Ten Good and Bad Things About My Life Read online

  After that we took a field trip to the ice-cream shop, which was only two blocks away, and thank goodness because there were those wheelchairs and strollers to push and also some people, like Daddy Bo, were a little tottery on their feet. But we made it safely.

  “What do you think?” Daddy Bo asked me as we walked inside a very air-conditioned store and saw two long tables that were clearly set up just for us.

  “This is great,” I said.

  The shop was called Dilly’s, and it sold nothing but ice cream and ice-cream cones and ice-cream sundaes and something called a Banana Boat, which served six. We all sat down at the tables and looked at the menus and I was just getting ready to order a scoop of vanilla, which is the only flavor I like, when I heard a very excited voice call, “Pearl! Pearl! Hi, Pearl!”

  I turned around and there was Justine with her father.

  “What are you doing here?” she cried.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  “We live around the corner.” Justine paused. “We come here all the time,” she added importantly, and I reminded myself that Justine is only eight and probably can’t help bragging.

  Daddy Bo stood up and shook Mr. Lebarro’s hand, and Mrs. Means invited the Lebarros to join us, and before I knew it, Justine had squeezed herself in between Daddy Bo and me and announced to the table that she was getting a dog, which wasn’t exactly true since her parents had said that she could get a dog when she was ten so she had two more years to go.

  When everyone had finished their ice cream, Daddy Bo told the Lebarros about the art exhibit and they decided to go back to The Towers with us for the reception.

  I could barely contain my excitement. Justine would be on hand to see me win my first blue ribbon ever. Except for the oyster, this had been a very good day.

  Back at The Towers we all took elevators to the second floor and walked along a hallway to a room with a sign by the entrance that read GALLERY AT THE TOWERS. Justine was at my side, and as we waited near the doors I said to her, “We had to submit our art ahead of time so it could be framed and hung and evaluated. Do you know what ‘submit’ means?”

  Justine shook her head. “No. And I don’t know what ‘evaluated’ means, either.”

  “‘Evaluated’ means ‘judged,’” I told her importantly. “And ‘submit’ means…” I paused. I couldn’t think of a good explanation. “Well, we had to send our pieces—our art—here ahead of time so the judges could look at everything and prepare the paintings for the show. There will probably be one first prize—that will be a blue ribbon—and one second prize—that will be a red ribbon—and then a lot of sad green consolation ribbons for all the losers.”

  Mrs. Means opened the doors to the gallery then, and Justine and I rushed inside. We were some of the first people in the room so I was able to spot my self-portrait right away. It hung in the center of the wall ahead of us.

  “Justine, look!” I cried. “The blue ribbon is on my painting! I won! I won first place!” I tugged Justine through the gallery. “This is my very first self-portrait,” I told her, “and the first painting I ever entered in a show. I can’t believe I won!” Winning a blue ribbon in an art show was certainly something Lexie had never done.

  We were about six feet away from my painting when I took a good look at the ribbon and saw the writing on it. It said GREAT ARTIST!

  “Hey,” said Justine then. “Everyone got first prize.”

  This was when I realized that a blue ribbon was stuck to absolutely every painting in the whole room, even crayon pictures by babies that were just like:

  And they all said GREAT ARTIST!

  “Where are the sad green ribbons?” Justine wanted to know.

  Luckily Daddy Bo had followed us across the gallery, and he saved me from answering Justine. “Pearl, my gem of an artist,” he said. “This is very impressive. A self-portrait! You certainly are talented.”

  “Yeah, especially compared to that,” said Justine, pointing to one of the baby scribbles. And then she added, “You’re the best artist I know, Pearl.”

  Which is one of the reasons Justine is still my old best friend, even if there are a lot of differences between us now.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  We walked around the room and admired the paintings and nibbled at Fruit Roll-Ups and Cheez Doodles, which is what you do at an art exhibit. At four o’clock our parents started to arrive and I heard Mrs. Means say, “Don’t forget to take your ribbons home with you.”

  That was when I got a good idea, and I snatched the ribbon off of my self-portrait and stuffed it in the pocket of my skirt.

