The Encyclopedia of Me

by Karen Rivers

  Halloween

  The last day of October, during which everyone dresses up and demands candy from the neighbors or goes to a party and screams when they put their hand in a bowl of spaghetti labeled “brains.”

  Last year for Halloween, Freddie Blue and I dressed up as dice. It was wildly funny. We did this whole thing where people would pretend to toss us and we pretended to roll around and we’d land on a different number each time. Actually, now that I’ve written that down, it sounds incredibly stupid, so you’ll just have to take my word for it when I say that it was hysterically funny. Freddie Blue peed her pants, but you couldn’t tell at all because she was wearing a box.

  See also Anderson, Freddie Blue; BFF.

  Haywire

  Another word for “out of control.”

  Lex is in a band called Haywire. If by a “band,” I mean “a group of boys who never actually practice but sometimes scream into microphones during parties or at ‘talent’ shows, which they have never won.” Originally, it was meant to be a band for Lex and Seb, both, but Seb hates music. Especially the kind of music that Lex plays. He says it makes him feel like he’s been put into a blender with a bunch of nails and broken glass and tinfoil and then blended at high speed.

  He is not wrong.

  So Lex is on his own. Secretly, Lex thinks that one day Haywire will be famous and will make billions of dollars and he will have enough money to take care of Seb forever, like when we are grown-ups and Mom and Dad are dead. I know this because I read it on the laptop. I guess he was trying to write a blog but didn’t realize that the Internet was involved and never got around to uploading it during his allotted thirty minutes. His attention span is quite short. The file was called “haywire.doc.” How could I know it was private? When he caught me reading it, he deleted it and everything else on the laptop’s hard drive too. He was grounded for a week, which did nothing to get my stuff back. I am still mad.

  Haywire is also how Seb gets when he is melting down. “Meltdown” is the correct word for “going haywire,” according to Charlotte Ellery, who is a big fan of using only the right word for anything, so if any of us say, “Seb went haywire,” she sighs and looks depressed, like she can’t believe we never listen. Then she says, “Actually, what you mean is that Seb had a meltdown, as is common among people with autism.”

  Honestly, I don’t see what difference it makes.

  Worse, I’m the “trigger.” The Haywire Trigger. Maybe Dad should call me that instead of the Peacemaker. Because it would probably be more true.

  Like yesterday, Seb went haywire. And it was my fault.

  I was writing my book when the boys came tumbling into the room, knocking over the mail, a glass of milk, and a table lamp,66 much like two unattractive ponies who have accidentally had a double-shot espresso.

  “What are you so happy about?” I said.

  “We’re going to be in Everybody magazine!” said Lex.

  “Give me five, Seb, my man, my bro, my brown, my MAIN FAME.”

  Seb slapped his hand. “European green crabs are now living at our beach,” he said.

  “Gosh,” I said. “That’s scintillating, Seb.”67

  “What I wouldn’t do to see a Chinese mitten crab,” he said. “Want me to draw you a picture of one?”

  “Hey,” said Lex. “You can tell that to the people from Everybody magazine. About the crabs.”

  “Really?” said Seb. “Cool. Maybe I could catch one for them, if I can find one. They’re hard to find. I wonder if they’d wait if I took a long time to find one.”

  Then for some reason, I said, “Everybody magazine! Gosh, that’s exciting. Imagine all those hundreds of cameras snapping your picture, Seb. Over and over again. Picture after picture after picture. I can’t imagine a crab would like that.”

  I knew it was mean, but still, Seb did not freak out.

  “Pictures?” I repeated. “Of you? With a camera?”

  Seb shrugged and said, “You’re crazy, Freckles. Must be a freckle in your brain. Freckle-brain.” He laughed his I-am-a-weird-maniac laugh.

  Lex laughed too. They have the exact same laugh. It’s like being trapped in some kind of nightmare echo chamber of bullying brother laughter. “Freckle-brain, good one. Hey, I wonder if Freckles does have freckles in her brain. That’s hilarious!”

  “Shut up,” I said. “You’re bullies.”

  “Bullies who will be in Everybody magazine,” said Lex.

  “Don’t call me names,” said Seb. “Don’t call me a bully.”

