Dog Daze Page 4

  Her pencil lay still in her hand, acting as though it had never encountered a sketch pad. Wink was an orphan, like her. Little droopy Wink. The sag of the good eye and the squint of the bad eye. How he really did wink. The pencil began to scratch, slowly at first as she retraced each moment of the afternoon—from the first sight of the woman flinging the bag into the water, to how her lungs had nearly burst reaching for Wink as the bag sank, to Wink’s weak hurl on Nadine. Her pencil began to speed across the paper.

  She’d completed his eyes and had just begun the broader strokes of both his ears when she heard Mom’s familiar greeting through the intercom connected to the front gate of The Gates.

  “Honey, I’m home!” Mom said it every night.

  Aneta jerked her head toward her watch. Early! With a desperate glance at the half-finished portrait, Aneta leaped to her feet, dropping the pad and pencil. One step toward the door then two leaps back toward the patio chair. Stay and finish? No, she always greeted Mom at the door to the mudroom. She scooped up the paper. She had to do everything right tonight. If she could show Mom how responsible she was, tell her about winning the contest—that Mom made her enter—and then show her Wink’s portrait, surely Mom would see Wink needed to come home.

  At the threshold of the patio door, she stopped short. Oh. There was the Aneta/Annette thing. The telephone rang, but thinking about this was more important. Maybe the Annette/Aneta thing would be tomorrow night’s project. Suddenly so many projects. This was summer vacation!

  “We must adopt Wink. He is an orphan like me. He is so cute. You will love him.” She began to practice what to say to Mom as she skipped toward the garage door. Every workday she would meet Mom in the mudroom by the garage. Mom’s blond hair might be falling out of the low ponytail and her blue eyes might be tired, but they would brighten when she saw Aneta.

  “My girl!” she would say, extending her arms for a hug. The Fam was big on hugging. Aneta found she liked it very much. After a quick stop at the fridge for sparkling water for Mom and Mom’s special lemonade for Aneta, the two of them would walk arm in arm out to the pool in nice weather. This is where Aneta would complete the simple Step Two: Wink’s story. Step Three would be easy: Mom says yes.

  As Aneta rounded the corner of the mudroom, however, she saw Mom standing by the washer and the open door to the garage. Standing with a pile of wrinkled clothes in her hand, a frown creasing her forehead. Aneta could smell the clothes from where she stood. Lake stink. Dog vomit. Six days of sitting. Her gaze traveled up to Mom’s face. Most of Mom’s hair had escaped her ponytail. Her eyes were more tired than Aneta had ever seen when she looked up from the clothes in her hand.

  Uh-oh.

  “I—I—” began Aneta. Suddenly she didn’t know where to start. The long list of what had transpired since Friday tied her tongue. The paper in her hand crinkled and she looked down at it. Wink. Yes, Wink. “You are home early.”

  “Yes, my conference finished early, and I ran for an earlier plane.” She raised the pile of clothes to her nose then made a face and held them away. “Why are these clothes on the washer? And why”—she stopped and sniffed—“do they smell like the lake”—another gingerly sniff at the wrinkled, stinky mess—“and vomit?” Alarm flashed in her eyes. “Are you sick, sweetie?”

  “I—I—” Why hadn’t Aneta remembered the yucky clothes the day she took them off? Or when she and Gram came to the house yesterday? Mom looked so tired; she needed some good news. Aneta glanced again at the drawing in her hand and raised it to Mom’s eye level, drawing in a deep breath. “The Crocs Killer threw Wink in the lake. We saved him. He needs a forever home—” She stopped short. If Aneta had learned one thing about Mom, it was that “just the facts” worked better than a wandering explanation. “I—I—I won the contest. I made new friends.” That second statement was a bit of a stretch. She didn’t think she could call Sunny, Esther, and Vee friends exactly.

  “You won the contest!” In an instant, Mom’s frown had cleared; her eyes brightened. She clutched the clothes to her chest. “Congratulations, sweetie. I knew your poster would touch people.” She gestured to the paper in her daughter’s hand. “But what is this? That’s not the orphanage drawing.”

