I smiled. Aaron seemed to have picked up Shona"s knack of saying just the right thing at just the right time to make me feel better. "Thank you," I said.
Just then, a door behind us opened, and Mandy"s parents came in, laughing and chatting with a man I"d never seen before.
"Who"s that?" I asked.
Mandy glanced over her shoulder. "Oh, him. That"s Mr. Beckett, the editor of the Brightport Times. He and my parents have been best buddies ever since they all made thousands of dollars from Mom and Dad"s sea monster photos."
"Hi, kids!" they called, and disappeared into the sitting room.
"Anyway, it"s not just that," I went on. "It"s Mom. If she knew we had a week to prove to Neptune that we can do this task, I don"t know what she"d do. She already feels terrible that we haven"t managed to achieve much so far."
"Not managed to achieve much?" Mandy spluttered. "After what you"ve just done?"
I shook my head. "I know, but - well, she"s still upset about the other thing."
"What other thing?" asked Aaron.
"My grandparents," I said. "We still haven"t found them. Now that she"s seen them once, she"s been thinking about them more than ever. If only we could get them back here somehow. I can"t help feeling the same way as she does. How can we bring two worlds together if we can"t even bring our own family together?"
"Have you tried to get in touch with them?" Mandy asked.
"Millie has. She"s called them over and over again but they won"t answer. With the memory drug in place, all they"ll remember is that she"s the one who told them they"d won a compet.i.tion, and then they got here and found it was all a setup. They"re not likely to listen to her again."
"Why can"t your mom just call them?" Mandy insisted.
"She won"t. She"s too proud - or too stubborn. And after what happened when they came here, she"s not going to put herself up for another rejection."
"Why don"t you call?" Aaron suggested.
"And say what? *Hey, you don"t know I exist, but I"m your granddaughter and if you could just come over to Brightport, you"ll suddenly remember me, honest"? I don"t think so!"
Mandy looked over to the sitting-room door with a strange expression on her face. A sparkle appeared in her eyes. "Hang on a minute," she said. "I might have an idea. Listen up."
Mandy"s idea was a good one, and we left her to try it. But any hope it might have given me that we were on our way to getting this whole thing sorted out was obliterated when I got home.
Mom and Dad were outside together, Dad in the sea, Mom"s dress trailing in the water as she sat with her legs dangling over the side of the boat.
"Hey, sausage," Mom said flatly.
Dad gave me a weak smile.
"Mom, Dad, what"s up?" I asked.
Dad shook his head and didn"t reply.
"We"ve just found out the council met this afternoon," Mom said.
"And?"
"Well, Mr. Beeston had been trying to get them to drop their development plans," she went on. "But they"ve just voted unanimously in favor."
"So what does that mean?" I asked.
"It means they"re still going to go ahead with one of the original schemes," Dad said. "Both of which spell disaster for Shiprock."
And for any hope of us miraculously doing something to please Neptune. Shiprock was doomed - and so was I.
"They"re going to decide which one at their next planning meeting," Mom said.
"Which is when?"
"A week from today."
Brilliant. The day I was due to tell Neptune we"d changed the world was the day my world would officially come crashing down around me. Just perfect. Why did everything I did always have to turn to disaster?
Well, OK, maybe not absolutely everything. We had rescued Shona and Melody and . . .
Wait! Melody!
What had she said? If there is anything you need, come to me and I will help you.
I allowed myself a brief smile as an idea took shape in my head. Maybe all wasn"t completely lost - yet.
"How did you find me?"
"Mr. Beeston - er, Charlie - told me where you were," I stammered.
Melody smiled. "My son," she said, enjoying the word as though it were a precious jewel that someone had just given to her. I guess in a way, it was.
"You, er, you know you said you would do anything you could to thank me for saving you?" I went on.
"Of course," she said seriously. "And I meant it."
"Well, there is something."
I told her my idea. When I"d finished, she frowned. "Emily, I want to help you, I really do. But it"s years and years since I -"
"You were the best," I said. "You still will be, I"m sure of it."
Melody turned away from me as she fiddled nervously with one of the sequins on her top. Where had I seen that gesture before? I suddenly realized, and laughed.
"He does that, too," I said.
She turned back to me. "Who does?" she asked. "Does what?"
"Mr. B - your son," I said. "He fiddles with the b.u.t.tons on his jacket, just like that."
