Felicia- 9/12
First notice the absence of the salutation. I am not in the mood to
call you dear right now. It's not everyday that I move across country to
live with my mother's sister and her family. If it were everyday, I would
have experienced heart failure by now.
Aunt Eileen and Uncle Steve are kind of enthusiastic. Eileen is a
senator here in California. Uncle Steve is a lawyer. He is quite the
amateur chef, too. Or so I've heard.
Ren, Donny and Louis. Where do I begin? Ren is an over-achiever with
a ten-year plan. She must dust her room an average of twice a week, because
dust is a foreign object in her room.
Louis is off the wall. I know it sounds cliché, but I'm oh-so-totally
serious. When I arrived from the airport this morning, he was literally
trying to climb up the living-room wall to retrieve his plastic dart from
where it was stuck on the ceiling. He is as much of an opposite of Ren as
you can get.
Donny can be summed up in two simple words: big jock. There is no
sport that he can't master. No obstacle he can't overcome. As long as the
obstacle has to do with basketball or football, that is.
You know I miss you a lot Felicia. I wish more than anything that I
hadn't left Virginia.
Just remember. It's not my fault I left. It's my parents'.
Kisses,
Evie
I signed my name with a flourish at the bottom of my paper. I felt guilty telling Felicia that I didn't like my family's house. It was true that it wasn't my fault that I left, but it wasn't totally correct that it was my parent's fault that I had been ushered to Sacramento to live in the Stevens household. My mother and father are archeologists whose work has taken them all over the world. A few months ago, they got a chance to go to an excavation in Egypt. I knew it had been my parents' dream to head a dig in Egypt. My father talked all the time about how grand it would be if he stumbled on some find that was thousands of years old. When they got the offer, they almost turned it down. "Now Evie, don't feel guilty. We're not going to go, because we don't want to disrupt our routines now." My mother had said. I knew that my mother really didn't give an owl's butt about our 'routine'. I was the reason they weren't going to go. They couldn't take me with them, for fear that I would get sick, fall behind in my schooling, be unhappy and about three hundred and two other reasons. I crossed my arms over my chest. "Fine." I said. "Don't go there and find some ancient treasure that is wasting away under the sand." I turned my back on them. "If you really want to pass up a chance like this, then stay." I could practically see the longing in my father's eyes. The next day, my mother made a phone call to California. "Eileen." She had said. "You would take her in for a whole year?" "Of course!" Aunt Eileen answered. "She's family. She can stay with us for as long as you want." Aunt Eileen knew that she was helping her little sister achieve her goal. I knew that I had just set myself up for a huge change of scenery. I haven't really given Sacramento a fair chance yet. I just arrived this morning. After a long, uncomfortable flight, I was picked up by My Uncle Steve, and he brought me back to their lovely house. I was shown to the guest bedroom. Uncle Steve left me to unpack my belongings. I've been sitting on the bed in the spare room ever since. I haven't even put my clothes into drawers, I've only unpacked my pen and stationary so I could write Felicia with dismal news of my new surroundings. A sudden burst of laughter caught my attention. I peered into the hall and saw Ren and a short, fair-haired girl coming up the stairs. "Ren, I can't believe you have a new crush! Give me details! I'm dying." The blonde exclaimed. I was taken aback. I hadn't seen Ren in nine years. She was about two feet taller than she had been when we were five. I started to creep back into my room, but Ren spotted me. "Evie, is that you?" She asked. I nodded. She came closer to me. "I haven't seen you since forever! You're so much taller than you were!" I laughed. Ren was taller then me when we were five, and she still dwarfed me by at least four inches. "Taller, maybe," I said. "But no different." "I'm Ruby." The blonde introduced herself. "It looks like Ren can't make fun of short people anymore." Ruby came over and stood next to me. "She's outnumbered." We entered Ren's room. I sat on her bed, and picked at her tattered, old stuffed animal. "You still have this old thing?" I wrinkled my nose. Ren scowled in mock anger. "Leave Mr. Pooky alone." She looked at him. "He is rather worn, isn't he?" I nodded. "Ruby, who