Death by Eggplant (9 page)

“Uh, hello? Can I talk to Granny Greta?”

“Who is this?”

“You don't know me. But I've got a sack of flour from back when you were Dutch's Old-Time Oregon Mill.”

“This is a completely different company. I've told you bill collectors that a thousand times.”

“I'm not a bill collector,” I said. While I talked, I laid Cleo on a sofa pillow. “I thought maybe Granny Greta might know how to get in touch with Dutch. It's an emergency.”

“That's what they all say.”

“It really is,” I tried to explain. “Please, I need to get an extra bag of Dutch's Old-Time Oregon Mill flour.” Mrs. M. had said I couldn't do it, but I just had to try.

“You need a bag of flour?” asked the voice.

“Maybe two. It looks like it's going to be a very bad week. I'm expecting a terrible accident to happen at any minute.”

“Accident? Are you getting wise with me? That warehouse fire was an accident. Is this the insurance company? Where's my money? I mean, Dutch's money?”

“What fire? No, don't tell me, I don't care,” I said. “I just need a couple of sacks of flour, you know, the ones that read, ‘Dutch's Old-Time Oregon Mill.'”

“Everything's in ashes. A complete tax write-off. Hey,
are you the IRS? I don't—I mean, Dutch doesn't owe you guys a dime. Or, well, that's what he told me before he left town.”

“Dutch is gone?” It was the first part of this conversation I had understood. “Did he take all his flour bags with him?”

“There was nothing left to take. Listen up! I repeat: warehouse fire. It's toast. Got it? Crispy critters.”

Instinctively I backed away from Cleo. Had she heard the loud voice over the receiver? She was the only one left. Did that make her an orphan? I had read about orphans in books, of course. It seemed you couldn't even be in a kid's book unless you were an orphan. But I had never known one myself.

“Do you have to shout?” I said. “So . . . there's nothing left?”

“Not a thing.”

“Not even a few empty sacks?”

“Not a single one.”

All at once I got an idea.

“You know how new businesses frame their first dollar bill?” I said. “Did Dutch frame his first sack of flour, just the bag? If he did, could you mail it to me overnight? Then it would all work out. I could put plain flour in it myself, see, and draw a face on it. Then I would have a fake Cleo to bring to school and when this terrible accident that's going to happen happens, the real Cleo will be safe.”

“Cleo?”

“Yeah, Cleo, my flour-sack baby.”

“You have a baby? And she's a flour sack?”

I sighed. “It's a
very
long story.”

“You must think you're pretty clever, trying to convince me that you're crazy so I'll admit something. Well, it won't work.”

“I'm not crazy. I'm just a desperate eighth grader. Please,” I insisted. “Just let me talk to Granny Greta.”

“This
is
Granny Greta. Now get lost, and take your flour-sack baby with you.”

Click
.

I shook my head. Granny Greta's Merry Mill needed better customer service.

As I hung up, I heard the front door open. I ran out into the hall and almost knocked my father down.

“Whoa!” he said, holding me back by the shoulders. “What's wrong, Bert?”

I felt all mushy inside, as if someone had tied me to a chair and made me watch
Bambi
three times in a row. I guess it was having my mother tell me she loved me. Or maybe it was hearing that Cleo was an orphan.

Suddenly I imagined one lonely little patch of white in a field of smoking ashes.

I was a traitor a dozen times over.

“Ready to talk yet, champ?”

I hated to be called that, especially when I knew I
would never make it to Friday. I pulled back and shoved my hands in my pockets.

“What's going on?” my father asked.

“Nothing.”

“Really?” He ducked his head till it was level with mine. “Your mother thinks you're going to run away. Bertie, that would break your mother's heart. Mine, too.”

“What?” Is that why she had told me she loved me, and what she meant about making mistakes at my age? “What do you mean, ‘run away'?”

“Well, that's what you intend to do, isn't it? Run away and become a spy?”

“A spy?”

“I had such different plans for you, son. I really wanted you to join me at the company. But a . . . a . . . ”

“A spy?” I repeated, still not believing what I had heard. This was too weird, even for
my
family.

“It's okay,” my father said. “Your mother told me all about the letter. She called at the office this afternoon.”

“Letter? What letter?” My heart started to thump a bit quicker.

“The letter from the CIA. Bert, that kind of life is so dangerous, no insurance company in the world would give you a policy!”

The letter! The letter that for months I had been waiting for, dying for, praying for. The letter I had pushed out of my mind entirely just so I wouldn't spend every second
of every minute of every hour thinking about it—
the letter from the CIA!

I ran up to my parents' bedroom.

“Mo-o-o-om!”

I found her sitting cross-legged on the bed, half a dozen books opened before her.

“Where is it?” I demanded.

“Oh, honey, why? And why did they have to answer you through the regular mail?” she asked. “Just getting a
letter
from the CIA could put you in danger. There could be counterspies everywhere!”

“Where is it? Where is it?”

She slid her hand under her pillow and pulled out a business-size envelope.

I snatched it, ran into my room, and slammed the door behind me. For long minutes, I was afraid to do more than stare at the return address—CIA, the Culinary Institute of America.

The Culinary Institute. How had I dared to even write the school, much less apply there? Me—traitorous Bertie Hooks, who hadn't even told my own parents I wanted to be a chef? I didn't deserve to get in. I didn't deserve to wear white.

I opened the envelope. The CIA agreed.

“Application denied.”

“You have Dr. Zimmerman after school,” my mother said, pouring a bowl of cereal. “I'm skipping yoga and will come pick you up after class.”

“Dr. Zimmerman? I didn't know I had him on a Wednesday.”

