The Great Unexpected Read online

  SHARON CREECH

  The Great Unexpected

  DEDICATION

  for

  Pearl and Nico

  and

  for you, reader

  EPIGRAPHS

  So much world all at once …

  —Wislawa Szymborska

  OVERHEARD CONVERSATIONS

  Father and four-year-old son:

  Father:

  Did you brush your teeth?

  Son:

  Yes.

  Father:

  Really?

  Son:

  Yes.

  Father:

  Tell me the truth.

  Son:

  What is “truth”?

  Mother and five-year-old daughter:

  Daughter:

  I’m going to be a dolphin.

  Mother:

  Is that so?

  Daughter:

  Yes. I will live in the ocean.

  Mother:

  For real?

  Daughter:

  What is “real”?

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Epigraphs

  Prologue

  1 A Body Falls from a Tree

  2 Lizzie

  3 Across the Ocean: Revenge

  4 The Body Speaks

  5 The Moon

  6 Across the Ocean: The Solicitor

  7 Nula and Joe

  8 Families

  9 Black Dog Night Hill

  10 Across the Ocean: Dogs Sleep

  11 The Crooked Bridge

  12 Another Stranger

  13 Across the Ocean: A Visitor

  14 Witch Wiggins

  15 The Barn

  16 Across the Ocean: The Request

  17 The Unfortunate Souls

  18 The Dangle Doodle Man

  19 A Family

  20 Finns

  21 Across the Ocean: The Bridge

  22 I Don’t Care

  23 The First Unfortunate Soul

  24 The Second Unfortunate Soul

  25 Of Lies and Such

  26 Across the Ocean: The Call

  27 The Limits of Friendship

  28 Don’t Get Too Friendly

  29 Reluctant Souls

  30 Across the Ocean: Another Call

  31 Wrinkles

  32 A Patch of Dirt

  33 Across the Ocean: A Visitor Returns

  34 Two Trunks

  35 Across the Ocean: Plans

  36 The Third Trunk

  37 Return to the Unfortunates

  38 The Wind Blows

  39 Side Trips

  40 Across the Ocean: A Prowler

  41 News

  42 Lar-de-dar

  43 Across the Ocean: Ireland

  44 Pilpenny

  45 The Bridge and the Orchard

  46 Across the Ocean: A Storm

  47 Real or Not Real?

  48 Across the Ocean: Wind and Fire

  49 From Donkeys’ Ears

  50 Across the Ocean: The Witch Visits

  51 Ashes

  52 The Great Unexpected

  53 One More Trunk

  54 Across the Ocean: The Mail

  55 Mary-Mary and the Gold

  56 Across the Ocean: True as True

  57 Standing on the Moon

  About the Author

  Other Works

  Credits

  Copyright

  Back Ad

  About the Publisher

  PROLOGUE

  My name is Naomi Deane and I grew up in Blackbird Tree, in the home of my guardians, Joe and Nula. Among the tales that Joe often told was that of a poor man who, while gambling, lost his house but won a donkey.

  “A donkey?” the poor man wailed. “What do I want with a donkey? I cannot even feed a donkey.”

  “No matter,” replied the donkey. “Reach into my left ear.”

  The poor man, though shocked that the donkey could talk, nonetheless reached into the donkey’s ear and pulled out a sack of feed.

  “Well, now,” the poor man said. “That’s a mighty handy ear. I wish it had food for me as well.”

  “Reach into my right ear,” the donkey said.

  And so the poor man reached into the donkey’s right ear and pulled out a loaf of bread, a pot of butter, and a meat pie.

  Joe went on like this, spinning out the tale, with the poor man pulling all sorts of things out of the donkey’s ears: a stool, a pillow, a blanket, and, finally, a sack of gold.

  I loved this story, but I always listened uneasily, fearing that something bad would be pulled from the donkey’s ears. Even after I’d heard the tale many times, always the same, I still worried that the poor man might reach in and pull out a snapping turtle or an alligator or something equally unpleasant and unexpected.

