Tallahassee Higgins
he's never sure he's in the right house because she's always redecorating and moving the furniture around."
    "At least you know where she is, Jane." I bent down and called to the cat. "Here, kitty, kitty, kitty."
    As he circled my legs, purring, I stroked him. He reminded me of my old cat, Bilbo, and I wondered sadly what had ever become of him. "I remember you," I thought, picturing his big, green eyes and his shiny, black fur, "even if nobody else does. And I miss you."
    "When I grow up," Jane said loudly, "I'm going to have an exciting life like Liz. I'm not going to stay home all day and wallpaper bathrooms."
    "Then don't have any kids, Jane." I watched the cat give himself a little shake and walk off, twitching his tail, his head high.
    "Liz had you." Jane jumped up and grabbed a tree limb hanging over the sidewalk. She chinned herself and dropped back to earth.
    "Lots of movie stars have kids," she continued, a little out of breath, "and they don't get married, just like Liz. And they still have exciting lives."
    "You shouldn't believe everything you read in
People
magazine." I grabbed the limb and chinned myself five times in a row without letting my feet touch the sidewalk. I knew I was going to get mad at Jane if she didn't shut up about movie stars and their exciting lives.
    "You sure are in a bad mood today," Jane said. "Just because of Dawn and Karen."
    "Race you to Uncle Dan's." I started running before she had a chance to say yes or no. The big old houses on Oglethorpe Street flashed past me, and I heard Jane yelling at me to slow down, but I couldn't stop. For a few seconds I felt as if I could run all the way to California without stopping once and get there before it was dark.

Chapter 10
    O NE AFTERNOON JANE and I were slogging home under a dark sky. It was almost the end of March, but, except for a lonely crocus poking up here and there, it didn't look much like spring. The wind was still cold, the grass was brown and marshy with puddles, and the rain hung in huge drops on the bare branches and dripped slowly to the ground. A few drab little birds—sparrows, I guess—huddled together on the telephone lines, their feathers fluffed to keep warm. They made a sad, wheezing sound, nothing you could call a song.
    "Want to come over for a while?" Jane asked when we got to her corner.
    "Is your mother still mad about last Saturday?" I looked at Jane uneasily. Mrs. DeFlores had grounded Jane because we had gone to the park without telling her and come home with wet feet and muddy jeans.
    "I don't think so." Jane didn't sound very positive, but she added, "We could go straight upstairs. I've got something to show you."
    As soon as we were safely in her room, with the door shut, Jane pulled an old photo album out from under her bed. "I found this last night when I was looking for a dictionary. See if you can guess who the people are."
    Opening the album, she spread it out on her lap. The first picture was of two little girls squinting into the sun. They were holding dolls, but their faces were too blurry to tell what they really looked like. Underneath, somebody had written, "Linda and Liz, Christmas, 1961."
    "Is that my mother?" I stared at the little face, fascinated.
    "Isn't she cute? Look at those long braids." Jane smiled at little Liz and then tapped her mother's face. "She's kind of pudgy, don't you think?" She puffed her own cheeks out and giggled.
    Jane skimmed through the album, flipping past page after page of photographs of the DeFlores family at long ago Christmases, Easters, and Thanksgivings, every now and then finding Liz in one of them.
    "Here she is when she was your age." Jane paused on the first good picture of Liz she'd produced. She was standing next to Mrs. DeFlores on the front steps of Jane's house, grinning at the camera, her head tilted to one side, her tawny hair hanging loose in long waves. She was wearing bell-bottom jeans and a tie-dyed T-shirt. Mrs. DeFlores, shorter and plumper than

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