by Lenore Look
Oooommmmpf. My toes pointed downwards.
It was a house named Calvin.
“I can’t believe you let that happen!” cried Calvin, squeezing me between his knees. “Thou burly-boned, mad-brained malt worm!”
“It wasn’t my fault!” I cried.
“Thou pukey, lumpish idle-headed hugger-mugger!” said Calvin.
“But I can’t talk in school,” I wailed.
“You can shake your head,” said Calvin. “You can write.… You can gesture.…
“You can talk with your eyes,” he added. “You’re not exactly dead, you know.”
“But I’m—cough—nearly dead now!” I squeaked. “Help! Anibelly, help me!”
But Anibelly only stared, her mouth opened in an O. Watching me get killed by Calvin is the second-best spectator sport around our house, next to watching me get busted by my dad.
So Calvin sat harder.
Milk sprayed out of my nose.
“GungGung!” Anibelly cried excitedly. “Come quick! Come quick! Alvin’s getting killed! Alvin’s getting killed!”
“Owwwwoooooo,” howled Lucy.
I pounded on the floor with my fists. But I knew that downstairs GungGung was in Stage Three deep sleep with no eye movement or muscle activity and there was no way that he would hear the ruckus and come save my tuckus.
“Owwwwwww!” I cried. “Owwwwwww!”
Calvin sat even harder.
Then I went limp. Like a squirrel flattened out by the side of the road. This made Calvin twitch and lift just a little and I slipped out from under him, like a snake from under a rock. This always works; even though Calvin’s a killing machine, sitting on roadkill makes him squirm.
I gulped the air hungrily and noisily.
Then I looked at Calvin. He had turned a purpley plum from being super-duper mad at me, and his eyes were still puffy and red like they were in school. But lucky for me, he wasn’t in a killing mood anymore.
“How did you think I felt when the principal called me into her office and said she was very sorry that my grandpa had died?” asked Calvin. “And how did you think I felt when the next thing I knew, I was invited to his memorial service with your second-grade class?”
Calvin wiped his eyes and nose on his sleeve. Calvin rarely cries, but when he does, he doesn’t recover very quickly.
“I’m a fourth grader, you know,” said Calvin.
“Don’t be mad, Cal,” I said. “GungGung is going to die. Look!”
I held out the paper.
“GungGung made his BUCKET LIST!” I screeched, holding out the piece of paper.
“What’s a bucket list?” asked Anibelly.
“It’s like a Last Will and Testament,” I said. “You write it before you die—but instead of saying who gets your stuff, you say what you want to do before you go for your final bus ride!”
“Then what?” asked Anibelly.
“Then you do it,” I said. “And then you die!”
“Lemme see that,” said Calvin, taking the paper from me.
Calvin read it silently.
Then he read it again.
“What does it say?” asked Anibelly.
“It says he wants to spend a lot of time with us,” said Calvin.
“That’s what he said.” I nodded.
“This is serious,” said Calvin.
“IT’S THE NAIL IN THE COFFIN!!!” I shrieked.
“Hmmm,” said Calvin. “But look, number six says he wants to write his life’s story.”
“So?”
“He’s not a very good writer,” said Calvin. “It takes him forever to write anything. Then he goes back and changes everything. He’ll be at it until we’re as old as he is now.”
Calvin looked really relieved.
Then he put his arm around me.
“It’s really scary thinking about GungGung dying,” said Calvin.
I nodded.
“But it makes me more sad than scared,” said Calvin.
“Me too,” said Anibelly.
I thought about it.
Calvin and Anibelly were right. When GungGung dies, it’ll be so sad that the moon will cry.
And that’s very different from being scared.
“If I were you,” said Calvin, “I’d be freaked out about going to Charlie’s funeral, not about GungGung dying.”
Silence.
“Do you have any idea how creepy a dead body is?” asked Calvin.
Silence.
Calvin hurried to the computer.
Click, click, click, went Calvin’s finger on the mouse.
“Did you know that they embalm your body when you die?” asked Calvin.
“What’s that?” I asked. But I really didn’t want to know.
“It’s modern mummification,” said Calvin. “It’s so you can look good at your funeral. First they clean your body with a strong disinfectant, then they replace all your blood with embalming fluid to keep you from rotting.”
I was really sorry I asked.
“But if you’re Tibetan, they won’t do that to you,” said Calvin. “In Tibet they do sky burials—leaving your body at the top of a mountain for the vultures to eat.”
Gulp!
“In Africa, you could get buried under or next to your house,” Calvin continued. “And they’ll bury you with your eating utensils, walking sticks, blankets and other useful items that you’ll need in your next life.”
“Let’s move to Africa,” I said. “You can put me behind the garage.”
“In India, they’ll cremate you within twenty-four hours,” said Calvin.
Silence.
I didn’t ask. I didn’t want to know.
Calvin scrolled down the page.
“Did you know that typically a dead body cools about one degree a minute until it reaches room temperature?” asked Calvin.
