The Wednesdays

by Julie Bourbeau

  Two tapped his toe loudly and impatiently. “Just let me know if you need me to take over,” he offered, not at all kindly.

  Max ignored him and decided to try a different approach. Remembering what had happened earlier in the park, he stopped trying to focus on a particular outcome. Instead, he closed his eyes and thought about just how much he was starting to dislike Two. He doesn’t think that I can do it. But if I can just make something happen, then he’ll have to answer a question. I’ll show that detestable monster.… Max was thinking so intently that he didn’t even realize anything had happened until he heard a loud racket, accompanied by surprised gasps from the wednesdays in the room.

  ax opened his eyes just in time to see an avalanche of sports equipment burying the wednesday standing in front of him.

  A deluge of soccer balls, basketballs, and half-deflated red rubber balls rained down onto the unfortunate wednesday. Max winced as he watched a hard baseball bounce off the top of the creature’s head. One of the storage shelves had broken, and the contents—the ghosts of sports teams past—were spilling out all over the stunned wednesday.

  Max vaguely realized that the balls seemed to be falling … farther than they should have. He was no physics expert, but it looked like the balls were going out of their way to hit the convicted wednesday, while missing everyone else.

  Just when it seemed that the avalanche of balls had stopped, a carton of golf balls rolled off the broken shelf and ricocheted musically off the wednesday’s forehead—tok tok tok tok tok!

  The room was completely silent for a moment. Then the punished wednesday, still surrounded by balls from every sport, raised his silver gaze to look into Max’s bewildered face. Slowly, his face broke into a smile, and he grinned broadly at his punisher. The rest of the wednesdays began to shriek with giggles, and even Max chuckled a bit, although he felt very confused.

  Two clapped his clawed hands slowly and sarcastically. “Not bad, Max. Not bad at all for your first Council. A bit lenient, perhaps, but it’s a decent start. Now, let’s move on to the next—”

  “Wait,” Max interrupted. “I get to ask a question now.”

  Two frowned peevishly, but he waggled his fingers at Max to proceed.

  All the silver eyes in the room turned toward Max. The wednesdays leaned forward, waiting to hear what his question would be. Max opened his mouth to ask his question, only to realize he had no idea what to ask. He had a million questions, of course, but where should he start? He wanted to know a little bit about everything, but he couldn’t quite come up with the right way to ask anything at all. He bit his tongue nervously, annoyed at himself for not planning better. Different topics raced wildly through his head. The dust in the room, the dim lighting provided by the two bare lightbulbs, the rank smell of the wednesdays, and the truly disturbing way that Three was glowering at him were all starting to make him feel a bit dizzy. A droplet of sweat trickled down the side of his face.

  “Perhaps another time,” Two started to say, and Max knew that he had to ask something or else lose his chance forever.

  So, with a thousand thoughts competing to come out, he opened his mouth again and asked the first thing that popped into his head. “Why aren’t there any girl wednesdays?”

  Stupid, stupid, stupid! He berated himself silently the moment the words left his lips. Of all the questions he really needed to ask, why did this pointless question pop out? He raked his fingers through his sweaty hair in frustration, certain he had wasted his opportunity.

  Max’s question caused quite a stir among the wednesdays, though. The younger creatures twittered, the older ones gasped, and Two’s brow creased in anger. Then Max realized that Two wasn’t angry—he was embarrassed! Swirly pink blotches bloomed on his pale face until he looked like a strawberry sundae. His mouth opened and closed wordlessly, like he either couldn’t or didn’t want to answer the question.

  Two, Max realized, was absolutely, completely mortified.

  At their own peril, the other wednesdays answered for him. In fact, they seemed positively eager to answer.

  “Silly,” squeaked one of the creatures, in a strange, high-pitched voice that sounded like a poor imitation of a girl’s voice.

  “Messy, dirty, smelly,” squeaked another wednesday in the same high voice.

  “Mean, awful, immature,” chanted three of the wednesdays together in a girlish singsong.

  “Loathsome, nasty, vile,” chirped Ninety-nine from his corner.

  “Gooooood-byyyyee,” they all sang in a chipper falsetto chorus. All of them, that is, except Two, whose face had turned crimson.

