Call Waiting

It was funny because when Viola heard me talking on my new phone system, she thought I had gone crazy. She thought I was just talking to voices in the air, voices only I could hear, but it was just a wireless system with one of those tiny earplugs. They don’t even have those where she’s from, I found out later. She thought there was something wrong with me, and she called my father and told him. I knew, because he beeped in on my line a few minutes after she’d brought me my snack. He wanted to know if I was okay. Yeah, I said. Why? Oh, he said, Viola was worried about you. She said you were having a spell. No, I said. Just talking on the phone. And he says, Well, whatever, and then hangs up.

How to Insult Almost Any Species with One Simple Request

(for use by Homo sapiens)

“Excuse me, could you please hand me— Oh … right. You can’t.”

new additions to The Mysterious Adventures of Pancakes Dunst

#9
Pancakes Dunst Battles the Blanket Policy!
On a class field trip to the Chrysalis Comforter Company, the cleverest girl in the world witnesses a contentious management meeting that leads to a sudden worker’s revolution. But who is the CEO so out of touch with the workforce that his decisions incite mild-mannered citizens to take up arms? A Forbes executive profile may hold some answers!

#10
The Ghost of Elvis Has Left the Building
It’s a haunted thrill ride for Pancakes Dunst and best friend Galen! A Thanksgiving trip to Graceland turns into a spooky shindig when a poltergeist interrupts a tour of Elvis’s home. Could this dangerous otherworldly disturbance derail Graceland’s business? And why? Willie the Caretaker seems to want to help discover the truth, but Pancakes is suspicious. Does he really believe the cleverest girl in the world hasn’t seen countless reruns of Scooby Doo?

#11
A Conspiracy of Bellhops
“That’s not my luggage,” the ambassador says, but the man in the red jacket and pillbox hat is already gone. Soon the mysterious metallic cases morph into spidery robots that bear him off to a generic lair of a generic evil mastermind. The world gasps. Will Pancakes Dunst not take action? Not when she’s advancing to the final rounds in an international chess competition. But as play proceeds, she notices the odd uniforms of the competition organizers. What up with the red jackets and pillbox hats?

#12
Alsatian, Dalmatian, Keeshond, and Pug, LLP
The American legal system is going to the dogs! Courtrooms across the country are being overrun by canines with doctorates of law, but these litigating pups tend to turn on juries when verdicts don’t go their way. Pancakes Dunst has her day in court to bring the calamitous counsel to heel, but wait … is that her long-lost beagle Ionesco denouncing her in a press conference? And what happened to his collar? That was brand new!

PLUS!
Pancakes Dunst Doesn’t Have Time to Play With Dolls! Super Deluxe Edition
with two brand-new stories—
“Mullets Over Oklahoma”
“An American Sock Monkey in Francisco Franco’s House”

somebody has an issue with thespians

Almost as soon as Pancakes handed Pastina the casting list she’d worked out for O Socialism!, she found the paper flying back into her face as a crumpled ball. Pastina stared into her friend’s not-all-that-surprised face with not-all-that-unexpected anger.

“I cannot believe you!” Pastina yelled, her hands waving above her head. “What are you thinking?”

Pancakes shrugged and tried to look bored. “What?”

“You hate Astrid Inglaterra. You cut her down all the time. You make fun of her to her face. You started a club that was dedicated only to finding new bad stuff to say about her.”

“You joined it,” Pancakes pointed out.

“Because I’m your best friend, you dork,” Pastina said. “I don’t care one way or the other about her.”

“So what's the problem then? Why do you care that I cast her?”

Pastina looked skyward mock-thoughtfully. “Let’s see . . . um, one, because you never consulted me. Two, you would have totally flipped out if I tried to cast her. Three, because you’ve spent the past six years convincing me that she’s the vainest, most full-of-herself, shallowest show-off on the planet. Four, there was the time—”

“All right!” Pancakes yelled. “I get it.”

“Did I mention that you never asked me?”

“Yeah.”

“Because this isn’t the first time you’ve tried to hijack this musical. I don’t know why you have to be so hard to work with.”

“I’m sorry, Pas! I really just forgot.”

“You did not forget.”

“How can you say that?”

“Because casting Astrid as the lead in the show is a big, big thing. And you've pretty much remembered to bug me with every trivial decision along the way. It’s just when you think I might say no that you just do it first and ask forgiveness later.”

“But, Pas, she’s really good,” Pancakes said.

“I didn’t say she wasn’t good. I think I’m saying that you’re not good.”

“Fair enough,” Pancake said with a nod. “Then we’re agreed. Now, I’m not saying Astrid’s not a leech and a ninny and a bore . . . but she can hit a high C on command. And clothes fit her like she’s a dressmaker’s dummy. And her head’s so empty of any kind of original thought that she has loads of space left over to memorize lines. See? Don’t you get it, Pas?”

Pastina crossed her arms across her chest. “Get what?”

“Astrid’s the perfect actress.”

The Big Cheese in the Woods

Terrance had been on campus only two weeks so far this semester, but he was loving life. If he were a student, the tedium of attending classes, reading badly-copied course packets, and studying for exams might detract from the quality of his days, but he had no such obligations. With vague promises of future attendance and a plea of being “more into absorbing my world’s culture rather than merely studying its facts,” he was now entering his third semester of aimlessness.

“Good thing I’m so ruggedly handsome,” he thought to himself as he stopped along the street to admire his ruggedly handsome features in the glass in front of the display of the ruggedly handsome outfit on the ruggedly handsome mannequin in the window of the Urban Outfitters store. Terrance approved of what he saw, both in the glass and behind it. He would have to get those pants. And it looked like they might be on sale. Score.

But soon he resumed his loose-limbed and confident stride toward his destination. He had made plans to meet a group of friends for drinks, and he was now more than an hour late. Time to make a belated appearance, always leave them wanting more. Maybe tell them the story about the Duke of Wellington. That always got a laugh, maybe even a free drink or two.

Terrance realized suddenly that he was being approached by a scruffy-looking man who seemed intent on presenting him with something. Before Terrance could maneuver around him, the man swiftly opened a small, light brown valise just a foot from his face.

“Hey, dude, looking to buy a pipe?” he asked, indicating the single glass water pipe nestled atop the valise’s foam rubber–covered interior. Terrance wondered at this sales pitch. Surely it would be easier to display an array of pipes for those interested in such things. This method was just too hit-or-miss. You had to know your customer. This guy obviously didn’t.

“Got all I need,” Terrance said brusquely, though that’s not the way he himself would have described the manner of his speech. In fact, he went like this:

“So I’m like, ‘Back it up, dude!’” Terrance told his acquaintances at the bar. He took a large drink of his second microbrew beer of the hour. Everyone laughed out loud at the progression of his story. He pushed on toward its climax.

“Then I turn to him just before I go and say, ‘You’d be a lot better at selling bongs if you’d just go find some head shop and sit behind the counter!’”

The group of people around him—most of them, anyway—exploded in laughter. Terrance grinned and finished off his beer. Someone offered him another.

“Hey, Ter,” someone called to him from nearby, “why don’t you tell them the one about the Duke of Earl?”

Terrance took a long sip of his beer and waved his hand in front of him. “Hey, now, get it right. That’s the Duke of Wellington you’re talking about,” he said, and prepared for the drinks to flow until all hours. He just hoped the aftershave would hold up as well as his hair gel was.

Suddenly he thought he noticed something out of the corner of his eye and turned to get a better look. Whoa, was that waitress checking him out, or what?

and it wasn't like he even checked

My friend Mark told me about a book he'd gotten from the library. It was all about life and simple things to do to get the most out of it. More like an owner's manual than a self-help book, though. It had really helped Mark. I could see how much he'd changed since reading it, and he hasn't gotten a speeding ticket in months.

"Some of it's just mnemonics," Mark said. "Some of it's isometric exercises. A whole bunch of stuff. You should check it out."

What was dumb was that Mark didn't remember the title exactly. "Something kind of boring, actually," he recalled. "The Dynamics of Something Something Something. But, you know, not really 'something, something, something.'"

Mark found the notebook that he'd written the call number on, though, so I got the number and went down to the library a couple of days later to get the book and see what it was all about. I couldn't find it. Mark must have written it down wrong, because that sequence of numbers didn't seem to be where it was supposed to fall.

