The Absolute Value of Mike

by Kathryn Erskine

  Past sighed. “I guess I’ll have to go back to calling you by that culturally common name of Mike.”

  “Look. I know you don’t think it’s a sign that Misha and I have the same name. And you have a point. But it’s not just the name. Or the T-shirt. Or even the LEGOs. It’s the eyes.”

  Past stopped the cart and studied me. “Yours are brown. His are blue.” He paused. “They both start with b. Is that the sign?”

  I folded my arms. “No. His eyes are . . . I don’t know . . . trying to say something.”

  Past raised his eyebrows.

  I pushed the toe of my Clarks against a wheel of his cart. “It’s like . . . okay, this is going to sound really weird . . . it’s like he’s trying to tell me something.”

  Past’s eyes were wide and his face was frozen.

  “Never mind! Forget I said anything!”

  “No.” He started blinking again and leaned his forearms on the cart, bending over like I’d knocked the wind out of him. “I believe you, Mike,” Past said quietly. “If you’re feeling something at a gut level, then you know what? You’re right. That’s a sixth sense. Or spirit. Or whatever you want to call it.” He looked up and stared at me with his Bono eyes. “I want that kid adopted, too.” For a long moment, he just kept staring at me. Then he scratched his stubbly chin and a smile started growing until it was a broad grin. I realized that I’d never seen him smile this much, because now that I saw it, I knew for sure that he was a guy the girls would drool over. Jeez, why didn’t I get his face? I mean, if I wasn’t going to get a brain, couldn’t I at least look good? Past even looked great in a frayed green-striped button-down shirt and tweed jacket. Maybe I should wear—

  “My shirt!”

  “What?” It came out croaky because I couldn’t believe he’d been inside my head.

  “My shirt! I can sell my shirt on eBay!”

  I felt better realizing that he hadn’t known what I was thinking, but it took me a moment to catch on to what he said. “EBay? A shirt?”

  “It’s not just any shirt. It’s a shirt worn by a real street person.”

  “Don’t you . . . need it?”

  He waved his hand. “Plenty more where this came from. In fact, I’ll put one shirt a week on eBay.”

  “Do you have that many shirts?” I asked.

  He gave me a funny look. “I believe I can part with that many shirts, yes.” He put the blueberry jar in his cart, whipped off his jacket, and unbuttoned his shirt, taking it off quickly. He handed it to me as he started to put his jacket on over his gray T-shirt with his free arm.

  I was doubtful, but I decided to humor him. “Okay,” I said, slowly reaching out for it, trying not to act like I didn’t want to touch it. “Uh . . . I’ll take care of washing it.”

  He jerked it back. “What? Are you crazy? And devalue it? This is a shirt worn by a real live homeless guy. This shirt has lived against the man’s skin! This shirt has lived on the street, night and day, for . . .” He froze, went pale, and then slowly a look of resignation came over his face, gentling out the lines in his forehead. His voice came out low and in a monotone. “I’ve been forgetting to count. Wow,” he said quietly. “Anyway, it’s been”—he looked at his watch—“two months, twenty-seven days, six and a half hours.”

  “Since what?”

  He blinked rapidly, not looking at me and not answering. “I—I have to get to the soup kitchen. In the meantime, I’ll head you in the right direction for home.”

  12

  ORDER OF OPERATIONS

  —the order in which a problem is solved

  I was a little frustrated that we couldn’t get started on videos or website design right away, but I figured I couldn’t begrudge a homeless guy a free lunch. Past told me how to get back to Moo’s and drew a map on the back of a flyer from Natalie’s Natural Products health food store. Those were the flyers he had in his cart, and for some reason he had a ton of them. I guess they weren’t any use to Natalie anymore, since her store was out of business.

  Fortunately, there was only one turn to get to Moo’s, so even I could follow a map like that. It was still a long walk, but I had a lot to think about, so I made a list in my head.

  Website—call it Bring Misha Home! • upload pictures of Misha and tell about his life—what it is now, and what it could be

  • show countdown on website of how many days before Romania closes

  • show running tally of how much money we’ve made and how close we are to the goal

  • get Moo on camera selling her vinegar

  • get Past on camera eating Mrs. P’s fruit spread

  • get Gladys on camera playing guitar and singing?

