The Summer of Moonlight Secrets (19 page)

49

Chase

“Crazy?” I breathe like I just ran five laps. “What did he say?”

She tells me the whole thing, how sad the man looked, and that he was worried someone would hurt Tara—Pamela—because she lived in a fantasy world.

“He said she's not quite right in the head.” Allie Jo's eyes ask me to agree or disagree, but I'm still reeling from the word
crazy
.

I take a deep breath and close my eyes, shut out the hotel and all these people and even Allie Jo.

“Chase?” She nudges me in the ribs. “It makes more sense, right?”

I bow my head. “Yeah … it makes more sense.” I mean, a seal that can turn into a human? My heart falls into my stomach. She'd made it seem so real, with the moonlight swimming and calling to manatees. And how she likes fish, and how she talks, and even her long, dark hair that dangled almost to her waist like seaweed. I press my fist to my chest; there's that pain again.

Oh, man. Why couldn't there be one cool thing this summer? But the knot in my chest unravels when I remember Sophie. The green heart ring is upstairs on my nightstand. I'm just trying to plan the right time to give it to her.

For now, though, I've gotta find out what's going on with Tara. “Come on,” I say to Allie Jo. “Let me do the talking.”

When we knock on the door of the employee break room, Chef ushers us in with the boys. “More testers!” Chef says. “I have no more shrimp, no more pancakes!” He looks at Nicholas and Ryan. “But I do have chocolate chip cookies!”

That's all they need to hear. They follow him to the door of the kitchen; Allie Jo and I sit at a table with Tara and Sophie.

“So,” I say to Allie Jo. “Maybe you should get an extra cookie for
Pamela
.” I'm expecting a knee jerk, a gasp, or something from Tara, but her expression stays the same.

“Yes,” Allie Jo says. “I'm sorry her parents died. I wish she would've told me.”

Someone does gasp, but it's Sophie. She asks Allie Jo, “You have a friend whose parents died?” Her eyes widen. “That's terrible.”

“She doesn't want anyone to know,” I say.

“She's pretending it didn't happen,” Allie Jo adds.

Sophie breathes out a quiet
Wow
. We all sit there, silent, thinking.

“Cookies!” Nicholas and Ryan come running back in. Ryan eats by smashing the cookie into his mouth.

Tara runs a hand over her hair. I can tell she wishes Allie Jo hadn't dyed and cut it.

She looks straight at me, her eyes deep and endless. Chills crawl up my spine and the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

Pamela or Tara?

We can't ask her right out because of the boys and Sophie, or maybe that's a secret we don't need to keep anymore. But it doesn't seem like a good idea to bust out with the news. If she does have something wrong with her, it might send her off into the deep end.

I want to find out more from Allie Jo, but the only second I'm alone with her is at the sink, when I pretend I need to wash my hands.

“I don't think her name's Pamela,” I say under my breath.

“Why would he lie about her name?” she asks.

Then everyone's at the sink, washing their hands, getting ready for the next task. Allie Jo still has to babysit the boys, and I don't want to leave Sophie, so the afternoon turns into evening with all of us working for Taste of Hope.

I'm actually bushed after Dad and I get back to our room after supper. He flips through his notes and turns on the typewriter.

“You get a lot of stuff for your article?” I ask.

“Oh, yeah,” he says. “Lots of good photos too.” Then he turns, leaning one arm over the back of his chair. “I saw manatees in the springs today—manatees!”

My ears prick up, but I shrug to act casual.

“Usually you only see them here in the winter,” he explains. “But I took a whole roll of film on them.”

I hesitate before replying. “That's kind of strange, isn't it?”

Dad's face breaks into a big smile. “Yes! The photos are going to be incredible.” He describes the manatees to me, their walrus shape, the way they float through the water, big yet graceful.

Yeah, I know,
I want to say.
I swam with one.
He has no idea.

“Dad, remember last year when they discovered that giant squid?” With tentacles almost fifty feet long, the squid made all the papers.

“Yeah?” He's loading the typewriter with a piece of paper, not really listening now. That's okay, because I don't want what I'm about to say to seem important.

“Well, before that, people just thought it was a legend, right? Like something out of
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
?”

“Guess Jules Verne knew what he was talking about.” Dad starts pecking. For a guy who uses only two fingers, he's pretty fast.

“Do you think there's other stuff like that, stuff that could be true?”

Tap, tap.
“Sure, why not? We've got men flying through space, black holes in the universe, and supernovas—who knows what they'll discover next.”

“I mean more like legends. You know, Loch Ness monster, Bigfoot—”

He chuckles. “I want the first scoop on those stories.”

I think of more legends. “Trolls … mermaids … Selkies—”

Dad spins around in his chair. His gaze is open but penetrating. “Why are you asking me this stuff?”

I mask my face really quick. “No reason. Just … you were talking about the manatees and that made me think of the squid, that's all.”

He stares at me for a moment, a moment I have to get out of. He looks like maybe he thinks I'm nuts.

