Aces Wild (18 page)

“No thanks,” I said. I couldn’t even look at it. Ace raised one eyebrow, but he folded it up and put it in his pocket.

“AND,” said Ace, digging in his other pocket. He took my hand and deposited a big handful of money in it. I guess he’d collected O.J.’s contents off the floor.

“GELT BY ASSOCIATION,” he joked.

“Yeah, it’s all just one big joke,” I said. “You don’t get it.”

“WHAT DON’T I GET?”

“Forget it,” I said. “Let’s go.”

“PUT YOURSELF IN HIS SHOES, KID.”

“He doesn’t have shoes! He’s a dog!”

“I GOT NEWS FOR YOU, KID. EVERYBODY HAS SHOES.” Ace stood, hitched his pants up over his belly, and led the way outside.

“Yeah? Well, what about
my
shoes? I worked for months on training, just so I could have a sleepover. I did my best, and where did it get me? Nowhere! And not only that, I passed up an invitation to go to a sleepover to come here instead!”

“ALL RIGHT, SO YOUR SHOES STINK,” admitted Ace.

“I know!” I told him as we carefully navigated the icy parking lot. “Wait, how did you get here?” I asked, remembering that Ace had arrived late.

“I FINAGLED A MEANS OF TRANSPORTATION,” replied Ace. He walked up to a yellow Volkswagen “punch-buggy-no-punch-back,” as Sam would say. The back end of it was covered—I mean completely wallpapered—with bumper stickers. Some were ones I’d seen before, like
I LOVERMONT
and
LOVE YOUR MOTHER
, with a picture of the earth. Others had slogans like
WELL-BEHAVED WOMEN RARELY MAKE HISTORY
and
UPPITY WOMEN UNITE
. There must have been a hundred of them, easy.
The coolest car on the planet
, I suddenly remembered, according to Sam.

Ace unlocked the passenger side and held the seat down for me and Ace to jump in back.

“You borrowed Margie’s car?” I asked. “Aren’t you supposed to not drive anymore?”

“YOU’D RATHER TAKE THE BUS?”

I got in the car. Ace pulled out of the parking lot and headed home without saying another word. But for some reason, when he got to our street, instead of turning right, he kept going straight.

“Grandpa? That was our street.”

“YOU KNOW WHAT I DO WHEN MY SHOES STINK?” he asked. “COME ON. I’M GOING TO SHOW YOU.”

“That’s okay,” I told him. “My shoes are actually fine. Let’s just go home.”

“THREE LEFTS AND WE’LL BE RIGHT THERE,” he answered.

“Grandpa, I just—” He turned left into a long driveway. I looked around as he veered left up the winding path and then a steep hill. “The golf course?” I asked. “What are we doing at the golf course?”

“I COME HERE,” Ace said.

“In the winter?”

“YUP. CLEARS MY HEAD.”

I remembered when Ace had his accident.
What was he doing at the golf course?
my dad had asked. Ace had always loved golf, but he stopped playing when Bubbles died and he moved in with us. Plus everyone knew that as soon as the snow fell, the golf course was only good for one thing:

Sledding.

Ace turned left into a parking spot at the top of the sledding hill and got out. Reluctantly, I followed him, leaving Ace-the-dog in the car, where he was already fast asleep, exhausted from his big night. Since it was after dark, there was no one else there. A round golden moon was out, though, so the snow-covered hill practically glowed. You could see icy tracks where kids like Sam and me had been flying down the hill since the first snows in November, narrowly missing the trees positioned dangerously at the bottom.

Ace closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He spread his arms wide and exhaled. “AHHHHH!” he bellowed. Next he used his cane to pick up a blue plastic sled someone had apparently left there. Holding it vertically, Ace began doing some sort of limbering-up stretches. Was the full moon to blame? This was crazy!

“Grandpa, stop!” I blurted out. “You’re acting crazy! There are better ways to deal with your grief. You don’t have to break every rule!”

“BETTER WAYS TO DEAL WITH MY … WHAT?”

“Grief,” I repeated quietly. “Mrs. Wright says you’re acting this way because you’re grieving. Did she tell you that?”

“NO. WHAT ELSE DID SHE SAY?”

“She says it’s okay. And if going dancing makes you feel good, maybe you need to go dancing.”

“SHE’S A SMART COOKIE, THAT ONE,” he said.

I nodded. It didn’t make me mad to hear him say it. I was pretty sure even Bubbles, up on her cloud with Bridget, was nodding in agreement too.

“It’s okay if you like her,” I told him.

“ISSAT SO?”

“But you’re not going to be around to tell her if you go through with this. This is totally meshugge!”

