Benny laughed. “That’s good, Calvin. I’m going to remember that one.”
Willy looked at Rubin. “Ready?”
Rubin grinned.
“Hey!” I yelped as they picked me up and threw me in the ocean.
I came up laughing.
Getting up at three o’clock the next morning was no party. I set my alarm and put it on the windowsill right by my top bunk. When it went off I didn’t know where I was.
I rubbed my eyes and leaned over the edge to see if Streak’s dark shape was there.
“Zombie day,” I mumbled, rolling back on my bed.
Zombie day!
Instantly, my mind was as sharp as a machete. I climbed down and got dressed, then crept into the house. Lazybones Streak didn’t even peek open an eye. But she couldn’t come with me anyway.
It was dark. No one was up.
Mom had said she would come to the beach with Darci and Stella around eight. Stella wasn’t doing her part until later.
I grabbed a bowl and a box of cereal.
Fifteen minutes later I was heading down to the beach with Julio, Willy, and Maya.
Julio seemed extra quiet, like he still had stuff on his mind. So I kept my mouth shut. I’d ask him later if he got chewed out by his dad.
We walked in silence. That’s how it is when you get up early. You just think and look at stuff until you’re ready to wake up.
The huge crowd of the night before was now a small army of people running around under the bright glare of portable lights. A mass of black power cords snaked out from one of the big trucks idling in the beach parking lot. It hummed loudly, probably waking up everyone in the houses nearby. Benny said it was a generator truck that made electricity for the equipment.
I spotted Rubin and Shayla at a long table with some other soon-to-be dead people, including Ace from school. We headed over to them, staying clear of the guys moving lights and other equipment around.
“Hey!” Rubin pointed with his chin. “Here come the costumes.”
Guys rolled two racks of raggedy-looking rags over to the table.
Shayla giggled. “Ooo, I love this!”
Within minutes we were wearing those rags, and right after that people were painting our faces and going over our costumes with pins in their mouths. When I looked in a mirror I couldn’t believe it was me. My eyes looked bruised, and my face was like I was sick. Someone pulled a rubber wig with scraggly hair over my head.
Holy baloney! I was a corpse!
“You lucky,” I said to Rubin, who got a mask with a hanging eyeball. “I want one like that.”
Willy looked Rubin over. “Can you see?”
“Sure. My good eye still works.”
Maya and Shayla got torn, dirty dresses, and wigs with wild hair that went every whichaway. “This fake hair will still stick up even in the water,” Maya said. “Touch it.”
It felt rubbery. “Cool.”
Willy and Julio got ripped shirts and shorts. Their legs were painted with streaks of gray and purple-black.
Benny walked up with an arm that showed the bone coming out. “Ho!” I said, stepping back. “That looks real!”
“You like it? I made it myself.”
“Really?”
“Uncle’s teaching me everything from makeup to set design to editing. I made some of the sets in My Cousin Is a Teenage Vambie, too.”
“You did?”
“Yeah. At the studio in Hollywood.”
“Wow, you are so lucky.”
“Not luck. Talent.”
Benny looked away. Like even he didn’t believe what he was saying.
“Can you show us how to have talent, too?”
“Yeah,” Julio said. “We need some talent.”
Willy squeezed in. “Show us.”
Benny brightened, like a light switched back on. “Just watch what I do and do that.”
We stood around with the rest of the zombies. Thirty-eight of us, young and old. I knew Ace was there, but I sure couldn’t tell which one he was.
Before we started Mr. Obi checked everyone over. “You’re better zombies than the ones in my last film. This is going to be great. Okay, here’s the story.”
Mr. Obi rubbed his hands together, his eyes twinkling like polished dimes. “You zombies invaded a ship that sailed out of Manila and killed everyone aboard. Then the ship sank in a storm. You are the only survivors. Except technically, since you’re dead, you didn’t survive.”
Everyone mumbled a laugh.
“You ended up sinking to the bottom of the sea.”
“We didn’t drown?” somebody asked.
“Nope. Zombies are already dead, so when you hit bottom you just started walking. It took you weeks, but here you are about to come out onto land again. We will film you coming from the sea in the early-morning light.”
My cheeks hurt from smiling. This was so cool!
Mr. Obi clapped his hands. “Ready?”
“Yeah!”
Me, Willy, and Julio were grinning like donkeys and banging each other with our shoulders. Julio was coming back to his old self now, and that felt really good.
“Remember,” Mr. Obi went on. “You rise up out of the ocean slowly, then shuffle toward shore, where you limp around dazed and confused, and don’t forget you’re hungry—really, really hungry. I want to see starvation all over your faces.”
“Do we eat?” I whispered to Benny.
“No, you just look around and wander along the beach. We’ll film what happens next later today, and some more tonight.”
Mr. Obi checked the cameras, lights, and reflectors that were set up along the top of the beach. One guy marked numbers on a slate, and three other guys set up long poles with microphones on the end.
Lana, the assistant director, ran around telling people what to do, watching over everything all at once.
Dawn hadn’t broken yet. The dim lights made it look like there was a moon out. My friends’ dead-looking faces gave me the shivers.
