Caterpillar Summer, page 5
Lily, Cat, and Chicken waved from the side deck as Mom backed up onto Ocean Road. She honked the horn and then drove away.
“That’s that,” said Lily. “Now let’s have some biscuits.”
PART TWO
Bad & Good
New things can be scary, but they can also be fun.
—Caterpillar in Caterpillar & Chicken: The Nervous Narwhal
Chicken rolled over and kicked her in the side. “Do you smell that?”
Cat blinked for a moment before answering. But then her brain caught up to nose. A warm and buttery scent filled the room.
Chicken leaped out of bed and grabbed at her arms until she followed him downstairs.
“Good morning.” Lily pulled a tray of biscuits from the oven.
Chicken went through five before he spoke again. “These are the best things I’ve ever eaten.”
Lily smiled wide. “We’ll have them every day if you like.”
“Yes, please,” he said around a mouthful of biscuit.
“That’s enough, Chicken,” said Cat. “Save some for Macon.”
Lily waved her hand. “Never has anything but coffee in the morning until he’s back from his morning walk.”
Cat looked out the window. “Is he on the beach?”
“Every day, rain or shine,” Lily answered.
Cat cleared her plate and Chicken’s, too, but Lily scooped them away. “I’m happy to do the dishes.”
Cat stood awkwardly. “Can I help?”
“Why don’t you look around a bit?” Lily asked. “This is your home for the next three weeks.”
Cat followed Chicken to the living room window. Yesterday’s green glow was gone. The ocean was flat and gray under a thick layer of clouds.
Chicken examined the bookshelf. “They have all of Mama’s books!”
He was right. The Caterpillar & Chicken books lined a low shelf in a cheerful row. Lily must have bought them—or maybe Mom sent them. Cat was certain Macon had never read one. Did Lily know they were about Cat and her brother?
Nearby on the floor a green plastic laundry basket held clean laundry inside. Chicken dumped the basket, then filled it with books from the shelf.
“This is my boat,” he said. He hopped in the basket and began paging through a book.
Cat looked at him, shocked. “Chicken! You can’t do that!” She didn’t want Lily to think he had no manners.
“I don’t mind a bit,” said Lily. “I want you to make yourselves comfortable.”
Cat gathered the towels and refolded them. At the top of the bookshelf was a row of golden trophies. They were different from Rishi’s soccer trophies and it took her a moment to realize why. They were fishing trophies, each topped with a fish. Golden plates were engraved with the year and Amanda Stone. They were Mom’s!
“Lily?” Cat asked. “Was Mom into fishing?”
Lily looked up from the sink. “Oh, yes—as a girl she loved to fish. Our freezer was always full to bursting—we could never keep up with her.”
“She’s never taken us,” said Cat. She’d never even mentioned it. Not even when Cat told her about Rishi’s fishing plans.
Lily put down the dish she was holding. “Would you like to see some pictures?”
Cat nodded. Lily pulled out a thick album with a fabric cover, much tidier than the battered Big Blue Book Chicken loved so much.
They sat on the sofa, slowly turning pages. Cat had never seen so many pictures of Mom. She looked so fancy in dresses that were monogrammed, embroidered, covered in flowers. A different dress in each picture and with a giant hair bow on her head.
But when she wasn’t dressed up fancy, she was fishing. Fishing! Cat still couldn’t believe it. At age four or five, in pink rubber boots that were up to her knees, holding a fish as big as she was. In pigtails, standing on a pier holding three smaller fish, with Macon’s hand on her shoulder, both of them grinning like crazy. Throughout elementary school and middle school, getting older, hair getting longer, sometimes in a ponytail and sometimes in loose curls. Fishing, fishing, fishing.
Cat turned the pages. “She never told us about this.”
After Amanda got to high school, the fishing pictures stopped. Cat paused at a fancy picture—a group of teenagers in white dresses, wearing gloves and holding bouquets of flowers.
“What is this?”
