“Also, we’re more waterproof,” I joke.
Thermos doesn’t laugh.
“Sorry,” I say. I made a huge mistake coming over here. “Bad joke. I just wanted to tell you what Nick’s note said. If you want to know.”
Thermos puts a hand on her hip and taps her foot. “Okay.”
“He wanted me to ask you to be my partner for the talent show.”
Thermos bends down, rips up a handful of grass, and sprinkles it on the ground.
“He was going to do it, but I guess you already know that. And since you can’t do a pitching demonstration without … Well, I guess we both need a part—”
Thermos cuts me off.
“I switched to a dribbling demonstration.”
“Oh.” Right. She wouldn’t drop out of the talent show just because Nick changed partners. Most people don’t have a problem performing alone. “A dribbling demonstration sounds neat. You’ll be great at it!”
I turn and run back to the shady spot by the rock-climbing wall before Thermos can say anything else. My heart is skittering and my whole body jitters with nerves. I only have two options left: either I have to kill, or I have to fail so spectacularly the audience won’t know what hit them.
AND THEN THERE WAS BARF
The next evening, when it’s time to leave for the talent show, my ears are ringing and my palms are so sweaty my rubber chicken slips right out of my grip. Mom announces that we all have to get in the car now or we’re going to be late. I grab the giant cardboard Chicago skyline poster I made. It’s my backup plan for failing. If nobody laughs, I will bring it out and do a Buster Keaton. The whole thing will fall and squash me flat.
Ari, Ruby, and I get in the car. Mom loads the skyline in the back and honks the horn for Dad. He rushes out carrying a suspicious small gray bag.
“Hey! I said no pictures or video!”
“Come on, Louie,” my dad moans. “It’s a big night. You might want to see it someday.”
“Definitely not.” I put my hand on the door handle. “I won’t perform if you are going to record it.”
Mom gives my dad a look. “Don’t worry, Louie. We will leave it in the car.”
My parents drop me off at the gym doors at 6:30, then go park the car. I head backstage so full of pre-show jitters I can barely see straight.
I’m wearing an orange T-shirt and jeans because bright colors and casual clothes help put the audience in a laughing mood.
To get my mind off my act, I pretend I’m Buster Keaton in his famous boxing lesson, where he keeps getting stuck in the ropes.
“Uh, Louie? What are you doing?” a voice behind me says.
I turn around and see Thermos, only she doesn’t look anything like herself. She is wearing a poufy pink coat, a grumpy expression, and a big red bow. Her hair is long and curly.
“I’m going to do your act with you,” she says. “For Nick.”
She unbuttons the coat to reveal a ruffly red dress. “My mom made me wear this,” she says. Her eyes dart around the room, making sure no one notices, and she pulls at her collar and scratches her shoulder like she’s wearing the most uncomfortable clothing in the world.
“Wow,” I say. “That’s really nice of you.” Thermos and I have never practiced together, but since the most likely outcome is failure, it should be okay. “You’ll be my straight man. Just answer any questions I ask you, and no matter what happens, don’t laugh!”
Thermos scowls and gives the stink eye to Ryan Rakefield as he walks by. She tugs at the waist of her dress. I don’t think not laughing will be hard for her.
Mrs. Adler comes over and pats Thermos on the shoulder. “You are a good friend.” She gives my shoulder a squeeze. “Remember, Louie, you’re offering the audience a gift. Present it from your heart and you’ll do fine.”
I nod my head as Mrs. Adler walks off to talk to Owen. Thermos looks as if she’d like to give the audience directions to the exit. Her lips are pressed together in a thin line. A swell of fear builds in my stomach.
We are the tenth act in the talent show, right before intermission. Thermos and I stand in the wings and watch the other acts, but Thermos won’t take her coat off. Finally, the act right before ours takes the stage. It’s Owen. His plate spinning has really improved.
For his finale, he gets five different plates going at the same time, in different directions. After a minute, my stomach spins, too. I close my eyes because the plates must be giving me reverse motion sickness.
When the announcer calls our names, my stomach still feels funny. And my ears don’t work. His voice sounds tiny, like it’s coming from miles and miles away.