  Aneta removed the clothes from Mom’s grip, set them back on the washer, and drew her by the arm toward the kitchen and the fridge. Time for sparkling water and lemonade. Note to self: from now on, watch out for the stupid laundry. Mom worked hard. Aneta could do her part. This next conversation must go perfectly. While she took two tall turquoise plastic tumblers from the cupboard and filled one with lemonade and the other from a bottle of sparkling water, Aneta plunged in. “I would like to adopt Wink, a basset hound someone tried to murder the other day. He is an orphan, like me.”

  The telephone rang, but they both ignored it.

  Mom remained motionless, leaning against the island counter. Not even a twitch of her eyebrows. Her gaze had traveled up from the sweating glass Aneta had set in front of her to Aneta’s face. Long moments ticked past. At least it seemed that way to Aneta. She must have said too much too fast. Would she have another chance?

  “You would love him,” she said, feeling desperate. Step One had been easy, even though it had been interrupted. Step Two wasn’t working. She hadn’t even gotten to how she had rescued Wink, how he’d winked at her, and how he wasn’t dead and needed a forever home.

  “But, Annette, you’re not an orphan. You’re a Jasper.” Mom looked puzzled and, well, like Aneta had punched her.

  Annette. One of the other projects. For pizza sake, as Sunny would say.

  “Um, Mom, about—about my name.” Now what should she say? She inspected her smudgy hands holding the sketch.

  Mom’s face furrowed into worry lines so deep her entire face seemed scrunched. Had that not been the right thing to say either? This was hard. How to get back to talking about Wink?

  The front doorbell chimed. Aneta’s mother hunched her shoulders, stretched her neck, and sighed. “If that’s my family, I’m telling them no Pool Plash tonight.” She stood slowly, as though she were pulling up through cement. Passing by Aneta, she squeezed her daughter’s shoulder. “It seems we need to talk.”

  Chapter 8

  A Waddle Is a Winner

  So she had gotten through! Good. Oh. Another flash of inspiration hit. The Fam. Wait. Sketch in hand, she followed Mom through the family room toward the front door. Telling The Fam to go away was not good. I need them. Of all nights, she needed them there—to argue, to yell, to laugh, and to help Mom know they needed to give Wink a forever home. To convince her to take Wink away from being scared and put him in a place where everywhere he turned, he kept running into a hug and a smile. Maybe one of them would even suggest first that Mom and Aneta be his forever home.

  Mom opened the door. Aneta peeked over her shoulder. How many cousins had come with Gram tonight? The group of three on the front steps, who were not The Fam, waved at her.

  Uh-oh. Aneta had completely forgotten both the project and the group of Melissas.

  “Oh hi, Aneta.” Esther’s louder-than-necessary voice. The girl waved at her.

  Mom looked at Aneta. Aneta looked at the girls.

  “Nobody answered the phone, so I thought I would just walk around and pick everyone up. We all live so close! I hope you don’t mind.” Esther’s eyes were now surveying the roomy family room with its fireplace that could be seen on both sides—both from the kitchen and the family room. Comfortable burgundy leather love seats and oversized footstools filled the room, with colored-glass lamp shades over wrought-iron lamps on the table. “We’re late turning in a fund-raiser idea for Oakton Founders’ Days.”

  “And you’re so cool to let Aneta adopt Wink!” Sunny stepped forward, her voice bubbling like Mom’s sparkling water. “Can you believe that Crocs Killer tried to drown him?”

  Oh, if only The Fam had descended instead. Aneta considered saying she was suddenly sick and running up to her room. No good. S
he was rarely sick. She eyed the phone on the long coffee table. Only a few steps away. A quick call to Gram… She began moving toward it.

  “Crocs Killer? Aneta?” Mom repeated.

  Oh dear, this was getting worse. Aneta took her hand off the phone, thinking fast.

  “Hi!” she said, her voice sounding as loud as Esther’s. “Mom, these are my new friends from the community center. Now we are a team!” She searched Mom’s face for signs that she was shifting away from the shock toward the new good news.

  It worked. Mom smiled. She shook her head the tiniest bit. “Oh, Annette! Teamwork is great.” She stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Aneta, her head only slightly taller than Aneta’s. “I knew it was a good opportunity.”

  Vee spoke. “There’s a problem, though. We don’t have a fund-raiser to present to the city council yet.” She jerked her chin toward Esther, her eyes slitted. “Some of us are not team players.”

  “Yet,” Sunny said quickly, stepping forward with a smile. “Can we hang out for a while and come up with our project, Mrs. Jasper?”

