My Life as a Human Hairball

by Bill Myers

  Off to my right, I spotted a pinkish wall with hundreds of things, almost like arms or giant fingers, sticking out of it. They were waving back and forth. And directly behind them, on the other side of the wall, were what looked like huge rivers. But these rivers weren’t blue. They were red.

  “Opera!” I shouted into my intercom. “Where are we now?”

  “You’ve left the submarine!” he cried. “There are a couple of new blips on the screen. It must be you guys.”

  “But where are we?” I shouted.

  “Hang on . . .”

  I waited as the current tumbled and tossed us, pulling us closer and closer to the waving arms. Opera came back on. “Wally?”

  “Present.”

  “It looks like you two are now in the small intestines.”

  “Small intestines!” Wall Street shouted. “What happens there?”

  “Let me see. . . . Ah, here we go. It says: ‘The small intestines are where the nutrients are trapped by millions of tiny, fingerlike structures called villi.’”

  “I see them!” Wall Street cried as she looked toward the arms. “I see the villi!”

  Opera continued reading: “The villi trap the food molecules until they are absorbed through the intestinal walls and into the bloodstream.”

  “That’s wonderful,” I shouted. “But what about us? What’s going to happen to us?”

  “Wally?” Wall Street called.

  I paid no attention. “I appreciate the biology lesson, Opera, but—”

  “Wally?”

  “. . . what’s it say about—”

  “WALLY!”

  I turned to her. “What?”

  “I think we are those molecules.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  She turned back to the wall of arms. She was nearly in them. “It means you and I are small enough to be absorbed through this wall and into the blood—”

  But she never finished the sentence. Suddenly, she was caught by one of the arms and—

  “WALLY! . . .”

  it immediately pulled her in.

  “HELP ME! WALLY, IT’S GOT ME!”

  I watched in horror. Not only did the arms pull her tight against the wall, but she immediately began to be sucked through it. She was being sucked right through the wall and into the other side! Right into one of those raging red rivers!

  “WALLYYY!”

  I knew it was time to be the hero. I knew it was time to forget all my past mistakes, step up to the plate, and save my friend’s life. And I would have, too, if it wasn’t for—

  “Uh-oh . . .” Suddenly another arm snagged my own body and started pulling me in. I struggled to get free, but it did no good. Soon I was pinned against the wall. Sooner still, I was getting sucked through that wall! It was a terrible sensation— words could never describe . . . except I suddenly had greater sympathy for milkshakes being drunk through straws.

  But this was no time for sympathy. This was a time for action. A time to fight, a time to muster up all my manliness and . . . scream my head off:

  “AUGH!!”

  I broke through to the other side of the wall. Suddenly, I was in the middle of a raging red river. Suddenly, I was racing through it, completely out of control!

  Chapter 4

  A Little Swim

  “Wally!” Opera cried. “Wally, what’s happening?”

  “I’m in some sort of river!” I shouted.

  “It’s all around me, like I’m in a giant pipe or something.” “It’s a capillary,” Wall Street yelled. “If this is the bloodstream, then this is one of those capillary things we read about in science.”

  I spotted her. She was swimming just in front of me. “A what-illary?” I shouted.

  “She said it’s a capillary,” Opera answered. It was obvious he was looking at the video readout again. “It says here that they’re tiny blood vessels that pick up and deliver oxygen from the lungs and nutrients from the intestines.”

  “That’s what we’re being treated like,” Wall Street exclaimed. “Right now, this body thinks we’re nutrients.”

  “Wonderful,” I sighed. “So now what happens?” Opera continued reading. “The oxygen and nutrients will be transported in larger and larger vessels until they arrive at whichever body cells need them.”

  “And then?”

  “And then they’ll redivide into another bunch of tiny capillaries to give those cells the oxygen and food they need.”

  “Hold it,” I shouted. “I’m not going to be some cell’s after school snack.”

  “I don’t think you have any choice in the matter,” Opera said.

