In Memory of Gorfman T. Frog Page 5
Payson didn’t say anything.
Josh could feel the pressure building. He’d said his line. Now all the grown-ups were waiting for Payson to do his part.
“Let’s get this show on the road,” said Coach Bell. “We’ve got a game to play. Shake hands, Payson.”
Payson stuck out his hand and quickly Josh shook it. Josh wasn’t really sorry and Payson wasn’t really forgiving him. Why did grown-ups feel better if kids went through a whole make-believe making up? Josh didn’t feel better. He felt gross.
Chapter 8
The Bio-Grands
He’s here!” cried Lacey, squashing Josh in a big hug. She smelled like strawberries. She was wearing a matching pink sweatshirt and sweatpants, her usual outfit, even though Josh had never seen her running or working out. Matt got up from the computer. He was tall and thin, with reading glasses that perched on the tip of his nose. “Joshua Tree Hewitt,” he said, taking off his glasses and tucking them in the pocket of his shirt. “Welcome!”
Josh slipped off his backpack and put a paper bag on top of the magazines that were piled all over the kitchen table. The television was on, but with no sound, because Matt was streaming in the baseball broadcast on the computer.
“What’s in the bag?” asked Matt.
“My frog,” said Josh.
“Matt, will you turn that sports racket down so we can hear?” said Lacey, shutting it off herself. “Josh, what do you mean you’ve got a frog in the bag?”
“It’s not alive,” said Josh. “It’s dead. I want to bury it here, okay?”
“Absolutely,” said Lacey. “We’ve got a special place for burying animals. Come on.”
Josh and Matt followed Lacey outside. The bio-grands’ yard was like their kitchen: messy in a fun way. There was a lawn mower, a wheelbarrow full of petunias in pots, and a blue tarp covering a pile of canned goods that Lacey was collecting for the church food bank. The chickens were out, scratching around the sunflower patch. This was where Josh had gotten his experiment seeds.
It was early in the evening, but still bright and warm.
Lacey took a deep breath. “Smell those lilacs,” she said. “Smell those strawberries. I am pretty sure that heaven is going to be a June evening.”
Matt rummaged through the toolshed and pulled out a spade. “I’ll take a September afternoon,” he said. “Apples and cider—and no mosquitoes,” he added, slapping his neck. “Got ’im.”
“Don’t you think something might be done about the mosquitoes?” asked Lacey, taking the spade and starting to dig.
“Hold on!” cried Matt. “That’s right where Shelby’s buried! Push over a couple of feet.” He pointed to a spot by some ferns where she should dig.
Lacey looked horrified. “I will not—that’s where Jonathan buried all those hamsters.”
Matt looked at Lacey like she was crazy. “What hamsters?”
“Don’t you remember Luke?” demanded Lacey. “And Chewie? And Obi-something-or-other?”
Matt shook his head. “No.”
“How could you not remember that?” Lacey turned to Josh, as if he alone understood what it meant to put up with Matt. “Your father had hamsters one year,” she explained.
“I guess I’m having a senior moment,” grumbled Matt. “But do you think we could discuss this later so Joshua doesn’t have to stand there holding his dead frog any longer?”
“That’s okay,” said Josh. He kind of enjoyed listening to the bio-grands bicker. They were like a couple of squirrels, chattering and scolding, running up and down a tree. “I was wondering . . .”
The thing he wanted to know was how much he was like his birth dad, Jonathan. Josh was noisy and messy, and so were the bio-grands. He figured his first dad must have been, too. And his mom had left that dad. So where did that leave Josh?
He took a deep breath and asked the question. “Did my dad ever get sent to the principal’s office?”
“Well,” said Matt slowly. “I don’t believe he did.”
“Of course he did,” contradicted Lacey. “It’s only natural,” she said to Josh. “I think it was something to do with his homework. Not always doing it.”
“Why didn’t I know this?” demanded Matt.
“Maybe you knew and forgot,” said Lacey vaguely. “Or possibly I forgot to tell you.” She winked at Josh. “Now where’s a good spot?”
