Munmun

by Jesse Andrews

  She sat on the wickerchair, I sat between her knees on the footstool, a screen sat in front of us. And I tried reading articles and storybooks, tried learning how letters fit into math, tried swallowing the basics of science and history and humanstudies, the world slowly widened in my rattled battered head.

  Was I a little in love with this cute braidheaded girl who saved my life, wanted me to succeed, sure, a little bit, I mean ofcourse, you would be too.

  But it’s not the love of, I want to hold you in my arms for a million sunsets, if I don’t get to marry you I will starve myself to death. It’s a different kind of love when the girl outscales you by five.

  You ask, Warner what the heck do you know about love, look, I know I’m young and I don’t have the deep feelings of forexample Usher but I know a few things about love. Warner’s kissed a few girls and not just in Dreamworld, also in Lifeanddeath, even banged a girl once.

  The bang was back when we lived in the abandoned coastguard station, a few weeks after my dad got crushed. This older girl named Kelly took me aside and said hey, cute little sadface, I know how to make you feel better, comewithme. Tobehonest I didn’t really want to but didn’t want to say no either, longstoryshort we banged in a sandpit and then I ran away. Prayer found out and yelled at me, Warner you’re going to get a million diseases if you bang Kelly, so I started hiding from her, then a few weeks later she left for the desert with some psycho boneblue todds and that was that, story of my first bang, why am I even telling you it, definitely no love in there.

  My point is, do I know what love is, well maybe, a little, and it’s different when you love someone way bigger than you, richer than you, incontrol and knows it. I think it’s like loving a god you can see.

  You don’t get to kiss a god. The god and you don’t cuddle or canoodle. You can’t even sit on a god’s lap, that’s too weird.

  Instead you and the god talk, trade attention, focus energies on each other. And when the god loves you back, smiles at you, tells you goodjob, it feels incredible. But when the god ignores you to talk on the phone, it twists you up inside. Part of you thinks, ofcourse she gets to ignore you, she’s a god. Other part thinks, that’s just because she was born a stupid god, I could be a god too if I got born that way.

  And most of the time you’re together, your mouth is all twisted up too, can’t talk to this god the way you do with the other normal human poors. Your words are stiff, your jokes are bad. The only time your tongue gets loose is talking to her about your sad past, the sadness of being a littlepoor, the only kind of person you get to be with her is a noble sufferer.

  “Dang, if only littlepoors got to learn equations at a younger age, maybe it would all be different, such a tragedy,” is the kind of dumb crap I heard myself saying.

  “I keep telling my dad, what if Lossy Indica was the first in the Yewess to build state littleschools,” she said.

  “With a littleschool to go to, whoknows how my life would have ended up, I could have been the president,” I heard myself agreeing like a robot pet.

  I mean she’s notwrong, I just wish we could have other conversations, but when you’re talking with someone of a super different scale, scale is all you talk about.

  “Warner,” she asked onenight after dinner, “what do you want.”

  I was plopped on her sweetsmelling bed playing mathwars on a screen.

  “Retrack ofcourse,” I said.

  “I mean what’s like your heartsdesire,” she said.

  I must have looked confused because she explained, “If you could have anything you wanted, in the whole world, what would that be.”

  Obviously the answer was, still have my mom and dad around, mom not catcrippled, dad not stepped on.

  Instead of saying that I just airscraped my throat a few times.

  “How big would you be,” she forexampled.

  I said, “As big as you I guess.”

  “And what would you do,” she asked.

  “Prettymuch nothing,” I said, didn’t mean to be funny but she thought it was hilarious.

  “Ohman that is a hoot,” she giggled.

  I glanced around for something to change the subject, in the closet half a guitar peeked at me from behind dresses.

  “Bytheway do you ever try to play your dreammusic in Lifeanddeathworld,” I asked her, a classic Change The Subject from me, king of changing the subject.

  She ducked her eyes for a second at her hands.

  “Uh, not really,” she said, allofasudden she was the muttery one.

  “It would be super hard I guess,” I realized, “forstarters you would have to be a thousand people.”

  “Well, it’s just, for me, it’s kind of impossible to play anything,” she mumbled.