So I went to the guy who was working that floor of the library and showed him the number. He looked at it, but didn't really say anything. I told him what the book was and that it was The Dynamics of Something Something Something, and he just shrugged. "We don't have that," he said and looked back at his computer so he could ignore me.

Giving Kids the Business

(The Factory Owner’s Song, from the as-yet-unproduced Broadway musical O Socialism!)

[Interior of a spacious, almost cavernous bedroom, beautifully appointed with rich wallpaper, intricate moulding, decorative paneling in the doors, a massive fireplace at one end. Beside a wide picture window covered by crisp white draperies and heavy burgundy curtains is a large canopy bed. Horace Hardstubble, the Factory Owner, sleeps beneath the thick layers of blankets. The lighting from behind the window hints that dawn has just recently broken. As the scene begins, a servant in fine black dress enters from stage right and stokes the embers of the fire, producing a high, crackling flame. He then parts the heavy drapes to allow more light to filter into the room, then leaves. Hardstubble begins to stir, soon sits up and stretches, and in low tones begins his song. The tempo begins slowly, speeding up gradually after every few verses until we reach the rapid-fire, rousing end that sweeps us out of the room and onto the next scene.]

Each day I wake up early
And I’m feelin’ kind of surly
And I roust myself out of my feather bed

The servants stoke the fire
And the flames they burn much higher
As I take a shot of whisky for my head

I part the drapes and peer out
And I’m hoping it’s not clear out
’Cause the black clouds always brighten up my day

Fact’ry smoke is blowing
And I settle back then knowing
That my workers have arrived to earn their pay

’Cause we’re giving kids the business every day!
I don’t doubt the Church might like to have some say
But my profits stagnate when the kiddies play
None of them has got a future anyway
So we’re giving kids the business every day!

[Hardstubble finishes preparing to leave the house through these next verses. As he makes his way out the front door, the priest gives him a hello and a blessing. Hardstubble mounts his carriage, which whips off down the streets, occasionally running down a pedestrian, some of them kids.]

I eat and read the paper
Skipping stories of a caper
Between police and a shiftless, angry mob

My servants help to dress me
And the priest can’t help but bless me
Without me, no parishoner’d have a job

My carriage goes to lurchin’
As we hit the odd street urchin
Thank God Darwin has shown these accidents for

The way of Nature’s weeding out
The able worker from the lout
And it’s not like we don’t have a wealth of poor

So we’re giving kids the business, but what for?
They can work for me or they can find the door
There’s no kid too small or weak to do a chore
In fact, they’ll take work the grown-ups all abhor
So I’m giving kids the business AND what for!

[Arriving at the factory, Hardstubble strides into the main work area, where dozens of dirty, malnourished children are laboring away in hot, dirty, oppressive conditions. A few carry evidence of past injuries: bandages, noticeable limps, missing limbs. A couple have horrific accidents even as these next verses are sung. Any child who appears listless is berated by the obese, angry, florid foreman, who administers his instructions with a quick lash from a small whip.]

The fact’ry floor is teeming
With kiddies, some of ‘em screaming
As they lose an arm or leg between the gears

I wish they’d be more cautious
As their inj’ries make me nauseous
They rust all my machines with their damn tears

My foreman’s a drunken creep
But it matters more that he’s cheap
And he keeps the lads and lasses all in line

Through a fourteen-hour day
With only pennies for their pay
‘Cause I hate to part with money when it’s mine

And we’re giving kids the business, so don’t whine!
They’re all tougher than they look, they’ll be just fine
Not one of my kid’s a day younger than nine
It says so on the papers I make them sign
We’re giving kids the business unless they whine!

[Hardstubble makes his way to his office, which sits to one side of the main factory floor. He closes the door on the noise and the foul air, then shuffles angrily through papers on his desk. He grows increasingly angry and frustrated until by the end of these verses and the refrain verse, he’s shouting his lines out into the factory to warn all the kids not to complain. Then he slams the door and slumps down behind his desk.]

It’s true there’s some frustration
With the threats of legislation
It pays to keep lawmakers on the rolls

Social reformists hate me
Bloody do-gooders equate me
With a baby-eating, monstrous, evil troll

They all forget too quickly
Our economy was sickly
Before my smokestacks turned blues skies to gray

If they don’t like my money
And prefer their noontime sunny
Then they’ll need to find another place to stay

‘Cause we’re giving kids the business every day!
I own the means of production, so don’t say
That I have to let the rabble have their way
If I’ve a mind, I can always cut their pay
I’ll keep giving kids the business every day!

[Still working hard, the kids chime in after Hardstubble slams his door. They sing the first verse in unison.]

THE KIDS
He’s giving us the business
Our lives are on the brink
If T.B. doesn’t get us
We might succumb to drink

[A young boy sings this next part. He jeers as he sings.]

Our parents aren’t much better
My dad is locked away
In prison as a debtor
That’s prob’ly where he’ll stay

[A girl of about twelve sings this part. She seems resigned to her fate, more tired than sad.]

Me mum is a streetwalker
To pay for drink and board
But I try not to fault her
Soon I’ll be on that road

[The kids in unison again.]

Don’t look for silver linings
We faithfully report
No hope is out there shining
For people of our sort
‘Cause life is nasty, brutish, and it’s short!

[A very small and dirty child pops out of a pile of coal.]

RUNT
Like me!

The Brnwgthldinn’n’th Saga

Toth was a giant of a man. Standing astride his domain, a yards-tall heap of steaming, decaying animal dung, he prompted fear and awe from lesser men. They had to crane their necks to gaze up at his towering four-foot-eight frame on those rare occasions when they dared get close enough to do so.

As she stood atop the dung heap and watched the thin clouds slide across the cold, gray skies, his sleek, oil-soaked loincloth flapped about his stout and hairy loins. Toth had seen many a terrifying winter, months of frigid temperatures, heavy blankets of snow, and relentless freezing rain just when he had gotten used to the first two elements. For as many winters as he could remember, his only defenses against the sharp, strangling cold were his inadequate loincloth, the thick, matted hair that covered most of his body, and the heat generated by the decomposition of the dung on which he dwelled. Usually, these basic facts satisfied him. It meant he had all that he needed.

Recently, however, he had started to think something was missing. Not that he could have put his finger on it, but Toth had a new and confounding problem. Not the crunchy crust of ice that encircled his feet from where they sank into the soft peat heaped on his pile of dung. Not the vicious running sores caused by severe vitamin depletion now that most of the plant life had died off and the herds had fled south. Not the fact that he believed his whole tribe to have been whisked away many winters ago by Grntltl, the mighty winter hare with teeth sharper than splintered bone. Not even the fact that he was completely mistaken about this, as his tribe had in fact abandoned him in the night when he’d suddenly become insanely obsessed with protecting against all reason the massive heap of reindeer dung the tribe used for fertilizer and fire.

No, Toth’s problem was more elusive. And to his mounting frustration, it was approaching him now.

Out of the pass through the high, red hills came Depthana, the woman who passed this way every few weeks as she gathered things for her own tribe. Toth watched open-mouthed from where he stood. She was very small from this distance, but he enjoyed watching her small figure stride across the blasted landscape from the pass on one side of the narrow valley to the next, where she always faded from sight. To an objective eye, Depthana did not so much stride as lope awkwardly, half-bent and skittering on rickety legs. Over her thin shoulders she bore a ragged, torn pelt holding together a collection of several score pounds of dried peat. The burden accentuated Depthana’s natural shuffling gait and made her appear even more sickly and infirm than did her poor wintertime diet. As always, Toth’s heart was inflamed with love at the sight.

Toth knew he must do something, but he had a limited supply of reactions to most things. She wasn’t prey, so he couldn’t approach her that way. He had tried that once, charging down the hill of dung, waving a club over his head, and shrieking at the top of his strangely high voice. But then Depthana had fled as quickly has her spindly, calcium-deprived legs could carry her. At the time, Toth at first thought there was something promising in the fact that she left her burdens behind her, that they were gifts of some sort, but it had never happened again.

Ever since, Depthana put a much greater distance between them. She walked well out of her way to give herself plenty of time to run away. So Toth started to think maybe she had been frightened the same way prey would be. It had taken him some months to work out these details. Ever since, he had simply stood and stared. Sometimes he made involuntary noises of longing in the back of his throat, but that was it.

