“Five is good,” Hank says. “Six would mean a lot of money coming in, but five means something interesting will happen. Four would mean rain.”

  “Something interesting,” Clodine repeats. “That’s right. I remember now. And what would seven mean?”

  “That we have a toad problem,” says Hank.

  “Sometimes I think you all just make this stuff up,” I say as I open the refrigerator door and take out the milk.

  “And why would we do that?” asks my grandmother.

  “I don’t know,” I admit. “But honestly, do you think the number of toads sitting in the dog bowl really means anything?”

  “We’ll see,” Clodine says. “Something interesting happens today, then it does.”

  “And what does interesting mean, anyway?” I ask. “To some people, that could be finding a penny on the sidewalk.”

  “What’s gotten into you?” Starletta says, fixing me with a stare. She makes me nervous, and I spill Froot Loops on the counter.

  “Nothing,” I mutter, sweeping the cereal into a bowl and sloshing milk over it.

  Reluctantly, I sit down at the kitchen table. I can feel the three of them watching me, so I concentrate on the calendar that hangs on the wall beside the door. At the top of the page is printed COMPLIMENTS OF TOONEY’S FEED & FARM. WE APPRECIATE YOUR BUSINESS! Below that is a painting of a tractor moving through a field of corn. The farmer driving it is waving and smiling, as if harvesting corn is the most exciting thing anyone could ever do. The month is August. The date of the seventeenth is circled in red, and in the box is written: ILONA’S BABY.

  Ilona is my mother. The baby is me. The calendar hung on the wall the summer she was pregnant with me. And the reason the calendar is still on the wall is because of the curse. I was born on a Monday, and seventeen years later the seventeenth of August also falls on a Monday. So the calendar not only marks my birthday, it marks the day I have to make it to without the curse coming true. We’ve done this for every baby born into the family since we became unlucky, starting with my great-great-grandmother Clodine back in 1930. The idea is that the calendar acts as a kind of good luck charm. Or maybe a warning. When you see it every single day of your life, it’s hard not to pay attention.

  So far, though, it hasn’t worked.

  Nine more weeks. If I can make it nine more weeks, I’ll be the first to escape. It sounds easy enough. But we’ve come close in the past. Hank made it to three days. Clodine and Starletta were so sure she was going to do it that they planned a big celebration for her birthday, which is on January 3. But then she went to Ruby Ginnison’s New Year’s Eve party and got caught unawares. Starletta says it’s because they got too cocky, so now we don’t celebrate birthdays at all. Not until number eighteen.

  I can practically feel the three of them doing the math in their heads, so I finish my cereal and get up. “I’m going to be late,” I say. I rinse my bowl in the sink, then head out before anyone can say anything else.

  The Eezy-Freezy is a ten-minute drive from the house, but I drive extra slowly so it takes almost twice that long. My father has probably been there for a couple of hours already. Even though we don’t open until eleven, there’s a lot to do to get ready. Also, he just likes being there.

  This is my sixth summer working with him. He opens on Memorial Day and closes the day after Labor Day. In the fall and winter, there aren’t enough people wanting hot dogs and soft-serve ice cream cones to make it worth staying open. Those months, he works at the garage in town as a mechanic. He’s not as happy then.

  If we just counted on the people who live around here for business, we wouldn’t be open at all. But in the summer we get tons of people who have camps on the lake. The Eezy-Freezy is right on the road to the cabins, so every car passes by it coming and going. It’s kind of a tradition for a lot of people to stop there, especially if they have kids. My father painted a sign that says SCREAM UNTIL DADDY STOPS THE CAR and put it on the side of the road, and sometimes when I’m working the order window I can see and hear them do exactly that. It’s pretty funny, actually, even though I’ve seen it a million times.

  When I pull into the crushed-gravel parking lot, my father’s black 1970 Chevy Chevelle SS 454 is the only other car there. I can tell he’s already been here awhile because all the trash is picked up and the eating area looks great. We repainted the seven wooden picnic tables just a few weeks ago. We choose a different color every year. Starletta says the color affects how well we do. My father wanted to prove her wrong, so last year he painted them yellow, even though she said that was a bad choice. Business was slow, so this year they’re red, which according to Starletta is lucky. We’ll see.

