Edison's Gold (7 page)

O
n a college application, does ‘convicted felon' go under extracurriculars or sports?” Noodle cracked his knuckles and fidgeted restlessly.

The threesome were seated in a line of folding chairs inside Lieutenant Ellen Faber's nondescript office at the Central Park Precinct police station. Through the double-glazed window, Tom could see his mom and dad, along with Colby's nana and Noodle's mom, standing outside, talking with the grim-faced police officer.

His mother's expression was especially tense.

This is bad
, Tom thought. Even though Faber had agreed to let them off with only a warning, he figured that being in trouble with his parents would still be way worse than anything the police could legally do to him.

“I bet you Faber only said we could leave so that we'd let our guard down,” Colby whispered. “Ever hear of good cop, bad cop? She'll be bringing in the bad cop any second, trust me.”

“You're probably right,” said Noodle.

Just then, Lieutenant Faber entered the room, followed by Tom's parents, Noodle's mom, and Colby's nana.

“Oh, my little Bernard!” Mrs. Zuckerberg cried, hugging Noodle and then giving him a twist on the ear the way she always did when he did something that both scared and upset her. Mrs. Z tended to be all of the overs: overprotective, overemotional, and generally overinvolved. “The thought of my baby at the police station. Dragged in like some criminal.”

“Ma!” protested a beet-faced Noodle. “You watch too much
CSI
.”

Lieutenant Faber cleared her throat, bringing the room to silence, before she took a seat behind her desk, folded her hands primly, and jumped into her lecture. “I'm sure you three are fully aware of how worried and upset we all are. Breaking into a closed exhibit—”

“But we didn't steal anything,” Tom interrupted.

Faber shot him an icy stare, almost baiting him to keep talking.

“Sorry.” Tom placed a hand over his mouth and slouched low in his chair.

“Breaking into a closed exhibit, then having to be rescued from the air-conditioning vents by the fire department.”

From the corner of his eye, Tom looked over at his mother, who was sitting in her chair, tight-lipped and poker-faced, which made her seem all the more scary.

“Fortunately,” continued Faber, “the museum has agreed not to press charges. In so doing, however—”

“Here it comes,” Noodle muttered, with another loud crack of the knuckles. “So long, NYU drama scholarship. Hello, lockdown.”

Faber's lips pressed together. It was clear she'd had about enough of these kids interrupting her day.

“In so doing, however, you are all on one-year probation from entering the Met.” Her pale green eyes studied Tom for a long moment, and he couldn't help feeling like there was something else behind her gaze. Something mistrustful.

“I assure you, ma'am.” Now Tom's dad spoke up,
adjusting his glasses nervously, then wiping his palms on his grease-stained khakis. “These are good kids. This will never happen again.”

“Let's hope so.” Faber stood up from her chair and swept around the group to open her office door. “I hope to never see you all in here again. You kids could've seriously hurt yourselves.”

As he exited the office, Faber gave Tom's dad a steady once-over. “So you're really Thomas Edison's great-grandson?”

“I am.” He puffed up a little. Tom wished he'd worn a less wrinkly shirt and that the fingerprint wasn't so visible on his glasses lens.

Faber nodded, not too impressed by what she saw.

The kids shuffled out the door with their heads held low like badly behaved puppies. “Hanging there in the middle of the courtyard!” Tom heard Colby's grandmother hiss. “I almost fainted when they told me. And I'm sure those vents are completely toxic, teeming with strange dust mites and allergens. You'll catch an infection and be in an iron lung, sure as I'm standing here.”

“I feel fine, Nana,” said Colby, “and I don't think they even make iron lungs anymore.”

Tom walked past the maze of police desks toward the station's entrance, when he happened to look back and see Faber standing near the back hallway outside her office. She was talking to a portly man in a black suit that looked tight at every place on his body. The man's neck was like an exploding tube of cookie dough that oozed into a sweaty bald head.

The man glanced up and held Tom's gaze with a stare so unnerving that Tom could feel himself getting flush. The man's eyes narrowed into slits, and it felt like he was searing Tom's identity into his brain, filing it away for future use.

Faber placed a hand on the fat man's shoulder and led him into her office, but before closing the door, she also locked eyes with Tom for a split second. It felt like they were issuing him some kind of warning. About what, though, he had no idea.

Spooked, he turned on his heel and sprinted, bursting through the precinct doors and out onto the sidewalk—and wasn't sure what to make of what he saw next.

His parents stood together on the bottom step, speaking in low tones. As Tom neared, he saw his mom twist off her wedding band and, with a nod, place it in his dad's
palm. Now Tom was close enough to make out their overlapping waves of conversation.

“No, no,” his dad said. “What kind of—”

“Just talk to Pete,” his mother interrupted. “He'll help.” She leaned in and kissed his father's cheek.

“You're the light of my life, do you know that?” said his father, with a smile so warm and soupy it could have fogged over his glasses.

“Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad.” Tom approached with caution, testing the parental waters.

“Well, if it isn't the man of the hour.” His dad shook his head. “I'm still not sure what this latest stunt merits in terms of punishment.”

“And we haven't even addressed your little science-class escapade yet either,” added his mom flatly.

“What were you all even doing in that exhibit?”

They were coming at him from all angles. Tom wondered if he was ever going to see the light of day again.

“Mom, Dad. You know I'm sorry to the millionth degree. And I would just like to point out that, although it was my first brush with the law, it involved a very respected museum, no damages, and no technical violation of—”

His mother had her hand up, crossing-guard style. “Thomas Alva Edison, why do you always have to see how far the rules bend before they break?”