Josh grinned. Even though it wasn’t exactly good news, he felt better, knowing a new fact about his birth dad: he had gotten in trouble at school, too.
“How about under there?” He pointed to a lilac.
“Looks good to me,” said Matt.
“Wait!” cried Lacey. “I have to dowse for it.” From beneath her pink sweatshirt she pulled out a small crystal on a chain and pulled it over her head. Dangling the chain, she let the crystal swing back and forth. Her eyes were closed.
Matt grinned at Josh and whispered, “First she’s got to get her Yes and her No directions.”
Josh nodded; he knew how Lacey did it. She couldn’t ask, ‘Where is a good place to bury the frog?’ She could only ask, ‘Is this a good place to bury a frog?’ It was sort of like playing twenty questions—you could only ask something that could be answered with a Yes or a No.
Finally Lacey said, “It’s good!” She handed Josh the shovel.
Josh didn’t know if he believed in dowsing, but he believed in Lacey. He stepped on the shovel, and it slid into the soft ground. He leaned back on the handle and pried up a shovelful of dirt, and then another, and another. The chickens were making chicken noises, and Matt picked a wriggling worm from the turned-over earth and tossed it to them. Lacey was humming something that sounded like a hymn.
Finally he had a good-sized hole. He put down the shovel and took the frog out of the paper bag. It felt cold and heavy in his hands. The three big back legs dangled down.
Lacey made a sympathetic clucking sound, and Matt said, “You didn’t tell us it was such a special frog.”
“Most people just think it’s gross,” said Josh bitterly. “Or a big joke. They don’t really care.”
He set Gorfman down in the hole. The frog’s eyes were wide open. It seemed like they were staring at Josh. Saying: Don’t you care about me, either?
Matt picked up the shovel. “Want me to fill in the hole?”
“Wait a sec,” said Josh, kneeling.
He did care about Gorfman.
Because he knew how it felt! He knew how it felt to have your parents look at you like you were from another planet—to have your teacher look at you like she wished you’d move to another planet—to have kids look at you and laugh!
He couldn’t put Gorfman in a hole and forget about him. Never talk about him. Pretend he never existed.
If he did that, how would he ever find out what made Gorfman grow three back legs instead of two? To find that out, he probably needed evidence. He needed Gorfman. That was the big reason he couldn’t bury him.
Then there were about a thousand other little reasons not to bury Gorfman. The tadpoles from the vernal pool in the woods. Gorfman’s babies, maybe.
Josh reached down and picked up his frog. “I changed my mind.”
Chapter 9
Confession Time
Sleepovers at the bio-grands’ meant going out for breakfast on Sunday morning, and then church.
They called it church, but it wasn’t like any other church Josh had ever heard of. The building was in the shape of a dome. And the stained-glass windows were big squares of bright colors, not pictures of people from a long time ago. Best of all, you could bring your pet anytime you wanted, not just for the Blessing of the Animals on St. Francis Day.
Josh slid into a pew and opened up the comic book Lacey had brought for him. Matt slipped him a lemon drop.
After a couple of songs a lady with a poodle on a leash came up to the microphone for the Prayers of the People. She asked everyone to pray for the sick, especially Betty Malone, undergoing treatment, and Ray Burnham, scheduled
for surgery. Please add your own prayers.
For my mother, a voice murmured nearby, and other voices chimed in. For Emily. For Charlie.
The lady asked everyone to pray for the dead, especially Marilyn Ashford, whose memorial service was to be held tomorrow and in whose loving memory the flowers on the altar were given. Please add your own prayers.
“For Josh’s frog,” Matt called out.
People were turning around to see who was praying for a frog. The prayer lady asked the congregation to join in a moment of silence. Everyone was quiet except for the poodle, who gave a little yip.
Lacey put her arm around Josh and gave him a quick squeeze. Josh liked the way she smelled—like maple syrup from their pancake breakfast. He liked the smell of the beeswax candles, too. The sun coming through the stained-glass windows made him feel like he was opening his eyes underwater.
