Читать книгу The One and Only - Valerie Tripp - Страница 7

he hose was right next to the kitchen door. Tom, who always liked to pretend that he was a fireman, held the hose while Joan washed the sand off Mikey’s feet, which made Mikey giggle and dance. Then Tom squirted Scooter, who sat agreeably and let him do it.

Maryellen didn’t even change out of her bathing suit, but went straight to the carport and began rummaging around on Dad’s workbench for red paint and a paintbrush. She was going to paint the front door of their house red, really red: bright, shiny, eye-catching, fingernail-polish-ish, lipstick-y red. No one else in The Palms had a red front door! Betty and Florence would be so impressed. They’d say to Mom, “My goodness, Kay! Your house really stands out from the rest. It’s extraordinary! It’s the only one with a bright red door!” And Mom would smile proudly and say, “Maryellen painted our door red. It was her idea. She always has great ideas!” And then, when Betty and Florence talked to Maryellen for the first time, they wouldn’t say what people usually said, which was, “You’re Maryellen? Which one are you, the second, third, or fourth sister?” Instead, they would say, “You’re Maryellen? Oh! You’re the one with all the great ideas!”

Maryellen was so intent on imagining Mom’s pride and Betty’s and Florence’s admiration, and so focused on her search for paint, that she practically jumped a foot when Beverly’s squeaky voice behind her asked, “What are you doing?”

Maryellen turned to see Beverly, Tom, Mikey, and Scooter standing in a row behind her, watching her. Beverly was wearing her baseball-cap crown. Except for Scooter, they were all eating orange Popsicles, so their mouths were wreathed in orange stickiness.

“What are you doing?” asked Beverly again.

“Nothing,” Maryellen answered. “Go find Carolyn.”

“She left for her piano lesson,” said Beverly. “She said to tell you to take the brownies out.”

“What about Joan?” said Maryellen.

“She’s getting ready for Jerry,” said Beverly. “She gave us Popsicles and told us to come find you.”

Maryellen sighed. She could see that she was stuck with Beverly, Tom, Mikey, and Scooter as an audience for her project whether she liked it or not. “All right,” she said briskly. “I’m going to paint the front door red, like Mom’s fingernail polish. You can watch. But don’t get in the way.”

Maryellen found a can of red paint and a paintbrush left over from when Dad had touched up Tom’s fire truck. The paint was sort of lumpy and smelly, and the brush had dried so that it was stiffened into a hard curve. Maryellen knew that Dad would say that she should clean the brush with turpentine, but she didn’t have time to fuss. She had to finish her surprise before Mom and Betty and Florence came home. To make herself faster and taller, Maryellen put on her roller skates. She pictured herself gliding smoothly as she painted, like the waitresses on roller skates at drive-up restaurants she had seen on TV.

“I want to paint, too,” said Beverly. She and Mikey trailed along behind Maryellen as she roller-skated to the front door. Scooter, who had an unerring instinct about where he’d be most in the way, plunked himself down right behind Maryellen.

“I want to paint, too,” echoed Tom, pedaling his fire engine along behind them.

“Paint!” said Mikey.

“No,” said Maryellen.

“Why?” asked Beverly.

“Because there’s only one brush.”

“Can I have a turn with it?” asked Beverly.

“Me, too?” asked Tom.

“Paint!” said Mikey.

“No,” said Maryellen shortly.

“Why not?” asked Beverly.

“Because it was my idea and I’m doing it,” said Maryellen. She sounded crosser than she meant to. The truth was that she was cross at herself, because only now that she looked at the front door did she realize that she had forgotten about the screen door, which was outside the front door, so she’d have to paint that first.

Oh, well. There’s not much to paint. How hard could it be? Maryellen thought. She remembered seeing a commercial on television in which a lady painted her whole living room all by herself, and there was nothing to it! She pretended to be in that TV commercial. She held the can of paint in one hand, dipped the brush into it, and boldly swiped a stroke of red on the middle slat of the screen door.

“Uh-oh,” said Beverly.

“Uh-oh what?” asked Maryellen, even though she had spotted a problem, too.

“It’s all bumpy,” said Beverly.

“Oh, no one will see,” said Maryellen airily, even though it was easy to see that she’d painted over dead bugs, and their bodies were now permanently attached to the screen door, like raised polka dots. She was glad when Joan’s boyfriend, Jerry, drove up in his convertible hot rod. He would be a great distraction for her critical audience.

