The Battle of the Red Hot Pepper Weenies Page 5

  “Oh, don’t the two of you look cute,” Deb’s mom said. She walked over to the couch and gave Deb a hug. Then she reached down and patted Anne. “What an adorable pair.” She raised her other hand, which held a brush, and started brushing Anne’s hair.

  “We’re not a pair,” Deb muttered. Her own scalp tingled as she spoke. She turned away from the doll and continued working on her homework, trying to ignore the tuneless drone of her mother’s humming.

  Anne joined the family for dinner that night. Once again, Deb’s mom set a plate for the doll. At least she didn’t give her any food, Deb thought as she ate her meal.

  That evening, after the three of them watched television, Deb’s mom stood up and said, “Bedtime, Deborah Anne.”

  Deb was about to answer when she realized that her mom was talking to the doll. Deborah Anne? Deb thought. It must have been a slip. A stupid slip. “Fine,” she muttered as she went upstairs to get ready for bed. “If that’s what she wants. Just fine. They can have each other.”

  She stomped down the hall to the bathroom. When she finished brushing her teeth, she walked into her room.

  Anne was sitting on her bed. Deb froze in the doorway. Down the hall, she could hear her mom in her own bedroom. “I’ll be there in a minute to say good night,” her mom called.

  Deb sat at the foot of the bed, far from Anne. Her mother came in and said good night to them, looking straight at the doll the whole time. As soon as her mom left, Deb tossed Anne up onto her shelf. Hard. She smiled at the sound of the doll’s head smacking against the wall.

  Sleep tight, Deb thought as she crawled under the covers.

  Deb woke in the middle of the night with a headache. She knew, without checking, that Anne was tucked in next to her again. Deb closed her eyes, curled up with her back to the doll, and tried to sleep.

  The next day, after school, Deb had an idea. She’d fix things so Anne didn’t look like her anymore. Then her mother would snap out of this weirdness. “Shock her right out of it,” Deb said as she went to the kitchen and grabbed a knife.

  “Plastic surgery,” she muttered. “A little off the nose. A little off the cheeks. A whole new face.” She was halfway to the couch when her mom’s scream locked her in her tracks.

  “What are you doing?” her mom asked, pointing at the knife.

  Deb shrugged and spat out the first lie that came to mind. “Nothing. I was just going to trim her hair. The bangs are too long.”

  “With that? Have you lost her mind?” Her mom snatched the doll from the couch and wrapped her arms tightly around it, cradling the doll against her chest. “There, there,” she crooned. “It’s all right.”

  Deb turned away and went back to the kitchen. Her chest felt so tight, she could hardly breathe. She put the knife back in the drawer, then sat at the table.

  A while later, she heard steps.

  “Deborah Anne forgives you,” her mom said. “She’s very understanding. Everyone says she’s a perfect doll.”

  Deb nodded, but didn’t look up at them. She heard her mom put the doll on a chair. Her own breath came more easily now.

  “I don’t want her in my room tonight,” Deb said.

  “Sure you do,” her mother said. “Besides—it’s her room, too.”

  “No, it isn’t!” Deb shot up from the chair and leaned toward her mom. “It’s my room. She’s a doll! She isn’t real!”

  Her mom reached out and placed her hands over the doll’s ears. “Ssshhhhh. I don’t know what’s come over you.”

  Deb stormed out of the house. She walked aimlessly for blocks, dreaming of how she was going to destroy the doll. The house was dark when she got home. Her mother had gone to bed. She didn’t even wait up for me, Deb thought.

  Upstairs, in her room, the doll waited for her. It was on her bed, tucked under the blanket. Deb’s favorite bracelet was fastened around the doll’s neck. Her mom must have put it there.

  “Enough!” Deb said. She raced across the room and grabbed the doll. She fumbled with the catch on the bracelet, then stopped. She was afraid that she’d break the chain. There was an easier way to get it off. A much more satisfying way. She twisted the doll’s head, eager to rip it right off the body. In her mind, she saw herself throwing the head through her window. In her mind, she saw herself screaming at her mother, telling her how wrong all of this was. In her mind, she saw the world returning to the way it once had been.

