The Second Life of Abigail Walker (11 page)

Abby froze in the middle of the street.

Kristen and Georgia were sitting on her front steps.

Abby's heart thudded in her chest and a strange
roaring filled her ears. Her mind, which had been running along at fifty miles an hour just a second before, came to a complete halt. She couldn't think of what to do, so she just stood there, half wishing a car would come whizzing down the road and hit her—just barely—so she could be whisked off in an ambulance to a faraway hospital.

“Hey, Abby, we were hoping you'd be back soon!” Kristen called out. “Your mom said we could wait for as long as we wanted.”

Abby opened her mouth. Nothing came out.
This must be a bad dream
, she told herself,
the kind where you try to scream, but you don't make a sound.

Abby's mother peeked out the front door. “Oh, good! You're back,” she called cheerfully. “Look who's here!”

Abby took a deep breath and ordered herself to say something. “I see.”

Abby's mother frowned. Clearly, Abby was not excited enough. “I think it's awfully nice of Kristen and Georgia to come by. It's such a beautiful morning.”

Which has now been totally ruined
, Abby
thought as she forced herself to cross the street and straggle up the sidewalk toward her front steps. “What do you want?” she asked, looking at Kristen.

Kristen smiled brightly. “Just to talk, Abby. You haven't been hanging around much lately. To be honest, we've been sort of concerned.”

“Kristen says you've stopped eating lunch with them,” Abby's mom reported, coming out onto the porch. “She's worried about you. So is Georgia.”

“No, they aren't,” Abby said. She stood in front of them, wondering if she could get up the steps without one of them grabbing her ankle and pulling her down. “They really aren't.”

Kristen's mouth dropped open. “God, Abby, how can you say that? You're one of my best friends.”

“Mine too,” Georgia offered unconvincingly. “I've been totally worried about you.”

Abby sat down on the bottom step. She thought she might be having an out-of-body experience, and sitting down was probably the best thing to do.

“We just think maybe something's wrong,” Kristen explained, turning to look up at Abby's mom. “Sometimes that happens when kids start middle school. They change. Like, Abby has completely stopped hanging out with us, and she's friends with some really weird kids. And I'm sorry, Abby”—and now she turned to face her—“but Anoop Chatterjee? Jafar Ross? Please.”

Georgia let out a dramatic sigh. “Let's go, Kristen. Abby's just not interested in being friends with us anymore.”

“Wait!” Her mother held up her hand, as though ordering the girls to stop. “Abby, these are your best friends, and they care about you. The three of you should go upstairs and talk. I just pulled a tray of carrot muffins out of the oven. Why don't I bring some up?”

“C'mon, let's talk, Abby,” Kristen echoed Abby's mother. “We want to help you.”

Abby followed Kristen and Georgia upstairs to her room, like it was their house and not hers. Like she was the intruder. She took a deep breath and reminded herself that she wasn't against anyone, not even Kristen and Georgia.

“Nice place you've got here,” Kristen said as she looked around at the mess Abby had left that morning. “Clean it much?”

Abby took a seat on her unmade bed. She made her voice sound friendly. Cheerful. “Why are you here?”

“We're concerned about you, didn't you hear?” Georgia asked in a nasal voice, Georgia being prone to allergies in the fall. Once she'd sneezed during a gymnastics meet and fell off the balance beam. Remembering this now, Abby almost laughed, but she didn't. She didn't want to be like them, laughing at things people couldn't help, like sneezing at the wrong time or being a terrible runner.

So instead of laughing, she looked at Georgia and said, “You should be friends with people who actually like you instead of just use you.” She pulled her stuffed leopard, Perd, out from under her pillow and stroked him on his spotted head. “You'd probably be a lot happier.”

Georgia shook her head, either in disgust or sheer disbelief. “When did you get so weird? Are you on drugs?”

“Enough.” Kristen pulled out Abby's desk chair, turned it so it was facing the center of the room, took a seat. “You're both so totally immature sometimes. Of course Abby isn't taking drugs. She's just going through a difficult stage.” She smiled a snaky, grown-up smile. “She'll grow out of it.”

Then she leaned toward Abby, face serious, like a concerned camp counselor. “So what's up, Abby? We're all really worried about you. On top of everything, you look like you're getting fatter. You're going to cross the line into Christine Boggs territory if you're not careful.”

Christine Boggs was famously fat. While Abby was officially chubby, even “had issues with her weight,” as her mother would put it when her concern about Abby's weight was at its peak, Christine was obese, and she walked through school with her head down. Abby didn't think she'd ever seen Christine look at another human being.

Little waves of shame began to slap at her ankles. She clutched Perd and looked at her thighs. They reminded her of bread dough. She
glanced at her stomach, where a roll of fat peeked over the waistband of her jeans.

She tried to think about something else. She tried to think about the house she was going to build, and how she could make the birds look like they were really flying. With wires, maybe? Or else the birds could sit in the hydrangea bushes, their wings spread, like they'd just landed.

Abby glanced out the window, wondering if the fox was across the street. It could be looking up at her right this very second. Suddenly she knew that the fox was
definitely
across the street and
definitely
trying to tell her something.
Don't listen to them, Abby
, the fox was calling.
Don't listen!

I won't!
Abby called back in her mind.

She turned to Kristen. “I'm on a diet,” she lied, clutching Perd so Kristen couldn't see her hands trembling. “I've already lost two pounds.”

Kristen smiled a great big fake smile. “That's great! You should come walk with us at lunch-time. We've started doing laps around the blacktop.”

