Текст книги "Dash & Lily's Book of Dares"
Автор книги: Rachel Caine
Соавторы: David Levithan
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Текущая страница: 4 (всего у книги 13 страниц)
Since Langston was lost to Benny, I had spent the night in my special “Lily pad,” in Grandpa’s apartment. The Lily pad is an ancient, afghan-
draped chaise that sits underneath a skylight built into the at ic apartment that Grandpa turned into his retirement home after he sold his business
on the ground oor and my family moved into the third– oor apartment, where Grandpa and Grandma once raised my mom and my uncles.
Grandma died right before I was born, which is maybe why I am Grandpa’s special girl. I was named after her, and I arrived into the downstairs
just as Grandpa was transitioning upstairs. So while he’d lost one Lily, he’d gained back another. Grandpa said he decided to renovate the upstairs
apartment for his later-in-life bachelor digs because climbing the stairs every day would keep him young.
I take care of Grandpa’s cat, Grunt, when Grandpa goes to Florida. Grunt’s an ornery cat, but lately I like him more than Langston. So long as I
feed him and don’t smother his furry head in too many unwanted kisses, Grunt would never toss me aside for some boy. Grunt’s as close to my own
animal as I’m al owed to have in our living space.
When I was lit le, we had two rescue cats, named Hol y and Hobbie, who disappeared very suddenly. They both died from feline leukemia, only
I didn’t understand that at the time. I was told that Hol y and Hobbie had graduated to “col ege” and that’s why I didn’t see them anymore. Hol y
and Hobbie went o to col ege only a couple years after the gerbil incident, so I guess I understand why the real reason was kept secret from me.
But it would have saved everyone a lot of grief if they’d been honest at the time. Because when I was eight and went with Grandpa to visit my
cousin Mark, who was a freshman at Wil iams Col ege, I spent the whole weekend darting through al eys and peering inside every bookcase
crevice I found in the library, looking for my cats. That’s when Mark had to break it to me, in the very public dining hal no less, why the poor
lit le things were not, in fact, at Mark’s col ege, or at any col ege, other than the big one up in the sky. Begin Shril y incident, stage 2. Let’s just say
Wil iams Col ege probably would appreciate me not applying there next year.
In the years since, I have petitioned at various times to adopt a kit en, a turtle, a dog, a parrot, and a lizard, but al requests have been denied.
And yet I al owed my parents to go on holiday at Christmas, guilt free. Who was the wronged party here? I ask.
I like to think of myself as an optimistic person, especial y at the holidays, but I couldn’t deny the cold, hard suckage that this Christmas had
sunk to. My parents were away in Fiji, Langston was al into Benny, Grandpa was in Florida, and most of the cousins were spread far and wide
away from Manhat an. December 24—what should have been the Most Exciting Day Before the Real y Most Exciting Day of the Year—appeared to
be one big blah.
It would have been helpful at this point, I suppose, if I had some girlfriends to hang out with, but I’m comfortable as a nobody at school, except
on the soccer eld, where I am a superstar. Strangely, my saved-many-a-game goalie skil s have never translated into popularity. Respect, yes.
Movie invitations and after-school socializing, no. (My dad is the vice principal at my school, which probably doesn’t help—it’s a political risk to
befriend me, I suspect.) My athletic ability mixed with my complete social apathy are what got me elected captain of the soccer team. I’m the only
person who gets along with everyone, by way of not being friends with anyone.
On Christmas Eve morning, I decided maybe I should work on this de ciency as my New Year’s resolution. A less Shril y, more Fril y plan. Learn
to be more girl friendly so I’d have some backup on important holidays should my family ever abandon me again.
I wouldn’t have minded someone special to spend Christmas with.
But al I had was a red Moleskine notebook.