  Then Dad came clomping into the room, wiping grease off his hands. “I heard you talking about Everybody!” he said. “This is going to be so great.”

  “Whatever,” I said. “Big deal.”

  “It IS a big deal,” he said, grabbing me off the couch and whirling me around the room and then throwing me back, nearly breaking my neck. “I’m getting the video camera! Let’s interview each other about how it feels to be famous.” He turned the camera on and started this pretty bad voice-over about how we’re going to be in Everybody magazine. And then.

  Then.

  The minute the camera hit Seb, he started an A-1 haywire meltdown freak-out. Whatever Charlotte Ellery wants to call it, it doesn’t change what it was.

  Which was terrible.

  I won’t say what he said, but it was a lot of swearing and yelling. At me. At everyone. When he gets like this, he’s said that he actually doesn’t even really see anyone else, but it sure seems like he does. Then he started hitting himself on the head with one of the encyclopedias. I think it was S.

  It was really hard to watch, but also hard to know what else to do. Sometimes when it happens, I feel like I become part of the wall. I am invisible. And I can’t move. I can’t look away. What happens to Seb seems totally private, but he does it in such a berserko way that it’s completely public, so you look. Even when you shouldn’t. Even when you don’t want to.

  Dad tried to wrestle the book out of his hands, and the rest of the pile of encyclopedias teetered and fell in a cloud of gold dust. The fan hit the floor and Hortense jumped and meowed so loudly, everything paused for a second while we watched her climb up the drapes. Then Seb let go of the book, pushed Dad off, and ran up the stairs into his room. He was sweating. His hair was soaked.

  He slammed the door so hard I could hear Lex’s signed, framed poster of LeBron James smashing on the floor. Then I heard Seb throwing more stuff around. I could see Lex’s jaw working, but he didn’t say anything.

  Dad sighed and put the camera down as though it weighed a thousand pounds. For a second, he leaned on the table. It almost looked like he was going to cry. Lex went, “I’ll go.”

  And Dad said, “No, I’ll do it.”

  “I don’t mind,” said Lex. “No big.”

  “Lex!” shouted Dad. “I’m going.”

  “Fine,” said Lex. “Whatever. Do your thing.” He sat down on a chair and started tipping it backward.

  “Stop it,” I mumbled.

  “Don’t tip the chair,” said Dad. Lex ignored him.

  “DON’T TIP THE CHAIR!” Dad repeated.

  “STOP IT!” I yelled. “It’s not Lex’s fault!”

  “HE’S TIPPING THE CHAIR!” yelled Dad.

  “BUT HE ISN’T WHY YOU ARE MAD!” I shouted.

  “Hey,” said Lex. “Forget it. It’s fine. I’m not tipping. See? Nice work, Peacemaker.”

  “Don’t call me that,” I said.

  “Guys,” sighed Dad. “Oh, forget it.”

  We listened as Dad went and knocked on Seb’s door and Seb screamed, “Go away! Get the #^&@^&# out of here!”

  Dad called, “Go ahead, guys, go outside.”

  “But . . .” I started.

  “GO,” he said. “NOW.”

  Dad gets way stressed out when Seb’s in his rage cycle. I should also mention that Dad handles Seb completely differently than Mom does. Mom’s done a lot of research and has all these elaborate steps that she follows, and t
he step she’d take right then would be to ignore Seb entirely. It’s part of the chart that she has attached to the fridge.

  Dad is the opposite. He always goes in and tries to hold on to Seb and hug him and go on and on and on about how much he loves him until Seb snaps out of it. Mom gets so mad when he does that. She says he’s positively reinforcing the behavior.

  Anyway, I didn’t need to be told to go twice. I followed Lex out the door. “Whooo!” I yelled. I don’t know why I yelled that. I think I was just so glad to not be in the House of Haywire anymore.

  Lex glared at me. “Yeah,” he said sarcastically. “It’s a total celebration. I’m going to the beach. Are you coming or are you just going to be a freak?”

  “I’m not a freak,” I said. “I’m coming.”

  “Whatever,” he said.

  “Want to get ice cream?” I said.

  “No,” he said. Then he totally stalked off without me.

