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  Only my reading is soon interrupted by what is most likely my own war—the crunch of gravel in the driveway followed by the slam of a car door. I quickly switch off my flashlight and take up a battle position behind the couch so that I'm hidden and yet can still peek out the window and observe the back of the Stockton house.

  After a few minutes a girl about my age or perhaps a little older appears and tentatively makes her way to the back door. She's quickly ushered inside as if her arrival is expected. Hmmm. I'd have to say that eleven o'clock at night is a bit late to be selling magazine subscriptions. I'll bet she's there to score some hashish.

  At least I can rest easy knowing that whoever she is, she isn't looking for me, for a change. Besides, after working in the yard all day I'd rather have a plateful of Mr. Bernard's lamb and a good night's sleep than a line of cocaine. As I understand it, drugs aren't very filling.

  Chapter 17

  Doubling Down ♣

  Since my funds are down to a handful of loose change, there doesn't seem to be much point in riding over to the convenience store the following morning. A dollar is pretty much the opening bid at any 7-Eleven. Unless I want to buy a gumball from the machine. Besides, I'm pretty sure the Stocktons won't mind if I bum a Yoo-Hoo and maybe a piece of fruit for breakfast. I mean, they bought the Yoo-Hoo for me. And after the Lars experience they'll probably be relieved I'm not whittling away at a stalk of celery from my wake-up Bloody Mary.

  I navigate my bike through the path in the woods and backtrack to the driveway so it appears as if I'm just rolling up from home. However, from the end of the street I can see a squad car, my parents' station wagon, and another car that doesn't belong to the Stocktons, Mr. Gil, or my folks.

  Well, hail, hail, the gang's all here. Ambushed. I ride back through the woods and collect the papers I'd copied from the library and then go back around to the driveway. The first dead leaves of autumn scrape along the blacktop and catch in my spokes.

  There's a big powwow occurring on the front porch—Mom, Dad, Officer Rich, and Just Call Me Dick appear to be facing off against Mr. Bernard and Mr. Gil. Lots of gesturing is happening on the part of Dad. The fact that the Stocktons haven't invited them in for coffee is a good sign. And so far it's safe to assume that Ms. Olivia hasn't asked anyone to supply a synonym for their genitals.

  The hive stops buzzing as my bike pulls to a stop in the driveway and everyone turns to stare. In the direct sunlight Just Call Me Dick appears excessively crustaceanlike, as if he's an advance man for an invasion of fiddler crabs. The sun is directly behind me, and so they all simultaneously shade their puckered eyes with their hands as if I'm an eclipse. In a burst of maternal joy, Mom runs over and hugs me and says how relieved she is that I'm all right and why did I run away and perhaps they were too harsh about the car.

  Returning her hug, I try to think of a nice way of saying that I really do love them and appreciate all they've done for me, only it no longer holds any interest for me to be around them on a day-to-day basis. We never agree on anything. And so our relationship has been reduced to one round of fighting after the next. Plus those little annoyances like placing me under house arrest.

  After the long-lost mother-daughter National Enquirer-style reunion, I confidently saunter up to the front porch with my handful of documents like Nancy Drew preparing to solve the mystery once and for all. Only I don't have a light blue convertible or a drop-dead handsome boyfriend to look on in an admiring fashion. Just an anxious mother wondering if I've eaten anything over the past two days.

  Dad appears incredibly angry, as if he's about to say something disagreeable. But when he glances over and notices the tears running down Mom's face, he stops himself. Instead he just stands there glaring at me, feet firmly planted, hands on hips, looking every bit the ex-linebacker daring me to make a try for the end zone.

  Mr. Gil and Mr. Bernard study me as if they're not sure if they've hired a convict, and maybe Lars the Lush isn't looking so bad after all. At least he wasn't a minor. Though Mr. Bernard appears vaguely amused by all the drama.

  "Okay," I say. "Before you guys read me my Miranda Rights, do you mind if I get something to drink?"

  "I'll get it," Mr. Bernard offers.

  I take this as a good sign, Mr. Bernard demonstrating that we're in cahoots enough to both know what "it" is.