“All right,” Mr. Obi called. “Into the water. On my signal, submerge yourselves entirely, count to five, then slowly come up and slog toward shore.”
We headed toward the black ocean with the sun’s faint glow just beginning to appear on the horizon.
The water was warm. Except for the sound of small, never-ending waves slapping the sand, the whole world was silent.
I waded out up to my neck and waited for the signal.
Being in the ocean at night was awesome … until I thought about sharks.
Don’t think about that now!
Onshore, unseen behind the eerie glow of movie lights, Mr. Obi called, “Get ready.”
I took a deep breath.
“Action!”
I sank down into a world of snapping and clicking sea creatures, bazillions of them, large and small.
A whole other world.
I started counting.
One.
Two.
Three …
Creeping up out of the ocean with silent zombies all around me was the spookiest, bone-chillingest experience I ever had in my whole entire life!
Just ahead of me, Maya’s wild wig was wet and dripping, and her arms, painted brown and green with fake bones, hung at her sides like on a half-rotted, meaty skeleton.
The sun glowed brighter behind the horizon. Colors started to come alive on the beach, shadows turning into things I could recognize.
I crept closer. Up to my waist, my knees.
Slow, slow, slow.
We made shore, looking lost, hungry.
The warm ocean rolled off me, dripping to the sand.
Behind the eerie movie lights I could see silent people watching us.
I started limping and dragging one foot. It was so fun I had to work hard to keep from smiling at Julio.
We wandered around the beach for about five minutes before Mr. Obi called, “Cut!”
“That means stop,” Benny said.
The sky was pur
ple and pink, with blue on the way as the sun peeked up over the horizon. Mr. Obi raised his hands as if to say, Yeah!
You did it!
I grinned at my friends.
The camera crew began hauling their equipment down onto the sand. Mr. Obi pointed here and there, tossing orders around.
“All right!” he called to us. “We’re going to shoot more of you on the beach. Just wander around aimlessly, and don’t go up to the houses. We’ll do that later. Sort of stay in the same area and look hungry.”
“I really am hungry,” I muttered to Julio.
“Yeah, me too. Maybe they’ll give us breakfast.”
“Shhh.” Benny nodded toward his uncle. “Listen for the cue.”
Mr. Obi spoke through a megaphone. “Mill around until you hear music. When you hear that, turn and start walking toward it. Slowly, remember. You’ve been walking underwater for weeks. You’re tired, weakened, waterlogged dead people.”
That made me laugh.
“Ready! Action!”
We limped around looking confused and hungry, which was easy. The hard part was to keep from laughing every time I passed my friends, especially Rubin, who was probably the best zombie of us all. He had it down good.
Were Mom and Darci here yet? Were they watching?
I was jolted out of my daydreaming when somebody’s dog came running down from a house.
Benny started limping toward it.
The dog backed away. It didn’t know what to make of that ugly thing coming at him.
Benny kept going.
Finally the dog took off and Benny lurched back.
The sun, now climbing into the sky, flooded the beach with new light.
We were almost to the cameras before Mr. Obi called, “Cut!”
I stopped in my tracks and stood frozen.
“S’all right,” Benny said. “The scene is over. You don’t have to freeze.”
“Oh.”
“When do we eat?” Rubin asked.
“Soon,” Benny said. “Brains on toast.”
Standing in line with a bunch of zombies waiting to eat wasn’t something we did every day. It was past nine o’clock, and Mom, Ledward, Darci, and Stella had showed up. When Mom saw us she thought we looked so funny she ran home to get her camera. Actually, she said we looked precious.
Hunh?
The line was slow, but the food smelled good—pancakes, bacon, scrambled eggs, and hot chocolate.
“Hey, Benny,” Julio said. “Remember the time you ate bugs at school? That was so gross. I don’t even know how you did that.”
“Pfft,” Benny said. “That was nothing. One time I ate real brains.”
He gave us a blank look, waiting for what he knew would come next.
We said it together. “What!”
Benny shrugged. “In My Cousin Is a Teenage Vambie, my uncle wanted us to act like we were really eating brains. So we did, just to see what it was like. Cow brains.”
Maya covered her ears. “I don’t want to hear this.”
“They were soft,” Benny went on. “They had to be cooked by a specialist, because if you don’t cook brains right you could get mad cow disease.”
Shayla grimaced. “Eeew.”
Benny looked at her. “It didn’t taste that bad, really. People eat brains all over the world. Calf brains, mostly. People eat everything. Dogs, cats, insects, skunks—”
“Not,” Willy said. “People don’t eat skunks.”
“Sure they do. They aren’t poisonous. You just have to remove the stink gland without breaking it. If you break it you can’t eat it.”
“That’s sick,” Willy said.
Benny shrugged.
I glanced toward the food table. Was Mr. Obi going to put brains in the food so we could act better?
Benny elbowed Rubin. “You ever had in-ago? That’s Japanese food.”
Rubin grinned. “Fried grasshoppers.”
“You can eat them alive, too,” Benny went on.
“Crunch,” Rubin said.
