"I was reading."
"I see."
"I'm afraid I'm not in the mood for conversation, Phoebe."
"This won't take long. School starts soon and there are a few things we need to discuss."
Phoebe's poodle scampered through the door and bounded over to Molly, who drew back and glared at her sister. "Where did that dog come from?"
"Since it looks as if I'm going to have to settle here for a while, I had Viktor put her on a plane."
Molly moved her feet away from the poodle as it began to attack her fuzzy yellow slippers. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't let it in my room. I'm highly allergic."
Phoebe sat on the edge of Molly's bed and reached down to snap her fingers for Pooh, who came to her side. "Poodles don't shed. They're good dogs for people with allergies."
"I don't care to have animals in my bedroom."
"Are you this unpleasant all the time, or is it just me?"
Molly's lips set in a mulish line. "I'm tired, and I want to go to sleep."
"It's only nine o'clock."
"I've been ill."
Phoebe watched as Molly bent her head over her book, deliberately shutting her out. Once again she experienced the familiar combination of frustration and sympathy that took hold of her whenever she tried to talk to the child. She hadn't even been back in Chicago for a week before Molly had been sent home from camp to recuperate from the flu. If anything, their relationship had grown worse in the past two days instead of improving.
She plucked at the stitching on the bedspread. "This house has to be closed soon so it can be put up for sale. Unfortunately, it seems as if I'm going to be stuck here for the next few months, so I've decided to move into a condo Bert owned that's not too far from the Stars Complex. The lawyers say I can stay there until the first of the year." She was also being provided with a living allowance to take care of her expenses, which was a good thing because her bank account had dipped alarmingly low.
"Since I'll be back at Crayton, I don't see how your living arrangements concern me."
She ignored Molly's sullenness. "I don't envy you going back. I hated it when I was there."
"I don't have much choice, do I?"
Phoebe went completely still as an eerie tingling traveled up her spine. Molly's face was stiff and inexpressive except for a small quiver at the corner of her mouth. She recognized that stubborn face, the refusal to ask for help or admit to any weakness. She had adopted some of those same strategies to survive the misery and loneliness of her own childhood. As she watched, she became even more convinced that the idea she'd been mulling over since yesterday was a good one.
"Crayton is small," she said carefully. "I always thought I'd be happier at a bigger school with a more diverse mix of students. Maybe you would, too. Maybe you'd like to go someplace coed."
Molly's head shot up. "Go to school with boys?"
"I don't see why not."
"I can't imagine what it would be like to have boys in the classroom. Wouldn't they be rowdy?"
Phoebe laughed. "I never went to school with them either, so I have no idea. Probably." Molly was exhibiting the first display of animation she had seen, and Phoebe continued cautiously. "There are some fine public schools in this area."
"A public school?" she scoffed. "The quality of education is so inferior."
"Not necessarily. Besides, anybody with your IQ could probably educate herself, so what difference would it make?" She gazed at her sister with compassion and said softly, "It seems to me that making some friends and enjoying being a teenager is more important right now than jump-starting calculus."
Molly's protective shell clamped shut. "I have dozens of friends. Dozens of them. And I happen to enjoy mathematics. I would never subject myself to an inferior education just to go to school with some silly, adolescent boys, who, I'm certain, wouldn't be nearly as mature as all my boyfriends in Connecticut."
Phoebe had to hand it to her. She was willing to brazen it out right to the end.
Molly's small lip curled. "You wouldn't understand since you're not gifted."
"I hate to disillusion you, Mol, but my IQ isn't anything to sniff at, either."
"I don't believe you."
"Pull out your notepaper then. Let's solve some integrals together."
Molly swallowed hard. "I-I haven't got that far yet."
Phoebe concealed her relief. She hadn't done that kind of math for years, and she didn't remember a thing. "Don't judge a book by its cover, Mol. For example, if people judged you only by appearances they might decide you were unfriendly and a little bit snobbish. Both of us know that's not so, don't we?" She wanted to make Molly think, not to antagonize her, and she tried to take some of the sting out of her words with a smile. It didn't work.
"I'm not a snob! I'm a perfectly nice person with dozens of friends, and-" She gasped.
Phoebe followed the direction of her stricken gaze and saw Pooh pulling a bedraggled stuffed monkey from under Molly's bed. She quickly disengaged the animal from the poodle's mouth. "It's all right. Pooh didn't hurt your toy. See."
Molly's face was scarlet. "I don't ever want that dog in my bedroom again! Never! And it's not mine. I don't play with toys. I don't know how it got there. It's stupid! Throw it away!"
Phoebe had always been a sucker for lost souls, and her sister's rejection of the obviously well-loved stuffed monkey touched her in a way nothing else could have. At that moment, nothing could have made her send this confused, frightened young girl away.
She casually tossed the stuffed animal to the foot of the bed. "I've decided I'm not sending you back to Crayton. I'm going to keep you here in a public school for the fall semester."
"What! You can't do that!"
"I'm your guardian, and I certainly can." Scooping up Pooh, she walked to the door. "We move into the condo next week. If school doesn't work out, you can go back to Crayton for second semester."
"Why are you doing this? Why are you being so hateful?"
She knew the child would never believe the truth, so she shrugged. "Misery loves company? I have to stay here. Why shouldn't you?"
It wasn't until she reached the bottom of the staircase that the full implications of what she'd done hit her. She was already buried under problems she didn't know how to solve, and she had just added another one. When was she going to learn not to be so impulsive?
Trying to escape her troubled thoughts, she made her way to the French doors at the rear of the house and stepped outside. The night was quiet and fragrant with the scent of pine and roses. The floodlights on the back of the house illuminated the fringe of deeper woods at the edge of the yard, including the old maple tree that had been her refuge when she was a child. She found herself heading there. When she reached the tree, she saw that its bottom branches were too high to reach. Leaning back against the trunk, she stared toward the house.
Despite the peacefulness of the night, she couldn't shake off her worries. She didn't know anything about raising a teenager. How was she supposed to overcome Molly's hostility? She slipped her fingertips into the pockets of her slacks. Her problems with her sister weren't all that was bothering her. She missed Viktor and her friends. She felt like a freak when she walked in the door of the Stars complex. And she spent far too much time thinking about Dan Calebow. Why did he have to be so adamant in his refusal to let her rehire Ron?
She sighed. It was more than his attitude toward Ron that kept him in her thoughts. She was much too aware of him. Sometimes when he was nearby, she experienced an emotion that was very close to panic. Her heartbeat accelerated, her pulses quickened, and she had the unsettling sensation that her body was coming awake after a very long hibernation. It was a ridiculous notion. She knew too well that she was permanently damaged when it came to men.