Chapter Seventeen, In which I have Thanksgiving with Weirdo

On the Friday after Thanksgiving I got a call from Weirdo.

“Hey, do you want to have Thanksgiving dinner with us?”

“What, you mean next Thanksgiving?”

“No, this Thanksgiving.”

“You’re a little late aren’t you? It was yesterday.”

“Well, we are having Thanksgiving today because my mom had to work all day yesterday.”

I didn’t even know Weirdo’s mom had a job. I still don’t think she had a job, but I didn’t worry too much about that. I counted myself lucky to get a Thanksgiving dinner two days in a row. I put my jacket on and walked over to Weirdo’s house.

When I came to his driveway I saw a big sign hanging in the window of Uncle Jake’s RV. It was a messy drawing of a turkey eating a person. Uncle Jake had written “Happy People Day” at the top. I knew it was Uncle Jake who wrote it because in the corner he also wrote “The Dragon Bleeders Rock!”

I rang Weirdo’s doorbell and his Uncle Luis answered. He was wearing his gloves and sunglasses and standing there at the door looking at me like he wasn’t sure if he knew me. Finally he asked if I needed something. I was surprised to see him because I didn’t see his bike outside the house, plus I was still embarrassed about the last time I met him.

“I… I… I…” The reason I was there totally escaped me.

“Did Weirdo invite you over to partake in the bountiful spread of our Thanksgiving dinner?”

I had no idea what he was talking about, but I recognized the word ‘Thanksgiving’. He spoke very friendly to me, which made me feel more comfortable around him, especially after making fun of him and his goofy bike so much.

“Yeah, Weirdo invited me.” I glanced behind myself and asked, “Where is your bike? I didn’t see it.”

“Oh, that wacky excuse for a vehicle?” I thought for a moment he was trying to make me feel bad. “I sold that thing a couple weeks ago. I was getting a little embarrassed riding that thing around. Why ride on two wheels when you can ride on eight?” Uncle Luis reached behind the door and picked up a pair of old white roller skates. He put the skates down and closed the door behind me as I came in the house. I didn’t say anything about the skates, I learned my lesson already.

Everyone was already gathering around the dining room and I could smell great food as I walked up the stairs.

I came into the dining room and looked at the table. They put the extra leaves in the table so it was super long and there eight chairs around it. On the table was a humongous platter with all the food on it. There were mashed potatoes, corn, jellied cranberries, stuffing, biscuits, green beans, sweet potatoes and the turkey all cut up and ready to eat at the center of it all.

When everyone sat down I tried to get a chair next to Weirdo, but his sister and Uncle Jake got there first. I ended up sitting between Uncle Luis, who took his glasses off but still wore his gloves, and Weirdo’s Grandpa Carl, who I never met before.

I tried to say hello to Grandpa Carl, but he was so old that I don’t think he even knew there was anybody sitting next to him. Uncle Jake heard me say hello to him and laughed.

“Don’t even try man. G-man Carl is so far gone that he probably thinks your Weirdo.”

I looked at Grandpa Carl, who was staring at his plate and fiddling with his fingers. He turned to me slowly and said, “Now that’s a good boy.”

Once everybody was seated at the table Weirdo’s dad announced, “How about we all give our thanks for this great food?” He looked to his right and said, “Let’s start with you, Mother.”

“Well,” Weirdo’s mom folded her hands and closed her eyes, “I would like to thank the good lord for his many blessings this year, and for the gifts he has provided for this Thanksgiving meal. Thank you, Jesus our lord and savior.”

Grandpa Carl called out, “And also with you.”

Uncle Jake chuckled and said, “We’re not in church Grandpa.”

Everyone else laughed a little too. Then Weirdo’s dad straightened up in his chair and folded his hands.

“I would like to thank the magnificent ways of natural selection for evolving the elements of the universe into this delicious Thanksgiving feast.”

Grandpa Carl started to say “And also…” but Weirdo’s mom politely patted him on the hand to make him stop.

Next it was Uncle Jake’s turn. He scratched at his beard and looked at the corner of the ceiling.

“I am thankful for electric guitars.”

Weirdo’s eyes lit up. He grabbed Uncle Jake’s wrist and said, “Hey, I was going to say I’m thankful for electricity. That’s kind of the same thing. What a coincidence!”

Uncle Jake pulled his wrist away and rolled his eyes. Weirdo sat up in his chair and put his finger in the air.

“I’m thankful for…”

We all said at the same time, “Electricity.”

Weirdo frowned and said, “Hey, that’s not fair.” Then he turned to his sister and said, “I guess it’s your turn.”

Weirdo’s sister slouched a little further in her chair and said so quietly we almost couldn’t hear, “I’ll be thankful when I get these braces off.”

“And also with you,” Grandpa Carl said.

Weirdo’s dad motioned to Uncle Luis, who was picking lint balls from his gloves.

“Oh, my turn?” He put his hands in his lap. “I’m thankful for smoothly paved sidewalks.”

My turn was next. I should have been thinking about what to say instead of listening to everyone else, because my mind was totally blank. I tried to buy some time by speaking very slowly.

“I… am… thank… ful… for…”

“Spit it out,” Uncle Jake demanded.

“I’m thankful for… uh… uh…”

Weirdo’s mom said in her overly sweet voice, “There must be something you’re thankful for. Are you thankful for your family?”

I nodded my head.

“Are you thankful for your school?”

I wasn’t, but I nodded my head anyway.

“See, there are plenty of things to choose from. Just pick one.”

I still couldn’t think of anything. I closed my eyes and thought really hard, then decided that I would just open my eyes and say I was thankful for the first food I saw on the table. I opened my eyes and tried to look at the food, but Weirdo was crossing his eyes and puckering his lips at me, trying to make me laugh.

“Weirdo,” I said. “I’m thankful for Weirdo.”

Everybody was very quiet for a second. Then they burst out in laughter.

Weirdo’s sister said, “Oh come on, you can’t be serious.”

I nodded my head and confirmed, “No, really, I’m thankful for Weirdo.”

When I said that everybody got really quiet again and looked down at their plates. Weirdo spoke up.

“That’s kind of weird, man.”

Weirdo’s dad said, “Well, to each their own.” Then he turned to Grandpa Carl and said, “You’re up, old man.”

Grandpa Carl put his wrinkled finger against his chin like he was thinking really hard for something to say. We waited for two minutes. Finally he opened his mouth, but no sound came out. We waited some more.

He opened his eyes wide like he had an idea. He pulled his finger from his chin and put it in the air and said, “I was born on Christmas Day.”

Everyone laughed, and Grandpa Carl put his finger back on his chin and muttered to himself. Then everybody put their napkins on their laps and situated their plates and silverware in front of them.

I figured it was time to dig in when I saw Uncle Jake scooping some mashed potatoes onto his plate. I reached out took a biscuit from the platter, and then reached for the big fork used to dish out the turkey.

“Whoa, hungry little feller,” Weirdo’s dad put his hand on my hand to stop me from picking up the turkey fork. “I don’t know how you do Thanksgiving in your house, but that’s not the way we do it here.”

I figured he was talking about me reaching across the table. I wasn’t allowed to do that at home for any meal, but I didn’t think I was reaching that far.

“Sorry, can you please pass me the turkey?”

“You’re just not getting the message are you?” Weirdo’s dad gestured to the rolls in front of me. “You’ll need to wait your turn for the turkey. There are plenty of rolls for you right now.”

I wondered what the heck he was talking about. Then I looked around the table and saw what he meant. Weirdo was scooping all the corn onto his plate. Weirdo’s mom was removing all the stuffing from the platter and putting it on her plate. Uncle Luis took all the sweet potatoes. Uncle Jake took all the jellied cranberries. Weirdo’s sister took all the mashed potatoes. Weirdo’s dad took all the turkey, and there was a lot of turkey. Grandpa Carl was putting all the green beans on his plate, one at a time.

That left the biscuits for me. I felt weird doing it, but I piled all the biscuits on my plate and watched the others to see what they would do next.

Before I had time to guess what they were up to, they all dived into their plates like this were the first and last Thanksgiving they ever had.

“Coo it, Unga Jage,” Weirdo said with his mouth full of corn. Little yellow pieces spit out as he talked. “Weave some cwanbewies fo a wes of us.”

Uncle Jake slowed down a bit, took a big bite of cranberries and said, “don cawk wi yo moug fur.”

I munched on a biscuit, feeling bummed that I wouldn’t get to eat any of the other food. I wondered why in the world they would eat this way. Who ever heard of eating a plate of just one thing for Thanksgiving?

I was halfway through my biscuit when Weirdo’s dad called out, “Switch!” Everybody put their silverware down and pushed their plates to the person sitting to the left of them.

The half eaten biscuit was still in my hand when I pushed my plate to Grandpa Carl. He saw that I was still holding on to my biscuit.

“Thief! He’s a thief. Your son is a thief!”

Everybody stopped what they were doing and stared at me. Weirdo’s dad told me to give the biscuit in my hand to Grandpa Carl. I thought it would have been rude to pass half eaten food to someone else, but I just went along and put the biscuit on top of the rest of them and finished scooting the plate over to Grandpa Carl.

Uncle Luis passed his plate of sweet potatoes to me. I hated sweet potatoes. I could only imagine what kind of goofy rule they had for not eating what was in front of me, so I took tiny little bites but mostly just pushed the food around on the plate so it looked like I was eating it.

I looked next to me because Grandpa Carl’s head fell into the plate of biscuits. He immediately started snoring.

Weirdo shouted, “Free biscuits!” then explained to me that if someone falls asleep at the table you don’t have to wait for that plate to be passed around. I took my half eaten biscuit back and the rest out to the others around the table.

It seemed like forever before the mashed potatoes came to me. There was plenty left, but they were a little cold. Plus, there was no butter or gravy to put on them. Weirdo’s mom said, “Not everybody likes butter or gravy, so it wouldn’t be right to ruin a perfectly good plate of mashed potatoes with unwanted accoutrement.”

I asked what accoutrement meant, and Uncle Jake snapped, “It means butter and gravy. What did you think it means?”


* * * * *


Finally the plates had been passed around twice and Weirdo’s dad announced, “Last call!” Weirdo explained to me that last call means the plates would go around one last time, so you better get enough of your favorite food because you wouldn’t get another chance.

Everybody began eating faster and messier. I had my eyes on the jellied cranberries, and they were going fast. The rule was that you could not finish the entire plate of something unless it was the plate you started with and everybody had gotten two turns with it. So I wasn’t too worried about there being enough cranberries. Although, when they finally came to Uncle Luis, which meant that I was next, there was the tiniest little bit left. Uncle Luis knew the rule, so he just took a tiny little speck and ate it very slowly while he waited for Weirdo’s dad to call out “switch”.