  Sensing my fear, Joe would say, “It’s only a story, Naomi, only a story.” He suggested that I say to myself, “I’m not in the story, I’m not in the story”—a refrain I could repeat so that I would feel less anxious.

  And so each time the poor man would reach into the donkey’s ears, I would tell myself, I’m not in the story, I’m not in the story, but it didn’t help because a story was only interesting if I was in the story.

  CHAPTER 1

  A BODY FALLS FROM A TREE

  If you have never had a body fall out of a tree and knock you over, let me tell you what a surprising thing that is. I have had nuts fall out of a tree and conk my head. Leaves have fallen on me, and twigs, and a branch during a storm. Bird slop, of course, everyone gets that. But a body? That is not your usual thing dropping out of a tree.

  It was a boy, close about my age, maybe twelve. Shaggy hair the color of dry dirt. Brown pants. Blue T-shirt. Bare feet. Dead.

  Didn’t recognize him. My first thought was, Is this my fault? I bet this is my fault. Nula once said I had a knack for being around when trouble happened. She had not been around other kids much, though, and maybe did not know that most kids had a knack for being around when trouble happened.

  All I really wanted to do that hot day was go on down to the creek and hunt for clay in the cool, cool water. I was wondering if maybe I could deal with the body later, when the body said, “Am I dead?”

  I looked at the body’s head. Its eyes were closed.

  “If you can talk, I guess you’re not dead.”

  The body said, “When I open my eyes, how will I know if I’m dead or alive?”

  “Well, now, you’ll see me, you’ll see the meadow, you’ll see the tree you fell out of, so I guess you’ll know you’re alive.”

  “But how will I know if I’m here or if I’m at Rooks Orchard?”

  “I don’t know anything about any rook or any orchard, so I can pretty much guarantee that you are here and not there. Why don’t you open your eyes and have a look around?”

  And so the body opened his eyes and slowly sat up and looked all around—at the green meadow, at the cows in the distance, at the tree out of which he had fallen, and at me, and then he yelled, “Oh no!” and fell back on the ground and his eyes closed and he was dead again.

  CHAPTER 2

  LIZZIE

  No sooner had the body lain back down than I heard the warbling voice of Lizzie Scatterding. Lizzie often felt it necessary to sing—in a high, trembly, warbly opera voice—when she was outdoors.

  “Oh, lar-de-dar, the sky so blue”—definitely Lizzie—“the fields so green, oh lar-de-dar—”

  Lizzie was my friend, and usually I was glad to see her, but I was not sure how she was going to handle seeing the body at my feet. Sometimes Lizzie could be a little dramatic.

  “Oh, lar-de-dar—Naomi! Is that you?” Lizzie stopped in the middle of the path and cro
ssed her hands over her chest as if to keep her fragile heart steady. “Naomi!” She ran toward me, her frizzy mane flopping here and there.

  “Ack! Naomi, what is that? Is that a person?” She inched her way around to stand in back of me so that I was her shield. “Who is it? Where’d it come from? Is it dead?” She clutched my shoulders. “You didn’t kill it, did you?”

  “It fell out of this here tree. I thought it was dead, but then it spoke, and now it’s gone off again.”

  I kneeled beside the body and put my hand on its chest.

  “Is it breathing?” Lizzie asked. “Take its pulse.”

  I held the body’s wrist. “I can feel something gurgling in there.”

  “Oh, my! Then it’s alive. Have you ever seen it before? What did it say when it spoke—before it went off again?”

  “Something about a rook’s orchard, or maybe a crook’s orchard.”

  Lizzie’s foot nudged the body’s foot. “Maybe it was in an orchard place and a crook tried to kill it and so he hid in this tree and then when you came along—”

  “Maybe we should stop calling it an it.”

  Lizzie studied the body’s face. “Never saw it before, did you?”

  “Nope.”