Confession time. Matt and Lacey’s church had the kind of confession where everyone said it together, out loud. On either side of him the bio-grands were saying the words: I confess that I have sinned . . . by what I have done and what I have left undone . . . I have not loved my neighbor as myself.
Josh sucked harder on his lemon drop.
He probably should confess to punching Payson in the nose.
But why was Payson acting like such a jerk about the frog?
And why did God even let a frog with three back legs exist?
But maybe it wasn’t God’s fault, he thought, as the last sliver of lemon drop melted on his tongue.
But how could it not be, since God made everything?
But sometimes people took what God made and messed it up.
Except why did God let them mess it up?
By the end of the service Josh had more questions than ever and still no answers.
During the organ postlude, Lacey leaned over and whispered, “Go ahead and get a snack—just don’t knock over any little old ladies.”
Josh hurried off to the room where they served coffee and cookies. He took a brownie and bit off a chocolaty chunk.
Across the room he could see Matt and Lacey talking to some old ladies and a couple of singers in their purple choir robes. Sometimes Josh thought it would be cool to sing in the kids’ choir because you got to wear a long, black, Hogwarts kind of robe. He saw Matt nod and point at him. Lacey waved at him to come over.
“I need strength,” murmured Josh, grabbing another brownie and heading over.
“I gave them the basics,” explained Matt. “And they want to know more.”
A lady in a wheelchair piped up, “Tell us about your frog!”
“Even though it’s dead?” Josh asked.
“Yes, tell us all about it!” She pounded her wheelchair’s arm to make her point. “I can’t very well go mucking around in ponds and streams, now can I?”
No way out. You had to be nice to old ladies in wheelchairs.
“I guess not,” admitted Josh.
“He’s a leopard frog,” he began. “I mean, he was a leopard frog. They’re green with round or oval spots. And except for the extra leg, he seemed normal. His front legs were okay and his head was okay and his skin felt normal.”
By now more people were gathering round. Moms with kids hanging onto their legs. Guys Josh had seen carrying up baskets of food during the service.
A lady in a straw hat asked, “How big was he?”
“Big,” said Josh. “Like . . .” He searched for a good way to describe Gorfman’s size. “Like three of those brownies! So I’m pretty sure he’s at least a year old, not one of this year’s frogs, ’cause they’re still tadpoles. We found a whole bunch in the woods behind my house.”
A little girl asked, “Are they his babies?” She was holding a doll with a matching blue dress and one of those giant toy horses just the right size for the doll.
“Well,” Josh said uncertainly. He didn’t know how much detail he should go into about frog reproduction with a little kid at his grandparents’ church. “They could be.”
The lady in the wheelchair said, “You remind me of my daughter when she was your age.”
The girl with the doll and the horse asked, “You mean Mom?”
The old lady nodded. “Once your mother went into a great big muddy puddle and came out shrieking with delight. She had lost her sandal, but she didn’t care because she’d caught an enormous bull-frog. They were brand-new sandals, too. And what good is one shoe without the other?” She laughed a tiny little-old-lady laugh.
“You never told me that story!” said the girl. “Did she get in trouble?”
“I don’t remember,” said the lady, shaking her head. “I just remember how happy she was.”
“You must be proud of her now,” said Lacey. “All grown up and teaching at the university.”
“I have a question,” said a man with snow-white hair and a purple choir robe. “How did the frog die?”
“I’m not sure,” said Josh. “I never saw him eat anything. Maybe he starved to death. Or maybe . . .” He trailed off.
There was something he wanted to say. Something he maybe should have said at confession time.
“It’s probably my fault. I shouldn’t have taken him to school for sharing. Maybe it stressed him out too much. He spent a night in the terrarium and then I brought him home, and then he died.”
For a minute there was silence. Through the open window came the sound of a car door slamming. The room was emptying out. The brownies were all gone and two ladies were washing coffee cups.
Matt put a hand on Josh’s shoulder. “Time to go, friend.”
