Mallory and the Ghost Cat Read online

  “Oh,” said Melody, looking at herself in the mirror, “I am a lovely, lovely lady.”

  Kristy had to stifle a giggle. She knew that this was the most important part of the game, and the dialogue was always the same. She mouthed Karen’s line along with her.

  “Would you like to have some tea?” asked Karen, who was also painstakingly admiring her reflection.

  “Why certainly,” said Melody. “Lovely Ladies must always have tea.”

  That’s about the extent of the Lovely Ladies game!

  Kristy applauded, which was kind of awkward, since she was still carrying Skylar. “Very nice outfits, girls!” she said. “Now, are you Lovely Ladies ready for dinner?”

  “Almost,” said Karen. “First we have to say our lines over again, but this time I go first.” She turned to Melody. “Oh-I-am-a-lovely-lovely-lady,” she said quickly. They ran the little scene over again in a flash.

  “Okay,” said Kristy. “Who wants to help make dinner?”

  “I do!” called Karen. She loves to help in the kitchen.

  “Meow!” said Melody.

  “What?” asked Kristy.

  “Meow,” repeated Melody. She was busy taking off her Lovely Lady outfit. “I’m tired of being a lovely lady. From now on I’m going to be a cat.”

  “Tat!” said Skylar, with a fearful look on her face.

  “Don’t worry, Skylar,” said Melody. “I’m not the kind of cat you’re scared of. I’m a Melody-cat!”

  Kristy remembered then that Skylar has a terrible fear of cats. But the baby seemed reassured by her sister’s statement. “Melody-tat!” said Skylar, smiling. “Pat Melody-tat!” She struggled to get out of Kristy’s arms and began to stroke Melody’s head.

  “Purr, purr,” said Melody.

  “Cats are kind of boring,” said Karen suddenly. She adjusted her cloak. “Don’t you at least want to be a Lovely Lady at the dinner table?” she asked Melody. Karen can be bossy sometimes, and once in a while when some other kid comes up with a good idea, Karen will resist it. She wants to be the one running the show.

  “Meow,” said Melody, sinking even further into her cat role. Melody loves to play pretend. She rubbed her head against Kristy’s leg and ignored Karen.

  Kristy looked at Karen and shrugged. “Oh well,” she said. “I guess we’ll have dinner with one baby, one boy, one Lovely Lady, and one cat.”

  Karen pouted, but she followed Kristy, who was carrying Skylar again, and Melody (who was padding along on tiptoe with her “paws” held out in front of her) to the kitchen. Karen helped Kristy set the table, while Melody pretended to play with a piece of string. Then Karen helped Kristy make a salad, while Melody pretended to drink from a bowl of milk that Kristy had poured for the “cat.” And when dinner was ready, Karen ran to get Bill, while Melody took a “catnap” under the table.

  “What’s for dinner?” asked Bill. “Hot dogs, I bet. That’s what we always have when baby-sitters are here.”

  “Well, I fooled you this time,” said Kristy. “How do fishsticks sound, instead?”

  “Yay!” said Bill. “I love them. So does Skylar. Melody doesn’t like them so much, though.”

  It was a good thing Bill and Skylar were happy with the meal, since Karen and Melody were pretty glum. Karen was clearly having a hard time dealing with Melody’s cat act, and Melody was having a hard time with the fishsticks. Kristy decided just to let Melody pick at her bun, as long as she ate a little salad. And as for Karen, Kristy decided that it would be best if she headed home soon after dinner.

  “I’m going to call your mom and have her come over to pick you up,” she told Karen, after the meal was over.

  “Okay,” said Karen right away. Kristy saw that she was relieved to be going home. Normally she would have put up a big fight about it, but after sitting next to a cat at the dinner table for the last half an hour, Karen was in no mood to argue.

  Karen changed out of her Lovely Lady clothes, and she was waiting at the door by the time her mother showed up. “ ’Bye, Melody,” said Karen.

  “Meow,” said Melody.

  Kristy rolled her eyes and Mrs. Engle smiled. “That’s a lovely cat you have there, ma’am,” she said as she turned to walk off with Karen.

  “Meow,” said Melody.

  And “meow” was all Melody said for the rest of the night. Kristy tried everything to end the game, but Melody was determined.