  "How dare you frighten your poor mother, especially in her condition?" Dad can no longer help himself and starts laying into me. "What if Mrs. Mul-doon hadn't seen you yesterday? We had the police out looking everywhere for you. We called all the hospitals and checked the Cleveland bus station and—"

  "Excuse me, but why don't we all go over and meet in my office at the school?" Just Call Me Dick suggests in his varmintlike way, beady eyes glinting with dark deeds. He's clutching a file so thick that it must include my kindergarten immunization records. "I really must insist we bring in the district psychologist at this juncture. Obviously there are some issues concerning the home environment."

  Wrong thing to say, Mr. Collier. This will really piss off Dad. My father faces off with the Attendance Nazi mano-a-mano, or rather bureaucrat-a-bureaucrat. Dad's counted beans for the State of Ohio for twenty years. There's no piece of red tape he hasn't wrapped around someone's neck. Dad takes the two steps across the porch in one and places his arm around Mom. Now that an outsider is threatening the family pod, they're back on the same team.

  "Excuse me, Richar—"

  "Just call me Dick," Just Call Me Dick interjects. He rubs his hands together like an insect scrapes its feelers against each other.

  "Of course. With all due respect, Dick, we have raised seven perfectly well-adjusted children in a Christian home—"

  Mr. Bernard arrives with my Yoo-Hoo, and that stops Dad midsentence.

  "Listen, I'm going to save you guys a lot of time and trouble," I announce. Of course, this is entirely the wrong thing to say to career paper shufflers, since that's what makes up their workday in the first place, wasting time.

  No matter. After taking a big swig of chocolate drink I dig the photocopies out of my pocket. "Number one, I don't have to go to school anymore, Collier, and you know it." I say "Collier" the way they do on police shows— last name only and pronounced with disdain. "Sixteen is the legal age to drop out. It says so right here." I punch the papers with my index finger for emphasis.

  "Of course you can leave school, Hallie," Just Call Me Dick admits in that smarmy voice he puts on whenever parents are around. "But you're too smart to make such a poor choice," J.C.M.D. continues. "You can't go on to college without a high school diploma."

  "Who said anything about going to college?" I quickly retort. "I've got a job."

  Mr. Bernard and Mr. Gil observe the exchange as if they're watching a tennis match, heads bobbing back and forth between Just Call Me Dick and me.

  "Mr. Stockton, I must advise you that you can't employ a student full-time," J.C.M.D. arrogantly states, as if he's threatening Mr. Bernard with detention.

  It's do-or-die time. There's no photocopy that can get me out of this one if Mr. Bernard caves in to the scholar majority.

  Mr. Gil puts on his best deferential corporate seminar voice and pleasantly addresses Officer Rich: "Excuse me, Mr. Collier, but I believe we're within our legal rights to employ Hallie if she's not in school."

  Meantime I remove the next crumpled photocopy from my pocket. "You only have to be sixteen to work full-time." I pass around exhibit B.

  "I'm afraid she's right," Officer Rich concedes, apparently with mixed emotions. I have a feeling he secretly gets a kick out of me fucking with the grown-ups. As if his job is so boring—cats up trees and housewives locking keys in cars—that I'm his current big entertainment, the ESPN Game of the Week. It's not like we get any homicides, serial killers, or crimes of passion around here, especially crimes of passion.

  Everybody on the opposing team begins harrumphing and scraping the toes of their shoes into the concrete like agitated horses b
efore a storm. All except my mother, that is, who gives my father the do something look. But my father only gives her the what am I supposed to do? look in return.

  For a moment I feel terrible, torturing my mother like this. She's an awfully nice person. On the other hand, the Palmer household isn't into any of the latest educational theories—for instance, that different children learn differently.

  "I don't mind about the school, Hallie." My mother bursts into tears again the way overtaxed pregnant women are supposed to do. "Just come home. You can go to a private school. Or attend night classes at the community college to prepare for the high school equivalency exam. We'll hire a tutor."

  That's one thing you can say about mothers when it comes to their offspring—while other people are trying to untangle the legal system, they're busy working out practical solutions. And yet how do I explain why I can't live with my parents anymore when I don't completely understand it myself?

