The peach pit, p.9
The Peach Pit, page 9
7. He had a lot of work to do if his art project was going to be ready for the citywide competition and show. All he had at the moment were a bunch of ideas and sketches, and that wasn’t gonna cut it. (Trouble was, Dad kept reminding him that his schoolwork had to come first—before he was allowed to work on his art, or the Peach Pit, or baking things. After he got a 42 percent on his first math test of the year, he was now required to get Dad or Lucy to sign off on his homework before he was allowed to spend any time out in his art shed each day. Freddy found this infuriating.)
8. Competitive art used to be a category in the Olympics.
9. Freddy Peach baked the best blueberry scones on earth. So good, in fact, that they could easily win a gold medal in the Olympics if that ever became a category. (Would competitive baking be a Summer Olympics category, or Winter? Winter, Freddy decided. Definitely the Winter Olympics.)
10. The blob of toothpaste that gets plopped on top of your toothbrush has an actual, official name! It’s called a “nurdle” (and somehow, knowing this made Freddy actually enjoy brushing his teeth for the first time in his life). In other random-fact news, he’d also recently discovered the dot over a lowercase i and j is called a “tittle.” This, too, was endlessly fascinating. He couldn’t help but wonder: Whose job was it to name these kinds of random things? Was that a job Freddy could get someday?!
11. Freddy had just devised the very best prank ever to play on his little brother.
Herb was completely obsessed with the dollhouse that Lucy had found somewhere deep in the mansion’s creepy, twisting servant staircases. Over the past few weeks, while the rest of the family worked with the Handy Gals and electricians and a never-ending stream of plumbers to repair the skin, bone, and guts of the mansion (as well as the more boring tasks of painting, organizing, and cleaning guest rooms and common areas), Herb had spent hours decorating his mini Peach Pit and futzing around with his LEGO figurines to set the house up just so. Whenever Freddy walked by during the day, he liked to move something around inside—just to see if Herb would notice.
Herb always noticed. Just like with his boxes and bins of collections, Herb was particular about what went where. He was so particular about his dollhouse arrangement, in fact, that he’d started using Dad’s phone to take pictures of each room in the mini Peach Pit before he went to bed at night to have it on record. Herb’s obsession with order was what gave Freddy the perfect idea for a prank.
From the time he was a baby, Herb had been afraid of Great Aunt Lucinda’s mansion. He was convinced it was haunted, and all the funny noises the house made didn’t help at all. Freddy had discovered it was easy to hide just around a corner and pop out to surprise his little brother, eliciting a scream so loud that it set all the dogs to barking at once.
With Halloween on the horizon, creepy decorations had been popping up in yards all over their new neighborhood. So ghosts and goblins were top-of-mind for Herb, and Freddy had a little something special planned to totally spook his brother in the most hilarious way possible.
One Friday night at dinner, right in the middle of October, Freddy set the stage for his prank. “Have any of you guys heard that weird moaning in the wall behind the first-floor stair landing?” he asked his dad, Lucy, and Herb through a mouthful of mashed potatoes (the kind from a box).
Herb’s mouth dropped open, revealing a mass of white mush inside. His eyes grew wide. “Moaning?” he whispered.
“Maybe it’s more groaning,” Freddy said with a shrug. “I found the dogs all sitting in front of the wall right by Herb’s dollhouse, barking at something yesterday. Then Dasher started sniffing and scratching at the wall. It was weird.” He tried to hide a grin. “But I’m sure it’s nothing.”
“Pipes,” Dad said, grabbing a roll off the plate in the middle of the table. “Our pipes make an awful racket.”
Lucy glanced at Herb and said in a lighthearted voice, “I’m sure it’s just the pipes.”
Dad heaved a sigh. “We really should get the plumber to take a look at that and see if she can get back there and tighten some stuff up.”
For a moment, Freddy felt a little guilty for dropping yet another to-do in his dad’s lap. But he knew they couldn’t actually afford any shoulds at the moment—they could only afford the must-do projects—so he’d clear things up before Dad ever actually put a plumber on the case.