“WHAT IS TOTALLY MESHUGGE?”

“Sledding,” I said.

Ace laughed out loud, a big belly laugh. It turned into a coughing fit, as was often the case. When he finally stopped laughing and coughing, he said, “ZELDALEH, LISTEN TO ME: I DO MANY THINGS. MAYBE SOME THINGS I DO I SHOULDN’T DO. BUT THERE’S ONE THING I DON’T DO: SLED.”

“You don’t?”

“ARE YOU FOR REAL? ON THE ICE, ON MY TUCHES? WHAT KIND OF A MESHUGGENER DO YOU THINK I AM?”

I felt a gigantic sense of relief. I looked out over the steep frozen hill. “Well, then, what are we doing here? Why do you go to the golf course in the winter?”

“TO TALK TO HER.”

“Who?”

“MERYL STREEP. WHO DO YOU THINK? YOUR GRANDMA!”

“Bubbles is buried at the golf course?” I asked.

“NO, KID,” said Ace. “WE USED TO PLAY THIS COURSE TOGETHER, ALMOST EVERY WEEKEND.…” Ace’s voice trailed off. He cleared his throat. “WHAT CAN I SAY? I MISS HER, ALL RIGHT?” Then he added, “PLUS IT’S QUIET HERE. SO I KNOW SHE CAN HEAR ME.”

I couldn’t help laughing at that. “Grandpa,” I told him, “no one ever has a problem hearing you.”

“YOU IN THE MARKET FOR A POTCH IN TUCHES, KID?” he asked me.

“Nope, I’m all set,” I said. But I smiled. Only Ace could make me feel better by suggesting I deserved a smack on the bottom.

“SO?”

“So, what?”

“SO WE’RE HERE, ALREADY. TELL HER SOMETHING.”

“Like what?”

“LIKE THIS.” Ace handed me a piece of paper. I unfolded it and held it out to try to read it by the light of the moon. It was what Ace had received at the end of his test.

Some of the writing was hard to read. But there at the bottom in big letters were the words:

CONDITIONAL PASS
.

“Pass?” I whispered. “As in …”

“PASS AS IN PASS. NU?”

“Woo-hoo!” I hooted, throwing my arms around Ace and giving him a huge hug.

“CONDITIONAL,” continued Ace, talking over my shoulder as he hugged me back, “AS IN HE NEEDS TO COME BACK AND REPEAT THE PART HE MESSED UP. BUT FOR NOW, HE’S AS GOOD AS GRADUATED.”

“We did it!” I told him. And then, softly, I addressed the snow-covered hill and the trees and the stars in the sky—which I couldn’t see, but in my heart, I knew they were there. Somewhere, hiding behind Bubbles’ and Bridget’s clouds. “Grandma,” I said shyly. “Bubbles, we did it,” I said.

“SHE DID IT,” corrected Ace, his arm draped around my shoulder. “KID, YOU SHOULD’VE SEEN YOUR GRANDDAUGHTER IN ACTION. GOOSE BUMPS, I TELL YOU!” He kissed me on the head and gave me a proud squeeze. “AND SPEAKING OF GOOSE BUMPS, ENOUGH FREEZING OUR TUCHESES OFF. LET’S GET A MOVE ON.”

“Did you just call Bubbles
kid
?” I asked him.

Ace nodded. “ALWAYS,” he said.

“But you call me
kid
,” I said. I had never liked it much. Until now.

“I COULD CALL YOU SOMETHING ELSE,” said Ace. “RUTABAGA?” he suggested. “PICKLE NOSE?”

“Let’s stick with
kid
,” I told him.

Ace barked excitedly as we climbed back into the car. He flung himself at me, slurping my face with doggie kisses, all signs of obedience vanished.

But it didn’t matter—Ace had passed.

Poor old battered O.J. sat in the front seat to protect him from further attacks. I couldn’t resist reaching over the seat and giving him a little pat.
Sorry
, I told him silently.
And thanks
.

Don’t mention it, kid
, he told me back, smiling as always.

“Out!” My dad paused in the kitchen doorway, wielding a pastry bag filled with neon-green frosting.

“Come on, can’t I just peek? Please?” I asked, leaning from side to side, trying to glimpse the cake he was decorating.

“Yahh! Slime her!!!” begged Sam, who was thrilled to be on the other side of the door, hopped up on buttercream icing and green dye. Ace barked excitedly, skittering across the kitchen floor, hoping food would be flying soon. He looked great. As a special treat, Mom had taken him to the Poochie Palace dog salon to get him ready for the party.
My
sleepover party.