Toth knew he knew he needed a new approach. But that was the only one he’d ever had. It had carried him through hunts, through raids on villages, through one-on-one combat over choice hunks of meat and gourds of fermented grain and spittle. It had gotten him everything he ever wanted. But it didn’t seem to work on Depthana. This was Toth’s problem, and he had only recently begun to understand its broad outlines.

He needed a new tactic. Something that would get Depthana’s attention without sending her screaming over the horizon. Toth reluctantly put down the club he had absent-mindedly been gripping. He picked it up again. Then he thought very carefully and very deliberately put it down. A weapon might frighten her. He would simply call out to her.

“Aaaaaggghhh!” Toth shouted cheerfully, waving his heavily-muscled arms over his slope-browed head. Depthana didn’t appear to react. She didn’t look at him, but she didn’t flee either. Toth considered it a minor success. But then he noticed that she gained speed as she passed the closest approach to his mound of dung. He wanted her to stop. “Uragh!” he ventured. Still she kept her eyes on the pass and hurried along. “Uragha ah!” Toth elaborated, trying to make his point clearer.

His beloved, the long strands of her greasy, sulfur-colored hair obscuring her fearful, wide-set eyes, still seemed to be in a hurry. She had just passed as close as necessary to him as she traversed the valley. Soon, Toth worried, she might not be able to hear him at all. How could he make himself clear? He had to get her attention.

Rooting around in the icy clods of dung surrounding his feet, Toth selected a hefty chunk of frozen feces and tested its weight. If his voice wouldn’t reach Depthana, maybe he something else would. He gauged the distance to her shrinking figure through squinting, watery eyes, then spun around a few times to build up some power and finally let fly with the missile in his adored’s general direction.

It soared through the crisp air, trailing a cloud of debris, and struck heavily on the hard, bare ground over which she was making her trembling way. The icy clod shattered only a few dozen feet in front of her. She tried to jump back at the impact, but her burden still weighed her down. A small avalanche of dried peat spilled from her pack. But rather than looking Toth’s way to witness the wild, over-the-head waves with which he greeted her, she shifted her sack and pressed on even more quickly.

Toth was dumbfounded. He was, however, generally pretty close to being dumbfounded on any average day, so he soon looked to further refine his courtship of the fair Depthana. He stooped to select a particularly round, hefty, and solid piece of dung, then steeled himself for a better throw. She would be impressed with his strength. She would see that he was presenting her with these gifts. She might realize that instead of walking to further valleys for dried peat, she could come to him for all the dung she could carry. Toth took four full spins, then sent the brown, crumbly sphere into the sky with all the might his mighty but malnourished body could muster.

The dung ball traced a gentle arc across the slowly darkening sky, seeming to defy the relentless pull of gravity. Toth followed its path with his whole body, bending himself to aid in its journey to the one who unknowingly held a fierce grip on his heart. Depthana trudged along as fast as she could, thankfully putting distance between herself and the fetid, steaming mound and its hairy, horrible protector. From his vantage point, Toth quietly grunted and tried to nudge the dung ball on its way with jerking movements of his head. Finally the clod reached its apex and began its rapid descent toward the point where Depthana picked her way across the blasted ground.

When it at last came into contact with her unshielded skull, it struck her instantly to the ground. Her massive bag of dried peat landed on her like a massive earthen pillow.

“Ooohhaalaa!” Toth shouted joyfully. He could not have been happier if a mastodon had wandered into the valley on the coldest day of winter and died of a brain hemorrhage at his feet. His heart spilled over with endless waves of excitement, love, and victory. He picked up his club and scrambled down toward the ground so he could rush out and introduce himself to the woman destined to be his bride.

The Morally Ambiguous Boyhood Adventures of Me and My Evil Twin

I didn’t want to get a cat, but Abel did. We convinced our parents, and they said, Okay, but you have to take care of it. Meaning me. And then I realized that he was the one who convinced me about getting the cat, but now I’d have to be responsible for it.

“Let’s go to the movies,” Abel suggested. We couldn’t. We had to stay and make sure the cat was okay. It had been sick.

“It’ll be fine,” he said. But he couldn’t know that for sure. At least one of us had to stay home.

“But either way is bad,” he argued. “If you go, you’ll worry about the cat. If you stay, you’ll know you’re missing the movie.” But if that was the case, then how come he could go?

“Because I know the cat will be fine,” he said, putting on his jacket. “I’ll bring you back some Raisinets.” But the cat wasn’t fine, and the leftover Raisinets melted in Abel’s pocket before I got any.

+ + +

When the camp counselor took me aside and threatened to send me home, I couldn’t understand what I’d done.

“What you’ve done?” he asked me. “I’ll tell you what you’ve done. You scared that whole cabin of girls when you snuck into their showers this morning.” I didn’t know what he was talking about, but I knew someone who probably did know.

“And don’t accuse your brother again,” the counselor warned me. “I’m onto you. Every time you get caught, you pretend it was his fault.” I wanted to say no, it wasn’t me, but what was the point? If I didn’t give in, I probably would have been in more trouble.

Later I told Abel about it, and about how I was put on kitchen duty for the rest of the time at camp. “They can’t do that to you,” he said. “I’m going to straighten this out.”

After supper, Abel took me to the counselor. He told him it wasn’t fair. There was no way to be sure I had done anything.

“The girls know who they saw,” the counselor said. “They pointed him out. Unless it was you.”

“Memories are tricky,” Abel said. “Like, I’m not sure which counselor goes to meet the arts-and-crafts lady by the docks every night after lights out. Even though I've seen it myself.”

“Which lady? Miss Deery?” the counselor asked.

Abel nodded. “If everyone trusted their memories, people might start thinking that guy looked like you,” he said. “Which would be a bad thing for them to say, because what they do out there is against camp code.”

I asked if someone should tell anyway, if it was against camp code. If it was wrong, we should stop it. Abel looked at me. I shut up.

The counselor nodded. “I see your point,” he told my brother. He looked at me. “You’re lucky to have a brother to look out for you. Why don’t we all just forget this ever happened?”

Abel nodded. “That’s what I was thinking,” he said. I wasn’t so sure, but it meant that I didn’t have to have kitchen duty.

Two days later, another counselor said I’d broken into the mess hall and stolen some of the chocolate we used to make s’mores. “If we’d put you on kitchen duty the first time,” he told me, “I bet we wouldn’t be having these problems anymore.”

I agreed that was probably true.

+ + +

Our glee club won the all-district competition on a technicality. The other group had to forfeit. They couldn’t get their uniforms out of their dressing room in time to perform.

“They lost the keys,” our director told us. “So they have to award us the prize.”

“But that’s good if we win,” Abel said. “It will be the first championship for our school.” It didn’t seem totally fair to me.

“It’s still fair,” Abel said. “That’s why there’s the rule. And no one’s going to remember later if we had to sing or not. When they see our trophy at school, they’re just going to know that we won.”

“So it’s good for the whole school,” another kid agreed. Everyone liked the idea.

Later they engraved all of our names on the trophy. It didn’t say anything about the forfeit or about how the keys got lost. It just said that we came in first. Our parents took a picture of me and Abel in front of the trophy case when they came to open house.

+ + +

Abel threw some of his macaroni and cheese with hot dogs in the trash when our mother wasn’t around to see. I told him he shouldn’t. Mom always said there were kids who were starving in other countries.

“That’s the narrow view,” Abel said. “That’s just our species. The food won’t go to waste.” Unless someone got it from our trash to get it, I didn’t see how it was going to get eaten.

“Nothing is wasted,” he said. “Bugs will eat it. Or mold or something. It’s the cycle of life.” I didn’t know what he meant.

“Food is matter, and matter is energy,” he said. “And energy can’t be created or destroyed. Everything’s becoming. So the macaroni is just becoming something else. Just like you will one day.” I didn’t like the way that sounded, but I knew Mom still wouldn’t like it.

“Then don’t tell her,” Abel said. “Why does she have to know about things that would just upset her? It seems wrong to tell her.”

