shudder runs through me. Maybe that crunch was his skateboard smacking the wall.

  The skateboard—did he get it back? I can’t remember that part. The least I can do is go get it for him. Before I stand, I pet Jinx one more time. She leans into my hand as I scratch between her ears; then she’s swatting at that butterfly again. I hate leaving her alone up here, but I know she can take care of herself.

  The darkness of the fourth floor is almost depressing after the brightness and the liveliness on the fifth. I walk down the hall. The creaks are especially loud on the fourth and the third floors because neither of them has carpet or vines. The third floor doesn’t really look any different from the fourth. It’s dark and shadowy on account of some of the windows being boarded up.

  A long time ago, one of the owners talked about knocking down the hotel, saying they could build a new, modern hotel or a strip mall in its place, but Hope raised such a fuss about The Meriwether being the heart and soul of the area’s history that the owners instead sold it to an investment company, who sold it to another investment company, who sold it to the one who owns it now. I don’t know what they’re investing in when they still haven’t bought new glass for the windows.

  As I stroll down the hall, I scan its length for Chase’s skateboard, but I don’t see it. The floor groans and snaps under my feet; I don’t think anything of it until I hear a scrape, and it’s not coming from me.

  Wood floors are not your friend when you’re trying to be sneaky. The best thing to do is to walk on the edge, hugging the wall, like I do now. I listen for that scrape; it’s coming from 312! I creep to the doorway and lay my fingers on the doorjamb like a spider stretching its legs toward its prey.

  I whip myself around. “Gotcha!”

  No one.

  Still, I heard something, and it could be coming from the closet or the gutted bathroom. Might be a squirrel. But I think it’s a kid. I pick up a ratty old sneaker and hurl it into the closet. Nothing. I need to check the bathroom, but I don’t see any more ammo.

  “Allie Jo?” Mom’s voice rises from the staircase. “Allie Jo?”

  “I’m right here,” I holler.

  I lean against the wall, feel the ripples of peeling wallpaper ruffle against the back of my shirt. “You might as well come out,” I say, crossing my arms. “My mom’s coming up.”

  Nothing. Then a girl steps out of the closet and I whoop, practically jumping out of my skin. It’s the girl from the springs! I am frozen to the spot. Her movements are so quiet and smooth, it’s like she’s floating. Her hair is silky, slipping over her shoulder. I forget to tell her that she is prohibited from being up here.

  Erk! Aaar! Mom’s footsteps. She’s getting closer. “Allie Jo?”

  The girl takes a step toward me, her mouth hinting at a smile.

  My heart beats a little faster. She puts her finger up to her lips. Shh, she says, without making a sound at all. The footsteps are almost upon us. She puts her finger to her lips again and slips into the shadows of the closet.

  “There you are!” Mom stops in the doorway, takes a step in. “I’ve been looking all over for you. There’s a girl downstairs I want you to meet. She’s really nice and she’ll be staying for the summer.” She smiles. “I think she could use a friend.”

  What Mom really means is she thinks I could use a friend. I do have one, Melanie, but she’s on vacation up north for the whole summer. A couple of girls who I did invite over, their moms wouldn’t let them come because I live in this hotel. Hotel rat is what I hear behind my back, which, when you think of it, isn’t even correct because I haven’t ever seen a rat here, but I know an insult when I
hear one.

  Mom says people say mean things because they’re jealous. I think people say mean things because they’re mean.

  What does it matter if you get your clothes from a secondhand store instead of from the mall? They probably came from the mall to begin with. And all the popular people have perms, but my hair is straight. That’s okay, though—I don’t want to look like a poodle.

  I hate passing their lunch table during the school year. They giggle when I walk by, and once, when I was wearing my favorite checked shirt, one of them called out, Hey, Allie Jo, did your mom make that shirt out of a tablecloth? When I got home, I folded that shirt up very nicely and put it in the bottom of my dresser drawer.

  They act like if your family doesn’t have as much money as their family does, you’re a nothing.