  “Enough!” Two shrieked furiously. His eyes narrowed to slits as he glared at Max. “Watch yourself,” he hissed.

  Max was baffled. It was just a silly question that had popped into his head at the last second. Of course, he had wondered why all of the wednesdays were boys, but that wasn’t the most critical piece of information. He would have been better off asking where they went the rest of the week, or something about how the mind’s mind worked.

  “Goooooood-byyyyyeee,” the other wednesdays sang again, softer this time. Even the older members of the Tribunal joined in. Two lashed out, flinging several wednesdays violently to the floor.

  An idea crept into Max’s mind. Was it possible that the girl wednesdays had left because they were so disgusted with Two? It dawned on him that this could be important: he had stumbled onto a weakness in Two’s authority. Max mentally filed away Two’s reaction. It might just come in handy someday. Two bared his teeth and roared to regain control over the group. This time, the other wednesdays obeyed him. They fell silent with their eyes once more averted.

  “Ah, yes. The girls.” Two brushed himself off prissily, acting as if nothing extraordinary had just happened. “Lovely creatures, all of them. Following a slight … misunderstanding, shall we say, about, ahem, management styles, the girls opted out of our happy little wednesday family here. We haven’t seen them in over a hundred years. Tragic, really. I, for one, miss them terribly.”

  Max opened his mouth to ask another question, but Two interrupted him, rather rudely.

  “Let’s continue with the punishments, shall we?” Two snapped his fingers impatiently.

  Three hesitated for a fraction of a second, but then shuffled over to the next wednesday sentenced by the Tribunal. He shoved Ninety-eight into the center of the room and then lurched back to his spot in the ring.

  Two gestured at Max to begin the punishment. “Remember, Max, if you can’t do it, then I will.”

  Ninety-eight looked pleadingly at Max, but this time Max knew better than to stare back or even to focus too intently on anything at all. He was ready to try out a new approach. He tried not to let any particular action or plan enter into his thoughts; in fact, he banished all thoughts of Ninety-eight from his mind altogether. Instead, Max simply stared straight at Two, narrowing his own eyes in response to Two’s threatening glare. He didn’t so much as blink, nor did he lower his eyes, even as Two bared his mossy teeth and ran his leathery tongue over one of his sharp fangs.

  In his mind Max replayed what he was now sure was an imitation of the long-gone girl wednesdays: silly, messy, dirty, smelly, mean, awful, immature, loathsome, nasty, vile. It certainly sounded like an accurate description of Two.

  Two started to fidget slightly under the strength of Max’s stare. Just as Two looked to be ready to take a step back, a small voice that sounded very much like his own echoed in Max’s head. “Gotcha,” whispered the voice in Max’s mind, just as everything went crazy in the Council room.

  he hanging lightbulbs feebly illuminating the grimy room flickered and swayed, and objects began to fly around chaotically. A great bolt of electricity flared out from one of the dangling lights and connected briefly with Two, making him yelp in surprise. The room went pitch black, and Max heard the sound of heavy objects dropping all around him. Something papery fluttered by his ear, and something wet dripped on his cheek.

>   Finally, there was silence.

  After what felt like an eternity, the lights flickered back on. The room was in utter shambles. The shelves had all collapsed, boxes were turned upside down, and paint in various shades of institutional beige was splattered everywhere.

  Amidst the topsy-turvy mess, Two was cowering meekly in a corner. His hair was slightly singed, and his eyes were squeezed shut. He slowly opened first one eye, then the other, and then jumped to his feet as he realized that everyone was staring at him. “You’ll pay for this,” he growled at Max, but for once he didn’t sound convincing at all. In fact, Max thought that he sounded almost … scared.

  Wide-eyed, Max surveyed the damage to the room. I did this? He was starting to feel a bit proud of himself until he saw what had happened to Ninety-eight.

  The poor wednesday was standing stiffly, as if afraid to move. His eyes brimmed with tears, and he was moaning quietly in pain. Max had to look closely to see what the matter was: an entire carton of pushpins had launched itself at Ninety-eight, literally turning him into a wednesday pincushion. Max rushed over and began pulling out the pushpins as Ninety-eight whimpered pitifully. One of them had narrowly missed his eye.