So we didn’t. When Mom came back to the kitchen, she saw that my plate was still full. She told me to eat up, to be more like my brother. I ate.

from The Astonishing Adventures of Pancakes Dunst

#1: Attack of the Left-Leaning Pundits
Earth is invaded by very calm and reasonable aliens bent on taking over the world in a peaceful but absolute manner. To mollify the people of Earth, the media is co-opted by a vast army of intelligent and well-spoken aliens, who try to quell all resistance with their restrained but impassioned arguments against humankind's being allowed to rule itself. Eight-year-old Pancakes Dunst realizes that she, the cleverest girl in the world, is the only thing that stands between freedom and complacent slavery of her planet.

#2: Ooze Gonna Help You Now?
Federated Fossil Fuels grounds an oil tanker off the coast of South Carolina, spilling the ship's experimental, high-performance new fuel into waters once contested by Civil War ironclads and coastal forts. Pancakes Dunst offers her assistance in planning the cleanup to minimize the danger to the ecosystem, but she never expected to have to face an army of Civil War zombies stirred up by the fuel spill. And what about that mile-long slick of ooze floating in the bay? Has it really started talking?

#3: Toeing the Maginot Line
Pancakes’s French Adventure! On a goodwill tour of the European continent, Pancakes finds herself in danger by shady men in long trenchcoats and red berets. The prophecy of the Moroccan Medium points to a family secret left over from World War II, a Swiss bank account in her grandfather’s name, and a lost cinema classic by a reclusive director. Even more baffling, the ghost of Gertrude Stein keeps leaving phone messages with the concierge at Pancakes’s hotel. Now she has no choice but to find the links between these seemingly absurd events and still clear up matters in time to attend a dinner with the President of France!

#4: Night of the Narcolator
How can the cleverest girl in the world fight a danger she can’t identify? Someone is brewing anti-espresso, a high-powered drink that puts people to sleep in seconds. And it’s so popular that entire cities are shutting down all over the world! Pancakes is on the case, but with no apparent motive and no one claiming responsibility, it’s unclear just what the case is. But maybe a new friend named Pipo has some answers. At least, he claims to be a friend….

#5: Calling All Crips!
It’s gang warfare on the airwaves, and no one knows how to stop it before it before someone gets hurt. The city erupts in chaos when citizens are taken over by rival DJs with mind control messages encoded into their music. At first they seem intent only on ridiculous pranks, but as they battle for dominance, the pranks turn more and more dangerous. Pancakes Dunst knows she has to put the scratch on their tracks, but the only people who can help are part of a hearing-impaired street gang. If they can’t hear the music, will they listen to the cleverest girl in the world?

#6: A Night in the Bunker, A Day at the Races
“Does art excuse all?” Professor Gulglitch asked Pancakes as they stood together on the train platform. The bleak, slate-gray sky met the featureless horizon almost seamlessly in the distance. The rain beat down without pity or care. “I don’t even think the train stops here anymore,” Pancakes replied. A feral cat hiding beneath the rotting wood of the platform growled its annoyance at the wet weather.

#7: The Man Who Grew Too Much
Pancakes’s science fair project gets attention from the U.S. military, so the cleverest girl in the world takes a special trip to the President’s Easter party! While talk show hosts debate the separation of church and state, Pancakes and her best friend Galen take a stroll around Camp David in search of colorful eggs and chocolate treats. That’s when Dr. Patchwork, Pancakes’s evil nemesis, decides to make a mockery of the event by scaring off the media with a monster-sized Easter Bunny. Only that bunny wasn’t a nobody. It was the Secretary of Defense in a costume, and now he’s forty feet high!

#8: (Inner) Space Is the Place!
The greatest challenge of her life faces Pancakes Dunst: the holiday play! Special guest appearance by May-tall and the Deuteronomy Crew.

Superspecial Holiday Edition!
Pancakes Dunst Doesn't Have Time to Play with Dolls!
A collection of four special stories, including
“The Last Taco Stand in Berlin”
“Why a Bowler’s Tour, Dad? Why?”
“Slow Boat to Monkey Island”
“What I Did On My Summer Vacation, by Pancakes Dunst”
Plus: Collectible Stickers!

update: a vast wasteland of pixels and light

So my question to all of you out there is ... uh, is there anyone out there?

The blog: Yeah, it's about ego. It's about self-promotion and instant gratification and "Look at me! Whoa-ho! Look at me! Look at what I'm doing!" Thousands of individuals with the impulses of a five-year-old. We may be better at dressing ourselves, and, okay, many of us have gotten a grip on concepts like cause-and-effect and the transient nature of time. Doesn't mean we're not all twirling and jumping and hoping that Mommy looks over and sees.

A simplistic critique? Hey, I'm not exempting myself. And I'm not even using it as a means to head off the essential message of this post: Look at me!

I know it's a silly request. I mean, if you're reading this (or even if you just stopped because you realized I was just going to keep going and you were wondering what happened to the little tennis girl), then you're looking. If you're not, well, my drawing your attention to a forum you're ignoring by communicating over a forum you're ignoring isn't likely to meet with massive waves of success.

This is simply the first time I'm breaking from my pattern of posting bits of fiction on here for you. Whoever you are. You know who you are. At least I hope you do. And since I'm breaking the pattern, I'll just clarify what I've been doing, in case it wasn't obvious. I'm ... oh, gosh, I gave it away just now, didn't I? I'm posting bits of fiction on here for you. Bits of fiction I wrote. Bits of fiction you may or may not have seen before. Bits of fiction you may or may not ever see again.

This isn't a testing ground, exactly. Most of what I'm putting here is in a state that's close to finished. Or I mean to say that it's finished for now, but if were called on to repurpose it for something or have it printed elsewhere, I wouldn't be able to resist giving it a touch-up. But this stuff was put down much as I intended to put it down, and only the passage of time and my own glacial learning process will give me the insight to do much better than I've done here. Also maybe some effort and encouragement. A promise of wine. A breezy tennis date ...

Uh ... oh, so there it is. I'm putting the stuff out there. If you read it, tell me something about it. That is, if you have any thoughts at all. If not, then maybe your communiques wouldn't be of much use to either of us. Too bad, because you seemed so nice at first.

In any event, I'll continue putting stuff here as long as I'm able to cull it, draft it, or crib it from someone else. Shout-outs to CO, Lil' Biscuit, and JR Guttertype. Peace out, ya'll. As my great-grandfather used to say, "Be yourself and you free yourself." We kids never really got what he meant, but when he said it, we knew he was finally tipsy enough not to watch the beer cooler too closely. That's all we'd been waiting for.

We learned so much from that old man.

jalasso pei, part-time potential junior tennis champ (III)

[part two]

Part Three: The Tennis Bag . . .

“Okay, I’m not looking!” Jalasso announced to Tommy. She had her face turned toward the wall, her eyes closed, and both hands in front of her face for good measure. She really wanted to look like she wasn’t looking.

“Do you promise this time?” he asked. The last two times, she had been peeking.

“I’m not supposed to know where my racquet that needs to be restrung really is,” she explained for the fourth time. “So I can’t see where you put it.”

“I know,” Tommy said for the third time. “But you keep looking!”

“Bad habits,” Jalasso said. “But I have them under control now. Go.”

She heard Tommy rustling the heavy black and yellow tennis bag she’d given him. Obviously, she intended him to carry the lamp away with him, but she thought she could provide herself some protection from accidentally giving herself away by not seeing the crime. She tried not to imagine exactly how the lamp might be slipped into one of the side pouches meant to hold up to four rackets on each side. She tried not to wonder if the zipping sound she heard might be Tommy’s putting the cosmetics bag of glass in the front pouch intended for clusters of loose practice balls. And she tried even harder not to turn her head and look at how he was packing the bag once it occurred to her that he might put a couple of racquets in with it, and those might get scratched by that stupid Tiffany lamp. But she couldn’t look! Otherwise, she might end up blabbing if she knew where the lamp had gone. She wouldn’t mean to, but sometimes the words came out of her mouth before she could make them stop.

She heard someone clear her throat at the far end of the room. Jalasso’s mother stood in the doorway of her daughter’s bedroom. She frowned, eyes narrowed, hands on her hips. “Where do you think you’re going, young lady?” she asked.

Jalasso whirled and stared up at her mother in surprise. She glanced over and saw that Tommy had gotten the lamp safely packed away, but she felt her heart slamming against her chest all the same. She wasn’t safe yet. Her meeting with Johann Bjornbornssen still might be lost!

“What?” Jalasso asked, almost shouting in her nervousness.

