Sunny Days Inside Read online

  Mom just wanted a break.

  We can give her a break, I thought. A break x 10. Maybe even x 100.

  I pulled Dad’s pant leg to get him to crouch down. I whispered my idea in his ear.

  •

  While Dad was at the store, Mimi and I got everything ready. After we changed into our resort wear, we got to work pushing aside the furniture so there would be room to lay out our towels on the floor. We gathered all the lamps in the apartment and put them up high so they would shine down on the towels like the bright Mexican sun. We turned up the heat.

  Dad brought home bags of groceries: tortillas, refried beans, avocados, salsa, chili powder, sour cream. Orange juice and a pineapple to make some fruity drinks. He downloaded some happy Mexican music called mariachi that we listened to while we cooked and danced around wiggling our hips.

  We even put up some streamers that we found — green and orange, two of the colors of the Mexican flag — and taped beach pictures torn out of the brochures all over the walls.

  Then we knocked on the bedroom door.

  Mom must have known we were up to something, but she pretended to be surprised when we said, “Hola Señora. Bienvenida a nuestro complejo de apartamentos!” which Google Translate taught us how to say.

  We ate enchiladas for dinner, then lay on the beach.

  Mom’s phone rang and I went and got it for her.

  “It’s Auntie Susie,” I said.

  “Turn it off,” Mom said. “We’re in Mexico.”

  “Smart,” Dad said. “We don’t want roaming charges.”

  Dad cleaned up. He cleaned up every night while we were at the apartment resort, which was just the weekend instead of the whole week. We all cooked (except for Mom, who wasn’t allowed to help). All Mom did for the whole holiday was relax and sip her fruity drinks and read her book. We tried to sprinkle in Spanish words when we talked.

  “Buenas noches, everybody! See you mañana!”

  “Está soleado.”

  “Yeah. Qué calor.”

  On Sunday night, our last night at the resort, we filled the bathtub and put tea lights all around the bathroom. It looked so pretty. You couldn’t even see the black around the tiles that won’t scrub off. Dad found some ocean sounds and played them on his phone. Then we sat in a row along the edge of the tub and soaked our feet in the Sea of Cortez.

  “The stars are amazing,” Mom said.

  “Las estrellas,” Dad said.

  “They seem so much closer in Mexico.”

  Dad kicked his foot. “Did you see that? A delfín!”

  “Really?” Mimi said.

  He kicked again and she cried, “I saw it! I saw it!”

  Mom sighed with happiness. She put an arm around me and Mimi and kissed the top of our heads. “Gracias, chicas. This is the best holiday I’ve ever had.”

  “Better than the airplane holiday?” Mimi asked.

  “Yes,” Mom said. “All I really want is for us to be together, safe and healthy.”

  “Then it is better than the airplane holiday,” Mimi said, “because Gingersnap got to come with us!”

  •

  I believed Mom when she said our apartment holiday was the best holiday ever. But I don’t believe she thought it was better than an airplane holiday. After all, it was make-believe. That’s why she didn’t want to talk to Auntie Susie — because it would have reminded her about sibling rivalry. That Auntie Susie was on a cruise while we stayed home.

  It would have broken the spell.

  So it wasn’t until after we pushed all the furniture back to where it used to be and threw our beach towels and resort wear into the laundry hamper, after we ripped down the streamers and went back to macaroni and cheese (which tasted soooo good after all those beans), that Mom turned her phone back on.

  Then she saw how many missed calls and voice mails there were from Auntie Susie, and also from Grandma.

  First she tried to call Auntie Susie.

  “Why isn’t she answering?” Mom said.

  Dad said, “She’s probably somewhere out of range. No service —”

  Mom called Grandma. “What’s going on? What? No! Call me as soon as you hear from her.”

  Mom hung up and started pacing back and forth across the living room that had been our relaxing beach all weekend. She wasn’t relaxed anymore.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  “There’s been an outbreak on Auntie Susie’s ship.”

  Mom’s phone rang. “Susie! Are you okay? Oh, sweetheart! We’re on it. We’ll get you home! Hang in there. First we need the information. I’m passing you over to Guy.”

  She handed Dad the phone. He began writing down what Auntie Susie was telling him. She was half-yelling, sounding really scared.

  Dad got on the computer to look things up, while Mom tried to calm Auntie Susie. She took the phone to the bedroom and closed the door.

  Later, Dad explained the situation to us. Some people on the ship had got the virus. Now everybody had to stay in their cabins. When they tried to dock the ship to let everybody off and get medical help for the sick, they were refused. Nobody wanted the virus to spread on shore. Now the cruise ship was floating somewhere in the middle of the ocean, waiting for a safe harbor.

  “What if nobody lets them dock?” I asked.

  “Will Auntie Susie get sick, too?” Mimi asked.

  “We have to hope she doesn’t, sweetie.”

  That night Mimi couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t either, not with her sighing and squirming and rustling the covers.

  “What’s the matter?” I asked.

  “I’m thirsty.”

  Normally I wouldn’t, but for some reason I got her a glass of water. She took it from me and drank and drank until it was empty. I went back to the bathroom and filled it up again.