I glance at Thermos. Her eyes are as round as Owen’s plates. She looks like she wants to pull her coat over her head and disappear.
“Ready?” I ask.
Thermos nods. “I think so,” she says, but it sounds like she’s talking in a chicken voice.
“Okay,” I say. “Let’s go!”
I run out onstage, but don’t hear her footsteps behind me. When I get there I’m alone. Off in the wings, Thermos is clutching her jacket to her chest and shaking her head. Maybe she never planned on helping me. Maybe this is her way of getting back at me.
My stomach lurches. I don’t have to be good, I remind myself. I can fail spectacularly.
I turn and face the crowd. They look at me expectantly. Can they tell I’m dying? Someone coughs and a cold sweat drips down my back. My stomach clenches.
Every bit of advice I ever got races through my head. From my parents, from Lou, from Mrs. Adler. Even from Ruby.
I look through the crowd. Ruby is sitting in the front row with my family and Ari’s boyfriend, holding Dad’s fancy camera. Mom said they’d leave it in the car. Why would they let Ruby hold it? She’s probably going to film a ten-minute video of my knees.
Then Ruby shouts into the camera’s microphone: “Ladies and gentlemen! Bannouncing the world’s best comedian in the entire world … Louie Burger!”
People laugh, and an electric zap goes up my spine. I don’t have to do my act for the whole room. I can do it for Ruby. I grab the mike and it’s show-time!
“Hey there, boys and germs. Oops, I mean girls. I’m Louie Burger.”
That gets a few chuckles, but Ruby laughs a deep belly laugh. I lean back on my heels and continue, even though my stomach is swirling. Maybe Mrs. Adler will be right about the stage fright leaving once my act gets going.
“I’m a pretty regular fifth grader,” I say, “except for one thing. I’m not into sports. I wrote a little song about it for you. It’s called ‘Take Me Home from the Ball Game.’”
Take me home from the ball game.
I’m so bored I could cry.
I ate my peanuts an hour ago.
If I don’t go home soon, I think I might die.
I would rather watch blades of grass grow.
It’d be more exciting, I think,
Than this “One, two, three strikes, you’re out” stuff.
’Cause baseball stinks!
The audience laughs, but I can feel sweat starting to pour down my forehead. I’m ready for the part where the fear disappears.
“The only sport I’m into is competitive eating. How many hot dogs can a kid eat in two minutes? Now that’s exciting. They serve tofu dogs in the school cafeteria. Did you ever notice that the word tear is in the middle of cafe-tear-ia? They know the food is so bad it’ll make you cry.”
I glance into the wings, and now Ryan and Jamal are standing next to Thermos. Ryan has a little smirk on his face. My spine stiffens. I’m ready to show him a thing or two about real comedy.
“Why do cafeterias serve foods with the word surprise in the name? Meat Loaf Surprise? Tuna Surprise? I don’t want to be surprised by my lunch. It’s never a good kind of surprise. You never bite into your meat loaf and say, ‘Whoa! What a surprise! A forty-two-inch flat-screen TV!’”
The audience cracks up, but even better than that, I hear guffaws coming from backstag
e. I glance into the wings again and see Ryan laughing. For real. Even though my stomach still hurts, the rest of my stage fright is gone. I could tell jokes forever.
“I have a little problem when I eat too much,” I tell everyone, and then I start to sing “The Burp Song.” Because of the microphones, the burps reverberate around the gym, and the audience howls. On the last burp, I worry that more than air is going to come out of my stomach. I cover my mouth with my hand, but that makes people laugh even harder.
I peek down at Ruby. She’s laughing so hard the video’s going to look like earthquake footage. My stomach twists. I bring my other hand to my mouth. I don’t think I can talk anymore. Instead of my next bit, a geyser shoots up from my stomach. I spew chunks for real all over the stage.
Houston, we have a problem.
Fluffernutter soup. It’s not a pretty sight.
At first, a few people in the back groan and laugh like they think it’s a gag. But then I blow again, and my mom rushes to me. The houselights come up, and everyone murmurs in their seats.
“Are you okay?” asks Thermos, hurrying onstage from the wings. Now she unfreezes?