And even Nameless He of the Notebook Game, while he was intriguing me to an extreme that was causing my body to feel al tingly every time I
was alerted that the notebook had been returned to She Who Has Politely Told Her Name, was also a cause for concern. When not one, not two,
but three relatives (Cousin Mark at the Strand, Uncle Sal at Macy’s, and Great-aunt Ida at Madame Tussauds), independent of each other, al used
the same word—snarl—to describe the notebook’s mystery boy, who thinks he’s too “esoteric” and “arcane” to tel me something as simple as his
name, I had to wonder why I was bothering with this charade. No one had even bothered to mention whether he’s cute.
Is it wrong that I long for that idealistic, pure kind of love like in that animated movie Col ation? Oh, how I yearn to be the piece of paper
gliding the stapler around the conference room, treating it to amazing visions of city skyscraper skylines and annual reports with rosy earnings
forecasts, while avoiding the vil ainous star sh intercom phone on the boardroom table, Dante, voiced by Christopher Walken, the corporate raider
who’s secretly planning a hostile takeover of the company. Secretly, I want to be held prisoner by Dante and rescued by a heroic Swingline. I guess
I want to be … stapled. (Is that crude of me? Or anti-feminist? I don’t mean to be.)
Snarl is probably no dreamy stapler, but I think I might like Snarl anyway. Even if he is too pretentious to tel me his name.
I like that he wants an OED for Christmas. That’s so geeky. I wonder how he would react if he knew that I actual y know a way I could give him
what he wants, and for free. But he’d have to prove worthy. If he can’t even tel me his name, I don’t know.
My name is a connector of words.
What was that supposed to mean?!?!? I’m not Einstein here, Snarl. Or Train Man (connector of Amtrak and Metro North?), whoever you are.
Conductor? Is that your name?
The only other thing I want for Christmas, besides the OED, is for you to tel me what you real y want for Christmas. But not a thing. More like a
feeling. Something that can’t be bought in a store or gift-wrapped in a pret y box. Please write it in the notebook and deposit it with the worker
bees in the Make Your Own Muppet department at FAO Schwarz at noon on Christmas Eve. Good luck. (And yes, evil genius, you should consider
bees in the Make Your Own Muppet department at FAO Schwarz at noon on Christmas Eve. Good luck. (And yes, evil genius, you should consider
FAO Schwarz on the day before Christmas payback for Macy’s.)
Conductor Snarl should consider himself lucky that this year turned out to be the Christmas of Suck. Because normal y on this day, I would be
(1) helping Mom chop and peel food for Christmas dinner the fol owing night while we listened to Christmas music and sang along, (2) helping
Dad wrap presents and organize the mountains of gifts around the tree, (3) wondering if I should put a sedative in Langston’s water bot le so he’d
fal asleep early and then have no problem get ing up at ve the next morning to open presents with me, (4) wondering if Grandpa wil like the
sweater I knit him (poorly, but I get bet er each year, and he stil wears them anyway, unlike Langston), and (5) hoping and praying I was going to
get a BRAND-NEW BIKE, or any other Major Gift of Comparable Extravagance, the fol owing morning.
I got shivers when I re-read that Snarl cal ed me “evil genius.” Even though I am anything but, the compliment was so personal. Like he’d been
thinking about me. Me me, and not just notebook me.
After I fed Grunt, I headed toward the glass screen door that opened to the rooftop garden outside Grandpa’s apartment so I could water the
plants. From my warm perch inside the glass door, I looked out at the cold city, north toward the Empire State Building, which would be lit at
night in green and red for Christmas, then I looked east toward the Chrysler Building in Midtown, closer to where FAO Schwarz was, should I
decide to accept the dare. (Of course I would. Who was I kidding? Shril y play hard to get with an assignment in a red Moleskine deposited for her
at Madame Tussauds? Hardly.)
I noticed my old sleeping bag on the ground outside, the sleeping bag in which Langston and I used to snuggle up on Christmas Eve when we
were super-lit le so that Dad could, in his words, “zipper up the excitement until dawn on Christmas morning.” I saw Langston and Benny curled
up together in the sleeping bag now, with the blue comforter from Langston’s bed on top of them.
I went outside. They were just waking up.