  “Auntie Susie has food, doesn’t she?” Mimi asked when I came back the second time.

  “Yes. But she can’t leave her room. Somebody puts a tray outside her door.”

  “She’s all alone?”

  “Yes.”

  Mimi whimpered. “Why didn’t Auntie Susie come on holiday with us instead?”

  “I wish she had. So does Mom.”

  Then, instead of going back to my bed, I climbed under the covers with my sister and hugged her hard x 1,000,000.

  2

  How to Be a Cave Family

  1. Don’t cut your hair.

  Ivan’s was springy, Alek’s was straight. For as long as the twins could remember, they’d visited the barbershop once a month.

  When they were little, they used to wait on the bench with the barber’s basket of toys between them. Now they played a game on their dad’s phone, or just goggled at the barber’s deadly arsenal: the scissors and razors and the vat of combs soaking in the poisonous disinfectant. They used to think the blue comb liquid was Gatorade that the barber drank at the end of the day!

  Usually there were two barbers working. Ivan and Alek liked it best when both were free and they could sit side by side making faces at each other in the mirror. The barbers would pump the chairs, lifting the twins into the air. Then, with the cold mist from the spray bottle enveloping them, the brothers would close their eyes.

  Snip-snip-snip. Snip-snip-snip. The scissor blades tickled.

  Lastly, they bowed their heads, baring the back of their necks for the bzzzzzzing fly of the electric clippers.

  •

  It was just before spring break when Ivan and Alek went with their dad to the barbershop for the last time. They found a sign taped to the door.

  DUE TO PHYSICAL DISTANCING

  REQUIREMENTS

  THE SHOP WILL BE CLOSED

  UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

  They walked on for two blocks where there was another barbershop with almost the sa
me sign on the door. They checked out a third before giving up.

  When they got home, Ivan and Alek’s dad stopped in front of the hall mirror and ran a hand through his hair, which was wiry and thick like Ivan’s.

  “I’ll look like a cave man before too long,” he said. “We all will.”

  Ivan and Alek burst out laughing. Next thing they knew they were tearing around the apartment, scratching under their arms and grunting to each other. Their mom came out of the bedroom and told them to be quiet or they’d wake the baby.

  2. Be afraid of everybody.

  For the first week of spring break, Ivan and Alek ran wild in the playground with the other kids who lived in their apartment building. Some of the parents stood around talking among themselves.

  They were talking about the virus and how it was spreading so fast. Some families canceled their holidays. There was a rumor that school wouldn’t start again after the break.

  The grown-ups talked in whispers so that the kids wouldn’t hear. But the kids heard them anyway.

  When they chased each other around, the one formerly known as It was now the “Grown-up Virus,” a name one of them had misheard from the whispering grown-ups. “Grown-up Virus” was the last game they played as a group.

  The next day, somebody wrapped yellow tape across the entrance to the playground and around the equipment, too. No play dates allowed! You caught the virus from somebody who had it. But not everybody who had it got sick. They might be walking around feeling perfectly normal, infecting everybody with their poisonous invisible spit droplets and maybe even killing them.

  The safest thing was to be afraid of everybody.

  Later, when Ivan and Alek did their research, they discovered that this was an actual cave-person trait. Back in the Stone Age, cave people lived in small kin groups. Everybody was related to everybody else. Because resources (all the things you needed to survive, like food, water, firewood and tools) were scarce, you shared everything you had with the group.

  But there wasn’t enough for people from other kin groups. So if a stranger wandered into your cave, you wouldn’t welcome him. You wouldn’t offer food and drink. You would assume they were there to kill you so they could take your resources. You’d grab your spear and chase them off.

  Anybody could have the virus. If you were out walking and a stranger came along from the opposite direction, one of you had to cross the street.

  This was the perfect occasion for the twins to practice their cave-people skills! Ivan would growl in a low voice to alert his cave brother that somebody from an unfamiliar kin group was approaching and probably wanted to kill them with the Grown-up Virus, move into their apartment and eat all the food in their fridge.

  Alek would growl back.

  Then both boys would bare their teeth and puff out their chests in a threatening manner. If there was a stick or a rock lying on the ground nearby, they’d pick it up and wave it in the air.

  At the same time, the oncoming stranger would notice a cave woman and a cave baby in a stroller along with the two boys. They would immediately cross the street because it would be awkward and dangerous for the cave mom to have to maneuver the stroller up and down the curbs.

  The moment the approaching stranger crossed, the cave twins would crow in triumph and run around grunting and scratching under their arms. Underarm scratching meant they were especially pleased about something. (Also, cave people, who were hairy and never bathed, for sure had lice and probably fleas.)

  Too bad the cave mom couldn’t appreciate how well the cave twins protected their kin group!

  “Stop that, you two!” she hissed. “You’re embarrassing me!”

  3. Don’t go to school.

  The twins’ parents were very upset about this. In their home country, their mom was a professor of art history and their dad an information technology specialist. Now that they had immigrated, their dad worked in the IT department of the hospital across the street while their mom stayed home with the baby and supposedly worked on her own art projects.