  And the list went on and on.

  I was thinking so hard, I almost missed my turn. When I got to Moo’s, I maneuvered around the buckets in the front yard and walked up the carpeted steps. And stopped.

  A life-size rag doll sat on a chair on the porch. Wearing shorts and a striped T-shirt, like an overgrown kid. And a pink Life Is Good baseball cap. Its face was a round pale blue pillow with brown yarn hair. He had buttons for eyes, a dangly red pom-pom for a nose, and a wide, grinning mouth drawn on with black marker. It was so hideous that, well, it was kind of cute. I stared at it for a moment before I noticed the note sticking out of the shorts pocket:Hey, Me-Mike! This is a porch pal. He’ll bring you good luck.

  —Guido, Jerry, and Spud

  I couldn’t help smiling at him until I noticed the smell. Coming from the house. It was sickly sweet. And burning.

  I yanked the door open. “Moo!” I shouted.

  “In here, Mike!” Moo called from the smoky kitchen.

  Poppy grunted as I ran through the living room.

  “Moo, what’s going on? What’s that smell?” On the kitchen counter, I saw four cookie sheets completely covered with thick, black, smoking glop.

  Moo sighed. “These cookies are for a bake sale for Misha. They didn’t turn out very well, did they?” She looked down at her recipe card and read off the items as she put her hand on each of the ingredients on the counter. “One cup of sugar, three cups of flour—”

  “Moo?”

  “Yes, dear?”

  “That’s not flour. You’ve got two bags of sugar.”

  She peered at the bags. “I could’ve sworn one of them was flour.”

  “Moo, maybe you need new glasses. Your eyes might be getting—”

  “My eyes are perfectly fine!” she said, whipping her head around to glare at me.

  “I’m just saying . . .”

  Moo turned to glare at the cookie sheets instead. “Well, that was a bust! Never mind, I’ll clean this up and get our meal started. You go relax with Poppy for a few minutes.”

  I went into the living room and frowned at Poppy. For the first time, I noticed his feet. He wore huge duck slippers. They were realistic-looking ducks, the type with the dark green heads and necks. Other than the duck slippers, and the yellow yardstick now leaning against his recliner instead of across the arms of the wing chair, nothing had changed. Except the cat clock, which now said 5:15. Before, it had read around 8:00. Weird. I looked at Poppy. He had the same stubborn expression and devil-horn hair. His eyes were still fixed on the broken TV.

  “So, Poppy, what up?”

  No answer.

  “How are those boxes coming?”

  Mild grunt.

  “Yeah, well, that’s not helping make any money to bring Misha here. Guess you don’t care about that. It’s more fun to watch a dead TV, huh?” I looked at the blank screen. “Is this your favorite show?” I cupped my hand to my ear. “What’s that? Oh, it’s a movie. My mistake. James Bond?”

  Moo appeared in front of me. “What are you doing, dear?”

  “Watching TV.”

  She walked over to the set and pressed a button, and a truck ad shouted at us. “It works much better if you turn it on.”

  Poppy let out a snort.

  “But I thought—”
r />   “It’s all right.” Moo patted my hand. “Sometimes I forget to turn it on, too.”

  “I didn’t forget! I thought since Poppy was watching . . . never mind.” Why would I think that Poppy would want to watch TV “live” when he could watch it dead?

  Moo beckoned me into the kitchen and I followed. “I’m not sure Poppy is the best role model for you,” she said softly.

  Poppy made a low growling sound.

  I sneered through the pass-through at him. No kidding. He was ruining my life, at least for the short term, but more importantly, he was risking Misha’s entire life.

  “Now, that Past,” she said, drying her hands on a towel, “he’s an excellent role model.”

  “A homeless guy?” I liked Past a lot, but it seemed weird to call him a role model.

  “Oh, he’s not homeless, dear.”

  “Uh, yeah, I think he is.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “For starters, his office is a park bench. And he sleeps there, too.”

