The Keeper, page 1
Dedication
To Julie, always remember your Ita loves you!
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Acknowledgments
Glossary
About the Author
Copyright
About the Publisher
Chapter 1
The darkness comes upon us so quickly, I just know it’s a sign. This move across the country to Brentville, Oregon, is all wrong for us. I can feel it, deep down in the pit of my stomach—leaving Texas was a big mistake. Selling our little house in Somerset was a mistake too, because now we don’t have a place to go back to. But the biggest mistake was moving all the way up here, to a state known for having the largest fungus in America. Honestly, who brags about that? Not that I could’ve stopped any of it. I’m only twelve years old. Wherever my parents go, I have to go with them, fungus or no fungus.
“It’s going to rain,” I say, peering up at the darkening sky. “It always rains out here, you know. We’ll be wet and miserable for the rest of our lives.”
“Actually, it rains less than half the year out here, James.” My father parks the car in our new driveway and gets out. He puts his hands on his waist and stretches, arching his back and twisting his neck.
“It rains one hundred and sixty days a year out here, which might as well be all the time. That’s 43.8 percent of the time. I know. I looked it up,” I say as I open the car door to get out.
“Careful not to let your chucho out,” my mother says. “Not without his leash. He doesn’t know the neighborhood.”
I push on Baxter’s chest gently and give his thick black fur a friendly tug. “Stay with Ava,” I tell him.
But Baxter whines and looks over at my little sister, Ava, whose slack face is pressed against the window on the other side of the car. It’s been a while since he went number one, at least two hours, and I can see he needs to come out.
“Oh, okay,” I say as I look around for his leash on the floorboard. Finding it, I clip it to his collar and let him climb out of the car. I walk around with him, letting him find a good place to lift his leg. Baxter does his business against a stump far from the house, on the edge of the property, before we walk over to my parents on the other side of the yard.
“Now, there’s a grand view if I ever saw one!” my father says, and my mother grins as she leans into him.
My mother puts her hand to her forehead to shade her eyes and takes a deep breath. “I’ve never seen so many trees in my life! They’re so . . . majestic.”
I take my phone out of my pocket and try to turn it on, but it’s no use. It’s dead.
“It’s impressive,” my father tells my mother.
I’m not impressed. To be honest, I am feeling a little caged in—missing the brightness of summers in Texas. This wall of trees goes on forever, surrounding us, closing us in. The dark-gray sliver of sky above promises to make everything cold and dismal. And because it’s been raining here, the air is an invisible moist mist that won’t let me breathe.
I want to complain, to say for the billionth time how much I want to go back home. But I know that no matter what I say, it’s all going to fall on deaf ears, because my mother is in love with this place. She hasn’t stopped showing us pictures of it since my parents made the decision to take new jobs and move us out here.
That’s three months of long family discussions about “making sacrifices to get ahead in life.” Three months of oohs and ahhs over everything Oregon. Three months of Look at these Douglas firs. Christmas trees, everywhere! We can go see the migrating whales. And, oh, there’s a cave with sea lions. Don’t you want to explore the Columbia River Gorge?
Standing in the side yard, my mother takes a deep breath, smiles, and says, “Mother Nature really outdid herself up here.”
In the back seat, Ava stirs and wakes up. She lumbers out of the car, rubbing her eyes and yawning. She walks over, reaches out, and takes Baxter’s leash out of my hand.
“Give him to me,” she says. “He’s my dog!” And she walks behind Baxter, who’s eager to explore the rest of the yard with her. Ava is ten now. She’s very independent, so she doesn’t always let me help her. And since Baxter hasn’t gone number two yet, I’m happy to let her take care of that.
“What is it, boy? What did you find?” Ava leans over to look at whatever Baxter is sniffing at. Then she pulls a very large, moldy-looking mushroom out of the ground. “Whoa! Look at this!”
“What are you doing?” I ask, horrified, because Ava is waving the huge gray toadstool in my face.
“Eat it!” she says, laughing. “Eat it! Eat it!”
“Give me that!” I tell her, reaching up to take the giant fungus out of her hands. “Why do you always have to touch everything?”
But instead of letting me have it, Ava swipes the disgusting mushroom away and takes off with it. “No, it’s mine!” she giggles, and runs away with Baxter loping beside her.
I run after them, catch up to her, and knock the monstrous thing out of her hand. Ava stops and tosses the broken stem beside its broken hood. I pick up the nasty pieces of mushroom, walk up to the tree line to the left of the house, and toss them into the dark woods.
“Why’d you do that?” Pulling Baxter along, Ava walks over to me at the tree line. “I was gonna study that under my microscope!”
While Ava walks Baxter up to the porch, our parents stand side by side in the front yard, happy as holly berries, holding hands and taking in the sight of our new house.
“Look at what we did, Chris.” My mother slips her arms around my father’s waist and stands on tiptoe to plant a kiss on his chin. “We did this. You and me. Together.”
My father smiles smugly. “Yup. We’ve come a long way for two kids from the border,” he says.
“Yes, we have.” My mother nods. “We’re blessed.”
Blessed?
