“I guess you end up reading a lot if your mom’s a librarian, huh?” I said. “We end up eating a lot ’cause my mom’s a chef.”
It must have worked because when Josh pulled a block of cheese from the fridge, he was smiling again.
“Get this. I know a guy named Michael Michael,” he said.
It took me a second to retrace our conversation back to names. Ideas seemed to ping around Josh’s mind like balls in a pinball machine.
“So, wait, Michael is his first and last name?”
“Yup. Mr. Michael Michael.” Josh pulled a cutting board and box of crackers off the top of the fridge.
“I can top that. I know a girl named Sailor.”
“Like on a ship?” he asked as he sliced cheese.
“She was in my sister’s class.”
“That’s not right. Sailor’s not even a real name.” He handed me a cracker with cheese.
“I know. It’s like child abuse.”
“Yeah, like what if parents wanted to name their kid something like…Snot? That should be flat out against the law.”
“Why would anyone want to name their kid Snot?” I said, laughing so hard bits of cheese flew out of my mouth.
“I don’t know.” Josh was laughing now too. “Why would someone want to name their kid Sailor?”
Josh and I spent the next hour eating cheese and crackers and coming up with a list of names we thought should be outlawed. A few times, we laughed so hard his Mom had to come in to tell us to keep it down.
When it was time to go, Josh filled out a library card for me and checked out Both Hands on it. He was sure I was going to love it. I wasn’t, but I thought I should at least give it a shot.
“Hey,” I said as I was leaving. “You know the General Store?”
“Sure,” he said.
“You ever taste those doughnuts she used to make?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Were they really that good?”
“Not good,” he said. “Life changing.”
Life-changing doughnuts?
I had no idea what that meant, but I had to find out.
• • •
When we got home that afternoon, I finally had an email from Charlie:
From: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Hey
What are you talking about? Kids can’t start businesses. It’s like against the law or something because businesses need insurance and have to pay taxes. How many twelve-year-olds do you know paying taxes?
I slapped the laptop closed.
The first email Charlie sends me in days, and he’s telling me I can’t start a business? And what did Charlie know about taxes? This had Zane Kramer written all over it. Why did Charlie have to tell his dad what I was doing anyway?
In my head, I wrote back: What about lemonade stands? Why can’t kids pay taxes?
I opened the computer and hit Reply. But then I just stared at the screen. What was the point? Charlie would just keep repeating whatever his dad told him. I wouldn’t even really be emailing with Charlie then.
I hit Delete and shut the computer.
He hadn’t even told me what dessert I should make for Winnie.
9
The day after we went to the library, it was so cold I could see my breath. I’m not talking about outside. I’m talking in my room, still in bed.
I ran to the window to close it, but it wouldn’t budge, obviously part of a new plan by the Purple Demon to freeze us out.
I shoved my pillow in the window, layered up, and let myself down to the ladder through the hole in the floor.
Mmm. Mom was baking bread.
We never had homemade bread before we got to Petersville, but then Mom figured out it took her almost as long to drive to the nearest bakery as it did to make her own. At first, she just made simple stuff, like sourdough and whole wheat, but soon we were having sweet potato rolls, pumpkin biscuits, and hazelnut scones with homemade peach and strawberry butters. None of us were surprised when she announced she’d decided to serve a different homemade bread and butter every day when she opened the restaurant.
“Corn bread?” I said as I came into the kitchen.
“Close. Semolina,” Mom said.
She and Jeanine were already sitting at the table eating breakfast. Even though there were no windows open in there, it was almost as cold as it had been in the attic.
The Purple Demon is a mad genius.
“Is the heat working?” I said.
“I think so.” Mom handed me a plate of scrambled eggs and a thick slice of steaming bread with apple butter. “Houses are always cooler than apartments. It’s much healthier. When it’s too warm, it’s the perfect environment for bacteria to flourish. That’s why people are always sick in the city.”
“Who was always sick?” I said.
“Don’t you remember when we all got strep last winter?”
“Yeah, so? Don’t people get strep in Petersville?”
“I’m sure they do, but it doesn’t travel as fast because…because the bacteria can’t move as well through the cold.”
“Did you just make that up? Because it really sounds like you just made it up as you were saying it.”
“Look, I may not completely understand the science behind it, but I know it’s better not to keep your house too warm.”
“Too warm, maybe. But how about at all warm? I mean, look at Jeanine.”
Jeanine was sitting at the kitchen table with a sleeping bag around her bottom half, a bathrobe around her top half, and a ski mask.
“I don’t mind,” she said. “It keeps me awake. I’ve read seven hundred sixty-five pages since yesterday.”
“That’s great, honey,” Mom said.
Sometimes my mother’s completely clueless. The only reason Jeanine was able to read that much was because, unlike me, she still couldn’t sleep. Whenever I passed her room in the middle of the night on the way to the bathroom, she was up, reading by flashlight.
“Where’s Dad?” I asked.
“Upstairs. He’s really excited about this new idea he has for a pulley system to schlep stuff up the stairs.”
“Oh. That’s kind of cool, I guess.”
“I think so—and definitely better than the intercom idea. I really do think you need to be