  “Oh, that.” She stirred a pot on the stove. “It’s summer. He likes sleeping out in the open air. He used to go camping a lot, you know.”

  “He eats at the soup kitchen.”

  “No, he’s just there a lot because he likes to volunteer his time.”

  “Moo. He pushes a grocery cart around town. Doesn’t any of this sound strange to you?”

  “We all need a place to put our things. I put everything in Junior. He has a lot of important things in that cart. Mike, could you hand me the parsley flakes right above you?”

  I looked through the cabinet among the cans of cat food—for Felix? “Do you guys have . . . a cat?”

  “No, just Felix.”

  I stared at Moo. Someone had to tell her. “Moo, Felix is a clock.”

  “Oh, not that Felix. The stray cat who comes by sometimes. I call him Felix.” She patted my hand and whispered, “Don’t worry, I’m not as bad off as Poppy.”

  That’s when I remembered the Saint John’s Wort. It was worth a shot. Maybe it’d take the rust out of the artesian screw.

  “Hey, Moo? About Poppy. Have you tried Saint John’s Wort?”

  Moo stopped stirring the whitish, glue-ish stuff in the pan on the stove. “We’re not Catholic, dear.”

  What? “You don’t have to be Catholic.”

  She went back to stirring. “Well, it’s usually Catholics who pray to the saints . . . and sometimes the saint’s warts, too, apparently, although that does seem a little strange.”

  “No, it’s not—it’s just—”

  “But Mike, if you think it’ll work, you just tell me how.”

  “This stuff is an herb that helps with your depression.”

  “I’m not depressed, dear.”

  “No, I mean”—I lowered my voice—“you give it to Poppy.”

  “Oh! I see.” She banged the spoon on the side of the pot until the lumps fell off of it. “Okay, where’s Junior? We’re off to get some warts.”

  “Past already gave me some. I just wasn’t sure if you’d want it.” She seemed kind of sensitive about other things, like failing eyesight and being tired or old.

  “Well, of course I do! Poppy needs something. It’s not normal to sit in a chair all day like a zombie, Mike.”

  Poppy made a strangled zombie noise from the other room.

  I made Moo call the doctor, like Past said, and she gave Moo the okay. Moo served Poppy his “special recipe” scrapple on a tray in the living room. Then she made us sit down to eat in the kitchen, but fortunately not scrapple.

  “Well, I gave it a whirl. Do you think it’ll work?” she whispered.

  I shook my head. “I hope so. We need it for Misha.” It hadn’t done anything for Dad as far as I could tell, and I didn’t see how a drop or two of some herb could turn a giant vegetable back into a human being. It would take a heck of a lot more than Saint John’s Wort. It would take a miracle.

  Moo scraped a mouthful of food onto her fork, then put the fork down and looked at her plate. “I know you think it’s shellfish, Mike.”

  I looked down at the lumpy gray-white pile on my plate, too. “Actually, I thought it was tuna.” Then I remembered all those cans of cat food in her cabinet and my stomach howled. “It is tuna, isn’t it?”

  “What? Oh, the casserole? Yes.” Moo scraped the tuna blobs around her plate and sighed. “I know you think Poppy is being shellfish.”

  “Selfish. Yeah, I do.”

  “But he’s really not shellfish.”

  True. I’d put him in the vegetable category, not seafood.

  “You haven’t warmed to Poppy, have you?”

  Warmed? To iceberg lettuce? I shook my head.

  Moo sighed. “He’s doing the best he can.”

  “Moo, no offense, but if he were doing his best, he’d be out in the workshop. Don’t you think his best is a little lame?”

  She patted my hand. “It’s hard for you to understand, dear, I know.”

  Oh, I understood all right. He let everyone else take care of things, handle all the problems, while he just sat there, “away with the fairies.” Like Dad. I understood all about that. I was getting so ticked off that I even started wondering about Karen. I mean, everyone was trying to raise money for her, but what was she doing? So I asked Moo.

  “Oh, my dear, Karen is zipping all over the countryside on that scooter, getting her adoption papers signed, sealed, and delivered. Goodness, it’s a full-time job adopting a child! Well, she may as well get used to it, because that’s what having children is all about. Of course, this is rushed because of the adoption deadline. Only four months to get a child, not as leisurely as the other way.”