When it was time to switch I sat looking at the little dab of cranberries left on the plate. There wasn’t even enough to fill my fork. I decided to try something sneaky. When everybody was staring out the window admiring a red cardinal on the birdfeeder, I at the rest of the cranberries in one quick bite. Then I lifted up Grandpa Carl’s head and pulled out the biscuit plate and slid the cranberries plate in its place. Then I started munching on one of the many biscuits that was left as if nothing happened. When the bird flew away nobody even noticed what I did.

Finally all the plates were passed around and everybody sat back in their chairs and sighed. One by one they all got up from the table, leaving all the plates and uneaten food, then left the dining room; everybody except for Grandpa Carl, who was still asleep, and me, who was wondering where everybody went.

I walked away from the dining room to look for Weirdo. Uncle Luis was sleeping on the couch in the family room, and Uncle Jake was sleeping on the floor next to the couch. Weirdo’s sister’s door was cracked open and I could see her sleeping on her bed. Weirdo’s parent’s door was closed, and so was his. I cracked it open and saw him sleeping on his bed.

I thought for a moment about finding some place to fall asleep too, but I didn’t want to be around when Grandpa Carl woke up and somebody would need to explain why there was cranberry juice all over the side of his face. So I decided it would be best if I just went home.

When I got there my mom asked how Thanksgiving at Weirdo’s was. I told it her was okay. Then I asked her what accoutrement means.

“Accutra what?”

“Accoutrement.”

“I don’t know, but it sounds French. Why? Where did you hear it?”

I said, “Oh, nevermind. I read it in a food book at Weirdo’s.” Then I went and lay down on my bed.

Thanksgiving at Weirdo’s was by far the strangest meal I ever ate, but I can’t disagree at all with one thing. The nap afterwards is the best idea ever.

Chapter Sixteen, in which a rabbit's foot brings us luck

I was walking to Weirdo's house one Saturday when I saw him poking around in the woods that separated our neighborhoods. He was kicking around dead leaves and looking all over the ground. I entered the woods and approached him.

"What are you looking for?"

"I dropped a twenty dollar bill a little bit ago, and I can't find it."

"Why did you have your money out in here?"

"I was going to pay the woodland faun to teach me some spells."

"You what?"

"I said, I was going to nail it to this tree."

"But I thought you said you were going to pay a woodland faun."

"Oh, so you did hear me the first time? So are you going to help me find it, or just pretend to be deaf all day?"

Weirdo pointed to the other side of the woods and said he hadn't looked over there yet. So I went to that area and slowly walked around looking just in front of my feet. We looked for at least thirty minutes and found no money. We did, however, find a lot of other interesting things.

We made a small pile by the big tree in the middle of the woods. There were: three old lighters (two yellow ones and a blue one), a dirty shoelace, a few soggy pages from a newspaper, a plastic fork with one prong broken off, a torn piece of flannel cloth, an empty peanut butter jar, six soda cans (three diet pepsis, two regular, one dr pepper, and one generic cola), a thin metal rod, a ripped envelope and our favorite... a black bowling ball with a big chunk broken off.

I steered clear of the old bucket Weirdo used for his BM, but Weirdo assured me he checked inside it twice already. My neck was getting sore from looking down. I finally said to Weirdo, "I don't think we're going to find it. We've looked this whole place over twice."

"Three times a charm, my friend."

So we scoured the woods for another twenty minutes. We found some more items: another diet pepsi can, a long rusty nail, a tangled ball of yarn, a piece of a tennis ball and the missing prong from the plastic fork. No twenty dollar bill.

"Man alive, that was fun! It probably wouldn't be so much fun if I actually had lost a twenty dollar bill."

My mouth dropped open.

"What, you mean you actually thought I lost a twenty dollar bill. You are something else."

"Why did we just spend an hour looking for something that you knew wasn't there?"

"It was a treasure hunt, except that you didn't have to pretend, because you really believed there was money to be found. You should thank me."

"Thank you for wasting an hour and putting a kink in my neck?"

"My grandpa says that if you can't make lemonade out of lemons, then you don't deserve any lemonade at all."

"What?"

"Are you pretending to be deaf again? Come on, let's go get a bag from my house to put all this cool stuff in."

We turned to leave the woods and saw Blake Wilson coming in. He treated us much nicer after he put his hand in Weirdo's BM that day, but he was still a jerk.

"What are you losers looking for, your barbies?"

"No," Weirdo said, "they're at home. I lost a twenty dollar bill and we couldn't find it."

"Are you serious, a twenty dollar bill?"

"Yeah, you can have it if you find it."

Blake left us alone and immediately started searching for the money. We heard a voice from the other side of the woods.

"What are you guys looking for?"

It was Eric. He lived in the house behind mine and played with us in the woods sometimes. When he came near I said, "We lost a twenty dollar bill. You can have it if you find it."

Weirdo and I left the woods laughing to ourselves. Erik and Blake were searching carefully for the money.

"Weirdo, don't they look like dopes looking for something that's not even there?"

"Yeah, but not as dopey as you looked. Because I didn't even tell you that you could have it if you found it."

I thought about that for a moment, then heard Erik's voice cry out, "I found it!"

Weirdo and I turned to see Erik running towards us with a dirty twenty dollar bill. Weirdo punched me in the arm.

"Ow, what is that for?"

"You told him he could have it if he found it."

"You told Blake that he could have it if he found it!"

"Do you worry about everything, or just dumb stuff?"

Erik stopped in front of us and put the bill in his pocket and pulled out a green rabbit foot key chain.

"Boy, this rabbit foot sure is lucky. Thanks guys, I'm going to buy a new Nintendo game with this. See you later."

Erik ran across the woods towards his house. He stopped for a moment near Blake, who was still searching, and said, "Watch out for that bucket over there. It looks like someone took a dump in it."


* * * * *


I told Weirdo that I had a lucky rabbit foot at home.

"Why didn't you go get it when I told you I lost a twenty dollar bill?"

"But you made that up."

"You always get hung up on the details, don't you? Go get it anyway, I lost a baseball in the field next to my house. Let's see if your's really is lucky."

We ran home and got the rabbit foot. Mine was purple, but I lost the chain part so it wasn't a key chain anymore. Weirdo grabbed it from me and we went to his house. We looked around in the field next to his house for only two minutes before finding an old baseball in some brush.

"Wow, your's really is lucky too! This is awesome!"

I remembered the baseball I lost in my neighbor's garden. They lived behind us and had a huge garden separating our yard from their's.

"Let's go find my baseball!"

"What are we waiting for?"

We ran to my backyard and started poking around my neighbor's garden. We found the ball almost right away.

"Wow, not only did we find your baseball, but we found about a hundred strawberries too!"

I looked at Weirdo and he had red juice running down his chin. I knew we weren't supposed to eat my neighbor's strawberries, but now that Weirdo had one I might as well have one too.

I picked a nice red one and pulled the stem out. As I put it to my lips I heard my neighbor, Mr. Shepherd, open the sliding door at the back of his house. I pulled the strawberry away from my mouth, but it was too late.

"What do you think you're doing?" Mr. Shepherd stood at the edge of his garden with his hands on his hips. He wore just a pair of gray sweatpants and his bedroom slippers.

Weirdo and I stood speechless, caught in the act. I tried to drop my strawberry so Mr. Shepherd wouldn't see.

"Well you might as well eat it now. It won't do anybody any good laying there in the dirt. I sure as hell won't eat it after it was on your lips.: He walked halfway across the yard to us. "Who told you you could eat my strawberries?"

I shrugged my shoulders and looked down at the strawberry I dropped.

"Did I tell you you could eat my strawberries?"

We shook our heads.

"Then who told you you could eat my strawberries? Oh, you must have made that decision on your own. That's funny, they're not even your strawberries and you decide who gets to eat them."

"We're sorry Mr. Shepherd. We won't eat any more."

Weirdo was hiding one behind his back, and I was trying not to look at it. Mr. Shepherd shook his head and walked back inside. He stood at the door and looked at us through the glass until we left the garden.

"Boy, your neighbor sure is a grouch. But your rabbit foot sure is lucky. We found two baseballs, and we got to eat a bunch of strawberries."

"I didn't get to eat any."

"You see, that's the problem with you. You just aren't aggressive enough. Come on, let's go back over to my house. We lost the remote to the downstairs TV. I bet we can find it with the rabbit foot."

We walked back over to Weirdo's. He ate the strawberry as we went and when we got to his house we went to the basement.

"Here, give me your rabbit foot."

"I don't have it. I thought you had it."

Weirdo folded his arms and pursed his lips.

"I do not have it. I remember giving it to you when we went to your backyard."

"And I remember giving it back to you right before we got caught by Mr. Shepherd."

I checked all my pockets again for the foot. Nothing.

"Great," Weirdo said, "what do you use for luck when you're looking for a lucky rabbit foot?"

Uncle Jake, who we didn't notice laying on the sofa, said, "You get yourself a rabbit trap, some carrots and a gun. When the rabbit enters the trap you shoot it."

"Why would we shoot a rabbit?"

"Because that way it won't hurt the rabbit when you cut its foot off."

"Why would we cut its foot off?"

"Because it's a rabbit's foot you want, right?"

"Yeah."

"Then where do you think you get a rabbit foot? From a pig?"

"You mean those things are real rabbit feet?"

"If they weren't real you would buy them off the shelf for five bucks. You get them for a quarter in the gum ball machine because rabbits are free you dummy. Fake rabbits cost money."

Weirdo and I looked at each other and frowned. I wiped my hand against my pants. I had no idea lucky rabbit feet came from actual rabbits.

Weirdo said, "Well, what else is lucky? Uncle Jake, you said you got lucky last night. What did you have? A dragon scale or something?"

Uncle Jake sat up on the couch slowly and stretched. He pulled at his whiskers and smiled. "I grew a lucky beard. Works every time."

Weirdo and I both felt at our naked chins. Then we noticed that Uncle Jake had been laying on the remote. Weirdo reached for it but Uncle Jake slapped his hand away.

"You lost your lucky rabbit foot. I guess it ain’t your lucky day."

Weirdo got mad at that. He scrunched his eyebrows and stared hard at Uncle Jake. Suddenly, Weirdo reached and yanked out a piece of Uncle Jake's beard out and ran up the stairs.

"Owwww! Grow your own you little twerp!" Uncle Jake held his fingers over the little bald spot on the side of his chin and looked at me. He held his chin up to me and sighed, "Well, you might as well make it even."

I smirked and reached out. I yanked at his beard and ran up the stairs laughing with a bunch of whiskers between my fingers. Uncle Jake yelled out behind me, "Oww! Not so much! I doubt if you can handle that much luck!"

