Trouble with a Tiny t

by Merriam Sarcia Saunders

  “Does he seem… bigger today?” I ask.

  Before Thor can answer, Tiny T and I notice the same thing—my bedroom door is open. I didn’t think to close it when I came in, since I hadn’t planned on letting T and the rest out of the closet.

  My breath seizes. “The door!”

  Too late. Tiny T is way closer to the open door than I am. With no hesitation, he waves his tiny arms and bolts out of the room.

  “Shoot!” I grab the butterfly net and rush out the door.

  A scaly tail disappears around the corner to the right. He’s in the living room. And so is Fiddles, sleeping in her cat bed next to the sofa.

  “Fiddles!” I shout, even though Mom might hear. If T notices her, she’s in for it. He’s bigger than she is now.

  “Run, Fiddles, run!” I yell, turning the corner.

  “West, please stop playing with the cat and eat your breakfast!”

  Fiddles is just lying on her cat bed in the sun, licking her fur, and T hasn’t noticed her yet. He’s too busy making a beeline for the hamster cage on the coffee table. But then he turns his head and sees Fiddles to his right.

  “No!” I run after him, waving the net. “Don’t touch her!”

  Fiddles doesn’t move. She looks up, her lazy eyes glazed. Tiny T detours from his hamster-cage course and heads straight for Fiddles.

  I raise the net, yelling, “Watch out, Fiddles! Go!”

  Tiny T stands before the cat bed, jaws wide. I jump onto the armchair and try to swoop the net down on him before he gets to Fiddles, but he ducks, and I miss. And what does Fiddles do? She yawns! Then she sticks her paw out, claws extended, and swats Tiny T on the forehead. Her claws get stuck on his head, and he makes a weird T. rex whine, twisting to get free.

  I swear Fiddles seems to be smiling. She’s either the bravest or laziest cat ever.

  Thor and his army, with their short little legs, finally peek around the corner into the room. “Do you need assistance?” Thor asks.

  “Get back in my room,” I say. The last thing I need is more chaos for Mom to notice.

  I take one more swipe with the net, then Tiny T finally frees himself from Fiddles’s claws and backs away—quickly. I’m ready for him. He runs right into my net—and doh—right back out again.

  “Darn it!”

  Just then, Mom pops her head in from the kitchen. “What are you doing with that net?”

  I look at my net, the cat, Mom, then back to the cat.

  “Nothing.”

  T is behind the coffee table, and Thor and the men are tucked around the corner. She must not be able to see any of them or she’d be screaming.

  “Leave the cat alone and come eat.”

  “In a minute.”

  “Not in a minute, West.” Her tone gets all I’m-the-boss-of-you. “Now.” With that, she disappears back to the kitchen.

  Behind the table, Tiny T’s dinosaur lips spread, teeth dripping, and in a flash, he’s clawing at the hamster cage. Cappuccino runs around her cage, back and forth, trying to get away from T’s sharp claws.

  “Get away from her!” I swipe the useless net at his head, and he ducks.

  “Who are you yelling at?” Mom asks from the kitchen. “You are not using good listening, West. Please don’t make me ask again.”

  I pick up a sofa pillow and throw it at Tiny T, but he just clonks it away with his head.

  Thor shouts from his corner at the hallway. “Your ogre-mother is igniting with the anger of a thousand suns.”

  “Not helpful,” I whisper-shout. “I can handle this. Go back to my room.”

  Tiny T jiggles the cage with his mini dinosaur hands, dodging my jabs.

  “It does not appear, ogre, you are handling anything.” Thor raises his hammer and marches in T’s direction. Tiny T—who has clearly been pelted by Thor like a zillion times by now—takes off, lumbering into the dining room. Right next to the kitchen. Where Mom is.

  “Westin Scott, your breakfast is stone cold now. And I’m not heating it back up.”

  Tiny T’s nostrils flare, and he darts toward the dining table, probably lured by the scents coming from my plate of eggs and sausage.

  “Sit down and eat now!” Mom’s heels click across the kitchen as she walks back toward the living room. Thor and the army are in the center of the room, attempting to make their way to the dining room, where T paws at my unreachable plate.