I closed my ears. I didn’t want to hear any more. I was getting closer and closer by the minute to that creepy funeral.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack!” I screamed. “Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack!”
Then I ran downstairs and out into the yard.
Outside, the air was already beginning to smell like moonlight. I charged full speed ahead, screaming at the top of my lungs. “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!”
Then I stepped back. In the half-sunlight, half-moonlight just before the sky turns inky dark, our house glowed from every window. And the moon hovered like a giant white pearl above our chimney. It meant that my mom would soon be home from work. And my dad too.
Normally, I love seeing the moon above our house. But there was something not quite normal about the moon tonight—what was that? It looked like two twiggy insects on our roof, their black wiry arms gesturing like crazy against the silvery moon.
“Hey, Sport!” one of them called out, waving at me.
“Uncle Dennis?”
“I came over to give your dad a hand,” said Uncle Dennis. “You were so busy that I didn’t get a chance to say hi!”
“Dad?”
“Hey, son,” said the other figure.
“What are you doing up there?” I asked.
“I came home early to start on the roof,” said my dad, perched like a mantis against the moon. “It’s a big job and it needs to be done before winter.”
I froze.
Suddenly, Mr. Arlecchino’s voice filled my ears. “Roofing isn’t a hobby—it’s a dangerous job.… One twist of the ankle and it’s Do-It-Yourself Ho no more.”
I couldn’t breathe.
I couldn’t blink.
I couldn’t move.
Were those death omens not meant for GungGung after all—but for—gasp!—UNCLE DENNIS and MY DAD???
Did I have the nail in the wrong coffin this whole time?
Everything began to spin around me—the trees, our house, our driveway, all my carved sticks, Louise, my dad, Uncle Dennis, nails and hammers, roof tiles, toads, worms, crickets, everything.
> “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!!!” I screamed. “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!!!”
It was the last thing I heard. But I was sure nothing came out of my mouth.
Worse, it’d been a LONG time since I’d used the bathroom.
poor me.
This is what you do after you’ve had one of those accidents.
You crawl into bed.
You curl into a little ball.
You die.
“Waaaaaaaaaah!” I cried.
“Waaaaaaaaaaaaah!”
Finally, my dad came in to read to us, like he does every night before bed. Tonight we got to the part where Odysseus escapes the Cyclops, Polyphemus, by blinding him with a steak.
“Sounds like you’ve had a rougher day than Odysseus,” said my dad when he closed the book.
I nodded. I was sitting very close to my dad, leaning against him to hold him up, like I do every night on account of he’s at that age where he needs all the help he can get. Calvin and Anibelly were holding him up from the other side.
“Do you have something to tell me, son?” my dad asked.
I love it when he calls me that. Son. I love it more than my own name. I love it so much that hearing it could make me cry. So I did. “Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!”
Then all my troubles came pouring out, from my toenails, past my gut, up my chest, out of my mouth and into my dad’s ears.
I breathed in.
I breathed out.
My dad said nothing. He put his book down. He put one arm around Calvin and Anibelly and his other arm around me and pulled me so close everything disappeared.
I breathed in.
I breathed out.
I love the smell of my dad.
Then I really cried. “WAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”
I cried so hard I couldn’t stop.
Finally, when I had to take a time-out, I told my dad to keep holding me, I never wanted him to let go, ever. So he didn’t. He said he would hold me forever if that was what I wanted him to do.
“How ’bout when you’re dead?” I asked. “You won’t be able to hold me then.”
“That’s true,” said my dad.
“You could fall off that roof tomorrow and be dead,” I said.
“True,” said my dad.
“Then why are you doing it, Dad?” I asked. “One twist of the ankle and you’re history!”
“I like taking care of my things,” said my dad. “And that includes working on our house and making everything safe and comfortable for my family.”
“But it’s not safe for you, Dad,” I said. “Or for Uncle Dennis.”
“I’m really sorry I’ve alarmed you,” said my dad. “But your uncle Dennis and I are extremely careful and taking every precaution. We don’t want to be history either.”
I could feel Anibelly and Calvin squeezing closer to my dad on the other side.
“Aren’t you afraid of dying, Dad?” asked Calvin. “And leaving us as half orphans?”
“And mom as a widow spider?” I added.
“Every day,” said my dad. “I’m afraid of it every day.”
My dad gave us a long squeeze.
“Before I became a dad, I wasn’t afraid of dying,” he said. “I did daredevil stunts with your uncle Dennis that should have killed us both. It’s a miracle we survived to our ripe old ages. I wouldn’t even think of doing any of those things today.”
“Why not?” asked Calvin. “Does being a dad make you a wimp?”
“Not at all,” said my dad. “Being a dad is the bravest thing a man can do. But it also makes him more afraid than ever of injury and death.”
“How can you be bravest and afraidest?” asked Anibelly.
“Because I don’t want to miss a day of your lives,” said my dad.
“Dad?” I said.
“Yes?”
“What if there’s something that’s extremely dangerous and super-duper creepy, would you do it?” I asked.