  It was a voice of, I don’t really want to explain this, suddenly I knew we were talking about why Tony called her Poor Kitty.

  A couple pangs went through me watching this richgirl sadly chew a lip, immediately I felt like I had to soothe her into not talking or she would start hating me.

  So I nodded and also shook my head like a maniac, trying to tell her with my wideeye tightmouth face, it’s super okay, I get it, stoprightthere, howabout we discuss something you like instead.

  But she misunderstood my clumsy headbobbling, thought I wanted her to continue.

  “So, okay,” she sighed, “I was born a little wrong, pretty early and with a pinched spine, and the doctors had to do a ton of surgeries on me, like when I was a baby. I’m really basically fine now but the easiest way to put it is, my brain is still not a hundredpercent plugged into the rest of my body, maybe closer to ninetyeight. So there are a few things I can’t do as a result, like play instruments or do any sports, I just don’t have coordinated enough motorcontrol.”

  “Oh dang,” I said stupidly.

  “I mean it’s barely ever an issue really,” she said.

  “I guess that last twopercent is your heartsdesire though,” I thought and also blurted like an idiot.

  “It’s actually not,” she snapped. “It’s enough for me to get to make music in Dreamworld, honestly that’s probably the reason I’m good at it.”

  “Ofcourse ofcourse,” I apologized, “no yeah no obviously, what am I even saying, howabout we never speak of it again.”

  She watched me babbling and softened, her lips scrunched and smiled, opened to speak.

  “Can I be honest with you about my heartsdesire,” she said.

  “Only if you want to,” I urged.

  “It’s to be a beloved dictator queen,” she confided.

  That got a giggle out of even stiffmouthed me.

  “Like of as many people as possible,” she daydreamed. “But chosen by the people, like so rapturously adored that I got elected queen yewnanimousely by the entire planet because every single person loves me so uncontrollably.”

  “Gottabehonest, I don’t think you’ve got Daisy’s vote,” I pointed out.

  “Gonna have her murdered I guess,” agreed Kitty.

  It was nice to joke and riff, happy little moment but over prettyquick, soon I got weird and stiffmouth again, we went back to work.

  Meanwhile the guitar kept peeking at me, would it really live there if she didn’t hope for the day she picks it up and strums a song she hears.

  “Bytheway it’s not a big deal, but if you could not talk about the brain thing to people I’d appreciate it, maybe not even Prayer if that’s okay,” she asked later, I promised I wouldn’t.

  We were a littlebit the same but only in ways you can’t talk about, two kids being wordless about their unfillable wants, pretty squeezyhand giant and lifty orphan pet.

  That night before sleep, Prayer confronted me.

  “You’re not crushing on Kitty, right,” she wanted to know.

  “No,” I lied.

  “It just couldn’t possibly work, an interscale romance between you and her, and I should know, I have a little experience in this department,” she said.

  “No one’s cr
ushing on anyone,” I said.

  “Well, that’s not true, she crushes on you alittle forsure, but it can never work ever, so please don’t screw things up by getting mushy feelings,” she said.

  “Wait what do you mean she crushes on me,” I said.

  Prayer looked into my eyes and saw a carcrash.

  “Ohno, Warner,” she said. “Crap.”

  “What,” I said. “Shut up.”

  “You crush on her super hard,” Prayer realized. “Nonono. Warner, don’t screw this up for yourself and also me, please.”

  “Shut up,” I said. “You think I don’t know it’s impossible? You think I feel any kind of stupid hope like I’m going to marry this girl? No, so just shut up please.”

  “If you have to crush, please don’t crush on Kitty, that’s a disaster, find some halfscale girl to crush on instead, a little less likely to ruin your happiness and also both of our lives,” Prayer told me.

  “Shutting up will need to happen soon in here,” I yelled into the pillow I was smashing into my head.

  “Better you don’t crush on anyone though, try to cool off that needy heart,” Prayer advised.

  But toobad Prayer, very nextday I found a new girl to crush on, a girl my scale too.

  “New” maybe isn’t the right word though, I’ve seen this girl before, you have too.