  In her neck, she felt a slash of tearing pain that hurt beyond anything she could imagine.

  The doll dropped from her fingers and fell to the bed. Deb staggered back, grabbing her injured throat. She crashed into the wall, then sank to the floor. A weak gasp came from her lips. She couldn’t raise her voice above a whisper, or turn her head to the front. On the bed, she saw the doll, its head twisted at an unnatural angle.

  “Deb!” her mother cried, racing into the room.

  Deb reached out a hand and mouthed the word “Neck.”

  Her mother sped past her. She grabbed the doll and cradled it in her arms. “Yes, your poor neck. How awful. Oh, dear. Don’t worry, I’ll get you taken care of. You’ll be fine. You’ll be just fine, Deborah Anne. I promise.”

  She rushed from the room, still talking to the doll. “Don’t worry. I know someone who can fix you. She lives right across town.”

  Deb, struggling to swallow, watched her go. A half hour later, as she sat on the floor in a corner of her room, her neck suddenly felt better. She knew the doll had been repaired.

  Her mom would be back soon. Her mom and Deborah Anne. Perfect Deborah Anne who never disobeyed. Who never sulked or pouted. Who never grew older. “No,” she said aloud. “I’m Deb. She’s just a doll. I’m Deb. Not her. Me.”

  But even to her own ears, her voice sounded flat and empty. Not human, really. Not very much alive at all.

  WHAT’S EATING THE VEGANS?

  I love Thanksgiving. Or, at least, I did until about half an hour ago. That’s when my cousin Krystal and her family showed up. She’s a lot older than I am, and has a husband and two gooey little kids. They were passing through Pennsylvania today on their way down to Florida, so Mom and Dad invited them to join us for dinner. On Thanksgiving. Which is the absolute worst day in the world to sit down at a table with vegans.

  I hadn’t even known that word before today. Here’s how I learned it. Right after Cousin Krystal and her family came through the door, she handed Mom a big box wrapped in foil. “I brought a tofurkey,” she said.

  “What’s that?” I asked. It almost sounded like a bad word.

  “A tofu turkey,” she said. “We’re vegans. We don’t eat meat or fish or milk or eggs.”

  “Meat is murder,” her daughter, Aggy, said.

  “Meat is tasty,” I said.

  “Now, Eric, you need to respect other people’s beliefs,” Mom said.

  And they don’t have to respect mine? I kept my mouth shut.

  Mom put the tofurkey in the oven. I helped set the table. Aggy and her little brother, Sam, followed me around. “Do you have any companion animals?” he asked.

  “What?” I didn’t have a clue.

  They both looked at me like I was stupid, then said, “Dogs or cats?”

  “You mean pets?” I asked.

  “That’s what unethical barbarians call them,” Aggy said. “Civilized people call them companions.”

  “Yeah. I’ve got a companion. He lives in a bowl of water in my bedroom. He stinks at keeping me company because every time I take him out of the water so we can do stuff together, he starts to die.” I did an imitation of a gasping fish. I think it was pretty good. My second cousins thought otherwise.

  “Mom!” Aggy shouted, “Cousin Eric is being mean.”

  “You stink,” Sam said. “Fish killer.”

  Mom shot me a glare wrapped in a long sigh, which I knew was a dangerous combination. But I could tell that Dad was struggling not to laugh.

  The real food was ready, so we sat down at the table
. “Happy Thanksgiving,” Dad said. He put the turkey on the table and picked up the carving knife. The bird was a beauty. Twelve pounds, fat and juicy. And it came from the local turkey farm, right across the river. I couldn’t wait to bite into a drumstick. At least I wouldn’t have to fight my second cousins for one.

  “Happy turkey slaughter day,” Aggy said.

  I turned toward her and made a slashing motion with my knife. “I’m pretty sure most of the turkeys were slaughtered a couple days ago.”

  “Mom!” Aggy shouted. “Make him stop!”

  My mom shot me another glare. I shut up. But Cousin Krystal kept lecturing us. “Meat is ruining the whole planet. They put all sorts of hormones in cattle feed. And all that stuff washes into the rivers and pollutes everything. It’s a miracle there aren’t giant fish or something flopping on the banks. On top of which, you’re two miles from a nuclear reactor, and less than three miles from a pesticide plant. It’s amazing you all aren’t mutants or giants.”