Chapter Fourteen - In which Weirdo and I tell scary stories

I asked Weirdo to spend the night at my house. He pulled at his lip and thought about it for awhile.

"Okay, but you aren't going to make me sleep in the same bed as you or anything are you?"

"No."

"Then I guess I can make some time for you."

The next day he was going to get off at my stop with me. Since my stop was six stops after his, and since Weirdo had never been to my house before, he got to see where a bunch of other kids lived.

"Oh man, this is so cool to see how the other side lives. I ride the bus every day with all of you, but you never really know a person until you see where he lives." Weirdo pressed his face against the window. "Ooh man, whose house is that? Did you know a wise man said 'Home is not the place where you live, but the place where you belong', but my Dad says that most people never find where they belong so they may as well just throw that saying out the window."

I often found my mouth hanging slightly open when Weirdo talked.

"Oh man, look at the size of that maple tree. I bet he could hang some sweet Halloween decorations from that. What kind did he hang up last Halloween?"

"I don't know. Who cares?"

Weirdo pulled a big ziplock bag from his backpack. It had a little tube of toothpaste, a toothbrush, his night time mask in a tube and what looked like a little thing of chapstick.

"Why did you pack chapstick?"

"That's not chapstick, it's deodorant."

"I've never seen deodorant like that before.

"That's what they give out in jail. Uncle Jake got it when he went to jail last month."

"What did he go to jail for?"

"He says it was because he drank too much coffee at a party and got arrested for speeding on the way home."

We turned down my street I showed him where my house was. He made a face like he was disappointed, but didn't say anything.


* * * * *


I spent the afternoon showing him around my house and yard. If I showed him something he thought was interesting he would tell me I did good for myself. If I showed him something he thought was ordinary he would just nod his head and stay quiet. He became bored with my tour and asked to see the kitchen.

My mom was in the kitchen looking through the phone book when we came in. She asked if we had any requests for Chinese food.

"My mom makes her own Chinese food. She had a Chinese boyfriend in college who taught her Tai Chi and how to roll a perfect egg roll. Do you know how to make General Tso's sauce?"

My mom stared at him.

"Maybe my mom can call over and give you some pointers. That's if you have the right ingredients, though."

Weirdo opened our pantry and looked through it. He shook his head as he pulled out a can of Del Monte green beans.

"My dad says that anybody who buys Del Monte is a sucker. They all come from the same farm, but Del Monte costs more just because of the label. Did you know that?"

My mom took the beans from him and placed them back in the cupboard. Then she gave me the look.

"Come on, Weirdo. Let's go downstairs."

My older brothers shared a room downstairs next to the TV room. I sat down on the couch and turned the TV on. Weirdo was gone. I called for him and heard him in my brothers' room. My oldest brother had a locked trunk that he kept all his comic books in. The trunk was open and Weirdo was sitting on the floor next to it reading through all the comics.

"Weirdo! My brother is going to kill us if he finds out you broke into his trunk."

"Relax, he was just in here and said I could read them. He opened it for me."

"Really?"

My brother never let me read his comics. I sat down picked one up to read it. My brother walked in.

"What are you snots doing with my comics? How'd you break into my trunk?"

I looked at Weirdo. He looked back at me with big eyes and said, "What?"

"You said he opened it for you."

"That was so long ago, why are you even talking about it still?"

Weirdo tossed the comic he was reading back into the trunk.

"Besides, I already read #42. I have them all the way up to #56."

My brother looked surprised. "You mean you have Bonzai Man #'s 43 through 56?"

"No. I have #'s 1 through 56. I even have a special edition of #12 that's never even been read."

My brother was impressed. He picked me up by the arm and pushed me out of the room. The door closed behind me. I sat and watched TV while Weirdo and my brother sat by the trunk full of comics and talked about Bonzai Man and all the other cool comic book characters I knew nothing about because my mom wouldn't let me buy them and my brother wouldn't let me read his.

The doorbell rang and my mom yelled, "The food is here!" We all ran upstairs to the table. My mom passed out paper plates and forks.

"You guys eat your Chinese food with forks?"

We all stared at him. My dad looked at the fork in his hand and asked, "What do you expect us to use, our fingers?"

"You guys are too cute. My dad says that if you eat Chinese food with anything other than chopsticks you might as well dip it in ketchup too."

I kicked Weirdo beneath the table and gave crinkled my forehead at him.

"Well, I guess I can use a fork too. It won't hurt just this once."


* * * * *


After dinner Weirdo and I played in the back yard until it was too dark. We came inside and began getting ready for bed. We brushed our teeth together in the bathroom, then Weirdo pulled out his chapstick size deordorant and rubbed it into his armpits.

"You put deordorant on before you go to bed?"

"The mask makes my whole body sweat."

"Oh come one, please don't put that mask on. It's weird."

"Try eating Chinese food with a fork. That's weird."

Weirdo said he would do me a favor by not wearing the mask as long as I slept on the floor so he could sleep in my bed. I agreed. We went to my room, made my bed on the floor and turned the light out.

"Hey, I brought a surprise in my bag."

"What is it?"

I watched Weirdo reach into his bag and pull out a flashlight.

"This!"

"We have flashlights. What's the big deal?"

"Yeah, maybe you do, but do your flashlights do this?"

Weirdo pushed the little white switch and the flashlight turned on, beaming a bright circle on the ceiling. None of the flashlights in our house ever had batteries that actually worked. So I agreed with Weirdo that his was pretty cool.

Weirdo told me to get settled in, because he was going to tell me a scary story. He put the flashlight under his chin to make his face look real creepy.

"Last year... there was a man who worked at the bank. His boss told him he needed to get some papers signed by one of their clients. So the man went to the client to have the papers signed, but when he got back to the bank he couldn't find his brief case."

I was waiting for it to get scary.

"He looked, and looked, and looked for the brief case everywhere. He eventually told his boss that he lost the briefcase with the papers in it. His boss fired him on the spot."

I thought there was more, but Weirdo just looked at me waiting for me to react.

"That's it?"

"What do you mean, 'That's it?' Wouldn't that scare you silly if it happened to you?"

"I don't know. It doesn't sound scary.”

"The here, you tell a story scarier than that."

Weirdo handed the flashlight to me. I held it underneath my chin like he did. I felt like an old Indian storyteller sitting around a fire late at night in some tepee far out in the mountains.

"Once upon a time..."

"Boring."

"I didn't even start yet. Shut up."

I couldn't see real well in the dark, but I knew Weirdo was rolling his eyes.

"There was a man driving down a lonely highway at midnight. His car broke down and he had to pull over. There was nothing around but trees on every side. He didn't know what to do and thought he would have to start walking down the road to the next gas station miles away. He started walking, but then saw a light far off in the forest. It looked like a little cabin. He walked..."

"This had better get scary soon."

"It's called building up suspense. Now shut up."

"I think it's called a bedtime story for two year olds. Come on, let's get this story moving already."

I shook my head and continued.

"He walked into the forest and deep into the trees until he finally came to the little cabin. There were candles lit inside, which he could see through the little windows, but there was nobody in there. He opened the door and screamed! There was an old woman laying dead on the floor with blood all around. He heard something running toward the cabin. He turned around and screamed again! There in the doorway was giant wolf man with blood around his mouth!"

"Enough! That is so stupid. I thought we were telling scary stories here. We might as well save the batteries in my flashlight."

"What do you mean that's not scary? What's so scary about some dummy losing his job?"

"That could really happen! My Dad lost his job once and it was really scary. Wolf men aren't even real. How can it be scary if it can't happen?"

Weirdo took the flashlight from me and shined it underneath his chin again.

"Okay. Do you want to hear something really scary? I mean really, really scary?"

I nodded my head.

"Once, and this is a true story by the way, my Uncle Jake was on a plane that crashed high on top of a mountain. A bunch of the passengers died, but there were many who were still alive, like my Uncle Jake. There were stranded for days and were getting very hungry. They had no food at all except for chocolates that they passed out on the plane before it crashed. After three days, Uncle Jake decided that he was so hungry he could eat anything. He walked over to one of the people who died in the crash, licked his lips and started to..."

"No, that's gross. Don't even say it."

"What? Don't say that he checked the pockets for more chocolate? He was dead, you know. Dead people don't need chocolate."

"I thought you were going to say that Uncle Jake wanted to eat the dead person."

"Oh, that is gross. Why do you say things like that?"

"Well, then what's so scary about taking chocolates from a dead person?"

"I wasn't even done. Can I finish?"

I nodded in the dark.

"Uncle Jake knelt down next to the dead guy. Very slowly he reached into the guy's pocket. He didn't find any chocolates but he screamed when..."

Just then the flashlight batteries died and the light went out.

"Humph. I guess I'll just have to finish telling you later."

Weirdo put the dark flashlight back into his bag and fell asleep on my bed.

For once Weirdo was scary. Too scary. I wasn't sure that I wanted to know how the story ended, so I didn't ask him to tell the rest. I don't know what Uncle Jake screamed at, but my mind wandered the possibilities.

He screamed when the dead person grabbed his arm? He screamed when a spider hiding in the dead person's pocket bit him on the hand? He screamed when he found that the pocket was full of blood?

I pulled the blanket over my head and tried to think of happy things. I thought about throwing balls at a target to knock a clown in the water. I thought about how many colors of sprinkles are on donuts. I tried to think about Abraham Lincoln, but I remembered that he was dead. That threw my mind right back to Uncle Jake with his hand in a dead man's pocket.

I had a very hard time falling asleep, just like every time I sleep at Weirdo's house. Somehow he always creeps me out at night.


* * * * *


Weirdo woke me up in the morning. He was excited because he forgot that he packed an extra set of batteries.

"Now I can finish the story."

He turned the flashlight on and put it under his chin. The morning sun was shining and the flashlight didn't make a difference.

"So Uncle Jake put his hand in the dead man's pocket to look for chocolates. Then he screamed when he saw a helicopter come towards the mountain. He jumped up and waved his arms, and the helicopter pilot saw him and rescued all the survivors."

I stared at Weirdo.

"That's why he screamed? That's it? Geez Weirdo, what's so scary about that? I was up all night scared out of my wits."

"What do you mean what's so scary? The helicopter pilot almost didn't see them and they could have been stranded forever."

We were both quiet for a long time, just looking at each other. Weirdo scratched his head and looked at the corner of the ceiling. After another moment he said, "I saw my sister kissing Blake Nelson the other night."

"Now that's scary."

Chapter Thirteen - In which Uncle Jake buys an RV

One day in the summer I walked to Weirdo’s house and saw a big, junky RV sitting in his driveway. The parts that were supposed to be brown had turned orange, and the parts that were supposed to be white had turned brown. The screens on the windows were ripped, and somebody made a rainbow on one corner with spray paint.