“Do you guys want to know how we’re doing on our to-do list?” Lucy suddenly blurted out, obviously trying to change the subject before Herb got even more freaked out.
Freddy glanced at his little brother, who was now pushing mounds of potato mush around his plate. Freddy could tell the stage had been perfectly set to put his plan into action. Coughing to hide a giggle, Freddy said, “We’re making progress. The living room is done, right?”
For the next twenty minutes, they talked about all the projects around the mansion that were finished.
They had completed the living room, cleaned up the dining room and china cabinets, and fixed all the loose floorboards and doorknobs.
The outdoor window trim had been repaired and painted—but not well. Dad had decided they would handle that project all on their own and, with the exception of Freddy, none of them knew their way around a paintbrush. Also, they were still trying to wash all the little painted paw prints off the front walkway, which had been there since several of the pups had also tried to “help” with the project.
One weekend they’d spent what felt like a thousand hours deep-cleaning the kitchen and pantry, which was one of the worst weekends of Freddy’s entire life.
Lucy’s Winter Suite was coming along nicely, so they had at least one room mostly ready for guests.
And they’d interviewed a bunch of college kids who were interested in a part-time job as their B&B “host.” The job would involve helping out with guest services when the Peaches were at work or school or didn’t have the time to manage the day-to-day operation of the B&B themselves. They had all easily agreed on hiring a smiley guy named Theo who had actually lived and worked in an old historic inn in Connecticut as a kid and he totally loved dogs! It didn’t hurt his chances that Theo was also a Cardboard Camp counselor, which made him a true hero in Freddy’s book.
“It’s a good thing we’re in pretty good shape,” Dad said with a slight smile. “Because I have exciting news!”
Freddy had learned that exciting news in Dad-speak could mean any number of things: that he’d found a missing sock in the bottom of the laundry, or that his favorite flavor of iced tea was back in stock at the university quick mart, or that they were going to be taking a trip to Iceland. You never knew which level of exciting Dad was talking about at any given time.
“We have our first guest coming to stay next weekend!” Dad said, clapping.
Lucy coughed out a mouthful of milk. “A real, paying guest?”
“Sort of,” Dad said. “She’s not paying, but I got an email from Lois Sibberson earlier this week, and she’s on her way to sell baked goods at some sort of fall festival up in Ely. She’s going to be driving through town with the truck and asked if we’d be willing to have her swing by for a visit.”
“Lois Sibberson, the lady who bought the Peach Pie Truck off us at the Ohio Food Truck Festival this summer?” Freddy asked. “That Lois Sibberson?”
“That’s the one,” Dad confirmed. “I thought it would be fun to invite her to stay and check out our next Great Peach Experiment.”
“She can stay in The Winter Suite!” Lucy quickly offered. “I can have it ready by next weekend for sure.”
“Think we can have our breakfast plan figured out by then?” Dad asked, looking specifically toward Freddy.
Freddy flushed with pride. “Definitely. I’ll make blueberry scones. I bet Lois will ask me for my recipe, so she can sell some just like it out of her food truck.”
As they cleaned up dinner and talked about the plans for Lois and the Peach Pie Truck’s visit, Herb was much more quiet than usual. For a few moments, Freddy felt bad for planting more scary thoughts in his head. But Herb was always begging to be treated like a big kid (and Freddy had even overheard him telling their sister he was much more mature and adult-like than Freddy, which really peeved him). Only little kids were afraid of ghosts and spooky noises, so Freddy was really doing Herb a favor by helping him conquer his fear that the mansion was haunted. It would just take a little time to do that, that’s all.
That night before bed, Freddy offered to read with Herb to help him get to sleep. This was usually Lucy’s task, but she was happy to hand over the reins for a night, so she could do extra homework (or whatever it was she usually did on a Friday night). Before Freddy had even gotten to the end of the chapter in The Vanderbeekers of 141st Street, Herb had nodded off. Freddy poked his brother’s foot, then his cheek, to be absolutely sure he was sound asleep.