  I throw down the net and grab another pillow, diving headfirst toward Thor, covering him and the army as much as I can. The rest of the army men freeze in place.

  Mom pokes her head in. “What are you doing? Playing with your army men? I swear, West.”

  Thankfully Thor is covered by the flowered sofa pillow, but if Mom looks left into the dining room, she’ll see T. I’ll be toast.

  “What happened to all their little heads?” she asks.

  I shrug.

  She shakes her head. “Now you don’t even have time to eat. Clear your plate and put on your shoes. We have to go.” She walks up the stairs to her room.

  I run into the dining room, moving as fast as I can in socks, and circle the table so I’m opposite Tiny T. I reach for my plate and bring it down to his eye level, about twenty inches up. “Come here, buddy. Hungry?”

  Tiny T spies the plate and charges. I slide across the room and into the kitchen. T follows just behind, nipping at my heels as we exit the kitchen to the hall. I’m finally getting somewhere… until Fiddles saunters across our path. Tiny T is startled and makes a detour into the living room to avoid her.

  “Shoot!” I zip back into the living room as Mom comes down the stairs. She’s going to come face to face with my dinosaur in about one second.

  “Hide,” I hiss at Thor. He and the men duck behind a laundry basket at the foot of the stairs.

  “I’m ready to go, West. Get your things.” Mom turns into the kitchen. If she comes into the living room, I’m dead.

  I slide the plate of eggs across the floor toward Tiny T. It whizzes past him, under the armchair, and flies to the other side. T chases after it, sticking his pinhead under the chair. His dinosaur butt wiggles behind him, too fat to fit. I grab the butterfly net and try to scoop it over his tail and butt, a pillow at the ready to cover the top.

  “Are you trying to capture the cat with that net and a pillow?” Mom is in the room.

  I whip around, standing in front of Tiny T, blocking her view. Fiddles has bolted, so Mom doesn’t see that the creature trying to get under the sofa is definitely not our cat.

  “Maybe.”

  “That’s not nice. Put it down, and let’s go.” She leaves the room.

  I run around to the back of the armchair and grab the plate that flung out the other side. “Here, Tiny T. Yummy, eggs. Mmmmm.”

  Tiny T pulls his head from under the chair and lumbers after me again, arms extended like Frankenstein’s monster. I peek around the corner. Mom’s head is stuck in the fridge. I motion for Thor to follow.

  Moving quickly, I zoom down the hall and cross the threshold to my room, throw the plate toward the closet, and slip behind my door. The plate shatters and the eggs fly off, slamming into my desk as the sausage rolls into the closet.

  Tiny T scoots into the room, and after Thor comes in with his army, I close the door. T starts slurping the eggs with a gross sucking sound, then scrabbles into the closet for the sausage.

  “Westin! Now! And I mean, now!”

  Thor starts heaving the sliding closet door shut. I finish it off so T can’t escape.

  “Go, ogre,” Thor says. “I will subdue your wingless dragon in the dungeon. We will await your return at sundown.”

  “Thanks. I’ll be home late today—going to Gram’s after school to try to find out about this magic.”

  Which reminds me. I grab a fistful of allowance money
from my desk drawer to pay Gram back for the sheets I cut.

  “Westin. I’m almost out the door.”

  “I gotta go.” I shut the bedroom door behind me and run down the hall. Mom waits by the front door. Her face is tied in a knot, and I brace myself.

  “I swear, West. This has to stop. I’ve been late for work too many times. Where are your shoes?”

  “Oh, sorry. They’re in my room.” I turn, but a tug on my shirt stops me.

  “No. If I let you back in your room, you’ll never come out.” Mom walks to the coat closet. “Put these on.” She holds up the brown cowboy boots I got for horse camp last summer.

  “Mom, no!”

  She drops them at my feet. “This is what you get for dilly-dallying, West. I don’t know how else I’m supposed to get through to you. Put them on, and let’s go.”

  “But—” I feel the tears build in my eyes. “I’m not wearing those!”

  Mom’s face is a thundercloud. Any second, horns will jut out of her forehead and fire will shoot out of her ears. Her voice gets really low, and when she does that, I know she means business. “You. Will. Put. These. On. Now.”

