Centaur Rising by Jane Yolen Page B

ability to punctuate in her rush to get everything said, I thought. She continued in that same breathless manner: “Because of that fight, she wrote something for a paper in her summer psychology class, I mean Zoe, not Angela, who doesn’t take psychology but physics in summer school, but where she gets the brains for that, it’s not from me or her father, I’ll tell you, neither one of us can balance a checkbook. You see, her father has an accountant do that for him in his business, that is, not at home.” She finally took a breath.
    Mom said quickly, “What did she say?”
    â€œWho?” It was the shortest sentence I ever heard Mrs. Angotti utter, which just goes to show how sorry she was.
    â€œZoe.”
    â€œZoe didn’t say anything, she wrote it, in her paper like I told you, which the teacher said was the best essay in the summer class even if it was only science fiction, and she sent it to the Boston Herald ’s kids’ writing contest and—”
    Mom said again, “What did Zoe say in the essay?”
    Mrs. Angotti took a big breath this time, as if getting a hurricane’s worth of wind. “She said that a friend of a friend had a horse farm where a centaur was born that was half child and half horse, and then went into a full analysis of the kind of emotional problems such a child would face, calling it liminality. I had to look up the word and I still don’t get it but evidently Zoe says it’s the very latest thing in brain work, whatever that is.”
    Mom interrupted her, “Science fiction? Space walks? Twilight Zone ? John Carter of Mars ? Then that’s okay. Nobody really believes that stuff.”
    I hung up carefully. I knew it wasn’t okay. I ran into the kitchen just as Mom was putting the phone back on its stand.
    â€œWhat should we do?”
    She looked up, startled. “Why, nothing, my little eavesdropper. Stay off the phone when I’m on it. That way you won’t hear silly talk from Mrs. Angotti. And stop worrying. Nobody in his right mind will believe for a minute what that girl wrote. She said it was science fiction !”
    Kai, at least, was real.
    Very real.
    But I knew it wouldn’t be long till we had people lining up outside our barn door for a glimpse of him. And when they came, the reporters wouldn’t be far behind.

 
    14
    Under Siege
    T HE VERY NEXT MORNING , even before I got downstairs for breakfast, the phone rang. After the third ring, Mom picked it up.
    I could hear her shouting into the phone, saying, “Yes, yes, no—and where’d you get that … well, it’s wrong. Don’t you understand these two words? Science. Fiction . Yes, science fiction. Little green men. Forbidden Planet. The Twilight Zone . No!” And she slammed the phone down so hard, it made me wince.
    â€œThat’s nine words, Mom,” I said as I walked into the kitchen. “Or maybe eleven.”
    The phone began ringing again. Mom stared at it as if it were a rabid dog getting ready to bite her. Then she turned and went into the bathroom without saying a word. I could hear the water running, and I figured she was throwing cold water on her face, so I sat down at the table and grabbed a blueberry muffin, ignoring the phone until the Ansafone, our brand-new answering machine, picked it up.
    An accusing voice left a simple message. “Nobody hangs up on me, lady.”
    The phone rang twice more.
    â€œDon’t answer it,” Mom called out.
    The minute a fourth call came in, I waited till the caller hung up, then picked up the receiver and phoned Martha and then Dr. Herks.
    Mom came back into the kitchen, two red spots on her cheeks as if she’d scrubbed away tears.
    Five minutes later—a long five minutes—Martha showed up in her bathrobe and boots, hair pulled back in two green rubber bands. Dr. Herks arrived soon after.
    Mom pointed at the phone and said one word.