“Sam’s going to Paul’s, right?” I asked my dad.

“Zelly, we’ve been over this already. He’ll be here until seven, then Paul’s dad will pick him up. He won’t be here for the sleepover part.”

“But my party starts at seven,” I reminded him. I loved saying those words:
my party!

“Right,” said my dad coolly. “So I suppose it is
possible
your friends might see your brother for five minutes before he gets whisked away.”

“What about Ace?” I asked.

“I believe his plans for the evening were to watch television in his room.”

“But I need the TV,” I said nervously. “We’re going to want to watch a movie.”

“Zelly, would you please stop? We’ve been over this. The TV is on a rolling cart. We can easily move it into the living room for you and your friends later on.”

“Okay, okay,” I said. It was going to be the best sleepover ever!

When my dad finally declared that the kitchen was no longer off-limits, I went to look for the Sally’s Pizza menu. I found Ace poking around under the roasted chicken we’d had for dinner the night before with a butter knife. As I pulled open the junk drawer, Ace dipped his knife into the gooky mess under the chicken and spread it on the slice of rye bread he was holding.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“WHAT? HAVING A LITTLE NOSH.”

“Did you just put … chicken juice on your toast?”

“SCHMALTZ,” Ace corrected me. “WANT A BITE?”

I recoiled in disgust. “Are you supposed to be eating that?” I asked him.

“ARE YOU SUPPOSED TO BE GETTING A SLEEPOVER?” he shot back.

He had a point. When Ace and I came home to show off Ace’s conditional pass, Mom and Dad were pleased, but their idea was that the sleepover could wait until Ace retook the test and got a full pass.

“But, Mom,” I wailed, so frustrated I couldn’t see straight. “I did everything right! And Ace did almost everything right!”

“Exactly,” said my mom gently. “Almost everything.”

“COUNSELOR, LET ME SEE THAT DOCUMENT,” demanded Ace, holding out his hand. I unpinned my proposal from the bulletin board and passed it to him.

“That’s so not fair!” I said. “You promised I could have a sleepover if he passed. A conditional pass is a pass!”

“Zelly, he’s come a long way, but he’s not quite there yet. So maybe in another month or two—”

“CAN
YOU
MAKE THAT DOG STAY?”

“Dad, do you mind?” said my mom.

“CAN YOU?” Ace demanded.

“I don’t know,” Mom admitted.

“EXACTLY,” said Ace triumphantly. “HOW CAN YOU REQUIRE THE KID TO DO SOMETHING THAT YOU YOURSELF CAN’T DO?”

“Lynn,” said my dad in his
I can see where this is going
voice. My mom ignored him.

“I didn’t sign on to train the dog,” she told Ace. “Zelly did, and what I’m trying to do is hold her to her end of the bargain.”

“GO ON. TRY.” Ace sat down. I did too. “I’VE GOT A NICKEL SAYS YOU CAN’T DO IT.”

“I’ve got a whole orange juice jug full of nickels,” I added. I had argued with Ace a million times, but this was the first time I had been on the same side with him.

“This is ridiculous,” said my mom.

“YOU WANNA KNOW WHY?” asked Ace.

“No, but I’m sure you’re going to—”

“HE’S NOT READY,” said Ace. “SOMETIMES YOU CAN’T RUSH THESE THINGS.”

“Like Sam,” I chimed in. “He said he was ready to give up Susie, but he really wasn’t. So you fished part of her skin out of the trash and let him keep it.”

“YOU DID WHAT?” said Ace.

“That’s not the same thing,” said my mom.

“Yes, it is! It’s not fair to punish me because Ace isn’t ready to do this one thing yet. He’s just a puppy.”

“FROM EACH ACCORDING TO HIS ABILITY,” announced Ace. “MARX,” he added.

I wasn’t sure which of the Marx Brothers said that, but I knew better than to ask at a critical time like this. Ace was arguing for me, not against me. And it seemed—though I could be wrong—like maybe we were winning.

“FURTHERMORE,” said Ace, holding out the proposal, “WHAT WE HAVE HERE IS AN UNCONSCIONABLE CONTRACT.”

“An unconscious what?” I asked.

“UNCONSCIONABLE,” repeated Ace. “A CONTRACT
IS UNCONSCIONABLE IF IT IS UNJUST OR EXTREMELY ONE-SIDED IN FAVOR OF THE PERSON WHO HAS THE SUPERIOR BARGAINING POWER. AS SUCH, IT IS AN AFFRONT TO THE INTEGRITY OF THE JUDICIARY SYSTEM TO ENFORCE SUCH CONTRACTS.”

“Huh?” I said.