  I make the angriest frown I can and yank the boots from her. I’m wearing basketball shorts again today, of course. They’re shiny—clean, even—and navy blue with a white stripe down the side. Josh has the same pair. But nothing, no matter how cool, can make wearing cowboy boots with shorts okay when you’re an eleven-year-old boy and there’s not a horse in sight.

  WEDNESDAY—AT SCHOOL

  Some kids whisper to their friends. Others laugh as they pass me. And Nicole, her face twisted in exaggerated disgust, exclaims, “What’s wrong with you?”

  Snake smirks. “Dude. Nice boots.”

  Josh doesn’t say anything. Probably he just didn’t notice.

  At lunch, Lenora meets me at my cubby. She looks at my boots and lifts the visor of her baseball cap to smirk at me. “You know, I think Ms. Molly would say this is totally unexpected behavior.”

  “Not funny. Mom made me wear them.”

  “Harsh. What’d you do to deserve that?”

  “Tiny T got loose this morning. She almost saw. I was so busy chasing him, I made us too late to even get my sneakers on.”

  “Bummer.” Lenora leans against the wall. “Wanna eat with me?”

  Across the quad, Josh and Snake sit down with Alex and Frankie at a small table. If they see me eating with a girl, while wearing cowboy boots… ah, no.

  “Sorry. I already told the guys I’d eat with them.”

  Her face falls. “Oh. Okay.” She starts to walk away. “So, am I still going to your grandma’s with you or what?”

  I nod. “Meet at the library. You cool if we walk? Takes like twenty minutes.”

  “Sure. As long as you walk five feet behind me.” She glances down at my boots again, smirking. Then she sighs. “Guess I’ll go try to make nice with the Barbie dolls.” She heads to the swings where the girls eat lunch.

  When I get to the guys’ table, no one makes room for me.

  “Scoot over, Josh?” I ask.

  It’s tight, but he’ll usually try to make room for me, like yesterday. But today, nothing.

  “There’s not really room,” Josh mumbles.

  I pause, waiting to see if he’s kidding. He doesn’t move. Why’s he being like this? It gives me this PB&J-stuck-in-the-throat feeling, and I haven’t even started eating.

  “What’s with the boots?” Frankie can barely contain himself, and I brace for the onslaught of boot jokes.

  “He needs ’em to protect his legs from his vicious dinosaur, Frankie. Duh,” Alex says as the guys snicker.

  “They’re for riding the dino around his room,” Snake adds through a mouthful of white bread.

  They all crack up.

  “How would you get the bit in his mouth for the halter?” Frankie pretends to want to know.

  “Totally carefully!” Alex gnaws at his own arm like he’s getting mauled by a T. rex. The rest of the table howls with laughter.

  “He’s real!” I say.

  “Yeah, really boot-eeful! Ah-ha-ha!” Frankie nearly chokes on his chips as Alex slaps his back.

  “Did you bring the picture?” Josh asks.

  I sigh. The picture is on my phone. In my backpack. In my room.

  “No.” I stand there, lunch bag in one hand, sandwich in the other.

  “No picture? Hmm… I wonder why?” Alex taps his lips and looks skyward.

  Josh changes the subject. “Hey, Alex. Frankie says you’re blowing up a volcano for the science fair?”

  “Can I sit down already?” No one moves.

  I look briefly at other tables. It would be weird to eat with kids I don’t know. Plus, what would I say if Lenora saw me at another table? I pull out my PB&J and start to eat standing, waiting for one of the guys to scoot aside for me.

  “Turd-face, is that what you told him?” Alex swats Frankie’s huge noggin.

  “That’s not what I said. His volcano is going to erupt real lava,” Frankie says.

  Alex shakes his head. “Dork. Not lava. My volcano shoots up real fire.”

  “Guys? Can you slide over?” I ask again. “I’ll bring the picture tomorrow, I swear.”

  No movement.

  “Whoa, real fire? They’re going to let you do that?” Josh asks.

  “I know, right?” Alex nods. “Dad checked it out with the principal. She says it’s okay if Dad’s there the whole time. The flames shoot up mega high. It’s unbelievable.”

