Willy's Magic
By J. M. Naszady
Copyright 2012 J. M. Naszady
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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Chapter V: Middle School Vampire
Chapter VIII: More Than Just a Visit
Chapter XI: The Girls in the Band
Chapter XVI: Beginnings and Endings
This book is dedicated to my family, with love.
Today is my thirteenth birthday. Unless you count the actual day I was born, which would make this my fourteenth birthday. But I’m thirteen years old today. The adults in my life congratulated me with the traditional clichés for arriving at the starting gate of my teens.
"It’s a milestone."
"You’re not a child any more."
"You’re growing up!"
I don’t agree with the opinion that I’m only plunging into my teens today. According to my calculations, I’ve already been swimming in the sea of semi-adulthood for a year now.
The past twelve months have been my thirteenth year, and now I’m beginning my fourteenth. This is the kind of logic which is admired and celebrated by some people, while it only gives others a headache. But I can understand why. Thinking about it too long makes my head throb, too.
Most people recognize when a child truly becomes a teenager, otherwise why would twelve-year-olds be sent to a middle school along with all those other teens? Some middle schools even include fifth graders, but I don't think that's such a great idea. Not just because it blows my theory. They are too young to handle it.
Last year, when I was in the sixth grade, I had to take a class called "Introduction to Teen Life." It was a clever title for a class about sex, drugs, and making choices during the teen years. I think that proves my point. Twelve-year-olds aren’t children any more.
When I explained my theory about birthdays to my pre-algebra teacher, Ms. Marlena, she had a slightly different opinion on the subject.
"So what do you think, Ms. Marlena? Am I new to this teen stuff, or am I already a member of the club?"
She stopped writing on the whiteboard, and peeked at me over her skinny glasses.
"You’re completely correct about this being the end of your thirteenth year. But we celebrate birthdays as the anniversary of our birth. So you really can’t count the day you were born in the same way."
At least I was half right.
Logical thinking is supposed to make you good at math. I have to say that I’m good at some math and not so good at other math. I know all my basic facts. That part is easy for me. Sometimes my less fortunate classmates refer to me as "The Human Calculator." They say my green eyes glow like an LED screen.
"Hey Brainiac, what's thirteen times twelve?"
"It's one hundred forty-four plus twelve."
Sometimes you have to make them work for it.
Fractions don't give me too much trouble, but dividing them can be a little tricky if I'm not paying close enough attention. Sometimes I flip over the wrong part before I multiply.
"When dividing fractions, you multiply the first by the reciprocal of the second."
I used to read the tidbits my teachers put up on the walls whenever I was bored with what the rest of the class was doing. If I'm lucky, these bits and pieces pop up like fresh toast in my brain when I actually need them.
On to Algebra: I can usually figure out what x is supposed to equal. I'm not too sure about y yet. But Geometry is trickier. There are way too many angles. And don’t even get me started on pie with no "e".
Anyway, today I turned thirteen on the thirteenth. It’s January, which follows December, so it could be considered to be the thirteenth month. Therefore, I declare my thirteenth birthday to be 13/13/13. I know that sounds like a lot of bad luck, but thirteen has always been my lucky number.
It was lucky for me today, because I didn’t have to go to school on my birthday. Today is Sunday. First I slept late. I didn't get out of bed until the sun peaked through my curtains and warmed me as I snuggled in my blankets. Then I took a long shower and used up all the hot water, but no one even complained.
Next I had my favorite breakfast: blueberry pancakes with extra blueberries and plenty of warm maple syrup. If breakfast has a dessert, it’s hot cocoa. I breathed in the milky chocolate flavor while the mini-marshmallows melted on top. Mmmm.
Two hours after my morning feast, I had recovered enough from my food lethargy to take a walk downtown. I met my friends Bobby, Shell, and Sam at the local movie theater for a matinee. Sam brought a guest.
"This is my cousin Alex, who's visiting from Oregon."
"Hey. Happy birthday!"
My friends let me pick the movie, in honor of my special day. But they all agreed with my choice. This hardly ever happens.
