were hanging a big banner above the fireplace. I rubbed my eyes. It said “Sweet Sixteen.”
“Oh, yeah. It’s my birthday,” I said.
Jerri and Grandma, who was asking Jerri to lift up her side so the banner would be level, swiveled and looked at me.
“There he is!” Grandma Berba shouted.
“Happy birthday, Felton,” Jerri said. She looked tired.
“Sweet sixteen and never been kissed!” Grandma cried out.
“I’ve been kissed,” I said.
“Oh?” Grandma said. She scrunched her eyes at me. Then smiled.
“Well, happy birthday anyway!”
“Okay. Thanks. Should we do the route now? Is Andrew sleeping?”
“He didn’t come home!” Grandma Berba said. “He called and asked to stay at his friend’s house because they were working on a four-hand piece!”
I was getting a little sick of the false cheeriness.
“Aleah?”
“Yes!”
“Let’s go,” I said.
“Umm, I’m coming too, Felton!” Jerri said with a terrible false cheeriness.
The three of us loaded into Grandma Berba’s giant rental SUV, me in the passenger seat and Jerri in back, and rolled down the drive. At the bottom, our way was blocked by trash. Grandma Berba put on the brakes.
“Not more of this mumbo jumbo.” She put on the high beams because it was still dark. Somebody had gone to the trouble of writing out HAPY BDAY FAKER!!! in trash down about fifty feet of the drive. The H was closest to us; the exclamation points went out to the road. “Enough of this crap,” Grandma said. She gunned the engine, and we flew right over the top of the trash, scattering it behind us.
“Whoa!” I shouted.
“Terrible people,” Grandma said.
“That probably took them a long time to make,” I chuckled.
“Idiot kids can’t spell,” Grandma said.
Grandma Berba was funny, but the trash still hurt my feelings, which immediately turned to boiling in my gut. Did Cody decide to put all his organizing skills into vandalism? Cody is the one who’d remember my birthday. It had to be him. Asshole.
We rode through the route really slow. Jerri sort of meandered around. She’d get out of the SUV and walk a few steps and then stand and look at the sky.
“Get a move on, sweetie,” Grandma would call to her. “We’ve got places to be.”
“What places?” I asked.
“Oh, you know. Home,” Grandma said.
But she was lying. I knew that for a fact when we arrived at Gus/Aleah’s. For the first time in a week, the house was all lit up. Andrew and Aleah were staring out the window. When the three of us got out of the car, they ran away.
“Just two peas in a pod!” I said with false cheeriness.
“Let’s stop at this lovely house for a moment,” Grandma smiled.
“Oh, God,” I said, but I followed her up the stoop and in, staring at my feet the whole way.
Immediately upon entering, Aleah and Andrew began to play happy birthday on the piano. Just the standard happy birthday. Aleah went first. Then Andrew followed. Then Aleah made up stuff that sort of sounded like happy birthday. Then Andrew did the same. Then Aleah went completely out of this planet, playing something that sounded like happy birthday a little but had so many notes. Her hands went up and down the keyboard, striking keys, pounding for emphasis, nearly knocking Andrew off the bench. I remembered the first time I saw her in her white nightie pounding the keys like that, how I was mesmerized and couldn’t not watch, even though I hadn’t learned to talk yet, and how that wave just built and crashed over me. I remembered her spinning around on the bench and staring at me. I remembered talking and walking through the night holding hands and biking double on the Schwinn and kissing in the garage and snuggling in the basement while watching dumb movies. Aleah stopped, turned, and smiled. Jerri and Grandma clapped and shouted bravo. Ronald leaned in from the kitchen, whooping. I swallowed hard. My nose was sort of running.
“Oh, man,” I said. “That was so good. You’re so good.”
Andrew jumped off the bench and ran up and hugged me around the stomach. I was like a foot and a half taller than him.
“We worked on it all night!” he shouted.
“Happy birthday, Felton,” Aleah said.
“Thank you,” I nodded. “Thanks.”
“Now get going, little girl,” Ronald called from the kitchen. “Chocolate chip pancakes coming up.”
Aleah jumped up and headed for the door.
“You ready, Mrs. Berba?” she asked.
“Aleah and I are going to finish your paper route, young man!” Grandma shouted.
“I’m going too!” Andrew followed.
“And it won’t take long because I’m going to run