Jill stood at the top of the spiral staircase, listening. She was relieved that her brother was in trouble instead of her. Jill felt like she was always in trouble. Always disappointing her mom.
The list of Jill’s faults was long. Her hair was always tangled. She didn’t chew with her mouth closed, use good posture, or wait her turn to talk. She didn’t sit like a lady, speak like a lady, or eat like a lady. She had a terrible sweet tooth, which was why she was on the chubby side. She ate unhealthy snacks in her room in between meals. She pouted when she didn’t get her way. She wasn’t good at math. When cornered, she lied.
Downstairs, her brother shouted, “I’m not going!” and slammed his bedroom door.
“Wait until your father hears about this!” her mother threatened before screeching, “Jill!What’s taking you so long?”
Jill hurried down the winding stairs and followed her mother into the garage.
“We need gloves, clippers, a rake, a shovel, and garbage bags.”
Jill began gathering the tools, but stopped when her momlowered the tailgate of the station wagon. The rear cargo area was completely stuffed with flats of colorful flowers. “Where are we going?”
“To the house I’m selling.”
Jill shot a sideways glance at her mom. There’d been something unfamiliar about her tone. There was a lightness to it. She sounded almost... happy.
“Mr. and Mrs. McCreedy’s house?”
“That’s right. Put the tools on the floor behind your seat,” she said, slamming the tailgate. “There isn’t any room back here.”
As they drove up Tidewater Terrace and rounded the first of three bends in the road, Jill glanced at Heather Anderson’s house, hoping to catch sight of her best friend, but guessing she wouldn’t.
There was no reason for Heather to be outside this early on a Saturday morning. Heather was probably still in her pajamas, eating a bowl of Cap’n Crunch’s Crunch Berries on the sofa while watching cartoons.
The last time Jill slept over, she’d filled her cereal bowl to the brim with the sugary cereal. She’d picked out all the red spherical Crunch Berries first, crushing each one between her molars, the sweet flavor flowing over her tongue and coating her gums. Next, she’d eaten the rectangular cereal pieces. They scratched the roof of her mouth like sandpaper, but she didn’t care. The only cereal her mother bought was Raisin Bran or Grape-Nuts. Raisin Bran was okay because of the raisins, but the flakes got so soggy by the end that Jill didn’t want to put them in her mouth. And Grape-Nuts was totally disgusting. It was like eating twigs and acorn caps.
“It’s good for you,” her mother always said when she caught Jill grimacing.
Heather wasn’t forced to eat Grape-Nuts. Her pantry wasalways stocked with tasty cereals like Cap’n Crunch, Lucky Charms, Frosted Flakes, or Apple Jacks. Heather’s mom let her have soda with dinner and ice cream for dessert. She never told Heather she needed to watch what she ate or that boys didn’t ask fat girls out for dates.
Jill’s mother always asked what Heather’s mom had given her to eat, and Jill always lied. If her mother knew she’d had a TV dinner followed by an ice cream sundae on Friday night and sugar cereal for breakfast the next morning, she’d never let Jill sleep over at Heather’s again.
As if reading her mind, her mother frowned at the Andersons’ crooked mailbox. “Why don’t you ever ask Heather to stay over at our house? She owns a sleeping bag, doesn’t she?”
Jill tightened her jaw. She couldn’t let her mother see how important it was to have Heather’s house as a refuge. Spending the night there was like going on vacation. She could eat whatever she wanted. She and Heather could watch whatever they wanted on TV. No one told them when to go to bed or when to get up in the morning. No one told them to brush their teeth or put their plates in the dishwasher.
Jill was a different person at Heather’s house. She was more relaxed. She laughed all the time. She didn’t have to worry about being loud. She could say she was hungry without feeling like a pig.
She couldn’t let her mother take the Andersons away from her, which meant she had to pretend that she didn’t cherish every minute she spent with them.
Shrugging one shoulder, she said, “It’s easier for me to go to her house because she has two beds in her room.”
Her mother arched her brows. “Is that the only reason?”
Jill knew she had to throw her mom a bone. She had to tell her something to make their family seem better than the Andersons.
“Heather and I get to pick the movie we want to watch,” she admitted. “Erik doesn’t have to agree because he has a TV in his room now.”
“That explains why he barely passed the tenth grade,” her mother muttered. “Kids shouldn’t have TVs in their bedrooms. It’s ridiculous.”
Knowing she had to let her mom have the last word, Jill stayed silent for the rest of the short car ride.
Her mother pulled into the driveway of a lettuce-green ranch house Jill had ridden past on her bike a hundred times. All the kids took the dirt path connecting Tidewater Terrace to Idle Day Drive on their way to the hobby shop or pizza place. The McCreedys’ dogs always barked at them, their lips curling back into nasty snarls as they pushed their snotty muzzles through the fence rails.
Sometimes, Mr. McCreedy would whip his door open to see what had set his dogs off. He’d stand on the stoop in a pair of velour sweatpants and a dingy white undershirt that never covered the full mound of his hairy stomach, and he’d glare at the kids.
Mrs. McCreedy hardly ever went outside. She was a droopy-faced woman who wore shapeless housedresses and a head full of pink rollers. She never said a word to the kids. She just flicked the ash from her cigarette in their direction, watching them through slitted eyes.