  LIFEANDDEATHWORLD

  Tray and Brand and me were strolling Mun World in search of shootemups when I saw her with a little crew of girls, judging handbags and phoneshells in an aisle of jewels and fraygrances.

  Atfirst I thought where do I know this face, how is she familiar.

  Why do I remember this girl outscaling me by four, why am I remembering hiding in garbage, did this girl pity me once and leave me sweet limewater to drink.

  Does her family serve bowls of tangy creamy cowsoy in Sand Dreamough when it’s Neighborhood Souptime, ohmygod, it’s Grace.

  Definitely it was Grace’s sweet freckly plumface, but no longer fourtimes bigger than mine, actually littler if you can believe it.

  I stared a little too long, her friends noticed, mine did too.

  “Don’t creep, bradpitt,” said Tray, smacking my skull, and we escaped into some gameboxes for testdrives.

  Shootemups didn’t intrest me a ton but Tray and Brand loved all the various kinds. Infact I would say it was the only thing that brought Tray happiness. Be a starwarrior, be a batman, murder thousands of people, have nightmare adventures in hell, anything’s possible.

  The tech was intresting to me atleast. Stand inside your gamebox, dash and twist on the threesickty treadmill. I enjoyed traveling limitlessly all over magical environments, a wildwest, a worldwar, a roadrage, magic sewer, lordoftherings, anchorwat, outerspace. It’s a little like Dreamworld actually, nowonder poors love escaping into it.

  But the travel ends prettyquick when you get discovered by enemies and if you don’t have a childhood of playing these things, forget it, you’re useless. Die violently, tons of screaming, bloodandguts paint the boxwalls, plus mockingfaces, lol hey loser, how pathetic, you’ll never be goodenough to survive the miamivice no matter how hard you try, anyway why not try again, hey where are you going.

  I stepped out cautiously but Grace was nowhere to be seen. So instead I watched cops try to dig some littlepoors out from burrows in the phone section, Mun World contains thieves and schemers always, cops patrol it twentyfourseven.

  Secondtime I saw Grace, it was across the parkinglot, this time she was with some skinny nerd. This pimply scrawn held his foldphone for her to read, something he wrote forsure. She liked it though, was making nods and faces of, the surprising thing you wrote surprises me, wow, oh and now I’m laughing at the part where you made a stupid joke or something.

  Meanwhile, Brand was showing me wrestlingvids on his phone, less delightfull viewing material forsure. Specifically these were vids of the Cram Jam.

  Cram Jam is one of the annual battles of Yewess Wrestle Club, the Numberone In The Yewess And Worldwide It’s Numberthree Wrestling Entertainment Choice. This battle is, put thirty wrestlers in an enormous fishtank, all over the walls and floor are the slippery mouths of drainagepipes, goal is to cram everyone else into the pipes and flush them into the sea, winner is the last guy still in the tank.

  So, excited Brand and pretending to be captivated me were watching enraged oily wrestlers whirl a guy around or bonk him in the head and then frantically drag this stunned guy to the mouth of a drainagepipe and try to smush him in there, meanwhile the guy is pretending to wake up halfway into the pipe and furiously clawing his way back out and thrashing around, meanwhile meanwhile I saw that Grace was done reading, thanking the nerd but walking away to class or something, I thought about running up to her and introing myself, hey Grace, remember me.

  But then some other daves wandered up and yell, “Ohsnap, are you watching replays of the Cram Jam, heckyeah,” a loud crowd of morons gathered around us to cheer and then start also wrestling and cramming, Grace glanced over and without thinking I ducked and ran, can’t be seen with these psycho boneheads, that’s when I knew, I must like this girl.

  Thirdtime I saw her, it was in Mun World again, and again I was caught looking by one of her friends, shortest and feistiest. This time the friend shamed me before I could sprint away.

  “Hey creep, stop staring at my friend, either buy her some presents or go die in a hole somewhere,” she yelled.

  The other girls giggled and murmured except embarrassed Grace.

  “Okay sure, I’ll buy her a present,” I said for some reason.

  “Great, what are you getting her,” said delighted friend.

  I looked at Grace, Grace studied me carefully, wait do I know this guy, her eyes were fakeblue that day.

  I said, “Hey Grace, can I get you a mocha, please.”