  “Ms. Jasper is great. And it’s great you girls are working together.” She backed toward the kitchen, waving toward the patio. “Go ahead to the patio and start brainstorming. I’ll bring the lemonade and thaw out some cookies.”

  Aneta cast a longing look at the phone as she led the girls through the door and onto the cool stone patio. Esther, next to her, hissed in her ear, “Thaw out cookies?”

  “Yes, my mom makes peanut-butter cookies when she is—well, a lot. Then she freezes them.” It had been a tough month for Mom. She’d lost two cases. Jaspers didn’t like to lose. The freezer was full of cookies. Mom called it her “therapy.”

  Esther closed her eyes and smiled. “I love peanut-butter cookies.”

  After the girls had dropped into chairs around the glass-topped table, Vee pulled out her notebook. Aneta shot a glance toward Esther. The girl was already frowning. Any time Vee whipped out the notebook, Esther’s face settled into grumpiness. Aneta sighed. Maybe it would have been easier to be in the real Melissa’s group. At least then there would only have been one of her.

  “So, how come your mother calls you Annette, but when C.P. called you Annette, you said Aneta. What’s the story?” Sunny was consuming peanut-butter cookies rapidly, filling one hand as soon as it was empty and holding one in reserve. Vee daintily nibbled around the edges of her first, while Esther eyed the plate, hands folded in her lap.

  “By the way, these cookies are killer.”

  Pride rushed through Aneta. Even Gram said nobody could make a peanut-butter cookie like Mom.

  “Yeah, and how come you always say ‘Mom’ instead of ‘my mom’ or ‘my mother’?” Esther’s right hand snaked along the table until it encountered the cookie plate. She snatched one off the plate and stuffed it in her mouth. Aneta remembered girls at the orphanage doing that with bread at dinner and felt sad. “Like she’s just a mom and not your mom.”

  “I—I do not know.”

  Sunny brushed a couple of crumbs off the front of her shirt. “I say it’s none of our business. Just tell us what you want us to call you.” She looked expectant.

  “I want you to call me Aneta.” It was out. Again.

  Half an hour later, they were no closer to agreeing on an idea. Sunny had deserted her chair soon after polishing off her lemonade and several cookies and was pacing around the pool, snapping her fingers as she thought out loud. Vee and Esther interrupted each other on every idea.

  Aneta said nothing. She was thinking plenty, however, as she continued to draw Wink’s ears then move down his baggy throat. She did not care about Oakton Founders’ Day and the fund-raiser. She only cared about bringing Wink home and finding the Crocs Killer. While the voices swirled around her, she continued to plan. First, after the girls left, she and Mom would have their talk. That would take care of Wink’s forever home. Then she and Mom could “brainstorm,” as Mom liked to say, about how to bring the Crocs Killer to justice.

  The clink of ice brought her back to the patio action. Mom had stepped through the french doors with the turquoise pitcher. “More lemonade? How are the cookies holding out? What ideas are you getting for your fund-raiser?”

  Esther smiled at Mom. “The cookies are great. So’s the lemonade.” She straightened in her chair and glared over at Vee, who was draining the last of the lemonade from her icy glass. “Some of us can’t agree on anything.” Vee narrowed her eyes over the rim of the glass. The Vee Stare, Aneta had named it. Sunny groaned loudly. Aneta thought of Wink.

  As Mom set down the pitcher and filled the plate from the plastic container, she glanced at Aneta’s sketch. “Oh, sweetie, you’ve gotten so much further on that. It’s—beautiful, yet so”—she hesitated, looking for the right word—“pathetic. That poor little puppy.”

  Sunny, who had made a beeline for the cookie plate, leaned over Aneta’s shoulder. “You’re good,” she said, chewing. She looked at Aneta’s mother. “And so are these cookies.” In another second, the last bite of cookie was in her mouth and she was dusting off her hands. Her hands stilled. She dropped into the chair to the left of Aneta. Grabbing the sketch, she held it high above her head. “Guys! We have our fund-raiser!”

  What was she talking about? Aneta watched Sunny prance around with the sketch.

  While Mom stood holding the pitcher and smiling at Sunny’s enthusiasm, the other two stopped their most recent quarrel over whether the library or the senior center should be the focus of the fund-raiser.