  “Look in its pockets, Naomi. See if it has something with its name on it.”

  “I’m not looking in any boy’s pockets, dead or alive. You look.”

  Just then the body grunted. Lizzie skittered sideways like a crab.

  “Good gracious! I swear to bats! It’s alive!” Her hands were protecting her fragile heart again. “Naomi, the poor thing. What if his internal organs are hurt? What if he is bleeding to death and we don’t even know it? Naomi, you must get help.”

  The body spoke. “Am I here—?”

  Lizzie squealed. “It has a voice!”

  Its eyes were still closed. “Am I here—or am I there?”

  I touched his hand. “You’re here.”

  “How will I know that?”

  “Well, ding it, you are here. If you weren’t here, you wouldn’t be hearing me, would you? You’d be somewhere else. But you’re not somewhere else, you are here!”

  “Naomi, you don’t have to be so harsh. It’s a poor body lying there maybe bleeding to death and it just wants to know if it is here.”

  “Fine. Then you take over, Doctor Lizzie.”

  “I will.” Lizzie carefully placed herself beside the body, folding her legs daintily beneath her. “Now,” she cooed in the softest of tones, “everything will be just fine. We need to find out who you are and if you are injured in your internal organs.”

  The body was silent.

  Lizzie inched a little closer. “Boy, can you tell me your name?”

  Silence.

  “Boy, do you have family around here?”

  Silence.

  “Naomi, do you have a cool cloth?”

  “No, Lizzie, I do not happen to have a cool cloth on my person.”

  “I feel we should put a cool cloth on this poor injured boy’s forehead.”

  “I don’t have a cool cloth.”

  Lizzie sighed a deep, meaningful sigh. “Oh, dear, oh, dear.” She lightly touched her fingers to the boy’s head. Then she leaned closer and blew on his forehead.

  “Whatever are you doing, Lizzie?”

  “I am cooling the poor boy, Naomi. I am bringing comfort until such time as he can rouse himself.”

  “What if he can’t ever rouse himself? What if he dies for good?”

  Lizzie tapped the boy’s shoulder. “Please do try your best to rouse yourself and tell us your name.”

  Silence.

  “I am pleading with you, boy.”

  Silence.

  “Naomi, you will have to get help. I will stay here with the poor, injured boy. Please go. Please hurry.”

  But before I could move, the boy spoke again. “Don’t take the gold.”

  “Naomi, he spoke! He told us not to take the gold!”

  “I’ve got ears, Lizzie. I heard him.” I tapped his arm. “What gold?”

  Silence.

  I scanned the area. No gold in sight. I asked louder: “WHAT GOLD?”

  “Naomi, please don’t shout at the poor, injured boy.”

  The boy opened his eyes.

  “Naomi, he opened his eyes.”

  “For heaven’s sake, Lizzie, I’m not blind.”

  “My name is Finn.”

  “Naomi, he said his name! He said his name! His name is Finn!”

  “There isn’t any gold,” he said.

  “Naomi, he said—”

  “I know, I know what he said. There isn’t any gold. There isn’t any silver, either. There aren’t any emeralds or rubies or diamonds—”

  “He didn’t say any of that, Naomi. He only said about the gold.”

  “No gold,” the boy repeated.

  “See?” Lizzie said. “No gold.”

  CHAPTER 3

  ACROSS THE OCEAN: REVENGE

  MRS. KAVANAGH

  While Naomi and Lizzie were learning the name of the body that fell from a tree, across the ocean in a stately manor on the southeastern coast of Ireland, the elderly Mrs. Kavanagh paused as she wrote on a piece of fine parchment. She placed the pen to one side and tapped a finger on the desk.

  “There. Enough for now.” She smiled a wistful smile. “’Twill be a fine, fine revenge.”

  Her companion, Miss Pilpenny, recapped the pen. “Yes, Sybil, a fine and clever revenge.”

  “Shall we have a murder tonight?”

  “Indeed, Sybil. Splendid notion.”