is this crush that Ren is talking about?" "I would tell you, Evie, dear, but Ren over here hasn't told me yet, and I want to know desperately who it is." Ruby pouted. "I'll find out sooner or later, Rennie. You might as well tell me now so I don't have to go around asking everyone." Ren pondered this. "Hmmm.should I tell her now, or make her walk a little? She could use the exercise." "Ren!" Ruby screamed. "Okay, it's-." Ren stopped mid-sentence when Louis opened the door. "Hey Braniac, we need your help." He said simply. "We have a little plumbing problem." Another young man popped his head into the room. "Um. Ren?" He said nervously. "Louis has made the biggest understatement of his little lifetime. We have a huge pipe problem on our hands." He pointed to Ruby and me. "It's kind of hard to miss that you have company right now, but maybe they could help." Ren's face darkened. "What kind of catastrophe are we talking about? Goldfish in the toilet bowl? No hot water? No running water? Purple water? What?" She patted me on the head. "And Evie's not company. She's our cousin. She'll be living with us for a while." She placed her hands on her hips. "Now take me to the source of your problem." The tall boy who was standing next to Louis laughed. "The source of the problem is about five and a half feet tall, with brown hair and brown eyes." He raised his eyebrows. "Oh yeah, and he goes by Louis Stevens." I glanced at Louis. He was biting his lip. I could only imagine what Louis had done. I couldn't help but wonder if he was like this all of the time. Somehow, I guessed that my year would become a whole lot more confusing. Ren narrowed her eyes. "Twitty!" She muttered through gritted teeth. "Just tell me if what happened can be fixed before my mother and father get back home from work." "Twitty?" I questioned uncertainly. "Your name is Twitty?" I was confused. Where I came from, A Twit was a name you called someone who wasn't the sharpest crayon in the box. "Oh, no." He waved his hand nonchalantly. "Alan's my first name, Twitty's my last. I just go by Twitty. And Ren," He added. "This isn't going to be something easy to mend." Ruby, Ren and I followed Louis down the stairs, through the kitchen and into the laundry room. Louis opened a door and turned on an overhead light.
The bulb let off only a small glow, but it wasn't that hard to see what had covered the bottom of the basement. Five little letters had caused the five of us a major trouble. And those letters were W-A-T-E-R. "Ooh." I groaned. This is bad. Lou, how did you do this? I mean it's understandable that you like to get into adventures, but can you ever do that safely? Why don't--." "Cool off, Evie." Louis interrupted. "You'll pop a freckle. You didn't let me tell my side of the story." I touched my nose protectively. I had been the only person in my family besides Aunt Eileen who had been blessed with freckles. I believe I was cursed with them. Ruby snorted. "Do you really think that your side of the story will help ease the Wrath of Ren?" "Nope." Louis answered. "But it's worth a try." He clapped his hands. "Okay." He cleared his throat. "It's very simple, you see." He pointed. "It's Twitty's fault." He started to go back up the stairs, but Twittly leaped up and caught him by his collar. "You dork!" Twitty exclaimed. "If you're going to blame it on someone at least blame it on Tawny. She started it all." "Fine!" Louis sat down on a wooden step. "Tawny came over this morning, before Evie got in and showed us these great pictures of clothes that her father designed. He's an artist.well a psychiatrist too, anyway, she offered to teach me how the clothes were made. "I called Twitty to see if he wanted to come over and we could make the jackets like Tawny said. The paint we used on the jackets had to set in water for, like, two hours so it wouldn't dry up and crack when we wore them. That is where it all started." Louis paused dramatically. "We didn't have anything big enough to soak the coats in, so we went over to Mrs. Bradero's house next door, and got her kids' play pool. We dragged it over here and." "Does this story have an end?" Ren interrupted. "Yes." Louis sent a pointed look in his sister's direction. "We pulled the hose through the window up there." He pointed. "Tawny went home for lunch, and it was taking a really long time for the tub to fill up, so Twitty and I went out to shoot some hoops. After we finished, I helped mom take in the groceries, and Twitty left. I went to the living room to play darts with Donny, and then Haley got here." He shrugged. "Now it's