Chapter Twenty-Four

Author's note: I've been experimenting a little with hair, etc, so if the characters you know and love look different, that's why. :D

Unbeknownst to Wanda, Melody had found the keys to Stephen's toy shed.
After Wanda and Harmony had gone to bed, Melody took the walk from the main house to Stephen's toy shed, which had been locked and untouched since his death. When she looked around, she could feel his spirit all over the place. She saw unfinished toys littering the shed. She saw careful, exact blueprints of toys yet to be made. Picking up one of the diagrams, she marveled at its precision. Angles had to be perfect. So much thought and loving detail had gone into each and every one of his toys. Maybe toymaking isn't as elementary as I thought it was, she wondered as she removed the cobwebs and dust from Stephen's bench.
While locating a hammer, some tempera paints, and a wooden cinder block, she stumbled onto Stephen's account book. Here, too, she was surprised by the amount of detail. As she flipped through it, she realized that in the entire history of Tinker Toys, not one single toy had ever been returned as defective. In that moment she gained a new respect for Stephen Tinker, and in the process realized what it truly meant to be a Tinker.
Suddenly the DNA results didn't matter much anymore, not in the grand scheme of things. Melody had been raised a Tinker, therefore, even if she were only one by association, she was still a Tinker, and to be one meant that she was a part of a longstanding tradition of toymaking excellence. As she hammered away at one of the toy bricks she had watched Stephen make long ago, a memory flashed in her mind...
She was twelve years old, and the Tinkers had just purchased Inner Child Toys and Gifts. To celebrate, the family had planned on going to the shop to officially open it to the public. When they got there, everyone was excited -- but Melody was nearly hyperventilating in fright. All the toys seemed to spin around in a circle, with one thing in mind....
Only one lady, who had been Inner Child's very first customer, seemed to notice. "This child's having a panic attack," she'd told Wanda.
"She wants to go home," Wanda told her, "and I'm not leaving her in the house by herself, that's what she wants." Stephen intervened, taking Melody outside and getting her a drink of water to try to calm her down.
Then, returning to the present day, suddenly, as she picked up the hammer, it happened again. Melody's heart began racing, her breathing became frantic, she wrung her hands and stepped away from the bench.
I thought I was over this, she thought to herself.
Taking off her glasses, she wiped the sweat dripping from her forehead and into her eyes. Okay, Mel, calm down, she told herself, calm down. She walked back outside, sitting on the steps of the toy shed, burying her face in her hands.
Giving herself a pep talk, Melody told herself she could go back inside and finish the brick she was making.
Melody walked back into the living room, where Wanda was watching an old romantic movie. Then Wanda surprised her with a small announcement. "I'm going to Florence's for awhile. Could you keep an eye on Harmony for me?"
"Sure, mom," Melody said with mixed feelings. She was glad her mother had finally decided to get out of the house, but at the same time, she was mortified. She had never spent any significant time with her kid sister. How was she going to relate to a three-year-old?
Melody inhaled deeply as she walked upstairs to her kid sister's bedroom, which used to be the exercise room. There she saw little Harmony happily playing with -- toys! In particular, a see and say-like rabbit that a toddler pushes the ear of and it 'talks' in a mechanical voice and the little dots it had for eyes ran around in circles every time Harmony pushed its ear. She wished deep down that it could be that easy for her. But she knew it wasn't.
"Armi poop," said Harmony, raising her arms to Melody.
"What?" asked Melody, confused.
"Armi poop!" repeated Harmony.
This time Melody's face turned beet red and she started to cry. She wasn't sure what to do!
Wanda spent the afternoon at Florence's place on Lake Meadow Circle. "It's good to see you again, dear," Florence said, reaching for Wanda to give her a hug. "Melody's return sure seems to have done you a lot of good."
"I'm glad to have her back," Wanda admitted, "I wish I could keep her around forever."
"Speaking of which," Florence said, leaning forth conspiratorially, "she sure made quite a big splash at the Christmas party. People in town still can't stop talking about it. Frankly, I can't say I blame her for what happened. It was all boiling over underneath the surface."
"She doesn't really like to talk much about what's bothering her. She never did, really. Always kept everything in. I told her the other night that she can't keep doing that."
Florence had a thought. She grabbed the latest edition of the Sim City Times off the coffee table. "Um, Wanda, dear, I think you'd better take a look at this," she said as she handed the paper to Wanda, who was sitting on the sofa, sipping her chamomile tea.