  Even before school was canceled, the cave parents didn’t think school was challenging enough. Every evening when the cave dad got home from work, he questioned Ivan and Alek on what they had studied that day and asked to see their homework. Then he would shake his head in disappointment.

  Now the teacher was only sending worksheets (later there would be Zoom classes, but they hadn’t started yet). When the cave dad got home, he was even less impressed.

  “This is ridiculous.” He tossed aside the pages that the cave twins had finished in half the time it took them to do the work in school. “They’ll be illiterate by the end of all this.”

  He turned to the cave mom who was trying to quiet the baby. “You’ve got to tutor them.”

  “Sure.” She deposited the soggy screaming cave baby in his arms and left the room.

  Meanwhile, the cave twins started chasing each other around the apartment grunting because it seemed like an illiterate thing to do.

  It was the cave dad’s night to cook supper. How could he do that with a crying baby and a pair of ten-year-olds running wild?

  He would order pizza.

  But first the cave dad changed the cave baby and brought her to the cave mom for feeding. He apologized. He said he would get the boys started on a self-directed project where they would research a topic of interest to them and prepare some kind of presentation for the kin group.

  The cave twins scratched their underarms in ecstasy. Normally their computer time was strictly limited. Since the libraries were closed, they had no choice but to do their research online.

  “How about we research the Stone Age?” Ivan said.

  “Excellent,” the cave dad replied.

  The boys loudly cheer-grunted and got to work.

  4. Hunt and gather.

  Cave people lived around three or four hundred thousand years ago in the Stone Age, which was divided into three distinct periods: the Paleolithic, the Mesolithic and the Neolithic. First they were like apes, but slowly, slowly, they turned into cave people and then, eventually, into Homo sapiens.

  Cave people lived in caves, obviously, or sometimes in huts or tepees made out of woolly mammoth skin and tusks. They were hunter-gatherers. That meant they didn’t grow their food. Instead they spent all day wandering around searching for berries to pick and animals to kill.

  Ivan and Alek went gathering several times a week with their cave mom. In the early days, before their ears were completely covered by their hair, and before leaving the cave was no longer allowed, they would tuck the soccer ball in the bottom of the stroller so that they could stop at the school on the way home and play.

  But then they looked up “What are soccer balls made of.” No way were polyurethane, latex and polyester available during the Stone Age!

  The cave twins didn’t go inside the store to help the cave mother gather food. They had to huddle in the corner of the parking lot far away from other kin groups and watch over the cave baby sleeping in the stroller. While they waited — a very long time because of the lineups — they discussed what cave kids must have kicked around instead of a soccer ball.

  “Probably a woolly mammoth skull,” Alek said.

  “That wouldn’t roll very far,” Ivan said.

  But Alek was on the right track. When they looked up “What are soccer balls made of” they learned that the inside of a soccer ball was actually called a bladder.

  “We need a bladder,” Ivan said, and they both glanced over at the grocery store.

  They knew from past visits that all kinds of gross things were sold in the meat department, like pig ears and chicken feet and calf livers. Once Alek had dared Ivan to touch a cow’s tongue. The tongue was huge and purple, but Ivan touched it through the plastic wrapping. Then he dared Alek. Just as Alek reached out, Ivan shoved him. Alek’s finger pu
nctured the plastic and came into actual contact with the tongue.

  It was the worst moment of Alek’s life so far.

  They ended up kicking a stone around in the parking lot.

  “This probably is Stone Age soccer,” Alek said. “Hunter-gatherers only used stone tools, right?”

  The boys pictured the tools they’d seen online: Paleolithic spears and axes.

  All at once they came to the same realization, which often happens with twins.

  “What are we doing kicking this stone around? We should be hunting!”

  Between the parking lot and the sidewalk was a row of trees with some patches of dry grass poking through the dirt and stones. They wheeled the stroller over and started filling their pockets with the stones. Some they put in the basket of the stroller to take home.

  Cave people hunted animals like woolly mammoth and bison and deer, which were really big. Your aim didn’t have to be that good to hit a woolly mammoth. Unfortunately, they were extinct. There weren’t any deer or bison wandering in the city either, so Ivan and Alek had to hunt squirrels, which were a lot smaller.

  Luckily, there were plenty of them.

  The squirrels watched, their eyes bright with curiosity, as the cave twins crept toward them. These squirrels lived beside a busy grocery store, so they weren’t afraid of people. Even when the cave twins drew back their arms to hurl the deadly stones, the squirrels didn’t bother running. They just blinked at the spot on the ground where the useless stone landed and went on with their own gathering.

  Next the cave brothers tried chasing the squirrels, hoping to grab them by their tails. But after a while they got tired.

  Alek gave up first. “What would we do if we actually caught one?”

  “Kill it and eat it.”

  “Kill it how?” asked Alek, the sensitive cave twin.

  “Duh. With a rock. Then we’d roast it on a stick.”

  Just then, they heard a bleating sound coming from the stroller. It was the cave baby waking up.

  “Hey!” Ivan said. “We could hunt a baby no problem!”