Claudia and the Terrible Truth Read online

  “Sure!” said Kristy cheerfully. “It’s just a little person with a top hat and pointed shoes.” She was drawing on Margo’s piece of cardboard as she spoke. “See?” She held it up.

  “That looks more like a pterodactyl,” said Byron.

  “A sick pterodactyl,” added Jordan.

  “A pterodactyl with a p-tummy-ache,” said Adam, laughing. “Get it? You spell tummy with a ‘p’ before the ‘t.’ ”

  “Speaking of ‘p,’ ” Abby said to Mal, “Archie just told me he has to use the bathroom. Okay if I take him inside?”

  “Sure,” said Mal. “Just don’t let Pow out. If he realizes that Bo is out here in his yard, he might be mad.”

  Abby gave Mal the “okay” sign, took Archie by the hand, and led him into the house.

  Meanwhile, Mary Anne was helping Vanessa draw a harp to cut out. “My teacher says the harp is an Irish symbol,” said Vanessa. “It’s sort of poetic, don’t you think? I bet the ancient bards used to carry them.”

  While Vanessa was chatting, Mary Anne was drawing and erasing, drawing and erasing. “I thought I knew how to draw a harp,” she finally said to Kristy. “But I’m beginning to wonder. Is this how it goes?” She held up the cardboard.

  Kristy took one look and cracked up. “Another pterodactyl,” she said. “Glad I’m not the only one around here who can’t draw.” Mary Anne looked hurt for a second. Then she cracked up too.

  Claire, meanwhile, was working hard on her own piece of cardboard. Tongue between her teeth, she labored carefully, ignoring everyone else as she concentrated. On her way to help Marilyn and Carolyn cut out their twin shamrocks, Stacey glanced at Claire’s drawing. “Very nice, Claire,” she commented. “But — um — what is it?”

  “An eye!” Claire pronounced proudly.

  “An eye?”

  Claire nodded. “See, here’s the middle part, and here’s the eyelashes, and here’s the eyebrow — ”

  “I see, I see,” said Stacey. “But why are you drawing an eye?”

  “Because we’re supposed to,” said Claire. “Mal said we’re making Irish things.”

  Stacey looked confused. Then she smiled. “Now I understand,” she told Claire. “Here, let me show you something.” She grabbed a piece of paper. “This is how ‘eye’ is spelled,” she said patiently, writing out the word in capital letters. “And this is how you spell ‘Irish.’ The two words sound alike, but they’re very different. ‘Irish’ means from Ireland.” She was trying to be gentle with the news, since Claire is sensitive and can throw an excellent tantrum when she wants to.

  But Claire just nodded. “Okay,” she said cheerfully.

  “You could make a shamrock,” Stacey suggested, “or a leprechaun hat.” (We’d decided by then that hats would be a lot easier than entire leprechauns.)

  “That’s okay,” said Claire. “I like my eye. I’m going to finish it anyway, even if it isn’t Irish.” She picked up her pencil again and added another eyelash.

  At that, Stacey shrugged and gave up, moving on to help the twins.

  Over at the other table, Jessi and Mal were already opening paint for Shea, Andrew, and David Michael. “All set already?” asked Kristy, cruising by. “What did you guys decide to make?” She glanced over Jessi’s shoulder. “Nice,” she commented. “Nice — uh — shape.”

  “You don’t know what it is, do you?” asked Mal.

  “We’ll give you a hint,” said Jessi. “It’s a rock.”

  “A rock?” Kristy guessed.

  “A big Irish one,” Mal said, grinning.

  Kristy still looked confused.

  “Ready, guys?” asked Jessi, coaching the three kids. “Let’s tell Kristy what it is. All together, one, two, three —”

  “The Blarney Stone!” they chorused.

  Kristy cracked up. “That’s great!” she said. “Good choice,” she whispered to Jessi. “You thought of something easy to draw.”

  By then, almost all the kids had finished drawing and cutting out their Irish symbols.

  “Keep a close eye on Jackie,” Kristy whispered to Abby (who’d returned from the house). “Now that he’s ready to paint, you can bet he’ll find a way to make a mess.”