  The Closed sign is hanging in the order window, but the window itself is open. Through it I can hear the radio playing and my dad singing along. “Here I am!” he shouts. “Rock you like a hurricane!”

  The Scorpions. One of his favorites. My father likes hair metal bands from the ’80s. I do too, probably because he’s been singing those songs around me since I was a baby. I don’t even mind that he can’t really sing.

  “Rock on!” I shout through the window. My father turns around and flashes me the sign of the horns, sticking his tongue out and thrashing his head. This was more effective when he had long hair, but he cut it when he turned thirty a few years ago and decided he had to start acting more like a responsible adult, and it’s not quite the same now.

  “Sammy!” he says when I enter the kitchen through the screen door on the side of the building. “Nice of you to show up.”

  “Well, it was this or watch game shows with the Grands,” I joke, using our name for Hank, Starletta, and Clodine. “What’s going on here?”

  “I got the frozen yogurt machine working again,” he says. “But we’re just about out of pistachio ice cream and won’t get a delivery until Tuesday, so push the other flavors. Especially the candy cane. I overestimated how popular that would be, and we have a bunch of it.”

  “Got it,” I say as I put on an apron and get ready for a day of scooping, frying, and sundae making.

  The first customers show up about an hour later, just as I’m turning the sign to Open. It’s a family of five. I’ve never seen them before, but they look like most of the people who come here early in the season—happy, relaxed, like they have all the time in the world. They haven’t gotten bored with swimming, aren’t covered in mosquito bites or poison ivy, and haven’t yet had their first fight after spending four straight rainy days together in a small cabin with no Wi-Fi. That will happen soon enough, but for now they’re in love with summer.

  I get busy making their fries while my dad makes their hamburgers. He likes to stay at the stove most of the time, singing along to the radio and cooking burgers and hot dogs to order. His favorite thing to make is chili burgers, and he’s thrilled that this family has ordered two for their little boys. As he grills the hamburger patties and stirs the big pot of chili, he sings along to Twisted Sister. “We’re not gonna take it!” he informs the spatula.

  The family of five is just the beginning. We’re busy all day, and I barely have time to wolf down a plate of cheese fries for lunch because so many people are stopping by. From time to time I steal a glance at the tip jar that sits on the counter just outside the order window, and I see that it’s filling up. Most people just put whatever change I hand them into it, so usually it ends up filled with sticky dimes and nickels, but a couple of people have stuffed dollar bills in there.

  My dad lets me keep all the money from the tip jar, even though he does just as much work as I do. The only rule is that I have to save at least half of it. That’s fine with me, as the only thing I really spend money on is my truck. Oh, and wigs and makeup, although no one knows about those because I keep it all at the Shangri-La. And it’s not like I have a lot of that stuff anyway. Mostly I borrow from the other queens for now, until I figure out what my style is.

  I’m thinking about this whole style thing during a break in customers later in the afternoon when I hear someone say, “What exactly is a Roadkill Skunkcicle?”

  I look up and see a guy leaning on the counter, his head poking through the window. He seems to be about my age, with blond hair that falls over one eye. The eye that I can see is blue. He’s wearing a black T-shirt with Finn and Jake from Adventure Time on it.

  I groan, as I do every time someone asks this question. “It’s a chocolate-and-vanilla-twist soft serve dipped in cherry coating,” I tell him. “My dad came up with the name. It’s supposed to remind you of a squashed skunk.”

  He laughs. “That’s great,” he says. “I’ll take one of those.”

  As I make the cone, he keeps talking to me. “So, what’s there to do around here?”

  “That depends on what you like,” I tell him. “Are you staying at the lake?”

  He nods. “With my grandparents,” he says in a way that makes it sound as if this is a tragedy of epic proportions.