“Excuse me?” her mother asked. “Is that any way to talk to you mother?” She glanced at Tommy, who stood nearby, looking at her with his usual mix of fear and awe. Mrs. Pei, it was widely agreed, was not only the prettiest mother out of all the mothers they knew. She was the prettiest anyone out of all the anyones they knew. But she was direct and stern and proper in a way that insured she could take issue with anyone at any time, if there seemed some advantage in it. “Hello, Tommy,” she said. “I’m sorry to barge in here like this, but it’s a full-time job keeping up with Jalasso’s comings and going.”

Tommy smiled at the recognition from Mrs. Pei, although it was nothing new. He’d been visiting the Pei house for a couple of years, ever since he and Jalasso met at a local tennis clinic and they found they belonged to the same country club. He nodded and smiled. “Hello, Mrs. Pei. Jalasso and I were going to play for a little while.”

Mrs. Pei cocked an eyebrow in her daughter’s direction. “Oh, is that where you were headed, dear?” she asked.

Jalasso smiled weakly and nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

For a moment, Jalasso was certain her mother’s eyes were drawn to the spot in the room where the Tiffany lamp had stood, but then she continued. “Do we not ask permission in this house anymore? Your father is setting a bad example with all his travels, but this is a home, not a hotel. I don’t think tennis was on your schedule for this afternoon.”

Her mother was angry about the household schedule. She tried not to look as relieved as she felt, but knew that meant she looked plenty relieved already. “I’m sorry, Mother,” she said, regaining her composure. “It wasn’t a for-sure thing. Tommy didn’t know if he’d be able to come, so I forgot to add it.”

“Well, that’s not very good planning, Jalasso. We have to have a schedule, or nothing would ever get done around here. So apologize to Tommy for your mistake, but I’m afraid you have a tea at four. You don’t have time to visit the courts right now,” her mother said. She waited for the outburst that was sure to follow and prepared to threaten the cancellation of tennis camp again. It was one of her better tools for getting Jalasso’s compliance, but of course she would lose that power if she ever exercised it. Not to mention that two weeks free of her bounding, explosive little girl beckoned to her like a distant dream.

Jalasso surprised her mother by nodding once decisively, the way she sometimes did after making a convincing backhand, and turning to her friend. “I’m sorry, Tommy. I forgot to add our game to the schedule. I can’t go play with you today. Please forgive me.”

“Sure, that’s fine,” Tommy said. He didn’t move.

“We’ll have you over another time, Tommy. Maybe you can come for a morning game next weekend and stay for lunch. We’ll check the appointment book and set something up with you parents,” Mrs. Pei said.

“Great. Thank you,” Tommy said. He still stood awkwardly next to the oversized tennis bag at his feet.

“But right now I need Jalasso to figure out what she’s going to wear to the tea party.”

Jalasso suddenly realized how guilty she and Tommy both looked, and she rushed to Tommy’s side and shook hands with him awkwardly. “So I’ll see you soon, Tommy,” she said. “And we’ll play tennis!”

A look of understanding flashed across Tommy’s face and he leaned down to grab the large tennis bag and sling it over shoulder. “Yes, tennis is good,” he said. “I mean, that’ll be good. Playing tennis.”

“Hold on, Tommy,” Mrs. Pei said, and both children froze. “I’ll have someone take that bag down for you. It looks awfully heavy.”

“No!” Jalasso said, and her mother gave her a wide-eyed look as a reprimand. “I mean, that would be nice, but …”

“It’s very nice of you, Mrs. Pei,” Tommy said, trying to pick up the bag as casually as if it didn’t have a ruined antique lamp in it. “But you know how tennis players are. Always building up our muscles.” He hoped he didn’t sound like he was flirting with Jalasso’s mother. Tommy didn’t really know much about flirting, but he was pretty sure that’s what he had been doing.

Mrs. Pei looked unsure, but she stepped out of the doorway. “Yes, I do know how you tennis players are,” she said. She watched as the boy lugged the bulky bag out the door and down the hallway toward the central house. He was a good kid, she thought, and strangely loyal to Jalasso, despite the way she bossed him around. She could only assume that’s who had convinced him to attach the glittery unicorn sticker to the outside of his tennis bag.

jalasso pei, part-time potential junior tennis champ (II)

[part one]

Part Two: The Racquet That Needs To Be Restrung

Jalasso couldn’t believe how obvious Tommy was when he came to sneak away with the lamp. She wanted him to do it right, and she had half a mind not to restore his name to the birthday party list because of his poor performance. It was only the effectiveness of the job that convinced her not to be too hasty. She could cut him from the list for some other trifle, but she’d never bribe another favor out of him if she went back on their deal. She’d just wait another week or so, then find something that he said so offensive that she’d have no choice but to drop him from the invitation list.

She had dumped the contents of her wastebasket into a cosmetics bag to keep the maids from finding the broken glass. Jalasso meant to get a trash bag, but she couldn’t find any and she didn’t want to raise suspicion by asking. Then she thought she might find a shopping bag, but those were all gone. Groceries were almost always brought to the house by delivery, so she couldn’t even find a simple brown bag. At least the cosmetics bag was just a giveaway item her mother got with some boutique purchase. Plus, it zipped, which kept it from spilling.

The lamp itself was a lot harder to figure out. She needed to hide both the lamp’s base and the tangle of metalwork that had once helped define the shape of the stained-glass lampshade. Jalasso experimented with the latticework of soft metal that had made up the shade, and she found she could bend it very easily. But there were still a lot of glass fragments stuck to it, so she worried that she might cut herself and then the cut would get infected and then she wouldn’t be able to hold her racquet right and something like that could very well cost you a match. Better not to risk it. And, really, that was mostly Tommy’s job, getting rid of the lamp. When he got there, he could bend the metalwork in order to make it fit.

She’d told Tommy to bring something to put the lamp base and shade in, because she was stumped. The base would stick out of most bags, and even if Tommy could mash it down, the shade was going to have a weird shape that would be hard to hide. What if she just threw them both out the window and Tommy maybe stood outside and caught them? But her room was four stories up. She’d seen Tommy try to return her own forehand, and she knew he wasn’t really that coordinated. Besides, somebody might see. But Tommy said he had an idea.

When the butler, Marble, announced Tommy at Jalasso’s bedroom door, he mentioned that young Mr. Penchant had arrived for their tennis date. Jalasso tried not to react, but she knew that if she realized she should try not to react, she probably already had reacted with the kind of annoyed look of surprise she always displayed when she heard something she hadn’t expected or didn’t like. But Marble didn’t care as long as he believed Jalasso’s current mischief wasn’t dangerous. Plus, Jalasso had to admit that nine times out of ten, that’s the reason any of her peers came to her room.

“But you didn’t even bring a racquet!” Jalasso complained once they were alone in her room. “That’s not believable. Tommy, please don’t get me in trouble. I’m serious.” Ever since Tommy agreed to come help her with the lamp, she’d been pacing her room, spinning her racquet in her hands, and nervously keeping balls aloft with gentle taps. She kept imagining her mother finding out about the lamp. She could almost hear the sound of her mother’s voice telling the tennis camp that, fine, they could keep her deposit. But no way was Jalasso Pei making an appearance that year at their facilities. She could see all the other girls lined up during the morning clinics, smiling and flirting with Johann Bjornbornssen. And stupid Amy with her stupid blonde pigtails grinning at him with her big stupid mouth and fat, fat lips. It had started to make Jalasso sick with anticipation.

“No one noticed,” Tommy said. “Besides, that’s how we’re taking everything out. In one of your tennis bags.”

Jalasso stopped for a moment as she took hold of the information. She could have done the same thing herself! The lamp was exactly the right size for one of her big shoulder bags. And if she bent it right, the shade would flatten out to be about the size of a racquet head. Of course, if one of the staff insisted as usual that they had to take the heavy items, then the lamp might have been discovered. They’d let Tommy take his own bag, however. Not to mention the fact that she wanted to avoid that cut to the hand that would threaten her game. That was a risk she preferred Tommy take. Still, one thing bothered Jalasso.

“So you’re just taking one of my bags?” she asked. “Do I get it back?”

Tommy frowned at her in disbelief. “Jalasso, you have about twenty tennis bags at least.”