  10

  IV. I rescued Bitey (cat).

  I didn’t stop talking once the entire time my father and I were riding the subway home. The doors closed behind us at 79th Street and I said, “I’ll tell you about the whole day. First we had lunch, which was a buffet and you could eat whatever you wanted. Oh, and the server who scooped out the oysters for me? He said, ‘Here you go, ma’am.’ He called me ma’am!”

  By the time the doors opened at 14th Street I was saying, “… and I won a blue ribbon. It’s right here in my pocket.” This was not a lie. I really had gotten a ribbon that was blue. I had just left out the part about all the babies getting blue ribbons, too.

  A whole bunch of people streamed out behind us, and I heard a lady say to another lady, “Do you think she stops to breathe?” which I certainly hope she wasn’t talking about me because that’s a rude thing for a grown-up to say.

  I hopped along beside Dad on our way home and finally I said, “Did you have a good day?” and all he said was, “Yes,” and sometimes you can just tell when a person doesn’t feel like talking and is probably thinking about being fired and how the summer isn’t really going the way he had planned.

  When we got home, I found that Mom was working even though it was Saturday, so I bypassed her office and ran to Lexie’s room and barged inside, completely forgetting the rule about knocking on closed doors.

  “Guess what!” I cried. “Today was so much fun! We had a big buffet and I tried an oyster, and then I won first prize in the art show!”

  I jammed my hand in my pocket, getting ready to pull the ribbon out. I planned to flash it in front of Lexie’s face so fast that she wouldn’t be able to see that it just lamely said GREAT ARTIST!

  And that was when I realized my sister was crying.

  She was lying on the bottom bunk with her face in the pillow, and frankly I don’t know how she was able to breathe.

  I wasn’t sure what to do. I started to tiptoe out of the room, but Lexie hadn’t yelled at me yet, and furthermore, I could hear her sobbing in that awful adult way that’s sort of loud and quiet at the same time.

  I slid my hand back out of my pocket. Then I closed the door behind me and sat down on the edge of Lexie’s bed. A year ago I wouldn’t have been allowed to do this, but things had changed while we were roommates.

  “Lexie?” I said quietly.

  She sniffled and turned her head toward me. Her eyes were puffy, and her face was blotchy.

  I almost said, “Are you okay?” but I knew what her answer would be: “What does it look like? Of course I’m not okay!” I thought of those newscasters who interview crying people after horrible disasters and ask them how they’re feeling, and the crying people are always way too sad to reply, “Well, how do you think I’m feeling?” which is what you know they actually want to say.

  “What happened?” I asked Lexie instead.

  She sniffled again and drew in a shaky breath. “Dallas broke up with me.”

  My eyes widened. Lexie almost never gave me boyfriend information. I was trying to figure out what kind of advice I had on the subject when suddenly she leaped off the bed, reached for her cell phone, and held it out to me. “And you know how he broke up with me?” she went on. “He texted me. Texted! If you’re going to do something like that to someone, you should at least have the nerve to tell the person t
o her face. Not just write, like, ‘I think we should go out with other people,’ which means he’s already going out with someone else. I wonder who it is. It better not be Lindsey. If it’s Lindsey, I’ll—I’ll—”

  “Did you answer him?” I interrupted.

  Lexie nodded furiously. “I sent him a text back five minutes ago, but I haven’t heard anything yet.”

  I thought about Dallas, who I had liked because he had been nice to me even when Lexie was treating me like a baby. “Do you want me to send him a text?” I asked, even though I don’t know how to do that since I don’t have my own cell phone.

  “No!” Lexie was on her feet instantly. “I mean, thank you. But definitely not. And don’t call him, either,” she added, eyeing me.

  Lexie stayed in her room all evening, not even coming out for dinner on the family room floor, which was a sign of how upsetting it is to break up with your first boyfriend. The next morning my mother said to me, “Pearl, your dad and I are going to take Lexie to the Daily Grind. I think she needs a little treat. Can you stay at home by yourself for an hour?”