history." I tapped my foot on the step. "Didn't it occur to you to go check the pool?" Louis hadn't changed since I had seen him last. He was still the same pranking, joking kid. Louis sighed. "Of course I thought of that. In fact, Twitty said he would turn the flow off before he went home, and that was six hours ago." Everyone turned to Twitty who was slowly backing out of the basement door. I grabbed his ear and yanked. "Ow, ow, ow!" He yelled. "Jeez. I see you take after Ren! You two are both violent." Ruby put her hands on her hips. "So it's not Brillo-head's fault. It's Mr. I-desperately-need-a-hair-cut's fault!" "I just got a hair-cut last week!" Twitty said fingering his just-below-ear- length hair. "We need to pump this water out." I stooped down and estimated the space between two steps. "There are six steps covered by the water so because each step is about seven inches away from each other, there is about three feet of standing water in your basement." I checked my watch. "Your parents are coming home in two hours, too." I looked at Ruby who was staring intently at my head. "What?" I questioned. "I happen to like math." Ruby shook her head. "It's just, you are more like Ren than either of you would like to admit." My grandmother had always gotten me and Ren mixed up when we were little. And she only saw us once every year. Besides the height barrier, Ren and I looked fairly similar. We both had straight, brown hair, and comparable features. My eyes were greener, like Louis's, though. The phone began to ring, and Ren left the basement to answer it. Louis, Twitty, Ruby and I followed her. "Oh, hi mom!" Ren said into the receiver. "I'm fine. So are Louis and Haley. Nothing's going on! What have you heard?" She asked nervously. I silently pantomimed myself dying a gruesome death, and Louis slapped his forehead. "She's cooking her own goose! Isn't she?" Louis whispered. "You're right, mom, I'm just kidding." She listened. "Oh. You and dad got theatre tickets? In Willow Valley? But mom! Willow Valley is sixty miles away! What? Uh, uh. Yep. I know it's a great opportunity. We will. I promise." She paused. "I love you, too. Bye." Ren hung up the phone. "And?" Ruby asked impatiently. "My parents are going to dinner and the theatre, and." She smiled. "They won't be home until 1:00 AM."
"Twitty, go phone your parents and tell them that your staying the night." I said. "Louis get your swim trunks on, and lend Twitty a pair. Ruby, you and I will use Ren's extra bathing suits. Meet in the basement and if Donny comes home and asks what is going on, tell him it's a surprise." I threw up my hands. "For him." Louis smiled. "I work well under pressure."
Twenty minutes later, we were all sitting on the cellar steps, brooding over how to attack our predicament. "When I went to Boy Scout camp, we use to have to pump out our canoes when we came back from our trips." Twitty declared. "Does anyone have a pump?" "I do." Ruby spoke up. "I think I do, at least. It's this weird looking thing that my step-dad uses to get the water out of out gutters when they get clogged because of heavy rain." She laughed. "The only reason I thought of that just now is because the last time the gutters got clogged, my step- dad was shouting obscenities at a squirrel who had knocked the pump out of his hand." Ruby got up and brushed her hands on her legs. "I'll call my little bro and make him bring it over here. He owes me." She left the basement, and went to find the phone. I groaned and sat back on the first step. Ren stood up and yelled, "Lou, don't touch the water!" I glanced at Louis who was perched on the banister, in form for a dive into the shadowy water. "Don't have a heart attack, Ren, I wasn't gonna jump!" He smiled devilishly. "I was going to cannon ball!" "Louis," I said. "Did I ever tell you that you are my favorite cousin?" I patted him on the top of his head. He looked interested. "Really?" HE gave me a hug. "You never told me that." "That's because you're not! Shut up and listen to your sister, before I rearrange you so much that you will be listening to me yell at you with your feet!" I screamed, panting for breath. "I got it!" Ruby shouted triumphantly. She held up a bright orange appliance with a spout on one end, and a handle at the top. There was an opening at the bottom of the pump where the water came through. "My brother, Freddie, rode over on his bike." I looked across the room. The window was about two feet above the water; perfect position to drive the water through the pump, and outside. "I hate to be the pessimist here, but has anyone