We saw that (almost) new sci fi/fantasy film that came out last summer, the one with the cockroach that travels through time and morphs into a lot of different characters, and in the end is...oh, sorry! I don't want to spoil it for you. If you haven't seen it yet, you might be the only one left, unless you live here. Of course, Alex had already seen it, but promised not to spoil it for the rest of us. This mega-hit finally arrived in our tiny theater after the holidays.
When we emerged from the shoebox cinema, squinting in the pale winter sunlight, our ears were still ringing from all those concentrated sound waves. The building in the exact middle of the main street through town was once upon a time one large theater. Now it's split into two, so that the multitudes of local residents have twice as many choices from among the popular films everyone outside of our quaint village saw a year earlier.
My three friends and I, plus one, shouted at each other as we paraded down the street. Bobby and Sam felt compelled to tell cockroach jokes, and Alex laughed at all of them. If I was easily embarrassed, they wouldn't be my friends. Only some of their material was funny. The rest wasn't.
"Hey Shell, why did the cockroach cross the street?"
"I don't know, Sam, why did the cockroach cross the street?"
"The cockroach crossed the street…wait for it...to get to the roach motel!"
That was one of the funny ones.
Our next stop was the pizza parlor. We lingered there for over two hours. Our pentagonal group (my math homework was to use a geometry term in a sentence from real life) consumed large amounts of the second-best pizza in town. We were dining in the only official pizzeria. But Sam’s mom is the unofficial maker of pizza, and everyone says hers is the best.
By the time my so-called friends were three-quarters of the way full (Bobby’s math homework was to use a fraction in a sentence from real life-I think our teachers have been getting these ideas from the same place), they couldn’t resist the annual teasing I endure for my connection to the number thirteen. It's traditional. But the jokes never improve, or even change.
Bobby pulled their triggers, and they all started popping off like cap guns. Even Alex joined in.
"So, you better watch where you step today. You could end up with thirteen years of bad luck."
"Did you bring a black cat with you, and a couple of broken mirrors, to help celebrate?
"Hey, this pizza has thirteen slices! Who wants the last one?"
Last year, my birthday was on Friday the thirteenth. My friends practically declared it a holiday, but I had to go to school anyway. I brought cupcakes for everyone in my class to keep them from getting too crazy. Bribery always works!
Before we left the pizza parlor, Bobby and Sam had a contest to see who could eat the most without puking. I think they both lost. They tried to pretend they were checking out the games, and almost didn’t make it to the restroom.
After the marathon of entertainment with my friends, I had the traditional ice cream and cake with my grandparents. Gramps always makes Rocky Road Cake, which is my favorite. He’s the chef in the family.
My birthday gift to you is his recipe. Gramps tries to keep it a secret, so don't tell anyone!
Gramps' Rocky Road Cake
Combine 2 cups flour, 2/3 cup cocoa, 1 teaspoon baking powder, and 1 teaspoon baking soda. In a separate bowl, beat 3/4 cup oil, 1 3/4 cups sugar, and 2 teaspoons vanilla. Add 2 eggs, beating in one at a time. Alternately add dry ingredients and 1 cup water to sugar mixture. Stir in 1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts and 1 1/2 cups miniature marshmallows. Pour into greased and floured 13 x 9 inch pan, distributing the marshmallows evenly. Make sure the marshmallows are coated with cake batter so they don't burn. Bake at 350 degrees F for 30-40 minutes. The marshmallows will float to the center, and look and smell toasted. Check the center with a toothpick to make sure it's done. Sprinkle with powdered sugar. Cool and enjoy!
After dessert, my grandparents gave me a new notebook computer, because my old laptop died and had to be recycled. I kind of expected it. For the past couple of weeks Grams kept bringing up the subject of computers and asking for my opinion about which ones were the best. Then she pretended that she was just making casual conversation. I tried to sound surprised, but I don't think I fooled them.
"This is great! Just what I needed. Thanks!"
Lately I’ve been glued to the desktop computer in my grandparents' office, and Grams decided that I need to be more portable. And out of their work space. She's always trying to get me to go outside.
"It’s not healthy for you to spend so much time inside the house, sitting at a desk. When it warms up you can take your notebook computer out to the deck and still get the Internet, along with all that fresh air and solar radiation. Just make certain that the computer isn’t in the direct sunlight. And wear sunscreen, in case you lose track of the time. Remember what happened the last time we went camping."