“Hmmm,” said my dad, looking at me sideways. “You don’t mean something like … going to a funeral, do you?”
I nodded.
“Saying goodbye to someone we love is very important,” said my dad. “But I can understand your fright, son, and if you’d really rather not go, then you need to tell GungGung.”
“You mean I don’t have to go?” I asked.
“You don’t have to go,” said my dad.
“Wouldn’t GungGung miss me?” I asked.
“I’m sure he would,” said my dad. “But you need to be honest with him. He’ll understand if you’re not ready.”
I nodded.
I wanted to be ready, but I wasn’t.
“I made a promise that was bigger than I was,” I said, shamefully.
“You meant well,” said my dad.
My dad leaned in and kissed the top of my head. I love it when he does that.
“Maybe you’re actually bigger than your promise,” said my dad. “You just don’t know it yet.”
It was a good word from my dad. He knew that I knew that he knew that sometimes a good word from him changes everything.
But this time it changed nothing.
I was more freaked out about Charlie’s funeral than ever.
And I was relieved to know that I didn’t have to go.
this is how to pass a history test.
Plan A:
1. On the school bus, try to remember some historical stuff.
2. If you can’t remember any old stuff, don’t panic.
3. Go to Plan B.
Plan B:
1. Look like you are paying attention.
2. Do not wear a mask.
3. Do not wear garlic.
4. Go to Plan C.
Plan C:
1. When Miss P talks about Algonkians and Puritans, it’s a secret code of some sort.
2. Crack the code.
3. If you haven’t cracked the code by the time she’s passing out the test, there’s only one thing left to do.
4. Go to Plan D.
Plan D:
D is not a good name for a plan.
Go to Plan F.
Plan F:
F is not a good name for a plan either.
Go to Plan G.
Plan G:
G is a very Good letter for a plan.
When you get the test, look at it.
Look around.
Try to PASS your test to someone.
If you fail at #4, go to #6.
Keep your hands in plain sight.
Lift the paper to your mouth.
Open mouth.
Insert.
Chew slowly and carefully.
Pretend it’s pizza. It will help.
Calvin didn’t say anything about it being very dry or the girl sitting next to me whose one good eye was fixed on me, unblinking.
“Eeeeuuuw!” said Flea. She was supposed to be looking at her own test, but she was not. Her eye was as round as a magnifying glass.
“Miss P, ALVIN’S EATING HIS TEST!” cried Flea.
All heads turned.
All eyes were on my test.
“Oh, Alvin,” said Miss P. “You poor thing.”
I drooled.
“You’ve been through so much this week,” said Miss P, “I should have asked if you wanted to take your test next week.”
Gulp.
It tasted terrible.
Worse, Miss P sent me to the nurse’s office.
And the nurse called my mom to take me home.
“Alvin,” said my mom when she came to pick me up. “Tomorrow will be better.”
I didn’t think so.
I was miserable.
I didn’t nod.
I didn’t smile.
I didn’t even look at my mom.
I hung my head.
And clutched my stomach.
And I went home.
And it wasn’t even lunchtime yet.
a friday afternoon at home was heaven.
The light was bright.
The sky was blue.
Cotton-candy clouds floated past.
After making a bunch of holes in my yard, and running around a bit with Lucy, I was flat on my back in a ditch of my own digging, marveling at my good luck. I’d never intended to come home early, I had only intended to pass my history test. But a free afternoon at home was as good as playing hooky, without the worry of getting busted.
The afternoon would have been perfect except for one thing.
Anibelly.
“Lalalalalalalalala,” sang Anibelly, digging a hole nearby. “Lalalalalalalalalala.”
I wished my mom had left her at day care, but she hadn’t. My mom said that she would work from home this afternoon while I convalesced, whatever that is, and there was no sense in leaving Anibelly at Little Ducklings Daycare.
“You wanna be buried?” asked Anibelly, her head suddenly floating like a volleyball above mine. She smiled.
“You mean like at the beach?” I asked.
“Yup,” said Anibelly. “It might feel good.”
“Okay,” I said. “Dirt always feels good.”
“Yup,” said Anibelly. She picked up a shovel.
Dirt flew.
Rocks rolled.
Worms wiggled past my head.
“Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way,” sang Anibelly in rhythm with her shovel. “Oh what fun it is to ride in a one-horse open sleigh, hey!”
I closed my eyes.
Anibelly’s favorite song is “Jingle Bells” and she sings it whenever she’s in a good mood.
“Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way!” Anibelly blasted like a rock star. Shovel, shovel. Pat, pat.
I kept my eyes closed.
I lay as still as the dead.
“Do you like the singing?” Anibelly asked.
“I like it very much,” I said. “Jingle Bells” is my favorite too.
Shovel, shovel.
Pat, pat.
“How does it feel?” asked Anibelly.
The earth was cool against my chest.
My face was wet with Lucy kisses.
My butt was cold.
My fingers dug deeper into the soft dirt.
“I like it,” I said. “It’s very peaceful.”