As I walked up the driveway Uncle Jake burst from the creeky door on the RV and skipped into Weirdo’s house. Weirdo came out of the RV a second later.

“Why is Uncle Jake so happy today?”

“Because he finally got his own place.”

“You mean he’s moving out?”

“Kind of. He just bought this RV and he’s going to live in it.”

“Where is he going to move it?”

“Nowhere, he’s going to keep it here in the driveway.”

Uncle Jake came out of the house whistling and holding a white plastic bag.

“Come on kids,” he said in the happiest voice I had ever heard him speak in before. “I have a house warming present for all of us.”

We followed him into the RV. It was so hot inside that I instantly started sweating. Uncle Jake slid open the windows and plugged in a small fan.

“Now careful, kids. I tried to sweep all the mouse poop out, but there still some under the cabinet there.”

I looked to where he pointed and saw a small opening beneath a counter and shuddered to think of all the dust and mouse poop underneath there. Weirdo and I sat at the rickety table near the door and waited to see what was in the plastic bag. Uncle Jake sat down with us and dumped out three chocolate bars.

Weirdo and Uncle Jake promptly pulled theirs from the wrapper and licked the entire bar up and down. Then they set to taking huge bites. I unwrapped half of mine and took only a few bites before they had finished theirs. Uncle Jake reached for mine, and I pulled it away.

“You ate your’s. This one is mine.”

Weirdo also reached for mine and said, “But you didn’t lick it all the way. Whatever you haven’t licked belongs to anybody.”

I quickly unwrapped the rest of mine and went to lick it when Uncle Jake tried to snatch it from me. He accidentally knocked the bar from my hand and it flew onto the floor, sliding beneath the counter.

Uncle Jake lept from the table and reached his hand beneath the counter. Suddenly he stopped and opened his eyes real wide.

“What do we have here?”

Uncle Jake pulled a small dusty box from beneath the counter and placed it on the table. We gathered around closely and stared at the box.

“What do you think it is, Uncle Jake?”

“Well, it could be anything? Whoever owned this sweet RV before me must have forgotten this under there.”

I said that maybe it was filled with rubies. Weirdo and Uncle Jake laughed at me. Weirdo put his ear to it.

“I think I can hear a voice in there. Do you think there could be a fairy in there?”

Uncle Jake listened.

“I don’t hear anything. If there’s a fairy in there, it’s probably dead.”

I suggested that they open it to see. Uncle Jake blew the dust off the top and very carefully opened the lid.

“Dear sweet Jesus, would you look at these.” Uncle Jake put his fingers in the box and lifted out an old set of dentures. We were in awe.

“Just think of some old geezer riding across the country in this RV, couldn’t remember where he put his teeth,” Unlce Jake said looking back and forth between Weirdo and me. “Now he’s probably laying dead in his grave wondering where his teeth are.”

While Weirdo and Uncle Jake marvelled at the false teeth, I went to the corner where there was a tiny bathroom. I slid the accordian door open and squeezed myself in. It was so small in there I could barely get my pants undone.

When I finished and came out of the bathroom Uncle Jake stared at me.

“What did you just do in there?”

“I went pee.”

“Why did you go in there of all places?”

“Because it’s a toilet.”

“Yeah, a toilet that doesn’t work! Oh great, guess what now?”

“What?”

“Weirdo, go inside and get some paper towels. We have to soak your friend’s pee out of my toilet.”



* * * * *



When we finished soaking all my pee out of the toilet Uncle Jake told us to leave because he wanted to take a nap in his new pad. It was still boiling inside the RV so I was glad to leave. Weirdo and I went and played in his backyard for awhile. When I was ready to go home Weirdo asked me if I wanted to spend the night in the RV.

“Uncle Jake is spending the night at his friend’s house tonight and he said we could sleep in the RV.”

It may have been dusty, broken down and full of mouse poop, but it sure sounded like fun. I went home for dinner and came back later in the evening with my sleeping bag. We played for long while outside, and when it was very dark we went into the RV. It was still like an oven, but was bearable with the fan blowing right on us.

The box with the dentures in it was sitting on the table. We sat at the table and opened the box to look at the teeth again.

“Go ahead, take them out.”

“Your Uncle Jake won’t mind?”

“Heck no. He won’t care.”

I picked up the teeth and looked at them closely. I almost dropped them when I heard a voice outside on the street.

“Weirdo, who was that?”

“I don’t know. What did they say?”

“I didn’t hear.”

It didn’t sound like some person talking. It sounded like somebody moaned. Then we heard it again, but louder.

“Whooooo haaaaassss myyyyyyy teeeeeeth?”

Weirdo and I stared at each other, frozen. The voice came closer, maybe at the beginning of the driveway, I wasn’t sure.

“Whooooo haaaaaassss myyyyyyy teeeeeeth?”

“They want their teeth, Weirdo. Are these their teeth?”

Weirdo shrugged his shoulders and bit on his tongue. He looked more scared than I was.

There was a knock on the far end of the RV.

“Doooooo yoooouuuuu haaaaaaave myyyyyyy teeeeeeeeth?”

There was a knock at the middle of the RV.

“Doooooo yooooouuuuu haaaaaaaave theeemmmmmm?”

A rattle at the door.

“I waaaaaaaaaant myyyyyyyy teeeeeeeeth!”

I stood up and threw the teeth under the counter where Uncle Jake found them earlier.

“I don’t have your teeth. I put them back! I don’t want them! Leave us alone!”

The door shook, someone moaned. Weirdo and I backed away. Weirdo said he peed his pants a little. I looked and there was a dark spot on the front of his shorts.

The door shook again and it opened! Uncle Jake burst through the door holding his belly and laughing. Weirdo fell over holding his belly and laughing too.

“Oh, we got you good. Oh, so good. Weirdo, that was good, peeing your pants a little. Just like I told you to.”

I couldn’t help it. I laughed too. I felt silly to be joked on like that, but I was relieved.

Uncle Jake went over to the cabinet and got on his knees. He reached under it to find the teeth, but he stopped and a strange look came over his face. He pulled his hand out slowly and held it up in the light.

Uncle Jake began wimpering as we all looked at the dark substance covering the side of his hand and running down his wrist. He made an awful face and cried, “Ewww, what is it?”

Weirdo grabbed his arm and looked closely. He sniffed at the stuff, then licked it lightly. Weirdo’s eyes lit up.

“It’s the chocoate bar we forgot beneath the counter! It’s melted like chocolate syrup. Awesome!”

Weirdo and Uncle Jake fell to their knees and reached beneath the counter. They repeatedly dipped their fingers in the melted chocolate and licked them clean.

“Mmmm,” Uncle Jake said, “I didn’t know I bought you a crunch bar.”

I thought for a moment, then said, “You didn’t.”

“Then why is this so crunchy?”

We all realized it at the same time, and in unison shouted, “Mouse poop!”

Weirdo and Uncle Jake ran to the tiny bathroom in the corner of the RV and puked into the toilet. They finished gagging and slid to the floor with their backs against the dirty brown wall, laughing and sighing.

I asked Uncle Jake if his toilet was still broken. He closed his eyes and banged the back of his head against the wall a few times.

“Weirdo, do you favorite uncle a favor. Go get the paper towels.”

We slept in Weirdo’s room that night.

Chapter Twelve, in which I win a rabbit at the fair.

Every summer the county fair opened for a week. One whole week of carnival rides, games, rodeos, crash derbies, junk food, farm animals and the chance to run around it all without having to stay with an adult.

I went with Weirdo and his sister on the third day. Weirdo entered a project into a science competition, and the judging was done so we could see how he placed. I asked Weirdo what his project was. He told me some things are better seen that heard, and refused to tell me.

Uncle Jake drove us there in his RV. The county fair was always in a big field where no grass will grow because of the fair each summer. So the road leading to the fair and the entire parking lot was filled with pot holes that the RV bounced through. It bounced so hard all the cabinets opened up and all of Uncle Jake’s stuff came tumbling out.

“Oh come on guys!” Uncle Jake yelled over his shoulder. “I told you to hold those cabinets shut.”

“No you didn’t.”

“I told you using telekinesis, dope. You know that works, Weirdo. You’re a believer still, aren’t you?”

Weirdo looked ashamed and apologized to Uncle Jake.

A big dust cloud floated in the parking lot because of all the cars driving over bare dirt. We drove through the dust to the far end of the lot, which is where they made all the RV’s park. We got out of the RV and looked upon the sea of parked cars we had to walk through to get to the fair gates.

The dust clouds covered every car with dirt, making them all look the same. Weirdo suggested that we mark X’s in the dust on every car we pass, so it would mark a trail back to the RV in case we got lost.

Uncle Jake said it was a silly idea, because it’s so easy to locate the coolest RV in the lot. We all looked back to where the RV’s were parked. Uncle Jake spray-painted flames on the sides of his, and mounted three black flags above the windshield. One flag said “Rock,” the middle one said “n” and the last flag said “Roll.”

It wasn’t the coolest RV in the lot, but we all agreed that it was the easiest to find. So Weirdo stopped marking X’s on the cars and tried to wipe his dirty finger on me.

* * * * *

We finally made it inside the fair and Uncle Jake took off for a hot dog stand, leaving the three of us by ourselves. We were happy to be in a public place without an adult for the first time all summer.

Weirdo wanted our first stop to be the science building so we could see if he won a ribbon. We made our way past the crafts building and the farming building. Then we came by my favorite building, which was where all the local businesses set up booths and handed out all sorts of free stuff.

Weirdo waved his hand at that building and said how he would hit it up for stuff later in the day.

“Last year I filled two grocery bags with free stuff. I made a list that I memorized and still remember.”

I didn’t care to hear it.

“I had 16 key chains, 33 writing instruments, which are comprised of 14 pencils, 15 pens and box of four crayons: red, blue, yellow and green. I also got 2 rulers, 4 notepads, a frisbee, 9 peppermint candies and a ton of full color brochures.”

“Are you done?”

“No, those were just the highlights. I guess I can tell you the other stuff later.”

* * * * *

We came to the science building and Weirdo ran ahead of us to find his. When we found him he was standing looking at a red ribbon and shaking his head.

“Can you believe this? A red ribbon.”

“What’s wrong with red? You got a ribbon didn’t you?”

“Red is second place. I wanted the blue ribbon. I was sure that I’d win this year.”

Weirdo showed me his project. It was a white poster board covered with pictures, arrows and paragraphs describing how a light bulb works. He did a good job on it.

He led us to the exhibit that won the blue ribbon. It was a huge display of Happy Meal toys. Weirdo pointed at it and wrinkled his brow.