“I saw him yesterday. Yesterday before I . . . got home.”

Yesterday before I got the mail
, her face said, full of motherly hints. I refused to talk about the letter from the CIA.

“He was very eager that you come in, Bertie, something about your being on the verge of a breakthrough.”

Breakdown
was more like it. Yesterday's rejection had topped it off, though I tried to tell myself things weren't too bad. Once I pulled my eyes from that horrible word “denied,” I found out I was being turned down because I was too young. While my application had been exemplary, they said, applicants to the Culinary Institute had to be high school graduates. They also needed six months of
kitchen experience in a “non-fast-food environment,” plus a letter of recommendation from an industry professional. Cooking at home didn't count.

I had been so sure I'd get in. My application essay was about my goal of being a Certified Master Chef. There were only a few dozen CMCs in the whole country, which made sense, since the exam alone took ten days. Plus, even though original recipes weren't required, I had included my best: Death by Eggplant. The dish was a cross between baba ghanouj and eggplant parmigiana, with a few twists of my own. A single spoonful of it could bring tears to my eyes and banish any doubts I had about my abilities as a chef. And the admissions committee tried it! I knew because there had been a telltale smudge of garlic on the letter.

With all this, admitting me should have been a nobrainer. Never mind the nice words about looking forward to hearing from me in four more years. If this were France, I would already be packing my bag. But it wasn't France. I needed a high school diploma, which meant I first needed to pass eighth grade.

Sighing, I set a bowl of Oatie-O's and milk in front of Cleo. She had no teeth, but the cereal would get mushy enough if I let it sit. While I did this, part of me was saying, “How silly, flour sacks don't eat.” Another part said that if I didn't feed Cleo
something
, she would get cranky by gym. When Mrs. M. found out why, family services would
be called in, and I would be found guilty of flour-sack abuse. Not the path to a passing grade.

I began to pack my knapsack. Last night, I erased all the marks in my books so I could turn them in.

“When you pick me up after school, why don't you wait around back,” I suggested to my mother. “Less traffic.” And less of a crowd to see her in a turban.

“Okay,” she said. “Three o'clock, around back, then off to Dr. Zimmerman. Maybe . . . maybe you'll talk to
him
about . . . ”

“See you later, Mom,” I said quickly.

 

Indra was waiting for me on my porch.

“I'm still mad at you for calling Nicky ‘Shorty' and shoving him,” she said at once, playing with the end of her braid. Then she dropped it and looked up. “But I'm so furious with Nicky. I couldn't believe how mean he was to your father yesterday.”

And I couldn't believe Indra Sahir had come over this early just to tell me that. Maybe my life wasn't ruined after all.

Hiding my grin, I jumped from the porch and ran to the sidewalk.

“Where's the baby?” Indra called.

“In my knapsack.”

“Isn't that stuffy?”

“It's better than sunburn,” I answered.

“Oh.” She hurried after me for a while, then gave up. “Bertie, stop running! We've got plenty of time.” She stood still, hands on her hips. I slowed down, then slowed even more. She caught up.

When she was at my side, she said, “Oops, your books are falling out.” She walked in back of me and fussed with my knapsack. I held my breath, waiting to hear the zip of the inner pocket being opened.

“I really liked your father yesterday,” Indra said. “He was pretty cool.”

“
My
father?
Cool?”
Had she been in the same class as me yesterday?

“Yeah, all that stuff he said about weird stories and taking chances on whether or not they'll happen. And working with people like Head Cracker. His job sounded sooo interesting.”

I shrugged. “Maybe. He never really explained it like that before,” I admitted.

“And I really liked what
you
did yesterday. But I'm not surprised. I always knew you were nice,” she said from behind me.

My father was “cool.”
I
was “nice.” I had used the same word thanking my Great Aunt Ethel for my birthday socks.

“What do you mean, ‘nice'?” I asked. Maybe details would help.

“You know, nice for you and your father to distract the
kids. So they wouldn't look at Mrs. Menendez while she was upset.”

“While she was crying,” I corrected.

“You are
so
wrong! Mrs. M. was
not
crying!” Indra yanked my knapsack zipper shut. “She was just emotional. It made her nose run.”

My score on the nice-meter was dropping.

“If
I
got that emotional, I'd never hear the end of it,” I said. “‘Cry-baby.' ‘Sissy boy.' ‘Weepy peepy.'”

“Weepy peepy?”

I shrugged. “It's a family expression.”

“Weepy peepy?”

“Because my nose squeaks when I cry, all right? I mean, cried. When I was little. Real little.”

“Squeaks?”

“A little peeping noise, according to my mother. I'd cry and squeak, then she'd say, ‘Weepy peepy' and get me to laugh.”

“That is
sooo
cute, Bertie.”

I turned on her. “If you ever tell Dekker, I swear I'll—”

She put a finger on my mouth. It was supposed to shush me. It nearly stopped my heart.

“Your secret's safe,” she said.

“Is it?” I started to walk, just to get my heart pumping again. “Now you tell
me
a secret. So I'll know I can trust you.” Then maybe, I thought, maybe I would tell her a
real
secret. Fixing my books, she had been inches from the
chef's hat hidden in my knapsack. And I realized that, even though I had held my breath, I hadn't been afraid. I almost wanted her to discover it.

“All right, a secret,” she said. “But not a word to anyone, promise?” Braid flying, she quickly looked over her shoulder, then back at me. She lowered her voice. “I'm engaged.”

“What?!”

“Shhhh! Since I was six and my fiancé was one.
One!
I was engaged to a baby!” She clapped her hands over her giggle. “He's eight now. He's getting older. That's not good.”