thought about how we can get safely from over here on dry steps, to over there." I pointed to the window. Ruby scrunched up her face and groaned. "Another obstacle." She said. Ren snapped her fingers. "Hey Louis. Remember when Donny went through that phase with those inflatable chairs that are stashed in the hall closet. Get them. " She bit her lip. "We can use those to get over there. They should be buoyant enough to hold us." Three hours later, I shifted my position in the chair. "This really isn't necessary." I stated plainly. "It's nine o'clock. I'm going to stand up." "No!" Louis, Twitty and Ruby screamed at the same time. My eyes widened. "Why the heck not?" "She's right, you guys." Ren said. "Let Haley see how deep it is." I slid off of my raft and shivered. The water was frigid. It had receded in volume. "IT only comes up to my shin now." I waded over to Twitty. "Are you okay? You look like you are about to keel over." I leaned on his raft. "I think I am about to keel over." He confirmed. "I've been pumping for an hour. Who is going to pump now?" Twitty stopped pumping and wiped his forehead. "Lou?" "Sorry, muchacho. I pumped for an hour total and I think my arm is permanently bent." Louis rubbed his arm. "Evie?" "Sorry, Twitty." I said. "I only pumped for twenty minutes, but my left arm is like jelly." "What about your right arm?" Ren asked hopefully. I grimaced. "I dunno. I'm a leftie. If I were to pump for twenty more minutes with my right arm, I'd bet I wouldn't even make a change in the water." "Ren pumped for twenty, so I'll try and pump for a while now." Ruby said. Twitty jumped down from his position on the inflatable chair with a splash. "Thanks, Rube." He said. "You're a life saver." I walked slowly over to the stairs and stopped mid-step. "Omigod! What the heck is on the floor? I'm almost afraid to look." I reached down and cringed. The fabric-like thing felt greasy and slimy. "Louis. I found your jacket. The evil object that started this whole fiasco." I wrinkled my nose. "Why would you even want to make these? They're ugly!" "They were a lot more attractive before the basement flooded." Louis said.
We alternated turns pumping. At about eleven o'clock, the water had diminished to such a small amount, that the pump couldn't reach the window to transfer it outside. When that happened, the water was pumped into a bucket, and Ruby and I took turns in dumping it outside. When the water disappeared, the boys went to sleep, while Ren, Ruby and I towel-dried the cellar floor. "This has certainly been an adventure." Ren sighed and wiped her matted hair away from her eyes. "Let's go to sleep. My parents should be home soon." I trudged up the steps, rubbing my eyes. I crept into my sleeping bag without even brushing my teeth. "Hey Ren." I heard Ruby ask as I drifted off to sleep. "Who IS your crush?" I wasn't awake for the answer.
"Atchoo!" I sneezed loudly as I slumped into the chair at the breakfast table. Louis's head was becoming dangerously close to his oatmeal. His curly head bobbed for a few seconds in midair and finally took the plunge-into his cereal. "Lou!" I hissed. I shook his shoulders. "Louis, wake uhhh." I trailed off. My face screwed up in expectation of the sneeze. "Ahhhhh!" I grabbed a table napkin and held it up to my nose. "Achoooooooooooooo!" Aunt Eileen felt my forehead. "Haley, are you coming down with something?" "I'll be fine, Aunt Eileen." I answered with a smile. Or at least it was as much of a smile as I could muster. "Did you have a good time at the show last night?" I changed the subject.
I signed my name with a flourish at the bottom of my paper. I felt guilty telling Felicia that I didn't like my family's house. It was true that it wasn't my fault that I left, but it wasn't totally correct that it was my parent's fault that I had been ushered to Sacramento to live in the Stevens household. My mother and father are archeologists whose work has taken them all over the world. A few months ago, they got a chance to go to an excavation in Egypt. I knew it had been my parents' dream to head a dig in Egypt. My father talked all the time about how grand it would be if he stumbled on some find that was thousands of years old. When they got the offer, they almost turned it down. "Now Evie, don't feel guilty. We're not going to go, because we don't want to disrupt our routines now." My mother had said. I knew that my mother really didn't give an owl's butt about our 'routine'. I was the reason they weren't going to go. They couldn't take me with them, for fear that I would get sick, fall behind in my