The Rule of Threes, Marcy Campbell [short novels to read .TXT] 📗

Sherman’s office. Heck, maybe I could redesign Mr. V’s office. Why not?

I stood back, looked again, and smiled. This was probably our best job yet.

“Done!” I declared.

Olive’s mom came to pick us up. Noah was asleep in his car seat, and Olive sat next to him with me on her other side.

“He’s always falling asleep in the car,” she whispered to me. “Sometimes my mom takes him for a drive when she can’t get him to sleep any other way.”

I wondered what it would be like to have a baby brother, crying in the night, making a mess of everything. I used to think the worst part of having a baby sibling was that they’d break your stuff, but apparently breaking stuff was something some people never grew out of. I shook the thought from my head and instead looked out as all the familiar stores and houses went by my window.

I noticed the brightly painted doors on Elm, as though all the neighbors on the block had gotten together with a bunch of color swatches and decided to make something beautiful. I thought of the outer office and felt a little flutter in my chest that I realized must have been pride. We’d just done something huge, a major design project for our new school that would really help us make a name for ourselves. Maybe someday I’d be accepting a mega design award, and I’d point back to this very contest as the moment that started it all.

And we’d done it with just the two of us, although Rachel had helped in the beginning, and Tony had helped later on. Come to think of it, I guessed there were always three people involved, just not the same three. And of course, there was Grandma, who didn’t do any hands-on work but always inspired me. Would she be there to see me get an award someday? I didn’t want to think about that, either.

Olive leaned over as I got out of the car. “You did good,” she whispered, careful not to wake Noah.

“We did good,” I whispered back.

Mom opened the front door before I got to it.

“Where were you?” she asked, looking confused. I noticed she was wearing the same striped top and sweatpants she’d had on yesterday.

“At school with Olive, remember? We were setting up the room? Dad took the bookcase over there yesterday.”

“Oh . . . yes, yes, that’s right.” She stepped aside to let me in and pulled her limp, kind of greasy-looking hair back into a ponytail with an elastic she had around her wrist.

“How’s Grandma?” I asked, because I had a feeling my mom’s messy look had something to do with her. “Is she . . . okay?” Okay wasn’t the right word, but I didn’t have another one.

Mom said, “I was just on the phone with the assisted living facility about the room we’re waiting for in the memory care unit. They still don’t have one, but there’s a room in another unit, and they could transfer her later, and I really think . . .”

She paused, and it seemed like she was figuring something out. Then she put an arm around me and squeezed me close. “I don’t need to bother you with this stuff,” she said. “We’ll get through it, somehow.”

I pushed away from her. “Why does she need to go anyway?” I asked. I had thought I wouldn’t like it, having more people in our small house, but now the idea of Grandma going away made me anxious. And she was fine just yesterday.

Mom sighed. “Honey, you know why. Grandma’s disease is getting worse. I know sometimes it doesn’t seem like it—”

“You just want to get rid of her!” My voice had gotten so loud so quickly, and I surprised myself with how angry I felt.

Mom’s jaw clenched, and she looked like she wanted to pick up the nearest fragile object and smash it. Luckily, the only things within reach were our fall coats. After a few deep breaths, she said, “I’m not even going to reply to that.”

“Good!” I said. “Don’t!”

I ran to my room, gathered up an armful of magazines, dumped them on my rug, and sat in the middle, flipping through pages, staring at the pictures, and stopping to read captions about things like apron sinks or pendant lights.

The thing about decorating magazines? The thing that made me feel calm when I looked at them? They offered solutions. It didn’t matter how messy a “before” was, because an “after” was coming, and it would be awesome. Of course, it didn’t happen by magic. There was a lot of work involved, a lot of time. It didn’t happen in the seconds it took to turn a couple pages.

I felt myself slowly calming down. I shouldn’t have said that to my mom, I knew that. But also, I didn’t see why we couldn’t give the current situation more of a chance. Mom and Dad were telling me I had to adapt to Tony being in the house, so why couldn’t everyone adapt to Grandma?

I heard Grandma flip down the footrest on the recliner in the spare room, making its big clunking sound. She’d been sitting in the chair to work on a cross-stitch she’d started after she got here. She’d done cross-stitch for as long as I could remember.

Maybe she’d want to look through a magazine with me. I grabbed one and tiptoed to her doorway, peeking in. She smiled, and set her fabric down on her lap. The smile meant the coast was clear, that she was okay with visitors, that she remembered me.

“What are you up to today?” she said as I sat on the edge of the bed.

“Well, actually, I just got back from putting the final touches on that room I decorated at my school, for the contest.”

“How wonderful!” Grandma exclaimed.

She remembered! “I can show you some pictures if you want, on my phone,” I said.

“Okay,” she said, “but maybe later, dear one. My eyes are tired.” She looked down at the