“Happy Christmas Eve!” I chirped. “Did you two sleep out here last night? I didn’t hear you come in. You must have been freezing! Let’s make a
big breakfast this morning, what do you say? Eggs and toast and pancakes and …”
“Orange juice,” Langston coughed. “Please, Lily. Go to the corner store and get us some fresh orange juice.”
Benny, too, coughed. “And some echinacea!”
“Sleeping outside in the dead of winter not such a smart idea, huh?” I said.
“Seemed romantic under the stars last night,” Langston sighed. Then sneezed. Again. And again, this time with a ful -on hacking cough. “Make us
some soup, please please please, Lily Bear?”
It seemed to me that, in al owing himself to get sick, my brother had nal y, and total y, ruined Christmas. Al hope for any semblance of a
decent Christmas was now gone. It further seemed to me, since he made the choice to sleep outside with his boyfriend last night instead of play
Boggle with his Lily Bear as she speci cal y asked him to do and which she speci cal y used to do for him during his time of need, that Langston
sicko would have to deal with this crisis on his own.
“Make your own soup,” I told the boys. “And get your own OJ. I have an errand to run in Midtown.” I turned to go back inside and leave the
boys to their nasty new colds. Suckahs. That ought to teach them not to go out clubbing when they could stay home and Boggle with me.
“You’l be sorry next year when you’re living in Fiji and I’m stil in Manhat an where I can order food and juice from the bodega at the corner
and have it delivered to me anytime I want!” Langston exclaimed.
I swiveled back around. “Excuse me? What did you just say?”
Langston pul ed the comforter over his head. “Nothing. Never mind,” he said from underneath.
Which meant it was seriously something.
“WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT, LANGSTON?” I said, feeling a Shril y panic moment coming on.
Benny popped his head under the covers, too. I heard him say to Langston, “You have to tel her now. You can’t leave her hanging like that once
you slipped.”
“SLIPPED ON WHAT, LANGSTON?” I almost was ready to cry. But I’d decided to try to be less Shril y for New Year’s, and even though that was
stil a week away, I felt like I had to get started sometime. Now was as good a time as any. I stood strong, shaking—but not crying.
Langston’s head re-emerged from underneath the comforter. “Mom and Dad are in Fiji for their second honeymoon, but also to spend time
visiting a boarding school there. A place that’s o ered Dad a headmaster’s job for the next two years.”
“Mom and Dad would never want to live in Fiji!” I fumed. “Vacation paradise, maybe. But people don’t live there.”
“Lots of people live there, Lily. And this school caters to kids like Dad was, who have parents in the diplomatic service, like in Indonesia and
Micronesia—”
“Stop it with al these -esias!” I said. “Why would the diplomatic parents send their kids to a stupid school in Fiji?”
“It’s a pret y amazing school, from what I’ve heard. It’s for parents who don’t want to send their kids to schools in the places where they’re
posted, but also want to not send them so far away as to the States or the UK. For them, it’s a good alternative.”
“I’m not going,” I announced.
Langston said, “It would be a good opportunity for Mom, too. She could take a sabbatical and work on her research and her book.”
“I’m not going,” I repeated. “I like living here in Manhat an. I’l live with Grandpa.”
Langston threw the comforter over his head again.
Which could only mean there was more to the story.
“WHAT?!?!?” I demanded, now feeling truly scared.
“Grandpa is proposing to Glamma. In Florida.”
Glamma, as she likes to be known, is Grandpa’s Florida girlfriend—and the reason he had abandoned us at Christmas. I said, “Her name is
Mabel! I wil never cal her Glamma!”
“Cal her whatever you want. But she’s probably soon going to be Mrs. Grandpa. When that happens, my guess is he wil move down there
permanently.”
“I don’t believe you.”
Langston sat up so I could see his face. Even sick, he was pathetical y sincere. “Believe me.”
“How come no one told me?”
“How come no one told me?”
“They were trying to protect you. Not cause you concern until they knew for sure these things would happen.”
This was how Shril y was born, from people trying so hard to “protect” me.
