CHAPTER ONE There''s a storm brewing in my head, rumbling and raw. Mount Pleasant is not at all what I expect, and I''m about to call it home. I lean my head against the back seat of the taxi as it slows and click off the timer on my digital watch. Eight hours, one minute, and twenty- seven seconds. I''m a long way from where I started. "You want me to just keep rolling along?" The taxi driver smirks as we approach the mansion. "Very funny," I sigh. He rolls onto the circular driveway, gravel crunching below the! tires, and shifts his gear to park.
That''s my cue to take yet another step in this journey, to another new city, with another distant relative. "You sure we''re in the right place, kid?" he asks, turning the radio dial lower. Sister Sledge''s new song "We Are Family" vibrates from the car speakers. "Yep. This is home," I say. "For now." I look through the greasy car window and wonder how I could have gotten it so wrong. This is not Mount Pleasant, at least not the Mount Pleasant I expected.
I hoped for the estate that I saw in the old historic photo, the one that showed horses and carriages lined up in front of the grand mansion. I expected it to at least resemble its original form. This home is crumbling. There''s a well near the edge of the property with stone collapsing around the base, the towering brick chimneys are stained black near the tops, and there are tall, wide windows. In between damaged shutters, broken glass panes, and windswept corner carvings are hints of a home that once was something special. Maybe even celebrated. But not today. "You gonna get out?" "Just give me a minute.
" I stall, smoothing my clothes after a full day of travel. I had chosen to wear a burnt- orange pantsuit for the trip, but instantly regretted it when I climbed on that first hot bus. I''m a sweaty, oily mess. So much for making a good first impression. My long brown hair, fresh and wavy early this morning, is now matted to the sides of my face, crinkled and curled. I try to comb it with my fingers, glancing in the rearview mirror as I part it in the middle. The driver catches my eye in the reflection. "Golly, mister! Just one minute, please!" "I already shut off the meter," he says.
"Time to go, kid." He twists his body to see me in the back seat. "You got a parent, or someone who can collect you?" "Look, mister." I crane my neck to see his name tag. "Mr. Cooper. In the past eight hours I''ve traveled through four cities on three separate buses, sat next to two different people named Mack, and eaten one not- quite- right hot dog. I just need one minute.
" "That''s three dollars and fifty cents," he says, not at all moved by my situation. "You gotta pay before you get out so I know you won''t run." "I have bags in the trunk," I reply. "And besides, you obviously know where to find me." I overexaggerate an eye roll in the mirror and get out of the car, waiting by the trunk to collect my belongings. I dig in my pocket for the money my parents had given me, just before dumping me at Cousin Erin''s house a month ago. "Use it wisely," they said. I don''t think they would call a bus trip to Philadelphia wise.
They also didn''t expect Erin to get sick of me so quickly. "Bottle up that sass," Erin said over her blaring disco music when she dropped me off at the bus today. "Be a butterfly, not a bee." It was rich advice coming from someone who had just kicked a child out of her home. Mom and Dad thought a summer with Erin would be "exactly what I needed." "She''s a smart young woman who is studying to be a chemist," Dad had said, and that''s all he needed to say, like being in college makes her "exactly what I need." What Dad doesn''t know is that Cousin Erin spends most of her free time with her friends from the Clamshell Alliance organizing some sort of protest at a nuclear power plant. At first she had me help paint signs like "Honk for No Nukes!" and "Better Active Today Than Radioactive Tomorrow!" But eventually I was just getting in her way.
One month of me was enough. I first tried to convince her to let me stay. I promised that I would be fine on my own. I''m used to being alone. But once she mentioned Aunt Hazel, I zipped through the apartment to pack my bags before she could change her mind. A historic mansion? Yes! In historic Philadelphia? Yes, yes! "This place is gonna fall down with one strong gust of wind," the taxi driver says, snapping me out of my thoughts and setting my bags down with a grunt. "And I hear it''s got secrets. Plus, there''s a prowler on the loose," he says more quietly, like some sort of ghost might hear him.