  “Actually,” Wall Street called back, “I don’t think we have too much to worry about.”

  “Why not?”

  “Remember that clock in the submarine? The one that showed how much time we have left being miniaturized?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I entered it into my wristwatch. And if it’s correct, we only have a few minutes left before the process is reversed.”

  “You mean before we start growing bigger?”

  She gave a nod. “And become too large for any cell to eat.”

  “If you’re talking about this digital clock labeled: ‘Total Miniaturization Time,’” Opera said over our headsets, “I’ve got one right here on my control board.”

  “What’s it read?” Wall Street asked, looking at her watch. “Five minutes and thirty-three seconds?” “Exactly,” Opera answered.

  She gave a sigh of relief. “We’ll be big before you know it.”

  I nodded. “I hope you’re right.” Suddenly I spotted a huge, flying disc coming up from behind me. It was kinda red, and you could almost see through it. “Wall Street!” I shouted, “Wall Street, what’s that!?”

  She spun around. Even though she was wearing a face mask I could see her eyes widen in fear. “Opera?” I cried. “What else are in these blood vessels besides us nutrient-types?”

  “Hang on, I’ll check. Oh, here we go. It says over half of the blood is made up of something called plasma.”

  I watched as the flattened saucer continued to approach. “What’s plasma?”

  “About 90 percent of it’s just water.”

  “This ain’t water, pal,” I said as the red disk began passing over my head.

  “Maybe you’re seeing a platelet,” he offered.

  “A what-let?”

  “They’re small round cells that stick to cuts and form scabs to stop us from bleeding to death.”

  “This thing isn’t small. It looks like a giant, jelly-filled doughnut that’s flattened in the middle.”

  “A jelly-filled doughnut?” Opera shouted. The mention of food definitely got his attention.

  “Yeah,” I said, “and it’s red.”

  “Hang on . . . still checking. It’s not a whitish-clear globby thing, is it? ’Cause that would be a white blood cell. They attack germs and stuff.”

  I glanced around and saw a couple of them floating off in the distance, too. “No,” I repeated, “this thing is red and looks like a flying saucer.”

  “Oh, here we go,” he said. “I bet it’s a red blood cell. That’s what carries the oxygen from the lungs to the other cells of the body.”

  “You’re becoming a regular biology professor,” I quipped.

  “Actually, I wouldn’t mind it,” Opera said. “This stuff is pretty cool.”

  I watched as the giant cell finished passing over my head. Talk about awesome. Opera definitely had a point. Even though I was majorly frightened, I was also pretty impressed. I mean, it was incredible to see what we’re made of—how we’re put together. Let’s face it, God must have stayed up a few extra nights dreaming up some of this stuff. “Wally?”

  I turned to Wall Street. She was beside me now. Our capillary or vessel or whatever was getting a lot bigger, and we were picking up speed.

  “I wonder whose body we’re in?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “Got m
e. But I bet it’s going to smart when we start growing.”

  “So what do we do?” she asked. “Just float around and wait ’til that happens?”

  “I guess.” But even as I said that, I knew things wouldn’t be quite that easy. After all, we are talking about one of my adventures, right? So, to take my mind off of any upcoming, non-stop terror waiting to drop into my future, I began to think about the superhero story again. True, I didn’t have any keyboard handy, but I figured I could pretty much keep track of the stuff in my head and type it into Ol’ Betsy later. So . . .

  When we last left Mirror Man he’d just discovered RetroRunt had stopped the earth and started it spinning in the opposite direction. Talk about major whiplash. But, other than visiting chiropractors the rest of his life, there’s one other problem our helplessly handsome hero, knows he is the only one who can save the day. Worse than that, he knows he’ll actually have to leave his mirrors to do it.

  It’s a scary thought, but there’s no other solution.