As soon as he knew his brother was down for the count, Freddy quietly tiptoed down the stairs to the second-floor landing. Giggling quietly to himself, he carefully lifted several LEGO figurines from their places in the house, swapped their heads for LEGO monster heads Freddy had found in his own LEGO bin, and dropped the new creepy LEGO people right back into the same spots. Then he took the contents of the dollhouse’s living room and swapped them with the contents of the kitchen, being careful to set up each room exactly the way it had been in Herb’s original design—just in a totally different room within the mini-mansion.
As soon as he’d finished, he brushed his sweaty palms on his pants. Mission accomplished. Knowing Herb and his silly fear that the mansion was haunted, Freddy had absolutely no doubt his brother would assume the moaning ghost in the wall was now haunting his dollhouse. A little mean? Maybe. But funny? Most definitely.
13
THE FIRST GUEST
Lucy heard the familiar clanking sound of their family’s old food truck out in the driveway. They’d been expecting Lois Sibberson, a retired teacher from Delaware, Ohio, to arrive in Duluth sometime that Friday. Ever since she’d gotten home from school for the day, Lucy had been waiting impatiently in the kitchen for their first official B&B guest to arrive. Now, she peeked out the window, watching as Lois eased the giant beast of a vehicle into their driveway and parked it beside the giant construction dumpster next to the garage—easily taking up nearly half of the massive driveway. Lucy announced Lois’s arrival to her brothers and dad through the intercom, then ran outside to greet her.
“Welcome, Ms. Sibberson!” Lucy called out, waving at Lois through the driver’s side window.
Lois hopped out of the truck. “Hi, hon. How’s it feel to see this old friend again?” she asked, patting the side of the giant food truck affectionately.
“It looks almost exactly the same,” Lucy noted. “Just fancier.” The truck was still the same bright peachy-orange color it had been when Lucy’s family had owned it, but Lois had gotten a fancy food truck wrap to cover up the truck’s previous name. Where the side of the truck had once been emblazoned with THE PEACH PIE TRUCK in swirly, hand-painted letters, it now had a gorgeous illustration of muffins and cookies in a basket, along with the words BAKED WITH LOVE BY GRANDMA LOIS.
“Can I look inside?” Lucy asked.
“Be my guest,” Lois told her. “I haven’t changed a thing on the inside.”
Lucy went around back and climbed up into the familiar space. While she ran her hands across the countertops, peeked inside the giant ovens, fondly thinking back on some of the incredible adventures they’d had that summer, Lois chattered away. She told Lucy about her drive up from Ohio and her plans for the fall festival in Ely she was heading to early the next morning. She wandered around the outside of the mansion and peeked into the sprawling nature preserve backyard.
“This is quite a house,” Lois said, whistling as she took it all in. “What are you calling the place?”
“Freddy calls it the Peach Pit,” Lucy said. “Since it’s kind of falling apart.”
Lois snorted just as the other three members of the Peach family came parading out of the mansion’s back door. Lois waved at the guys, muttering to Lucy under her breath, “ ‘The Peach Pit’ doesn’t exactly say ‘cozy B and B’ to me. You might want to reconsider that.”
Freddy had obviously overheard her, since he called out, “It’s a working title,” and held out a hand for Lois to shake. “It’s great to see you again, Lois. Welcome to our home; your home away from home!”
“Thank you, Freddy,” Lois said, chuckling. “It’s good to see all your smiling faces again, too.”
“Can I collect your bags?” Herb offered with a stiff bow. Lucy could tell that Freddy had been coaching their little brother on the ins and outs of being a good host. But obviously, Freddy had gone a bit overboard, and both brothers were now acting like fuddy-duddy butlers in some sort of eighteenth-century castle. “Would you like an icy cold glass of cucumber water?”
“Ooh la la,” Lois said. “Cucumber water, eh? Very fancy.”
“Can I take your coat?” Freddy said, using the same weird accent as he had on the day they’d done their practice breakfast service with Ethan and Henry. “Would you like me to show you to the sitting room?” He took a step closer to Lois and offered her his arm.
“You’ve got a sitting room?” Lois hooted. She patted her fleece and said, “And this isn’t a coat, it’s a shirt.”
