Free Nancy and Nick by Caroline B. Cooney

hundred for your old one,” said the dealer, as if he were being incredibly generous. Maybe he was.
    Which meant, even buying a completely stripped-down model, we needed several thousand more dollars.
    “I guess,” said my mother, almost crying, “it’s time we found out if kitchen antiques are really an investment.” For another few days she walked around the apartment stroking her jars, bowls, choppers, spoons, toddy sticks, graters (carefully), butter molds, and candle boxes. I went baby-sitting and earned six dollars. Some spectacular contribution. I job-hunted. Fast food places had waiting lists. Department stores had hired all the temporary help they needed. Factories were laying off, not extending. Offices only wanted people who typed.
    Mother went to a bank to see about a car loan and found that since she had last borrowed for that purpose interest rates had gotten very high. The car would cost so much that the car loan would actually be higher than our rent. There was no way we could afford payments.
    “Okay,” said Mother. “Time to start pricing this stuff. It’s got to go. All of it.”
    “But Mother, you’ve spent years collecting this. Just sell some of it, Mother. If you sell it all you’ll be depressed. We’d just end up buying it back on our weekend hunts.”
    “No. We’re not doing that anymore. I’ve thrown away far too much money and time on that silly hobby.” She stroked a cherry dough trough that still had its milk-base paint on two sides. “We need to start thinking about how on earth you’re going to get through college.”
    “Mother, we decided years ago I’d go to college right here and live at home and go on loans for tuition if I can’t get scholarships.”
    “Just my Coca-Cola collection could probably pay for your first year,” she said. She knelt over a dusty cache of Coca-Cola memorabilia—bottles, caps, trays, clocks, ads, carriers, and so forth—that filled up the corner under the hanging antique baskets.
    There was truthfully not one object of Mother’s that I would miss. The clutter exasperates me. Sometimes I fantasize about having an apartment of my own. It’ll have wall-to-wall carpet, either deep rust or bright navy blue; sometimes I change my mind and visualize beige. Cream-colored walls to show off artwork. One single clock—long, thin, and modern. Tailored custom Roman shades at the windows. No clutter. No dust. No mess. No collections of anything except friends.
    Mother sat at the kitchen table (all our tables are kitchen tables; we’ve got about six kitchen tables) and began composing the advertisements she’d need to put in dozens of newspapers. She wasn’t crying, but she looked sort of beaten.
    It was so unfair. Mother worked hard and sometimes she was lonely, and this hobby was really a major part of her life. How awful to have to dispose of it in order to have four wheels.
    “Perhaps,” said Mother thoughtfully, “perhaps I’ll call David and Catherine Nearing and ask their advice. One of them might be willing to come up and help me run the sale. They’ve been in the business for thirty years. And if they’re not my cousins, they ought to be.”
    “They’d be Father’s cousins,” I said.
    “I’ve been a Nearing half my life. Let’s see if blood runs thicker than water.” She reached for the telephone.
    “Mother, how can you ask such a big favor of somebody you’ve only met once? What if he can’t remember you? We already owe him a lot for all that time and dinner and everything. What if he doesn’t want to do it except for a fee?” I felt embarrassed just thinking about the phone call.
    “I wouldn’t ask him to do it without a fee,” said Mother. “Stop worrying. The worst that could happen is that either David or Catherine will say no.”
    I actually had to leave the room when she was calling. Sometimes I have to do that during television comedies when you know the girl is going to be in a perfectly humiliating situation