I nod weakly. I won’t open my mouth again until I’m sure nothing will come out of it.
JoAnne brings the special powder and sprinkles it over the puddle on the stage. Mrs. Adler takes the microphone and announces the intermission, and my mom wipes me off with paper towels and tells me we’re going home.
How barfmiliating.
Ladies and gentlemen … my first performance.
The Top Ten Things Worse than Throwing Up Onstage in Front of Two Hundred People
1. This is the first and last item on this list because I really can’t think of anything worse than throwing up onstage. I don’t want to be Louie Burger, the Boy Who Barfed.
(Although I guess I would be okay with it if someone wanted to pay me five million dollars to make my life story into a made-for-TV movie.)
WITH A BARF-BARF HERE AND A BARF-BARF THERE
(Insert “Old MacDonald Had a Farm” music here)
When we get home, Mom sends me straight to bed, and I actually feel grateful.
I also feel horrible. I mean really, really sick. My skin is clammy. My knees are weak and my stomach keeps heaving. Mom gives me a pail to keep by my bed.
Barf may not be as funny as I originally thought.
When morning comes, my stomach stops turning inside out, and I fall asleep and don’t wake up until dinnertime. Ari brings me plain broth and Jell-O on a tray, which I get to eat in bed. The Jell-O tastes fluffmazing. (I’m trying out a new catchphrase in case barf and I never get back on speaking terms.) I never knew I was such a big Jell-O fan. It’s almost as good as Marshmallow Fluff. Hey, I bet it would taste even better with Marshmallow Fluff.
Ruby walks in with the latest Nutso magazine and says, “I told Dad to buy this for you, since staying in bed is the most boringest thing in the whole world.”
“Thanks,” I say. That was pretty nice of Ruby. “When I feel better, want to play Magical Mystery Unicorns?”
“Unicornefinitely!” she says. I don’t have the heart to tell her that her catchphrase needs work.
Ari and Ruby sit at the foot of my bed while I eat. Ari reads Nutso out loud, and we crack up at the comic strip “Winnie the Poo.”
I laugh so hard it hurts. My stomach is sore from the barfing.
After Ari finishes the last page, Ruby says, “Want to watch the talent show video?”
“No way!” I shout. I almost knock my tray over. Ari steadies it and puts it on the floor. I hide under my covers. “I don’t ever want to see it. Throw it away. Erase it. Blast it with a laser!”
“You could still send it to Lou Lafferman,” says Ari.
I shake my head. “It was a disaster,” I say. “I didn’t even fail the way I planned.”
“You should still send it,” says Ruby. “Everything before you threw up was funny.”
“No way!” I really mean it. I did the talent show (at least until I threw up) and I’m proud of that, but I’m not ready for my big break. I need more practice.
Ari and Ruby take my tray back to the kitchen, and I uncover myself, lie down, and fall asleep.
When I wake up the next morning, my mom has already left for work. I feel okay, but Dad says I have to stay home from school for one more day, to be on the safe side. He sets me up on the couch with a pancake-and-Marshmallow-Fluff sandwich and last night’s Lou Lafferman.
“I’m so proud of you,” Dad says as he turns on the TV. “You did it. You lived up to your end of the pact. That could be you someday.” He points to Lou on the screen.
I take the remote from his hands and pause the TV. “Dad, what about your end of the deal?”
Dad gets a sheepish look on his face. “I don’t know, Louie. I’m still trying to figure that out.”
Before I can ask him if he wants a push, the phone rings.
It’s Nick. I wonder if he knows about what happened at the talent show.
“Are you better?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say, “but I threw up onstage.”
“I heard.”
So word’s gotten around.
“Don’t feel bad. I barfed twenty-four times,” Nick says. It makes my stomach feel sore again just to think about it. “Guess the Barf Brothers barfed again.”
It feels good to hear him use our old nickname.
“Hey, Nick,” I say. “You and Thermos did a great job on your report. I never got to tell you. Kenji Okada is cooler than I realized.”
“Thanks,” he says. “Glad you noticed.”
Nick and I talk for a while more, and for the first time in a long time it feels like I have my friend back.
