Leeva at Last

Leeva Thornblossom flew outside the instant she heard the Nutsmore Weekly thunk against the door. Fetching the newspaper was the only time her parents permitted her in the front yard.

Ignoring the paper, she jumped off the step and waded through the weeds to the towering hedge that surrounded her yard. There, she knelt and cautiously worked her hands into the sharp-needled branches to open a sight line. Whoever delivered the paper was long gone, as always, but her eyes swept the sidewalk and yes! She was in luck today: a woman gripping a little boy by the hand, approaching from the right.

Leeva scarcely blinked as they drew near. First, she would call out a bright Hello! Then, when the woman located her in the hedge, she’d add … well, this was the hard part. What Leeva had always ached to say to someone was, I am here! And you are here! But somehow those words seemed too important to call through a hedge. Besides, what would she say next?

Just as the woman reached the edge of Leeva’s yard, she scooped up the toddler and crossed the street.

Again! Why did people always do this, as if avoiding an invisible barbed wire fence? Crestfallen, Leeva watched the woman hurry past on the far sidewalk, the little boy jouncing on her hip, until she was out of sight.

Better luck next week, she told herself as she plodded back to pick up the paper. There on the step, she flipped through it, looking for the Improve Your Vocabulary column filler—there was never any actual news in the paper, but a new word, complete with definition, every week, at least she had that. Before she found it, though, a headline caught her eye.

And Reader, for the first time ever, Leeva saw actual news: Nutsmore Announces Opening Day of School for Children Six and Older.

Well, she practically toppled over into the doorway briars in her shock. Her town had built a school! And since she was somewhere between eight and nine—not knowing her birthday, she had never been able to calculate her age exactly—she would be going to this school! At last, it was out into the world for her, in only—she checked the announcement—five weeks and three days.

She would tell her parents after dinner, when they were in the least rotten of the moods they simmered in all day.

Wait, that’s silly, she chided herself out loud as she ducked through the briars and went inside. Her mother was Nutsmore’s mayor and her father was its treasurer. Surely they already knew about this new school.

Then why hadn’t they told her?

Was it possible they were planning to surprise her? On the soap opera she watched, The Winds of Our Tides, the Cleverton family always made a big deal of revealing joyous news to their twin daughters: For you, darlings! Ta-da! Granted, this kind of parent-like behavior was wholly unlike her own mother and father, but there was a first time for everything.

It was hard to wait for them to get back from work.

Leeva solved the bookkeeping problem her father had left for her and signed it with a flourish. She sharpened the toes of her mother’s shoes and rushed through the rest of her regular duties. Then she threw herself into the exercises on Vim and Vigor at Any Age with extra vim and vigor and turned on The Winds of Our Tides with a new, warm sense of connection—those twin Cleverton daughters attended school and now so would she.

Unfortunately, though, today the show opened with the scene that Leeva always dreaded. This scene was so upsetting she usually closed her eyes when it occurred. Today she kept them open.

Bedtime! the Cleverton parents called. When the twins scampered up obediently, the parents patted their daughters’ heads and hugged those girls so tightly you’d think they were hurtling off into outer space instead of climbing into side-by-side beds, each with its own pretty quilt.

The soap opera parents squeezed those girls as if they couldn’t bear to be away from them for a single night.

They squeezed them as if they were precious.

Watching it now, an odd cry accidentally escaped Leeva’s throat—something between a gasp and a wail. She snapped off the television. Then she carried the Nutsmore Weekly to her thinking spot, which was the place between two cabinets where a dishwasher used to be until her parents sold it, noticing that Leeva had grown tall enough to reach the sink.

Leeva did her best brain work in this empty spot, right from the first day it had appeared. On that day, she’d sunk to the floor in shock. If she spent, say, half an hour a day doing dishes for the next ten years, she’d be at the sink a total of—even so young, she calculated easily—109,560 minutes. Then something worse struck her: her parents had traded those 109,560 minutes of hers—minutes they might have spent enjoying her company—for only fifty dollars. My parents don’t find me very valuable, was the depressing conclusion she’d drawn.

Today, her thoughts were more cheerful—School! Finally out into the world!—as she sank down crosslegged with the newspaper. Before turning to stare at the miraculous announcement again, she hunted down the Improve Your Vocabulary word: Deluxe—Notably luxurious or sumptuous; of a superior kind. The word was good enough to produce a tingle, which only happened with the best of them.

When her parents’ car crunched into the driveway at 6:20, she got up. Gazing into the refrigerator, she heaved a sigh. Didn’t a night like this call for a celebratory dinner, maybe even a meal for herself? But no, all she saw now was the same grim stuff she’d seen every day since her parents had decreed her big enough to prepare their food. She hasn’t made us any richer, she hasn’t made us any more famous. She might as well serve us our meals! had been their exact words.

Reader, let’s pause for a moment and have a look inside this fridge to see what caused her deep sighs.

Food in the Thornblossom household fell into two categories, neither of which could be labeled deluxe.

Leeva’s father bought only from the Cheap-O Depot Grocery Warehouse and only what was moldering on their Rock-Bottom Sale shelf. Mostly this was Cheezaroni.

Cheezaroni bore a glancing resemblance to macaroni and cheese, except that the macaroni and the cheese were indistinguishable from each other and they were both indistinguishable from the box, so even when you followed the instructions perfectly, what you ended up with was a flavorless cardboardy mash that smelled powerfully of feet. Once a month, Mr. Thornblossom had Leeva bake up dozens of these food bricks, thereby reducing the cost of turning on the oven, and stack them on his side of the fridge. He ate them night and day.

The items on her mother’s side were quite different. Celebrities This Week magazine was filled with famous people dining on trendy dishes, and Mrs. Thornblossom purchased them all. Last week, an actor had been spotted in a restaurant smacking his lips over an eel custard with boar’s knuckle jelly, and so that’s what Leeva was sighing at right now.

