Death by Eggplant

by Susan Heyboer O'Keefe

  “Bert?”

  But would he really listen to me? And what would he say?

  The repeated chirp of the phone made me twitch.

  “Answer it!” I yelled.

  He switched the phone off entirely.

  “Not until you answer me. What’s wrong?”

  Quickly I rinsed my face.

  “It’s okay,” I told him.

  He said nothing.

  “Really,” I insisted, then added, “For now anyway.”

  “And then what?”

  “I’ll explain things,” I said. “Just not now.”

  “You promise?”

  I nodded.

  “You know,” he said, leaning against the doorjamb, “all this talk about your running away to be a spy . . . it’s brought back such memories.”

  “Memories? You were a spy?”

  “Oh, no no no, there’s not much of a retirement package for spies, now is there? I mean, memories of when you were a baby, all the plans I had for you.” My dad smiled, and his eyes got a misty far-off look. “I remember every minute of the day you were born. Your mother phoned my office at 11:37 in the morning, and I said I’d race right over. By 12:03 I got her to the hospital, and at 7:14 that night you were born. When I saw you, the first thing I said was, ‘That boy has the hands of an actuary.’ So you can see, this spy business has caught us all by surprise.”

  I looked down at my hands. The streaks of shaving foam looked like whipped cream.

  “Well, I guess accounting could come in handy,” I admitted, “say, if I were . . . doing the books of a restaurant.”

  “A restaurant?” my father said. “Oh, we’ll have much bigger clients than that to insure. Mega-multi corporations with branches around the world. You and me, champ.”

  Hints were not going to work with my parents. Maybe if I went on a cooking strike and forced them to eat canned soup every night, they would finally notice what I had been doing all these years.

  Canned soup?

  During my last cold, my mother had tucked me into bed, put a box of tissues near me, and said, “I’ll make you some nice hot chicken soup, Bertie.” Smiling, I settled in for a long nap. But she was back just five minutes later, carrying a bowl of thin yellow liquid. Canned soup. Microwaved. I hadn’t even known the stuff was in the house.

  Coughing and sniffling, I dragged myself downstairs and opened the freezer door. Out came the chicken wings and necks I always kept on hand to make stock. Out came the onions and celery, carrots and parsley. Out came the pot. I sliced the onions—under cold running water to keep from crying. The circles within circles, white on white, led me into a zenlike calm. And when I chopped rib after rib of celery, each little half moon seemed to smile at me. That was what was missing from canned soup, besides the taste—that incredible energy, the relationship that flowed from cook to food to guest (or, in this case, from cook to food and back to cook again). Assembly-line soup had no heart in it; it could nourish the body, but not the soul.

  But my parents didn’t get this. Canned soup didn’t bother them.

  As I trudged to school, the words “Just today and tomorrow, today and tomorrow” pounded in my head like a march. But the closer to school I got, the less likely my living till tomorrow seemed. Tomorrow I only needed to show up and let Mrs. M. see my near-perfect flour sack. Dekker wouldn’t try anything then, not after Mrs. Menendez had seen Cleo. So today would be his last chance, and that meant all-out war.

  “I’m in danger, Bertie!” I could almost hear the whisper from my knapsack. “Don’t let anything happen to me.”

  “I’ll keep you safe,” I whispered back, before I knew what I was doing. I spent the rest of the walk to school making sure I didn’t talk to my flour sack.

  In class, half the kids had that jiggly “Summer’s here, let me out!” itch, while the other half had mid-June sleepies. Foot tapping competed with snores. Indra put her head down on her desk. I watched as she carefully arranged her long loose hair across her face like a curtain to block out the sun. Even triple A+ Judy Boynton was staring openmouthed out the window at the sunny day.

  Mrs. M. took the homeroom roll. All the flesh-and-blood students were present. Both flour-sack students were present. We were ending the year with a full house.

  The day continued lazily through the afternoon, with most of the teachers as summer-struck as we were. By last-period math, most of the kids were reading comics or books they had brought from home. Cleo was watching me use her memo pad to make tiny paper airplanes.

  The intercom buzzed. Mrs. M. picked up the receiver and listened.

  “Oh,” she said into the intercom. “No, there’s no problem. It’s just unfortunate timing. I meant to cancel, then forgot.”