She threw out her hands. Some people just didn’t get anything. “They’re all different,” she explained. “Different sizes and styles and pockets and stuff. And I have five different ones from five different years I’ve been to the Open. So those are mainly just for my collection.”

Tommy rolled his eyes as dramatically as a silent movie star. He shook his head. “Fine,” he said. “I’ll bring your bag back. Whatever one you can live without for a couple of days. Next time I come play you, I’ll bring it back.”

Jalasso shook her head. “And, what, leave your racquet?”

“I can borrow one of yours.”

She flinched as if someone had tried to strike her. “What? Be serious.”

Tommy made a noise of frustration. “Fine! I’ll leave mine. Or I’ll bring one with a head cover with a strap and stick it inside the bag. We’ll figure it out. Can we just get your busted lamp and go?”

Jalasso made a shushing motion at Tommy, although almost no sound could escape her huge, high-ceilinged room. After living through the noises of Jalasso’s first year of tennis obsession at age three, her mother had made sure of that, having insulation put in all around it to keep the repetitive “pock” sounds from invading the rest of the house at all hours. “Ixnay on the amplay,” she said. “You mean ‘the racquet that needs to be restrung.’”

He nodded. “Yes, the racquet,” he said in a monotone.

“That needs to be restrung.”

“That needs to be restrung,” he repeated.

Jalasso nodded happily, her dark, bobbed hair bouncing with the effort. “The racquet that needs to be restrung,” she prompted.

Tommy knew better than to continue. She’d have her way, or he’d never get back on that invitation list. After the amazing party favors of the past two years, he didn’t dare miss one of Jalasso’s parties. And the rumors had already started that there would be drawings for courtside seats at Flushing Meadow. “Can we just get your racquet that needs to be restrung and go?” he asked.

Jalasso bounced once and spun on her heel. “Let me go pick out a bag and we’ll go,” she said.

[part three]

jalasso pei, part-time potential junior tennis champ

Part One: The Lamp!

She was so mad that she wanted to break something, so she did. The Tiffany lamp never had a chance. Jalasso delivered to it a solid two-handed backhand with her favorite tennis racquet and watched in awe and anger as the multicolored glass shards of the antique shade scattered across the room.

“Moron!” she screamed at the high-definition flatscreen television hanging on the wall. On it flashed the pensive face of a linesman under scrutiny for a challenged call on a serve. Jalasso’s favorite player, Johann Bjornbornssen, stood before the official, holding out his hands plaintively. The linesman tried not to react.

“Jalasso Adromeda Pei!” called the weary voice of her mother from down the hall. “What are you doing in there?”

Jalasso whirled around toward the closed door of her cavernous bedroom. She tossed the racquet guiltily onto the canopy bed in the far corner. “Nothing!” she called back, her face in a grimace as she awaited her fate. She’d been warned about the tennis-induced outbursts before, and she was afraid her mother might eventually follow through on her threat to cancel her summer tennis camp enrollment.

“Are you injuring the furniture?” her mother asked, but Jalasso could tell that she sounded no closer. She breathed a small sigh of relief. There was still a chance.

“It was just glass!” she shouted, hoping the way she said it might lead her mother to believe she’d merely dropped a tumbler of water, that she hadn’t attacked her mother’s precious furnishings. It seemed like less of a lie that way. Some future cross-examination might yet require it.

There was a pause. Then her mother called, “Just a glass?” She still sounded no closer.

“Yeeeaaahhhh?” Jalasso said uncertainly. The lie was getting deeper now. She needed to keep her head.

Her mother sighed. “Well, get someone to clean it up,” she said at last. “And be more careful. If you don’t watch out, I’m calling that tennis camp and having them cross you off their list.”

“Okay, I will,” Jalasso said. She repeated it to herself to try to set the information deep in her mind. “I will. I’ll be good. I will. I’ll be good. I will …”

She couldn’t afford to miss the camp. Not that she hadn’t been there before. For several years now she’d been going to it, and she was in the top of the rankings in the Girls 8 to 10 Group. She was looking to break into a higher group this year, to play the older girls who were getting taller and faster already. But that wasn’t even the most important part. The most important part was the man on the television, who was even as she glanced up preparing to return serve on a crucial second-set break point. Because that summer the camp’s special guest pro was going to be none other than Johann Bjornbornssen!

Jalasso leapt lightly at the thought. She loved Bjornbornssen with all the devotion she could muster. And when it came to things tennis, that devotion was considerable, at times obsessively single-minded. It was evident from the posters and clippings that covered most of one vast wall of Jalasso’s room. It was evident in her choice of wardrobe, the majority of which featured blouses, skirts, and dresses intended as tennis sportswear. It was evident from the dozen racquets hanging at the far end of the room, the display case full of tennis ribbons and trophies, the stray tennis balls that littered the floor. And it was evident from the floor itself: a green, playable surface painted with thick white lines measuring a space of 78 by 27 feet.

Jalasso settled herself in a bright yellow beanbag designed to resemble a tennis ball. She tried to forget the awful call that had gone against her beloved Johann and to focus on the game. After all, the match wasn’t over yet. And it wasn’t like it was a Grand Slam event. Not that every game wasn’t extremely important to her, but she had to keep these things in perspective if she was going to do a convincing job of being good. She allowed that maybe she’d been a little hasty getting so mad that she’d broken that stupid lamp.

The lamp! She already forgot about the lamp! She bounded out of her chair and went to inspect the damage. The base of the lamp still looked okay, although she could see that it showed some scratches. She could put it back and turn the damaged part toward the wall. But that would never work, because the shade was beyond repair. Jalasso had been practicing her serve all spring, and she knew she’d hit the lamp as hard as some of her better, faster serves of recent weeks. Even in the middle of her desperation to figure out how to cover up the destruction, she couldn’t help but feel a little proud. She’d pulverized some of that stained glass!

Jalasso heard a cheer from the television, and she whirled around in time to catch the replay of the point she’d missed. Good. It was for Bjornbornssen. Well, she was recording the game anyway. She’d go back and look at the highlights later. She looked around the room and fetched a notebook from the oversized pine desk where she did her schoolwork. Tearing the front and back covers off the notebook, she used the thick cardstock to sweep the spray of broken glass into a neat little pile, then began depositing the glass into a wastebasket.

In a few minutes, she’d gotten rid of the majority of the glass, but she wasn’t sure how to make sure it was all gone. Plus she needed to make sure the lamp and the glass were safely thrown away without raising suspicion. She couldn’t just dump it in the trash and be done with it. The maids wouldn’t want to get in trouble for breaking or stealing it, so they’d probably mention it if they saw any part of it. Jalasso needed someone to haul the lamp away and make sure it was never seen again.

She placed the wastebasket and the lamp inside her closet. Then, skipping over to grab her mobile phone, she settled again in her beanbag chair and watched the onscreen action with rapt attention for a few minutes. Bjornbornssen had held serve, but he didn’t seem aggressive enough in trying to break his opponent’s serve. He was holding back, she decided. Maybe he’d make this an endurance match, betting that his legendary fitness would give him an edge when the man on the other side of the net began to tire. It wasn’t a tactic he’d used much this year, but there was a time …

Oh, but she still needed to get this lamp thing settled. Jalasso looked away from the television screen to prevent being distracted by it again and scrolled through the hundred-something numbers stored in her phone. She found her accomplice’s name in the list and hit the “call” button.

“Hello?” asked the hesitant voice of Tommy Penchant after a few distant rings. Jalasso sat with her hand over her eyes, but she was peeking between her fingers as Bjornbornssen leapt high for an overhead smash, evening the score and going to deuce. She squealed involuntarily at the exciting turn of events.

“Hello?” Tommy asked again, this time with a touch of fear in his voice at the unexpected sound of Jalasso’s loud, high-pitched exclamation. “Jalasso? Is that you? Are you watching a game?”

She stopped peeking at the game and regained her composure. She’d been well trained in her phone manners. “Tommy, hello,” she said warmly. “It’s Jalasso Pei calling. How are you today?”

“What’s going on, Jalasso?” Tommy asked.

“Ah, well, since you ask, I’ve called to ask for your help with something. I have a favor to ask.”

“What?”

“I’d be deeply in debt to you, Tommy.”

“Yeah?” Tommy asked, sounding a little more interested and a little less irritated.

“I would,” Jalasso said. “Birthday-party in debt.”