  Who cares anyway—I’m busy enough without a bunch of girls getting in my way. I’ve got Clay and Chef, and there’s Jinx to take care of, and my inspections—I really don’t know if I have time for anyone else. Still, Mom’s always pushing me to make friends even though I’ve explained to her I’m just fine with the way things are.

  Like right now, for example. A secret girl is hiding in the closet, but Mom wants me to go downstairs to meet a regular girl. Mom steps into the room even farther, and my heart flares.

  I block her path. “Okay!” I say. “Let’s go!” Mom looks surprised at my enthusiasm. I’m surprised too. I don’t know why—maybe it was the way she trusted me—but I’m keeping that girl’s secret, whatever it is.

  Mom loops her arm through mine. “Her name is Sophie and she’s twelve.” Close enough; I’m eleven. Mom rattles on and I feel torn as she pulls me out of the room. I take in the closet, but I see only darkness.

  “Come on,” Mom says, yanking me into the hall. “You can finish your inspection later. I think you’ll like this girl.”

  7

  Chase

  You’d think after all that, I’d get decent treatment—you know, sirens wailing, ambulance racing over curbs, medics rushing out of the ER, saying, What’ve we got here?

  But no. The paramedics took their time loading me on a gurney and talking about their own skateboarding days while they pressed the button for the world’s slowest elevator. No siren, and we stopped at every red light. Dad couldn’t even ride in the ambulance with me because we needed the car to drive back to the hotel.

  I don’t know how long we wait at the emergency room or even if we wait. A bunch of people talk to Dad and keep saying Hey, buddy to me. I’m thirteen, not five, but whatever. The doctors explain what they’re going to do and I’m all like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, because I’m thinking, Just do it! They decide I don’t have a concussion. Then they give me some kind of shot and I feel it going from my left arm, flowing warmly through my veins, all the way through my body, until it reaches my head.

  “Doing okay, buddy?” one of the doctors asks.

  When I nod, I feel like I’m moving in slow motion, kind of woozy but good. My head lolls to the side and I watch Dad ask the doctor questions. I grin. He should sit down, relax. Everything’s all right. He’s a good guy, just works too hard, that’s all. He needs a break. Look at him, writing stuff down even now. I snicker.

  They turn to me. I flash them a peace sign.

  It doesn’t even hurt when, a few minutes later, the doctor manipulates my right arm so that the bones meet the right way. I am floating through space. Then they wrap, wrap, wrap up my arm a few inches past my elbow with long bandages; some are wet with plaster of paris. Cool.

  As the cast sets, the doctor rattles off some rules. “No lotion or powder in the cast.”

  Check. No girlie stuff.

  “Don’t stick objects into the cast to scratch yourself.”

  Check. No objects.

  “Do not get the cast wet.”

  What? I push through layers of puffy clouds. “What about swimming?”

  The doctor shakes his head. “No swimming.”

  I knife through the clouds. “No swimming? What about the pool?” I glance at Dad, then back to the doctor.

  He shakes his head again. “No swimming at all. You’ll even need to be careful in the shower. If the cast gets wet, it’ll break down, or mold or fungus could grow inside.”

  My mouth drops open. The clouds flit away. I turn to Dad, hoping he can help me out here. “Dad, the springs! What about snorkeling and all that?”

  Dad exhales loudly and shakes his head.

  “And you’ll have to stay off that skateboard too. In fact, nothing with wheels,” the doctor says. “We don’t want you breaking the other arm.” He gives what he probably thinks is a good-natured chuckle, then hands Dad a paper. “This goes over how to take care of the cast and what to look out for.”

  The last little bit of warm feeling leaves me. I can’t believe this. I’m in Florida, just an hour from the ocean, only I can’t swim in it; I’m stuck in a hotel with a pool I can’t use, and now I can’t even skateboard. What am I supposed to do? Play shuffleboard? Oh, yeah, I can’t do that either—broke my shuffleboard arm.

  I’m sitting next to Dad in the Silver Bullet, the Camaro he and Mom bought before she left us. The Rusty Bullet, he should call it. This thing’s a beater, Dad. Why don’t you get rid of it? I’ve asked. Nope. He’d finger the New Hampshire Chevrolet sticker on it—that’s where we lived when she was still with us.