  Mrs. M. forgot something? The shock registered on the Richter scale.

  “No, don’t say anything,” she said into the receiver. “Just send her in.”

  Send her in?

  This could be bad, very bad. I could already hear my mother telling about the time she painted hieroglyphics on our roof in glow-in-the-dark paint.

  A moment later, there was a knock. Mrs. Menendez opened the door, and I tensed up, prepared to hurl myself out the classroom window.

  In walked the fattest woman I had ever seen. She was short, too, so she was like a ball walking into the room. I expected her to roll.

  “Look out!” someone whispered. “Free Willy escaped her tank.”

  The woman wore a black jacket, black slacks, a black-and-white dotted vest, and a frilly white blouse beneath. There was no way to escape the image of a killer whale.

  “Hello, Mrs. Menendez!” she said right away, reaching out and pumping Mrs. M.’s hand. Then she waved. “Hi, Nicky! Surprise!”

  Surprise? How about catatonic shock?

  “Hi, everyone!” she called. “I’m Mrs. Dekker, Nicky’s mom.”

  Most of the class mumbled a stunned “Hi,” though Jerome Lindsay next to me said, “Gee, Dekker, you’re lucky she didn’t squash you giving birth.” Dekker turned. He stared at me, his face as mean and scary as it had ever been. There was no point in saying I wasn’t the one making the wisecracks. I had seen his mother. That was enough.

  Now I knew why he had been holding cans of diet drinks when I ran into him in the supermarket.

  And now I knew why Mrs. Menendez had meant to cancel. After the fiasco with my father, having Dekker’s mother in to talk was weird and awkward. What I didn’t understand was how Mrs. M. could have forgotten.

  “Mrs. Dekker is a lawyer, class,” Mrs. Menendez said, as mildly as if I should not be out this very second getting measured for my coffin. “You may have heard about the student who recently sued her teacher, her school, and her school district. The student claimed that assigning homework and penalizing her for not doing it was an invasion of her privacy. Her lawyer said it was similar to a company trying to restrict what an employee does in his or her personal life. That made homework and penalties for not doing it a violation of her Fourteenth Amendment rights. Mrs. Dekker successfully defended against the claim, and the student lost.”

  Kids started to groan. Right away, Mrs. Dekker waved both hands no and stepped up to speak.

  “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,” she began. “I can see that you’re already prejudiced. But I ask you to put your own feelings aside and keep an open mind as I present my case.”

  In fifteen minutes, that woman had us convinced that homework was not only legal, it was the moral and cultural base upon which the whole world’s civilization rested. She was so good I forgot I hated homework. I forgot she was fat. I even forgot she was Dekker’s mother. When she asked for questions, my hand was first in the air.

  The class gasped. I yanked my hand back down, but it was too late.

  “You in the back.” Mrs. Dekker tilted her head to get a better look, then broke into a laugh. “Oh, another flour sack!” she said. “Mrs. Menendez did say another boy had the ‘same challenge’ as Nicky. How’s it going?�
��

  “Fine, ma’am, thank you.”

  “Your question?”

  “I, uh, oh, I forgot,” I blurted out. For some reason, the class laughed.

  Smiling, Mrs. Dekker shook her head and tsk-tsked. “You’d make a very bad witness,” she said.

  “Yes, I know, I mean, actually I wouldn’t know—because I’d forget. I can’t remember anything. For example, I won’t remember you were ever here. In fact, I’ve already forgotten.” I wiped my damp palms on my pants. “Did I just say something?”

  This time the laughter was unreasonably long and unreasonably hard.

  “What do you think?” Mrs. Dekker turned to Mrs. M. “Should I mark him as a hostile witness?”

  “I’m not hostile!” I protested in alarm, glancing at Dekker. He was facing front, his jaw clenched so tight I could practically count his teeth through his cheeks. “I like you, I really do.”

  “It just means you’re uncooperative,” Mrs. Dekker said.

  “I’ll cooperate, please. Just tell me what you want. If you want me to testify, I’ll testify. If you want me to love homework, I’ll love homework. Heck, I’ll even do homework.”

  “This smells of bribery. Do homework in return for what?” Mrs. Dekker asked.

