Tim snorted. He could just hear Molly. “That’s for me to decide, isn’t it, Hunter? Just give me the facts and I’ll make up my own mind.” She’d be a lot angrier if she found out he’d been keeping something this big from her, never mind the danger involved.
“Okay, so today’s the day,” Tim muttered. “You’ve been working up the courage since this whole thing started. Now do it!”
He rolled past her door one more time. He wanted to be sure he could explain it so that she wouldn’t question his sanity. He wanted her to know from the very beginning that what he was saying was true. But how could he do that?
“Evidence!” Tim declared, rolling to a stop. “I should figure out some kind of magic to do to prove to Molly that it’s all true. That way she’ll know I haven’t gone ’round the bend.” Just one problem, he reminded himself. You don’t really have a clue about what you’re doing. If I could just get in some practice time, he thought. But where I can I do that kind of homework?
Then it came to him. The abandoned lot. It had been his favorite place to think when he was a little kid. No one ever went there. He’d be alone, and he was pretty sure there wouldn’t be anything there that he could blow up or break. It was the perfect place to work on magic. He needed to know how to direct this overwhelming power so that he controlled it rather than the other way around. And then he could come up with something really snazzy to show Molly.
He checked his watch. I still have some time before meeting Molly, he decided, then skated the few blocks over to the vacant lot. It was overgrown with weeds, but the big spreading oak tree still loomed as large as a castle. Pieces of junk—rusting car parts, a bicycle wheel, a shoe—peeked up out of the tall grass and litter.
It looked a lot worse than he’d remembered. Everything changes, he noted, especially childhood hideaways.
“All right, Tim,” he muttered to himself. “So it was dumb coming here.” He sat down on his board and rested his elbows on his knees. When he was a kid, he had really believed this was the best and safest place to be. He had even had a group of little imaginary friends he’d hang out with here.
“It really bites,” he grumbled. “You stop believing in safe places about the time you start to need them.”
“Hey there, Hunter,” a boy called. “I’d stay clear of that lot if I were you, chap.”
Tim turned around and saw Scott Whitman, a fellow skater, kick his board up neatly to catch it. He was about a year older than Tim and went to a different school, but boarding made them friendly. He had a blond buzz cut, and wore his baggy trousers low. Tucking his skateboard under his arm, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his windbreaker.
“Hey.” Tim stood and greeted Scott. “What’s wrong with the lot?”
“I had Darlene out here the other night, hoping for some privacy,” Scott explained. “Between her parents, the guard dogs, and my stupid brothers we never get any chance alone, you know?”
Tim didn’t, but he nodded anyway.
Scott took a few steps into the tall grass of the lot. He laid his board on the pavement and held it still with one foot as he surveyed the area. He seemed to be troubled by the place.
“So what happened?” Tim asked.
“We’re in there, Darlene and me, and we’re heading for the big tree, but we stop. I’m hearing stuff in the grass. Rustling. Like someone or something’s following us. Then Darlene says it ain’t just grass she’s hearing.”
“What was it?” Tim’s eyebrows rose.
“She thinks it’s something whispering. Only we can’t see it.” Scott knelt down and rummaged in the grass. “Where’d the bloody thing go?” he muttered. “I know I chucked it right about here. Oh, here it is.” He held something out to Tim. “Then she steps on this, and we hear a nasty laugh.”
Scott stood and plopped the object into Tim’s hand. “We got out of there right quick, I tell you.”
Tim stared down at the object in horror.
Chapter Two
IT COULDN’T BE, TIM told himself. He was holding a little head in his hands. It looked as if it might have once belonged to some kind of elf or sprite. As far as he could make out, its face, its ears, and its hair all would have blended easily into the woods, as if it were designed to be camouflaged. But the little head had been cruelly severed from its body, and its mouth still seemed to be howling in pain. It had also been burned, and flecks of soot and ash came off in Tim’s hand.
“Whoa,” Tim murmured.