I can see why they think that. This towering house with its tall stained-glass windows and fancy architecture is my mother’s dreams coming true. I guess in her eyes they have because we moved here for her new job. Up here, in Oregon, my mother is Assistant Professor Marina Ruiz-McNichols—the first girl from her small town of Eagle Pass to ever get a PhD and teach at a big-time university.
My father’s a computer analyst, and he can always find a good job. That’s why it was so easy for my parents to—like my Ita, my maternal grandmother, used to say—pick up our tiliches and move everybody’s personal stuff all the way out here.
I don’t want to be mad about it, but I am.
“Come on,” my father says, waving us over. “Let’s go check out the house.”
In the living room, the fireplace crackles and snaps, releasing a scent that makes the house smell like ashes mixed in with some kind of flower-scented candle. Ava lets Baxter loose, and he goes around sniffing the wooden floorboards before he walks over and plants himself in front of the hearth. He puts his head down over his front paws and stares at the glowing embers.
“Will you look at that! Mrs. Benson must have sent someone over to start a fire for us,” my mother says. “She’s the best real estate agent ever. I’m going to have to do something nice for her later.”
“Because that’s not creepy at all, having some stranger let themselves into our house when we’re not here,” I whisper to Ava. But she covers her ears and turns her face away from me.
“James Anthony McNichols! Stop trying to scare your sister!” My mother’s brows knit themselves over her eyes like two angry caterpillars. I want to tell her that her face is going to get stuck like that, but I don’t.
Ava rubs her hands over the crackling embers. “I like it. It makes the house smell like . . . like . . .”
“Burning flesh?” I whisper, finishing Ava’s thought with my best devilish grin.
“I was going to say spring.” Ava punctuates the word spring with air quotes.
I inhale too deeply, and the flowery scent gets caught in the back of my throat. I cough, covering my mouth with my shirt. “Whoa, that’s strong.”
“I like the smell,” my mother says. “It’s soothing.” Then she strolls around the living room, putting her hands on everything she sees. “I love it all—the sparkling chandelier, the vaulted ceiling, the wooden railing. Of course, the circular stairway is my absolute favorite.”
My father sits on a stool at the breakfast bar and swivels around to us. “It’s a beautiful house. It’s way more spacious than I thought it would be.”
“I know!” my mother squeals. She puts her arms around my father’s back and presses a loud kiss on his blond head, right behind his ear. “Most houses look so big in the pictures, then you get there, and they’re tighter than you expected. But not this one.”
“Nope.” My father kisses and pats my mother’s hand. “This one doesn’t disappoint. I can tell already—we’re going to be very happy here.”
I stare at the f
“This is so exciting!” Ava says, and she runs up the circular stairway like a cochinilla, a tiny pill bug rounding the stairs in a hurry, before she disappears.
“What about you, James?” my father asks. “Aren’t you excited? How lucky are we, huh?”
“Pretty lucky,” I say, holding my shirt over my mouth and nose at the far end of the living room.
Ava comes running down the stairs. “I get the room with the big window!” she yells as she jumps off the last step.
“Uh-uh,” I say. “I’m the oldest. I get first dibs.”
Ava shakes her head. “Nope. Only the best for the youngest.”
“Ava, you know that’s not true,” my father says. “Why don’t you two flip for it? Come over here. You can call it, if you want.”
Ava grins at me as she crosses the room to try out her luck. She stands next to my father at the counter. “Heads. I call heads,” she says, when my father pulls out a quarter and puts it over his thumb.
“Is tails okay with you, James?” my father asks.
I shrug.
“Whatever,” I say because, honestly, nothing here is ever going to be all right. With or without a big window in my room, I’ll still be in Oregon. So, I watch my father toss the coin high up in the air, where it flips and glints before he catches it in midair. Then he slaps it down on the back of his hand.
“Tails!” my father calls and smiles over at me.
“Awww . . .” Ava’s shoulders sag, and she looks up at our father and pleads. “Let’s go again. Best two out of three.”
I roll my eyes.
“No,” my father says, pinching her nose. “Your brother won it, fair and square.”
“Are you okay, Jaimito?” my mother asks me. “What’s the matter? You don’t like the house?”
Hearing her call me by my Spanish name, Jaimito, makes me cringe. It’s the only name my Ita ever called me. It hurts to have my mother use it like this, while she’s trying to sell me on this house—this new start.
But today is not the time to tell her that. Ita’s only been gone for a month and a half. Forty-four days. I know, I’ve been counting, waiting for the day we can talk about my Ita without feeling sad that she didn’t get to make the trip with us, like she would have if she hadn’t gotten so sick.
I give my mother a thumbs-up and grin under my shirt, which is still pulled up over my nose. She comes over and touches my forehead. “What’s going on with you? Are you playing sick?” she asks. “I’m not buying it, little imp. I know your tricks.”
I sigh heavily, because I wish I could make her understand just how doomed this whole move feels. “This house smells like a crem—crema—cremetery!” I say, stumbling to find the right word. “It stinks like a cremetery in here!”