Just then I see a man looking at me through an upstairs window of what looks like a guest house on the right. He quickly moves out of the frame when our eyes meet. "Yeah, well, your taxi smells like egg salad," I say, and quickly hand him a fifty-cent tip. "I''m not sure that house is gonna be any better." He glances back at Mount Pleasant before getting in his taxi and speeding off. He might not have been the nicest driver, but he''s spot-on about Mount Pleasant. I pause at the base of the eight front steps, a suitcase in each hand, looking up. "How is this still standing?" I whisper to myself, lost in won der before the grand estate.
"Theodora! Mi amor!" Aunt Hazel bursts through the front doors and stops at the top of the steps, looking down at me with a big. Her arms are outstretched, awaiting my embrace. "Welcome to Mount Pleasant!" Each summer while my parents globe-trot for research, I''m usually sent to the family of one of their professor friends who bring me in with kindness but are often stiff and awkward, and it always feels like I''m messing up their lives. That''s how it started with Cousin Erin one month ago. Aunt Hazel is different. It looks like she''s expecting me to run up the steps and leap into a bear hug. She lowers her arms when she realizes I am not going to do that. "It''s Thunder," I say.
"Not Theodora." "I heard you were clever. Where''s Erin?" She looks up and down the gravel driveway, her flowy red- and- pink patterned dress swishing as she moves. It has wide-open sleeves and reaches just above her ankles. Dad always called her a hippie, and not in a nice way. She certainly doesn''t look like any of the stiff, wool- wearing academics my professor parents hang around. Despite wearing no makeup, her skin glows, and long, gray, wavy hair falls around her face and below her shoulders. She''s wearing open-toed, strappy leather sandals and layers of bangles that clink together whenever she moves her arm.
Aunt Hazel looks like an offshore breeze, soothing as a warm summer day. My dad would certainly disapprove. In fact, he has always disapproved of Aunt Hazel, so much so that I''ve never even met her. It''s a good thing he doesn''t know I''m here. She was the one sibling who did not follow Dad''s family tradition: become a world- renowned scientist, develop breakthrough discoveries, and eventually join the staff at an Ivy League university. "Squandered intelligence. A mistake I will not let you make," Dad said to me more than once. "Let her be," Mom would often challenge, though her defense of Aunt Hazel was always short- lived.
Every winter, when the conversation starts about where they''ll ship me off during the summer, Aunt Hazel is never an option. "The taxicab dropped me off," I say. "A taxicab?" She tilts her head to one side. "Where the devil did you pick that up?" "At the depot. I took a bus to Philadelphia." "Oh," she scrunches her forehead. "Oh, my. And she just let you come on your own? With all of your worldly belongings?" "She did.
" My face flushes. I lift my suitcases and shrug apologetically. "But I''m almost twelve years old." "That Erin is about as useful as a trapdoor in a canoe!" She hurries down the steps, takes a suitcase in one arm and puts the other arm around my shoulders. "You are very self-sufficient, and I like that. It''s 1979, after all. I suppose independence starts younger nowadays!" She squeezes my shoulder and squeals, "I''ll have to get used to that. Now let''s get you inside and give you a full tour!" I watch as she climbs the front steps and eagerly waves for me to join her.
She seems so happy now. It''s the last day of June, and I wonder if we''ll even make it to August before she''ll get tired of my being here. I climb the old steps, crossing the threshold of the great estate through the open wooden double doors. "Oh, wow," is all I can bring myself to say as I enter the foyer hall. I had hoped the inside would look better than the outside. I was wrong. "Mount Pleasant is my latest project," Aunt Hazel says as we begin to walk. "This is gonna take ten years to finish!" I exclaim.
"Maybe twenty! It''s two hundred and fifty years old so what''s a few more?" She shrugs, and her grin only gets wider. "But don''t tell me the sky''s the limit when there are footprints on the moon." She looks up at an imaginary moon and then back to me, grabbing each shoulder again. "I am overjoyed that you will share it with me!" She walks ahead, taking my hand and pulling me along. "You sure like to touch and hug people." I yank my hand away. "What people? We''re family.".