by Paul Griffin
• • •
“You got a dog, right?” Mrs. Lorentz said.
“How do you know these things?” I said. I turned around so she could see the dog through the mesh panel of the backpack.
“You don’t swamp the online reservation system with requests for dog training books when you adopt a ferret. Come around back here and let me see.”
I went behind the main desk, put the backpack on the floor, and unzipped it.
“I want to eat him,” Mrs. Lorentz said.
“Why?”
She scooped him up. “Hello, you little wombat.” The dog attacked her with a kiss. I mean he like totally Frenched her. “His eyes,” she said. “They remind me of our little guy Harry. We lost him in June. He was old. Died in his sleep in my daughter’s arms. You can’t wish for a better good-bye-for-a-while than that, right?”
“Good-bye-for-a-while,” I said. “Sure.”
An old man came to the counter to return a laptop. His book bag said: READING MAKES YOU LIVE LONGER. JUST LOOK AT ME.
Mrs. Lorentz put the dog into my backpack. She nodded to a stack on the counter. “Those are yours, Ben.” On top of the dog training books was Feathers. When I turned to put the books into the backpack, the dog was gone.
9
RETURN OF THE RAINBOW GIRL
The little mutt trotted to the back of the library where the diva was camped out. She wore a yellow beret, fluorescent pink nail polish and a tangerine scarf. The only thing not popping bright about her was her skin, which was really pale. She had bags under her eyes too, like she stayed up the whole night reading all those books I saw in her backpack last time. The dog climbed into her lap. “It’s criminal, his adorableness,” she said. “What’s his name?”
“Not sure yet,” I said. “I’ve only had him three days.”
She’d spread her books out all over the table that was previously mine until she took over the entire freaking thing. One was a copy of Feathers. Crazy-colored sticky notes marked off the pages.
“You’re her,” I said. “Mrs. Lorentz’s daughter.” The book was in my hand, Feathers, the library copy. “I’m almost done reading it.”
“Some books change the way you see the world, and then there’s the one that changes the way you breathe. How are you loving it?”
“You know, totally.”
“Then you may sit,” she said. She gave the dog a belly scratch. “I love how his tongue sticks out the side of his mouth.”
“How come I’ve never seen you around here before?” I said.
“I just started homeschooling. I work in my apartment until lunch, but after that I get totally stir-crazy. Besides, you have seen me before.”
“You mean on Friday when you made me hold the door for you the whole time you texted your friend back?”
“Before that, and sorry for being preoccupied. I was in the middle of a pretty important exchange. You really don’t remember me?”
It took me a little while to remember that I actually had met her. The oversized beret covering her head threw me off, but she was the girl with the loopy light brown hair from last winter break. “You helped me check out my books while Mrs. Lorentz was on the phone,” I said.
“Who admits to having read I, Robot and then renews it?”
“You look—”
“Different,” she said. “Look closer. See?” She had practically no eyebrows. “The chemotherapy is actually working. My latest bloods and scans are looking pretty decent. Bad numbers down, good ones up. I’m totally going to kick this thing’s butt, you know?”
“I know,” I said, like an idiot, like I knew anything about her except she made me feel the way I did when I saw the dog following me but afraid to follow me. It was like when Darth Vader chops off Luke Skywalker’s hand. Vader will let Luke live if he joins the dark side, but Luke doesn’t. He doesn’t submit to Vader’s light saber either. He freaking jumps into a reactor. The Force is with him, though, and he falls into a garbage chute, and after that Leia rescues him, and he gets a totally cool bionic hand. Yeah, this girl was tough like that.
“That was the email I got when you were starring in the role of aggrieved doorman,” she said. “The old thumbs-up from the doc. Yeah. I’m one of the lucky ones. The side effects from the chemo aren’t totally awful, other than I get tired for a few days after. And of course the, like, hair thing.” She nodded, and that got me nodding, despite the fact I was totally confused. It just made zero sense. You don’t take medicine that makes your hair fall out unless you’re really sick, and she was my age.
“Anyway, it’s just hair,” she said. “And it grows back, just so you know.”
“You still look totally beautiful, though,” I said. Sometimes I want to punch myself in the mouth, except it would hurt and just make me look even stupider. “Sorry, I have this problem sometimes where I forget not to say what I’m thinking.”
“How is that a problem, and why would you ever apologize for saying I’m totally hot?”
“Excuse me, beautiful I said.”
“That’s twice now.” She reached across the table and squeezed my hand, just for a second. “Thanks,” she said. Her fingers were cold and covered in sparkly gel ink. So was the top page of her spiral notebook, with the prettiest script, starbursts instead of dots over her j’s and i’s. “I’m writing a novella,” she said.
“Seriously?”
She made her face overly serious. “I’m afraid so. You’re not a writer?”
“I’m twelve.”
“Then what are you waiting for? My mom thinks you’re really cool, by the way.”
“She’s totally wink-worthy,” I said.
“Excuse me?”
“No, like on Facebook, you know? The wink? I’d totally send her the hugest one.”
“Ew.” She packed up her books.
“I’m getting the feeling the wink doesn’t mean what I think it means,” I said.