  “Uh, live through the day?”

  She frowned. “‘Live through the day’? Have you been threatened? Are you suggesting that you need the witness protection program?”

  Yes, against your son—the words danced in my mouth, frantic to get out. I choked them back.

  “No, no threats, not from no one, no one at all,” I finally managed to say.

  “Well then, I have a question for you.” Mrs. Dekker narrowed her eyes as she looked at me. “Why is your flour sack wearing a baby hat?”

  “To protect her from drafts.”

  “Oh. Uh, thank you, that’s all. Any other questions?”

  “Yeah,” said Jerome Lindsay. “How did you get so fat?”

  “Eating too many bratty kids. They make me bloat.”

  Dekker jumped up and flew out the door.

  “Let him go,” Mrs. Dekker said to Mrs. M. She turned back to the class. “Any legitimate questions?”

  Mrs. Dekker was as cool as a cucumber. I bet she could be defending a guy for murder, have him break down in the witness chair and confess in a crowded courtroom, and she would change tactics without a blink—and win.

  “No, that’s enough questions,” said Mrs. Menendez. “Mr. Lindsay, apologize to Mrs. Dekker, then take yourself down to the principal’s office.”

  Jerome pulled himself to his feet, mumbled an apology, then left the room. Mrs. M. whispered her own apology, which Mrs. Dekker waved off. The two walked out into the hall. Mrs. M. returned for a second. “I want a five-hundred-word essay from the lot of you on the meaning of courtesy. Start now. Finish it up for homework. Miss Boynton, hand out paper from my desk to anyone who needs it. Mr. Hooks, come with me to the office, please.”

  Stunned, I trailed behind them to the principal’s office. Why did I have to go with them? What had I done? It wasn’t fair.

  When the three of us reached the office, Mrs. M. asked Mrs. Dekker if she knew about Tuesday’s incident with my father. No, Mrs. Dekker didn’t. She had been away on business and apparently neither her husband nor her son had shared that bit of news on her return. So Mrs. M. summed it up, then explained how Dekker might have misinterpreted both his mother’s presence here today and any comment I had made. Skating around the really important points, Mrs. M. never mentioned that my family was loony or that Mrs. Dekker’s son was rotten. The bell rang, and Mrs. M. kept talking.

  Finally there were apologies all around, from Mrs. M. for letting the class get so out of control, from me for not keeping my mouth shut, from Mrs. Dekker for not knowing her son had been causing problems in school. It was a real lovefest. Any minute, I thought we were going to exchange friendship bracelets.

  “Don’t let me keep you, Mr. Hooks,” Mrs. M. said to me.

  “Yeah, I’ve got that long, long essay to write, too.”

  This was Mrs. M.’s chance to say, “Why, of course that didn’t apply to you, Mr. Hooks. After all, you’re the poor victim in this dreadful mess.”

  Instead she said, “Five hundred words. And I will count. One day you’ll thank me, Mr. Hooks. You can go now.”

  Since it was so late, I could leave the building straight from the office. That’s when I realized that I didn’t have my knapsack with me. I had been so shocked about going to the principal’s office that I had left my knapsack in the classroom.

  My knapsack! My toque!

  The class was empty by the time I ran down the hall and burst into the room. The bus kids, after-school-care kids, even walkers like Indra had all left. But there was my knapsack, just where I left it. I grabbed it up, unzipped the inner pocket, and stuck in my hand. The feel of cotton was smooth, cool, and comforting.

  Relieved, I scooped up the pens and paper on my desk in one hand and went to grab Cleo with the other.

  Cleo was gone.

  And on the floor beside my foot, as ghastly as a smear of blood, was a smudge of flour.

  DAY TEN

  It was three A.M. I had spent five sleepless hours tossing in bed. I was a wreck.

  Over and over, I kept thinking, what can I do? What can I possibly do?

  Absolutely nothing.

  I had failed the assignment. Now I would have to go to summer school, maybe even repeat eighth grade. My own class would be gone, and I would be left alone to tower over shrimpy seventh graders. Worse, my having to repeat a grade would look horrible when I reapplied to the Culinary Institute.

  Worser—Indra would be gone, too, over to the high school across town. No way would she want to be seen with someone from junior high, even though I was older than her fiancé.