  “Well, then there’s always swimming and kayaking,” I say. “Hiking. There’s mini golf over in Midgeville, and on Wednesday nights they show old movies on the side of the VFW hall here in town.”

  “Right on the building?”

  “Yep.” I hand him his cone. “It’s painted white, so it works just like a big screen. People bring lawn chairs and blankets and sit on the grass. I think this week they’re showing Jaws.”

  “Sounds fun,” he says. “You going?”

  “Probably not,” I answer. “By the time we close up here, I’m pretty tired.”

  “You don’t get days off?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “And what do you do for fun?” he asks, handing me a dollar and change. “When you’re not here, I mean. Because this totally looks like fun.”

  “If it’s really hot, I like to go tubing,” I tell him, not sure if he’s teasing me or not.

  “Explain,” he says, licking the edge of his cone.

  “On the creek. You take a big inner tube and float on it. It’s best if you start up by the falls, because when they open the dam the water moves faster and there are some small rapids. Nothing dangerous. Then you just float the rest of the way. You can get out at the bridge just outside of town. Takes a couple of hours.”

  “Now that does sound like fun,” he says. “Know where I can get an inner tube?”

  “My father works at a garage,” I tell him. “When he’s not working here. So we get them there.”

  “The garage,” he repeats. “I guess I could ask there.” He smiles, and I see that his teeth are a little bit crooked.

  “Or you could just use one of ours,” I hear myself say. I shut my mouth tight, as if someone else has somehow taken over my body and spoken through me. I don’t know why, but suddenly I’m afraid of looking like an idiot.

  “You mean we could go together?” he asks. “Cool,” he adds before I can answer. “I guess I should get your number, then. So I can call you.”

  “Good idea,” I say. “Here.” I take a napkin and write my name and number on it, although I have to concentrate really hard to remember what it is. I hand it to him.

  “Sam,” he says, reading what I wrote. “Hey, Sam. I’m Tom. Tom Swift.”

  “Hi, Tom Swift,” I say. “It’s good to know you.”

  “We’ll see,” Tom says. He writes his name and number on another napkin and slides it to me. Then he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a dollar, which he stuffs into the tip jar. “Maybe this summer won’t be so bad after all,” he says.

  “Jennifer, are you finished? Your grandfather is waiting.”

  Tom stiffens. Behind him, an older woman is standing with her arms crossed over her chest.

  “I’ll talk to you later,” Tom says to me, but his voice is tight. He turns and walks past the woman. As he passes the garbage can beside the picnic tables, he drops his unfinished cone into it.

  Three

  In the darkness of my room the fireflies hover like small green spaceships. I’ve put the screen on the window up so that they can come in. I like watching them float through the air, blinking their messages to one another. Occasionally one of them settles on something—the dresser, a lamp, the footboard of my bed—and winks on and off for a moment before taking flight again.

  It’s keep-awake hot, even at a few minutes past midnight, and I’m lying on top of the quilt with just my boxer shorts on. Even so, I’m still slightly sweaty, and the occasional breeze that blows across my skin is not quite enough to cool me off. It’s like the house is holding its breath.

  I have headphones on, the big, puffy kind that cover your whole ear and block out everything but the music. They’re plugged into the receiver beside my bed. On top of that is an old record player, on which is spinning an original vinyl pressing of Wanda Jackson’s 1961 album There’s a Party Goin’ On. The fifth song of side 1 is playing.

  “I got the feelin’ I’m a fallin,’ like a star up in the blue,” Wanda sings in her raw, gritty voice. “Like I was fallin’ off Niagara, in a paddle-boat canoe.”

  This is my favorite song on the album. I love the way Wanda yips at the end of some of the lines. I love the rockabilly guitars. I love the occasional pop and hiss in the sound as the needle travels around the groove. It sounds real.

  There’s a Party Goin’ On is number two on the list of the 21 Most Perfect Albums of All Time, at least as compiled by my mother, Ilona Weyward. (Actually, she’s not a Weyward, as she didn’t take the name. But last names are a whole other story in my family, and I don’t know hers.) It’s what she left me when she, well, left me. A cardboard box with twenty-one albums in it. Plus her record player.