I pick up the remote, settle on a game show, and pretend to be absorbed.

After a few minutes, the pecking starts up again.
Clack, clack, clack. Clack, clack, clack. Clackety-clack, clack, clack. Ding! Clack, clack.
Then the carriage return zips back to the left margin.

If Tara's crazy, we need to find her uncle. But if she's
not
crazy …

Clack, clack, clack. Clack, clack, clack. Clackety-clack, clack, clack.

50

Allie Jo

When I see Sophie at breakfast the next day, she looks positively terrible. Her eyes float in their sockets; her nose runs; even her hair looks sick.

“Don't sit too close!” Mrs. Duran says. “Sophie's got a cold.”

Sophie sneezes five times in a row as if to prove it. My own sneezes come in sets of two.

I sit in a chair across the table from Sophie, the one Mrs. Duran has pulled out. My science teacher told us last year that the air and moisture, by which he means spit, from an average sneeze travels at around sixty miles per hour.

Sophie starts to say hi but sneezes again. I'm sure one of them was a direct hit—these tables are only four feet across.

“Hi, Sophie.”

“Hi.” Her voice sounds gunked up and plugged. The only time I like to be that way is during the school year.

Mrs. Duran rises from her seat. “I'm going to use the restroom. Be right back.”

Sophie wads up some tissue to her nose and blurts into it.

“You don't sound too good,” I say.

“I don't feel so good either,” she says, except her
don't
sounds like
dode
. “Um … ,” she starts.

“Yeah?”

“I was wondering, like, um …” She shrugs one shoulder, laughs at herself, then looks away before looking back at me. “You and Chase—”

“What?” It comes so fast out of my mouth that I almost hit her with it. “What about me and Chase?”

“The way you guys were talking yesterday …”

“Yeah?”

“And how you guys hang out a lot …”

Oh, my gosh—does she know? My face tenses. “Yeah, yeah?”

“Well … what I mean is”—she curls up on her chair and leans forward—“do you guys … like each other?”

I almost fall out of my seat, half laughing, half relieved.

She looks confused. “It's okay if you do, you know.”

“NO! I don't
like
like Chase!” I give a little shudder. Puh-leeze!

She brightens. “Really?”

“Really!”

She sighs. “Thanks, Allie Jo.”

Then she sneezes big-time; I count seven in a row. Yep, this would definitely be a free day out of school.

She's still snorkeling into her tissues when a voice comes up behind me.

“What a surprise,” a man's voice says. As he comes around, I see it's Mr. Smith—Tara's uncle. He has a sour smell even though he's wearing different clothes. A Meriwether cup steams in his hand.

I jolt upright in my seat. “Are you a guest here?”

“Just here for breakfast,” he says. Even though his eyes are still red and glazed, he hones in on me. He plants his coffee cup on our table and reaches into his shirt pocket. “Thought you might have had time to think about that picture I showed you.”

Sophie shrinks back when he steps up between us and snaps down the picture of Tara in front of me.
I don't think her name's Pamela,
Chase had said.

Mr. Smith kneels to my height in the chair. “Remember, she needs help. I'm her only family.” He spouts out the same words as yesterday, but it's like he's reciting them. Leaning closer, he mutters, “You've seen her.”

My body revs up like a race car at the starting line.

His voice comes out rough. “Tell me.” Then he takes a big breath and blows it out. His eyes soften. His voice is gentler, but he speaks through clenched teeth. “Please. You
have
a father and a mother. She
lost
hers—that's why she's so mixed up.” He licks his lips. “I need her back.”

Heart pounding, I open my mouth. “I—I—”

“Excuse me!” Mrs. Duran calls out from the hostess stand. Her face is set like stone as she makes her way briskly toward the table. Her blue eyes are cold as ice.

Mr. Smith snatches up the picture, slides it into his shirt pocket, and presses his fingers into my shoulder. “Think about it.” He scowls, leaving before Mrs. Duran reaches our table.

Mrs. Duran hurries over to us. “Do you know him?”

My resolve crumbles and tears fill my eyes.

Her face hardens. She turns after him. “Excuse me? Excuse me?” But he barrels into the hall and disappears among the guests.

“Are you all right?” She strokes my hair. “What did he say to you?”

Sophie sneezes a big one into a new wad of tissues. “He showed her a picture.” She wipes her nose and stares at me. “Who is he?”

I shake my head. “I'm not sure,” I say, and it's true. Reaching for one of Sophie's tissues, I try to ignore what my tears are telling me.

You have a father and a mother. She lost hers.
How mixed up would I be if Mom and Dad died? I rub my nose with the tissue. I can't think of a world without Mom and Dad in it. But I do, and more tears threaten to flood my face. Then I picture them losing me. They'd go to the ends of the earth to find me, just like Mr. Smith is doing for Tara.

Sniffling, I sit straight up and rub my eyes with my hands. I think I know what I should do now.