She tapped up this blog about Facebook etiquette and appropriate use of emoticons. Here’s what it said:
;o) also known as “the wink,” is totally okay from your boyfriend, totally not in most other cases, and totally ick from the creep who thinks you’re hot when he’s so not.
“Wow,” I said.
“Yah.” She wasn’t too tired that day, the way she was marching for the exit.
I leashed the dog and scooped up the books Mrs. Lorentz left at the main desk for me and shoved them into the backpack.
“Why’d she storm out like that?” Mrs. Lorentz said.
“No idea.” I couldn’t even look at her.
The dog and I caught up with the Rainbow Girl on the side street. She was heading for the boardwalk. “You’ll never guess what I thought the wink meant,” I said.
“I don’t want to know,” she said.
“Anyway, I didn’t think it meant what it means.”
“I know,” she said. “I overreacted. I do that. It’s just one of the many facets that make up the intricate gem that is my persona.” She picked up the pace and huffed and puffed as she walked ahead.
“So homeschool, huh?” I said, trying to keep up. The dog nipped at our heels. “Sounds awesome.”
“I can’t wait to get back to school school,” she said. “Ever hear of Beekman 26?”
“That’s the arts school, right?”
“It’s paradise. I’m there just as soon as I’m back to a hundred and eleven percent. That’ll be the start of next quarter, definitely. Till then it’s me and Dad at the kitchen table. A hundred and eleven’s my favorite number, by the way. It’s the atomic number of roentgenium. You can’t find it in nature. You have to conjure it up in the lab, but it has the same properties as silver and gold. You probably knew that, being a sci-fi geek.”
“A hundred and eleven’s also the magic constant for the smallest
magic square using the number one and prime numbers. Here, check it out.” I grabbed her gel pen from behind her ear and wrote on my palm like this:
“Add those numbers vertically, horizontally or diagonally, and they equal a hundred and eleven,” I said.
She grabbed my hand and added and nodded. “How do you know this?” she said. “You’re like genius-level smart, aren’t you? Like smart enough where I’ll have to hate you for being smarter than me—than I am?”
“No,” I said. “You’re totally smarter.”
“All right then. In general, anyway. But clearly not in math. So annoying. I hate being a stereotype. You know, girl equals math dummy. Except I’m not. I was better than all the boys at school, if only to make them mad.”
“I’m not mad.”
“Why would you be? You don’t go to my school.”
“Huh?”
“Never mind, go on. I’m feeling better about you now, about our comparative intelligences. Please, continue.”
“I got this book for Christmas once,” I said. “It was like a math puzzle book.” I held up my palm. “It’s not like I thought this up myself or anything.”
“Who said you did? Anyway, I’ll need a copy of it.” She pressed her palm on mine and the ink transferred to hers.
“It’s backward,” I said.
“It’s perfect,” she said. “My mom. She was right. You’re cool. You’ve redeemed yourself, and from a very deep hole.”
“Your dad. He’s taking off work to be your tutor?”
“He works nights mostly. You’re really twelve? You look older.”
“Seriously? Thanks.”
“You’re hilarious.”
“How much older?”
“Twelve and a half,” she said.
“You’re like thirteen, right?”
“Am. You’re freaking hysterical.”
“Why?”
“Oh my gosh, stop making me laugh.”
“But you’re not laughing.”
“Do you have any money on you?” she said. “Buy me a Reese’s and I’ll forget that whole thing back at the library entirely.”
“What, that I wanted to send your mom the wink?”
“Why are you reminding me?”
• • •
I bought a three-pack and we sat on a boardwalk bench. She nibbled the candy. “Sweet Cheez Whiz, that’s good,” she said. “This dog’s very existence is preposterous. He’s sho goofy I want to shmoosh him and munch him up into a biwwion widdiw peeshes of fwuff. Gonna eachou! How do you not have a name for this little freak? I love the way he looks at you.”
“And how’s that?”
“Constantly,” she said. “You should get him certified as a therapy dog. That way he could come into the library, and nobody can give us dirty looks.”
“You mean like a Seeing Eye dog?”
“Exactly not. Are you blind? There’s this thing where kids who have a hard time reading, read to dogs. The dog doesn’t judge the kid when he mispronounces a word or whatever. The dog’s just completely psyched the kid is giving him all this attention. The kid feels like, whoa, this dog is totally listening to me, I must be reading pretty great. The more confident the kid gets, the better he reads. I swear, it’s a real program. They do it in schools and libraries and jails and stuff. I think your little guy here could do it. Look at him listening to us. To me anyway. I talk a lot.”
“Really?”
“Do you mean ‘really’ as in, do I think your guy could do it, or really I talk a lot?”
“That he could do it.”
“Liar. Your eyes are open too wide and you’re looking away.” Any guy who thinks he’s smarter than a girl is an idiot. But this girl was as smart as my mom, which was totally scary. “Read to Rufus, it’s called, where the dog listens to the kid,” she said. “I read about it in the education section of the paper. I’m going to be an English teacher by day and a novelist by night. You?”
I shrugged. “Waterslide tester?”