  “How about Chutes and Ladders?” asked Kristy.

  “Meow,” said Melody.

  “How about if we make some cookies?” asked Kristy.

  “Meow,” answered Melody.

  “How about if we watch TV for a while?” Kristy asked desperately. We try not to spend too much baby-sitting time watching TV with our charges, since we’d rather do fun, active stuff with them.

  “Meow,” said Melody.

  Finally, Kristy gave up and let Melody do what she wanted to do, which was lie around purring and meowing, and letting Skylar and Bill treat her like a cat.

  But just before bedtime, Kristy finally had her revenge. “Meow, meow,” said Melody. “I’m hungry!”

  “I’ve got the perfect snack for a hungry cat,” said Kristy. She went to the kitchen, took two leftover fishsticks from the refrigerator, and placed them in a bowl. She brought it to Melody. “Here you go, kitty!” she said.

  Melody looked up at her. There was no more purring, no more meowing. “Don’t we have any cookies?” she asked, like the little girl she really was.

  Kristy gave her a big hug — and then she gave her a couple of cookies, too.

  “Oh, no, another collection!” wailed Vanessa. She pointed into the little drawer in the end table. She and I had been assigned to clean up the living room, and the job was turning out to be a strange one. We kept discovering these odd little collections that Uncle Joe had made.

  I’d found a bunch of pop-tops behind the geranium on the windowsill. Then Vanessa had found a tangle of thread tucked under the cushion of “his” chair. A pile of scrap paper was stuck beneath a magazine on the coffee table. And, in the drawer Vanessa had just opened, we found a stockpile of little tin-foil balls.

  “I think this is how he spends all his time when we’re away at school,” she said, holding one up. “He must go all through the house every day, looking for stuff to add to his collections.”

  I shook my head. The situation with Uncle Joe had not gotten much better. He was still acting stiff and formal around us. He hadn’t bothered to learn our names. And he spent a lot of each day dozing in his chair.

  I was really, really trying to be patient. I was trying to put myself in his shoes and understand how it must feel to be old and achy and tired all the time. And I was still trying to convince myself that this visit was a good thing for him and for the Pike family.

  But it was getting harder and harder. And I wasn’t the only one having a hard time. The whole family was. The younger kids were confused by Uncle Joe’s behavior, and hurt by the way he refused to learn their names. Vanessa and I were tired of feeling responsible for keeping our brothers and sisters quiet and well-behaved. And Mom and Dad were obviously worried about Uncle Joe.

  “I think he was upstairs again today while we were out,” Mom said to Dad one night during dinner. Uncle Joe had, as usual, left the table as soon as he’d finished eating. The rest of us were still picking at our spice-free tuna casserole.

  “I think he’s just a little bored and restless when none of us are home,” answered Dad. “But I worry about him climbing those stairs. What if he falls when he’s home alone?”

  Uncle Joe was supposed to stay on the first floor. There was really no reason for him to go upstairs, since everything he needed was downstairs. But lately he seemed to like to wander around.

  “I think my supervisor’s getting upset about all the time I’ve taken off recently,” said Mom. “I’m worried about Uncle Joe, too, but there’s no way I can stay home every day to look after him.”

 
Mom works part-time, and it’s true that she’s taken a lot of days off lately. She thought it was important to spend as much time with Uncle Joe as possible. He seemed to need more and more attention as time went on. And Mom didn’t seem to mind spending time with him. But what if she lost her job?

  To be totally honest, there were times when I actually wished that Uncle Joe had never come.

  Like the time I got home from the mall last Saturday afternoon. Mom was working at the desk in the living room. She’s been bringing a lot of work home lately, just so she won’t fall behind because of the days she had taken off.

  “Hi, honey,” she said.

  “Hi, Mom,” I answered. “Where is everybody?” The house seemed awfully quiet.

  “Well, let’s see,” she said, putting down her pencil. “Vanessa’s upstairs. I think she’s working on a poem. Claire and Margo are playing dress-up in the rec room. And the boys are out playing with friends.”

  “What about Uncle Joe?” I asked.

  “I think he’s napping in the den,” she said. “But why don’t you check on him?”