“Yeah,” Scott agreed. “Sick, isn’t it? Somebody making a cute little thing like that just to chop it up and burn it. Like it was garbage or something.”
Scott picked up his skateboard. “Like I said, I’m not sticking around this place. I don’t want to meet the dude who thought that was fun. You coming?”
Tim never took his eyes off the little head. “No, thanks,” he replied. “I’ve got stuff to do.”
Scott shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
“Thanks for the warning,” Tim called after Scott. The older boy quickly skate-boarded around the corner and vanished.
Tim stared at the head. It was more than eerie—it was familiar. He recognized the face. “Is it really you?” he asked it. For in his hand he held none other than Tibby, one of his imaginary playmates from when Tim was a little kid. Or what was left of him.
Why would anyone kill an imaginary playmate? Tim wondered. Hold on—how do imaginary playmates become real in the first place? He had never tried to make a doll of Tibby, as he had with some of his other fanciful ideas. So how could he be holding this physical manifestation in his hands?
He scanned the lot and realized that it had changed somehow while he’d been standing there. The tree had grown larger, the grass taller. The area had expanded, so that he couldn’t see to the end of it. Yet just a minute ago the brick back wall of the Furniture King had been quite visible.
“Uh-oh,” Tim murmured. “Here we go again.” There was magic here. Was it the place? Was it him? Was it someone else here? He’d have to find out.
He took a few steps deeper into the lot and realized it now looked the way it had back when he was about five years old, when he had spent the most time here. The grass once again came up to his chest the way it used to.
He made his way deeper into the lot, pushing the tall weeds aside, trying not to trip over odd bits of trash.
“Really, Tim, if you must go wandering into fairy tales, why not try for something a bit nicer?” he scolded himself. He stepped over a pile of soggy and shredding newspapers. “Or at least something where you know the outcome in advance and are guaranteed a happy ending. Something with talking bears and porridge, say.” He sighed. “Almost anything would beat slogging through a place you made up when you were four, trying to find out what killed your imaginary pal.”
He arrived at the base of the enormous tree, and stared at its complex root system, its peeling bark. He squinted at the little head again.
“Let’s see,” he addressed the head. “You were the Narl who threw acorns at people I didn’t like.” Tim remembered the times he sat hiding in the tree, wishing he were brave enough to hurl acorns at the kids who picked on him. Sometimes, an acorn actually fell on its own and beaned one of the bullies, and Tim always attributed it to the Narl named Tibby. He’d imagine Tibby beside him on the tree branch, blending in with the bark. He’d picture Tibby shimmying to the very end of the branch and tossing down the acorns.
Tim shook his head, feeling a slight blush rise in his cheeks as he remembered all his childhood pretendings. “How embarrassing. What’s the point of growing up if you can’t leave behind all that kid stuff?”
He gently laid the little head to rest at the base of the tree. “There used to be a lot of my imaginary Narls down here,” he remembered. “One used to hide my glasses for me when I didn’t want to wear them. One used to turn me invisible when I knew Mum was serving deviled Spam for lunch.” He got on his hands and knees and peered into the hole in the base
of the tree. “And one—Hey!”
Suddenly Tim was knocked over by tiny hands. He sat back up and saw two little creatures glaring at him. They looked like they were made from bits of tree and grass—little pointy twigs stuck out of their heads, their limbs were spiky and splintery, and their skin…could it be bark? They were only about six inches high, but they looked as if they could prick a person like a porcupine. These were more of the Narls he had imagined, like Tibby.
Wondering what the little creatures would do, Tim sat up slowly and cautiously. After all, a bloke never knew what magical creatures were capable of, no matter how small and cute they looked.
“Stand clear, Tanger,” one of them ordered. He held a branch over one shoulder like a baseball bat. “Ooh, I’ll give him such a whack!”
“Er, pardon me, Crimple?” the one called Tanger said. He pushed his little spectacles farther up the bridge of his long pointy nose. He was a few inches shorter than plump Crimple. Both had moss and grass covering their bodies like fur. “Hang on a second.”