  “Or giant mutants,” I muttered, just loudly enough for Dad to hear.

  “Meat pollutes your whole body,” Cousin Krystal said.

  “Vegans are healthier,” Aggy said. “We make better athletes. I’ll bet I can run faster than you.”

  “Mmmmmm, nice thick gravy.” I licked my lips. “Some things aren’t meant to run. Like gravy.”

  After I finished the drumstick, which I purposely chewed with my mouth open while staring at Aggy, I got a slab of white meat and drowned it in gravy.

  “Animals have feelings, too,” Cousin Krystal said.

  “This one feels crispy,” I muttered. I kept my voice down, but Dad flashed me a smile. He loves steak.

  I was just helping myself to thirds when the side of the house crashed in. I heard the loudest gobbling sound in the world, and a giant turkey burst into the dining room. It was so tall, its comb touched the ceiling.

  “Run!” Dad shouted.

  We all scrambled outside through the opening in the wall. The turkey in our house wasn’t alone. I could see several more giant turkeys making their way across the river from the turkey farm.

  We raced out of our yard and headed up the hill behind the house. I was feeling a bit sluggish from all that food. Aggy hadn’t exaggerated about her foot speed. She and the rest of the vegans got way ahead of us. As Cousin Krystal reached the top of the hill, she paused long enough to taunt me. “See? Meat will get you killed. You pathetic carnivore.”

  She might be right. The turkeys were catching up with us.

  “At least my last meal tasted good!” I shouted as I tried for a final, desperate burst of speed. I stumbled and fell. I was too stuffed to get up.

  Seconds later, one of the turkeys hovered over me. It pecked at my leg, sending a jolt of agony through my thigh. I braced myself for another peck, but the turkey paused and cocked its head, as if thinking. Instead of attacking me, it did something I didn’t know birds could do. It spat. Then it shuddered, gobbled some giant turkey sounds at its giant turkey friends, and raced past us meat eaters, heading up the hill toward the vegans.

  “I hope they don’t like the taste of vegans, either,” I said. As much as I didn’t want to have another meal with the vegans, I didn’t really want them to become a meal, either.

  The shrieks that came from the other side of the hill a couple moments later told me I hadn’t gotten my wish. So, while these particular turkeys aren’t vegans themselves, it turns out that, unlike me, they like having vegans for dinner. Go figure.

  Mom got up and dusted herself off. “There’s pie,” she said.

  “Sounds good,” Dad said. “And we can have sandwiches later. There are plenty of leftovers. That was one large bird you cooked for us this year.”

  “I’ve seen bigger,” I said.

  Dad grinned at me. “I guess we’ll always be able to say that.”

  Mom and Dad headed down the hill. I followed. Dad was right. Pie sounded good.

  LET’S HAVE A BIG HAND FOR GERALD

  The first sign was the left glove. Gerald tugged at it and managed to get it on. But it felt tight. The right one had slipped over his hand with no trouble.

  “Mom, my glove is tight,” he called.

  “It probably shrank when it got wet,” she called back from the living room. “It’s leather. It’ll stretch.”

  But the glove didn’t stretch. The next day, Gerald looked for his old gloves. They were wool. Wool definitely stretched.

  The second sign, a week or so later, appeared when Gerald was washing his hands. This happened rarely enough, but he’d gotten ketchup on them while he was eating his fries. As he rubbed them together under the water, he noticed that the left hand definitely seemed larger.

  “Mom,” he called, “my left hand is bigger than my right hand.”

  “People aren’t perfectly symmetrical,” she called back.

  Gerald wasn’t sure what that meant. He dried his hands, put on his right glove, forced on his left glove, which stretched so much, he could see his skin through the knitted wool, and tried to put on his jacket. But his left hand wouldn’t fit through the sleeve.

  “Mom,” he called. “My jacket doesn’t fit.”

  “People grow,” she called. “Look in the closet for another one.”

  Gerald searched through the closet. He found a coat with bigger sleeves. It hung way past his knees, but he didn’t care.

