Happy Holidays, Jessi Read online

  “So,” Uncle Charles said, “any ideas? How do we fill the days and years ahead?”

  Aunt Cecelia looked straight at Daddy and said, “I believe some of us could use a little patience.”

  Daddy nearly choked on his turkey. “Well, gaining common sense might be a good thing for certain people,” he retorted.

  “John, please,” Mama said.

  “Not to mention remembering to side with one’s spouse,” Daddy snapped.

  “Ummm …” Uncle Charles shot Aunt Yvonne a nervous look. “I was thinking about, you know, spending more family time together …”

  “Teaching children to respect limits,” Aunt Cecelia commented.

  “Working in the community …” Uncle Charles pressed on.

  “Learning to drive safely through the community,” Daddy murmured.

  Aunt Cecelia lifted her napkin from her lap and tossed it on the plate. “I have had enough. I believe I will excuse myself —”

  Aunt Yvonne stood up. “Uh, listen, everybody. Maybe it wasn’t such a great idea for us to visit. This is a tough time for you, and you certainly don’t need the pressure of guests —”

  “It’s okay, Yvonne!” Daddy said. “Please sit down!”

  “John Ramsey, they are not our pets!” Aunt Cecelia snapped. “When are you going to learn to talk with people, not at them? Look at the harm you’ve already done to the family.”

  “I’ve done?” Daddy retorted.

  Squirt looked up from his mashed sweet potatoes with a start. His face crumbled and he exploded into tears.

  Mama reached over to pick him up.

  “Oh, you poor thing,” Aunt Cecelia said. “How can you be expected to recover with all this thoughtless behavior —”

  “Maybe we can visit at the end of January,” Uncle Charles was saying.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Daddy replied.

  “Really —”

  “Another day —”

  “I won’t hear of it —”

  “Why don’t we have some coffee?”

  Mama, Daddy, Aunt Cecelia, Uncle Charles, and Aunt Yvonne were standing now, all talking at once. Squirt had buried his face in Mama’s shoulder.

  Keisha pressed her hands to her ears. “Sto-o-o-op!” she screamed.

  The voices stopped. All the grown-ups spun to look at Keisha, as if she’d been hurt.

  “Why are you fighting?” Keisha demanded. “This is so stupid! It’s Kwanzaa. We need to celebrate!”

  Squirt pulled his head back from Mama’s shirt. He looked around, his eyes wide.

  Then he smiled, pointed to Daddy, and burped.

  Becca tried to swallow a laugh. It came out like a snort.

  That made Billy laugh. Squirt started applauding himself and shouted “Bup! Bup!”

  “Good one, Squirt!” Uncle Charles said.

  “Yaaaay!” all us kids shouted.

  “Yaaay bup!” Squirt said.

  Aunt Cecelia was trying desperately not to smile. She shook her head and said, “You’re only rewarding him …”

  And then she cracked up. Yes, Aunt Cecelia. She was hooting and snickering. She had to grab the edge of the table to keep from falling over.

  Daddy chuckled. He took one look at Mama, who let out such a sudden laugh that a piece of collard green flew from her mouth and across the table.

  That did it. We were all hysterical.

  Daddy put his arm around Uncle Charles’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, little brother. You, too, Cecelia.”

  “No, no, it’s my fault!” Aunt Cecelia replied.

  Uncle Charles was laughing so hard he had to catch his breath. “I say, you two, be quiet and let’s all dig in!”

  We did, too.

  I hadn’t tasted such a good dinner in a long time.

  “What do you mean, ‘It’s yummy’?” Aunt Cecelia asked.

  Keisha held out a bowl and I ladled some Hoppin’ John into it. “Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it, Aunt Cecelia,” I said.

  “Young ladies, I grew up with Hoppin’ John,” Aunt Cecelia replied. “I used to try to serve it to you both, back in Oakley, but you wouldn’t eat it.”

  “Oops,” said Keisha.

  I handed Aunt Cecelia the bowl. “Kids change.”

  Aunt Cecelia took a spoonful and chewed slowly.

  Around us, the Stoneybrook Community Center gym was filling up. Yes, the festival — my very own great idea — was underway. It was the perfect day for it, too: The theme for Kwanzaa’s sixth day is kuumba, or creativity. The sun was shining and it was New Year’s Eve.