schooling, be unhappy and about three hundred and two other reasons. I crossed my arms over my chest. "Fine." I said. "Don't go there and find some ancient treasure that is wasting away under the sand." I turned my back on them. "If you really want to pass up a chance like this, then stay." I could practically see the longing in my father's eyes. The next day, my mother made a phone call to California. "Eileen." She had said. "You would take her in for a whole year?" "Of course!" Aunt Eileen answered. "She's family. She can stay with us for as long as you want." Aunt Eileen knew that she was helping her little sister achieve her goal. I knew that I had just set myself up for a huge change of scenery. I haven't really given Sacramento a fair chance yet. I just arrived this morning. After a long, uncomfortable flight, I was picked up by My Uncle Steve, and he brought me back to their lovely house. I was shown to the guest bedroom. Uncle Steve left me to unpack my belongings. I've been sitting on the bed in the spare room ever since. I haven't even put my clothes into drawers, I've only unpacked my pen and stationary so I could write Felicia with dismal news of my new surroundings. A sudden burst of laughter caught my attention. I peered into the hall and saw Ren and a short, fair-haired girl coming up the stairs. "Ren, I can't believe you have a new crush! Give me details! I'm dying." The blonde exclaimed. I was taken aback. I hadn't seen Ren in nine years. She was about two feet taller than she had been when we were five. I started to creep back into my room, but Ren spotted me. "Evie, is that you?" She asked. I nodded. She came closer to me. "I haven't seen you since forever! You're so much taller than you were!" I laughed. Ren was taller then me when we were five, and she still dwarfed me by at least four inches. "Taller, maybe," I said. "But no different." "I'm Ruby." The blonde introduced herself. "It looks like Ren can't make fun of short people anymore." Ruby came over and stood next to me. "She's outnumbered." We entered Ren's room. I sat on her bed, and picked at her tattered, old stuffed animal. "You still have this old thing?" I wrinkled my nose. Ren scowled in mock anger. "Leave Mr. Pooky alone." She looked at him. "He is rather worn, isn't he?" I nodded. "Ruby, who is this crush that Ren is talking about?" "I would tell you, Evie, dear, but Ren over here hasn't told me yet, and I want to know desperately who it is." Ruby pouted. "I'll find out sooner or later, Rennie. You might as well tell me now so I don't have to go around asking everyone." Ren pondered this. "Hmmm.should I tell her now, or make her walk a little? She could use the exercise." "Ren!" Ruby screamed. "Okay, it's-." Ren stopped mid-sentence when Louis opened the door. "Hey Braniac, we need your help." He said simply. "We have a little plumbing problem." Another young man popped his head into the room. "Um. Ren?" He said nervously. "Louis has made the biggest understatement of his little lifetime. We have a huge pipe problem on our hands." He pointed to Ruby and me. "It's kind of hard to miss that you have company right now, but maybe they could help." Ren's face darkened. "What kind of catastrophe are we talking about? Goldfish in the toilet bowl? No hot water? No running water? Purple water? What?" She patted me on the head. "And Evie's not company. She's our cousin. She'll be living with us for a while." She placed her hands on her hips. "Now take me to the source of your problem." The tall boy who was standing next to Louis laughed. "The source of the problem is about five and a half feet tall, with brown hair and brown eyes." He raised his eyebrows. "Oh yeah, and he goes by Louis Stevens." I glanced at Louis. He was biting his lip. I could only imagine what Louis had done. I couldn't help but wonder if he was like this all of the time. Somehow, I guessed that my year would become a whole lot more confusing. Ren narrowed her eyes. "Twitty!" She muttered through gritted teeth. "Just tell me if what happened can be fixed before my mother and father get back home from work." "Twitty?" I questioned uncertainly. "Your name is Twitty?" I was confused. Where I came from, A Twit was a name you called someone who wasn't the sharpest crayon in the box. "Oh, no." He waved his hand nonchalantly. "Alan's my first name, Twitty's my last. I just go by Twitty. And Ren," He added. "This isn't going to be something easy to mend." Ruby, Ren and I followed Louis down the stairs, through the kitchen and into the laundry room. Louis opened a door and turned on an overhead light.