“That's a great idea,” Abby said, smiling her own fake smile. “Maybe I will.”

Her mother tapped on the door. “I've got muffins!” she exclaimed, carrying a tray into the room. “Oh, Abby, your desk is such a mess! Where am I going to put this?”

Kristen cleared off the desktop and took the tray from Abby's mother. “These look delicious, Mrs. Walker,” she said. “You're the best cook!”

“Why, thank you, Kristen,” Abby's mother said, clearly pleased. “You know, I wish you'd come over more often. I was so happy when you and Abby started spending time together last spring.”

“Me too,” Kristen said. “In fact, I'm going to come pick up Abby on Monday so we can walk to the bus stop together. We haven't spent enough time together lately.”

Abby's mother beamed. “That sounds wonderful.”

Kristen turned to Abby. “See you at seven fifty Monday morning?”

But she wasn't smiling anymore.

On Monday, Abby left the house at seven o'clock and walked the three miles to school.

abby had
spent three lunch periods in the computer lab, and she wasn't getting anywhere. There was too much information! How could there be so much written about the Columbian ground squirrel? It was ridiculous! At this rate, it would take the rest of the year for her to get through the first five animals on Mrs. Benton's list. But she knew Mrs. Benton and Anders wanted something soon. They hadn't actually given her a deadline, but Abby couldn't help feeling like she should work as fast as she could.

She punched the print button and walked over to the printer on the table next to Mr. Gruber's desk. Two measly pages of notes shot out onto the tray. She collected them, knowing they weren't enough, but she'd sworn to herself that she'd take something—
anything
—to the Bentons' today. At least they would know she was trying.

Suddenly she was aware of someone looking over her shoulder. Marlys Barry was standing behind her, reading the page in Abby's hand.

“‘Pronghorn deer'?” Marlys raised an eyebrow. “That sounds weird.”

Abby hugged the pages to her chest. “It's not really any of your business,” she snapped.

“I didn't say it was my business. Except that I know a lot about animals, but I've never heard of a pronghorn deer before.”

“You're interested in animals?”

“Sure,” Marlys said with a toss of her head. “I'm going to be a vet, aren't I?”

Like I'm supposed to know that
, Abby thought. Still, this was interesting information. Marlys liked animals, Marlys spent a lot of time on the computer. . . . 

“Do you like to do research on animals?” Abby asked in a bright tone of voice.

“Sometimes, I guess. Why?” Marlys sounded suspicious.

Should Abby ask for Marlys's help? How the heck could she explain the whole story? It would take forever, and Marlys might think she was crazy.
You're helping some man you hardly even know to write a poem? About the Lewis and Clark expedition? So he'll want to keep living?

It did sound weird.
Was
weird. Abby still couldn't figure out how she'd gotten herself into it. It had something to do with the fox, she thought, and Wallace, and Anders. Something about Anders made Abby want to help him—after all, he'd helped her with no questions asked when she was making her getaway from Kristen and Georgia.

“No reason,” Abby said, deciding that her reasons for what she was doing were too complicated to make sense to anybody but herself. She walked back to her desk and shoved the pages into her notebook.

As she walked up the hill toward the Bentons' farm that afternoon, she kept thinking that maybe
she should turn around. She'd have at least another page of notes by the end of the week. Showing up with only two pages might make it seem like she didn't really care—and she
did
care! She'd just been given a job she wasn't that good at, that was all.

Mrs. Benton's face was full of expectation when she opened the front door. “What have you got there?” she asked, nodding toward the folded-up pages Abby held clutched in her hand. “Something for Matt?”

“It's not much.” Abby wondered again if she should have come. She unfolded the sheets of paper and tried to smooth out the wrinkles. “I haven't had very much time to work on the list you gave me. It's been a pretty busy week. See, we have this holiday chorus thing we're doing in December and—”

“Why don't you show Matt what you've got?” Mrs. Benton took Abby by the arm and pulled her into the house. Lowering her voice, she added, “He could use a little cheering up today. He's feeling low. Won't say why.” Increasing her volume, she called, “Matt, Abby's here!”

Matt was sitting on the couch in front of the TV, which was on, but the sound was so low you could hardly hear it. “Hey, Abigail,” he greeted her listlessly. He patted the cushion beside him. “Have a seat. I'm watching some cooking show. You ever make your own corn dogs?”

Abby tentatively made her way to the couch. “Um, I can't really stay. I just wanted to give you some notes I wrote about some of the Lewis and Clark animals. For your poem.”

Matt, eyes still glued to the TV, held out his hand. “Notes, huh? Well, let me see 'em.”

Abby handed him the pages, her face hot. Would he throw them to the floor, yell,
You call these notes?

Matt slowly sat up and reached for the remote. Turning off the TV, he leaned forward, reading what Abby had given him. He read the first page, then slipped it behind the second and kept reading. Finally he looked at Abby. “Can you imagine what it was like for Lewis and Clark? Imagine walking down your street and tripping over some animal you'd never seen before. Wouldn't that be cool?”

Abby nodded, thinking of the fox. Of course, she hadn't discovered foxes, but then again, Lewis and Clark hadn't really discovered pronghorn deer, either. The Indians had probably known about them for thousands of years. But when you saw an animal right in front of you, one you'd never seen before in your entire life, well, it was pretty amazing. It made you wonder what else was waiting to be discovered.

Matt folded the pages into a neat square and tucked them into his shirt pocket. “This was really nice of you to do, Abigail. Really nice. To be honest, I'd kind of gotten stuck, and I was feeling pretty down about it. It means a lot to me that you'd go to this trouble.”