  So here goes the big one. I offer up the last piece of paper and hope for a better reception than Moses received. "Listen, it says in the state legal statutes that I can apply to become an emanated minor and—"

  "Emancipated," Mr. Bernard and Officer Rich chime in simultaneously.

  "Anyway, that's what I'm going to do. I'm working here during the day if you need me, I'm going to the track on the weekends, and I'll come home for dinner once in a while if you want."

  As I casually fold up the final paper, everyone looks to the gentle-mannered Officer Rich for guidance now that the entire calamity appears to hinge on a legal issue. And I realize that I'd better move things along. Because whether they accept it or they don't, it's not as if it's going to help my case to stand around and give them time to consider other options, like kidnapping. "Well, I've got weeding to do." I finish the last gulp of Yoo-Hoo and hand the empty back to Mr. Bernard. "Would you mind tossing this for me, please?"

  He takes it and appears well satisfied, as if he's just witnessed a good performance on Law & Order. Only now comes the real test. I turn and walk down the front steps. If they're going to try and stop me, then this is it. But they don't. And I don't look back, either. Finally, it appears as if there won't be any more "How I Spent My Summer Vacation" essays penned by Hallie Palmer.

  At around noon I get the scallion wave from Ms. Olivia, and it's a welcome occurrence, because I'm awfully hungry after no breakfast, the surprise front-porch trial, and then unearthing six bags of dead plants with root systems like chain letters. As I enter the house, Ms. Olivia delightedly claps her hands and begins a recitation: "Hail to thee, blithe spirit! Bird thou never wert, That from heaven or near it—"

  I don't know what it means, but it's definitely not the Patrick Henry High School song. I assume it's some kind of a victory acknowledgment, and so I wash my hands at the kitchen sink while she finishes trilling the last lines.

  "Pourest thy full heart/In profuse strains of unpremeditated art,”

  "Excuse me?" I finally ask when I'm pretty sure she's finished.

  " 'To a Skylark,' " says Ms. Olivia. "Percy Bysshe Shelley. I can't tell you how good it is to have a batfie raging once again. The only triumph of good over evil around here during the past few months involved trouncing the phone company for overbilling. And even that wasn't tremendously gratifying—just a credit for twenty-six dollars accompanied by a computer-generated form letter."

  There's a delicious-looking quiche with a thick light brown crust on the table, and Ms. Olivia catches me hungrily eyeing it.

  "Isn't Bertie wonderful? It's like having Meals on Wheels, but with goat cheese, sun-dried tomatoes, and Portobello mushrooms. Sit down and help yourself. The spoils go to the victor."

  Ms. Olivia reclaims her spot at the table from the day before.

  "I fudged a couple of answers," I admit. "I'm afraid it's only round one."

  "Without a doubt. Being a free spirit is never easy. You must constantly battle convention—the gatekeepers, the cage cleaners, the small-minded apparatchiks, the empty suits!"

  "You mean, you think it's okay that I don't want to get an education?"

  "Don't be ridiculous. Of course you wish to pursue an education. Education gives one dignity. You're familiar with Rosa Parks, are you not?"

  "Sure, she wouldn't move to the back of the bus." Everybody knows that, whether they went to school or not.

  "What is important to remember is that Rosa Parks took it upon herself to get an education and this served to give her dignity. When the bus driver threatened to arrest Ms. Parks, she replied, You may do that. She did not say, You can do that, or You gotta do what you gotta do. Do you see the difference?"

  Sort of. But then why did Ms. Olivia take my side instead of the school's? Fortunately I could see she was prepared to answer the question that I could not.

  "You just don't want to be brainwashed in their educational institution. And I don't blame you one bit."

  "So how do I get an education if I don't go to school?"

  "Hallie, learning is everywhere, knowledge is ubiquitous. In fact, the very idea that they can force you into a room and try to befoul your mind with meaningless catalogues of names and dates is preposterous. That's not even thinking—" She suddenly stops. "Isn't that why you won't attend?"

  "Yeah, I suppose." I don't want to disappoint her, especially since she seems so thrilled to be providing sanctuary to a radical. And second, I don't feel like telling anyone the real reason I can no longer go to school.