  “Fine,” I yelled after him. “Go!”

  Which is why I went for ice cream by myself.

  Which is why I saw Kai.

  Which is why what happened, happened.

  I am not prepared to write any more of this story right now. You are going to have to wait for the letter I, which I realize is probably going to be on the next page, but I am just not willing to write about what happened quite, quite yet.

  See also Aaron-Martin, Sebastian (Seb); Autism; Ellery, Charlotte.

  Heights

  Until I fell in love with the Tree of Unknown Species, I was totally and completely terrified of being high up. I was more afraid of heights than I am of elephants or even being murdered in my sleep by a mask-wearing criminal with claw gloves.68

  Now I am not at all afraid. It went away, just like that. I can’t remember why I was scared before. It’s weird how that happens, how one day something can scare you so bad that your legs won’t hold you up, and then you try it. And then everything changes, and it turns out you are OK, after all.

  Mom says that I’m still afraid, I’m just pretending not to be, but I think that’s just because she might be a little bit jealous that I’m completely cured and she is not.

  Hickey

  A hickey is a bruise that you get when your skin gets sucked very hard, either by a vacuum cleaner or by a mouth (your own or someone else’s). You can give yourself one by putting your forearm into your mouth and sucking really hard. Freddie Blue and I give ourselves hickeys sometimes in class if the class is very boring. Once she had fourteen hickeys on her arm. It looked like she’d been punched repeatedly by someone with a tiny fist, such as an elf.

  Apparently, boys like to give you hickeys on your neck, but honestly I don’t see how this could even happen, unless they are pretending to be vampires and you are pretending to like it.

  Howl

  A really loud noise made by twin brothers during full moons, which they think is hilarious and usually causes at least one passerby to scream and run away.

  I don’t actually remember when this started — it seems like the boys have been doing this stupid howl for my whole life, probably because they have. Lex says it helps Seb to work out all his stuff, to stand on the front lawn and just howl like a banshee at the moon. Seb says that he does it because Lex is actually a werewolf and the only thing that keeps him from eating the entire family is this stupid and annoyingly loud ritual. When I was little, that scared me to death, but now I know they are just kidding around. They never miss a moon.

  I guess I don’t mind it. I’m used to it, looking out my window on moony nights and seeing them there, heads thrown back, howling like psychos. It’s actually sort of funny.

  See also Aaron-Martin, Sasha Alexei (Lex); Aaron-­Martin, Sebastian (Seb).

  Ice Cream Incident, The

  Ice cream is a frozen dessert enjoyed by everyone. Go ahead, show me someone who does not like ice cream. You can’t, can you? Because everyone likes it. Because it is delicious.

  This entry is not really about ice cream.

  It is about kissing.

  It is a long-ish story. Be prepared. Maybe get a snack and a cold drink! Find a comfy place to sit, like maybe a hammock.

  Yes, this is the story that began with Haywire. If you have forgotten what happened in Haywire, I will wait while you go back and reread that entry. I have time.

  Done? OK, then.

  So Lex stomped off to the beach without me, and I headed into the ice cream shop. The very best ice cream shop in the world, as I may have already mentioned. I have two words: WAFFLE. And CONES. I was looking forward to seeing if they had my favorite of all flavors, which is called Sparkly Unicorns and Happiness. It has chocolate and tiny peanut butter cups and big swirls of caramel and marshmallow and colorful sprinkles. Basically everything you can put in ice cream that tastes good is in there.

  Kai was outside the shop, eating a huge cone of about eight different scoops, most of which looked like chocolate. At first I was nervous, then I went right away to excited to see him, then I noticed who he was talking to, and within a split second, I went right to downright annoyed. He was talking to a big gang of girls from my school, including, but not limited to, the horrifically awful Stella Wilson-Rawley. I glared at her ferociously, totally forgetting that I was going to practice being über-friendly at all times.

  “Hey, Tink,” said Ruth Quayle.69

  “Hello,” I said, without opening my mouth, which made it come out funny, like a small growl. She gave me an alarmed look. I tried to smile but I did not feel like smiling.

  “Tinky Tinky,” said Stella, and smirked.

  “Grak,” I mumbled, which wasn’t the least bit witty but was all I could come up with.