“Every Happy Meal toy since 1984. Each one accompanied by commentary, date of release and the day he ate the Happy Meal. I guess if I have to lose to something, I’d want to lose to this. This is amazing.”

Weirdo shook it off and we went outside to play some carnival games. We ran into Uncle Jake who pulled us aside.

“Listen guys. One of these carnies lost a finger and it ended up in my hot dog bun.”

Weirdo’s sister gagged a little.

“Keep your eyes peeled for a carnie missing a finger. If you find him tell him that you know who has his finger.”

We silently nodded our heads. I hoped we would not come across any one fingered carnies. I knew that most of them were missing teeth, hair and perhaps a few marbles, but I don’t think I ever saw one with missing body parts before.

Weirdo’s sister suddenly squealed and pointed to one of the game tents. She led us to a small animal pen with a low wooden fence around it. Inside the fence were about twenty white rabbits hopping around. There were kids trying to throw hoops around the rabbits.

Weirdo’s sister handed over her tickets to the carnie lady and asked how to play.

“You throw one of them there rings round a rabbit and you take the cotton pickin’ thing home with you.”

Weirdo and I handed over tickets to play also. We stood around the pen tossing rings at the rabbits. Weirdo and his sister missed every time, but on my last throw I ringed a rabbit.

The carnie lady reached in and pulled the rabbit out by the skin on the back of its neck. She tossed it in a big cardboard box and handed it to me.

“Water this thing a few times a day and give it rabbit food when it’s hungry.”

“How do I know when it’s hungry?”

“When you hear its stomach growl, Einstein.”

Weirdo’s sister squealed and said, “You won!” about fifty times. I picked the rabbit up out of the box and looked at it. It was pretty cute, and soft to pet. Then I thought about my parents.

“Oh no. I can’t keep this rabbit. My parents would never let me keep it.”

I asked the carnie lady if I could give the rabbit back because my parents wouldn’t let me have it.

“You should’a thought of that before you threw a ring round its neck. You win it, you keep it. Er, uh, what you kids call it? Oh yeah, no tag backs.”

The lady laughed and showed us her crooked brown teeth. We walked away from the game tent with my new rabbit. I knew Weirdo’s sister wanted to win a rabbit real badly, so I offered it to her.

“Are you serious? I can keep him? Oh thank you!”

She picked it up and held its nose to her nose.

“Oh my god! He has little brown spots on its nose, how cute! I think I’ll name him Speckles.”

She carried the rabbit in her arms and pet it while I carried the empty box. Weirdo wanted to go on some rides so we headed towards them. We got in the line for the Tilt-a-Whirl, which was our favorite.

* * * * *

The carnie who was taking tickets for the ride found a reason to not let most kids ride.

“You, you’re too short. You’ll fly out and get killed. You, you’re too fat. You need two tickets. Do you have two tickets? No? Then get out of line. You, you’re too tall. You could get your head chopped off.”

I felt bad for all the kids who didn’t get to ride, but at least the line moved a lot faster. We wondered if the carnie would find any reason for not letting us ride. When we got the front of the line he looked us over.

“What’s that you have there?”

“He’s a bunny.”

“You can’t carry a rodent on this ride. It could fly out of your arms and get stuck in the gears.”

“Oh please, let me on with him. I’ll hold on really tight.”

“Girl, I lost my patience three hours ago. If you ask me one more time to let that thing on the ride, I’m going to take it and throw it back in the pen you won it from. You got it? Now get out of line.”

We walked away from the ride with our heads low. Weirdo and his sister began to argue.

“I’m not gonna miss all my fun just because of your new pet.”

“You heard what the man said. He was going to take my rabbit away.”

“Then don’t go on the ride. Just sit on the bench while we go.”

“No, you can’t leave me alone. You know that Mom said we have to stick together.”

Weirdo put his hands on his hips and sighed.

“I guess I’ll just have to wait for tomorrow to ride it.”

He kicked at some dirt on the ground and stuck his tongue out at the rabbit. I had an idea.

“Hey, why don’t we just put the rabbit in the box and hide it around the corner so nobody will take it?”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea. Then my sister won’t have to act like a baby who’s scared to leave her teddy bear.”

Weirdo’s sister made a face at him then reluctantly agreed to hide the rabbit in the box somewhere out of sight. We put the box behind a ticket booth that was nearby and out of the way. Nobody would walk behind there, so it seemed like a safe place.

We got back in line for the Tilt-a-Whirl and listened to the carnie yell out the reasons why most the kids couldn’t ride.

“You, you look too scared. I don’t want to clean up your puke, so you can’t ride.”

We came to the front of the line and he shut the gate. The ride was full and we would have to wait for the next turn. I looked at the carnie and noticed something. I tapped Weirdo on the shoulder.

“Look at the guy’s hand.”

“Only four fingers?”

“Yeah.”

We looked at each other. Then Weirdo got the carnie’s attention.

“Hey mister, I know who has your finger.”

One of the carnie’s eyebrows went really high, and the other went low as he looked at Weirdo.

“What’d you say? You playin’ a joke on me?”

“No. I know who has your finger. I do.”

“Kid, that’s stupid talk. I know exactly where my finger is.”

He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a folded up handkerchief. We stepped back quickly and stared at the handkerchief. Did he really have his finger in his back pocket? I didn’t want to see it.

The carnie shook out the handkerchief and blew his nose.

“After it got cutted off, I donated it to sci-ence.”

He said science like it was two words. I guess it sounded more special that way. We were relieved that he was not going to show us his severed finger. Weirdo scratched his head.

“I’m sorry, mister. I had you confused with someone else.”

The carnie stopped the ride and told everybody on it to get the hell off. Then he opened the gate for us to get on. I gave him my ticket, and then Weirdo and his sister handed over their tickets. We climbed the steps and got on the ride.

Other kids handed over their tickets and scrambled around finding open seats. The carnie closed the gate and Weirdo shouted to him.

“Hey, do you know anybody else around here missing a finger?”

“Yeah! You will be if you don’t keep your hands and feet inside the ride at all times!”

With that he pressed a button and the ride spun us around so terribly that we all wished we hadn’t gotten on the ride at all. But when the ride was over we ran back in line for one more ride.

* * * * *

After our second ride was finished we went over to where we left Speckles. The box was still there, but the rabbit was not. Weirdo’s sister burst into tears. Weirdo put his arm around her.

“It’s okay sis. It was just meant to be. A rabbit is much happier hopping around a carnival eating garbage and getting chased by hungry carnies.”

She cried harder. I asked her if a funnel cake would make her feel better. She cried no and ran over to an empty porta-potty and locked herself in. Weirdo and I shrugged our shoulders and bought two funnel cakes.

We sat down to eat them at a picnic table nearby. My funnel cake was covered with chocolate syrup, and Weirdo ordered his with cinnamon and sugar. We were halfway done with them when I noticed an empty box nearby. I could see two white ears poking out the top. I pointed it out to Weirdo. Weirdo tried to talk with his mouth full.

“Whoth ith it?”

“I don’t know, but swallow your food before you talk. You just spit funnel cake on my cheek.”

“Thorry.”

We watched the box for a long time to see if anybody was coming back for it. Finally we decided that somebody must have left it there because they didn’t want it. I walked over to it and picked the rabbit up. It wasn’t Speckles, because there were no brown spots on its nose.

“Watch this.”

Weirdo wiped some cinnamon off the funnel cake with his finger and tapped the rabbit on the nose. It sneezed like crazy. But when it was done there was still some cinnamon left and it looked like the brown spots on Speckles.

Weirdo’s sister came running up.

“You found him! Oh thank you, oh thank you!”

She took the rabbit from me and hugged it. Then she kissed it on the nose and all the cinnamon came off. Weirdo and I held our breath.

“Oh my god, that was the sweetest little rabbit kiss ever. Oh, would you look at that! I kissed the speckles right off him. That is so cute!”

Weirdo’s sister was happy again and we decided that was enough excitement for one day at the fair. Anyway, it was time to meet Uncle Jake back at his RV. As we were walking away I heard a little boy crying. I trailed behind Wierdo and his sister to see what the boy was crying about.

“I left Hopsy right here in his box. Daddy, Hopsy is missing!”

I felt awful. I stole a little boy’s pet rabbit. Who could do such a thing? I had to console myself by telling myself that the little boy might find the real Speckles hopping around somewhere. Besides, I reasoned, the little kid would have probably killed the rabbit in a week by not taking proper care of it. Then he’d be really heartbroken. So in the end, I guess I helped him out. At least that’s what I convinced myself of.

I ran to catch up with the others and decided that I wouldn’t tell Weirdo about the little kid. I didn’t want Weirdo getting weird about it.

* * * * *

We finally made it through the dust clouds to Uncle Jake’s RV. He was sitting on the dusty hood with some girl he met inside the fair. It turned out she was a carnie, but she had all her fingers and teeth.

Uncle Jake kissed her on the cheek and she handed him a little piece of paper before running off towards the fair. We all got in the RV and headed home.

When we got to Weirdo’s house his sister ran inside to show their parents the rabbit. We stayed outside and played basketball with Uncle Jake, which was never fun, but it was something to do. Five minutes later Weirdo’s sister came out crying and squeezing the rabbit.

“They said I can’t keep him.”

She held the rabbit out to Uncle Jake.

“Can you keep him in your RV? I promise that I’ll feed him and take him for walks. All you have to do is make a space for him.”

“Are you kidding? What would my girlfriend think if I had a rabbit living in my pad?”

Weirdo asked if that carnie girl he met was already his girlfriend.

“No, but I don’t need to ruin my chances with her by rooming with a wild animal.”

“But we can’t bring him back to the fair because the carnies at the game won’t take him back. I can’t just let him go wild, some dog will kill him. What are we going to do?”

She sat and soaked the back of her rabbit with tears. Weirdo was coming up with all sorts of ideas for what to do with the rabbit.

“We could donate it to a farm, or we could send it to poor kids in Africa as a pet. Oh, I know! We could cut its feet off for lucky rabbit feet.”

Weirdo’s sister cried harder. I wondered if there was a way we could find that little kid at the fair who we took it from. Then I had a great idea.

“Hey guys, remember the carnie at the Tilt-a-Whirl? He said if we tried to get on the ride with the rabbit he was going to throw it back in the pen.”

Weirdo’s sister’s eyes lit up.

“Yeah! That would make me feel so much better.”

* * * * *

Uncle Jake let the rabbit stay in his RV for one night, since he didn’t plan on having any chicks over that night. The next day we all rode in the RV to the fair again.

We bought a few tickets for rides and went directly to the Tilt-a-Whirl. The same one-fingered carnie was there again, yelling at everybody and making up reasons for why they couldn’t ride. When it was our turn he looked at us and shook his head back and forth with a frown.