  Jackie’s a terrific kid, but he does have a habit of making messes and breaking things, including his own bones. (That’s why we call him the Walking Disaster.) He can’t help it. He’s just accident-prone.

  “No problem,” Abby whispered back. “He’s on his way to the bathroom. He won’t be anywhere near the paint for a while.”

  Kristy nodded. “Great. Did you remind him not to let Pow out?”

  Abby gulped. “Oops,” she said.

  Just then, Pow came galumphing out of the back door, barking his head off. Bo jumped up, instantly breaking the shoelace leash, and took off, with Pow behind him. The dogs raced around the yard, taking turns chasing each other.

  “Catch them!” yelled Kristy.

  Every last kid jumped up and began to run after the dogs. “Oh, no.” Mary Anne groaned.

  “Cover the paint!” Kristy called to Mal, who was still standing near the table. “Before the dogs — ”

  “Ohhhh,” moaned everyone at once. Pow had just run headlong into the first table, spilling three jars of green paint onto Bo, who was behind him.

  Jackie had done it again.

  It took at least half an hour to clean up and start over again. This time, Bo was tied up more securely, with a clothesline “borrowed” from between two trees. He was still green, since Kristy figured the poster paint wouldn’t hurt him. His bath could wait until later.

  By the time I arrived, panting, most of the work was done and the kids were cleaning up for the second time.

  “What do you think?” Kristy asked proudly, gesturing at a row of drying cardboard figures.

  I didn’t even glance at them. “We have to have an emergency meeting!” I blurted out.

  “Now?” asked Kristy, studying my face.

  I nodded. Kristy must have seen how serious I was. “We’ll meet you at your house in” — she glanced at her watch — “fifteen minutes,” she said. “As soon as we make sure these kids are all home safely.”

  A safe home. Every other kid in that yard had one. But Nate and Joey didn’t. What were we going to do about it?

  I sat on my bed, waiting for everyone else to arrive. My mind was spinning. I looked around my room at all the familiar objects: the art on the walls, my overstuffed bookshelf, my collection of sea glass found on the beach. I felt so comfortable here, so sure of my place in the world. How would it feel to be Nate or Joey or any of the thousands of kids who couldn’t feel secure in their own homes?

  I couldn’t imagine.

  I didn’t want to imagine.

  But I knew I would never forget the sound of that slap, or the image of those two little boys standing behind their father, afraid of him.

  I felt tears spring to my eyes, thinking of Nate and Joey, always worried about keeping things “just so.” What kind of childhood was that?

  I jumped when Kristy burst into my room. I’d been so caught up in my thoughts that I hadn’t even heard her come up the stairs. “What happened?” she demanded.

  “I heard —” I started to tell her, but then I thought better of it. I didn’t want to have to repeat the horrible story more than I had to. “Let’s wait until everyone’s here,” I said.

  Kristy, who’s not usually known as Ms. Sensitive, put a hand on my shoulder. “We’ll help you work it out, whatever it is,” she said softly.

  I nearly began crying. Instead, trying to control my feelings, I said, “Have a Milky Way while you wait,” and shoved a bag full of miniature chocolate bars into her hands.

  Within a few minutes, all the other BSC members were on hand. Stacey and Mary Anne joined me on the bed, one on each side. Jessi, Mal, and Abby sprawled on the floor. Everyone looked at me expectantly. But I couldn’t seem to speak the words I had to say.

  “What is it, Claud?”
asked Mary Anne gently after a few silent moments had passed.

  “I heard — I think Mr. Nicholls — he hit one of the boys!” I blurted out. “And I don’t mean a little spank.”

  “What?” Everyone gasped at once.

  “Oh, no.” Mary Anne put her hand over her mouth. “It can’t be.”

  “Sure it can,” said Kristy grimly. “Do you know how many abused children there are in this country?” She shook her head in disgust. “I did a report on it for social studies last fall. It’s unbelievable.”

  “But in Stoneybrook?” asked Mal.

  “Everywhere,” Kristy answered. “Rich people, poor people, people of all colors, shapes, and sizes hurt their kids.” She turned back to me. “Tell us exactly what happened,” she said. “Every detail. It’s important.”

  I began my story with my arrival at the Nichollses’ house that afternoon. I threw in a couple of things I hadn’t had a chance to tell my friends before, such as the way the kids became so upset when I spilled my juice.

