Free Summer Sisters by Judy Blume Page A

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    He’s got to get back to work. Zach’s going to be real glad he hired him. He can do a whole lot more than pump gas. He’s almost sure he can convince Lamb the Datsun truck makes sense. Twenty thousand miles. Almost new. Jet black. Like something James Bond might drive if he drove a truck. Perfect for next summer when he has his license. With a VIP plate spelling out SHRKY. Then Carly can write a song about him. Nobody Does It Better …
     
     

    A LL THROUGH LUNCH Vix watched as Caitlin seethed. She waited for the explosion, surprised when it didn’t come. It wasn’t until later, after Grandmother and Dorset left, that Caitlin stormed into the kitchen where Abby and Lamb were cleaning up. “I don’t see how you can stand it,” Caitlin said to Abby. “She’s such a prejudiced old bitch!”
    Abby looked stunned. So did Lamb. “I won’t have you bad-mouthing Grandmother!” Lamb said in a tone Vix had never heard him use.
    “I wouldn’t have to if you’d tell her off yourself.”
    “If it weren’t for Grandmother—” Lamb began.
    Caitlin cut him off. “What? You’d have been sent on the orphan train?”
    “Watch your step, Caitlin.”
    “It’s disgusting, the way you just let her say anything … without thinking how it comes across to the rest of us!”
    “That’s it!” Lamb said. “Go to your room.”
    “Oh, please … isn’t it a little late in the game for sending me to my room?”
    Abby reached out and touched Caitlin’s hand. “Thank you, Caitlin. It means a lot to me that you care.”
    Caitlin pulled away. “Don’t take it personally,” she said. “I was talking about prejudice in general. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I believe I’m being punished!”
    Upstairs, in their room, Vix wondered herself why Lamb let Grandmother Somers get away with those rude remarks. She didn’t have to ask. Caitlin volunteered the information. “You know what it’s all about? Money! You don’t tell off the one who controls the big stuff.”
    Oh, the Big Stuff . She couldn’t believe how naive she’d been, assuming Lamb was struggling to support his family, because who did she think paid for the fancy house, the new Sunfish, the camera Lamb and Abby gave her for her birthday—a gift so extravagant, she’d never show her parents? She’d heard Tawny refer to some of the Countess’s friends as trust-fund babies—always with disdain—but until now she’d never known any personally.
    “The one with the big stuff has a lot of power,” Caitlin said.
    “I wouldn’t know,” Vix said.
    “You’re lucky.”
    “No,” she argued. “You are.”
    “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
    She was right, of course. But Vix knew her parents would do anything to have plenty of money. Well, not anything, maybe, but close to it. And they wouldn’t need a lot. Not as much as Grandmother Somers, however much that was. Not even as much as Lamb. Just enough so they’d never have to worry. Just enough to buy a nice house, maybe one of those new places off the Old Taos Highway, and a couple of vacations a year, maybe to Hawaii, and plenty of help for Nathan. She could hear Tawny reminding her, The rich are different, Victoria .
    Yeah … right, she thought. They have more money.
     
     
    Abby

S O , C AITLIN HAS a social conscience. Well, good for her! She’s a spunky girl. Challenging but spunky. Just last week when she’d joined the girls on a bike ride, Caitlin had stopped off at the cemetery on Spring Street to show Vix Lamb’s parents’ grave.
    If they’d lived they’d be my grandparents , Caitlin said.
    If they’d lived they’d be my in-laws , she told Caitlin, placing a small stone on top of the double gravestone. Then she’d ambled through the cemetery checking out the Somers and the Mayhews, all of them Lamb’s ancestors. Caitlin and Vix followed. When she came to a wrought-iron arch with the words Martha’s Vineyard Hebrew Cemetery , she stopped. I could be buried here