  I stick my knee between Alex and Frankie, nudging Alex to move right. Alex whips a narrow stare at me through his big glasses. “Quit it.”

  I circle the table, hoping someone will scoot over. As I pass behind Alex, he sticks his leg under the bench behind him, and I trip over his foot. My lunch bag goes flying across the quad, and I land with a thump on my stomach.

  Everyone busts out laughing. Snake is holding his sides, doubled over. Even Josh is cracking up.

  I pull myself up. My sandwich is smushed all over the front of my shirt. Grape jelly covers the S of Red Sox. Peanut butter and bread covers the rest. Snake holds up his phone to get a photo.

  I try to laugh along with them, but mostly I feel like crying or screaming or punching someone. “Nice. That was funny, Alex. Gonna go clean it off.”

  I hurry to the bathroom and spend the rest of lunch trying to wipe off the grape jelly. I only make it worse, and now I have a giant purple-y wet stain on my favorite jersey. It’ll probably never come out, and Mom will kill me because authentic baseball jerseys cost like a hundred dollars. She saved up a super-long time to buy this one for my birthday.

  In a burst of anger, I kick the metal trash can in the bathroom. It falls over, shooting wet paper towels across the floor, just as Mr. Lowde comes in to do a bathroom check.

  “Westin?” he whispers.

  “Sorry.” I bend down and scoop the gross, wet towels back into the can.

  He comes forward to help. “Is everything okay?”

  I lift my shoulders, trying hard not to cry.

  “Did your parents get my email? I really hope you join the art club, Westin. You have a lot to offer.”

  I just nod, and I think Mr. Lowde can tell I don’t really want to talk because he pats my shoulder like always, smiles, and turns to leave. “I look forward to having you there,” he says, surprisingly loudly.

  After recess, we have tech class with none other than my un-favorite teacher, Mr. Widelot. We’re working on graphics today, so an aide wheels in a media cart stacked with thin, white laptops and starts doling them out to each kid.

  Mr. Widelot spies my shirt and makes a face. “You are not getting near a computer with food all over your shirt.”

  Like his shirt is any better. Today it says:

/>   Math teachers aren’t mean.

  They’re above average.

  How is that funny? I don’t even get it.

  “Go get a PE jersey from the gym and put that on instead,” he says.

  I hang my head. As if my outfit couldn’t get any worse. Our PE jerseys are bright orange and have the school mascot—a giant cartoon of a purple bear head—on the front. Plus the gym is on the opposite side of the school, and it smells funny. Like robot farts, if a robot could fart. Which means my PE shirt will smell like robot farts too.

  Thanks a lot, Mr. Widelot.

  I walk as slowly as I possibly can to the gym and back. When I return to class, Mr. Widelot is at his desk grading papers. I walk in with my humiliating, farty getup—smelly orange PE shirt with the purple bear head, blue basketball shorts, and, of course, cowboy boots.

  Everyone else has their faces inches from their laptop screens, but it’s not long before the chuckles begin.

  At first I figure they’re laughing at the way I’m dressed. But when I open my laptop and log on, there’s a message waiting in my school inbox. More laughter fills the room.

  “Settle down,” Mr. Widelot says without looking up. “There should be nothing funny about your graphics project.”

  But the twitters keep going. I open my inbox. That’s weird. The message looks like something I sent out to the class. I don’t remember doing that. I check the date and time—sent today, thirty seconds ago.

  When I click to open the message, I know why everyone’s giggling.

  “What is everyone finding so funny?” Mr. Widelot looks up. He walks to Nicole’s computer. I’m sure she’s looking at the same thing I am.

  It’s a photo of me. Cowboy boots. Basketball shorts. Red Sox shirt with peanut butter and jelly smeared over it. Only instead of my head, I have a dinosaur head, its jaws snapping open and closed. There’s a speech bubble overhead that says, “I’m going to eat Mr. Widelot and fart him out. Watch out for my Wide-farts.”

  Clearly at least one student has gotten super good with the graphics software. I whip my head up. To send this from my account, someone would have to know my password. There’s only one person in class who does—Josh.