  In a burst of courageously courageous courage our gorgeous good guy pulls himself away from the bathroom mirror and races down the hallway. But he only takes a few steps before he begins to sweat and gasp for breath. Already he is worrying if his hair is straight or if his eyebrows have been brushed. But a superhero’s gotta do what a superhero’s gotta do.

  He staggers to the door and throws it open. Holy heroics! It’s worse than he thought. Outside, cars are running backward, people are walking in reverse, and some kid is spitting his ice cream back onto his cone. (Don’t even ask about that poor guy who’s trying to blow his nose!)

  a mother cries as she pulls her baby carriage backward past him.

  Mirror Man nods, fully understanding their problem. “I fully understand your problem!” (See, I told you.) “But you’ve got to tell me one thing!”

  “How does my hair look?”

  With that bit of encouragement, Mirror Man races out onto the street. But where to begin? How to find the world’s tiniest villain? It’s not that RetroRunt is short (there’s nothing wrong with being short as long as your feet reach all the way to the ground). But this guy is also skinny——so skinny that he makes no.2 pencils feel a need to sign up for weight control classes.

  No one’s sure how RetroRunt got so scrawny. Some say that as a child he drew too many stick figures on his Etch-a-Sketch and just naturally figured he should look that way. Others say he wanted to be a model like all those other skin-and-bone types in the teen magazines. Then there’s the popular theory that he drank all those muscle-building milkshakes in a can, but that he opened the cans upside down, which, of course, meant that they had the opposite effect.

  Whatever the reason, RetroRunt is small in an I’m-afraid-to-be-in-the-bathtub-when-it’s-draining kind of way.

  But why would the tiny tot want to keep reliving this same day over and over again, unless...Suddenly, Mirror Man snaps his fingers (but not too hard, less he damage a nail). Of course, today was RetroRunt’s birthday! But why would the micro-mite want to keep reliving his birthday?

  (Oh, I know what you’re thinking——the more birthdays the guy has, the more presents he gets. But the same people would be coming to the same party with the same presents. Nice try, dear reader, but it’s better to leave the storytelling to us professional types.)

  Desperately our hero searches his mind (not so tough when it’s so tiny). Unfortunately, he still has no clue. (Come to think of it, neither do I. Hmm...maybe I need your help after all.)

  But Mirror Man is desperate. It’s been almost two minutes since he’s seen a reflection of himself, and he’s starting to get the shakes. Oh sure, he’s caught his reflection while passing store windows as well as vague outlines of himself in mud puddles. Then there’s that unfortunate incident where he began chasing the pickup with the shiny chrome bumper——until it suddenly hit its brakes. (Hey, who needs all those teeth anyway?) Still, those reflections are poor substitutes (not to mention painful ones) for the real thing.

  Then, just as he’s about to quit, just as he’s about to drag himself into the nearest clothing store and get a good three-way reflection of himself in the mirror, he spots a group of kids exiting the movie theater. And there in the lead is (insert that bad guy music again)...RetroRunt.

  Summoning his last ounce of strength our hero staggers toward the menacing vil-lian. “RetroRunt,” he cries. “RetroRunt!”

  Spotting him, RetroRunt immediately reaches down to his Remote Retrobelt, presses a few buttons——

  BEEP...BOP...BURP...BELCH!

  Suddenly the Earth’s retrorockets are fired. And, instantly, the entire planet comes to a screeching halt.

  Unfortunately, you can’t say the same about the people. Everyone screams as they tumble forward.

  But our famous, flea-high foe is far from finished. He hits another set of buttons——

  BELCH...BURP...BOP...BEEP!

  and everything begins moving in the right direction again. But not for long.

  Our hero knows that soon RetroRunt will send things in reverse again. Soon, everyone will have to go back and relive the day again, and again, and again. Kids will have to go to the same day of school, grownups will have to go to the same day of work, and TV viewers will have to watch the same episode of Happy Days for the zillionth time (hmm, I guess some things won’t be that different after all).