“What did I tell you kids? Tryin’ to take a rabbit on my ride two days in a row! What, are you stupid?”

He grabbed the rabbit from us and marched over to the pen where the other rabbits were. He threw the rabbit in. It landed on its feet but it rolled with the momentum a couple times. Weirdo’s sister flinched when she saw that, but the rabbit seemed to be fine from where we were standing. My plan had worked.

The carnie came back and looked us over, looking for a reason why we couldn’t ride. He must have figured the loss of the rabbit was punishment enough so he let us on. When the ride was over Weirdo’s sister thanked me.

We exited the ride and Weirdo wanted to go get his light bulb project to take home. We walked to the science building and down the row where his exhibit was. Instead of a red ribbon, there was now a blue ribbon on the corner of his project.

“Wow, a blue ribbon! I can’t believe it. The judges must have changed their mind! I knew it was a winner.”

We walked over to where the Happy Meal toy exhibit was and noticed there was no ribbon at all on it. Instead there was a paper taped to the bottom of it. Weirdo picked it up and read it.

“Upon further inspection of this exhibit the judges discovered that many of the Happy Meal purchase dates where falsified, and that many of the toys were purchased at garage sales. Therefore this entry is disqualified from judging.”

Weirdo shook his head slowly.

“I knew it was too good to be true. How could a kid have collected every toy from every series? I get the same darn toy every time I go.”

Weirdo took the blue ribbon from his light bulb exhibit and pinned it to his shirt. We started walking out of the fair towards the parking lot. Weirdo’s sister frowned as we walked.

“I’m glad that Speckles is safe and someone may win him to take home, but I’m still sad that I don’t get to keep him. I wish I didn’t have to give him back.”

* * * * *

I thought about the little boy and his rabbit. I still felt horrible, especially since Weirdo’s sister didn’t even get to keep it. The thought of telling her that it wasn’t really Speckles that I found occurred to me. I decided to pose a question to her.

“What would make you feel worse, having Speckles for a day and then give him back, or never finding him at all after you lost him?”

She stopped walking and thought about it for a minute.

“I guess I’m glad that I got to keep him for one night. Because if you never found him last night I would have been a wreck for weeks!”

That was the answer I hoped for. I never wanted to tell anybody that I stole a rabbit from a little boy.

We passed out of the fair into the parking lot and I heard a man talking to his son.

“See, Benny? I told you we could come back today and win another one.”

I turned around and saw the little boy from the day before with a big cardboard box and a huge grin.

“Yeah, and he even looks just like Hopsy did.”

I couldn’t believe it. Happy endings never happen that perfectly. I was about to whisper what happened to Weirdo when we heard a woman yelling behind us. We turned and saw Uncle Jake trying to block punches from the carnie girl he kissed the day before.

“You lying creep! I can’t believe you! Don’t even think about calling me!”

She tried hitting him more as he ran towards us.

“Go! Run away! She’s coming! C’mon, let’s go!”

We turned and ran with Uncle Jake to the RV. I looked over my shoulder and saw the carnie girl chasing us. We jumped in the RV and locked the doors. Uncle Jake started it up and peeled away. The carnie girl stood in the middle of the parking lot shaking her fist and yelling things we couldn’t hear.

“Uncle Jake, what happened?”

Uncle Jake shook his head and wouldn’t say a word. Weirdo asked again.

“What the heck did you do to make her so mad?”

Again, Uncle Jake shook his head quietly. At the next stop sign he turned around and faced us.

“Kids, never trust a carnie.”

I never have since.

Chapter Eleven, in which Fatso makes a funny

One day on the bus I asked why Weirdo was in fifth grade and not fourth grade like me, since we were the same age.

"I thought you would ask me that someday. I guess you're ready for the truth."

I rolled my eyes.

"My parents and the principal decided that I should skip second grade because they thought it would be too boring for me."

"Second grade was boring for me, and I didn't get to skip it."

"Yeah, but my boredom is on account of my superior brain."

I was about to tell Weirdo that that must be the reason why his head is so huge, but I was interrupted by an ugly, freckled face.

"I knew that's why you can't do any pull-ups in PE."

It was Mike, the bus bully.

"You're such a dweeb that nobody even knows your real name... Weirdo!"

"That's because you can't handle my real name."

"What? That's stupid. I bet it's a girl's name. C'mon, tell it to me."

"Fine. What's your name."

"You know my name, doofus. What's your name?"

"I told you. What's your name."

"I'm asking you!"

"And I'm telling you. What's your name."

"What's your name?"

"No, that's my name."

"Quit being weird or I'll give you a Charlie horse."

There are five ways of hurting another kid that don't count as picking a fight. They are: the Charlie Horse, the Noogie, the Wedgie, the Indian Rug Burn and the Corkscrew. You can use them on another kid, and the worst that will happen is they will use one back on you. But an actual fight never results until someone gets shoved.

Facing a possible charlie horse, and the litany of torture that could follow, Weirdo bravely spoke in a funny accent.

"My name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father. Prepare to die."

Mike scratched his head and looked out the corner of his eye. Then he shook his head and punched Weirdo hard in the shoulder. I winced and Weirdo cowered. Mike was looking proud of his achievement when we heard a strange, high voice nobody had ever heard before. I thought for a moment it could have been Mickey Mouse.

"Leave him alone!"

We all turned around to find the fattest kid on the bus (and in the school) had spoken for the first time that anybody could remember. We stared with wide eyes at the kid who was so fat that one butt cheek touched the side wall of the bus, and the other hung over into the aisle.

"You are a big bully and you should not pick on other kids."

Not only was he speaking, but his first words were used to stand up to a bully, something most of us wouldn't even do with our last words. Mike was delighted. He stood up and moved into the aisle.

"Ha, not only are you fat, but you have an old lady's voice too!"

Fatso crossed his chubby arms over his large stomach and squinted his eyes at Mike.

"Do you want a Noogie."

Fatso pursed his lips and said, "You can't keep picking on us like this."

He was inspiring us all, despite that Mike was already in position and rubbing his knuckles hard into Fatso's skull. Even though I was not involved yet, I knew that I was next in line simply because I was nearby, which meant that I would be getting either the Wedgie, the Indian Rug Burn or the Corkscrew. I decided to attack first.

While Mike was busy with the Noogie I stepped into the aisle and kicked him hard in the shin. He fell to his knees holding his leg and whimpered. I had not used one of the fair implements of torture. A kick was a fight starter. I just picked a fight with the bus bully! My face got hot and I felt real dizzy. I told myself, whatever happens try not to cry.

Suddenly the bus stopped and the driver called out, "Mike, your stop."

Mike glared at me and pushed by to exit the bus. I sat down among Weirdo and Fatso's congratulations for picking a fight with a bully and walking away unharmed.

Weirdo turned to Fatso and studied him. He said jokingly, "You have some explaining to do."

Fatso was happy to speak.

"I've decided to turn over a new leaf. My dad is reading a book on assertiveness training and he's teaching me what he learns. He and I are going to help each other lose weight and start making friends. So he said that I have to start getting out of the house and make friends at school to help divert my attention from food and tv."

Weirdo and I agreed that he could be our friend.

"And my dad is trying to teach me how to be funny. Watch this and tell me if it's funny."

Fatso pretended to take his nose off and eat it. Then he pretended to spit it back out and put it back on his face.

"Was that funny?"

We shook our heads no, then asked Fatso if he wanted to come over to Weirdo's house after school and play basketball. It turned out that he did not live far from us and he could walk over without getting too out of breath.

* * * * *

That afternoon Weirdo and I waited for Fatso to come over. We saw his huge figure waddling down the street. He was wearing red, white and blue sweatbands around his head and wrists, but he still had on the button-up shirt and jeans he wore to school that day. Fatso never played basketball before, so we told him the rules and said that he could just stand by the basket and try to stop us from doing layups.

Weirdo and I dribbled the ball around him while Fatso kept trying to tell jokes. He could never get it right though.

"There was this guy who needed a job, so he got one at the zoo pretending to be a lion. But when the gorilla got in his cage... wait a second, the guy was pretending to be a gorilla and the lion got in his cage... no, wait. He accidentally got in the lion's cage and... ummm."

We kept telling him that he wasn't funny yet, but encouraged him to keep trying.

After a few minutes we noticed Mike riding his bike down the street towards us. When he came closer we saw he had a sandwich bag filled with gravel. As he passed by the driveway he flung the bag open and sprayed us with the rocks.

We tried to act like we didn't notice, but Weirdo had a rock stuck in his ear that I had to help him get out. Mike came riding back up the street again and whipped another bag of gravel at us. One rock hit me in the teeth and Fatso got hit in the forehead with a couple. Weirdo didn't get hit that time because he hid behind Fatso.

Mike threw several more bags of rocks at us in the same way. We decided that he wasn't going to stop any time soon, so we needed to do something. We discussed things we could do to make him stop. Weirdo said we could build a giant shield out of old milk jugs, and Fatso suggested that we use our positive thoughts to guard us from the rocks. We hadn't finalized our plan when Mike returned again.

I quickly picked up a rock the size of a Silly Putty egg and threw it at Mike as he rode by. The rock hit him directly at the top of his forehead. The blow stunned him and the handlebars on his bike wobbled crazily. His balance was lost and he crashed into the muddy ditch on the other side of the street.

Mike slowly got to his feet. He was covered in mud, which we laughed at hysterically. Then we saw a stream of dark, red blood running down his face. We stopped laughing and watched silently as Mike felt at his bloody forehead and started balling. He got on his bike and rode home, leaving dots of blood and mud on the road behind him.

We didn't know whether to be proud and happy, or terrified. I was feeling sick to my stomach, but felt better when when Weirdo patted my shoulder and told me I had incredible aim.

* * * * *

We played basketball for about ten more minutes. Fatso kept us from the basket every time. He was so big that we couldn't get near the hoop, and every time he knocked the ball away from us he called out in his high voice, "Not on my turf!" We decided to play something else.

"Weirdo, I hope you didn't mind me calling this my turf. I know it's your driveway."

"Hey, no problem. Whatever keeps you out of the cupboard is cool with me."

We were making our way to Weirdo's front door when a car screeched into the driveway. First we saw a lady in a bathrobe jump out of the car, then we saw Mike sitting in the passenger seat with a bloody rag on his head and looking as sad as could be.

"Go get your parents, you rotten bullies!"

We all looked at each other, not sure what to do. Weirdo's dad must have heard the car pull up, because he came outside asked the lady what was wrong.

"These kids are wrong, that's what! And your parenting skills are probably all wrong too! Who taught these kids to throw rocks at innocent children riding their bicycles?"