  “And then perhaps a little jam and bread.”

  “Indeed. That plum jam from the Master’s orchard?”

  Old Mrs. Kavanagh laughed, a sudden girlish burst that was followed by prolonged wheezing.

  Miss Pilpenny rubbed the old lady’s back until the wheezing subsided. “There, there. You can rest now.”

  CHAPTER 4

  THE BODY SPEAKS

  The body named Finn asked if we had any sweets on us.

  “Candy?” I said.

  “Yes. Can-dee,” he said, as if he had never said the word before.

  Then he asked if we had any can-dee drink.

  “Candy drink?” Lizzie said. “Whatever do you mean, Finn boy?”

  By this time, Finn had sat up and commenced to scratching himself: his head, his neck, his belly, his ankles. “You call it, wait, you call it—soda pop. You got any of that?”

  You could take one look at me and Lizzie and see that neither one of us was carrying anything whatsoever, so where would we be stashing soda pop?

  “No soda pop,” I said.

  Apparently Lizzie thought I was too abrupt. She smiled at Finn and put her hands together under her chin. “I think this boy needs some refreshment, Naomi. I think this boy is hungry and thirsty.”

  “I think this boy is old enough to say what he wants, Lizzie. I think this boy is not invisible.”

  Lizzie ignored me. “Finn boy, are you entirely sure you are not bleeding from your internal organs? Because if you are, you should not move, and we should send Naomi for help. But if you are not bleeding from your internal organs, then perhaps we should escort you home, if you would be so kind as to tell us where that might be, Finn boy.”

  “No. No help,” Finn said, leaping to his feet.

  “Oh, my,” Lizzie said. “Are you entirely sure you should be upright?”

  “I’m fine, fine.” Finn rotated his head and his hands. He lifted one foot and then the other. “I’ll be going now.” Finn turned and started off across the meadow.

  “But wait,” Lizzie called. “Wait, wait, Finn boy!” She ran up behind him. “Won’t you let us escort you home? What if you become faint along the way? What if—”

  “I can make it fine.”

  Lizzie was protecting her fragile heart again. “But, Finn boy, at least tell us where you live. We’ve never seen you in these here parts before.”

  Finn looked
to the left and right and then to the sky above. “I’m staying up the hill a piece.”

  “Up that hill?” I said. “Black Dog Night Hill?”

  “That’s what you call it? That’s where I’m headed.”

  “But nobody lives up there, nobody except the—” I looked at Lizzie. She looked at me. “Nobody except the dim Dimmens clan.”

  Lizzie batted at me with her hand. “Shh.”

  Finn looked right in my eyes, calm as could be, and said, “That’s where I’m staying, up at the dim Dimmenses’ place.” With that, he continued on his way with only the slightest limp.

  “Look what you’ve gone and done, Naomi.”

  “What? What’d I do?”

  “You called them the ‘dim’ Dimmenses. That’s so rude.”

  “That’s what everybody calls them. That’s what you call them.”

  “But not to their—their—houseguest.”

  “‘Houseguest’? Since when did you start calling company ‘houseguests’?”

  “Oh, Naomi. That poor, injured boy. That poor, poor Finn boy.”

  CHAPTER 5

  THE MOON

  Lizzie joined me at the creek, where we dug clay for an hour or two. We found a good gray clump of it, smooth as could be, beneath the top gravelly layer. Perfect for making bowls and such. Lizzie felt obliged to talk.

  “Naomi, I can’t help worrying over that poor, injured Finn boy. What if he has fallen on the path and no one finds him for days or weeks and he dies all pitiful and alone and then goes rotten and the raccoons eat him up? I can hardly bear the thought. Where do you think he came from, Naomi? Why do you think he’s staying with the dim Dimmenses up on Black Dog Night Hill? Do you think he’s kin to them? That would be the most awful shame.”

  Joe, my guardian and a man of few words, once said about Lizzie, “That girl could talk the ears off a cornfield.”