Grams and Gramps love to camp. The last time we went, I brought my laptop. I couldn't get the Internet, but I was reading a story I had already downloaded, and lost track of the time. I kind of remember hearing someone tell me to put on my sunscreen. Even though the tube was right next to me, I forgot.
The next morning I woke up on fire. The left side of my face, including my ear, my neck, my arm, and my leg were magenta. I guess it's obvious that I sunburn easily. It was months before my friends stopped teasing me about it, and even now the subject comes up from time to time. Ouch.
I have lived with Grams and Gramps in this house since I was a baby. Or a toddler, I guess. They are the only parents I have ever known, which has been just fine for me. They’re not really old as grandparents go. They are only in their late fifties and not even close to retiring.
My grandparents are both teachers, which can be good and not so good. They are always helpful to have around when I’m stuck on something, especially math and any kind of report. Grams and Gramps know a lot.
Their favorite TV show is Jeopardy. They watch it every day and compete with each other. It’s pretty funny to see them both hollering at the TV for about five minutes, and then I usually leave the room.
They love to work on class projects with me. But I can never get away with anything less than my personal best, and they always seem to have a pretty clear idea of what that is. I’m expected to go the extra distance in everything I do. Gramps is really hard core about effort.
"Did you finish that science report?"
"I'm going to work on it today. Sam and I are helping each other."
Oops, too much information.
"Don't take any short-cuts! A job worth doing is worth doing well. Start early, take your time, and do it right or don’t do it at all."
Not doing something that is expected, at home or at school, isn’t really an option in this family. Grams and Gramps have big plans for my future. My biggest plan right now is to finish middle school as quickly as possible, although I guess there isn't any way to speed it up. There is no fast-forward button that I know about. Too bad!
I'm not brilliant enough to skip a grade. But after a year and a half, the middle school experience is starting to get old. I’m halfway through the maze, and I can smell the cheese at the other end. I can’t wait to leave and start high school. Seventh grade isn't so bad, but there are a lot of reasons why I think high school will be better.
The campus is enormous. There's a long list of classes to choose from at the high school, and they have an open campus. It's not like there are that many places to go for lunch without a car, but still, it’s nice to have the freedom. Also, there are more opportunities for extra-curricular activities, like clubs, sports, and field trips.
The kids at the high school come from a lot of different middle and elementary schools in our county, so it's a large student body. Some people think I'm a loner because I like to read so much. My reading can interfere with other people's social plans. But I have lots of friends, and I wouldn't mind meeting more. There will be plenty of opportunities for that, with so many students around.
After going to school with the same kids since Kindergarten, it will be interesting to have friends who went to other schools. Living in the same small town in the mountains of northern California my whole life, I’ve met other kids at church events, soccer camp, and computer camp. But it’s not the same as hanging out with them every day at school.
Most of the kids my age where I live go to my school. Only a couple of them go to private school. It's a pretty long drive and most people around here just don't have that kind of time to spend driving their kids up and down the mountain. There are lots more opportunities out there to meet new people, and I can't wait to get started. I like the friends I’ve always had, but you can never have too many friends.
The teachers at the high school aren’t so uptight about kids listening to music in class, either. I heard they don’t even notice. That's what my friend Sam’s older sister Cath says.
"You’re going to love the high school. It’s so much better down there. You’re expected to pay attention, and take responsibility for your own learning. You don’t get treated like a little kid. Also, you do most of your work on a laptop."
"Do you have to take your own laptop to school?"
"No, they have a fleet of them for everyone to use."
"That's cool."
Sounds pretty good to me.
I’m a reader, like I already mentioned. Not many of my friends like to read as much as I do, but that’s OK I guess. Everyone has their own interests. The library at the high school has a lot more books than our middle school library has, and the media center has a lot more computers than the lab at my middle school. Also, they’re newer than ours, which make dinosaurs look like newborn babies.
You can check out books for a longer period of time at the high school, and the computers are available before and after school. The bus that comes up the mountain to where I live leaves early in the morning and returns late in the afternoon, so I will be at school longer. I won't mind the extra time at school though, because I always find something to do.