  We’d opened the doors at noon, and the place had begun filling up right away. I recognized some African-American families from Stoneybrook — the Battses, Fords, Harrises, Ingrams, Hickses, and Olatunjis — but there were some faces I’d never seen before. (“Because of the fliers I put up in the other towns,” Kristy said.)

  Plenty of non-African-American families had stopped by, too. I overheard Buddy Barrett trying to convince his parents to celebrate Kwanzaa in their house. Timmy Hsu and Bob Ingram were leading a parade, waving the red-green-and-black bendera ya taifa flag. Jake Kuhn asked me why we were selling menorahs. (I had to explain they were kinaras.)

  Of course, the entire BSC was on hand. Stacey was the festival’s cashier. We had decided to donate our proceeds to a special fund for children’s services at the Stoneybrook Hospital. (That was my idea.) Abby was the official stage manager for the show. Kristy was at the door, greeting families and handing out a guide to the festival (with a BSC flier tucked into it, of course).

  Claudia had designed the guide. It was called “The Official Map and Guide to the First Annual Stoneybrook Kwanzaa Festival.” It briefly explained the event, listed the participants, displayed the starting time for the play (2:00), and showed our arrangement of the gym.

  Food was on tables against one wall, crafts against another. Posters were everywhere. The biggest one was an illustrated history and explanation of Kwanzaa. But my favorite art project was the mural of African-American portraits. Looking down at us were Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, Marcus Garvey, Thurgood Marshall, Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Shirley Chisholm, and Martin Luther King.

  I felt in good hands.

  At the far end, the stage was set for our play. We’d painted a rural backdrop, using Mary Anne’s house as a model for the farmhouse. Claudia had done most of the sketching, but the kids had painted it. The farmhouse windows were pink, the sky had an orange-soda stain on it, and one of the chickens was saying “Duane Rules” in a speech bubble, but it looked great anyway.

  Aunt Cecelia swallowed her Hoppin’ John and said, “Needs thyme.”

  “We cooked it for hours!” I protested.

  “Thyme, the spice,” Aunt Cecelia explained. “And some cayenne pepper, too.”

  “Jessi!” Becca rushed up from behind me. “Jessi, I lost it!”

  “Lost what?” I asked.

  “My script!”

  Becca was the narrator of Malindy. It was the only role I could give her. She had missed so many rehearsals, and the narrator doesn’t need to memorize lines or act. “When we left home,” I said, “it was in your backpack.”

  “It was? I’ll check.” Becca zoomed away.

  “Uh, Jessi?” Keisha said. “Do you know that kid?”

  I followed Keisha’s glance to the beverage table. Marnie Barrett, a two-year-old BSC charge, was reaching up over her head for a very full cup of Caribbean fruit punch.

  Yikes. I sprinted to the table and carried Marnie back to her family.

  “Jessi!” Abby called from across the room. “Fifteen minutes to curtain! Spread the word!”

  My stomach clenched up. The play was the only thing I was nervous about.

  Mallory and I ran around, gathering up our actors. They headed backstage, which was a corner we’d roped off with a hanging sheet.

  By the side of the stage, Rosie Wilder set up a music stand and took out her violin.

  Boy, were the
kids nervous. They couldn’t stop yakking. They also couldn’t seem to put on their costumes. Bob’s finger caught in the zipper of his dog outfit (brown feet pajamas painted with white spots). Omar’s plastic devil horns kept drooping. Duane’s pig snout hurt his nose. Tomika popped a button on her plaid dress.

  “Rosie!” Abby called out. “Start playing!”

  As we frantically helped the kids, we could hear Rosie’s version of “Turkey in the Straw.”

  Nine times.

  Finally I stepped in front of the crowd, and Rosie stopped.

  “Welcome to the Stoneybrook Kwanzaa Festival’s production of Malindy and Little Devil!” I announced.

  The whole room cheered and whistled.

  From the front row I heard Kristy whisper, “Mention the Baby-sitters Club!”

  “This play is based on a traditional African-American folktale from the South,” I continued, “traced back to the late nineteenth century. The kids you’re about to see have worked very hard. I’d like to thank them, and also the members of the Baby-sitters Club for their help —”

  Kristy stood up. “Our number is on the flier!”

  “And now,” I shouted, before Kristy could say another word, “I present your narrator, Becca Ramsey!”

