“By the Shores of Silver Lake Reservoir”: A New “Little House” Book

Pa wanted to go West, but Ma didn’t.

“Charles Ingalls, no!” Ma exclaimed, looking up from her cross-stitch. “We’re finally settled on the farm, and we just spent all that money on organic certification.”

Pa didn’t care. He didn’t like so many outsiders in Plum Creek. Every day, the road in front of our little house filled up with overflow parking from the new Trader Joe’s.

“The move won’t cost a cent,” Pa said, and showed us an ad on Home Exchange that read: WEST COAST GRANDMA LOOKS TO SWAP HOUSE FOR CABINCORE.

“Her name’s Mrs. Oleson and her homestead is in Silver Lake. That’s in Los Angeles,” Pa said.

“We’re not big-city folk, Charles,” Ma replied.

“It won’t change us a bit,” he promised. “The house is right by a reservoir and there’s even a balcony for Blind Mary to sit a spell and listen to the birds.”

We’d called my older sister that ever since she lost her sight from scarlet fever, measles, tetanus, chicken pox, and COVID. Pa and Ma were anti-vaxxers.

“You know how I feel, but you must do as you think best,” Ma said, and he did, so we packed the wagon with our most important possessions: my books, Ma’s sewing machine, and Mary’s Two Buck Chuck.

Off we drove in our Outback—West! I was like Pa, excited to feel the miles rumble under us. My heart was full to bursting as we pulled into our new driveway. What a house! It was big, for one thing. Its two stories rose out of lush banana plants and lemon trees.

“Didn’t I tell you this was paradise?” Pa ran inside with a whoop.

Ma, Carrie, and I helped Mary up the path to the front door.

“The outside walls are made of glass, so we have a vast view of the reservoir,” I described to Mary. Ma made me “see” for her, because of the whole blindness thing. “Oh, Mary, sunlight twinkles on the water like the fancy lady’s gown at the T.J.’s grand opening.”

Ma didn’t care for strangers looking right through the walls into our lives, so she pulled the sheets from the beds and sewed them into curtains. She made the leftover material into dresses for Carrie and me for our first day of school. My younger sister Grace didn’t go because she was just a baby, and Mary didn’t go because, well, you know.

Ma and Pa enrolled us at the Little Red Schoolhouse. They said that, with a name like that, the schoolmarms wouldn’t reckon with devil’s teachings like critical race theory. I didn’t dare tell them about Intro to Women’s Studies or Crypto Club.

“J’adore your prairie dress,” a girl named Environment said, in homeroom. “Is it Vampire’s Wife?”

“My ma made it.”

“Standout brand name!” Environment hollered. “She’s fire!”

Really? I thought of her as just plain old Ma, who nagged me about manners and frowned on women voting.

“If your mère gives me a dress, I’ll wear it in my next TikTok,” my new friend said. Ma agreed, so goodbye, duvet cover.

It was worth it. After the TikTok, a lot of orders came in and Ma started making more money than Pa. He worked at the hipster butcher shop, where they valued his hot takes on tenderloins and manscaping.

One day, Ma surprised us with tickets to the Magic Castle. When the magician asked for a volunteer, Mary’s hand flew up. She glowed onstage. She had such a powerful presence, straight and true, like the handle in a butter churn.

“That’s my sister,” I proudly told the man next to me. “I could never be as brave as Blind Mary.”

The man’s face lit up, as though inspired.

“I might have a job for her.” He gave me his card. “My name’s Dick. Call my assistant to set up a meeting.”

Not long after that, Pa came home with news:

“The boss is opening a second location in Silicon Valley. He wants me to run it.”

“But I finally made a friend at school,” Carrie wailed.

“I don’t want to go, either. My pilot shoots in two weeks,” Mary said. She’s the lead in a new Dick Wolf show about a blind magician slash district attorney who solves crimes and then prosecutes the offender.

“You must do what you think best, Charles, but I can’t leave now. Environment’s helping me with my merch drop,” Ma said.

“What about you, Half-Pint? You won’t abandon your old pa.” He smiled down at me.

I wanted to agree with him like before, but I guess I was more like Ma than I thought. “The thing is,” I said, “we’re learning about microaggressions in my Women’s Studies class and it made me realize—why do we have to center our story around you all the time? Maybe you should do what we want.”

So we stayed. At least until Mrs. Oleson came back.

Now we’re glamping while we look for another house swap in L.A. It will be hard, though, because Mrs. Oleson gave us only two stars on account of us cutting up her Italian bedding and not disclosing the T.J.’s-parking situation in Plum Creek. Hopefully, we’ll find a new place soon, or it’ll be a long winter. ♦