  At last I fell asleep. The worrying became a dream with a very sarcastic voice.

  “Oh, boo hoo,” it said. “Poor Bertie might have to go to summer school. What about poor Cleo? Have you given a second’s thought to her? Her life is in danger!”

  “She’s a flour sack,” I answered.

  “She’s your baby!”

  Cleo appeared. “I’m your baby!” she pleaded. She started to grow little arms and legs. Then Cleo turned into Chuckie, the demon doll from all those horror videos I never should have watched.

  “Ah ha!” Cleo/Chuckie crowed. “I’m the child of lies!”

  Suddenly I was in school, running down an endless hallway, as Cleo/Chuckie chased me with a knife. A door appeared. I rushed through it into a huge kitchen. I began to throw egg grenades. From nowhere, I grabbed a hose and milk spurted out. The powdery white legs became sticky. Cleo/Chuckie got stuck to the floor and couldn’t move. I had just turned on the electric beater when Cleo/Chuckie became Cleo again.

  “Save me,” she whispered. “Be brave, Chef Bertie, and save me . . . ”

  She melted into a puddle of white goo, wailing pitifully, “Save me, save me!”

  I woke up, heart pounding, body sweating. I rushed to my parents’ bedroom.

  “Mom! Dad! Help!”

  My mother popped straight up.

  My father, snoring loudly, lay sprawled on his stomach. His hand was stretched toward the floor, where his cell phone, calculator, pen, sheets of paper, and a book light, still on, were scattered.

  “Dad!” I grabbed the big toe that stuck out beneath the sheet and shook hard. “Wake up, Dad!”

  “Sixty-two one hundredths, and not a point more,” he mumbled.

  “Mom, Dad! It’s Cleo!”

  “What?” they asked, both waking up.

  “Remember last night when you asked where Cleo was and I told you she was at a sleepover at Patty Cakes?” I took a deep breath. “Well, I lied. Cleo’s been kidnapped.”

  “Kidnapped?!” they shrieked in unison. Two of my mother’s curlers popped—sproing!—right off her head.

  “At first I didn’t care, and I wasn’t going
to do anything about it,” I confessed. “I mean, she’s just a flour sack and this whole thing has gotten way out of hand, and so what if I have to go to summer school or even repeat eighth grade? I do not want a flour sack for a sister. Well, at least I thought I didn’t. But Cleo’s been saying, ‘Save me, Bertie’ over and over, and she knows who I really am because she calls me ‘Chef ’—”

  “Cleo can talk?” my mother interrupted.

  “She can’t talk, she’s a flour sack! But I’ve got to save her, at least until I can bring her to class, then afterward I think we should all go see Dr. Zimmerman together and maybe find out if there’s some special therapy group for people like us, you know, for flour sacks who pretend to be kids and the families who believe them, but until then, all I really need is to get Cleo to class to be graded.” I gasped for breath.

  “Mrs. Menendez is going to grade Cleo?” my mother asked. “Isn’t that, well, severe? After all, you’re an eighth grader and Cleo’s a . . . a . . . ”

  “A flour sack!” I roared. I ran my fingers through my hair. I was never going to be able to explain this right. I tried another tactic. “Mom, Dad. Listen carefully. Nicholas Dekker kidnapped Cleo. Can you help me save her?”

  “Kidnapped?!” they both shrieked again.

  They jumped out of bed.

  “Quick, Bert, get dressed while I call the police!” My father punched 911 into his cell phone.

  “No police!” I snatched the phone and cancelled the call. “The . . . the kidnapper’s note said to come alone . . . or else.”

  At those ominous words, my parents looked at each other. My mother’s eyes started to fill up. Then she shook her head a little, frowned, and massaged her temples.

  “But wait a minute,” she began. “I mean, Cleo isn’t—”

  “Mom,” I pleaded. “Whoever she is, whatever she is, however she got here, Cleo needs us, all of us, right now. Please?”

  “You’re right,” my father said solemnly. “We’ve got to do it for Cleo.”

  “For Cleo,” I agreed. We both looked at my mother. There was a very long pause.

  Finally she smiled a bit, then nodded half a bit. “For Cleo.”