Melody"s smile lit up the rocky room. Literally. The water turned warmer; the glowing lights in the rocks burned brighter. Even the rocks themselves seemed to glisten with a shimmering light. If just a smile from her could do that, imagine what would happen if she were to - "All right," she said eventually. "I"ll do it."
Yes! Now I only had one more thing to organize - and I had the feeling I knew someone who could help.
Three days later, I was woken up by a knocking on my window. I pulled the curtain across the porthole to see Aaron"s face. He was standing on the jetty outside my bedroom saying something I couldn"t hear and waving at me to come outside.
I leaped out of bed and ran out to join him.
"Mandy"s plan worked!" he said. "I just heard them arrive."
"You"re sure?" I asked, hardly daring to believe he could be right.
"I saw their car - and I saw them go in. It"s definitely them!" He grabbed my hand. "Come on, let"s go."
"Wait," I said. "What if - what if it hasn"t worked? What if they don"t remember anything?"
Aaron glanced down at the sea under the jetty washing slowly toward the sh.o.r.e and out again, breathing in, breathing out, always moving away, always coming back.
"We"re keeping our promise to Neptune. He will have kept his," he said. "They"ll remember."
I nodded. "In that case, wait here a minute." I ran inside the boat.
"What are you doing?" he called after me.
I called to him as I bent down to enter. "Getting Mom."
I pulled Mom toward the door of the cottage. "Turn left. Stop. OK, two steps forward, then up one."
"What is this, Emily?" Mom complained. "You know I"m not big on surprises, especially first thing in the morning."
Aaron grinned at me. "Oh, you"ll like this one, Mrs. W.," he said.
Mom frowned from behind the dish towel we"d wrapped over her eyes. "I hope so," she said sternly, "for both of your sakes."
I undid the towel. "OK, ready?" I asked.
Mom rubbed her eyes. "How can I know whether I"m ready or not if I don"t know what I"m meant to be ready for?"
Aaron joined us on the doorstep. "Right. Come on, then," he said. "Let"s do it."
And then he lifted his fist. Knuckles hovering in front of the door, he turned to me. "Sure?" he asked.
I nodded quickly. Behind my back, I crossed my fingers as tightly as I could. Please have worked, please have worked.
Aaron rapped on the door, and I held my breath.
Movement inside. Someone shuffling toward the door.
And then it opened.
"Oh my, oh my word, oh heavens." The woman standing in front of us clapped a hand over her mouth. Her eyes filling with tears, she clung to the door with her other hand. "Harry!" she called. "Harry - come quickly! We"ve found her. We"ve found our daughter!"
A moment later, she"d wrapped Mom in her arms. "Oh, my baby," Nan cried over and over again. "My darling, darling girl."
Granddad was behind her. "Come inside, come in, all of you," he said.
We went inside. Granddad held his arms out toward Mom and she fell into them while Nan stood behind Mom, stroking her back, whispering to herself and half laughing, half crying.
I turned to Aaron. "We did it!" I said. He smiled and held his arms out to me.
"You did it," he said, pulling me close. "You and Mandy did it."
Mandy - of course. We had to tell her. "Should we go see her?" I asked.
Aaron held me a little closer. "In a minute," he said. "Not just yet." I snuggled more tightly into his shoulder and didn"t argue.
"Well, I don"t know about you, but I think this calls for a cup of tea," a voice announced from the doorway.
Millie winked at someone standing next to her. As she came through the door, the other person followed. Mandy.
"Well, fancy that," Millie said to Mandy as they both came inside. "I wonder how that happened. . . ."
Then she marched through the front room, straight into the kitchen. "Right, where"s the kettle?" she asked.
Mandy joined us in the front room. "I told her," she said bashfully. "I had the feeling she might be able to help. Turns out she did."
"How?" I asked.
Mandy smiled. "You"ll see."
"You"ll see what?" Mom said, coming over and putting an arm around my shoulders. "Do you think it"s about time someone explained some of this to me?"
Nan put an arm around Mom"s waist. "And me," she said.
So we did. Millie poured the tea while Aaron, Mandy, and I explained everything.
"But there"s one thing I still don"t understand," Mom said. "How did you get them here now?"
Granddad pulled out a newspaper. "With this," he said.
He opened it up and spread it on the table for us all to see. It was a photograph Millie had taken of my grandparents.
I looked at Mandy. She smiled back. "That"s how," she said.
I read the caption under the photograph.
Is this you?
If so, please, please come to Brightport immediately. The biggest reward of your lives is waiting for you.
Come now! You won"t regret it!