Crimple ignored him. He took a few tiny steps toward Tim. “I’ll teach him to go peering and prying in decent folk’s trees. The worm.”
“Crimple!” Tanger said more forcefully. This time Crimple looked at Tanger. The wee woody creature sidled up to Crimple and whispered hoarsely behind a splintery hand. “That’s the Opener himself you’re calling a worm. Or I’m a saucepan!” He stared down at the ground, rocking back and forth on his tiny feet.
“The Opener?” Crimple lowered his twig weapon. His little eyes went wide. “Oh, my brittle spittle spattle. Mercy me!”
He gaped at Tim, while Tanger smiled sheepishly. Tim took a long look at the woody creatures, hiding a smile. For such cute little critters, they were awfully feisty and fierce. He admired that.
“I know you,” Tim exclaimed. He pointed at Tanger. “You used to hide my glasses.”
Tanger placed a hand on his chest and bowed his head. “And a great honor it was, your benevolence, I’m sure.”
“Oh, pish posh!” Crimple sputtered. “You haven’t been here long enough to polish a perishing root, Tanger, much less pinch spectacles. None of us have!”
Their disagreement on the basic facts of their existence surprised Tim. “How long have you been here?” he asked.
“Ages and ages, your worship, or I’m a colander!” replied Tanger.
“Piffle!” Crimple exclaimed. “Five moons and not a sliver more!”
Five moons? Tim realized that meant five months. That was about the time he’d had his visit from the Trenchcoat Brigade.
“Five moons?” Tanger repeated. “Five moons? That is highly unlikely, given the pleasant memories I have of the Opener.”
“Memories?” Crimple scoffed. “What have you to remember, you who are barely here?”
“I am as here as you are!” Tanger objected. “Or I’m a cheese grater!”
Crimple held up his hands in a placating gesture. “All right, old friend, perhaps I’m slightly off the mark. I haven’t really been myself of late.”
Tim listened to them argue, trying to figure out what was going on. If Tanger truly was the Narl he remembered, he’d have been here for years. But Crimple didn’t agree with that time frame. Then again, time did funny things when magic was involved. And why did they call him the Opener?
Tanger held up a pointy wooden finger. “If I may offer a solution to solve this perplexing riddle,” Tanger said. “Perhaps we were here, and then we returned.”
“If that’s the case, splinter head,” Crimple said, “where did we go?”
Tanger’s mouth opened, then shut. They both turned to Tim and waited for him to come up with an answer.
Tim shrugged. “I think Tanger’s on the right track,” he said. Tanger gave Crimple a smug smile. “I think you were my friends when I was small and then you went into kind of a hibernation and recently woke back up.” Just around the same time my magic was woken up by the Trenchcoat Brigade. Go figure.
“All right, you two,” Tim said, clambering back up to his feet. “I came in here because I found one of you out there, and he had been—well, destroyed. I want to know what happened to him. And something else.” He put his hands on his hips and scanned the overgrown lot. “This place isn’t quite the way I remember it. This junk was never here, for one thing.” He kicked an old tire.
“No, Master Opener. I suppose it wasn’t,” said Tanger. “I expect the Wobbly was a bit more discreet about feathering its nest back then.”
“Hey, how’d you know about the Wobbly?” Tim asked. “It was a funny little bird-headed thing, right? And I used to feed it, uhmm…” he trailed off, trying to remember.
“You fed it bread crusts,” Crimple finished for him. “And pieces of toys that bored you. Broken shoestrings and old clothes.”
“Things you didn’t have any use for,” Tanger added. “Things you’d outgrown. Like you’ve outgrown us.”
A dark shadow overhead made Tim shiver. His nose wrinkled as a foul odor filled the air and a rustling sound came closer and closer. Tim glanced up at the sky, and his mouth dropped open.
A vulturelike creature was approaching, huge flapping wings creating a stench-filled breeze. Instead of bone, flesh, and feathers, this bird of prey was made of garbage—odds and ends and junk. It let out an ugly caw! and with every flap of its grotesque wings, pieces dropped off, as if it were falling apart. Held together by muck and dust, dirt and debris, it swooped down, reached out its talons, and grabbed Tanger.
