I stopped by the market for fish and when I got home, I found Dad in full pumpkin farmer mode. He wore a pair of juice-splattered overalls and gestured excitedly with a spade as he talked to a couple of tourists in colorful vacation clothes. They were drinking up every word, no doubt awed by the depth of his passion for giant squashes.
Dad spotted me and beamed. "Ah, here's my loyal assistant! Without my daughter's help, Big Ben would be half his size today." He pointed at his massive prize pumpkin, which towered over the others.
I waved away the compliment. "You're the one with the orange thumb, Dad."
"You're so modest," one of the tourists told me, smiling. "Will you be working for your dad full-time now that you're done school?"
Dad chuckled. "I'm sure her mother will have something to say about that. Noelle's just as talented in the shoe shop as she is out here in the fields."
I felt my cheeks grow warmer. "Dad, stop bragging."
The tourist grinned. "What a proud papa. I guess it's good that you won't be leaving. Your parents seem to need you too much!"
I shifted my weight, the C.A.F.E. ad practically burning a hole in my pocket. I tried to ignore the hard knot of guilt in my stomach. "Would you excuse me? I have to take this fish inside before it goes bad."
Dad clapped me on the back. "Good thinking. And you'd better go help Mom after. The shop's packed today."
The fact that my parents really did seem to need me was reinforced the minute I walked into the shoe shop. Mom practically melted with relief when she saw me, her pretty face flushed from running back and forth.
She handed me a pair of sky-blue pumps with wooden heels that had been carved into the letter 'E' and had taken us weeks to perfect. "Would you get a pair with the letter 'A' instead, honey?" She lowered her voice. "How was I to know she didn't spell her name with an 'E'?"
I grinned in spite of myself. "Coming right up."
"And while you're back there, could you grab me an extra pair of the apricot flats?" Mom hurried off to help a woman who had apparently been reduced to tears by the pressure of selecting the perfect shoe. Her friends stood around her, some of them looking more murderous than sympathetic.
I dodged at least a dozen dawdling customers before I reached the peace and quiet of the storage room. Although the shop itself was neat and orderly, it was nothing compared to this room. Last summer, we spent two weeks organizing everything in our stock by style, color, and function. The system helped me find whatever I wanted with ease.
I ran around the shop, delivering shoes, and sighed when I saw the piles of discarded footwear people had left carelessly behind. I was just about to clean them up when a group of giggling girls asked for seven pairs of ribbon-strap pumps, all in different sizes and colors.
This went on for some time until the flow of customers finally slowed down.
"It's been a madhouse all morning." Mom collapsed onto one of the sofas where shoppers' bored husbands usually sat. "I think I must have sold about 300 pairs."
"I wonder why. It's August. There aren't any holidays coming up soon," I mused.
Mom gave me a strange look. "The King's Festival, silly!"
"The one in Irisia? But that's not until December!"
"You really need to catch up on current events, Noelle," Mom said, chuckling. "The ball's going to be a big deal this year. Prince Christopher is turning eighteen and his parents are using the festival to find him a future bride."
Now that made more sense. The prince of Irisia had many things going for him – like being the heir to Finale's largest kingdom, for one – but his looks were talked about more than anything else. To hear swooning girls tell it, angels' harps and rainbows exploded every time he and his perfect hair entered a room.
"It's going to be some kind of pageant to get him a girlfriend?" I asked, shocked.
Mom shrugged. "He's the crown prince. One day in the future, he'll need a queen. Anyway, more importantly, I got an order from our own queen. She wants four new pairs of dancing shoes."
My jaw dropped. "But she's way too old for him!"
My mother cackled. "No, silly. She wants him for her daughter, Princess Octavia, of course. I'm sure the queen is hoping the two of them will hit it off. Maybe she'll bring her stepdaughter, too, and double her chances."
"Princess Cynthia hasn't left the castle in ten years, Mom," I pointed out. "I don't think she'll miraculously recover for some party."
No one knew what Queen Ingrid's stepdaughter looked like. The last time Princess Cynthia had been in public had been at her father's funeral, and she had been too ill ever since to leave the castle.
"Well, we need to get to work on the order. You can help me draw up some new designs tonight." Mom rubbed her hands together eagerly, then noticed my expression. "Why the long face? You look like you just got three dozen orders for cork shoes." Last year, cork had been all the rage, but it was incredibly difficult to work with. Mom and I had barely slept, trying to cook up a formula that would strengthen the heels enough to walk on.
"Oh, ha, ha. It's just, I don't know . . ." I fiddled with a tassel on one of the shoes. "I wonder what else is out there besides measuring people's smelly feet."
"Oh, sweetheart, you love doing this." Mom tilted her head. "Is this about Geoff? You're going to miss having your best friend here for the summer, aren't you?"
"Well, yeah, but it's not just that . . ."
"You know how much Dad and I appreciate your help, don't you? Maybe we don't say it enough."