After we hang up I watch a bunch of old episodes of Lou and take a nap. When I wake up, I realize there’s someone else I need to call, so at 3:30, when I’m sure school is over, I pick up the phone and dial.
“Hello,” I say. “May I speak to Thermos?”
“I’m sorry,” the woman on the other end says. “There’s no one here by that name.”
“Oh.” I double-check the school directory. Maybe I got a number wrong.
“Goodbye,” she says.
“Wait!” I shout, realizing my mistake. “May I speak to Theodora?”
There is a pause on the other end of the line, then, “One moment. I’ll get her.”
“Hello?” Thermos says.
I clear my throat. “Uh, hi, it’s Louie. I wanted to say thank you for doing the talent show with me.”
“I didn’t do it. I freaked out.”
“Well, then, not thanks?”
Thermos makes a noise. I’m not sure what it is. Half laugh, half groan? “You’re not welcome.”
There is an awkward silence.
“But seriously,” I say. “Thank you.”
“Seriously,” she repeats. “I didn’t do anything.”
This could go on all night. “You did! You came to the show. You were willing to be my partner even though I’ve been a jerk. I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time.”
“You are?”
“I am. Really.”
“Okay,” Thermos says. “I’ll let you have a do-over. Want to ride bikes?”
I laugh. “At recess?”
“No! Right now. I can bike over to your house.”
“Sure, but I don’t know if Nick’s allowed outside. His mom is extra careful about germs.”
“That’s okay,” she says. “You and I can hang out alone sometimes, you know.”
Huh. I never thought about that before.
I check with my dad, then say, “Come on over.”
As soon as I hang up the phone, I realize I have a problem. Bike riding is basically a sport that is higher up off the ground. So when you fall, it’s a lot worse. For example, your front tire could hit a unicorn that’s lying in the middle of the driveway. The horn might go straight into your wheel and stop you dead in your tracks. Then you might fly ov
er the handlebars and land in a kiddie pool filled with papier-mâché paste for a Fourth of July Statue of Liberty. Um. That didn’t actually happen. Really.
And besides, if we ride bikes, Thermos might want to race or pop wheelies or ride no-handed or any number of things that could result in serious damage to my epidermis. But I can’t say no. Not when Thermos and I are finally becoming, gulp, friends.
“My bike is buried in the garage,” I tell her when she gets to my house. I haven’t used it since the unicorn incident that didn’t actually happen. “It might be hard to get.” There is a giant mess in there. My mom and dad are always planning to clean it out, but they never do.
“I can help.” Thermos heads back toward the garage and I follow her. I punch in the key code and the door slides up to reveal a solid wall of stuff crammed so tightly together there isn’t even a path to the inside.
“Whoa,” says Thermos.
“I know,” I say. “It could win the award for Messiest Garage on Earth.”
“No,” she says, pointing. “I mean those. Whoa!”
She’s whoa-ing at the wire mailbox stands my dad made in the shape of Ruby, Ari, and me. He worked on those out on the driveway every weekend for the entire summer last year, but still never finished them. Whenever people walked by our house, they stopped to ask questions and a couple people even wanted to buy them.
“My dad made those.”
“Your dad’s an artist?” she asks. “Cool. My dad is an insurance analyst.”
We burst out laughing, because we both know that’s one of the most boring jobs ever.
“I think my bike might be in the back corner.” I stand on tiptoes, trying to get a better look. “Behind those giant metal flower sculptures.”
Thermos scratches her forehead. “We’ll have to take everything out to get to it.”
“We could do something else instead,” I suggest. I’m sure Thermos doesn’t want to clean out my garage any more than my parents do.
“No way,” says Thermos. “Who knows what we might find in there! It’s going to be awesome.”
We start taking stuff out a piece at a time, but soon it’s getting as messy outside the garage as it is inside, so Thermos and I decide to sort everything into different groups: Dad’s art, gardening supplies, toys, mystery items, and trash. It takes us about two hours to get everything out of the garage. We find my bike halfway through, but the tires are deflated and we don’t find the bike pump until we reach the very last corner.
The Barftastic Life of Louie Burger Page 9