  I turned. Abby had folded back the black drape, and Becca was standing there.

  Frozen.

  She was gazing at me as if she were headed for the gallows.

  “Go ahead,” I said.

  “I —” Becca’s voice caught in her throat. “I —”

  “Somebody go!” Abby urged.

  Bob darted around Becca and sprang onto the stage. “Roof! Roof!” he barked.

  “Beeeaaaaahh!” bleated Ebon, crawling onto the platform after Bob.

  Out walked Duane the pig. “Oiiiiink!” he squealed in Bob’s ear.

  “RAAWWWWWF!” Bob howled, pushing Duane to the floor with his hand.

  “BEEEEEEEAAAAH!” Ebon butted Bob’s chest.

  “Oh, no,” Abby moaned. “They’re getting carried away!”

  I could hear a few puzzled laughs in the audience. “Becca,” I whispered. “We need your help.”

  Becca unlocked her knees and stepped timidly onto the platform. “Um …” She held the script in front of her face. “Once-upon-a-time-there-was-a-little-girl-named-Malindy-who-lived-on-a-farm.”

  The animals fell suddenly silent. Becca looked over the top of her script, startled. Then she smiled.

  Aunt Cecelia started clapping. Then Daddy and Mama. In a moment, the whole crowd had joined in.

  “They like me!” Bob exclaimed. He stood up and took a bow, but I don’t think Becca noticed. She was grinning up a storm.

  “Well, Malindy just loooooooved to sing and dance,” Becca proclaimed loudly. “Hey, yo, here she comes now!”

  “That’s not in the script,” Abby whispered to me.

  “What a ham,” I said.

  Sharelle skipped out onto the stage with a bucket full of shredded white paper. “I’m going to get some milk from the moo cow!” she sang.

  Our cow was Laurel and Patsy Kuhn, covered with a brown sheet (Laurel was the front part, and she held a papier-mâché cow mask).

  As Sharelle pretended to milk the cow (the udders were a surgeon’s glove filled with air), Omar sneaked onto the stage. Clutching his rubber pitchfork, he sneered at the audience and said, “Nyah-hah-hah!”

  “Sssssss!” some people hissed.

  “Booo!” cried a few others.

  Omar looked crushed.

  “That’s what they’re supposed to do!” Abby whispered from behind him. “It means you’re doing well!”

  Sharelle stood up and began skipping in Omar’s direction. Then she dropped her bucket and screamed, “EEEEEK!”

  The shredded paper was stuck inside. Duane pounced on it and began throwing the shreds out. “It’s supposed to be milk,” he explained to the audience.

  Well, Omar told her he’d restore her milk for a price — her soul. And Sharelle said she wanted to live a long, long life. Say, to ten years old or so. So Omar agreed to wait. The years went by (and all the kids had a chance to play minor parts). Malindy became Sara, then Tomika.

  At the big climax, Tomika gave Omar the sole of a shoe.

  “That’s it?” Omar said. “I thought it was bigger.”

  Tomika shrugged. “That’s all. Now get out of here before I whup your tail.”

  She pretend-kicked him, and Omar scurried offstage.

  “And Malindy lived happily ever after,” Becca announced. “Because the devil can only get your soul once, and then he has to stop. The end.”

  Daddy shot to his feet. “Bravo!”

  Guess what? We had an instant standing ovation.

  “And here are the writers!” Becca shouted. “Mallory Pike and my sister, Jessi Ramsey.”

  We stood on the stage and bowed — Mallory, Abby, and the whole cast.

  After the play, we were mobbed. Our friends in the BSC lifted Mallory and me off the ground and led a “Two, four, six, eight” cheer. Keisha promised to help me run the festival next year. I took Squirt from Mama and he couldn’t stop hugging me. People I didn’t know were shouting, “Great job!”

  Aunt Cecelia gave me a big kiss. “I was so proud of you both,” she whispered. (I may be wrong, but I think her mascara was running.)

  As for Becca, well, I saw her signing autographs for two admiring little boys.

  I was flying. I hadn’t felt so good in weeks.

  As people started moseying back to the displays, Mallory put her arm around my shoulders. “We did it.”

  “We sure did!” I gave her a big, long squeeze. “Thanks for coming through, Mallory!”

  Mal smiled. “Are you hungry? I’m starving.”