  Max felt awful. He hadn’t meant to actually hurt anyone.

  That did it. He resolved to make his next question count, and this time he knew exactly what to ask. He pulled out a few more tacks and then turned toward the front of the room. “I’d like to ask my next question now.”

  Two, who had been huddled in deep conversation with several of the largest, ugliest Tribunal members, turned on him slowly. “Here’s your answer, Max,” he hissed. “But it’s one you won’t like. We wednesdays lie. We lie a lot. We quite like to lie.”

  “But I haven’t even asked my question yet,” Max protested. “You don’t even know what I planned to ask.”

  “But I answered you already, and since an answer always follows a question, we’re obviously done here.” Two leered at him mockingly.

  “That’s absurd!” Max stomped his foot angrily. “It doesn’t make a bit of sense, and besides—we had a deal.”

  Two raised one bristly, crusty eyebrow. “Well, then,” he sniffed. “Since you clearly aren’t satisfied with the terms of our arrangement, I will relieve you of your next sentencing duty.” His eyes narrowed evilly as he pointed a crooked, clawed finger at Ninety-nine, who was desperately trying to hide behind one of the taller wednesdays. “Ninety-nine, for your crimes I hereby sentence you to two minutes of Tuesday.” He gestured toward Max. “You have him to thank.”

  Ninety-nine cried out briefly, then collapsed to the floor in a faint. The other wednesdays looked stunned. Even Three seemed surprised. “Two minutes?” he asked the leader.

  Two didn’t answer. He turned abruptly on his heel and stalked out of the room in his strange, stumpy-legged way, leaving behind the distinct smell of burnt hair.

  The rest of the wednesdays filed out of the room slowly; two of them had to half drag Ninety-nine, who was awake, but still shaky on his feet.

  Only Ninety-eight and Max remained in the dusty storeroom. Max helped Ninety-eight pull the remaining pushpins out of his back, although, with his long wednesday arms, Ninety-eight didn’t really need help reaching anything. The creature moaned woefully.

  “I really am sorry, Ninety-eight,” Max pleaded. “I truly didn’t mean for you to get hurt.”

  “You do know that it was all a trick, don’t you?” The wednesday was sulking now.

  Max looked at him questioningly.

  “Two tricked you, dummy,” Ninety-eight said petulantly. “I tried to warn you. Every time you use your mind’s mind, it gets stronger. The more you use it, the more wednesday you become. Eventually it just takes over, and you become like them—like us. It’s been going on for weeks now, but you’re just too dense to see what’s been happening to you.”

  Max sank to the floor, stunned. If this was true, then he’d been played quite the fool. It had never even crossed his mind that Two had tricked him into using his new power. “It’s not a ‘power,’ ” he corrected himself out loud. “It’s a curse.”

  Max looked over his shoulder to make sure that they were still alone in the room, and then leaned over to whisper in Ninety-eight’s ear. “Where do you go when it’s not Wednesday?”

  “There’s Wednesday, and then there’s not-Wednesday. On not-Wednesdays, there are not wednesdays,” Ninety-eight answered cryptically, and Max could tell that the creature was still angry at him.

  “But Ninety-nine was just sentenced to two minutes of Tuesday. Tuesday is obviously not Wednesday, so what does that mean?” Max was determined to get an answer. He suspected that finding out where they hid, or slept, or whatever it was they did six days a week, was the key to curing his case of the wednesdays.

  “Oh, poor Ninety-nine,” breathed Ninety-eight sadly. “Two minutes of Tuesday means that he has to be a wednesday on a not-Wednesday.”

  “I get that,” Max said, frustrated, “but what does it mean?”

  “It doesn’t mean anything; it just hurts.” Ninety-eight shivered. “It’s like having your skin ripped off and your eyeballs poked and your throat pulled out your nose and—”

  “Okay, okay, I get it,” Max interrupted him. “It hurts.”

  “Not-Wednesday is the very worst possible kind of punishment.” The wednesday looked frightened just talking about it.