“PROTECT THIS!” I shouted, lifting my middle nger to Langston.
“Shril y!” he admonished. “That’s so unlike you.”
“What is like me?” I asked.
I stormed away from the garden rooftop, snarled at poor ol’ Grunt, who was licking his paws after breakfast, and continued my storming, to
downstairs, to my apartment, to my room, in my city, Manhat an. “No one’s moving me to Fiji,” I mut ered as I got dressed to go out.
I couldn’t think about this Christmas catastrophe. I just couldn’t. It was too much.
I felt especial y grateful now having the red Moleskine to con de in. Just knowing a Snarl was on the other side to read it—to possibly care
–inspired my pen to move quickly in answer to his question. As I waited for the subway en route to Snarl’s Midtown destination, I had plenty of
free time on the bench at the Astor Place station, since the notoriously slow 6 train seemed to take its usual forever to arrive.
I wrote:
What I want for Christmas is to believe.
I want to believe that, despite al the evidence to the contrary, there is reason to hope. I write this while a homeless man is sleeping on the
ground under a dirty blanket a few feet away from the bench where I’m sit ing at the Astor Place subway stop, on the uptown side, where I can see
across the tracks to the Kmart entrance on the downtown side. Is this relevant? Not real y, except that when I started to write this to you, I noticed
him, then stopped writing long enough to dash over to the Kmart to buy the man a bag of “fun size” Snickers bars, which I slipped underneath his
blanket, and that made me extra sad because his shoes are al worn out and he’s dirty and smel y and I don’t think that bag of Snickers is going to
make much di erence to this guy, ultimately. His problems are way bigger than a bag of Snickers can resolve. I don’t understand how to process
this stu sometimes. Like, here in New York, we see so much grandeur and glitz, especial y this time of year, and yet we see so much su ering,
too. Everyone else on the platform here is just ignoring this guy, like he doesn’t exist, and I don’t know how that’s possible. I want to believe it’s
not crazy of me to hope he wil wake up and a social worker wil take him to a shelter for a warm shower, meal, and bed, and the social worker
wil then help him nd a job and an apartment and … See? It’s just too much to process. Al this hoping for something—or someone—that’s
maybe hopeless.
I’m having a hard time processing what I am supposed to believe, or if I’m even supposed to. There is too much information, and I don’t like a
lot of it.
And yet, for some reason that al scienti c evidence real y should make impossible, I feel like I real y do hope. I hope that global warming wil
go away. I hope that people won’t be homeless. I hope that su ering wil not exist. I want to believe that my hope is not in vain.
I want to believe that even though I hope for things that are so magnanimous (good OED word, huh?), I am not a bad person because what I
real y want to believe in is purely sel sh.
I want to believe there is a somebody out there just for me. I want to believe that I exist to be there for that somebody.
Remember in Franny and Zooey (which I assume you’ve read and loved, considering the location where you found the Moleskine in the Strand)
how Franny was this girl from the 1950s who freaked out over what’s the meaning of life because she thought it was embedded in a prayer
someone told her about? And even though neither her brother Zooey nor her mom understood what Franny was going through, I think I real y did.
Because I would like the meaning of life explained to me in a prayer, and I would probably ip out, too, if I thought the possibility of at aining
this prayer existed, but was out of my reach of understanding. (Especial y if being Franny meant I’d also get to wear lovely vintage clothes,
although I’m dubious on whether I’d want the Yale boyfriend named Lane who’s possibly a bit of a prick but people admire me for going out with
him; I think I’d rather be with someone more … er … arcane.) At the end of the book, when Zooey cal s Franny pretending to be their brother
Buddy, trying to cheer her up, there’s a line where he talks about Franny going to the phone and becoming “younger with each step” as she
walked, because she’s making it to the other side. She’s going to be okay. At least that’s what I took it to mean.
I want that. The get ing younger with each step, because of anticipation, in hope and belief.