The bulb let off only a small glow, but it wasn't that hard to see what had covered the bottom of the basement. Five little letters had caused the five of us a major trouble. And those letters were W-A-T-E-R. "Ooh." I groaned. This is bad. Lou, how did you do this? I mean it's understandable that you like to get into adventures, but can you ever do that safely? Why don't--." "Cool off, Evie." Louis interrupted. "You'll pop a freckle. You didn't let me tell my side of the story." I touched my nose protectively. I had been the only person in my family besides Aunt Eileen who had been blessed with freckles. I believe I was cursed with them. Ruby snorted. "Do you really think that your side of the story will help ease the Wrath of Ren?" "Nope." Louis answered. "But it's worth a try." He clapped his hands. "Okay." He cleared his throat. "It's very simple, you see." He pointed. "It's Twitty's fault." He started to go back up the stairs, but Twittly leaped up and caught him by his collar. "You dork!" Twitty exclaimed. "If you're going to blame it on someone at least blame it on Tawny. She started it all." "Fine!" Louis sat down on a wooden step. "Tawny came over this morning, before Evie got in and showed us these great pictures of clothes that her father designed. He's an artist.well a psychiatrist too, anyway, she offered to teach me how the clothes were made. "I called Twitty to see if he wanted to come over and we could make the jackets like Tawny said. The paint we used on the jackets had to set in water for, like, two hours so it wouldn't dry up and crack when we wore them. That is where it all started." Louis paused dramatically. "We didn't have anything big enough to soak the coats in, so we went over to Mrs. Bradero's house next door, and got her kids' play pool. We dragged it over here and." "Does this story have an end?" Ren interrupted. "Yes." Louis sent a pointed look in his sister's direction. "We pulled the hose through the window up there." He pointed. "Tawny went home for lunch, and it was taking a really long time for the tub to fill up, so Twitty and I went out to shoot some hoops. After we finished, I helped mom take in the groceries, and Twitty left. I went to the living room to play darts with Donny, and then Haley got here." He shrugged. "Now it's history." I tapped my foot on the step. "Didn't it occur to you to go check the pool?" Louis hadn't changed since I had seen him last. He was still the same pranking, joking kid. Louis sighed. "Of course I thought of that. In fact, Twitty said he would turn the flow off before he went home, and that was six hours ago." Everyone turned to Twitty who was slowly backing out of the basement door. I grabbed his ear and yanked. "Ow, ow, ow!" He yelled. "Jeez. I see you take after Ren! You two are both violent." Ruby put her hands on her hips. "So it's not Brillo-head's fault. It's Mr. I-desperately-need-a-hair-cut's fault!" "I just got a hair-cut last week!" Twitty said fingering his just-below-ear- length hair. "We need to pump this water out." I stooped down and estimated the space between two steps. "There are six steps covered by the water so because each step is about seven inches away from each other, there is about three feet of standing water in your basement." I checked my watch. "Your parents are coming home in two hours, too." I looked at Ruby who was staring intently at my head. "What?" I questioned. "I happen to like math." Ruby shook her head. "It's just, you are more like Ren than either of you would like to admit." My grandmother had always gotten me and Ren mixed up when we were little. And she only saw us once every year. Besides the height barrier, Ren and I looked fairly similar. We both had straight, brown hair, and comparable features. My eyes were greener, like Louis's, though. The phone began to ring, and Ren left the basement to answer it. Louis, Twitty, Ruby and I followed her. "Oh, hi mom!" Ren said into the receiver. "I'm fine. So are Louis and Haley. Nothing's going on! What have you heard?" She asked nervously. I silently pantomimed myself dying a gruesome death, and Louis slapped his forehead. "She's cooking her own goose! Isn't she?" Louis whispered. "You're right, mom, I'm just kidding." She listened. "Oh. You and dad got theatre tickets? In Willow Valley? But mom! Willow Valley is sixty miles away! What? Uh, uh. Yep. I know it's a great opportunity. We will. I promise." She paused. "I love you, too. Bye." Ren hung up the phone. "And?" Ruby asked impatiently. "My parents are going to dinner and the theatre, and." She smiled. "They won't be home until 1:00 AM."
"Twitty, go phone your parents and tell them that your staying the night." I said. "Louis get your swim trunks on, and lend Twitty a pair. Ruby, you and I will use Ren's extra bathing suits. Meet in the basement and if Donny comes home and asks what is going on, tell him it's a surprise." I threw up my hands. "For him." Louis smiled. "I work well under pressure."