  The breakup must have been very serious if Mom and Dad were going to spend $$ on coffee at the Daily Grind when they could make coffee at home for a lot less $$. And also if Mom and Dad were going to trust me alone in the apartment when everyone knows how much trouble I can get into, even with adults around.

  “Sure,” I said.

  “You won’t be scared?” asked my father, just as my mother said, “And you’ll stay put?” which she was probably remembering the time when Daddy Bo and I had left the apartment together and didn’t tell anyone where we were going and accidentally went all the way to New Jersey and then there was a little trouble.

  “I’ll stay right here with Bitey,” I said, glad that I wouldn’t be entirely alone in the apartment. And wanting to prove how responsible I could be. Maybe when I turned eleven my parents would think back on my responsibleness and get me a cell phone.

  Mom and Dad left a few minutes later with Lexie trailing sadly after them.

  “Bye, Pearl,” she said tragically to me as the apartment door closed. Her eyes were large and wet, even though she must have been thinking about ordering that whipped-cream coffee thing.

  I wandered into the family room. I planned to see if there were any I Love Lucy reruns on TV, and if there were, to watch them with Bitey. He lies on my head and waves his tail back and forth in front of my face, which makes it a little hard to see the TV, but that’s okay because I like his tail.

  I looked around the living room. No Bitey.

  “Where are you?” I said aloud.

  I checked my bed and then Lexie’s bunks and then Mom and Dad’s big bed. No Bitey curled up on a pillow.

  I looked under the beds. I looked behind the couch in the family room. I looked under Mom’s desk. No Bitey.

  “Bitey!” I shouted, even though he almost never comes when you call. “Bitey!”

  A funny feeling crawled around in my stomach, a little bit of uneasiness. “Bitey?” I said.

  I tried to think of all the strange places Bitey has chosen for naps—the shower in Mom and Dad’s bathroom, the basket of onions on top of the refrigerator, Lexie’s wastebasket. I looked in those places and didn’t find him, and then I went from room to room and looked in every spot where Bitey could possibly fit and I still couldn’t find him. I opened closets in case he had gotten locked in. I looked in the hallway in case he had escaped when Lexie and my parents had left. No Bitey anywhere at all.

  I felt a lump forming in my throat. Mom and Dad had trusted me to stay by myself for the first time ever, and I had lost our cat. I tried to think how someone mature—Lexie, for instance—would handle the situation. She would call one of her friends on her cell phone, I decided. I was about to call JBIII on our regular non–cell phone when I noticed something that made me shiver. One of the family room windows was open. The safety guard was in place, but there’s no screen behind it, and the bars of the guard are wide enough for a fat cat to squeeze through.

  My heart began to pound so hard that I could feel it beating in my ears. I crossed the family room and peered out the window. Two floors below me was the terrace of apartment 5F, which belongs to the Olsons who are fun to spy on because in warm weather they eat breakfast outside in their pajamas and talk very loudly about television shows I’m not allowed to watch, and also sometimes Mrs. Olson goes out there and plays her flute, and let me tell you, even without one lesson I could play the flute better than she does.

  Anyway, sitting on one of the Olsons’ striped lounge chairs was Bitey. He didn’t look hurt, but he looked embarrassed, the way I must have looked the time I decided to experiment with our blender, a jar of peanut butter, and a can of apricots, and realized too late why you’re supposed to put the top on the blender.

  “Bitey!” I called “Bitey!”

  He turned his face toward me and mewed the tiny baby mew he uses when he’s feeling especially pitiful about something.

  “It’s okay, Bitey!” I told him. “Don’t panic. Stay right where you are.”

  I paused to think. Since Bitey wasn’t hurt I knew I could take time to do things the proper way and prove my responsibleness. One of the problems with the trip Daddy Bo and I had taken to New Jersey was that we hadn’t told anyone where we were going. I realized I should probably call Mom on her cell phone now and tell her I was on my way to rescue Bitey, but I didn’t really want to have a conversation with her about the open window, just in case she thought I was the one who had left it open, which I was not. So I found a pen and a pad of paper and I wrote:

  Dear Mom and Dad and Lexie,

  Back very soon. Rescuing Bitey, he’s OK. Really.