  Then I explained why the boys hadn’t been allowed to come to the St. Patrick’s Day preparations.

  “Because Joey did what?” asked Abby. “He touched his father’s briefcase. Since when is that a crime?”

  I shook my head. “Mr. Nicholls has a lot of rules,” I said. “Now I know why the boys are so careful about following them.”

  “It’s so awful,” said Mary Anne.

  “I know,” I answered. “I thought his rules and his yelling were bad enough. But this —”

  “Explain ‘this,’ ” Kristy said. “We need to hear the rest.”

  So I told them about Mr. Nicholls coming home, and how he seemed to be in a terrible mood. “He was still acting nice to me,” I said, remembering his fake smile, “but I was already starting to worry about the boys. I had a feeling he was going to yell at them no matter what they did.” I paused. “But he did more than just yell.” I told them the rest of the story. How Mr. Nicholls had paid me and told me to leave. How I’d gone upstairs to find my jacket. How he’d started yelling about his paper.

  “Then I heard this sound,” I said. “A slap.”

  “You heard it?” asked Kristy. “You didn’t see anything?”

  “No, I was still upstairs. But when I went down, the boys were crying and one of Joey’s cheeks looked red.”

  “And Mr. Nicholls?” Kristy asked. “How did he act when he saw that you were still there?” She was gripping a ruler she’d taken from my desk. Her knuckles were white.

  “He acted just the way he always acts around me,” I said. “Like he’s just this nice, regular guy. He offered me a ride home.”

  “Did you take it?” asked Jessi, her eyes wide.

  “No way! I ran home, and that’s when I realized you were all over at Mal’s.”

  Everybody in the room looked stunned.

  “We’ve never dealt with anything like this before,” said Stacey. “What are we going to do?”

  “That’s a good question,” said Kristy quietly. She was still gripping the ruler. “Accusing someone of child abuse is a big deal.” She frowned. “But if it’s true …”

  “I think it is,” I said. “I really do.” I didn’t know what else to say.

  “But you didn’t actually see anything,” said Stacey. “Right? I mean, he could have — I’m not saying he did, but he could have — smacked the table to make that sound. All we know for sure is that Mr. Nicholls yells a lot. Plus, some parents do spank their children.”

  “His kids are totally afraid of him,” added Abby.

  “But these things aren’t crimes,” said Mal.

  I understood why my friends were being so cautious. As Kristy said, child abuse is a very serious accusation. But none of my friends had seen Mr. Nicholls in action. I knew that I, for one, couldn’t sit back and wait to see what happened next. I was about to say so when Kristy spoke up.

  “Still,” she said. “We have to do something. Even if we can’t prove that he hits them. We have to tell someone.”

  Thank you, Kristy. “I agree,” I said. “I know there’s no way I’d go back there to sit unless we tell someone what’s going on.”

  Jessi nodded. “Okay,” she said. “But who do we tell? The police? A social worker?”

  I gulped, imagining myself talking to someone official, someone who would question all my observations.

  “Maybe you could start out by telling your mom,” Abby suggested. “After all, she knows Mrs. Nicholls.”

  Mrs. Nicholls. I hadn’t even thought of her. She must know what her husband was doing. Why didn’t she stop him? Then I had a horrible thought. Maybe he treated her the same way. And maybe she was just as afraid of him as her sons were. “Ohhh.” I sighed, holding my head in my hands. This was way more than I could deal with. “I think I do need to talk to my mom,” I said.

  “Or you could talk to mine,” suggested Kristy. “She’s great in an emergency.”

  “My dad might be able to give us some legal advice,” put in Mary Anne.

  “Thanks, guys,” I said. “But I think I really want to talk to my own mom. And soon.”

  “Do you want us to be there while you do it?” asked Kristy. “You can do the talking, but we’ll be here, just for support.”

  I looked around the room at my friends. “That would be great,” I answered.

  Just then, I heard the front door open downstairs. “I bet that’s her now,” I said. “I’ll go see.”

  I headed downstairs and found my mom in the kitchen, putting a kettle of water on the stove for tea. She almost always has a cup after work.