Prayer or not, I want to believe that, despite al evidence to the contrary, it is possible for anyone to nd that one special person. That person to
spend Christmas with or grow old with or just take a nice sil y walk in Central Park with. Somebody who wouldn’t judge another for the
prepositions they dangle, or their run-on sentences, and who in turn wouldn’t be judged for the snobbery of their language etymology inclinations.
(Gotcha with the word choices, right? I know, sometimes I surprise even myself.)
Belief. That’s what I want for Christmas. Look it up. Maybe there’s more meaning there than I understand. Maybe you could explain it to me?
I had continued writing in the notebook when the train came, and nished my entry just as it arrived at Fifty-ninth and Lex. As the zil ions of
people, along with me, poured out of the train and up into Bloomingdale’s or the street, I concentrated hard on not thinking about what I was
determined not to think about.
Moving. Change.
Except I wasn’t thinking about that.
* * *
I dodged Bloomingdale’s, walking straight toward FAO Schwarz, where I realized what Snarl had meant by “payback.” A line down the street
outside the store greeted me—a line just to get into the store! I had to wait twenty minutes just to reach the door.
But no mat er what, I love Christmas, real y real y real y I do, don’t care if I am sardined in between two mil ion panicky Christmas shoppers,
nope, don’t care at al , I loved every moment of the experience once I got inside—the jingle bel s playing from the speakers, the heart-racing
excitement at seeing al the colorful toys and games in such a larger-than-life set ing. Aisle after aisle and oor after oor of dense funfun
experience. I mean, Snarl must know me wel already, perhaps on some psychic level, if he’d sent me to FAO Schwarz, only the mecca of
everything that was Great and Beautiful about the holidays. Snarl must love Christmas as much as me, I decided.
I went to the information counter. “Where wil I nd the Make Your Own Muppet Workshop?” I asked.
“Sorry,” the counter person said. “The Muppet Workshop is closed for the holidays. We needed the space for the Col ation action gure displays.
”
” “There are action gures for paper and staplers?” I asked. How had I not known to include these on my list to Santa?
“Yup. Just a hint: You might have bet er luck nding the Fredericos and the Dantes at O ce Max on Third Ave. They sold out here the rst day
they went on sale. But you didn’t hear that from me.”
“But please,” I said. “There has to be a Muppet workshop here today. The Moleskine said so.”
“Excuse me?”
“Never mind,” I sighed.
I worked my way past the Candy Shoppe and Ice Cream Parlor and Barbie Gal ery, upstairs past al the boy toys of guns and Lego warlands,
through the mazes of people and products, until I nal y landed in the Col ation corner. “Please,” I said to the salesclerk. “Is there a Muppet
workshop here?”
“Hardly,” she spat. “That’s in April.” She said this with al the contempt of Wel , duh, who doesn’t know that?
“Sorry!” I said. I hoped someone’s parents sent her to Fiji next Christmas.
I was about to give up and leave the store, my belief in the Moleskine defeated, when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around and saw a girl
who looked col ege age, dressed like Hermione Pot er. I assumed she was a store employee.
“Are you the girl looking for the Muppet workshop?” she asked.
“I am?” I said. Don’t know why I said it like a question, other than I wasn’t sure I wanted Hermione knowing my business. I’ve always resented
Hermione, because I wanted to be her so badly and she never seemed to appreciate as much as I thought she should that she got to be her. She got
to live at Hogwarts and be friends with Harry and kiss Ron, which was supposed to happen to me.
“Come with me,” Hermione demanded. Since it would be dumb not to do what a smarty like Hermione instructed, I let her guide me to the
farthest, darkest corner of the store, where the stu no one cared about anymore, like Sil y Put y and Boggle games, was. She stopped us at a giant
rack of stu ed gira es and tapped on the wal behind the animals. Suddenly the wal opened, because it was in fact a door camou aged by the
gira es (gira e-o– aged?–must OED that term).