  The albums were arranged in chronological order in the box, and that’s how I first listened to them. It’s how I still listen to them. I work through them from one to twenty-one, then start over. Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s Gospel Train, from 1956, is the first one. Lucinda Williams’s Car Wheels on a Gravel Road is the last one.

  Inside each album is a note. Some of them are written right on the liner sleeves, some are on slips of paper when there’s no clear space on the sleeve. Mostly they explain why my mother thinks the album is perfect, or almost perfect. Sometimes they say other things.

  The note inside the Wanda Jackson album, written in my mother’s sloppy handwriting, says:

  Some people call Wanda Jackson the “female Elvis,” or say that she was the first woman to sing rock and roll. This isn’t true. Sister Rosetta Tharpe was probably the first. But Wanda did it better than almost anybody. Her best song is “Funnel of Love,” but that wasn’t on any of her albums, so you’ll have to find that and listen to it somewhere else. But this is her best album. It’s only 29 minutes long, and every second of it is great.

  She’s right. There’s not a bad song on the album. When “Hard Headed Woman” ends, I lift the needle, flip the record over, and start side 2.

  I’ve played the twenty-one albums so often that I know every note and every word. Some of them I can even play on the guitar my father got me for Christmas a few years ago. But mostly I just listen to them, looking for whatever it is that made my mother fall in love with them. I figure that if I can understand what she liked, I can understand her, and maybe what she did.

  Wanda sings about falling in and out of love. As the first notes of “Tweedle Dee” begin, I find myself thinking about Tom Swift and what happened this afternoon. I can’t forget the look on his face as he turned away, like someone had just told his biggest secret to the world. Which I suspect is exactly what happened.

  I think about calling him. But it’s late, so instead I listen to the rest of There’s a Party Goin’ On. Then I turn the stereo off and pick up the telephone. My fingers search out ten numbers at random. After seven rings, someone answers.

  “Hello?”

  It’s a girl’s voice.

  “Tell me a story.”

  There’s a long pause, and at first I think she’s hung up on me. But then there’s a sigh, and I know she’s still there. One of the rules is that I don’t talk again until they do, so I don’t say anything.

  “Once upon a time, there was a girl,” she says after a minute. “She had brown hair and brown eyes. She was the average height and weight for her age. She looked like a million other girls. She had the same name as a million other girls, and listened to the same music that they did, and read the same books that they did, and ate the same food that they did. And when she slept, she had the same dreams that a million other girls had. She was perfectly ordinary.

  “But she didn’t want to be ordinary. She wanted to be special. She hoped that one day a fairy godmother would show up and tell her that she was really the daughter of the king and queen of Elfland, or that on her thirteenth birthday she would discover that she had magic powers. Sometimes she wished on falling stars, and didn’t tell anyone that what she wished was that one day everyone would see how different she really was from the million other girls who had her name.

  “On the day of her thirteenth birthday, as she was walking home from school, an old woman suddenly appeared in front of her. The old woman was dressed all in black, and the girl knew right away that the woman was a witch, because her hair was tangled and she was wearing a button that said ‘My Other Ride Is a Broom.’ To be sure, though, she asked her, ‘Are you a witch?’

  “‘Of course I am,’ the witch said.

  “‘Have you come to tell me that I’m a witch too?’ the girl asked her.

  “The witch rolled her eyes and said, ‘No. I’m just on my way to the store for some milk, and you happen to be in my way.’

  “‘So I’m not a witch?’ the girl said.

  “The witch shrugged. ‘Probably not,’ she said. ‘You seem perfectly ordinary to me. But give it a try if you want to. It can’t hurt.’ Then she walked away.

  “So the girl went home and tried to be a witch. But none of her spells worked, the black dress she put on looked ridiculous, and it turned out she was allergic to cats. So she gave up and went back to being perfectly ordinary, because in the end she really was just like the million other girls with the same name.