I wasn’t looking on the bright side. It’s better to have a big car than a little one when you are living in it. And it’s better to have a box in a car than a box on a street.
Those were just facts.
I wasn’t like my dad, who kept saying we weren’t homeless.
We were just car camping.
22
I didn’t think much about the cat tail–windshield wiper for a while. Things were so weird I guess I didn’t want to add any extra weirdness.
Our first night in the minivan was kind of fun. We drove to a park near the Golden Gate Bridge. A man had a telescope to look at the sky, and he showed us the Big Dipper and Orion. Across the water, the lights of San Francisco covered the ground like lazy stars.
We were going to just sleep in the parking lot. But a security guy knocked on the window. He told us we had to get moving, and then he waved his flashlight around like a Star Wars lightsaber.
We drove to Denny’s, a restaurant that’s open 24 hours. My mom knew one of the cooks, and he asked the manager if we could park there for just one night. He said yes and even let us have some pancakes that were too burnt for the customers.
We had more burnt pancakes in the morning. By then everybody was grumpy and sore. Only Aretha was in a good mood. She loves pancakes.
My parents didn’t have any work scheduled that day, so we headed to the public library to kill time and wash up. My mom and dad took turns staying outside with Aretha. It’s dangerous to leave a dog in a hot car.
The library had air-conditioning and soft chairs. The bathrooms were clean, which was a nice plus.
I never used to think about things like is a bathroom clean or not. Whenever I took a bath, my mom would say, “Here comes Hurricane Jackson,” because I made such a mess.
One of my favorite bath experiments is about something scientists call buoyancy. Will It Float? is what I call it. It can get a little messy but it’s very interesting. For example, if you drop a mostly full bottle of ketchup in the tub, it will not float. But it will turn the water an awesome color.
It will also annoy your mom.
We stayed at the library most of the day. The librarian in the children’s department even shared her sandwich with Robin and me. She had Ritz crackers, too, and she gave all of those to Robin.
After that, Robin decided she was going to be a librarian when she grew up. If the animal scientist thing doesn’t work out, I might become a librarian too.
23
We’d only been living in our van for four days when somebody stole my mom’s purse, which had most of our money in it because my dad’s wallet was falling apart.
After we told a policeman, he wanted to know our address so if they found the money they could give it back.
We are between addresses is what my mom told him.
“Ah,” said the policeman. He nodded like he’d figured out a hard math problem.
My parents and the policeman talked for a while. He gave them the address of two homeless shelters where people can sleep at night. The dads go to one place and the moms and kids go to another, he explained.
“No way,” said my dad. “Not happening.”
Robin said, “We are car camping.”
The policeman looked at Aretha, who was licking his shiny black shoe.
He said that no animals were allowed at either shelter.
I asked if that included puppies.
“Sadly,” he said.
I told him my teacher Mr. Vandermeer had pet rats.
“Rats are especially not allowed,” said the policeman.
There are good rats and bad rats, I told him. I said white rats like the ones my teacher had, Harry and Hermione, were very clean animals. But wild rats could make you sick.
Then I told the policeman how Mr. Vandermeer was teaching his rats to play basketball with a teeny ball for a science experiment. Rats are amazingly intelligent.
“Basketball,” the policeman repeated. He looked at my parents like maybe they should be worried about me. Then he gave my mom a little white card with phone numbers on it.
“Social services, shelters, food pantry, free clinic,” he said. “Check back with us about the theft. Meantime, hang in there, folks.”
We were almost to the car when I heard the policeman call, “Hey, Ratman!”
I turned around. He waved me back. When I got there he said, “How’s their jump shot? The rats, I mean?”
“Not so good,” I said. “But they’re kind of learning. They get treats when they do something right. It’s called ‘posi—’” I couldn’t remember. It was two long words.
“Positive reinforcement?”
“Yep!”
“Yeah, I could use some of that myself,” said the policeman.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled twenty-dollar bill. “Give this to your dad,” he said. “But wait until you’re in the car.”
I asked how come I had to wait.
“Because otherwise he’ll give it right back to me,” the policeman said.
“How do you know?” I asked.
“I know,” he said.
When I was inside the car, I gave the money to my dad. He looked like he was going to throw it out the window.
I thought maybe he was going to yell at me, but he didn’t. He just tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. Tap. Tap. Tap.
Finally he shoved the bill in his jeans pocket.
“Looks like dinner’s on me,” he said softly.
24
The next day, we dropped my mom at her part-time waitress job. Before she got out of the car, she looked at my dad and said, “We have to apply for assistance, Tom.”
“We’ll be back on our feet before they deal with all the paperwork,” he said.
“Still.”
“Plus we probably make too much money to qualify for help.”
“Still.”
They looked at each other for a few long seconds. Finally my dad nodded.
We went to an office called Social Services to find out about help. My dad filled out lots of forms while Robin and I sat on hard orange chairs. Then we went to three hardware stores, where my dad put in applications for work. My dad grumbled about all the gas we used up. To cheer him up, I said maybe we could feed the car water instead. He laughed a little then.
“Not having enough work is tough work,” my dad told my mom when she joined us in the car after her shift. He took a deep breath and blew it out hard, like he was facing a birthday cake with too many candles.
“Dad?” I said. “I’m kind of hungry.”
“Me too, buddy,” he said. “Me too.”
“Almost forgot,” my mom said, reaching into her tote bag. “I grabbed some of the bagels that the chef was about to throw out.” She pulled out a white paper sack. “They’re pretty stale, though. And they’re pumpernickel.”
“Well, that’s a start,” said my dad. He stared out the window. After a moment, he clapped his hands. “Okay. Let’s get this show on the road. Guess I can’t stall any longer.”
My mom touched his shoulder. “Are you sure about this, Tom?” she asked. “I get my paycheck tomorrow. We could go to the food pantry. Or the shelter.”
“Nope. I got this.” He smiled, but it didn’t look like a real smile to me. “I’d rather do a little performing than stand in another endless line at some office, waiting for a handout.”
We drove to the back of the restaurant. My dad found a nice clean box in the Dumpster.
“Are you making the begging sign?” I asked him. He’d been talking about it off and on with my mom since our money was stolen.
“Given that I’ll be singing for our supper,” he said as he tore the box into pieces, “I prefer to call it a request for gratuities.”
“What’s a gratuity?” I asked.