  “What?” Esther asked.

  “Explain,” Vee said, her pen poised over the notebook. “I’ve got to be home in fifteen minutes.”

  “Paws ‘N’ Claws Animal Buddies!” Sunny danced around the table, turning the sketch this way and that. “Wink will be the poster dog for our event!”

  Her little Wink, a star? Aneta’s lips began to wobble into a smile. He was very cute. She would get him a new collar. Red, she thought.

  “And what’s the event?” Vee was not convinced. Her head tipped to the side. She looked down her nose at Sunny.

  This stopped Sunny. “Oh,” she said. “Event?”

  This time it was Esther who leaped from her seat as though someone had pinched her hard. “A Basset Waddle!” she shouted. Mom started; the lemonade sloshed in the pitcher. Esther would never need a microphone, Aneta thought.

  Aneta looked at the other faces. They showed the same lack of understanding that she knew must be on her face. She hadn’t seen Wink walk yet, but with that long body and short legs, he would definitely waddle. But an event?

  Seeing her audience was lost, Esther launched into an explanation. “My aunt lives in Michigan. We visited her in May. She took us to the Basset Waddle. A bunch of bassets walk in the street to a park, and everyone comes to watch them.” She flopped back into her chair and began to laugh. “It was amazing! Some people dressed up their dogs in costumes….” She clapped her hands. “We will be the fund-raiser for Paws ‘N’ Claws Animal Buddies of Oakton. The one Nadine and Frank work with!”

  “We could have a costume contest!” That was Sunny. She was up and pacing the pool again. “Dogs and their owners! They pay to enter the Waddle dressed up!”

  “They had a King and Queen of the Waddle—a boy and girl dog.”

  Aneta watched as the three girls began throwing out ideas. Vee wrote furiously, glancing at her watch now and then. Finally, after several minutes and Mom had disappeared into the house, Vee held up her hand.

  “I’ve got to call my stepmom and ask her if I can stay a little longer.” She pulled the phone from another pocket, rose, and walked away from the group to a corner of the patio.

  “I wish I had a cell phone,” Esther said.

  “Me, too,” said Sunny.

  “Vee told me both sets of her parents call it the ATP.” Aneta felt she should join in the conversation. After all, her Wink was going to be the poster puppy. Everyone would know he was hers!

&nbs
p; Two sets of inquiring eyes.

  “The Anti-Trouble Phone,” Aneta said.

  In a moment Vee was back, a frown on her face. “Okay, I’ve gotten an extension of twenty minutes. Then I have to be home or I’m in trouble.”

  Aneta was glad she had never been in trouble with Mom. She worked really hard at that. Oh. Except for today with the stinky clothes.

  Standing straight, Vee read from her list.

  “We have a Basset Waddle, a King and Queen of the Waddle—we will need to get crowns—” She scribbled a note. “Costume contest.”

  In a few more minutes, assignments were given to each girl. Vee laid the list on the table. Aneta saw the note about Esther and made a face. That might start another argument.

  Crowns for the King and Queen—Sunny (How will we make the crowns stay on dog heads?)

  Contest entry forms—Esther (Check to make sure she spells everything right.)

  Pooper-scooper and bags—Esther (If her dad can get the church youth group to do it.)

  Stuffed basset hound toys for the King and Queen of the Waddle—Vee (My dad knows a guy who sells all kinds of dog toys.)

  Dog treats for dogs who are in the Waddle—Aneta (Make sure her grandmother helps her remember.)

  Wink’s sketch as a poster with bunches of copies to put around town—Aneta (Maybe her grandmother will let us ride her scooter?)

  It did. Sunny stopped it with a shout of “GIRLS! Do I have to pull this car over?” which made everyone laugh. By then it was time for Vee to go. Vee promised to e-mail everyone a copy of the list. E-mail addresses of parents were exchanged, with the exception of Vee who had her own, and the meeting was over.

  After the girls left, Aneta headed toward the kitchen. The sooner she and Mom agreed that Wink had a forever home with them, the sooner they could begin to think of ways to catch the Crocs Killer.

  “We have a plan!” Aneta said, stepping into the kitchen, expecting to find Mom in the window seat with her knees up like a kid, laptop braced on the tippy top. Her hair would be yanked up in a ponytail like Aneta’s, and she’d be wearing shorts and a T-shirt.