“The debutante ball,” said Lily. “With her friends. This is her.” She tapped one of the figures in the picture, but Cat had already spotted her in a fluffy, layered dress.
“Fancy,” said Cat. It was hard to believe Mom ever picked that, since she was one of the most yoga-pants-wearing people Cat had ever known. “What’s a debutante ball?”
“It’s a way of celebrating a girl becoming an adult.” Lily smiled, remembering. “It wasn’t exactly Amanda’s style, but Macon wanted it for her. She wanted to make him happy.”
So Mom had loved Macon, at least when she was a girl. Cat turned the page, showing a picture of Mom in the same dress, posing with Lily in sky blue.
“Why aren’t there any pictures of Macon that day?”
A frown passed over Lily’s face. “He was called in on an emergency surgery and he couldn’t avoid going in. She was so upset he missed it.”
Mom was pretty, but in this picture her eyes seemed flat. There was a squareness to her jaw, a look Cat recognized from the times Mom had made up her mind and there would be no changing it.
Cat flipped pages until she returned to the girl in pigtails, who looked the kind of happy that came easy. Macon was grinning, too. There was something familiar about the picture that Cat couldn’t place, but then she realized it. They looked like a team. Cat felt a pang.
Cat wanted to find out what happened all those years ago. She turned pages again. The scrappy kid in boots didn’t match the teenager in a bouncy white dress. It felt like something was missing. It looked like Mom had a good childhood. She grew up in a beautiful house, with the ocean in her backyard. She went fishing with her dad, and had lots of friends. To Cat, it looked like the perfect life, one Cat would give anything to have.
Something had caused Mom to turn away from Gingerbread Island. Cat needed to find the hidden story, the bits and pieces that wouldn’t show up in a photo album. She could talk to Lily and possibly Macon. In a small town like this, she could find other people who knew Mom. She wanted to know why Mom stayed away for so long . . . she wanted to understand.
Cat had an ocean of questions. She hoped the island would answer.
Cat’s favorite spot in the house was her bedroom—Mom’s old room. If the house was something out of a picture book, the room was something out of a dream.
The big bed was snuggly and safe, even though she had to share it with Chicken. The walls were lined with detailed drawings of maps and ships. They were the kind of drawings that invited you in. Cat imagined Lily picking them out and framing them. Mom must have loved looking at them, too.
Cat looked for clues everywhere. So far, all she found out was that Mom had been a collector. Her treasures included shells and shark teeth, a telescope, three bunny night-lights (why, Mom?), and a million colored pencils in every shade. It was perfect, and for these three weeks, it was hers—and Chicken’s, at least at night.
Downstairs, Lily was straightening the kitchen. Chicken was drawing at the table.
“Can we go out on the beach again?” Cat asked.
As she spoke, the door opened and Macon was standing on the deck, shaking the sand off his shoes. He held a blue coffee mug in one hand and a few pieces of trash in the other.
“How was it?” Lily asked.
“Good.”
“Any action to report?” Lily asked.
“No action,” he said. He threw away the trash and started washing his hands in the kitchen sink.
Lily saw Cat’s curious expression and smiled. “Sea turtles. He looks for their nests.”
Chicken’s eyes widened. “There are sea turtles on the beach?”
“This time of year they make nests in the sand,” said Lily. “We have to keep the lights off at night, so they can find their way back to the ocean.”
“Let’s go find a nest,” Chicken said.
Lily patted Chicken’s shoulder. “We can’t investigate the nests, because that could hurt the baby turtles. But we can go for a walk after a bit. I need a little time to get ready.” She glanced at Macon.
“Ah,” said Macon. “I was going to work on my keel and rudder.”
“Well, for goodness’ sake,” said Lily. “If it can’t wait, bring your ship upstairs.”
Macon disappeared out the door.
“I can watch Chicken if he doesn’t want to be up here—” Cat started to say, but Lily had already gone to get ready. Cat felt awkward, like she had about doing the dishes. She didn’t understand the rules here. Maybe she should tell them that she could watch Chicken—she watched him all the time!