She had managed to subsist on the leftovers from her parents’ meals, but she was hungry all the time. She was hungry now, and she would be just as hungry when she fell into bed.

She prepared her parents’ plates and brought them into the living room right on time, at exactly 6:40.

Two television sets blared across the room. Leeva’s father was tuned to Money Talks!, tapping the figures that flashed across the screen into his calculator. Her mother stared hang-jawed at Celebrities Tonight!

Leeva set the plates on the trays in front of them, crawling on her hands and knees so as not to disturb their viewing, and then sat on her stool in the corner to wait.

Reader, we’ll take a break here, too. Regrettably, you have to meet Leeva’s parents.

Leeva’s parents cared about one thing only, and it certainly wasn’t Leeva.

Well, each one cared about one thing only.

Leeva’s mother cared about FAME. As mayor of Nutsmore, she made sure people knew who she was. Fame is the most powerful power there is, she liked to say. When the townspeople objected to something she did, she would shoot them a glare hot enough to fry bacon. Don’t you know who I am? she’d demand. If you have a complaint, I will fire you. Do you have a complaint?

No was the only acceptable answer.

Once in a while, some unlucky townsperson would make the mistake of asking, Fire me? From what job?

The job of being mayored by me, was her answer. Also, now I’m fining you a Talk-Back Tax. Stop talking and go away.

The best thing about Leeva’s mother was her shoes. She had hundreds of pairs. Along with her hair, which she wore stacked in a tower, the five-inch heels gave her a powerful height advantage and a signature look. The toes, sharpened by Leeva daily, could splinter shins. The stiletto heels, specially crafted with crystal beads at the bottoms, went clink-clink-clink when she tottered around and scritch-scritch-scritch when she ground them in fury. These brittle sounds were what made the shoes the best things about her—at least people always knew when to get out of Malicia Thornblossom’s way.

Leeva’s father, Nutsmore’s treasurer, cared only about MONEY. He collected gobs of it, wads of it, mountains of it from the citizens of Nutsmore. He stuffed this cash into shoeboxes (which he got for free, you can guess where) and stored it in a locked bedroom upstairs.

The best thing about Dolton Thornblossom was …

Actually, there was nothing good about him at all.

Reader, by now you might be wondering why these two despicably selfish human beings ever had a child.

Well, Mrs. Thornblossom, as we’ve seen, was obsessed with fame. One evening, she saw a piece on Celebrities Tonight! about how many movie stars were having babies. Here’s Hollywood’s most famous couple with their new little bundle of joy, cooed the show’s host.

A baby is a fashion accessory that adds to one’s signature look, Mrs. Thornblossom mused, checking the mirror she had hung beside her chair and patting her hair-stack. Like a pocketbook. We’ll get one.

Mr. Thornblossom’s fingers hovered over his calculator. Will it bring us more money?

This is the crucial moment, Reader. Leeva would not exist, and therefore this book would not exist, if the answer to his question had been No.

But Leeva’s mother, considering her husband’s question, turned back to her television show for guidance. And just then, the host announced that on the very day that Hollywood’s most famous couple had brought their baby home, they had signed a contract to star in a movie for more money than any actor and actress had ever been paid.

Fame and money, all from one little bundle of joy!

Hunh …, Mr. Thornblossom said, paying full attention now. Okay.

And so, nine months later, Leeva was born.

Did having a child make these two any richer, any more famous? No, of course not. Only a nincompoop would have believed it would.

All right, you’ve heard enough. Back to the story.

Once her parents had finished their dinners, Leeva positioned herself where she could address them both and cleared her throat. Mother? Father? Do you have some news to tell me? She stretched out her arms to welcome their surprise.

Leeva’s mother, staring at her television set from her throne-like chair, commented on how notable Taffy Glamoo’s new hairdo was. Leeva’s father, in his recliner, jabbed his calculator keys at a determined clip.

Leeva felt her arms drop a little bit. I’m ready for your news, she tried again.

Leeva’s father hunched closer over his calculator, muttering. Her mother turned up the volume on her set.

Leeva’s arms gave up. She looked down at her hands, their nails bitten as neatly as she could manage. At the brown braids she’d carefully finger-combed falling over her faded yellow dress. After years of comparing herself to the child stars in her mother’s magazines and to the twins on The Winds of Our Tides, she knew what a disappointment she was. Still, she did exist. How, then, could her parents act as if they didn’t see her or hear her? It was a question she asked herself every time she tried to talk with them. Tonight, with the exciting news hanging in the air, it was especially vexing.

Leeva tried one more time. Isn’t Nutsmore getting something wonderful?

Her mother finally looked up. She blew a quick kiss at her reflection in the mirror and then nodded. Oh, yes, that. I don’t know how you found out, but yes.

Oh, thank you, thank you! I’m so excited, Leeva cried, exactly the way the twin Cleverton girls greeted all their surprises.

You should be excited, Mayor Thornblossom agreed. Everyone will be.

Mr. Thornblossom cast a suspicious glance over at his wife.

I’ve commissioned a statue of myself, she told him. At his look of alarm, she flapped calm-down hands and added, Paid for by the townspeople, of course.

What? Leeva said. But that isn’t—

It’s a well-known fact that statues are of famous people. And famous people have statues.

No, I was talking about—

Fifty feet tall. I’ve hired a separate sculptor for the shoes. Gold-plated, five feet high at the heels.

Leeva shuddered. Life-size, her mother’s shoes were alarming enough. "But I meant this, she said, presenting the newspaper. Nutsmore has a school now! And I’m going!"

You’re not going, Mayor Thornblossom said with breathtaking finality. She had a lot of practice decreeing that people couldn’t do things, and