Mary Jane by Jessica Blau (debian ebook reader TXT) 📗

“You have Dr. Cone walk you or drive you if it’s after dark,” my mother said.

“Okay, Mom. Bye!” I hung up quickly before Izzy could shout again.

“I want cereal for dinner,” Izzy said.

“Have you ever had cereal for dinner?” I asked cautiously. It seemed as unimaginable as using a banana for a telephone.

“Yes.”

“Well . . . let’s look in the fridge and see if there’s something in there that might be a better dinner. Do you usually havea bath before dinner?”

“Nah, no bath.” Izzy opened the avocado-green fridge before I could get to it. I edged her aside and peered in. The door shelveswere crammed with mustards, oils, and grease-stained bottles of things I didn’t recognize. In the body of the fridge, standingout from the crowd of scantily-contained unidentifiable blobs, were two pots covered in tinfoil, a carton of eggs, a hunkof unwrapped cheese balanced on a Chinese take-out carton, and an unbagged head of iceberg lettuce. Everything, even the lettuce,had an odd, oily sheen. A smell created a wall that kept me from getting too close. Maybe the cheese?

“Where’s the milk?” I asked. Izzy shrugged.

Item by item, we unloaded the refrigerator, placing things in whatever space we could make on the orange linoleum counter.I finally found the milk in the back. When I pulled it out, the contents sloshed with an unusual weightiness.

Izzy stood on a stool and took down two bowls.

“Let me check the milk.” I opened the triangular pour spout of the carton and then jerked my head back from the slap of stinkthat hit me. It smelled like an animal had died in there.

“Peeee-ewww!” Izzy screamed, still standing on the stool. I put the milk down on the counter and put my hands on Izzy’s tinylegs, which were covered in a downy blond fuzz. The idea that she’d fall on my watch was more horrifying than the smell ofthe milk.

“Izzy?!” Dr. Cone shouted from the entrance hall. My stomach felt as if a string had pulled it shut like a drawstring bag. I lifted Izzy off the stool and placed her on the ground. I wondered if Dr. Cone would fire me for allowing her to climb up there.

“Here!” Izzy shouted.

Dr. Cone walked into the kitchen. “What are you two up to?”

“We were gonna make cereal for dinner,” Izzy announced. “But the milk stinks.”

“I think it soured.” I pointed at the carton on the counter.

“Oh yeah, that one’s from last month. I don’t know why no one’s thrown it out.” Dr. Cone laughed and so did I. What wouldmy mother think of milk that had grown chunky and putrid with age? It was unimaginable. Though, now that I was seeing it,it was very imaginable.

“What about we go to Little Tavern and get some burgers and fries?” Dr. Cone offered.

“Little Tavern!” Izzy shouted.

Dr. Cone moved things around the kitchen counter, looking for something. “Where’s your mom?” He patted his pockets—front,back, front again—and then pulled out his keys and held them in the air for a moment as if he’d performed a magic trick.

“Don’t know.” Izzy shrugged.

“We haven’t seen her,” I said.

“Let’s go!” Izzy marched—knees up, like she was in a band—out of the kitchen. Dr. Cone put his hand out for me to step ahead,and I did, following Izzy down the hall and out the front door to the wood-paneled station wagon waiting in front. Dr. Conedidn’t lock the front door behind us. I wondered if Mrs. Cone was somewhere in the house. If she wasn’t, wouldn’t Dr. Conehave locked the door?

“How many burgers can your mom usually eat?” Dr. Cone asked as Izzy opened the door to the back seat.

“She’s a veterinarian this week.” Izzy climbed in and pulled the door shut.

“Is she? I thought she got over that veterinarian phase.” Dr. Cone winked at me and stared up at the open window on the third floor. “BONNIE!” Dr. Cone cupped his hands aroundhis mouth and shouted. I looked up and down the street to see if anyone was witnessing this. “BON-NIE!”

Mrs. Cone stuck her head out the window. Her hair was blown around her shiny face. “What?”

“Do you want something from Little Tavern?”

“WHAT?!”

“DO YOU WANT SOMETHING FROM LITTLE TAVERN?”

Mrs. Cone paused as if she really did want something. Then she shook her head. “I’M TRYING NOT TO EAT MEAT!”

“SHE’S A VETERINARIAN!” Izzy shouted from inside the car.

“FRIES?!”

Mrs. Cone nodded and gave a thumbs-up. Then she disappeared into the attic room.

“You’ll eat Little Tavern, won’t you?” Dr. Cone asked me.

“Yes.” The truth was, I’d only been there once. My family didn’t often eat in restaurants. We did eat out of the house oncea week, but always at our country club. Sometimes, when we had visitors from out of town, we’d take them to a restaurant.But my parents would never eat at the Little Tavern, whose slogan was Buy ’em by the bag! The single occasion I’d been to the Little Tavern was the twins’ birthday, when we went with their parents.

“Okay then, get in!” Dr. Cone nodded at the front seat of the car. The passenger side was covered with piles of paper anda brown file folder. I stacked them neatly and slid them down the bench seat toward Dr. Cone so I could sit.

Izzy immediately scooted up and leaned her head over the front seat. She talked the whole way to Little Tavern and I triedto listen, but my brain was stuck on question after question. Had Mrs. Cone been in the attic all day, and was she convertingit into a guest room? Why hadn’t she come downstairs to make dinner? How did the Cones eat dinner normally? Who went groceryshopping and why wasn’t there fresh milk in the fridge? Did they not get their milk delivered like everyone else in the neighborhood?We got two cartons of whole milk every week. My mother said one was for baking and cooking and the other was for her and me.My father was never poured milk at dinner and instead had a glass