The camp that I went to last summer really got me excited about learning as much as I can about computers. It’s never too early to start. It was for middle and high school students, and it was held at the high school I’ll be attending in the valley. Grams and Gramps took turns driving me down there every day for three weeks. It only lasted for the morning, so they ran errands or went to the library to relax and read while they waited for me.
Just thinking about all that high school has to offer is making me wish that I was in eighth grade instead of seventh, and that this school year was in the past. I’m not even that excited about summer vacation. The computer camp is only offered every other year.
This summer I’m supposed to go and stay with my Aunt Kate and Uncle Edward on the coast. I kind of got tricked into saying I would visit them soon the last time they were here. Aunt Kate brought the subject up in front of the whole family.
"We hope you’ll spend the summer with us as soon as you can. I know the kids would be thrilled."
Then right on cue, like they had written a script, Jo toddled over and crawled up into my lap like he was scaling a rock wall, leaned his head against me, and sighed. The aroma of gingerbread hung in my nostrils. What else could I do but say yes?
"Sure, that sounds good to me."
I couldn’t go last summer, because I was already signed up for the computer academy. So they are expecting me to show up this year.
Spending a summer at the beach sounds great, doesn’t it? Imagine the sky as blue as a sapphire, with marshmallow clouds plied on the horizon. The sun sparkles on the curling surf, while you play volleyball or Frisbee with half-naked people wearing not much more than sunglasses. When you get too warm, you trot down to the water and plunge in to cool off. How could anyone not want this? Sounds like Paradise, right?
Wrong! First of all, my aunt and uncle don't live in sunny southern California. They live on the Oregon coast. Now imagine those same people bundled in wool and huddled around a campfire. The sky is gray, and so is the water. It's hard to tell where one ends and the other begins. The wind is blowing sand in your picnic lunch, and everyone has to keep getting up and moving when the smoke gets in their eyes. Don't even think about dipping a toe in the water. I get goose bumps talking about it!
Of course, it's really beautiful when the sun is out, and I could probably learn to surf. I would need a wet suit though. It's cold and foggy for half the summer. The water is polar. The weather here in the summer is sunny and hot, and by July the river is the optimal temperature for swimming or floating.
I was hoping that maybe my aunt and uncle had forgotten all about my promise, but then I got a letter in the mail last week. It was a homemade birthday card, and all of my cousins had signed it. There were illustrations of them playing in their yard, and there was a picture of me. It was labeled.
"Happy Birthday!!! We sent you a present. You’ll never guess what it is. We can't wait to see you this summer. It will be fun!"
A package arrived a couple of days after the letter. Inside was a hooded sweatshirt that said "Come to Oregon" across the back. I pulled it over my head, and came up for air. There was enough room inside for two of me, but it felt comfy. I decided to save it for my trip. No way was I wearing it around here.
I have a bunch of little cousins, and I think the whole idea of this visit is for me to chase them around so my aunt and uncle get a break. I might not even see the beach. I’ll have to take plenty of reading material with me to survive the culture shock. And unless I can find a ray of sunshine somewhere in all that fog my skin will be paler when I get back home at the end of the summer than it was when I left. I’ll look like I spent my vacation in Antarctica.
"Hey, welcome back! How was your summer? Have you been sick or something? You look really pale."
"Oh, fine, thanks. No, I spent the summer in Antarctica, studying penguins."
Normally I like little kids. They seem to like me, too. But I'm not sure I’m ready to give up my vacation to amuse them full-time. My cousins are pretty good kids though. Benny and Cassy probably already surf way better than I ever could, and they would make me look like a real idiot even trying. Ethan and Jo are pretty little still. At least they were the last time I saw them, which was Christmas the year before last. I don't know if Aunt Kate and Uncle Edward would let any of them in the water with a surfboard though. There’s a pretty wicked undertow that could suck them out to sea.
So I mentioned that my grandparents have big plans for me. Nothing is mapped out, but they do have a bank account with college money in it. They have been putting money away for me since I was born. Gramps talks about college a lot.
"Your grandmother and I want you to have a good education and plenty of opportunities to explore your potential."
"And we don’t want you to go into a lot of debt trying to prepare yourself for a career. Your grandfather and I have known many people who end up spending half their lives paying for school."