  “Mom, can you come upstairs? We’re having a special BSC meeting, and we wanted to talk to you about something.”

  “Sure, honey,” she said. She was leafing through a stack of mail, so I don’t think she saw my face. If she had, she’d have known how upset I was. “I’ll be up as soon as my tea’s ready.”

  “Thanks,” I said. Back upstairs, my friends and I waited quietly until there was a tap on the door.

  “Hi, Mrs. Kishi,” said Mary Anne.

  “Hello, Mary Anne. Hello, everyone. What’s up? Are you looking for book recommendations for your charges? Or is this about the fund-raiser next month? I knew you’d have some good ideas for that.”

  “Do you want to sit down?” asked Kristy, jumping up to offer her the director’s chair.

  My mom thanked Kristy. She sat down and put her cup of tea on my desk. Then she looked at me, really looked at me. “This is serious, isn’t it?” she asked. She reached over to take my hand. “Go on, Claudia,” she said. “Tell me.”

  I told the entire story again. Mom listened closely, holding my hand. Watching her face, I saw that while she was as upset as the rest of us, she was not exactly surprised. Maybe she’d sensed something from the way Mrs. Nicholls behaved. Or maybe it was just that, working at the library, she’d learned enough about the subject of child abuse to know it could happen anywhere. Maybe she’d even heard of other cases in Stoneybrook.

  Her first concern was for me, though. “Are you okay, sweetie?” she asked. “That must have been so upsetting. And scary.”

  Once again, I almost started to cry. Instead, I gulped back my tears. It wasn’t that I was embarrassed to cry in front of my friends. They would understand. It was just that I wanted to move forward, figure out what we were going to do next.

  So I nodded. “I’m okay. But I’m really worried about Joey and Nate. What can we do to help them?”

  “You’ve taken the first big step, which was to come to me,” said my mom. “And I’m really glad you did. I know it couldn’t have been easy to figure out how to handle this.”

  We all shook our heads.

  “And it’s not going to be much easier for a while,” said Mom. “Child abuse is an extremely serious accusation. Even health care professionals have to be very careful about how they handle cases that come into the emergency room or a doctor’s office. Still, they are almost always required to
report the cases to the authorities — even if they only suspect the children are at risk and don’t have solid proof. Right now, we’re in that gray area — we have a suspicion of risk, but no real evidence.”

  “Claudia’s not making up what she saw and heard,” said Abby.

  “I’m not saying she is. I know my daughter, and I know she wouldn’t lie about a thing like this. But she did not see Mr. Nicholls hit his child.”

  “We all think he probably did, though,” said Kristy. “From what we’ve seen. Remember, guys, how Joey spoke to Andrew that day over at Mal’s? I bet he was copying the way his dad acts.”

  “And I remember how nervous the boys were about grass stains and things,” added Mal. “I know a lot of boys, and none of them gives a second thought to things like that.”

  Stacey told Mom how I’d called her when I first started sitting for the Nichollses. “Claudia knew something was wrong from the start,” she said.

  My mother nodded. “I believe you,” she said. “But I need to take some time to think about what to do next. I want to talk to a friend of mine who is a social worker. Plus, I want to talk to Mrs. Nicholls.”

  “I know you’ll figure something out, Mrs. Kishi,” said Kristy. “Claud, are you okay now? I have to go home for dinner.”

  “I’m okay,” I said. “Thanks, everybody. We’ll talk some more tomorrow.”

  My friends left after we agreed to keep things quiet until Mom decided what to do. My mother stayed behind. She sat next to me on the bed. “Oh, Claudia,” she said, rubbing my back. “I’m so sorry. Sometimes I wish I could protect you from all the awful things in the world, the way I could when you were just a baby. But I can’t, can I?”

  I shook my head. “I guess not,” I said, thinking once more of the way Nate and Joey had looked the last time I’d seen them. The person who was supposed to be protecting them was hurting them instead.

  That’s when I started to cry. Mom held me as I sobbed and sobbed.

  It’s funny. I used to feel closer to Mimi, my grandmother, then to my mom. I could talk to Mimi about anything, and I knew she understood me best. I’ve missed that closeness more than anyone can imagine. But at that moment, in my room, I felt closer to my mom than I had in a long, long time.