  I took her arm, and we headed toward the food table.

  Parts of the play were running in my mind, especially the mistakes. And a few unexpected lines.

  “I could not believe it when Omar looked at the sole and said, ‘Ew, you shouldn’t have walked in the cow shed’!” I said to Mallory.

  Mallory laughed. “I think Abby taught him that.”

  “That was my favorite part.”

  “Nahh, not mine.”

  I turned to face her. She was beaming. “My favorite part is right now,” she explained. “Seeing Jessi Ramsey finally back to her old self.”

  I wasn’t expecting her to say that.

  But you know what?

  I had to agree.

  “Harambee! Harambee! Harambee! Harambee! Harambee! Harambee!”

  I love that word. It’s Swahili for “Let’s all pull together,” and you’re supposed to call it out once on the first day of Kwanzaa, twice on the second, and so on. But I just love the way it sounds. If the word were something like “Farquar” or “Ziziphus,” it just wouldn’t be as much fun to shout.

  And all of us — Mama, Daddy, Becca, Keisha, Billy, Aunt Yvonne, Uncle Charles, Aunt Cecelia, and I — were shouting it as loudly as we could. (Kara shouted, “Hambee!” and Squirt just sucked his thumb.)

  On New Year’s Eve, just a few hours after the Kwanzaa festival was over, us Ramseys held our karamu.

  Karamu is one of the best parts of Kwanzaa. It’s a fancy feast and a ceremony. Mama was dressed in a long, flowing busuti, a robe tied with a sash at the waist. Aunt Yvonne wore a green-and-red buba, a loose-fitting gown. She’d wrapped her hair in a matching cloth called a gele, and she looked like a queen. Daddy and Uncle Charles were both wearing dashikis, which are long, brightly colored shirts.

  Daddy spread our fancy mkeke mat on the dining room table. “No matter how high a house is built,” he said, “it must stand on something.”

  That’s a traditional Kwanzaa statement. And boy, is it true.

  “I think, over the last month,” Mama said, “we all learned how strong a foundation the Ramsey family stands on.”

  Aunt Cecelia nodded. “Amen.”

  Uncle Charles and Aunt Yvonne set bowls of fruit on
the table, plus a couple of ears of corn. These are symbols of the harvest.

  Standing at the head of the table, Daddy raised a big pewter goblet full of water. We use the goblet only once a year. It’s the kikombe cha umoja, or “unity cup.”

  Daddy carefully held up the cup to face the north, south, east, and west winds. Then he tipped the cup toward the floor. “We spill a few drops to honor our ancestors.”

  As the water tumbled to the carpet, Becca said, “Ooooh, who’s going to clean that?”

  Aunt Cecelia chuckled. “Don’t look at me.”

  “Ahem,” Daddy said. “And now we pass the cup around.”

  Aunt Yvonne took it and made a sipping gesture.

  “Ewwww,” Billy said. “We have to share germs?”

  “You just pretend,” Keisha whispered.

  Mama was the last to take the cup. She stood up and said, “This year I am supposed to give the kukaribisha, the opening speech of our little family ceremony. Last night I tried and tried to write down something to say. I thought about today’s theme: creativity. And I looked ahead to tomorrow’s: faith. And somehow, when I thought of those two words, I kept seeing the faces of my beautiful daughters.”

  Mama smiled at me and Becca, and I felt like dancing.

  “We saw their creativity at the wonderful festival today,” Mama went on. “But it was their faith that pulled this family through a trying time — faith that their brother would be all right, faith that the Ramseys would be unified, faith that the festival could be organized despite all our setbacks. So, Becca and Jessi, if you’re up to it, I’d like to give you both the honor of saying this year’s kukaribisha.”

  Huh?

  I sure wasn’t expecting that. I thought her speech was just fine by itself.

  Becca stood up, edged away from her chair, and said, “Uh, I have to go to the bathroom.”

  Whoosh. She was history.

  Now everyone was looking at me.

  “Go for it,” Keisha said.

  I rose to my feet. My mind was a jumble. “Uh … well …” I began.

  As I looked around the room, I spotted the big Kwanzaa poster we had made for the festival. I’d brought it home and propped it against the wall. On it was the farewell statement that had been written for the karamu by the creator of Kwanzaa, Dr. Karenga.