  Once again, Ms. Olivia doesn't press for details. She offers me another piece of quiche, which I gladly accept.

  "Do you know any painters?" she asks.

  "You mean who paint pictures?"

  "No, houses. Everything needs painting—the inside, the outside, the shutters and trim, the summerhouse."

  "The shed," I add.

  "And especially the porte cochere and the garage," she says.

  I'd noticed the garage is flaking like Herb's scalp. It's a good thing the bushes aren't navy blue like his sport jacket.

  "Yeah, me. I paint."

  "Excellent! We're in desperate need of a face-lift around here, and though Gil's been threatening to tackle it for over a year now, I don't see how he can possibly find time with Bertie marching him off to rummage sales every weekend."

  If nothing else, it sounded as if it would be good for my résumé. After "yard person" I could list "paint engineer." And if the Stocktons continue to promote me at this rate, then I might reach "gutter management specialist" by Halloween.

  Chapter 18

  Pay Dirt ♥

  At the close of the workday, when I stop up at the house to say good-bye, Mr. Bernard and Mr. Gil have just arrived home and are laughing about some fur stoles that Mr. Bernard purchased at a garage sale in order to resell down at the store.

  "If it isn't Prince Hal!" Mr. Bernard says.

  "I thought the British princes were William and Harry."

  "It's from Shakespeare's Henry V," Mr. Bernard says.

  "Never mind him," says Mr. Gil. "He criticizes Olivia, but in reality he's exactly like her—thriving on a good helping of social unrest with lots of foot stamping, sabotage, and threats of self-immolation."

  Meantime, from out of a shopping bag Mr. Bernard removes a black velvet hat with a starburst of rhinestones across the front and places it atop my reddish-blond mop. "Oh, Hallie, it's you!" The hat has a round brim that is at least a foot wide and resembles the top half of a flying saucer.

  "Wait," says Mr. Gil. He adjusts the front so that it covers my forehead and I can just barely peer out from underneath the expansive brim. Then he tosses a long billowy black feather boa around my neck. But looking in the mirror, I can only laugh at these movie star accessories combined with my T-shirt, jeans, and high-top sneakers.

  "Holly Golightly," says Mr. Bernard. "We just need the sunglasses."

  "Definitely," Mr. Gil adds.

  "Who's Holly Golightly?" I ask.

  "Audrey Hepburn, of course," answers Gil.
"Uh-oh," he says to Mr. Bernard. "I smell a movie night."

  "Most definitely. Saturday night—Breakfast at Tiffany's," states Mr. Bernard.

  "Are you free Saturday evening?" Mr. Gil inquires.

  "It's not as if they're expecting me at vespers," I say.

  "Brilliant! We'll have Cornish hen and I'll make a tangerine upside-down cake for dessert. And this way Mother will stop threatening to go to Havana for the weekend if she knows you're coming. She's taken a shine to you."

  "Yes," adds Mr. Gil. "You'd better watch out, Hallie, or she'll have you in Appalachia registering people to vote by Columbus Day."

  Mr. Bernard removes a neat stack of twenties from the pocket of his sport jacket and hands me the money. From the height of the pile I can tell that it's $240.1 suppose a person should know she's spent too much time at the racetrack and the gaming tables when she's able to identify a stack of cash in any denomination solely by its height.

  "What's this for?" I ask. No one gets paid after only two days.

  "We'll compensate you every Friday. However, this is a bridge until then."

  I guess it doesn't take a genius to figure out I'm on the lam. And probably broke, too.

  "Okay, but this is too much. You only owe me a hundred eighty-two."

  "Yes, well, Mother told me you changed the oil on all the cars. And refueling the tank on the QE2 is considered overtime."

  "I heard that," Ms. Olivia's voice chimes in from the den.

  "Go back to smuggling penicillin and schoolbooks into Cuba," Mr. Bernard shouts back.

  From the way the downstairs is laid out, with the rooms leading off and making a square around the central hallway, it's pretty easy to hear what's being said anywhere on the first floor. There aren't any doors dividing the rooms aside from the swinging one leading to the kitchen, but that's open most of the time, unless Ms. Olivia has set fire to something.