“How do you take your tea?” Herb asked, crowding in even closer. Now he was using an accent that made him sound like a vampire.
Lois took a step back. “I think I’m good.”
Lucy cringed. This whole butler routine was starting to feel very awkward. Her brothers were going to need to cool it a little bit, or they’d scare off all their guests by smothering them with too much hospitality.
“Come on in, Lois,” their dad said. “We’ll show you to your room and let you get settled. As I mentioned in my email, you’re our first official guest here at the B and B. We’re still working out some kinks and details of how things will actually run around here.”
“We just hired someone who’s going to help us out, but he hasn’t started yet,” Lucy explained. “So you’re stuck with just us.”
“Fine by me. Seems like you’re off to a good start,” Lois said kindly, trailing behind them into the house. “But as I said before, you might want to work on your B and B name—‘The Peach Pit’ doesn’t exactly have a charming ring to it.”
Just as Lois stepped inside the back door, all four dogs rushed at her in one furry pack. They jumped and yipped and crowded around her legs, nearly knocking her into the shiny new stainless-steel kitchen counter.
“Dasher! Donner! Vix! Rudy!” Herb barked back at them in a stern voice. The four dogs paused in their yipping and fixed their eyes on the youngest Peach. “Sit!”
By some miracle, Dasher and Vix did exactly as they were told. Herb offered each of them a treat from his pocket. Lucy couldn’t believe it—Herb had actually managed to train the dogs to do something on command! But before she could be too amazed by this turn of events, Rudy grabbed the bottom of one of Lois’s pant legs in his mouth and tugged. Startled by all the commotion, Donny lifted one leg and peed on the shoe that their guest had just taken off beside the back door.
“Bad dogs!” Herb yelled, swiping each of the two misbehaving pups into his arms. “No!” Lucy hustled to grab Lois’s shoe—which was, luckily, a strappy sport sandal-type thing that could be easily washed in the sink. Meanwhile, Dad apologized profusely, and Freddy just closed his eyes and moaned.
By this point, Lois was nearly doubled over with laughter.
“I’m so sorry,” Dad said again and again. “I don’t know what’s gotten into them!”
Lucy dragged the other two dogs out of the room by their collars. She followed Herb to the “piano” room (which was really just a sitting room full of fussy furniture and a bunch of stale old books), where they closed the four naughty pups in with a bowl of water and a stern “Behave!”
As soon as the dogs were contained, Herb turned to Lucy with a broad smile. “Did you see how nicely Dasher and Vix sat when I told them to?” he asked proudly. “My training’s working!”
Lucy took a deep breath. Though two dogs sitting on command was a big accomplishment for these four specific pups, a chewed-on pair of pants and pee in Lois’s shoe was not the best official start to their new business. “He peed on her shoe,” Lucy muttered.
Herb chewed his lower lip. “Yeah…we might want to consider locking the dogs up on the fourth floor when other guests check in, huh? Maybe we can put them in your room, since it’s bigger and not as messy and full of stuff as mine.”
“That’s probably the safest bet,” Lucy said.
But even as she tentatively agreed to this plan, Lucy couldn’t help thinking about the fact that she really didn’t want any more living things spending time in her bedroom. For the past week, ever since Herb had convinced himself his dollhouse—and thus the entire mansion—was definitely haunted, he’d been sleeping in a little blanket nest on the floor of Lucy’s bedroom. Because Herb was almost always attached to her (he refused to be anywhere in the house alone, for fear of ghosts), Lucy hadn’t gotten more than a few minutes to herself for nearly a week. She hadn’t gotten any time to go back up to explore more of the attic, and Herb kept insisting they read extra chapters of The Vanderbeekers and more stories from the Yasmin chapter books (which Herb was reading for his classroom book club) at night—so Lucy wasn’t getting much of her own reading time in, either.
When she and Herb returned to the kitchen, they learned that Dad had already escorted Lois to The Winter Suite. She had told Dad and Freddy that she was eager to take a nap before dinner. “The drive wore her out, I guess,” Freddy explained.
