Adventures with Waffles by Maria Parr

she?” I said.
    Then Mom explained that even if Lena didn’t say anything, she must definitely be missing her mother. Especially when she went to bed in the evening.
    “But she never says so,” I argued.
    “No, but does Lena usually say things like that?” asked Mom.
    I thought for a bit, then shook my head. There are lots of things that Lena doesn’t say.
    “She’s never told me that I’m her best friend,” I said to Mom. “Do you think I am?”
    Mom smiled. “Yes, I think so.”
    “But you can’t be completely sure,” I said.
    No, Mom said, you could never be completely sure if she didn’t say so. She had to agree with that.
    I didn’t think Lena could be all that upset now, though.
    “Isn’t it great that I’ve moved in?” she kept on saying, grinning widely.
    “Goodness gracious me, yes,” Grandpa answered. “Trille and I thought it was pretty tame in Mathildewick Cove during that week when you weren’t here.”
    In the afternoons, Lena and I had so much fun with Grandpa that we couldn’t get back from school quickly enough. One day when we had come back and thrown our bags by the door, Grandpa asked us if we wanted to go with him up to Hillside Jon’s farm. The snow had disappeared, so we could ride our bikes instead of sledding.
    But biking up to Hillside Jon’s, while trying to keep up with Grandpa on his “super-duper-tuned” moped, was almost as tiring as pulling Lena all the way up there on the sled. Grandpa had the moped at full throttle, and he laughed at us trailing behind. After that day, Lena and I gave Hillside Jon a new name: Hilltop Jon.
    When Hilltop Jon was young, he was a sailor, and he lost one of his eyes in an accident. Since then, he’s worn a black pirate’s patch.
    “I only see half of the world, and thank God for that,” he tends to say.
    Children are often scared of him because of the eye patch, but Lena and I both know that Hilltop Jon isn’t dangerous. On the contrary, there are a lot of good things about him, and the best of all is Hillside Molly, his horse. In summer she grazes at the edge of the forest, and in winter she eats inside her stable.
    “That mare is so intelligent that she can practically whinny hymns,” Grandpa says.
    When we finally got up there, Grandpa and Hilltop Jon sat on the steps drinking coffee, while Lena and I ran into the stable.
    “She’s quite an old horse,” said Lena, tilting her head in the semi-darkness.
    “She’s intelligent,” I said.
    “How do you know that? Can you neigh?”
    No, I couldn’t. I just knew, but it was no good trying to explain that to Lena.
    We stayed with Hillside Molly for a long while. We stroked her and talked to her, and Lena gave her a candy. I decided that she had to be the best horse in all the world.
    “The horse ate a piece of candy,” I told Grandpa when we got back to the moped.
    “That was probably the last candy she’ll ever have,” said Grandpa, tightening his helmet.
    “What do you mean?” I asked in surprise, but by then Grandpa had started the engine and couldn’t hear anything.
    When we got home and he’d finally stopped the engine, I ran over and grabbed his hand.
    “What do you mean, her last candy?”
    Grandpa muttered a little, but then he said that Hilltop Jon was so old that he was going to a retirement home, and Molly was so old that nobody wanted her. “Getting old stinks,” Grandpa mumbled angrily, shutting the door in my face.
    “What are they going to do with Molly, then?” I shouted through the closed door.
    Grandpa didn’t answer. He sat indoors being angry because people and horses and grandpas get old. But Lena answered, loud and clear: “There are no retirement homes for horses. Don’t you get it? She’s going to be put down.”
    I stared at Lena for a long moment. Then I yelled, as loudly as she normally does, “THEY CAN’T!”
    “Can’t,” repeated Krølla seriously.
    I told Mom and Dad. I cried and said that they couldn’t put down horses