“Hi, Jerry!” Maryellen, Beverly, and Tom called. Maryellen turned and waved her paintbrush.

“Hi, kids,” said Jerry as he got out of his car and came up the front walk. Maryellen thought he looked very handsome in his white tennis outfit. “What’s with the paint, Ellie?”

“Paint!” said Mikey.

“I’m painting our door red,” Maryellen explained. “It’s a surprise for Mom.”

“She’ll be surprised, all right,” said Jerry. “I guess I’d better knock on the kitchen door, to let Joan know I’m here for our date.”

Maryellen seized the opportunity, even though she knew she was risking Joan’s wrath. “Speaking of dates,” she said to Jerry, “have you ever thought about setting a date? To marry Joan, I mean.”

“To—to what?” Jerry sputtered. He looked surprised.

“Marry Joan,” Maryellen plowed on doggedly. “She’s almost eighteen, you know. She’ll graduate from high school next June. And millions of girls get married right after they graduate.”

Jerry looked stunned, as if someone had bonked him on the noggin. He was speechless.

Maryellen pressed on. “You had better ask her soon,” she advised Jerry. “She’s awfully pretty, and very popular, and—” But Maryellen didn’t have a chance to finish her sentence, because just then, everything happened at once.

Beverly, who had been dipping her empty Popsicle stick into the paint can and painting her fingernails red, stopped and looked up. “Ellie,” she asked, “what’s that smell?”

Maryellen turned and saw smoke billowing out of the kitchen door just as Carolyn came running up the driveway waving her piano music and shouting, “Ellie! The brownies—they’re burning!”

Joan, rushing out to see what the fuss was, flung open the front screen door and knocked Maryellen backward on her roller skates. As Maryellen fell over Scooter and landed bottom-first in a bush, red paint went flying—all over her, all over the front step, and all over Jerry’s white tennis shorts and shirt.

“Hey!” exclaimed Jerry.

“Oh no!” shrieked Joan.

Tom, making siren noises and clanging the bell on his fire truck, pedaled to the kitchen door and turned on the hose. He squirted water through the kitchen screen door, trying to put out the fire in the oven like a fireman. Beverly held up her hands, which were covered in red paint, and wailed. Mikey, unperturbed, picked up the paintbrush and began painting red stripes on Scooter, who didn’t seem to mind.

And it was at that exact moment that Mrs. Larkin’s car pulled into the driveway, horn honking “Honk, honk!” to announce its happy arrival.

“MOM!” Joan, Carolyn, Maryellen, Beverly, and Tom yelled at the top of their lungs.

“Fire!” yelled Jerry.

“Paint!” yelled Mikey.

“Ar-oooo!” howled Scooter, not to be left out of the ruckus. “Ar-ooo! Ar-ooo! Ar-ooo!”

The car screeched to a stop, and Mrs. Larkin, Betty, and Florence jumped out.

“What’s going on?” Mrs. Larkin shouted, over and above all the noise. “Oh, my stars—look at this mess! How on earth did this happen?”

Suddenly, everyone was quiet. None of them had ever seen Mom this mad before. Even Scooter was cowed, and maintained a dignified silence.

Maryellen stepped forward. At this moment, she certainly had her mother’s undivided attention, and oh boy, did she ever wish she didn’t. “Mom,” she began. Her voice sounded as wobbly as her knees felt. “I was only trying to paint the door. I didn’t mean to make a mess. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” Joan repeated. “You’ve ruined Jerry’s tennis clothes. You’ve ruined our date. You’ve ruined the front of our house. And all you can say is you’re sorry?” Joan put her hands on her hips and leaned toward Maryellen. “This is just the kind of disaster I was talking about earlier. Mom lets you get away with murder, but you’re not a baby anymore! When are you going to grow up?” She stormed off with Jerry, holding him by the arm, but gingerly, so that she wouldn’t get red paint on her tennis dress.

“Oh, Ellie,” moaned Mom. She closed her eyes and pressed her red fingertips to her forehead. Then she opened her eyes and said, “Ellie, I will speak to you about this privately. Carolyn, please help Betty and Florence get settled, and then give them a glass of iced tea on the back patio.”