I fol owed Hermione inside to a smal closet-like room where a worktable with Muppet heads and parts (eyes, noses, glasses, shirts, hair, etc.)
was set up. A teenage boy who looked like a human Chihuahua—excitably compact yet larger than life—sat at a card table, apparently waiting for
me.“You’re HER!” he said, pointing to me. “You don’t look at al like I expected even if I didn’t real y imagine how you’d look!” His voice even
sounded like a Chihuahua’s, quivery and hyperactive at the same time, but somehow endearing.
My mother always taught me it was impolite to point.
Since she was in Fiji on her own covert mission and wouldn’t be here to scold, I pointed back at the boy. “I’m ME!” I said.
Hermione shushed us. “Please lower your voices and be discreet! I can only let you have the room for fteen minutes.” She inspected me
suspiciously. “You don’t smoke, do you?”
“Of course not!” I said.
“Don’t try anything. Think of this closet as an airline lavatory. Go about your business, but know that smoke detectors and other devices are
monitoring.”
The boy said, “Terrorist alert! Terrorist alert!”
“Shut up, Boomer,” Hermione said. “Don’t scare her.”
“You don’t know me wel enough to cal me Boomer,” Boomer (apparently) said. “My name’s John.”
“My instructions said Boomer, Boomer,” said Hermione.
“Boomer,” I interrupted. “Why am I here?”
“Do you have a notebook to return to someone?” he asked.
“I might. What’s his name?” I asked.
“Forbidden information!” Boomer said.
“Real y?” I sighed.
“Real y!” he said.
I looked to Hermione, hoping to invoke some girl power solidarity. She shook her head at me. “Nuh-uh,” she said. “Not get ing it out of me.”
“Then what’s the point of al this?” I asked.
“It’s the Make Your Own Muppet point!” Boomer said. “Designed just for you. Your special friend. Arranged this for you.”
My day had been seriously suck so far, and despite the seemingly good intentions, I wasn’t sure I felt like playing. I’ve never desired a cigaret e in
my life, but suddenly I wanted to light one up, if only to set o the alarm that might get me out of this situation.
There was too much not to think about. I was tired from not thinking about it al . I wanted to go home and ignore my brother and watch Meet
Me in St. Louis and cry when sweet lit le Margaret O’Brien bashes the snowman to bits (best part). I wanted to not think about Fiji or Florida or
anything—or anyone—else. If “Boomer” wouldn’t reveal Snarl’s name or probably anything else about him, what was the point of my being here?
As if he knew I might need a morale boost, Boomer handed me a box of Sno-Caps. My favorite movie candy. “Your friend,” Boomer said. “He
sent this for you. As a deposit on a later gift. Potential y.”
Okay okay okay, I’d play. (Snarl sent me candy! Oh, how I might love him!)
I sat down at the worktable. I decided to make a Muppet that looked like how I imagined Snarl looked. I chose a blue head and body, some
black fur styled like an early Beatles hairdo, some Buddy Hol y black glasses (not unlike my own), and a purple bowling shirt. I glued on a pink
Grover nose shaped like a fuzzy golf bal . Then I cut some red felt to shape the lips like a snarl, and placed that onto the mouth position.
I remembered when I was ten—not too long ago, now that I thought about it—and loved going to the American Girl store beauty parlor to get
my dol ’s hair xed up, and how one time I asked the store manager if I could possibly design my own American Girl. I’d already gured my girl
out—LaShonda Jones, a twelve-year-old rol er boogie champion from Skokie, Il inois, circa 1978. I knew her history and what clothes she’d wear
and everything. But when I asked the store manager if they would help me create LaShonda right there inside the American Girl palace, the
manager looked at me with such an expression of sacrilege you’d have thought I was a junior revolutionary politely asking if I might blow up
Mat el, Hasbro, Disney, and Milton Bradley headquarters at the same time.
Even if his name was classi ed information, I wanted to hug Snarl. He’d inadvertently made one of my secret dreams come true—al owing me to
Even if his name was classi ed information, I wanted to hug Snarl. He’d inadvertently made one of my secret dreams come true—al owing me to
build my own dol while in a toy mecca headquarters.