“Stop!” Maya said. “You’re ruining my appetite.”
“My great-grampa ate them during World War Two,” Benny continued. “Just went out and caught them in the grass and ate them. Because food was scarce.”
Maya stepped between Benny and Rubin. “If you two don’t stop talking about this I’m going to barf, and when I barf I’m going to aim it at you. Got it?”
I pulled Julio aside and whispered, “You think they put brains in that food? If they did it for one zombie movie, they could do it for this one.”
Julio frowned. “With Benny anything is possible. Maybe his uncle is worse than him. Ever thought of that?”
“Aiy.”
Julio dug in his pocket and came up empty. “You got any money?”
“Zero.”
“Dang. I was thinking we could get something to eat at Kalapawai Market instead of here.”
“Good idea.”
Willy poked his head in. “What are you guys whispering about?”
“Benny put brains in the food.”
“What food?”
I lifted my chin toward the table of sweet-smelling pancakes and bacon. What a shame to ruin all that good food.
Julio raised his eyebrows. “You never know with Benny, right?”
Willy looked at Benny, who was talking to Rubin about Japan. “What are we gonna do?”
“Come,” I said.
“Hey, where you going?” Rubin asked as we left the line. The people behind us moved up and took our spot.
“Not hungry yet,” Julio said.
“Yeah, us too,” me and Willy said.
Maya was already at the table shoveling pancakes onto her plate with a white plastic fork.
“Suit yourself,” Rubin said.
“We will.”
We ran over to Ledward and Mom.
“Stand together,” she said, aiming her camera at us.
She took her time focusing. She had to ask Darci where to press. Kids always know stuff their parents don’t. Fact of life.
“Can we have some money, Mom?”
Click.
“That was a good one. Let’s do one more. What do you need money for, sweetie? Do you have to pay for that food? That doesn’t seem right.”
Click.
“No, Mom. It’s free. We just want to get something at Kalapawai instead.”
Ledward glanced over at the breakfast table. “Looks like a lot of good food is already here.”
“Yeah, but … come on, Mom. We’re hungry. We’d rather have … fruit, like papayas and pineapples.”
“Here,” Ledward said. He dug a ten-dollar bill out of his pocket and handed it to me.
“Thanks!”
But he wouldn’t let go of it. He kept his eyes on me. “First, tell my why you don’t want to eat that perfectly good food over there.”
I looked at Willy and Julio.
They waited with a look that said, Yeah, why?
I yanked the ten dollars out of Ledward’s hand. “Just in case they put cow brains in the pancakes.”
Ledward’s mouth fell open. Then he threw his head back and cracked up.
There was a car parked in front of Kalapawai Market. Four guys were standing around it.
“Uh-oh,” Julio said.
When we slid to a stop they all turned to look.
One guy in a red shirt laughed. “Look at these dudes.”
They all cracked up.
“Hey!” the red shirt guy called to us. “It’s Halloween or what?” The other three staggered with laughter.
We slipped past them into the store.
“Get something quick and get out of here,” I said. “We look like idiots.”
Julio and Willy didn’t argue with that.
We grabbed three cone sushis and a big bag of red licorice and hurried back to the beach.
On the way, I said, “So, Julio … did your dad chew you out for talking back to your mom last night?”
&nbs
p; Julio shrugged. “Not really.”
“That’s good,” I said.
Julio was silent for a moment. Then he stopped and turned to us. He wanted to say something.
“What?” I said.
Julio looked away, then back. “Well … my dad … he could have grounded me for a month for what I did. And he could have chewed me out, too. But you know what he said?”
“You were grounded for a year?”
“He said we were like the movie.”
I cocked my head. “I don’t get it.”
“Our family is just like Benny’s movie. He said everyone in it has a part to play. Some parts are small ones, like us being extras. And some parts are big ones, star parts, like Stella’s. And all the parts work together to make the whole thing work.”
I nodded. “Yeah, cool.”
Julio shook his head. “Then he said … in our family my part was a star part, and he was proud of me … because without what I do the family wouldn’t work so good.”
“Wow,” Willy said. “And he didn’t get mad at you for mouthing off?”
Julio shook his head. “He just said that and walked with me for a while. We talked about fishing.”
We fell silent after that, and I thought of how lucky Julio was to have a dad like that. But I had Ledward … and Mom. And even Dad, sometimes. We had our movie, too.
I shook my head. Julio’s dad was a smart guy.
We found Rubin, Benny, Maya, and Shayla sitting in the shade of the ironwood trees.
“How come you eating that junks and not pancakes?” Rubin asked.
I grinned. “How did those pancakes taste?”
“Good. I had seconds.”
“Then you must be smarter now.”
“Hunh?”
“Because those pancakes had cow brains in them.”
Rubin stared at me. “What you talking?”
“Tell him, Benny. Your uncle put brains in it so we could act better, right? Like you did in My Cousin Is a Teenage Vambie.”
Benny shook his head. “Nope. But so what if he did? Brains got nutrients in it, like vitamins and minerals. If you grow up eating brains you’ll have healthier brains than if you didn’t. Did you know that?”
Extra Famous Page 4
