Alice in the Know

Chapter One: Hired My knees were red from kneeling at my bedroom window, but I was obsessed. Elizabeth's family was having a reunion, and I couldn't stop watching. For three days there had been a half dozen cars parked across the street. Relatives spilled onto the porch and steps, playing croquet in the side yard and badminton out front. A boy about twelve started a water fight with the hose, and all the cousins joined in, grandparents cheering them on from the porch. I'd watched one of the uncles swing Liz's little brother around by his ankles. I'd seen an aunt braiding a new twist in Elizabeth's hair. Liz whispering to cousins under the linden tree at the curb. And I'd wanted it to be me surrounded by relatives. Me laughing and teasing and sharing secrets. My mother's closest relatives were in Chicago. Dad's were in Nashville, and Sylvia's were out west. All over the map, that's what we were -- spread so far apart, we rarely saw each other. How sad is that? Look what I've been missing, I thought, as Liz hugged everyone good-bye and people packed up to go home. I would have loved to have a gang of cousins to hang out with -- more siblings, at the very least. "Why couldn't you have been triplets?" I groused to Les when I finally went downstairs. Les doesn't live here anymore, but he stops by for dinner whenever he can. "What?" said Les. "Can't get enough of me, huh?" We'd had a barbecue out back the day before, and I'd gone with Dad and Sylvia to watch fireworks at the Mall. I'd liked sitting there on the blanket between them, enjoying the July night, the Washington Monument lit with flood lamps against the dark sky. But Liz, I knew, was there in the crowd with several dozen relatives, and I felt a little cheated that the rest of the people I love -- my people, I mean -- lived so far away. Grow up, I told myself. Dad and Lester had done their best to raise me, and now I had Sylvia to fill in for the mom I'd lost. I thought of the way Les and Dad and I used to cook dinner together; of Dad and Les teaching me to drive; of Sylvia helping me buy a dress and Dad letting me work for him during the summer. Small family or not, they were always there for me. So when I walked into the kitchen for supper, I said, "I just want to thank you, Dad, for letting me work at the Melody Inn. It sure saves a lot of hassle." Dad smiled at me and stabbed a chunk of melon. "You're welcome," he said. "But you know...I've been thinking...it would be good for you to work someplace else for the rest of the summer if you can find something." "What?" I choked. "March to a different drummer," he said. I could only stare. Dad is manager of the music store over on Georgia Avenue, and I'd been working there part-time ever since we moved to Silver Spring. "You mean...I'm being fired?" I cried. "Of course not. We could still use you some Saturdays and sale days if you're free, but it might do you good to work for someone else for a change." "Why? Haven't I been doing a good job?" I'd been running the little Gift Shoppe there at the store all by myself on Saturdays. It's the counter under the stairs to the second floor where we sell all kinds of musical stuff -- Mozart mugs and Chopin scarves plus jewelry with a musical motif. I knew the merchandise! I could handle the cash register! "Are you hiring somebody new?" I asked. "Yeah, Al," Les cut in. "He's outsourcing your job. Someone over in India's going to be running the Gift Shoppe on eBay." "What?" I screeched. "He's kidding," said Dad. "But you can't see what the rest of the world is like if you spend your spare time working for me." "If you want me to see what the rest of the world's like, Dad, send me to Paris!" I said. "Let me woNaylor, Phyllis Reynolds is the author of 'Alice in the Know ' with ISBN 9780689870927 and ISBN 0689870922.