“That’s the last thing I would’ve expected you or anybody to say. Okay, I am now officially falling in like with you. That is so freaking awesome. You are my hero.” I think that’s what she said. Things got fuzzy after falling in like with you. “Stop jackhammering your leg,” she said. “It’s spectacularly annoying.”
“Sorry.”
“Stop apologizing. Don’t feel compelled to say anything at all. I know, I’m bossy.”
“I’m not saying anything at all.”
“Flip,” she said. “That’s what you should call him.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s his name. Watch. Flip. See? He cocked his head.”
“He cocks it no matter what you say to him,” I said.
“Flip Flip Flip Flip Flip.”
The little dog licked the Rainbow Girl’s lips and she smiled the most awesome smile, like in the picture of Mom’s partner Laura. Not pushing it, just real. Then she pushed up from the bench and headed off. “Gotta go study. Dad’s dropping an algebra test on me first thing tomorrow morning.”
“Beats what I have, a quiz on chapters one through five of To Kill a freaking Mockingbird.”
“What, you expect them to let you analyze Starship Troopers in English? At least you love Feathers, which means there’s hope for you. Look into the therapy dog certification. Maybe I’ll help you get that Read to Rufus thing going at the library. My mom would be totally into it.”
We were backpedaling away from each other, and we had to shout now. “Hey, I’m sorry about your dog,” I said.
“We’re adopting a new one as soon as I’m a hundred and eleven percent.”
“What’s your name anyway?”
“Halley, like the comet.”
“Wow.”
“Yup.”
“I’m, like, Ben, just so you know.”
“I, like, know. Mom told me, plus it’s on your library card, duh.”
“What’s it about, your novella?”
She spun around once and skipped and smiled. “I don’t know you well enough to tell you yet!”
“Does that mean you’ll be at the library tomorrow after school?”
“I have a doctor’s appointment! We look like idiots, hollering as we’re backing away from each other! You’re about to backpedal into an old man in a wheelchair! Ben?”
“Yeah?”
“A hundred and eleven! That’s how many books I’m going to write! That’s how many years I’m going to live! Bye Flip!”
I texted Chucky.
BC: Who told you the wink means profound admiration and respect?
CM: Rayburn, why?
10
DESTINED FOR AMAZINGNESS
“He’s going to be amazing with the kids,” the lady at the Read to Rufus office said.
Mom elbowed me and got back to signing the paper that said she would sponsor my training to become a Read to Rufus facilitator because I was underage.
“This girl, my friend, we’d like to start a program at my library,” I said.
“Sounds fantastic,” the lady said. “You and Flip will need to attend some classes to get him certified. There’s a bunch of homework too. Can you commit to that?”
“A hundred and eleven percent,” I said.
“He’s absolutely devoted to you, Ben,” the lady said. “Go ahead, do it again. I’d like to take a picture and post it on the website, if you’re cool with that.”
I read to Flip from The Memory Door, by N. T. Castillo-Cormier. His little ears perked up and he cocked his head, his big gold eyes on me. When I winked at him he dove at my mouth and stuck his peanut-butter-stinking tongue in there.
“Check your training books about how to teach him not to fly at the reader’s face,” the lady said. Her phone camera clicked. “
Keep going, Ben.”
The book was about this guy who finds a doorway that’ll let him travel a hundred and forty million years into the future. “‘He opened the door and the whole Earth was ice. The sky was black even though the sun was shining. The sun itself was ten times bigger, but the future was all cold wind. He turned around to go back home, but the door had disappeared, and now it and everything and everyone he’d ever known and loved existed only in his memory.’”
• • •
The subway car was crowded on the way home. I left the backpack open, and Flip stuck his little head out to look around. This girl in the next seat said, “I want to cuddle him till I crush him.” I held the backpack a little closer to me. The train stopped and the girl got off and actually said bye to me.
“Wield your newfound power gently, Traveler,” Mom said. “Who’s this friend you were talking about? The one who’s going to help you set up a Read to Rufus clinic at the library?”
“You know, just this girl I met.”
“Okay,” Mom said. “How long have you known her?”
“Like, since last winter? Mom, she’s a library girl, for cripe’s sake. Relax.”
She put me into a sort of headlock and kissed my forehead and then she went back to her book, some nonfiction thing about getting traumatized kids to talk again. That’s what she did for work. That was how we met.
I didn’t want to think about it anymore, the time before I went to live with Mom.
I put on my headphones and listened to the Transformers soundtrack and dreamed about the future, about all of us hanging out at the library: Flip and me and the Read to Rufus kids and Halley Like the Comet.
11
I WRITE, THEREFORE I AM
Wednesday was Rayburn-free. Word was getting around school that he cut out to do something illegal, not to mention profitable. Angelina started the rumor, and the way she said it, I was pretty sure she thought Rayburn was the most fascinating humanoid on the planet. “He’s gonna be so rich someday!” Big deal. A rich moron, some prize.
Chucky and I were going to eat in the cafeteria, but the urge for half-decent slices overwhelmed us and we went out to Nice Guy Eddie’s. “Does she have a nice butt at least, the library chick?”