  And then, just when it couldn’t look any worse (except for that guy who never gets to finish blowing his nose), everything suddenly——

  THUD-THUD

  The noise was so loud that it jarred me from my story. But it was more than just a noise. It was a vibration. A thundering vibration so powerful I could feel it through my whole body. In fact, everything around me was shaking with it.

  THUD-THUD

  I threw a look over to Wall Street. She looked as worried as I felt.

  “What is it?” she shouted.

  I shook my head. “Opera?” I yelled. “Opera, what’s happening?!”

  “Uh, guys?” he coughed nervously over our headsets. “I think I’ve got a little bad news.”

  “What’s going on?” Wall Street demanded.

  THUD-THUD

  “It looks like the two of you—” He coughed again. “What is it?!” we both shouted.

  “You’re in a major blood vessel, and you’re heading straight for the heart!!”

  Chapter 5

  The Heart of the Matter

  The pounding grew deafening. And for good reason.

  “Look!” Wall Street pointed. I spun around and saw a giant red wall closing in front of us, blocking our path.

  “What’s that?” I shouted.

  “You guys are there!” Opera yelled. “You’re inside the heart!”

  “What about this wall?” I shouted. “What’s this supposed to—” But that’s all I got out before it finally slammed shut with a powerful—

  THUD!

  Suddenly our raging river had no place to rage. We came to an immediate stop. Now everything was very still and very quiet.

  “Opera?” Wall Street whispered through the headset. “What’s going on?”

  “Looks like you’re in one of the heart chambers,” he said. “Something called the right atrium. And that must have been the tricuspid valve that closed in front of you.”

  “Great,” I sighed. “So now what do we—”

  “Hang on,” he interrupted, “it’s not over yet.”

  As he spoke the valve began to open again. That was the good news. Unfortunately, there was a little bad news—as the valve opened, the giant chamber around us began to collapse!

  “OPERA!”

  “It’s okay! That’s just the atrium contracting. It’s getting ready to shoot you through the tricuspid valve and into the next chamber, the . . . right ventricle.”

  Before I could answer, Wall Street and I were quickly squirted through the opening—

  “AUGH!”

  and into that next chamber.
r />   But the fun and games weren’t exactly over. Suddenly, another wall closed in front of us—

  THUD!

  and suddenly we came to another screeching stop.

  “Opera??”

  “That’s the semilunar valve!” he shouted.

  “How many valves does this guy’s heart have anyway? I’m getting seasick.”

  Wall Street agreed. “This is worse than riding with my brother when he had his learner’s permit!” “It’s not over yet,” Opera warned. “This next part might get a little rough!”

  “A little rough?” I cried. “What do you think it’s been the rest of the—”

  “WALLY, LOOK OUT!”

  I glanced up just as the top of this new chamber came crashing down onto me. But it wasn’t only the top of the chamber. It was all of the chamber— from every side. Suddenly, I felt like the ketchup in one of those little packets as it’s being stomped by a very big person—or a very large freight train.

  We shot out of there faster than a health food addict from a candy store.

  “OPERA!”

  “Hang on, guys,” he yelled, “hang on!”

  It was a pretty good piece of advice considering we didn’t have anything else better to do. We continued zipping through the vessel so fast that the force pulled my lips back to my ears—which didn’t help much in talking:

  “Waalll Freeet,” I cried. “Whaaar arrrr woooo?”

  I tried looking for her, but the force was so strong I couldn’t turn my head. All I could do was stare straight ahead at the blur of blood vessel wall racing by. I did notice that my old buddy, Mr. Red Blood Cell, was sailing right along beside me. But, for some reason, I didn’t find that a great comfort.

  “Man,” Opera yelled through the headset, “you guys are really hauling!”

  “Mooo kiiidding,” I yelled back. “Boooot whaaar’s Waalll Freeet?”

  “The screen shows a blip right behind you. That’s gotta be her. You’re in the pulmonary artery, heading toward the lungs.”