  Souvenirs are supposed to remind you of a good time you had somewhere. The Camaro is one big souvenir—it reminds Dad of good times with Mom. I have to look at photos to do that.

  The seat belt’s making my arm seriously uncomfortable. I unbuckle it.

  “Put it back on.” Dad doesn’t look at me when he says it.

  “Too uncomfortable.”

  “Just put it on,” he says, sounding tired. Hey, I’m the one with the injury, remember?

  I fumble with my left hand, trying to snap the buckle in, but it’s not a one-arm job. Then the belt gets stuck and I try retracting it, which only makes it get stuck higher. I grit my teeth and yank on the belt.

  Dad jerks his head at me. “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to put on the seat belt like you said!” I pull on it. No go.

  He shifts hands on the steering wheel and stretches his right hand over. “Well, let me help you if you can’t get it.”

  “I don’t need your help!” I go into crazy mode, retracting the belt and yanking it over and over again until, finally, it comes loose and I pull it down. But I still can’t make the connection; the buckle keeps flopping. My lips smash together as I try and fail one more time. I breathe hard through my nose. A trickle of sweat runs down my right arm and into the cast. Great. My body goes rigid: one arm frozen into a right angle; the other arm frozen in position holding the seat belt.

  Dad reaches over and holds the buckle still. I push the seat belt in and it snaps into place.

  We ride in silence to the hotel.

  8

  Allie Jo

  Knit one, purl two. Or at least I thought that’s what knitting would be. I loop the yarn around the needle and try to pull it back.

  “Oops! You dropped a stitch.” Sophie lays her own needles down and takes the ones she’s lent me.

  We’re sitting in the parlor next to the grand staircase that separates us from the front-desk area. I happen to think it’s an excellent sitting area, good for reading, for thinking, and especially for spying on every single guest that comes to check in, but since there’s not much going on today, knitting is okay too.

  When Sophie and I first met yesterday, I was a little put off after Mom dragged me away from the third floor and that girl hiding in the closet. Also, I saw how pretty Sophie was. In my experience, pretty girls are usually mean, like Jennifer Jorgensen from school—that’s why you have to avoid them. But the first thing Sophie said was how lucky I was to be living here, so I shucked the chip right off my shoulder and crunched it under my feet.

  Sophie hands my knitting back to me. “There yo
u go!”

  Raising the needle up, I examine a few rows that weren’t there before. You’d think a person might get mad, someone doing their project for them, but I’m glad. Sophie said I should start off with a scarf, and she wondered if it ever gets cold in Florida, but I said a scarf would do just fine, since I saw it was nothing but straight lines. Easy as pie.

  Boy, was I wrong. You’ve got to have nimble fingers to knit, and Sophie’s pale fingers fly with the yarn. She’s making a scarf, too, but hers has patterns she knits right into it. Still, I’m happy with mine. She let me pick from her bundles of yarn, and I pulled out a ball of the most shimmery green I’ve ever seen.

  My best friend, Melanie, doesn’t knit. She likes to watch TV and go swimming, but only if there’s no one else in the pool. This is on account of she’s kind of what you might call—well, I don’t like to say anything bad about her; she’s my best friend and all—but the kids at school call her Shamu, so now you know what I’m talking about, but I didn’t say it myself.

  If I get really good at knitting, I’ll teach Melanie how to do it when she gets back from up north. I hate that she’s gone all summer. Not only is she my best friend, she’s my closest friend, and I really mean that—she’s the only girl from school who lives in bike-riding distance. I don’t count Jennifer Jorgensen and her little followers; they don’t live too far, but they think they’re so big because they’re one grade ahead of me. When Melanie gets back, we’ll knit ourselves all kinds of fancy stuff and everyone else will be jealous.

  Where’d you get that? Jennifer Jorgensen will ask, eyeing my scarf.

  I’ll toss it around my neck. It’s one of kind, I’ll say, and Melanie and I will walk off airily.

  “Oh, um … ,” Sophie says. “I think you dropped a couple of stitches.”