She looked at Chicken. “Did Macon say he was going to work on a ship?”
“That’s what he said,” said Chicken, still drawing.
“And he’s going to bring it up here?”
“That’s what Lily said,” said Chicken, switching to orange.
“Well, how is that going to work?”
Chicken didn’t look up. He drew the fin of a hammerhead.
Cat looked at the page. “Sharks don’t have orange fins.”
Chicken shrugged. “This one does.”
The door opened and Macon came in, holding some pieces of wood in one hand and a glass bottle in the other.
“Thought you might like a look at this.” Macon placed the bottle sideways on the table. Inside was a tiny ship.
“Whoa!” Chicken dropped his crayon. “These are like the ones in the guest room. Do you make them?”
“I do,” said Macon.
“How?” asked Cat.
“I learned by using kits, but now I make pieces from scrap wood.”
Cat leaned forward. It didn’t look like it had been made out of scraps. It had two masts with two big sails and a few smaller sails. The base of the boat was painted a rich navy blue and there were little portholes and even a tiny anchor.
“Do you ever go fishing on boats?” Cat asked. “Real ones, I mean.”
Macon’s face tensed. “No. I get seasick.”
It was hard to believe that such a solid person would do something like get seasick. The thought made her want to smile a little, like when she saw a really tall person walking a tiny dog.
Macon cleared his throat. “Your mom always liked boats, but I get sick every time. I’m meant to be on land, I guess.” He looked down. Cat didn’t feel like smiling anymore.
Macon stood so quickly, his chair scraped the floor. “I have an errand to do. Your grandmother should be downstairs soon.” He gathered his things and was out the door before Cat or Chicken could say a word.
She didn’t understand what made him bolt, just as they were having a real conversation. Watching the blue Jeep back out of the driveway made her realize how alone she and Chicken were on this island. Macon and Lily were technically their grandparents, but they were also strangers. Macon seemed happy to keep it that way.
Chicken looked upset. “Was Macon mad?”
Cat’s sadness turned to irritation. She couldn’t stand people who made Chicken feel worried.
“I guess he had to go. Grown-up stuff.” It was all she could think of to say.
“He should use belly breaths to stay calm,” said Chicken. He handed her fuchsia. “Want to draw?”
She drew a starfish and filled it in until Lily came downstairs.
“Ready to go out?” she asked. She carried three rolled towels and showed them a mesh bag of sand toys. Together they headed to the sand. Sunshine danced on the waves.
“Walk first or castles first?” asked Lily.
“Let’s walk,” said Cat, as Chicken said: “CASTLES.”
Lily looked at both of them. Cat was about to say that it was okay to build, she could wait for her walk.
“Let’s walk,” said Lily finally. “I want to find some sea glass for my collection. Do you want to start a collection, too, Chicken?”
Chicken nodded, with a glint in his eye. “Shark teeth.”
Of course. Lily held Chicken’s hand carefully and they walked toward the water.
“I don’t like the waves!” he said, digging in his feet.
“We won’t go in, but if we want to find shark teeth we should get closer,” Lily said.
Chicken closed his eyes. Cat could tell his insides were battling—ocean-fear versus shark-love. He opened his eyes and blinked in the bright sun.
“We can look for shark teeth,” he said finally. “But I don’t want to get wet.”
They approached the water, Chicken finding shells and rocks with each step. He handed each to Lily.
Cat paused, turning to where water met sand. There were so many shells, she had to be careful where she stepped. She checked again to make sure Lily was holding his hand. She was. Chicken pointed at the water, talking animatedly while Lily listened patiently.
The water was cooler than yesterday. She waded to her knees, watching choppy waves rush around her legs. A family of five pelicans soared over the water.
Cat wanted a do-over. She felt betrayed by Chicken for seeming so comfortable and happy here. He had been looking forward to seeing Rishi almost as much as Cat. She didn’t want to let go of the vacation that should have happened. She wanted the green lake with friends who were like family—the one where she got to see Mom every night. Not dumped here with people she barely knew.