  A month later, that coat didn’t fit, either, but the weather had grown warm enough so he could get by with just a sweater—which wasn’t too hard to tug on.

  Soon after that, Gerald realized he had to stop putting anything in his left pants pocket because there was no way he could reach in to take stuff out.

  His left hand was a lot bigger than his right. A month or so later, this became a real problem.

  “Mom. I can’t get any of my shirts on,” he called.

  “It’s warm enough to go shirtless!” she yelled back.

  So he did. Eventually, his fingertips started to bleed. Gerald realized they were scraping the ground when he walked. He found his old wagon and put his hand in it. That was better. But even with the wagon, his shoulder was starting to ache all the time.

  He went inside. “Mom, can you look at my hand?”

  “Stop being such a baby,” she called back.

  “Please?”

  “Oh, come in then,” she said. “But hurry up. The commercial’s almost over.”

  Gerald walked down the hall to the living room. He went through the doorway and squeezed past the gigantic left foot that was propped on a stool near the couch.

  “What’s the problem?” his mom asked. She didn’t look away from the television.

  “Nothing,” Gerald said. Sighing, he dragged his hand back into the hallway.

  BIRD SHOT

  I think summer camp was invented by the same person who dreamed up opera. There’s no reason for it to exist, nobody except grown-ups thinks it’s a good idea, and it can cause an extreme amount of misery for everyone involved.

  So there I was, unpacking my clothes in cabin five at Camp Wamaguchi. Right after I jammed the last of my T-shirts into the locker and tossed out the vitamins Mom had packed for me, the kid at the end of the row waved me toward his bunk. He was a heavy kid—but not really fat—with a bad haircut and a nice shirt. I noticed he chewed his fingernails.

  “Come here,” he whispered. He glanced around like he was making sure none of the counselors was nearby.

  I could have said, No, you come here. Or I could have ignored him. But I went. There’s no point making enemies on the first day. “What?”

  “Check it out.” He leaned down and slid something out from under his bunk. It was a blanket. Actually, something wrapped in a blanket. He pulled back a corner. I saw brass and wood. Now he had my interest.

  “BB gun? I asked.

  “Yup.” He dropped the blanket back in place, slid the gun back under his bed, and winked at me. “We’re going to have some fun this summer.”


  A minute later, we all got called outside so we could meet one another. The kid’s name was Elton. I noticed he didn’t participate all that much in any of the activities. Mostly, he hung back and kept looking at our cabin.

  That evening, after dinner, when we were supposed to be reading quietly and not bothering the counselors, Elton said, “I’m going shooting. Want to come?”

  “Sure.” My cousin had a BB pistol. I liked plinking at cans and stuff. I followed Elton outside. We snuck along the path away from the counselors’ cabins and followed the trail downhill to a large clearing.

  Elton finally stopped in the center of the clearing. “There’s one.” He pumped the lever, raised the BB gun, and fired off a shot.

  I followed the line from the muzzle to the sky and saw a bird about twenty yards away.

  “Not cool,” I said. “You shouldn’t shoot at birds.”

  “It doesn’t hurt them,” Elton said. “It’s just a little BB.”

  He spun away from me and shot at another bird. This one was closer. I thought I saw it startle, but it kept flying and didn’t seem to be injured.

  “Want a shot?” he asked, holding out the BB gun.

  “No, thanks.”

  “Chicken?”

  “Not me.” I grabbed the gun, pumped it, and waited to spot a bird. They weren’t hard to find. They were heading to their nests to settle down for the evening. When I saw one, I aimed a bit low before I fired.

  “I think you missed,” Elton said.

  “I’m not much of a shot.”

  “Stick with me,” he said. “I never miss.”

  I stuck with him until he was done, but promised myself I’d make an excuse the next time he wanted to go out. I really didn’t think it was fun to shoot at animals. I mean, hunting was one thing. I had relatives who hunted. But this wasn’t hunting. It was something sick and evil, and it told me as much as I needed to know about Elton.

  He invited me out again the next evening, but I said I had to write some letters. I found another excuse the day after that. Elton just shook his head and said, “You’re no fun.” I figured that was the end of it.