I already know what I want to do with my life. I’m going to be a children's librarian. I know, a real glam job, huh? It's not just about reading to little kids and checking out books, though. There is so much literature online now that you have to be on top of the technology that goes along with it. I haven't told anyone about my plans, though. They can't handle it.
First of all, my friends already give me enough crap about how much reading I do. I am kind of a fanatic about science fiction and fantasy. I'm glued to my computer a lot, and they sometimes have to physically remove me from my chair, and even my house, to get me to join in their plans. Sam always attacks first.
"C’mon, let’s go! You’ve been hiding in here all day. Bobby, Shell, you grab that end and I’ll grab this end. Now, let’s head for the door, quick!"
"Wait! No! Just one more page!"
Grams and Gramps, I'm sorry to say, only encourage this kind of behavior from my friends. They claim I need sunshine as a natural source of vitamin D so I don’t get Rickets, whatever that is. I was going to Google it but I keep forgetting.
Second, my grandparents rant and rave about funding for libraries getting flushed down the toilet and how we have to build libraries, not take them apart. We always participate in fundraisers for the local branch of our county library, and both the elementary and middle school libraries. Grams makes the most speeches about libraries in our family, probably because she’s a reading teacher.
"Libraries are for everyone. Everyone benefits when children discover the joy of reading. The entire community uses the local library for more than checking out books, which is important enough. There are cultural events like poetry readings, writing workshops, and historical programs. There is access to the Internet. How can we not support our libraries?"
If Gramps knew my plans I know what he would say.
"It’s a noble profession, and I don’t want to discourage you, but who knows how long it will be before library funding is at a reasonable level again? You’d be taking a huge risk with your future."
My opinion is that by the time I’m ready to look for a job in a library things will be back to normal. I have about ten years to prepare for my future. That should be plenty of time.
You may have noticed by now that I have the annoying habit of starting conversations with people and forgetting to introduce myself. My name is Willy. That’s not my full name, but it’s what I’ve been called as long as I can remember. For a while I spelled it Wille, but that confused too many people. My full name is Wildernys Trayle Walker-Jones.
Grams and Gramps are Mary and John Jones, which is a little easier to say and remember. They had my mom right after they finished college and started teaching. Then they left the city and found their own little paradise in the pine forests of the northern California mountains. They've been living and working here ever since.
"Your grandmother and I have lived in these mountains for over thirty years, Willy. We'll probably never leave. Where would we go that's as nice as it is here?"
"It was a wonderful place to raise our children. There's plenty of fresh, clean air and water, and no traffic. We're happy that you have grown up here."
My mom’s younger sister was born here. Her name is Mary Katherine, just like Grams, so they call her Kate to avoid confusion. Aunt Kate says she misses the mountains. But I can tell she likes the coast better. I don’t really know why for sure, but I think she’s in love with the ocean. She’s always painting it, and her artwork is swimming all over the walls of their house. She is artistically gifted. But I think that’s an awful lot of water.
My mom’s name was Joana. She was named after Gramps, but a girl’s version. She met my dad, Will Walker, during one summer when they were in college and working outdoors in a conservation job. They hit it off right away. He was a city boy, but once he got a taste for the outdoors he never wanted to be anywhere else. My dad is why I’m called Willy.
Both of my parents liked to hike and camp and all that. So they gave me an unusual name. I don’t ever complain about it even when I get teased though, because it’s my first and longest-lasting gift from them. Grams tells me a lot of stories about my mom.
"From the time she was little, Joana was always outdoors. She went to the river with her friends in the summer and skied on the roads in the national forest in the winter. She was also a nature photographer. Being the daughter of teachers, she thought teaching people about how to take care of nature was a good idea. Your dad felt the same way."
"No wonder you're always trying to get me outside!"
Sometimes I wonder how the child of parents who loved the outdoors as much as mine did could be such an indoor person. Even though he grew up in the city, my dad always wanted to go exploring. When he was still in high school, he and some of his friends took a trip across the country. They spent the whole summer traveling and camping. My dad’s favorite part was the southwest, in the red rock canyon country of Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona.