“I know I messed up, but I'll do all the dishes, all the housework,” said Tom. “Just please, please, please don't ground me. Not on my last spring break in New York, with my best friends, who I'll never get to see once we move. I haven't even had a chance to break the news to them yet. I can't even think about telling them, and then not even getting to see them.”

He had been rehearsing this impassioned speech in his head, hoping it would hit all the right emotional marks without overdoing it. Tough to tell. His mom and dad both looked exhausted, like they already had a zillion things on their minds.

“We'll discuss this tonight,” said his mom. “I have to get back to my sister's and pick up Rose, and your father needs to run an errand in town.” But Tom could tell by her softening tone that his speech just might have struck a nerve. Given the circumstances of their move, maybe there would be no grounding after all.

“I'm just so disappointed in you,” she added before heading to her car.

“I'm sorry, Mom,” said Tom. He truly meant it, too. Ever since setting off his first combustion explosion in third grade, he knew he'd caused his parents enough stress and worry to last five lifetimes.

For some reason, he just couldn't ever seem to see the consequences of his actions, no matter how extreme or dangerous.

And now thanks to all his thoughtlessness, Tom was never going to get his hands on
The Alchemy Treatise
. That much, he knew.

M
y ma's gotta head back to work, too,” said Noodle as he approached Tom and his dad on their way to the car. “Is it cool if you guys give me a lift home, Mr. E?”

“Sure, Noodle,” answered Tom's dad. “But I've got a quick detour to make.”

“Thanks. Shotgun!” He already had his hand on the door to the Edison family station wagon and was lounging comfortably in the front seat before Tom had a chance to protest.

With the caution of an old lady at a busy intersection, Mr. Edison pulled onto Central Park West and headed uptown. He was out of his element driving in Manhattan and puttered along at seven miles an hour, hugging the right-hand line, while yellow taxis honked and swerved
past him on all sides. It took them well over an hour and a half just to get out of the city.

Southeast Yonkers, where the Edison family called home, was like a lot of towns in the outer boroughs. Brick, bland, and boring, with mom-and-pop hardware stores, pharmacies, and an Italian restaurant on practically every corner. As soon as they merged onto Midland Avenue, Tom's dad began what Tom thought of as the “vulture circle”—wheeling around and around the same blocks, in hope of finding that elusive parking spot.

Noodle had commandeered the radio and didn't even notice when Tom's dad missed two free spaces.

“Dad!” Tom pressed forward, pointing. “There! And there … and there.”

“Oh, right—thanks.” Mr. Edison craned his neck to reverse the station wagon at a snail's pace into a massive spot by the curb. As he put the car in park, Tom caught his dad's eyes in the rearview mirror. They looked troubled and distant. “Why don't you two go hang out at Sammy's for a bit? And I'll meet you back here in twenty minutes.”

“Sure,” said Tom. “Where are you going, anyway?”

“Just a couple things I need to take care of.”

Something was definitely up. Even Noodle raised his eyebrows. “Mr. Mystery,” he murmured as the three of them stepped out of the car.

At their first stop, Sammy's Electronics, the wire adapters Tom had been waiting for still hadn't come in, so they decided to kill time at their mutually favorite haunt, Lucky Lou's Five and Dime, one of the several run-down retail shops along Midland.

Inside the stuffy, overstocked store, Noodle swept a rainbow wig off one of the shelves, fixing it onto his head as he checked his reflection in a tiny mirror by the front counter. Lucky Lou himself was in his normal spot, snoozing away behind the front register while an
I Love Lucy
rerun played on his tiny black-and-white TV.

“Noodle, I have something I really need to get off my chest.” Tom had planted himself directly in his friend's path. “It's been killing me.”

“Literally? You're not dying, are you?”

“No. Worse. My dad just took some job in Wichita.” Tom let the words hang in the stale air for a moment. Noodle's mouth opened slightly, and his eyes drifted to
the side, like he was trying to figure out a strange riddle in his head.

“What do you mean, Wichita?” he finally said.

“Like, halfway across the country. Kansas. We're moving in two weeks.”

“When were you gonna tell me?”

“I just found out two days ago.”

“Is this for … forever?”

Tom shrugged. “For a while. Probably till I'm in college.”

“You can't do that,” said Noodle dryly. “We have too much stuff to do. There's like, puberty and driving and, and, and …” His gaze was bouncing around the room, and his voice was growing louder. “We were supposed to get part-time jobs together at Pie in the Sky, remember? Now who am I gonna learn to toss pizza dough with? You know everyone else at school annoys me!”

“At least you have Colby. I'm losing my two best friends, and I'm not gonna know anyone.”

“Your dad's whole plan is Craisins! You're from New York.” Noodle was pleading with Tom now, as if he'd been the one who'd decided to move. “People in the
Midwest'll think you're like some kind of a Martian with your weird inventions and stuff.”

“Richard Drew invented Scotch tape, and he was from Minnesota.”

“You're missing the point. Which is that this is the worst news ever.”

Tom had been dreading this conversation for a while, and though he was thankful for it to be over, it had gone as terribly as he thought it would, and he didn't feel the least bit better now that the secret was off his chest. In fact, on top of all the dread, he now felt guilty for letting down his friend.

Too depressed to continue their conversation, Noodle gave the turnstile of sunglasses a hard, squeaky spin, then wandered off toward the souvenir section, where Lou kept the shelves stocked with New York shot glasses and postcards.

Alone in the aisle, Tom distracted himself by absent-mindedly inspecting the inside of a cheap FM radio in search of a frequency scanner for Nanny Golightly. Since there was no foreseeable way to continue the treasure hunt, which probably never existed in the first place, he would
have to turn all his attention and hope back to her. Even though she was shaping up to be another bust like all the others.