  I was about to push by her when Kai noticed me. He gave me this huge, manic, crazy-guy grin and shouted, “THERE you are.”

  Which made me slightly happy. But then, before I could even say, “Hi,” which is what I was going to do, but in a voice that was just slightly frosty and unwelcoming, he grabbed me and then he

  . . . kissed me right on the mouth.

  With his mouth!

  Which had melted ice cream bits on it! And saliva!

  I repeat: HE KISSED ME ON THE MOUTH! WITH HIS SLIMY MOUTH!

  I was so stunned that all I could do was gawp at him like a fish that has been tossed onto the beach by a rogue wave and cannot breathe air and is dying. Your first really meaningful kiss is supposed to be amaaaaaazing and mine was just plain shocking. SHOCKING. I didn’t have time to mentally prepare! I thought I liked him! But then I didn’t! And then I did again! And now I just wanted to run away, screaming!

  But why?

  My heart started pounding like someone trapped in an elevator who is about to plunge to a terrible demise. I couldn’t get my breath. He then whispered something in my ear.

  “WHAT?” I said loudly, because I didn’t hear him. I couldn’t hear anything. Well, that’s not true, I DID hear SWR saying, “Ew.”

  “Thanks, you SAVED me,” he repeated.

  I can hardly remember the next bit because my head was spinning like a Tilt-A-Whirl. But I must have somehow gone in, ordered, and paid for my Sparkly Unicorns and Happiness cone because the next thing I knew, I was marching directly out the back door of the shop. Alone.

  As in, with no one following me.

  Not Kai the Kisser. Not Ruth, my supposed new friend. Not anyone.

  I kept marching until I got to the beach, but by then, I felt light-headed. From the SHOCK! And my ice cream had melted all over my hand, giving me that gross sticky-finger situation that I hate. I was tragically forced to throw away the cone. I threw away Sparkly Unicorns and Happiness! Could things get worse?

  I thought about it. I guess it would be worse if, for example, a passing great white shark — and yes, they DO have those here — could suddenly become demented and throw itself onto the beach, snapping its jaws at everything that moved, chomping off my right leg below the knee before belly flopping back into the bay. Worse, no?

&nbs
p; Maybe not, actually.

  At least that wouldn’t be embarrassing. Or awkward.

  I sat and ran sand through my fingers and stared out to sea. Crab traps bobbed up and down on the waves, and kayaks paddled by in colorful flocks. Every once in a while, someone dove in and shouted from the cold. Finally, Lex came up behind me and grabbed my shoulder, scaring me half to death. I was obviously totally still in shock, or I would have smelled his approach and been ready for the assault.

  “Time to go,” he said.

  We walked home slowly. I could feel my legs again, but I wished I couldn’t because they were itchy from the sand and also felt like lead. I sighed dramatically, in a universal signal of, “Ask me what is wrong!”

  “Stop doing that, you’re bugging me,” Lex went, and then he punched me hard on the arm.

  “THAT HURT!” I shouted.

  “You’re a total pain,” he said. “I don’t need this. I’m not your babysitter. Why do I always have to look after everyone?”

  “I’m not a baby,” I said. “And you aren’t looking after me. I go to the beach alone all the time.”

  “Whatever.” Lex shrugged, putting his iPod on. The music reverberated loudly around his head in a cloud.

  I hated Lex right then for not asking me what happened. Why do other people get nice siblings who they can confide in about things and I get . . . LEX AND SEB?

  Talk about unfair.

  When we got home, the house was quiet. Lex went and made himself and Seb sandwiches. I did not want a sandwich. I did not want anything. My lips felt weird and tingly, like maybe I was going into anaphylactic shock.70 I sat down on the hall floor. The floor is tile and it was nice and cool against my skin. It helped, sort of like how an ice pack helps when you hurt your knees trampolining on them in the middle of the night during sleepovers.

  Half of me was going, Wheee! He kissed me! A cute boy kissed me! KAI kissed me! The other half of me was going, Ick! Ack! Ick! Ack! Kind of like a ticking clock, or more like a ticking bomb. Punctuated every now and again with stabbing feelings of fury! Betrayal! And rage! None of which I really understood!