  I went to the door of the den and knocked lightly. No answer. I pushed the door open a crack and peeked inside. No Uncle Joe. The bed was made up neatly and his carefully folded pajamas were on the pillow.

  “He’s not there!” I said to Mom.

  She looked up at me, her eyes round. “Oh, dear. And all this time I thought he was in his room. Where do you suppose he’s gotten to?” she asked. “We’d better search the house.”

  We looked everywhere. We checked the whole house, top to bottom. No Uncle Joe.

  “Maybe he went out with Dad somewhere,” I said hopefully.

  “No, I saw your father leave. He was on his way to the hardware store, and he was definitely alone in the car. Uncle Joe must have gone out by himself.”

  I volunteered to look for him, so I hopped on my bike and set out to search the neighborhood, while Mom stayed at home with my sisters. I rode all over, but I didn’t see Uncle Joe anywhere. Finally I returned home, feeling defeated. Then, just as I flew up our driveway, I saw our neighbor, Mrs. Murphy, come out of her house. She was leading someone by the hand.

  Uncle Joe!

  “Mallory!” she called. “I’m glad to see you. This is your Uncle Joe, right?”

  I nodded. What was he doing over at the Murphys’?

  “Well, I guess he decided to pay us a visit,” she said. “I just got home from the supermarket and found him napping on our couch.” She smiled kindly.

  I was so, so embarrassed. For myself and for Uncle Joe. “I guess he went out for a little walk and got confused about where he was staying,” I said. “He’s still not really used to our house.” I had parked my bike in the driveway while we were talking, and now I headed over to Mrs. Murphy and Uncle Joe. I took Uncle Joe by the arm, gently, and led him back to our house. “Thanks!” I called to Mrs. Murphy. She waved and gave me an understanding look.

  Uncle Joe had done some other strange things, too. For example, my mom decided that Uncle Joe might feel more like part of the family if he was given some responsibility around mealtimes, just like the rest of us. We take turns setting the table and clearing it and washing dishes — stuff like that. Anyway, Mom asked Uncle Joe to help her by wiping the dishes as she washed them. She figured that drying dishes was about the simplest job she could give him. He was just supposed to stack each dish on the counter as he finished it.

  Well, Uncle Joe didn’t seem to mind his new job. In fact, I think he liked it. He would stand by the sink in his suit, humming tunelessly while he polished each dish carefully. But after a while, he started to do odd things with the dishes. He’d put some of them back into the “dirty dishes” pile, and whoever was doing the dishes would end up washing half of them twice. (We caught on to that one pretty quickly.) Other times dishes would turn up in the strangest places. Uncle Joe would wander around with them and arrange them carefully on the TV stand, or in the oven. Once Mom even found some coffee cups in the washing machine!

  Pretty soon Mom took Uncle Joe off dish duty. (“Too bad I never thought of hiding the dishes,” said Nicky enviously.)

  Uncle Joe was also having trouble with his sense of time. One morning, just after we’d finished having breakfast, he changed back into his pajamas as if it were time for bed. Another time he asked Mom why supper was so late that night, but it was only two in the afternoon! And every now and then I’d wake up and hear him shuffling around downstairs in the middle of the night.

  Uncle Joe didn’t always act weird. A lot of the time he seemed fine; he sat in his chair, he read the paper, and he ate his meals with our family. But I could tell Dad was feeling worried about Uncle Joe, and once in a while I’d catch my parents in the midst of a whispered conversation, both of them looking very serious.

  Dad was awfully nice to Uncle Joe. We all tried to make him feel welcome, but Dad was the only one who could ever involve Uncle Joe in a real conversation. Sometimes at dinner they’d start talking about people they’d known years ago and Uncle Joe would look almost happy. The funny thing was that he never had any trouble at all remembering the names of every friend they’d ever gone fishing with. He remembered details about things that had happened forty-five years earlier, the same way I remember what happened to me yesterday. Yet he still couldn’t tell me apart from Vanessa, or remember where he’d left his glasses.

  One night, Dad and Uncle Joe were talking about this trip they’d once taken to the circus.

  “Do you remember how we snuck Spanky into the tent?” Dad asked.