“You mean crematory, or crematorium, either is correct,” my father says. “But that’s not very nice. It’s inappropriate to talk like that.”
My mother unmasks me.
“You need to stop,” she tells me. “You promised to give this move a chance!”
My mother puts her hands on my cheeks and tilts up my head. Her warm brown eyes check my face. When she gets closer, I stick out my tongue and lick my lips quickly, like a salamander.
She makes a startled noise and then laughs at herself. “Oh, you’re such a silly lagartijo!”
“He’ll be all right,” my father says, chuckling from across the room. “He just needs to acclimate. But he’s a good little lizard. He’ll feel better once we get some food into him. How does pizza sound? Pepperoni? Mom? Ava? Medium cheese for James?”
“Nope,” my mother says. “There’s no pizza delivery. Not all the way out here.”
“No delivery?” I frown at my father. “What kind of place is this?”
“A gated community. Very posh.” My father winks.
“But very secluded,” my mother chimes in. “Never fear, Mrs. Benson said she stocked the fridge!” My mother holds the refrigerator door open and steps aside so we can see that every shelf is full of goodies.
“Well, she just became my favorite neighbor,” my father says.
Someone knocks on the door—an unexpected rapping that startles us all. My father gets up. “I’ll get it.”
“Mrs. Benson!” my mother says, when a plump, white-haired woman slips through the front door holding a huge plate of cookies in her hands.
“I see Henry got the fire going.” Mrs. Benson smiles smugly. Her thin lips pull at her cheeks and crinkle at the corners of her bright gray eyes. “I knew it was going to rain, so I sent Henry up here to take care of it for you.”
“Thank you so much for the groceries,” my father says, closing the door to keep out the draft. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“Yes. Thank you,” my mother says. “For everything.”
“Oh, it was our pleasure. Henry and I wanted to make sure you feel welcome in our neighborhood,” Mrs. Benson says. “It’s important.”
My mother smiles. “Are those for us?” she asks.
Mrs. Benson looks from me to Ava. Her smile is a little tight-lipped. She tries to hand Ava the plate of cookies, but Ava looks up at my mother as if waiting for approval. My mother takes the cookies, and Mrs. Benson walks toward me. As she gets closer, I can see her better. Her gray-white hair is brittle as straw, and when she leans over I see that she’s very wrinkly. She looks a little nervous, like she’s trying hard to make a good impression but doesn’t quite know what to do or say.
“Is this your young man James?” Mrs. Benson extends her hand to me. I’m sure it’s not her fault, but her old lady’s breath is a little sour, so I pull the collar of my shirt up over my mouth and nose again.
“James?” my father says. “Don’t be rude. Shake the lady’s hand.”
I let my shirt go and shake the old woman’s hand. “Thanks for the cookies,” I say. “I’m sure they’re delicious.”
Mrs. Benson’s smile widens. Her gray eyes sparkle down at me, and she suddenly looks like that cartoon of Mrs. Claus that plays on TV every year.
“Welcome, James. Welcome.” Mrs. Benson pats my hand. Then she lets me go and turns to look at my mother again. “I can’t wait for everyone to meet you and your beautiful children.”
“Everyone?” I ask. “Who’s everyone?”
“The community,” Mrs. Benson explains. “There’s Mr. Brent. He lives down the street, and Mr. and Mrs. Harvey live around the bend. Mr. Morris and his daughter, Betty, are just up the road, over the hill. This street is a circle, so including Ms. Phillips, the Johnsons, Mrs. Coleman, and the Martins, we all live on the same road. But the village is much, much bigger. There are twenty-five streets altogether, with all kinds of families, large and small.”
“Really?” my mother asks. “I didn’t realize we had so many neighbors.”
“Oh, yes.” Mrs. Benson smiles. Her lips form a tight little line that she presses together. “We’re a very close-knit community. But don’t worry about trying to figure out who’s who. You’ll meet them all at the meet and greet this weekend.”
“Meet and greet?” my mother asks.
“Yes, the community voted,” she says. “We’re having a cookout. Oh, don’t worry. It’s nothing fancy. Just a little barbecue. Out here in the quad. In your honor.”
“Oh, that sounds great,” my father says. “I’ll put it on the calendar.”
Beside my mother, my sister is lifting the plastic wrap off the plate of cookies.
“Ooooooh!” Ava says, as she eyes the huge chocolate chip chunks on the thick cookies.
“Not before you wash your hands,” my mother says. “You touched that dirty mushroom out there. Go on.”
“I have to clean up too,” I say, and I run off behind Ava.
While I wait for Ava to wash her hands, I peek into the bedrooms. “Good job on the coin toss,” I tease her. “Big window’s nice.”
“Don’t gloat,” she says, frowning as she walks downstairs.
Later, after a dinner of fish tacos and a quick video game battle in our new living room, I go up to my room. I can’t call my best friends, Beto and Mike, because I put the leftover honey from my road biscuit on Ava’s face while she was sleeping in the car. Baxter went nuts trying to lick her face off, and my mother took my phone away. She said I was distracting my father’s driving, but I think they were just cranky. Four days on the road will do that to parents.