  Max thought about this for a moment. “But,” he began slowly, “Two said the girl wednesdays decided to leave the wednesday family. Wouldn’t that mean they had chosen something else? Something not-Wednesday?”

  “They didn’t choose anything,” Ninety-eight corrected him. “Two banished them. He closed the door.”

  Max wasn’t getting anywhere at all. He desperately needed information, but every time he asked a question, he ended up even more confused by the answer.

  “Sing him the song.”

  The quiet voice seemed to come from out of nowhere.

  Ninety-eight acted as if he hadn’t heard anything, but Max could see that he had.

  “The song. Let’s sing it for him.” It was Ninety-nine. Max hadn’t heard him enter the room, so he didn’t know how much he had overheard.

  Ninety-eight hesitated, still upset with Max, but he finally relented. Together, he and Ninety-nine sang a joyless tune:

  A wednesday’s job is never done

  As long as Wednesdays are.

  We heed the clock when it tolls twelve

  And come from near and far.

  We’re never late–we cannot be–

  For then we’d miss the door.

  Neither do we dare to leave

  Till Wednesday is no more.

  Ninety-nine had crept out of his corner to sing the song, and he met Max’s eyes boldly. Max was struck—not for the first time, either—with the strong feeling that there was still some small part of the creature that wasn’t completely wednesday yet. And now, this not-wednesday part of Ninety-nine was trying to send him an important message. He paid careful attention to the song, searching for hidden meaning.

  Just as they finished singing, Three poked his ugly, scarred face into the room and growled. The two smaller wednesdays scampered out past him, and singing time was over.

  Max, who had had quite enough of the wednesdays that day, decided that it was a good time to head home. Three stood in his way menacingly, clearly trying to intimidate him. As Max pushed past, another bolt of electricity sparked briefly from the dangling lightbulb, zapping Three with a jolt that made the creature dance on his toes for a fraction of a second.

  Max chuckled and kept walking. He hadn’t really meant to do anything mean to Three, but neither did he feel sorry. Not one bit.

  ax glanced at his watch as he headed home. It was still several hours before midnight. He didn’t know what to do until it was safe to go inside, and he was also feeling more than a little sorry for himself.

  As he shuffled across the deserted town square he
heard a voice calling in the distance. He froze in his tracks, not wanting to deal with yet another wednesday confrontation. Fortunately, it was only Mr. Grimsrud calling for his dog.

  “Thursday! Thursday? It’s time for supper, little fellow.” Max heard Mr. Grimsrud before he spotted him.

  The old man was limping about frantically, knocking on his head every second or third step. When he saw Max, he lurched over to him quickly. “I almost didn’t recognize you without the blue skin,” he said. “Have you seen my little dog?”

  Max had not, but he promised to keep a lookout for him. “Mr. Grimsrud?” he asked hesitantly. “Why do you think the wednesdays leave you alone?”

  The old man was distracted; his eyes continued to scan for his lost dog as he spoke to Max. “I don’t know, lad. Like I told you, I’ve never even seen one.”

  “Because I was wondering if maybe it might have something to do with the metal plate in your head.”

  “Oh, it could be, but trust me, you don’t want one of these in your noggin,” Mr. Grimsrud told him, “no matter how pretty they sound when you knock on them. A boy your age wouldn’t much like what you have to go through to get one. War’s not much fun at any age, come to think of it.” His expression turned melancholy.

  Max sighed. He just wanted to find something—anything—that could help him to stop turning into a wednesday.

  Mr. Grimsrud was about to walk away when he turned back to Max. “I do still have my old army helmet, though—it’s made of steel. I don’t know what good it’ll do, but you’re welcome to it.”

  Max nodded gratefully. He’d try anything.

  Mr. Grimsrud instructed Max where to find the old helmet. “I’d accompany you, but I need to keep looking for Thursday. He’s never run off for this long before. If I didn’t know better, I’d say those wednesday critters were baiting him.”

  They parted ways and Max headed over to Mr. Grimsrud’s cottage on the outskirts of town. Mr. Grimsrud had warned him that the helmet would be very dirty and probably rusty, too, since he had been using it as a flowerpot for years.