In horror, Tim realized that this…this…thing was the Wobbly, a creature he himself had invented to get rid of stuff.
The Wobbly hovered above the ground, Tanger dangling in its powerful grip. “What’s the use of growing up,” it rasped in a terrible impersonation of Tim, “if you can’t leave behind all this kid stuff.”
“Tanger! No!” Crimple jumped up and down, trying to grab Tanger’s tiny foot, but he couldn’t reach it.
The Wobbly threw back its head and let out another skin-tingling caw. It flapped its wings and started to move away.
“Stop!” Tim shouted.
The garbage vulture paused and perched on a tree limb. “You cry stop, Opener? To me? You opened the way between realms; you opened the door between thought and action, imagination and reality. You made me to serve your purpose. And you tell me now to stop?”
“Wobbly, listen. What you said just now—”
“Is what you said a moment ago.”
“I may have thought that, but I didn’t mean it. Not the way you do. Put Tanger down.”
“These useless ones.” The Wobbly lifted its talon and waved Tanger in front of Tim. “These useless ones and I, we came back again with the new magic that comes from you.”
“Me?” Tim took a step backward. So it was true. They called him the Opener because that’s what his magic did: It opened up possibilities. When he had chosen the path of magic, these creatures had popped back into existence, suddenly wholly real.
The Wobbly swung Tanger back and forth. The little wood man’s eyes were round with terror behind his spectacles. He was too afraid even to scream.
“The useless ones shape themselves from your old way of thinking,” the Wobbly snarled. “But I shape me from the new. I do not stop, Opener. I do not put down. I am keeper of the new way. I work for you as you are now.” With its free talon, it pulled a ragged, rusty hacksaw from somewhere amid the garbage that was its body. “You are done with these. They are useless. To be discarded. Destroyed.”
Crimple threw twigs at the Wobbly, then grass, and even clumps of dirt. But his hands were so tiny that all he could throw were little bits that the Wobbly never even noticed.
Do something, Tim admonished himself. Say something. Six-inch Crimple is fighting back. So should you.
“It is my mission to rid the world of the useless,” the Wobbly continued. “For this you made me. You have outgrown them, so these will be destroyed. As I destroyed the one you called Tibby
.”
“You’re doing this all wrong,” Tim said, hoping he sounded sure of himself. “We don’t burn our rubbish or saw it into little bits anymore.”
That caught the Wobbly’s attention. “No?”
Keep it up, Tim told himself. You can handle the old vulture. You made it out of sticks and rags when you were five years old, remember? How bright can it be?
“Sawing up throw-aways, burning them—that’s considered very old-fashioned,” Tim scoffed. “Recycling is the new thing.”
The Wobbly pulled its head back and clicked its beak a few times. “What means this, Opener? Re-cy-cling?”
“It means finding new uses for the useless,” Tim explained. “It means keeping the useless in one piece and letting it find a new purpose, a new way to be useful again. So nothing ever has to be chopped up or burned.”
“Yes! Recycling is all the rage these days,” Crimple said, nodding quickly several times.
“Beautiful concept, hey?” said Tanger. His voice shook, but he smiled as if he didn’t have a care in the world. “Quite ingenious, really. Or I’m a teapot.”
“Hrawwwwww,” the Wobbly cawed as if it were thinking. “Crawwwwww.”
“Now if you’ll just put me down,” Tanger said eagerly, “I’ll pitch myself under the, ah, good old recycling tree. And I can get right to work finding a new use for myself.”
The Wobbly dropped Tanger to the ground. “Go, useless. And I go. To wait for other rubbish that has no purpose.”
The Wobbly lifted off the branch, shaking the leaves. It trailed tin cans and old shoes and bits of half-eaten hamburger as it flew away.
“Much obliged, your Wobbly-ship,” Tanger called after the garbage vulture.
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