  “I do,” said Uncle Joe. “And I also remember how the crowd laughed when your dog ran out to join the clown parade.”

  Dad grinned. “That was when we were asked to leave. But it was worth it, wasn’t it?”

  Uncle Joe didn’t answer for a second. I saw Dad flash a concerned look at him.

  “Uncle Joe?” he asked, touching the old man’s arm.

  Uncle Joe turned to look at Dad. He smiled politely at him. “I’m awfully sorry, sir,” he said, “but I’m afraid I just can’t seem to remember your name.” Then he picked up his fork and took another careful bite of shepherd’s pie.

  Dad looked as if he’d been punched in the stomach. I glanced around the table to see whether everybody had seen and heard what had just happened, but my brothers and sisters were involved in other conversations. And Mom was busy refereeing a squabble between Claire and Margo.

  “Uncle Joe,” Dad said cautiously. “It’s me, John Pike. You’re visiting here with me and my family. We were just talking about the trip you and I took to the circus when I was a little boy.” Dad sounded very gentle. He was giving Uncle Joe all the information he needed in order to remember where he was and what was going on.

  “Of course, John,” said Uncle Joe, as if the horrible episode had never happened. He looked insulted. “I was merely … preoccupied for a moment.”

  I exchanged glances with Dad. Preoccupied? Try “on Mars!” I couldn’t believe what I’d just witnessed, but I could see by the look on Dad’s face that he’d like me to keep it to myself. I gave him a nod, and I didn’t tell anyone in the family. But I did tell Claudia that night on the phone. I’d called her because she was my “old-person expert.” I hoped she’d be able to tell me something reassuring.

  “Wow,” she said. “That sounds really wild. I wonder if he had some kind of a stroke or something. That’s what made Mimi act weird just before she died — a stroke.”

  “But he seems fine,” I said. “It’s just his thinking is a little off. Oh, Claud, it’s so weird around here lately. And kind of scary …”

  “Maybe you should tell that to your mom or dad,” said Claudia. “Let them know that you’re scared, and maybe they can help you understand what’s going on.”

  I thanked Claudia for her advice, but I hung up feeling just as frustrated and confused as before. I couldn’t go to Mom and Dad with my fears. They were worried enough already, and both of
them had their hands full dealing with Uncle Joe. They didn’t need a wacked-out daughter to add to their problems.

  That night, though, the situation came to a head. I was fast asleep when I was awakened suddenly by a loud shriek. I jumped out of bed, my heart racing. The clock by my bed said three-thirty. I heard voices in the hall, so I went to investigate. Mom and Dad were both out there, comforting a sobbing Margo, who had been on her way to the bathroom. The three of them were in their pajamas — which made sense, since it was the middle of the night. But standing nearby was Uncle Joe, and he was fully dressed in his blue suit and starched white shirt. He looked as if he were on his way to church. Which, as it turned out, is exactly where he thought he was headed.

  Margo calmed down and was put back to bed. Dad helped Uncle Joe downstairs and got him to bed. The house was quiet again. But something had changed. I’d seen it in Dad’s eyes when he took Uncle Joe’s arm in the hall.

  Sure enough, the next morning Dad called an emergency family conference. We assembled in the rec room. Uncle Joe wasn’t there — he was still sleeping, I think. Anyway, the door to his room was closed.

  “I’m afraid we’re going to have to cut Uncle Joe’s visit short,” said Dad. “He needs more care than we can give him here at home, and your mother and I have decided that he’ll be better off back at Stoneybrook Manor.”

  I can’t say I was dismayed by the news, except for two things. One, I had had such high hopes for this visit. And two, Dad looked so sad.

  “Tell them the rest,” said Mom gently. “They deserve to know what’s been going on.”

  “Well,” said Dad reluctantly, “when we picked up Uncle Joe at Stoneybrook Manor, the nurses told us they suspected he might be in the beginning stages of Alzheimer’s disease. They asked us to watch for symptoms, and to bring him back for observation and tests if we felt it was necessary.”

  The younger kids weren’t following this too well. “What’s all-shiner’s disease?” asked Claire.

  “Alzheimer’s,” said Dad. “It’s a disease that some people get when they are older. It can make them forget things, and act restless and confused. It affects their brain.” He looked upset.