Jalasso’s birthday parties were known to be the best and the biggest and the most fun birthday parties in three states. Tommy had been both on and off the guest list multiple times over the past several months, depending on how recently he had either pleased or displeased the guest of honor. “Keep talking,” he said, as she knew he would. Jalasso smiled and allowed herself a glance at the television. Bjornbornssen had the advantage!

[part two]

bunnies

I found this photo in a junk store in Austin, TX, and something about it said, "Yeah, I'm worth a dollar."

There's a story here. More than one. I have to wonder why someone assembled this many puffball bunnies. And what happened next? Off to the arts-and-crafts fair? Maybe they were Easter treats? Or did their creator stand before them, these loyal and inanimate subjects, and proceed to read his or her own skewed manifesto?

Draw your own conclusions. They were obviously proud of these creations. But then, why not zoom in on them a bit more? One sees a little too much uninspired home decor. The rabbits don't feature as prominently as you'd expect, really.

Once Upon a Time

THE NOVEL BEGINS, TAKE 1

What he never remembered, even years into their hasty marriage, even after their difficulties conceiving a child and the eventual birth of their pale, serious daughter, even once his initial glimpse of her had taken on for him a mythic quality quite at odds with its humble simplicity, was that at first she had reminded him of an actress he didn’t much like.

THE NOVEL BEGINS, TAKE 2

Of all of Maurice’s awkward poses—and I had been witness over the years to hundreds of them, from the time he skidded across the kitchen floor on his belly at age four to the hard-contested fist fight between us in the barn the summer we were both in love with Tabitha Rosen, to his drunken collapses on the lawn during one party or another to the “incident” with out-of-town strikebreakers that resulted in a new contract for the millworkers but a broken collarbone for him—the worst and last was his graceless, impossible arrangement at the bottom of the cellar stairs, down which I had just pushed him.

THE NOVEL BEGINS, TAKE 3

From where I stood on the red brick sidewalk, it appeared that someone in one of the numerous Victorian duplexes in the immediate vicinity had put out for curbside collection almost a dozen brown paper grocery bags full of lush, multicolored flowers at the height of their bloom, and I couldn’t imagine why anyone would throw away such expensive, well-nurtured plants, but as I drew closer along the street I saw that the bags contained papers, bottles, and cans intended for recycling and that the flowers remained well-rooted in the raised planting bed that encircled a young maple sapling.

THE NOVEL BEGINS, TAKE 4

When she picked up the handset of the pale blue telephone by her bedside and heard Henry’s voice sounding awkward and strained as he suggested their meeting somewhere later that evening, she remembered the several dozen other times he had started similar rushed conversations with her, like after the first time he had broken things off with the “it’s not you, it’s me” line … or during the three weeks she had been seeing Philip on the side and Henry suddenly regained his breathless interest in her … or right after they’d gotten the good news that they were wrong about her being pregnant—both times.

SPAM

Tracy? Oh, I’ll tell you about Tracy. She can’t go a day without getting six or seven e-cards from her boyfriend. I don’t know what he did, but someone should tell him that it might say more if he’d spring for a stamp once in a while. Doesn’t stop her from opening them, though. And then, great, those cheap e-card sites just attract more and more and more spam. More work for me, basically.

You’re actually better than most users. At least I’ve never had to mumble you a warning about porn being against company policy even on weekends. Only to get ignored, for all the good it did. Yeah, keep your eyes open. See who makes a trip down to HR in the next day or two. You’ll know what I mean.

I’m just glad the holidays are over, you know? How many years have some of those desktop Christmas light programs been going around? Doesn’t everybody have them by now? Or the dancing reindeer. The elf bowling. Snow on the desktop. Build your own snowman. Digital snowglobe. And then it doesn’t matter how many damn virus warnings I send out, people are clicking on every idiotic attachment they get.

I could send out an attachment entitled Dangerous Destructive Computer Virus.EXE, but as long as I put in a header that said “Check out Disco Dancing Santa!” it’d spread over half the globe in fifteen minutes. People just love Santa. They don’t care what happens to their computers.

Honestly, I don’t have to be even as nice as I am about all this. This isn’t what I was hired to do, policing people’s e-mails all the time. Network security? I’m like a hall monitor watching people pass notes in class all day. How does this company even stay afloat? When you look at the kind of junk that Leon is passing along to all his college buddies, it makes you wonder about just how much he deserves that salary of his.

No, he didn’t tell me. That’s against company policy, anyway. But if I happen to see mention of it just because I have to approve the gigabyte of vacation photos from when he went to Mardi Gras this year, that’s not my fault.

Anyway, I probably shouldn’t say this, but I’ve met his wife, and that wasn’t the woman in those pictures. But that’s just between us, of course. Unless he wants to take it up with someone else. I can play it that way too.

I’ll tell you what’s really getting on my nerves, though: how paranoid everyone is about their e-mail. Like we’re here just to spy on them. Do you think I have time for that? Just think about how many messages you send on an average day. Now times that by everyone in the company. No way could I read that much e-mail, even if I wanted to! I’m just trying to stay ahead of the dangers, and the only way to do that is to check out the suspicious stuff. It’s not my fault if people can’t be smart enough to send messages without little movie files about office Olympics or pictures of dogs in Halloween costumes. That’s the stuff I have to review. If people would just write to each other about appropriate work stuff, then we’d have no problem. And if they’d clean up their language a little, I wouldn’t have to see the details of their trip to the doctor or the marginally illegal thing they did to their ex-boyfriend.

I mean, just as an example.

The paranoia, though, that’s just irritating. And everyone’s so nice to my face, of course. But I hear the whispering, and, come on, they have to know that if they’re writing e-mails to each other about it and using words like “spying” and “espionage” and “Spam,” I’m going to see that. Doesn’t that stand to reason?

Well, you’re right. I suppose maybe people don’t always know that, but that’s not an excuse. They should know it. So when they write stuff like that, it makes it all the harder for me to be nice about things. Someone writes an e-mail about how the whole IT department is a bunch of Nazis, and the next thing they do is write me some nicey-nice message about how they were expecting this document, and could I please see if something’s happened to it? Yes, please, ask the Nazis for assistance. The same evil people who are violating your rights are really going to spend half a day scrolling through mail queues to figure out if your drop-out, drug-addicted son sent his resume along for you to review. Or something like that.

I shouldn’t even be telling you this, but as far as I’m concerned, sending something in a company e-mail is about the same as putting it up on the bulletin board in the coffee room. The whole privacy thing is such an illusion. You’d think management would be above that … or at least that they’d know that the guy they barely have time to say hi to in the parking lot is the same guy who gets to see when they’re arguing with their wives about how late they’re having to work all of a sudden. And then at the same time has to approve some message from their college-age girlfriend … the one who likes to reveal whether or not she’s wearing underwear and always wants to know when they can get away to a hotel in the city for a weekend again.

Really, when I think about how much money gets spent on those little extracurriculars, it makes it a lot harder for me to deal with the crap salary they pay me. Because it’s not like they’re using their own credit cards to pay for that stuff. Their wives might see that. But I’ve asked Eva in Accounts Payable, and she’s seen a lot of suspicious weekend stays at the Four Seasons for a certain person whose title starts with “C” and “E.” I’ll let you connect the dots on that one.

Look, I’ve got to get going. There’s this whole new virus or something I have to check on, and if I know the people in this company, they’re probably going to cripple the whole network if I don’t keep on top of it.
All that stuff was in confidence, by the way. I mean, people still have a right to privacy, even if they don’t do anything to help themselves. So seriously, don’t tell anyone.

Previously On . . .

She brushes her son’s long, dark hair out of his eyes. He looks up, tears still on his cheeks. “We’ll get through this,” she says. “Together.”

* * *

A green station wagon rolls into a lonely gas station at dusk. Steam rolls out from under its hood.

* * *

“That kid, this station wagon, and about sixteen outfits that are two years out of date,” she tells the old man at the gas station. “That’s all I have left in the world.”

“That’s enough,” the man says, nodding and spitting. “Long as you don’t count on the car.”

* * *

She and her son step into a tiny motel room with twin beds and three different kinds of wallpaper. She drops her suitcases. “We’re home,” she says hollowly.

* * *

She and her son sit at bright yellow counter in a highway diner. They scour the newspaper. “What skills have you got?” the fifteen-year-old asks.