Casting a quick glance at the open page, Wanda gasped in shock. Printed in bold letters, glaring out at her was this article: WHAT HAS HAPPENED TO TINKER TOYS?
"For years, Tinker Toys has been the pinnacle of Bluewater Village and the surrounding area. But now, its closed doors and halted production line are sparking numerous rumors. Is it possible that this once busy company is at risk of closure, disappointing millions of children nationwide?"
As Wanda read the article, a deep knot developed in her stomach. She knew that she hadn't the heart to maintain the shop or even make more toys since Stephen's death. But Melody's vehement refusal to sell the company remained fresh in her mind. This was a girl, she remembered, who had such a deep and paralyzing fear of all toys that she wouldn't even set foot in the shop. Who knew, Wanda wondered, the workings of her eldest daughter's brain?
"Malcolm Landgraab offered to buy the company," Wanda casually mentioned to Florence.
"And you refused, right?"
"Well, Melody did. She was upset with me for even considering it."
"And she was right. Do you realize who Malcolm Landgraab is? He owns half of Sim City and is constantly looking for more lambs for the slaughter."
"You don't understand why I'm so confused, Florence. This girl wouldn't even set foot in the toy shop. My husband and I begged and pleaded with her to come in and help us but she refused at every turn. And now all of a sudden, now that Stephen is dead, she decides that she doesn't want to sell the company?"
Florence laughed. "The girl has a plan, Wanda."
"If she's got a plan," Wanda wondered, "what?"
Sipping her tea, Florence mused, "Maybe -- maybe she wants to reopen the toy shop."
Wanda shook her head in astonishment. "What? But why? She never showed any interest in toys or toymaking. She was from one project to another --"
"She wants to keep his memory alive, Wanda. Even if he's not her biological father, he raised her, so he's her dad. Reopening the toy shop is her way of paying tribute to him."
Tears began flowing down Wanda's cheeks. "I had no idea she felt this way."
"She may go about things differently than what you're used to, but you've got to admit, her heart's in the right place here."
"Sometimes, Flo," Wanda thought, "I think you understand Melody better than I do."
When Wanda returned home, Harmony leapt over to her and yelled, "Armi poop! Armi poop!"
"Melody! You were supposed to change her diaper!" shouted Wanda as she scooped Harmony up.
"I didn't know I was supposed to change her diaper!" Melody hung her head in embarrassment. "I'm not cut out to be a parent."
Wanda took a deep breath. Instead of launching into a tirade, she lifted Melody's chin and gave her a kiss on her forehead. "Neither was I, when you were born. Some things you just can't learn from books, love." She walked upstairs with Harmony in tow.
Melody decided to play a little chess. She hadn't touched a chess board in awhile and needed to refresh her skills.
With Wanda and Harmony both asleep, Melody wandered into her parents' bedroom, searching through her father's records on his computer and through crates of papers. She discovered something she probably should have seen months earlier -- a copy of Stephen's last will and testament.
There it was in black and white. "I, Stephen Ronald Tinker, being of sound mind and body... do, in the event of my death, hereby leave my backyard toy shop and my community lot business, Inner Child Toys and Gifts, both collectively designated as Tinker Toys, to my darling daughter, Melody Autumn Tinker..."
Melody took another gander at the words printed on the page. She wasn't entirely sure she'd read them correctly, so she went over them again. They read the same thing. She had become president and chief executive officer of Tinker Toys immediately upon her father's death. The news was, to put it lightly, a stunner to her, especially since she'd spent much of her young life running from the fact that she was a Tinker.
Melody returned to the backyard toy shop, soaking everything in. It belonged to her now, all of it. The bench, the shelves, the cash register, the record books, even the community-lot business, Inner Child Toys and Gifts -- was hers. And she wasn't exactly sure how to handle this new situation -- and the new responsibilities the situation created.
Walking up to some of Stephen's blueprints, Melody examined them again, and ideas began to churn in her head. With the cell phone Wanda had bought her for Christmas, Melody dialed the one person she knew could help -- her best friend in the world, Chester Gieke.
Chester had decided to stay behind at Le Tour rather than return to Bluewater for the holiday. And boy, she decided, he didn't know what he missed.
"Hey Ches --""Mel!" Chester's jocose voice scratched through the receiver. "Merry Christmas! How's it going?"
"Pretty good -- and you?"
"Bored out of my mind."
Melody laughed. "I told you, you should've come to Bluewater with me. There's been enough entertainment here to fill a year's worth of programming on SBN."