After college my parents had me and continued doing conservation work. Before I came to stay with my grandparents, I was living with my mom and dad in a converted school bus. Back then people did crazy stuff like that. It wasn’t really a school bus any more, it was a motor home, and had all the usual stuff motor homes have. That way my parents always had a place to live and transportation. They never knew where they were going to end up next.
I have lots of pictures of the motor home. My parents did most of the work themselves, with some help from family and friends. It had a shower and a little kitchen and everything. They parked it here at Grams’ and Gramps’ while they worked on it, and Aunt Kate painted waves crashing all over the outside. It was a real masterpiece!
"Your mom and dad finished converting the bus to a motor home right before you were born, and even broke a bottle of champagne across the front like you do when you christen a ship."
"That was on New Year’s Day 2000, about two weeks before I showed up, right? They named the bus, I mean motor home, Walker-Jones."
I had heard the stories so many times, I had them memorized. But I still enjoyed hearing them as much as Grams enjoyed telling them.
I lived in Walker-Jones with my mom and dad for eighteen months before they took it on their last trip. My parents drove across the country to New York City when I was about a year and a half old, in the late summer of 2001, and left me here with Grams and Gramps. They were supposed to be gone for a month. It was a trip to get funding for a project they were working on, and they were also going to visit a friend from college. Talk about bad timing! Grams and Gramps waited a long time to find out my mom and dad died at Ground Zero.
Everybody knows that’s what they called the World Trade Center site after it was attacked and destroyed by terrorists on September 11, 2001. But not everyone knows someone who died there. We don’t know what my parents were doing that morning, but we think it’s where their friend worked. All we know for certain is that they never came home.
I don’t remember my dad and mom at all, except for the pictures that I’ve memorized from looking at them so many times. When I was in the fifth grade, my class did a unit on terrorism in America for US History. I did a report about my parents’ work and what happened to them.
No one else in my class knew anyone who died on 9/11. Grams and Gramps helped me with my project, and it made them really sad. But Grams said that she and Gramps were glad we were working on it together.
"Don’t worry about us, Willy. Nothing is sadder than losing a child or parent. But this project is very important for us to do together. It's a way of remembering, and honoring the memory of your parents."
"It’s also a way for us to educate other people, so nothing like this ever happens again."
My class created a memorial to my parents and all the others who died that day with all of our reports and displays. It was planned for the tenth anniversary remembrance of 9/11, and it’s still on display in the front entrance of our school.
Sometimes I get a strange empty ache in my stomach when I think about what my parents would be like now and how it would feel to have a brother or sister. I try to imagine where we would live, and what we would be doing on a typical day. I wonder what I would say to my parents if I saw them again. I would have a lot of questions!
I want to know how they felt when they were my age. I wonder what it's like to die, but I don't like to think about that very much. It's kind of creepy, and I get a tingling in my spine. I wonder how they felt when I was born, and if they miss me, wherever they are.
But I have friends, and I have Grams and Gramps, so I’m pretty lucky. I was also lucky to meet Alex, Sam's cousin. We kept making eye contact and smiling at each other when we were hanging out at the pizza parlor on my birthday. Finally, Alex got up to get another soda and then came back to the other side of the table to sit next to me so we could talk.
We discovered that we have a lot in common. Both of us enjoy reading science fiction and fantasy. We are also really good with computers. And we enjoy meeting new people.
"How long are you staying here with Sam’s family?"
"I’ll be here for the rest of the school year. My mom and dad are traveling on business all over Europe until the summer. I didn’t want to tag along with them. It should be fun to hang out here."
I was a little surprised that Alex wanted to give up a trip like that. It was a pretty long time to travel with your parents, I guess. That will give us lots more time to get to know each other, though!
Alex’s parents are supposed to be back here in June, and they happen to live only an hour away from my aunt and uncle in Oregon. I am already hoping that we’ll see each other over the summer, too. Spending some time with Alex in Oregon would be a definite improvement to my summer trip!
But leaving Grams and Gramps for the whole summer to visit my aunt, uncle, and cousins has me more than a little worried. My grandparents have been pretty stressed out lately. With all the school budget cuts the last few years, they get pretty nervous every summer, wondering what will be cut next.
First our music programs were eliminated, and then art was cut. We don't have electives at the middle school any more. There are no school sports, but there are a few town teams that you can join. I played soccer for awhile, but there was a lot of traveling, and none of my friends wanted to play this year.