Twenty minutes later, we were all sitting on the cellar steps, brooding over how to attack our predicament. "When I went to Boy Scout camp, we use to have to pump out our canoes when we came back from our trips." Twitty declared. "Does anyone have a pump?" "I do." Ruby spoke up. "I think I do, at least. It's this weird looking thing that my step-dad uses to get the water out of out gutters when they get clogged because of heavy rain." She laughed. "The only reason I thought of that just now is because the last time the gutters got clogged, my step- dad was shouting obscenities at a squirrel who had knocked the pump out of his hand." Ruby got up and brushed her hands on her legs. "I'll call my little bro and make him bring it over here. He owes me." She left the basement, and went to find the phone. I groaned and sat back on the first step. Ren stood up and yelled, "Lou, don't touch the water!" I glanced at Louis who was perched on the banister, in form for a dive into the shadowy water. "Don't have a heart attack, Ren, I wasn't gonna jump!" He smiled devilishly. "I was going to cannon ball!" "Louis," I said. "Did I ever tell you that you are my favorite cousin?" I patted him on the top of his head. He looked interested. "Really?" HE gave me a hug. "You never told me that." "That's because you're not! Shut up and listen to your sister, before I rearrange you so much that you will be listening to me yell at you with your feet!" I screamed, panting for breath. "I got it!" Ruby shouted triumphantly. She held up a bright orange appliance with a spout on one end, and a handle at the top. There was an opening at the bottom of the pump where the water came through. "My brother, Freddie, rode over on his bike." I looked across the room. The window was about two feet above the water; perfect position to drive the water through the pump, and outside. "I hate to be the pessimist here, but has anyone thought about how we can get safely from over here on dry steps, to over there." I pointed to the window. Ruby scrunched up her face and groaned. "Another obstacle." She said. Ren snapped her fingers. "Hey Louis. Remember when Donny went through that phase with those inflatable chairs that are stashed in the hall closet. Get them. " She bit her lip. "We can use those to get over there. They should be buoyant enough to hold us." Three hours later, I shifted my position in the chair. "This really isn't necessary." I stated plainly. "It's nine o'clock. I'm going to stand up." "No!" Louis, Twitty and Ruby screamed at the same time. My eyes widened. "Why the heck not?" "She's right, you guys." Ren said. "Let Haley see how deep it is." I slid off of my raft and shivered. The water was frigid. It had receded in volume. "IT only comes up to my shin now." I waded over to Twitty. "Are you okay? You look like you are about to keel over." I leaned on his raft. "I think I am about to keel over." He confirmed. "I've been pumping for an hour. Who is going to pump now?" Twitty stopped pumping and wiped his forehead. "Lou?" "Sorry, muchacho. I pumped for an hour total and I think my arm is permanently bent." Louis rubbed his arm. "Evie?" "Sorry, Twitty." I said. "I only pumped for twenty minutes, but my left arm is like jelly." "What about your right arm?" Ren asked hopefully. I grimaced. "I dunno. I'm a leftie. If I were to pump for twenty more minutes with my right arm, I'd bet I wouldn't even make a change in the water." "Ren pumped for twenty, so I'll try and pump for a while now." Ruby said. Twitty jumped down from his position on the inflatable chair with a splash. "Thanks, Rube." He said. "You're a life saver." I walked slowly over to the stairs and stopped mid-step. "Omigod! What the heck is on the floor? I'm almost afraid to look." I reached down and cringed. The fabric-like thing felt greasy and slimy. "Louis. I found your jacket. The evil object that started this whole fiasco." I wrinkled my nose. "Why would you even want to make these? They're ugly!" "They were a lot more attractive before the basement flooded." Louis said.
We alternated turns pumping. At about eleven o'clock, the water had diminished to such a small amount, that the pump couldn't reach the window to transfer it outside. When that happened, the water was pumped into a bucket, and Ruby and I took turns in dumping it outside. When the water disappeared, the boys went to sleep, while Ren, Ruby and I towel-dried the cellar floor. "This has certainly been an adventure." Ren sighed and wiped her matted hair away from her eyes. "Let's go to sleep. My parents should be home soon." I trudged up the steps, rubbing my eyes. I crept into my sleeping bag without even brushing my teeth. "Hey Ren." I heard Ruby ask as I drifted off to sleep. "Who IS your crush?" I wasn't awake for the answer.
"Atchoo!" I sneezed loudly as I slumped into the chair at the breakfast table. Louis's head was becoming dangerously close to his oatmeal. His curly head bobbed for a few seconds in midair and finally took the plunge-into his cereal. "Lou!" I hissed. I shook his shoulders. "Louis, wake uhhh." I trailed off. My face screwed up in expectation of the sneeze. "Ahhhhh!" I grabbed a table napkin and held it up to my nose. "Achoooooooooooooo!" Aunt Eileen felt my forehead. "Haley, are you coming down with something?" "I'll be fine, Aunt Eileen." I answered with a smile. Or at least it was as much of a smile as I could muster. "Did you have a good time at the show last night?" I changed the subject.