"That wild, huh?"
"Yep." Melody suddenly turned serious. "Something else has happened, too. I found out my father left me the company."
Chester let out a loud gasp. "Your dad left you Tinker Toys?"
"You got it." Melody let out a deep sigh.
"Do you realize you're a bona fide heiress?" Chester joked. "Can I call you Paris Hilton?"
"I thought he would have left it to my mom, but he left it to me instead. I don't know what to do. I can't just leave the company here. And I certainly don't want to leave college. I worked too hard to get there. If I knew my dad was going to die and leave me the company --"
"Mel, I'm on my way there first thing in the morning. And I'm sure I could convince Edwin to come too, and maybe Marla as well."
"You know where my house is, right?"
"Sure I do, it's the yellow two-story one on Eagle Lane."
"Yep, that's it. See ya tomorrow then?"
"We'll try not to get there too early in the morning, maybe ten-ish."
"Don't worry about it, I get up early anyway. And my mom might be up with Harmony." With that Chester hung up the phone, and Melody locked up the toy shop for the evening. She knew the next day was a big day.
Melody had difficulty sleeping that night in anticipation of Chester's arrival. That also meant she would have to introduce her friends to her mother -- her two worlds would now be colliding. How would her mother respond to her friends? Would she like them?
Like she used to do, she rose at precisely six in the morning and put on her workout gear to take a jog around the neighborhood. A fitness freak, she liked to keep herself in shape by lifting weights and running, either on the treadmill or around campus.
While coming back from her jog, she saw a bright yellow cab pull up in front of the house. "Oh my gosh!" Melody exclaimed. "Already?" Sure enough, out of the cab came Chester, Edwin, and Marla. How was she going to explain all this to her mother?
Turns out, she didn't need to -- at least, not for the moment. "You must be Melody's college friends," Wanda said sweetly, greeting the group at the door with Harmony in her arms.
"Mom," Melody breathed, "these are my college roommates, Chester Gieke, Edwin Sharpe, and Marla Biggs."
Wanda smiled. "How do you all do? I'm pleased to meet you."
"I'm happy to meet you, too, Mrs. Tinker," Marla said. "Melody doesn't talk a lot about you, but everything she's said has been good." Marla then gushed over Harmony. "Oh, my goodness, is this cutie Mel's kid sister?"
Meanwhile, the boys followed Melody to the backyard toy shop, and Wanda looked outside in disbelief. "Goodness, what is she up to?" she wondered.
"Gosh, I remember playing with Tinker toys," Chester recalled as the three of them walked to the backyard toy shop. "I had a little red fire truck, it was the Little Heroes --"
"That's it." Melody smiled at the memory. Just then she had a vision, of Stephen back in the shed, working on a Little Heroes fire truck.
Edwin's eyes widened with disbelief. "You're Melody Tinker -- of THOSE Tinkers? The guys who made all the toys? Even the water wiggler my sister and I played with?"
"You got it." For the first time, Melody glowed with pride at being a Tinker.
"Didn't you ever sneak in here, sneak a peek at what was in here?"
"Not really --" Melody said it with a tinge of regret.
"Man, if it were me, I'd have been in here for hours."
"I sneaked in here the other night for the first time."
Chester shook his head in astonishment. "I'd have thought, with your creativity, that this would be right up your alley."
Melody took a deep breath. Little by little she offered the astonished guys a glimpse into her soul. "I'm afraid of toys," she whispered sadly. Then she finally mentioned the jack-in-the-box incident to them.
Seeing her stiffen at the mention of it, Chester and Edwin wrapped their arms around her. They didn't judge her or try to understand why she felt this way.
"Well," Chester suggested, "there are plenty of things you can do in the toy shop besides make toys. You can design them -- I'm sure you have tons of ideas for new products swimming in that cute little head of yours. Designing stuff would be right up your alley, I think. Other people can actually make the toys."
Melody chuckled. "And just who exactly did you have in mind?"
Chester playfully batted his eyelashes in a fake diva pose.
"You -- make toys?" Melody shook her head. "I thought the only toys you messed around with were of the electronic variety. These are made with wood and tempera paints."
"There was a time when I didn't play with electronic toys." Chester grinned.
"Last person to the shed is a rotten egg," Melody called to the boys, knowing full well that in her great physical shape, she would win any footrace. With legs like the wind, her curly ponytail flying, she beat the boys to the toyshop door, leaving Chester muttering and Edwin huffing and puffing.