“Goodbye, Grace,” said Lacey to the little girl. “Goodbye, Mrs. Donatelli. Give our best to Dr. Donatelli.”
“Will do,” said the old lady. “It was a pleasure meeting you, young man. And you mustn’t think the frog’s death was your fault. You did everything you could.”
Josh didn’t need a lecture from his dad to know that he shouldn’t argue with little old ladies in wheelchairs, but he couldn’t stop himself. “I didn’t do anything for him,” he said bitterly. “He’s dead.”
The lady held out her arm and drew the little girl toward her, “You didn’t do anything yet,” she said to Josh.
Chapter 10
Silent Lunch
Rain on Monday meant indoor recess. Josh was hanging out with Michael. The girls were reading or folding paper into cootie catchers, and the other guys were playing table soccer with balls of wadded paper or fighting with Payson to let them have a turn at the classroom’s only computer.
Ms. O’Reilly had taken the telephone out into the hallway. She kept glancing in through the door’s glass window, but as long as the noise level didn’t rise so high it went through the door and interfered with her phone call, she stayed out in the hall.
“Hey”—Josh pointed at the picture Michael was drawing—“that’s a good frog!”
“Thanks.” Michael stopped drawing and sniffed the air. “What’s that smell?”
“Popcorn,” answered Josh. “Somebody’s making microwave popcorn in the teachers’ lounge. Indoor recess is bad enough, and then we have to smell popcorn before lunch! There ought to be a rule against that.”
“Not that smell,” said Michael. “The candy smell. Somebody’s got candy!”
Candy was against the rules.
“It’s not candy,” said Charu, pulling up a chair and sitting down with them. She jerked her head toward Lisbet. “It’s excessive application of lip gloss. E-x-c-e-s-s-i-v-e. Excessive.”
Lisbet had lip gloss in the shape of a Tootsie Roll. Every time she popped off the cap and smeared her lips the smell of Tootsie Roll filled the air.
“That’s disgusting!” said Josh.
“I know,” agreed Charu. “Spell that d-i-s-g-u-s-ti-n-g.”
“Did I miss something?” asked Michael. “Do we have a spelling test today?”
“Sorry,” said Charu. “I’m working on my words. The middle-school spelling bee is in October.”
“My mom says there’s a first time for everything,” said Charu. “My mom’s way into me winning. Hey,” she added, making a sorry-for-him face. “Too bad about your frog.”
“Thanks,” said Josh.
“How did you know?” asked Michael.
Charu shrugged. “Everybody knows.”
“It was probably my sister,” said Josh. Probably Cady had told every single kid she saw on the playground Saturday, and they had told all their brothers and sisters. By the time he’d gotten to Hollison Elementary Monday morning, the entire school seemed to know.
“So what happens now?” asked Charu. “Are we still going to study him?”
“I don’t know,” said Michael gloomily. “We spent the whole morning on math facts.”
“You mean we wasted the whole morning!” said Josh. “We might not have much time!”
“What are you talking about?” asked Charu.
“Tadpoles!” said Josh. “In the woods behind my house. Pretty soon they’re going to lose their tails and grow legs, and what if they grow too many? I need to learn all about deformed frogs, but I’m grounded from computer.”
Payson shouted, “Score!” and pumped his fist in the air.
“Oh,” said Josh. “Duh.” He was sitting in the same room as a computer. All he had to do was get Payson off it.
Josh felt queasy, and not from the smell of Tootsie Roll lip gloss. He felt gross, remembering his phony apology and Payson’s phony forgiveness. Yuck. Josh didn’t want to be friends with Payson, but he didn’t want to be enemies, either.
Charu marched over to the computer nook. “Time’s up, Payson.”
“Says who?”
“Says me,” said Charu. “And I’m sure Ms. O’Reilly would, too, if I asked her.”
Josh grinned at Charu. She was smart enough to know that Payson would cave, and she was right. He moved aside and Josh took his place. Charu and Michael stood beside him, watching the screen.
“Thanks,” said Josh.