  “Ohgod, the creep knows her name,” yelled friend. “That is some nextlevel creeping.”

  “Ohmygoodness, it’s you, you’re out of jail,” cried Grace, finally realizing who is this pumpedup bustednose redfish.

  The friends were losing their minds from excitement, ontheonehand overjoyed that Grace has a scandalous secret, ontheother terrified of a creepy criminal. Two friends encircled Grace protectively, a third actually raced away shrieking.

  “You brought me a nice drink once, now maybe I can return the favor,” I suggested and she blushed glowy white under the plumskin.

  Kind Grace agreed to a date at Shaky Buzz, a loud jittery zone of Mun World featuring mochashakes, coffeecreams, pearlteas, nonstop popvids starring Famous Randy and his famous turtleneck.

  The friends agreed to sit two tables away, inreturn I had to buy them drinks.

  “Oh, you don’t have to buy so many drinks,” started to say Grace.

  Short loud friend Angel interrupted, “Heck no, beautifull Grace, he completely does because your friends need drinks to sip on while we stare at him vigilantly, that’s incase he tries any funnybusiness.”

  “She’s right ofcourse,” I said, “what does everyone want, please order your heartsdesire,” so what do you think happened, obviously each friend ordered the most expensive, ultralarges with surplus pearls, lavish syrups, expressiveshots, fizzy tops, frothy gallons that taste like cartoons.

  I smiled casually to pretend it was nobigdeal and infact great that half my freaking allowance was swimming down the throats of these giggly sceneteens.

  Grace, last to order, got a simple minimocha.

  Thank you, Grace, said my heart.

  We sat, she sipped, I told her the supershort version: Sorry again for hiding in your garbage, what happened was, a faceboy lowlife tried to kidnap my sister, I tried to shoot him, hid from the cops for a few days mostly in your garbage, finally turned myself in, my lawyer made me plead guilty and the judge thought I was nogood, I spent a year in jail, then a cityboss’s daughter learned about my story and got me out, now I and also the sister live with them, we’re scaledup on a gift of their munmuns, trying to make t
he most of this opportunity.

  But I was listening to my own story and it didn’t sound like me. It sounded like the story of someone tougher, dumber, meaner, some thug hoping to convince you he doesn’t love violence.

  I heard a jacked guy with faketeeth telling a girl, “judge thought I was nogood,” I didn’t care if it was true, I didn’t care if it was me. I still thought to that girl, ohno, turn, run, you don’t want this guy in your life.

  But Grace listened, sipped, gazed. And didn’t assume I was lying or evil, didn’t see in my eyes the twitchy mistrustmyself feeling. Or maybe she did but she understood somehow, sympathized, whoknows, all I knew was, I felt like allofasudden there was a girl I could realtalk with.

  “What about you, Almanac is pretty far from the Dreamoughs,” I asked.

  Yeah rent got too high in Sand Dreamough, at the same time business got too bad because middleriches can’t eat at a middlepoor stand. Oneandahalfscales are kind of taking over and rebuilding Sand Dreamough blockbyblock, widening the roads, combining buildingstories, for littler middles the writing’s onthewall. So Grace Family Cowsoy moved to Eat Almanac, hopefully things are better over here, lots of middlepoors anyway, more littles too.

  But Grace made it onto Wordy Track, great reading skills from her love of comics, speaks three languages, parents are hoping for lawschool. What about you, Warner, is your track impressive or pathetic.

  “I’m on Lifty Track,” I admitted, again it was the voice of a big dumb strangler.

  But she actually smiled a little deeper, glanced at my arms, said, “You look like you might be prettygood at it too.”

  The smile made my heart gulp.

  “Well, I’m letting you in on a secret here, Lifty is only tenpercent muscles, it’s really ninetypercent brain,” I told her.

  “Oh really,” she said.

  “Yeah it’s true, Lifty is the secret home of geniuses,” I said. “Yesterday during Generic Distress Response three guys working together invented a brandnew way to get trapped under a bus.”

  She laughed a real laugh, my heart got dizzy, meanwhile twotables away her friends noticed, elbowed each other, hands halfway covering big horrified smiles.