A wave bubbled her back a step. Cat dug her toes deep in the sand. She glanced again at Chicken, who held Lily’s hand like it was the most normal thing in the world. Cat wanted to flop down and cry, like Chicken had at the airport. The difference was, Chicken knew someone would carry him and Cat didn’t. She always picked herself up. She would have to figure out how to do that here.
During the heat of the afternoon, Lily and Chicken played Go Fish. Cat read in her room.
When she came downstairs, the house was quiet. Lily and Chicken were gone. Maybe they’d gone outside. Of course, she hadn’t seen Macon since morning.
Cat pushed the sliding glass door, and as she did, a scream came from the beach. She froze for an instant. Chicken.
She imagined the worst—he was upset and ran down the beach. Or worse, into the waves. Her heart flip-flopped at the thought. She ran onto the sand. Chicken and Lily were there, on the beach. Somehow, Chicken had convinced her to take the laundry basket outside.
“Are you all right?” she asked when she got close enough. “I thought I heard you scream.”
Chicken turned to her. “We dug up a half-eaten crab. It was super gross.”
Lily smiled. “We threw it in the sand over there a ways if you want to see before a gull snatches it.”
Cat would wait for her heart to return to normal before she went looking for something disgusting.
They were building a sand castle. Lily sat in the sand, but Chicken kneeled in the basket and reached over the edge to dig. He’d leaned so far, it looked like he might topple out.
“Careful of your treasures,” said Lily.
He squinted up at Cat. “See my collection?”
Inside the basket were dozens of shells.
“Very nice,” said Cat. She sank to the ground and scooped a handful of sand.
“When we’re done, we’ll fill that bucket and make the moat,” Chicken explained.
Lily beamed at him. “To keep dragons out?”
Chicken looked at Lily like she’d lost her mind. “It’s so sharks can live there.”
He shook his head and went back to his digging, muttering “dragons” under his breath.
Cat smiled to herself, excavating a handful of sand. Moats were obviously for sharks. Lily hadn’t totally figured out Chicken yet.
Lily handed her a plastic shovel. The shovel was flimsy, but better than using her hands.
“We’ll find better toys,” said Lily. “We weren’t prepared.”
Cat didn’t want Lily making a big deal out of their visit. They would leave in three weeks, probably never come back. “Don’t bother buying anything new. We won’t be here long.”
They worked quietly for a while. Lily mounded damp sand on the castle. After a while, Chicken said he was tired of digging. He arranged the shell collection into smaller piles.
Digging made Cat feel peaceful and calm. “Rishi’s family used to take us to the beach sometimes when Mom worked.”
“Sounds nice,” said Lily.
“Most of the time, the water was too cold to swim,” Cat went on. “But we could dig.”
From the laundry basket came a blub-blub-blub . . . vrooom. Chicken was making motorboat noises. Cat and Lily flashed a quiet smile at each other.
“This is my favorite time of the day.” Lily’s voice was barely louder than the sound of the waves.
“The way it cools off before sunset . . . the light is so beautiful, everything glows.”
Cat squeezed a mound of sand. She opened her fingers slowly. The sand had ridges from the spaces between her fingers. “My dad always talked about the light like that.”
Lily paused mid-scoop. “He saw such beauty in the everyday.”
Cat, startled, looked up from her hands. “Did you know him?”
“Oh, yes,” said Lily. “Amanda brought him home many times, even before they were dating. He liked the island. And I loved having them here.”
This seemed like a clue—one that had popped up out of nowhere. To hide her surprise, Cat concentrated on smoothing the walls of the moat. She didn’t know that Macon and Lily had ever met Daddy, but they had. It sounded as if Lily liked him, even. Cat wondered what Macon thought. It would be close to impossible to find out with the way he hid in his workshop all the time. The one time he actually talked to them, he rushed off abruptly. Maybe he was the reason Mom left.
Lily squinted at something behind Cat.
“Oh, dear,” she said. “Those boys shouldn’t be on the dunes. They know better.”