  I said, “What other way?” before I realized she was talking about pregnancy.

  “Oh, Mike!” Moo’s eyes were wide. “Hasn’t your father talked to you about sex? Because if not, I can tell you all—”

  “No, no—I mean, yes, yes, he has! I know all about that . . . stuff.” Dad hadn’t told me a thing, but I knew it all from health class, books, and Sasha. And even if I were clueless, I couldn’t imagine getting the sex lecture from Moo. My face was hot and felt red just from the mention of it.

  I quickly changed the subject to our visit with Dr. P. I asked Moo what he’d meant about Gladys and her family.

  “Poor Gladys got a bum rap,” Moo said. “Her mother was awful. Taking up with a new man every week. That’s no home for a child. And who knows where her father went?” Moo sighed. “So, Gladys keeps everyone at a distance. That’s what all those piercings are about. They’re her armor. If she rejects everyone first, then no one has a chance to reject her.”

  “That’s dumb. Who would reject her?”

  “Well, her father, for one.”

  I flinched.

  “And her mother ignored her, which is as good as rejecting her.”

  I swallowed hard.

  “You know, Mike, being abandoned by your parents can make you feel quite bad about yourself, even though it’s not your fault at all.”

  I shrank in my chair.

  “I think the reason she hangs out with Numnut is just to sing in his band.”

  “He has a band?” Then I remembered the amps, drums, and mikes in his pickup.

  “Yes. It’s truly awful. But Gladys’s father was a singer in some band when he ran off, and that’s why I think she likes going to Big Dawg’s, so she can play in the band with Numnut.”

  My toes were wiggling and my brain was firing. “Do you think you could get her to sing on camera? She could do kind of a commercial to raise money for Misha.” I could picture the video already: it would begin and end with the bling-framed photo of Misha that sat on Gladys’s desk. And a donation request.

  “I suppose I could ask her. She might do it for me.” Moo stood up and took our dishes to the sink. “Now that you mention it, giving her a way to showcase her singing that doesn’t involve Numnut is an excellent idea.”

  She grinned at me and I g
ave her a thumbs-up.

  Moo went out to the living room to get Poppy’s plate. She returned at a trot. “Look! He cleaned his plate!” She pointed at the Saint John’s Wort on the counter. “Warts and all!”

  I heard a grunt from Poppy’s chair that almost sounded like “Hey.” A real word.

  Moo grinned. “I think it’s working already!”

  13

  ADJACENT ANGLES

  —angles that share a common vertex and edge but do not share any interior points

  The next morning at Past’s office, we got to work. Past had gotten the laptop as well as the parts I needed for my Pringles Wi-Fi antenna. I put the antenna together in less than an hour and attached it to the back of his bench. I fired up the laptop and . . . it worked! The signal was great!

  “You’re brilliant, Mike!” Past said, slapping me on the back.

  I guess it wasn’t hard to impress a homeless guy.

  I have to say, though, that I designed a pretty sweeeeet website. I mean, how could you not love a page that opened with Misha’s earnest eyes staring at you? Karen e-mailed me Misha’s photos—the one in my Buzz Lightyear shirt and the LEGO one—so I posted them on the Bring Misha Home! website as well as every social networking site I knew, telling the world how they could help bring Misha home. Karen had told me that at first the adoption agency didn’t want Misha’s photo posted online—something about distant relatives coming forward and claiming him—but she said her faith led her to trust that Misha would end up where he was supposed to, and if by some chance a relative came forward and actually wanted him, maybe that was for the best. I didn’t believe her for a minute, but I did believe the next thing she told me: that it rarely, if ever, happens. To be on the safe side, I wasn’t giving a last name. Heck, I didn’t even know his last name. To us, he was just Misha. Karen’s Misha.

  “It’s looking good,” Past said. “How about a tally of the money we’re raising?”

  “Oh, yeah.” Figures I’d forget the part that had to do with numbers. I put counters showing the days left to adopt Misha before the government shut the door—21—and the money Karen still needed—$37,914.62.