Weirdo's dad looked us over. He took a long time looking Fatso over.

"Is this true, kids? Did you throw a rock at that poor boy?"

"Why are you asking them? Isn't the evidence sitting right there in my car? Look at my poor son. Who's going to pay the doctor to stitch up that gash?"

I must have been looking the guiltiest. After all, I felt like I was about to pass out or throw up. Weirdo's dad wrinkled his forehead and put his hand firm on my shoulder.

"You have some explaining to do."

Weirdo and his dad were always saying the same things.

I didn't know what to say. I had thrown a rock that hit Mike in the head. I couldn't deny it. I was looking to Weirdo and Fatso for help, but they looked as sick to the stomach as I did.

I decided to just open up my mouth to see what came out first, a horrible excuse or a load of puke. Before I could let anything out, we heard loud footsteps walking up the driveway from the street.

A huge man, with arms the size of Weirdo's entire dad, was walking straight at me with a mean stare. Oh no, I thought, is this Mike's dad? I thought about telling Weirdo that he could have my boombox if I died.

The man walked right up to me and demanded, "Are you the one who threw that rock?"

My head nodded up and down a little. This was surely the end of my life. Then the man walked behind Fatso and put his hands on his shoulders.

"Do you think you can teach my son to throw like that?"

Everybody's eyes popped wide open and stared at the man, except for Fatso who patted the man's hand and said to him, "I learned how to play basketball today, dad."

Mike's mom threw her arms into the air.

"Somebody had better start writing me a check for my son's poor head. And I'll get the police involved if you keep condoning this kid's behavior."

Fatso's dad stepped forward and looked down his big belly at her. His voice boomed.

"Woman, you get in that car of yours and drive that no good excuse of a son home. I saw the whole thing from my front porch and was about to take care of that jerk myself until this fine young man," he patted my head, "exercised his precision aim in a brave act of self defense."

Mike's mom turned bright red in the face. She walked backwards to her car waving her finger at Fatso's dad.

"Nobody calls my son a jerk but me!"

She got into the car and slammed the door shut. She whacked Mike on the arm and said stuff we couldn't hear as she pulled away. Mike wouldn't look at us the entire time.

Fatso tried another joke, but gave up before the punchline.

* * * * *

The next day on the bus ride home Mike sat by his self at the front of the bus with a bandage on his forehead. Everybody kept asking him what happened. Each time he acted real cool and said that he went hunting with his cousin and a stray bullet grazed him. When Weirdo bravely asked him what happened he just turned away and frowned.

We sat several seats behind Mike, and Fatso sat behind us. Almost the whole bus ride we discussed what happened the day before. We decided that we wouldn't tell anybody else the truth about Mike's head, but we weren't sure if we should still be afraid of him anymore.

We pulled up to Mike's stop, and Fatso decided to test the waters. As Mike was exiting the bus, Fatso called out to him in his cartoon voice and to the tune of nanny nanny boo boo.

"My dad yelled at your mom."

Mike stopped for a moment, but didn't look back at us. He just scrunched his face up and got off the bus.

Weirdo and I looked at each other, then at Fatso as we both said, "Now that's funny."

Chapter Ten, in which Weirdo gets a mouthful

Weirdo’s family pulled in front of my house and honked the horn. Weirdo ran up to my house and rang the doorbell. All this even though I was sitting in a lawn chair in the driveway.

When Weirdo finally saw me he said, “Didn’t you hear me ringing the doorbell?”

“No, because I was right here the whole time.”

“Well you make people wait. We have to get to the beach before it gets too crowded. Did you go toity?”

“Yes, Daddy.”

“Did you get any on you?”

“Shut up.”

Weirdo spit at me and got me in the leg. He laughed and said, “Oops, I got some toity on you!”

We got in the car and I told on him. His mom said, “Oh, a little spittle never hurt anybody.”

His sister chirped in, “At least he just got it on your leg and not all over the seat like you did when you couldn’t find the opening of the toity jar.”

Everybody laughed, except me. I wanted to get them all back somehow for this. I decided I would just get Weirdo back for now. I knew it was going to be a long ride, so I stopped swallowing and saved all my spit.

I just sat there quietly the whole ride. While they were all singing about how Jesus is the rock that never rolls, or something like that, my cheeks were growing larger. My throat was getting dry, but this would be worth it.

Finally we reached the beach. Everybody got out of the car and I met Weirdo face to face.

“What are you doing?” he demanded.

Kaplooey! I spewed an hour’s worth of spit onto Weirdo’s bare chest. I didn’t realize my cheeks could hold so much. The spit covered his entire upper chest and ran down to his belly and into his shorts.

Weirdo stood there in shock. He looked up at me with eyes that said ‘what did I ever do to you?’ Then he screamed like a little girl and ran for the water.

* * * * *

We had a great time swimming. After Weirdo washed all the spit off he acted like he forgot about the whole thing. It started getting late so we dried off and got back in the car.

Weirdo was extremely quiet on the way home. Even when the rest of them were singing he didn’t yell NO like he usually does when the devil threatens to blow out the little light of his.

I began to notice his cheeks getting bigger. Then I knew what he was up to. I watched him nervously, and he sat there looking straight ahead. Those cheeks were getting bigger and bigger.

We were almost home and I was very worried. I knew what would be coming as soon as we got out of the car. And I wouldn’t have the luxury of jumping in the lake to wash off like he did.

His dad rounded the corner to our neighborhood. In just a few moments I would be drowning in Weirdo’s spit. He had much more cheek space than I did.

We came to Weirdo’s house. I was ready to make a run for it before the car even stopped moving. But his dad turned too sharply into the driveway and the tires on the right side ran off the road and up into the driveway. The car bounced hard, causing Weirdo to choke on some of his spit. I saw his cheeks clench. His eyes looked very worried. Weirdo held his hand to his mouth, but it was too late. He couldn’t hold it any longer.

A gallon of spit gushed forward from Weirdo’s mouth onto the back of the front seat, the back of his mom and dad’s head and all down his own chest into his lap. His sister and I burst into laughter. His dad turned around and yelled, “What in spit’s name?”

Even though there was no danger of getting caught in Weirdo’s spit storm anymore, I still got out of the car quickly and rushed home. At least I was dry.

Chapter Nine, in which I learn what a BM is

Weirdo and I were walking through the woodsy area that separated our neighborhoods. Kids would sometimes hang out there after school. On this day we were the only ones there.

We were about to climb a tree when Weirdo started groaning.

“What’s wrong?”

“Ohhh, I have to do a BM.”

“A what? What’s a BM?”

“You know, a BM. Not a toity, but a…”

“Why do you call it a BM?”

“Because poop sounds stupid. Oh man, I have to go bad.”

“So go home and do it.”

“No, I can’t. It’s coming now.”

“We’re in the woods, just go behind that tree.”

“No, I can’t. Last time I tried going behind a tree it landed on ankle and I didn’t know till I got home and my mom smelled it.”

There was a white bucket laying near some garbage. I grabbed it and took the lid off, it was empty.

“Here, use this then. It’s like a toilet.”

“Okay, that will work.”

Weirdo took the bucket behind a tree and sat on it. He groaned for a long time.

“What’s taking you so long?”

“It’s prairie dogging.”

“What?”

“You know how a prairie dog pops his head in and out of its hole?”

“Oh man, you’re sick. Just finish and call me when you’re done.”

After a few minutes Weirdo called out to me that he was done and that now he needed something to wipe with. I suggested he grab some leaves.

“Oh no, oh no. Just my luck I’ll get some poison ivy. Leaves of green, let it be. Everything around here is green.”

“No, that’s leaves of three, let it be.”

“That’s not what Uncle Jake says. Please run to my house and get some toilet paper for me. But don’t tell my parents I’m doing a BM out here.”

I unwillingly agreed and ran to his house and up to the bathroom. There was no toilet paper on the roll. I checked under the sink, nothing. I checked in the linen closet, nothing.

I ran back to where Weirdo was sitting on the bucket and humming.

“I couldn’t find any.”

“What do you mean you couldn’t find any? There’s a ton of it in the bath tub. Why didn’t you look there?”

I ran back to his house, up to the bathroom and pulled back the shower curtain. Uncle Jake was asleep in the bathtub. The water was filled all the way and all his clothes were still on. The toilet paper was soaked. So I grabbed a newspaper off the table on the way out.

Weirdo was still humming the same song when I returned.

“Your Uncle Jake was in the bathtub with his clothes on and the paper was all wet.”

“Yeah, he usually does that when he has a concert the night before. He says he needs to cool off from being smoking hot all night.”

“I brought you a newspaper though.”

“Oh, not today’s newspaper! My dad hasn’t read it yet.”

“I’m not getting anything else. Use it or nothing at all.”

Weirdo took it and muttered to himself as he prepared to wipe. “I guess I can use the comics. Mom usually throws them out anyway, on account of it being inappropriate humor.”

He finished up and we put the lid back on the bucket. We were about to throw the bucket deeper into the woods when we heard a voice.

“What are you losers doing?”

It was Blake, the biggest jerk in the neighborhood.

“What’s in the bucket?”

Weirdo and I looked at each other. We both said, “Nothing.”

“Come on freaks, show me what’s in the bucket or I'll tell everybody you two were making out.”

I took the bucket from Weirdo and walked it over to where Blake was leaning back against a tree. I backed far away from him after delivering the bucket.

Blake tore the lid off the bucket and looked inside. “What, just a bunch of newspaper comics?” He reached in and grabbed a handfull of newspaper and pulled it out. His face went pale.

The bucket dropped and Blake stepped backward into the tree and knocked himself forward. He tripped and put his hands out to break the fall. His right hand went right into the bucket.

Blake screamed. We ran.

* * * * *

When we were far enough away we stopped and laughed between breaths.

Weirdo held his hand out under my nose. “Smell my hand.”

I took a whiff. “Ohhh, that’s gross. It smells like poop.”

“I thought it might. The newspaper slipped when I was wiping.”

“Then why did you have me smell it?”

“I wanted to know if it smelled?”

“Of course it does. Why didn’t you smell it yourself?”

“What, you think I’m going to smell my own hand after wiping up a BM? That’s sick.”

Chapter Eight, in which I learn that monkeys have uncles

Almost everyday on the bus ride home from school we saw a man riding his bicycle down the street. Even on warm days he wore a stocking cap, thick jacket, pants, boots, gloves, scarf, a fleece band over his ears and big dark sunglasses.

Everybody, including me, would make fun of him. Weirdo, on the other hand, always said that we shouldn’t make fun of him. One day I asked him why not.

“Because I don’t think it’s a very nice thing to do.”