“Do you play soccer?” Hermione asked me while she folded away the clothes I didn’t use for my Muppet. Her folding was so expert I wondered
if she was a store employee on loan from the Gap.
“Yeah,” I said.
“Thought so,” she said. “I’m a freshman at col ege now, but last year, when I was a senior, I think my high school played yours. I remember you
because your team’s not that great, but you’re such a power goalie it didn’t mat er much that the rest of your team seemed more interested in
touching up their lip gloss than playing, because you were so determined not to let the other side score. You’re a captain, right? So was I.”
I was about to ask Hermione what school she played for when she dropped this one on me: “You’re di erent than So a. But maybe more
interesting-looking. Is that your school uniform shirt you’re wearing underneath that reindeer cardigan? Weird. So a wears the most gorgeous
clothes. From Spain. Do you speak Catalan?”
“No.”
I said no in Catalan, but since the word sounds the same in English, Hermione didn’t notice.
I was starting to wonder what language they spoke in Fiji.
“Time’s up!” Hermione said.
I held up the Muppet. “I christen thee Snarly,” I told it. I handed Snarly over to the guy named Boomer. “Please give this to He of the
Unknowable Name.” I also handed over the red Moleskine. “This too. And don’t read the notebook, Boomer. It’s personal.”
“I won’t!” Boomer promised.
“I think he wil ,” Hermione murmured.
I had so many questions.
Why can’t I know his name?
What does he look like?
Who the heck is So a and why does she speak Catalan?
What am I even doing here?
I gured I would get answers in the notebook, if Snarl decided to continue our game.
Since Grandpa wasn’t here this year to take me to my favorite Christmas sight—the way way waaaayyyyy over-the-top decorated houses in Dyker
Heights, Brooklyn, which this time every year were lit up to such an extreme that the neighborhood was probably visible from space—I gured the
least Snarl could do would be to show up himself and tel me about the experience. I’d already dared him to in the notebook, leaving him a street
name in Dyker Heights and these words: The Nutcracker House.
I realized I wanted to add something to the instructions I’d writ en in the notebook, so I tried to take it back from Boomer.
“Hey!” he said, trying to block me from my own Moleskine. “That’s mine.”
“It’s not yours,” Hermione said. “You’re just the messenger, Boomer.”
Soccer captains look out for one another.
“I just want to add something,” I told Boomer. I gently tried to extract the notebook from Boomer’s grip, but he wasn’t let ing go. “I’l give it
back. Promise.”
“Promise?” he said.
“I just said ‘Promise’!” I said.
Hermione said, “She said ‘Promise’!”
“Promise?” Boomer repeated.
I was starting to see how John got his name.
Hermione snatched the notebook from Boomer’s grip and handed it over to me. “Hurry, before he freaks. This is a lot of responsibility for him.”
Quickly, after the words The Nutcracker House, I added a line to the instructions:
Do bring Snarly Muppet. Or don’t.
seven
–Dash–
December 24th/December 25th
Boomer refused to tel me a thing.
“Was she tal ?”
He shook his head.
“So she was short?”
“No—I’m not tel ing you.”
“Pret y?”
“Not tel ing.”
“Hel aciously homely?”
“I wouldn’t tel you even if I knew what that meant.”
“Was her blond hair blocking her eyes?”
“No—wait, you’re trying to trick me, aren’t you? I’m not saying anything except that she wanted me to give this to you.”
Along with the notebook, there was … a Muppet?
“It looks like Animal and Miss Piggy had sex,” I said. “And this was the spawn.”
“My eyes!” Boomer cried. “My eyes! I can’t stop seeing it now that you’ve said it!”
I looked at the clock.
“You should probably get home before they start serving dinner,” I said.
“Wil your mom and Giovanni be home soon?” he asked.
I nodded.
“Christmas hug!” he cal ed out. And immediately I was enmeshed in what could only be cal ed a Christmas hug.
I knew this was supposed to raise the temperature of my cockles. But nothing associated with the culture of Christmas could real y do that for