Um, yeah, you do, I thought. I thought about pulling the C.A.F.E. ad out of my pocket right then and there. Just shove it under her nose and be done with it. But I couldn't find it in me to break it to her like that.
Instead, I said, "I just want to go places, like everyone else."
Mom got up and kissed my cheek. "I'm sure you will one day," she said absently, and I knew I had already lost her. I could tell her mind had switched back to the topic of Queen Ingrid's shoes. "Go help Dad, and then we'll have an early dinner, okay?"
I went outside, feeling dismissed. I kicked a couple of stones on my way to Dad, feeling satisfied when they bounced off nearby pumpkins.
"Turn that frown the other way 'round," he said, peering at me from where he knelt in the soil. "What happened? Cranky customer?"
"No," I said, plopping down beside him. "Just feeling like Mom never listens to me."
"Mmm-hmm, whatever," he replied, his eyes on the thermometer in his hands.
I punched him in the arm. "Very funny, Dad!"
He guffawed. "Why do you think Mom never listens to you? Is this about the vacation thing again?"
I spread my hands. "All I'm saying is everybody needs a break from time to time." My father opened his mouth. "Except for you and Mom," I added quickly. "But I just want to try something new. We work on the farm and we work in the shop, seven days a week, three-hundred-and-sixty-five days a year. It's your whole life. It's my whole life."
Dad nodded. "I get it, Noelle."
"You do?" I asked, skeptical.
"Yeah, sure. It must be hard to see your friends go away when you're at home all the time," he said. Satisfied by the thermometer reading, he cleared a small hole in the soil and sprinkled a few seeds in. "But you know, you've got responsibilities that they don't have. You're a Simpkins. We're successful because we work hard. It's what you were born to. It may seem unfair, but I think one day you'll appreciate it."
That was Dad. Always trying to be fair, yet somehow always ending right back on Mom's side.
He must have sensed my frustration because he allowed me to do the seeding, a task he usually insisted on doing himself. He dug evenly spaced holes in the fresh soil, and I placed an exact number of pumpkin seeds inside, scattering them the way he had taught me.
"Excellent," he said. "Just twenty more to go, and then it'll be dark enough for us to do the gossamer powder."
My mood lifted a little. Spraying pumpkins with our own special blend of ingredients was one of my favorite parts of working on the patch. Gossamer powder was a secret, sparkling substance that came in unmarked packets. According to Dad, it contained crushed sprite wings, nightshade extract, and the shredded petals of some white rose that only grew on a mountain overseas. It was rare and expensive stuff, and Dad always added a few more secret ingredients that were just as rare and expensive. It was all worth it, though, because it had helped Big Ben grow to roughly the size of a pony.
That reminded me. "Dad, do you think the Tented Market has gossamer powder?"
"Probably. I've heard they carry a lot of unusual things," he said, covering the last hole and grunting as he got to his feet. "Why do you mention it?"
"Oh, someone in town told me it was going to Irisia," I said. "By the way, I stopped by the library. Miss Jenkins has a new book you might like. And I ran into the Snapp-dragon."
Dad led the way to the shed, where he kept his tools and powder. "I don't know why you girls can't get along. You used to be such good friends."
"Yeah, when we were four, and then she cut off my ponytail because she wanted to have the longest hair in the class. And she lost Lily on purpose at my birthday picnic," I reminded him, still furious every time I thought of the search for my dog.
"Oh, honey, you don't know that. Maybe Lily jumped over the gate by herself."
I followed him back out onto the patch. "She tried to sabotage my run for student council. And she spread those lies about me stealing the field trip money, and even got Geoff to believe her. Need I continue?"
"I think she's just jealous of you," Dad said. "I mean, you get to do this." He stopped in front of Yelly Belly, a bright golden pumpkin about half the size of Big Ben, and tossed a sparkling fistful of powder over it. The squash shimmered for a few seconds, shuddered slightly, and then was still again. I knew that in the morning, it would be ever so slightly bigger. "Your turn."
I stopped in front of the next pumpkin and imitated his movement. The powder settled on its broad, rough surface, like stardust on an orange moon.
"Nice job. I think that one might be a potential dwarf house," Dad commented. "It has the right shape."
The pumpkin had thick, ropy green tendrils that twisted into graceful curlicues around its base, reminding me of wheels. "I could see it becoming a carriage. You could carve out a couple of windows," I said, walking around the squash with a critical eye. "Maybe attach a bar to the front where the horses would be harnessed."
"There's an idea!" Dad agreed. "That's what I meant about you being born for this, kiddo." He walked over to the next pumpkin, humming as he sprinkled gossamer powder over it.
He's the one who was born for this, I thought. The one who's fine staying here forever.
As for me, I wanted nothing more than to leave. The contraband C.A.F.E. flier in my pocket was proof of that.
I made a mental note to get rid of it as soon as possible.