It seemed so strange to me that someone wouldn’t want to make fun of that guy. Even if he didn’t dress like an Eskimo, his bike had crazy stickers and flags all over it. There were streamers coming out the ends of the handlebars and two big baskets on each side of the back tire, usually filled with flattened soda cans.

“Oh come on, Weirdo. That guy is a nut. What’s wrong with saying so?”

“I just don’t think it’s a very nice thing to do.”

* * * * *

One evening I walked to Weirdo’s house and saw a very familiar bicycle parked outside his house. There were stickers and flags all over it, and two big baskets on the back tire.

I rang Weirdo’s doorbell and he let me inside.

“Come on. My Uncle Luis is here. You have to meet him.”

I was just about to ask Weirdo why that crazy guy’s bike was parked out front when we walked into the living room and I saw him sitting on the couch. Weirdo’s parents were there too, and his mom said to me, “Have you met Weirdo’s Uncle Luis yet?”

I quietly said no. I couldn’t believe this was Weirdo’s uncle. There sat the crazy man with the bike. Even though we were inside, and it was seventy-seven degrees outside, he still wore all his winter clothes. The only thing that he took off was his sunglasses. His eyes and the skin around his eyes was all red. He leaned forward and shook my hand with his big gloved hand.

“So Weirdo was just telling us how you and all the other boys on the bus make fun of me each day.”

I looked at Weirdo. Weirdo nodded his head up and down cheerily.

“Yeah, tell my Unlce Luis some of the things you all call him. He’ll laugh. He really thinks it’s funny.”

Everybody giggled and laughed quietly. My face felt hot and I started feeling dizzy. I sat down in a chair across the room and tried to disappear. Everybody stared at me. I tried deflect the attention by pointing at Weirdo’s dad and saying, “Weirdo says that he is missing brains.”

The room became very quiet. Weirdo’s dad sighed.

“Actually, yes, I am missing some brains. I had a tumor many years ago and the doctors had to remove some of my brain to get it out.”

Weirdo’s mom shifted in her seat and said, “That’s right, and it’s not something we talk about lightly. It was a very scary time in our family and I’m sure that Weirdo told you because he thought he could trust you not to make a joke out of it.”

Now I really wanted to disappear. I got up and left. Weirdo met me outside and me how I liked his Uncle Luis.

“Why didn’t you tell me that was your uncle?”

“What difference would that make?”

“Well, I wouldn’t have made fun of him if I knew he was your uncle.”

“My dad always says, ‘Even monkeys have uncles.’”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means you never know who you're making fun of. So you shouldn’t do it at all.”

"And monkeys have uncles?"

“Sure. But only on their mom’s side. Because monkeys don’t get married like we do.”

“But my cousin Benny is an only child. He won’t ever be an uncle.”

Weirdo scratched his head for a moment.

“Hold on. Let me go ask my dad about that one.”

Weirdo came back a minute later nodding his head.

“Yeah. My dad says it’s okay to make fun of your cousin Benny.”

It made me feel better, so I told Weirdo that my cousin Benny had three nipples.

Chapter Seven, in which we go camping.

I was invited to go with Weirdo’s family on one of their camping trips. Weirdo always talked about how much fun they have camping, so I figured there was no reason to miss out.

We got to the campsite late and the first thing we did was unpack our swimsuits and beach towels to have a quick dip, but it was too dark and we couldn't find the swimming pond.

We laid our towels across the picnic table and set up our tents in the dark. Weirdo and I shared a tent, his sister got her own and his parents shared one. Our tent leaned to one side really bad, probably because it was on the side of a little hill and we had one pole left that we didn’t know what to do with.

The ground was really hard and rocky. Plus, the slope we were on was so steep that if you moved a muscle your sleeping bag would slide downhill in the tent. I was sleeping downhill from Weirdo. He tosses and turns so much that he kept sliding into me and we both ended up crammed against the side.

In the middle of the night, I woke up. My sleeping bag was soaked and it smelled like pee. I felt Weirdo’s sleeping bag. It was soaked too. I was so confused about who peed. Did we both pee, or did he pee a big gigantic river and let it run downhill to me?

Either way I had to get out of there. I pulled my dripping wet sleeping bag from the tent and brought it down to the creek that ran through the campground. When I got there I took off my wet clothes and put them in the creek with my sleeping bag to rinse out all the pee.

I heard someone cough nearby. I thought I was alone. I hoped I was, because I was naked. I hid behind a tree and looked out from behind it.

Weirdo’s sister was walking near the creek. She was smoking a cigarette. I was so shocked that I stepped out and said, “You’re smoking!”

She gasped and said, “You’re naked!”

I jumped back behind the tree. “You can’t smoke. You’re just a kid."

"I'm older than you. So just mind your own business."

"Is that why you’re teeth are yellow?”

"They are not yellow," she hissed. Then she softened and asked, "are they?"

I was about to tell her just how yellow when there was a rustle in the brush nearby and a low growl. We ran back the campsite. I quickly grabbed one of the beach towels on the picnic table to cover up with.

“Where are your clothes?”

“Oh man, I forgot them in the creek with my sleeping bag.” I noticed something bright coming from the front of the sun dress she had on. “Where is your cigarette?”

“I threw it down by the creek. Why?”

“I think it went in your pocket.”

The front of her dress had a small flame growing at the front. She gasped and tore it off.

I saw her naked.

She grabbed a towel of her own and stomped the fire out and threw the burnt dress behind her tent.

We heard Weirdo coming out of his tent. He didn’t see us and was talking to himself. “Man oh man, one of us sure peed a gallon and a half.”

He took his clothes off and threw them behind our tent along with his sleeping bag. He turned around and saw us. He yelped and grabbed a towel from the picnic table.

We heard a zipper, and out stepped their dad.

“What are you all doing?” We thought we were in trouble deep. “It’s way too late to be going swimming. It's..." he looked at his bare wrist where his watch was before he took it off for the night. "It's too late. Everybody back in your tents.” He disappeared into his tent and zipped it closed.

The three of us stood staring at each other. Weirdo’s sister said, “How about we all just keep our mouths shut about what happened tonight.”

Weirdo said, "What did happen?"

His sister and I both said, "Nothing."

We agreed and went into our tents for the rest of the night.

* * * * *

In the morning we were woken by the sound of Weirdo’s dad calling us out of our tents. He didn’t sound happy.

“Kids, get out here right now. You have some explaining to do.”

The three of us appeared sleepy-eyed at the flaps of our tents.

“Can anybody explain to me why I found a burnt dress behind this tent, and soaking wet clothes and sleeping bags behind this tent and in the creek?”

We were frozen. We weren’t quite sure ourselves what happened. Weirdo’s dad was getting impatient. His sister was about to speak when an old man walked up to our campsite laughing.

“He he, I saw the whole thing, mister.”

“You did?” said Weirdo’s sister.

“Sure did little gal.” He turned to Weirdo’s dad and said, "Friend, these kids of your's are heroes.”

“We are?” asked Weirdo.

“Sure are, kiddo.”

Weirdo’s dad asked, “What did they do?”

“Well, it wasn't pretty,” the old man sounded like he was going to tell an old war story, “but it all started with me down at my campsite late last night. My old dog, Bojangles, got a little too close to the campfire and caught his tail on fire. He tore through the campground so fast I couldn’t catch up. I was scared my poor Bojangles was going to be a crispy critter.”

We all listened closely. We had no idea what the man was talking about.

He continued, “Your kids must have heard the commotion because they jumped out of their tents. Your daughter grabbed Bojangles by the legs. She sure is brave. She’s lucky her whole dress didn’t catch fire. Your boys ran down to the creek and dunked their bags and clothes so they could douse the fire. I guess they were in such a hurry that they forgot half of them down at the creek.”

Weirdo’s dad looked very proud. He put his hands on his hips and puffed his chest out.

Looking us over he said, “Well I guess they are some pretty good kids. They must take after their old man. I once saved a puppy from a hot car in a Walmart parking lot.” He turned to the old man. “Say friend, what’s your name?”

“You can call me Campfire Joe.”

“Well, okay Campfire Joe. Thanks for sharing the story. We’ll see you around, and best of luck to Bojangles.”

* * * * *

The three of us kids searched around the campground later that day for Campfire Joe’s campsite. We didn’t find him anywhere. We went to the campground office and asked the old lady behind the desk if she knew Campfire Joe. She cocked her head and looked at us with squinty eyes. “Who are you looking for?”

“Campfire Joe. We met him earlier today. We’re looking for him and his dog, Bojangles.”

The old lady scratched her head. “Well, that’s Bojangles over there beneath that tree.” There was a dog so old it could barely wag its tail. “But as for Campfire Joe, he died in a tent fire twelve years ago.”

“How did he die?”

“Nobody knows for sure, but most people think that he fell asleep while smoking a cigarette, and when the cigarette dropped out of his mouth he wasn’t awake to see the tent burst into flames. By then it was too late. Old Bojangles, he barely escaped. All that happened to him was his tail caught on fire, but some kids caught him and put the fire out.”

We stared at the old woman. She continued, "That was back before they started making these tents today that are all fire retarded, or whatever they are."

Weirdo suggested, "You mean flame retardant?"

The old lady looked over the top of her big plastic glasses at Weirdo.

We thanked her for the story and walked back to our campsite. On the way we stopped and pet Bojangles. He was so happy to get attention he mustered the strength to wag his scraggly bald-tipped tail.

* * * * *

That night we were sitting around our campfire. Weirdo’s parents left to get more firewood. As soon as they left we saw an old man walking toward us.

“So you like to smoke do you?”

Weirdo’s sister gasped, “Campfire Joe?”

“That’s right. Now you promise me to quit that smoking. Do you hear me?”

She nodded her head up and down real fast.

“And you two.” He turned to Weirdo and me. “Don’t you think it’s time you quit peeing your pants at night. That's kid stuff. You two want to be men someday don't you?”

We nodded, even though we still weren’t sure who it was that did the peeing.

Weirdo asked, “Are you a ghost?”

Campfire Joe said, “I guess I am if you say I am.” With that he turned around and walked away into the darkness. We heard him say over his shoulder, “Remember those promises. Don't go breaking them."

* * * * *

We didn't see Campfire Joe for the rest of our time camping, except for on the day we left. We were driving up the bumpy dirt road towards the highway and we saw Campfire Joe, the old lady and Bojangles sitting in rocking chairs outside the campground office.

The two old people held hands and the dog laid between them. I saw Campfire Joe point at our car and say something that made the old lady laugh.

I know that I broke my promise to Campfire Joe a couple times since then, and I’m sure Weirdo has too. His sister, on the other hand, never smoked again. She also developed a mild fear of matches and old men.

Copyright 2007 Jeffrey A Pierce