“Oh, darn!” Mom said. “Isn’t there anything you can do about it?”
His voice flew up a whole notch. “Don’t be such a worrywart!” he said. “We have to take it one step at a time, and that means cutting corners.”
“Cut corners! Cut corners!” shouted Mom. “That’s all we ever seem to do!”
Dad pounded his fist on the table. He almost had all the forks and knives jumping right off the plates. “We’re not the only ones, for cryin’ out loud!” he shouted. “And in case you haven’t noticed, everyone has money troubles these days! That’s reality . . . don’t you get it?”
I’m not an absolute dimwit, you know. That’s probably why people are surprised that I don’t do so great in school. Even my teachers don’t know that when it comes to solving everyday problems, I’m no slouch. Not that I can figure out square roots or breeze through long division like some kind of Einstein. No. It’s that I’m pretty good at things that really matter. Like, at carnivals, I can usually come up with a pretty close guess about how many beans there are in a jar. Okay, maybe that’s not the best example. Once, right in the middle of Woolworth’s, a whole bunch of people kept trying to get this baby to stop crying. “Maybe he’s thirsty.” “Maybe he’s wet.” “Try picking him up.” They carried on as if they’d all just graduated from Doctor Spock University. After they all gave up, I figured I’d give it my best shot. A few peek-a-boos—a couple of funny faces—and, within seconds, the little guy turned all cute and giggly. That’s the kind of stuff I mean. I’m pretty good at things like that. So what I’m getting at is that, lots of times, if I really put my mind to it, I can even get my parents to snap out of their crummy moods. Don’t get me wrong. It doesn’t work every time, but just on the odd chance that it might, I’m always ready to give it a try.
“Say, here’s a good one,” I said. “A big moron and a little moron were walking along the edge of a cliff. The big moron fell off. Why didn’t the little one?”
Mom yanked off her apron. She kept firing words at Dad as if she hadn’t even heard me. “That Drapeau and his promises!” she continued. “Little shrimp of a mayor . . . he’s leading us all into the poorhouse!”
Dad’s voice boomed, “Give the man a chance, for heaven’s sake! He’s only been in office a few months, and if I remember correctly, you voted for him.”
“He was a little more-on,” I said. “Get it? He didn’t fall off, because he was a little . . . more . . . on.”
Mom gave me a look. “Please! This is no time for your foolishness!”
It seemed that neither one of them was in the mood to switch to another mood.
Dad shoved his chair back hard enough to chip the paint off the wall. “There’s no point in rehashing our budget right this second,” he roared. “The whole thing can wait till later . . . when we’re alone. So just drop it!”
Well, isn’t that just dandy! Now they’ve got themselves caught up in a math problem all their own, and it looks like mine’s gonna have to wait.
FIX-IT NIGHT AT GRANDPA’S
Grandpa says that girls are usually cheated out of learning important stuff. He says that everybody should learn how to splice electric wires, refinish furniture and solder pipes. So on my Wednesday visits to Grandpa’s, we usually fix things . . . or make things. Grandpa always says, “If y’ have only one hour to do a task, you’d be wise to spend the first forty-five minutes planning and measuring. If y’ do that, then the rest of the job will be as easy as pie.”
We’ve built birdhouses and knick-knack shelves. We wired up a lamp and installed two light switches. I even helped him change a few worn-out washers to stop the taps from dripping. Grandpa promised that he’d even let me help him do some plastering and painting in the spring. “You’re ready for life,” Grandpa says. Whenever we finish a job, he hugs me and says that. “You’re ready for life.” I love when he says that.
Of course, my visits to Grandpa’s are not only work-work-work. We always set aside time for a few games of chess. When I was a little kid, maybe five or six, he taught me the names of all the pieces, how each one moves, and how to plan my strategy. Now I even beat him sometimes.
The worst thing about Grandpa is that his place is one gigantic mess. It’s even worse than our place. He keeps boxes of things everywhere. Broken watches, cameras, radio parts and all kinds of electrical stuff. He has stacks and stacks of newspapers and magazines. He says there’s a few articles in them that he’ll get around to reading one day. (Ha!) Grandpa has two or three vacuum cleaners, all in pieces, in a corner of the dining room. “I hate to throw ’em out,” he says. “The minute I throw ’em out . . . that’s when I’ll need the parts for somethin’ else.”
I kicked off my boots and slung my jacket over the nearest doorknob. “I’ll drop by around ten thirty to pick you up,” said Dad. He tweaked my nose, gave Grandpa’s shoulder one of those gentle love-pokes, and left.
“Okay, Vivi. The board’s all set up,” said Grandpa. “But first, we’ve got some important fixin’ to do. Ready to tear into some tile work?”
I followed him into the kitchen. “Tile work?”
“Y’ bet yer boots! A few tiles popped up beside the bathtub. Just loosened up, they did, and I can sure use your help. I’ll just guzzle down another cup of tea and then we can get straight to work. Need somethin’ to wet yer whistle, Vivi? How about a hot chocolate?”
“No thanks, Grandpa. Maybe later on.”
He reached for the little brown teapot and filled the granny-cup. That’s what I always call it. The delicate china teacup had been Grandma’s favourite, but after she passed away, Grandpa stashed his own chipped mug way up on the highest shelf. He’d decided to keep Grandma’s cup and saucer for himself.
Grandpa dropped three sugar cubes into the strong, dark tea. I watched him chase the cubes around with a little silver spoon to make them dissolve faster than they’d planned. Then he sipped his tea. Slurped it, that’s what he did. Grandpa’s really a gentleman, but he does slurp his tea, and when I’m with him, I slurp too. Mostly hot chocolate. He never hassles me for slurping, and I never hassle him. It’s just something we do.
Grandpa tapped each tile lightly with the back of a putty knife. “See, Vivi. This is how we’ll figure out which ones are the troublemakers. It’s good to learn about working with tiles, ’cause y’ never know when it’ll come in handy.”
We worked side by side, pulling out the wobbly tiles, clearing away the damp grout and scraping off the old cement.
“Grandpa, I’ve . . . I’ve run into a problem,” I said.
“What is it?”
“It’s . . . it’s . . . I can’t get the grout out of this corner.”
“Here. Try using the small chisel,” he said.
I tapped the small chisel straight down with the hammer. The grout came away perfectly, without loosening up any of the nearby tiles.
“Seems like the floor’s still a bit damp,” said Grandpa. “We’ll have to dry it all out before we start to set the tiles back in. But first, take this brush and try to sweep out all those loose particles.”
“Grandpa?”
“Yes, Chipmunk. What is it?”
“There’s something I have to tell you.”
“Okay, shoot.”
“I . . . I sure like doing fix-it stuff with you.”
He put his