“What’re they asking? I can lie with the best of them.”

* * *

The sheriff tips his hat back and looks at her across his cluttered desk. “How soon can you start?” he drawls.

"Don’t you have to take some kind of test or something?” she asks.

“All in good time,” he says. “It’s not like we have any other candidates.”

* * *

She stands behind a low counter, buttoned up in the light brown uniform of the local police. She speaks rapidly into the microphone of a dispatch unit. “Hey, I just started!” she shouts. “I don’t know if it’s a 3120, a 4711, or a 5150! Just get over there! You can ask the damn cows if they’re being stolen or not!”

* * *

“Your boy’s starting school here in September?” the handsome man with smiling eyes asks.

“Despite my best efforts,” she says.

“I’ll keep an eye on him,” he says, holding out his hand in greeting. “Coach Byerly. Maybe he wants to come out for track?”

* * *

She watches from the stands while her son lopes around the track. Coach Byerly stands next to her. “He’s got some talent,” he says.

She smiles wistfully. “Yeah, so did his dad.”

“So where’s he these days?”

She shrugs. “What can I tell you? He was always a good runner.”

* * *

The boy, now with close-cropped hair and wearing a letter jacket, is slammed against a row of school lockers. A larger blond boy flanked by two friends, points at him threateningly. “Becky doesn’t want nothing to do with you.”

“I agree,” says the dark-haired boy.

The blond boy looks confused. “You do?”

He rolls his eyes. “If you don’t get double negatives, then maybe you’ll get this,” he says, then rushes headlong into the blond boy.

* * *

His mother stands in the doctor’s office, a mixture of anger and concern on her face as she looks at her son with his assortment of bruises and bandages. “How do you think it feels to be dispatching a patrol car to break up a fight your son is in?” she asks.

He looks up at her. “I don’t know. As bad as getting the crap kicked out of you by three football players?”

* * *

The boy sits on the tailgate of an old pickup truck, talking in low tones to a pretty blonde girl with a round face. “Darryl’s always like that,” she says, touching his bruised cheek tenderly. “Don’t let him get to you.”

The boy shrugs. “He already got to me,” he says. “But I’m not going to let him stop me.

They kiss.

* * *

Twin silhouettes of teen boys run across a darkening horizon. A thin curl of smoke rises from a building in the distance.

* * *

The boy is speaking into the telephone in the hotel room, now made much homier. “Becky’s barn?” he asks, alarmed. “Is she okay?”

* * *

Coach Byerly drives speedily through the night. The boy sits next to him, his face an emotionless mask. “This probably isn’t the time, but since your mother and I have been seeing each other, I want us to try to be friends.”

The boy nods. “You’re right,” he says. “This isn’t the time.”

* * *

She sits at her post at work, speaking into her dispatcher’s unit. “I don’t want us to fight anymore,” she says. “I want us to both be happy for a change … at least for a little while.”

Outside the police station, her son is stretched out across the front seat of a parked police cruiser. He’s been crying. The last couple of words his mother just spoke crackle over the radio. He holds the microphone to his face and clicks its black trigger. “Fine. Let’s try it and see what that’s like.”

Forecast

If you were to ask, I could tell you all about your future.

I could assure you about the next dozen years or so, take away all your worries. I could remove the nagging doubts about your choices. I could let you know with perfect certainty whether or not you're on the right path. You'd get a lot more rest, I'm telling you.

For instance, I could tell you that, yes, the choices you've been making will pay off. In your relationship you've invested a lot of time, taken a lot of risks. You've given up a lot. You've made yourself vulnerable, and at times you weren't sure if that would be enough, if that would hold him. But I'm here to tell you it will. He'll remember these things at crucial moments, moments when maybe he's wavering, and he'll choose you. See? Aren't you glad to know? No reason to be so concerned!

But, okay, the next couple of years aren't going to be cakewalks. Not at all. But if you're fully prepared to deal with whatever happens, things will eventually fall into place very much the way you want. That's the truth to cling to. That's the prize. Eyes on it!

How about this? That job in Santa Monica will come through for him in another few weeks. He'll want to take it, and naturally you'll tell him you want him to take it, and so he will. It's the future you've both been imagining. Good job, stable industry, nice surroundings. Hey, I know these things. Trust me. Know what else? Money will no longer be a problem. No more arguments about that, anyway.

Of course there's obviously going to be an adjustment period. He'll move out there first to get set up, find a place to live. It's going to feel like he's leaving, but you'll tell yourself that at least he's looking for a place for the both of you to live. No more of this leaving-your-wardrobe-draped-between-two-apartments thing. If you move, you're moving with him, and that means living with him. Finally. After four years? What was he waiting for, anyway?

This is where there'll be a bit of a hang-up, but you can push past that. You've done it before. You know if you keep working on the relationship, it will eventually come on line again. Is it even worth going into details? It's the same stuff--his maturity issues, his half-formed notions of individuality, his naive ambitions that you've always encouraged him in but that he's never really done anything about. And just like all the times before, he'll come around after a few months. You will get back together. Maybe there'll be a technical breakup, but you'll both forget about most of that in time. Down the road, it won't seem so important what might have happened right before the marriage.

Oh, you caught me! Yes, I said "the marriage." Because after he's come back and helped you pack up and gotten you moved into the new place in California, he's going to pop the question. Not right away, but after another year ... a little more than a year, but not quite two. He'll ask, and you'll say yes, and you'll be so surprised and excited that you'll forget about the way you had been fighting for quite a while by then. Mostly he was just nervous and scared, but then he got around to it. See? Your mother doesn't know everything.

I'll tell you what else she got wrong: that you'd be a bad mother. Nothing could be further from the truth! You'll be an amazing mother. You're patient and kind and loving. You've learned how to overlook inconsistent behavior, to love unconditionally, to be a lot more accepting than she ever was. That'll be obvious from the time your first son arrives less than a year after your wedding.

That's right: your wedding. But you want me to leave you some surprises, right? You don't want to hear whether or not he gives in to having a church wedding. Or about the incident at the bachelor party. Or the tedious details of the "cold feet" conversation. Hurdles, not roadblocks, I tell you.

Oh, but here's something: Your bridesmaids will all hate the seafoam color of their dresses. Nice work!

Where was I? Oh, your son. First pregnancies can be tough, but in the end you'll have a healthy, happy baby boy. A lot like his father, actually. As he gets older, you'll see just how much, but he'll always have your eyes. You can see it when he squints, especially. And when he laughs, you'll swear your little brother is in the room again. Your husband will adore him, and he'll adore you just for being his mother.

You'll never know a more stable time than those few years right after his birth. And there will be one bright June day when the three of you go out to the ballpark for the first time as a family. Your husband will be bursting with pride as he tells your son with hushed excitement just what all those men are doing down there on the diamond. Around the fifth inning, with your husband's favorite team since his own boyhood leading eight runs to two, both of the men in your life will look over at you at the exact same time and smile.

Decades later, you'll look back on that moment as the happiest in your entire life. Promise.

Popular Monsters and Their Primary Antisocial Characteristics

Frankenstein’s Monster: Unpredictable violence; undeveloped conversational skills

The Mummy: Slow, relentless mauling; poor hygiene; adherence to obscure, rigid religious beliefs

Zombies: Slow, relentless mauling; poor hygiene; clannishness

Dracula / vampires: Narcissistic charm punctuated by bloodletting; superiority complex; Eurocentricity

Werewolves: Tendencies toward primal behavior; lunar obsession; parasite infestations

Crazed robots/computers: Superior attitude; monotonous modes of expression; inability to compromise

Demonic manifestations: Absolutist thinking (reliance on “good vs. evil” paradigm); overt need to provoke through unpleasant appearance, behavior, smell, etc.

Ghosts: Inability to let go of the past; tendency toward shocking behavior, followed by flight

Poltergeists: Same as above, but with property damage; acting out; pathological fixation on the young

Gigantic monstrosities/swarming hordes/environmental threats of all kinds: Arrogant, finger-wagging reminders of our own fears of modernity; reductionism; knee-jerk mistrust of science and progress

Invaders from space: Xenophobia; delusions of grandeur; reliance on complicated means of asexual reproduction; occasional gunplay

The lone, indestructible killer: Sociopathy; low self-esteem; misuse of edged weapons, power tools, and farm implements