Clever's Way

Chapter One
This place smells like an old sock,” Amelia said, wrinkling her nose.

“We’re busy right now,” her grandmother snapped. “You can have a snack later.”

Amelia rolled her eyes. By now, she was used to her grandmother misinterpreting everything she said. It wasn’t that Grandma was going deaf, it was that she never really listened to Amelia. Grandma had a lot of things going on in her head and there just didn’t seem to be enough room for Amelia’s words.

“Okay, how about some Chocolate soufflé?” Amelia asked, trying not to smirk.

Shifting the box she was carrying to a hip, her grandmother glared at the locked door. “Where did I put the key?”

“I think you left them in the car,” Amelia said.

Her grandmother grumbled. “Yes yes, I know. Go be a dear and get them for me, Emma.”

“My name’s not—” Amelia sighed in exasperation. “Okay,” she said, and set down the cat carrier on the porch. “I hope you’ll like the new home more than I do, Squeaky,” she said, crouching down to look into the cat carrier. A large, cream colored ball of fluff covered by a blanket stared back at her with large amber eyes. He squeaked a response and buried himself farther into the blanket.

Amelia hopped off the porch and scurried to her grandma’s minivan, the headlights still on, lighting up the dimming streets.

She walked around to the driver’s side and opened the door. The interior light flickered on and Amelia noticed a lopsided dreamcatcher hanging off the rearview mirror.

 

And why, Amelia thought, ''would anyone need a dreamcatcher in a car? ''She didn’t think her grandma had ever fallen asleep while driving, but wasn’t certain.

Amelia stumbled over the mounds of colorful pillows piled up against her grandma’s seat and raised a hand to brush away a string of beads hanging from the ceiling caught in her hair.

Amelia glanced around. She had never really appreciated the eye-popping fabrics strewn across the walls, or the heaps of poetry books and romance novels wedged in every nook and cranny you could find. Or sometimes even the various family photos plastered in the corners of the windshield. But now, really, they were the only things that reminded her of home. Except for Squeaky.

Amelia looked at the ignition, but the key slot stared back at her. Grandma’s keys – which had with at least a hundred of those little plastic customer cards for every grocery store, gas station, and hardware store in the city – were somewhere else in the van. Amelia groaned and sat down in the driver’s seat. Holding her breath, she shoved her hand between the side of the seat and the emergency brake. She felt something! Like a crab, she pinched it between two fingers and hauled it out. Her smile faded and she peered at the little wooden toy. Had it been one of hers? Amelia couldn’t remember the tiny, bright orange fox with black feet and white-tipped tail.

She turned it over in her palm and rubbed at the chipped paint. Whatever it was, it certainly had a long history. Storing it safely in her pocket, she continued her search for the keys.

After a while, Amelia noticed a thin, plastic card hanging out of the bottom of one of the Japanese paper lanterns, connected by a thin string hot-glued to the ceiling, above the passenger seat, grandma had bought right before they had moved.

“How in the world did it get up there?” Amelia muttered and grabbed the card, hauling about fifteen other knick-knacks and a set of keys with it.

She hopped out of the car, slamming the door behind her and raced right back to grandma and Squeaky.

“What took you so long, Emily?” Her grandma growled as she bounced up the steps. “I thought you had gotten lost between the cushions for a while.”

“Sorry, it’s just since there’s so much jun— urm, stuff in your minivan, it was a little difficult to find.” As she presented the keys to Grandma, Amelia noticed that the mixture of keys and plastic cards made the whole think look like some kind of animal. A porcupine? An echidna?

The keys and plastic cards were whisked away before she could think of any more spiky animals. After a few minutes of jangling and muttering, her grandmother opened the door.

“Well, this is home now,” her grandmother announced, picking up the box and waddling through the doorway.

Amelia backed up a few steps and peered at the outside of the house in the twilight. It was a bit lopsided and in bad need of a paint job and someone had left a light on upstairs, making the windows glow just a little bit. If she squinted, it looked kind of like a big strange beast with shedding skin and shining eyes getting ready to lay down and go to sleep.

“Have a good night, Home,” she told the house. Back on the porch, she picked up Squeaky’s carrier and went inside.

(More Coming Soon!)