Now everyone is talking about one of our schools closing, because the enrollment is too low to keep it open. A lot of people left town when the lumber mill closed right before I was born. There’s been a steady stream of people leaking out of here ever since. Gramps brings the subject of our declining population up every time he reads the local paper, which only comes out once a week, but it always seems to be on his mind.
"Families hang on as long as they can and end up leaving for jobs in other places. If one of the schools closes due to decreased enrollment, all of the students and teachers from that school will have to move to the other. That would be very disruptive, some jobs would be lost, and that means even more people relocating. This issue is threatening to divide the town. Everyone has been arguing about which school should be the one to close."
There is one elementary school here and one middle school. The middle school is newer, so most people seem to think that closing the elementary school makes the most sense. But that’s the school where both of my grandparents teach. Grams has something to say about that.
"I know I’m not impartial as an elementary teacher. But a move will be much more disruptive for the younger children. Also, the middle school was designed for older students. It lacks the features that are necessary for the youngest children, and making adjustments will cost money that the district doesn't have. Some people think we should hang onto our students in ninth grade, and keep them at the middle school an extra year to increase our enrollment. The sixth graders could stay at the elementary school."
I am not in favor of this plan, for all of the reasons I mentioned earlier, and neither are my friends. We want out of here as soon as possible! We definitely don’t want to spend another year trapped at our middle school before we start high school. Since we already went to sixth grade there, my class would get stuck spending four years in middle school. Not a good idea at all. But I don’t bring this up with Grams.
There have been monthly meetings all year, and it looks like the school closure is going to happen next fall. If the elementary school closes like most people seem to want, Grams and Gramps would have to spend their whole summer moving all their stuff from three decades of teaching out of their classrooms at the elementary campus and into new classrooms at my school. They're going to need some help with that.
"I could stay here and help you both move your stuff. Aunt Kate and Uncle Edward would understand."
Gramps didn’t think that was a good idea.
"We appreciate the offer Willy, but it isn’t your responsibility. Your aunt and uncle are counting on you to visit them this summer. Your grandmother and I think it’s important for you to go to Oregon now while you have the chance. Once you start getting ready for high school, you’ll be busier all the time. You will start working in the summer. It would be good for you to spend time with your cousins now. Your grandmother and I will put our heads together and figure this out. Everything will be fine, you’ll see."
I noticed the worry lines on Grams’ face, even though she tried to hide her feelings behind a smile. I wasn’t convinced. There was no point in arguing about it though, because that would just make them feel worse. My grandparents already had enough worries dancing in their brains!
I haven’t told you about my great-grandparents yet. My family isn’t that large, but it has a lot of layers. There are several generations keeping track of each other. I think Grams and Gramps seem so young to me because of Mama Em and Papa Martin.
Gramps is their son, and they still like to boss him around whenever they get the chance. They live in the city, and every summer and winter he spends at least a week with them. They like to call him "Johnny." I think it’s kind of cute. Usually Grams and I show up for a couple of days, and then we leave. That’s about all we can handle.
Gramps’ parents are in their eighties, and they like to have things their way. Which is fine, but Mama Em is so forgetful that she doesn’t remember she already told you five times to do something. And Papa Martin actually falls asleep while he’s talking to you. It’s no use attempting to escape once he drifts off, even if you’re as quiet as a mouse without its squeak, because he always wakes up and begins telling you whatever he was saying before he fell asleep, starting at the beginning.
"When Johnny was little, his favorite food was ice cream. If you ever wanted him to do something he thought was unpleasant, he would do it if there was the promise of ice cream…
Willy? Where are you going? I was telling you how much Johnny liked ice cream."
"I was just stretching my legs, Papa Martin."
I love them but they wear me out pretty fast!
It’s getting tough for them to do stuff around the house now. They hardly ever go upstairs any more. They pretty much just live downstairs. When Gramps goes to visit his parents lately, which is for a long weekend every chance he gets, he always has to check upstairs to make sure nothing’s leaking or broken. Sometimes they go up there and leave things and then forget about them. The last time Gramps visited, there was an ant invasion. He found a plate of half-eaten spaghetti that looked like something from a horror movie.