“Sure, Mom,” said Carolyn. Everyone skedaddled, and Jerry and Joan drove away. Mom and Maryellen were alone.

Maryellen picked up the paintbrush and the paint can and tried to explain. “I only wanted to—”

But Mom interrupted. “No explanations right now, please. And just leave the mess,” she said flatly. “We’ll deal with it later, after Betty and Florence have left. Right this very minute, I’ve got to tell you that I am disappointed in you. Dad would be, too. It is childish to get so carried away that you don’t stop to think. I understand that in a big family like ours, it’s hard to get your fair share of attention. But Ellie, honey, like it or not, you are just one of six children. You cannot be the center of attention all the time. And in any case, there are better ways of getting attention than showing off and slathering red paint all over. Didn’t you promise me just this morning that you’d act more responsibly?”

Maryellen nodded. She was too close to tears to speak. She was sorry to have upset Mom, and she was even sorrier that her surefire way of pleasing Mom had completely backfired. What a flop! What a failure! What a disaster.

She sure had failed Mom’s test. Now Joan and Mom would never agree to the All Girls Room. Worse than that, instead of thinking that she was more grown-up, Mom and Joan now thought of her as even more messy and irresponsible than before.

The full moon was so bright and shone such a strong silver light into the bedroom that Maryellen could not sleep. Lying on her upper bunk, she tossed and turned and flushed hot and cold just thinking of the red paint disaster. No one had said anything about it at dinner or later while everyone was watching TV. Even Joan didn’t mention it, and her silence was strange considering how mad she’d been earlier. But Maryellen knew it was on everyone’s mind. Especially hers.

“Jeez Louise, Ellie,” Joan said sleepily. “Stop spinning around. What are you doing—practicing your underwater somersaults? Go to sleep, why don’t you?”

“Sorry,” said Maryellen. She flinched, expecting Joan to jump all over her again the way she had earlier when Maryellen had used the inadequate word sorry.

But Joan didn’t. In fact, her voice was kind when she said, “Listen, Ellie-jelly, don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re upset because your red paint idea didn’t work out. But everybody makes a mistake once in a while. Your mistake today just happened to be a lulu.”

“All my ideas seem to be mistakes,” said Maryellen. “They’re all lulus.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” said Joan. “You had one good idea today.”

“I did?” asked Maryellen. She could hardly believe her ears. “What was it?”

Joan giggled a little. “You told Jerry to, uh, get on the ball,” she said.

Maryellen gulped. “You’re not mad about that?” she asked.

“Well, no,” said Joan. “In fact, I’m glad you said something.”

Maryellen was flabbergasted. “Glad?” she repeated.

“Mm-hmm,” said Joan. “Thanks to you, Jerry finally gave me his fraternity pin.”

“He did?” squeaked Maryellen.

“Yep,” said Joan. “I was hoping that he would pin me before he went back to college in the fall, but of course I couldn’t ask him. Girls don’t propose to boys.”

“So that means you’re engaged to be engaged, right?” Maryellen asked. “And does that mean you’ll be getting married soon?” Now that Joan was being so nice, Maryellen wasn’t sure she wanted her to leave—not right away, at least.

“No, we won’t be getting married for a while yet,” said Joan. “So don’t say anything to Mom and Dad. Jerry and I want to talk to them together, because it’s a pretty big deal. Getting pinned does mean there’s a wedding in our future.”

“Oh boy!” said Maryellen. “A wedding! Can I help you plan it?”

“You bet,” said Joan. “So, see? Not all of your ideas are bombs. Even this All Girls Room isn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I have more space in here, and you organized your stuff pretty well. After Betty and Florence leave, I think I’ll tell Mom it’s okay with me to make the move permanent.”

“Really?” asked Maryellen, her heart lifting.

“Really,” said Joan. She yawned, and then she said, “You still have to get Mom to agree, though. Now if you could just come up with another one of your Great Ideas for undoing the mess you made with the red paint out front, you’d be all set. Meanwhile, go to sleep, okay?”

“Okay, I’ll try,” said Maryellen. Full of gratitude for Joan’s forgiveness, she closed her eyes and tried to go to sleep. But her brain kept going over and over what Joan had said. Undo the mess, undo the mess…How, Maryellen thought, can I undo the mess?