  Love, Pearl

  P.S. I am safe. Really.

  I left the pad on the floor of our foyer where no one could miss it. Next I closed the family room window. Then I found my key to the apartment, locked the door carefully behind me, and rode the elevator two flights down to the fifth floor. I knocked on the Olsons’ door and waited. No answer. I knocked again, this time more loudly in case Mrs. Olson was in there hooting away on her flute. But when I pressed my ear to the door I didn’t hear a sound. I knocked twice more and then, very slowly, I twisted the doorknob. My heart started to pound again. I knew I shouldn’t go into an apartment uninvited, but this was an emergency. The knob wouldn’t move, though. The door was locked.

  I scurried back onto the elevator and rode it down to the lobby. Luckily, John was at the desk.

  “John!” I cried. “John!”

  John looked at me in alarm. “Pearl, is everything all right?”

  I thought again about those newscasters, but I didn’t want to be rude to John, so I just said, all breathless, “No! Bitey fell out the window. He isn’t hurt. He landed on a chair on the Olsons’ terrace. But I have to rescue him and the Olsons aren’t home!” I paused. “And I was not the one who left the window open.”

  John was already on his cell phone, calling Etienne, who is the superintendent of our building, and you probably won’t be surprised to learn that Etienne speaks with a French accent. The next thing I knew, Etienne and I were standing outside the Olsons’ apartment and Etienne was jingling through the biggest ring of keys I’d ever seen.

  “Ah-ha,” he said at last. “Zees ees zee one.” (That’s really how he talks.) He opened the door, calling out, “Meester Olson? Meesiss Olson?” as he stepped inside. There was still no answer, so then Etienne said to me, “All right, Pell.” (He has a very hard time with my name.) “Let us go.”

  Etienne led me through the apartment to a sliding-glass door. Beyond the door was the terrace with its deck chairs and potted plants and Mrs. Olson’s flute case. I had expected to see Bitey waiting patiently for me, since I had told him to stay where he was and not panic. Instead, he had panicked completely and was jumping from chair to chair, looking for an escape. When he saw Etienne, he growled and leaped onto the terrace wall, which if he fell off of
it, he would sail five stories down to the cement sidewalk of Twelfth Street.

  “Bitey!” I shrieked, imagining what would happen if Mom and Dad and Lexie were on the way home right now and their cat suddenly shot out of the sky. I made a grab for Bitey and caught him around his middle. Then I hurried back inside the Olsons’ apartment and Etienne closed the terrace door.

  Bitey hissed and struggled in my arms, but I held on tight as we hurried through the living room. I was just thinking that I might be able to keep this entire adventure a secret from my family, when the Olsons’ front door burst open and in rushed Mrs. Olson and Jasper. Jasper is a breed of dog that is extremely large, extremely loud, and extremely non-cute.

  The next few seconds were kind of confusing. Clearly, Mrs. Olson had come in through the back door of the building and had not spoken with John, because she was completely surprised to find Etienne, Bitey, and me in her living room. She said, “Oh!” and tripped and fell over an umbrella stand, which I would have to remember to tell JBIII about that. Jasper sprang up in the air in fear, and Bitey escaped from my arms and took a swipe at Jasper’s nose when he landed. He missed, but Jasper yelped, and then Mrs. Olson said, “Get that thing out of here!” and I said, “I’m trying,” and Etienne said, “So sorry, Meesiss. Come, Pell.”

  Etienne took the regular elevator back downstairs while I rode to the seventh floor in the service elevator with Bitey. I half hoped Mrs. Mott would be on it for some reason and that Bitey would try to swipe at her, but it was empty, and before I knew it, Bitey and I were safely at home.

  I was wondering again if there was any way at all that I could keep Bitey’s accident a secret, when Mom and Dad and Lexie all came flying into our apartment and Mom said, “Is Bitey okay, Pearl?” and Dad said, “Poor old Bitey,” and Lexie moaned and covered her face with her hands and said, “It’s my fault. It’s all my fault.”

  John had given them the news as they’d walked through the lobby. I couldn’t really blame him for gossiping. It was one of the more exciting things that had happened in our building lately.