by Pat Schmatz
"His daughter came back last week and kicked me out of the trailer and took the scarves. She's the lawyer I want to sic a dinosaur on."
"Why did she take them?"
"Because she is a manifestation of the forces of evil."
A woodpecker rattled, and Travis searched the treetops, trying to track the sound. It stopped, then started again, farther away.
"Can we get them back? I mean, maybe we could figure out a way."
"Nope," said Velveeta. "She lives in San Diego. The scarves are gone. Except this one because I was wearing it."
She stared up at the sky, rubbing the scarf between her fingers. Travis took the rabies tag off the key ring and handed it to her.
"Rabies vaccination?" She sat up to study it.
"I know it's not the same, but our dog Rosco died on August ninth. I mean, he's not a person or anything, but he was . . ."
What was Rosco? Mother father and a couple of brothers? Best friend? All that and more.
"August ninth this year? A Saturday?" Travis nodded.
"That's exactly one week before Calvin died." She handed the tag back. "Calvin liked dogs. Maybe they're hanging out together."
"You think?"
A couple of birch leaves floated down into their own reflections in the black swamp water, more bright yellow boats in the harbor. Travis pulled Haunt Fox out of his backpack and opened to chapter two.
"See this?" He pointed at the line drawing of the hound. "That's what Rosco looked like."
"Oh . . ." Velveeta ran her fingertips across the picture.
"He had the softest ears ever. He was about the same color as your hair. Maybe a little more red."
Velveeta stroked the Haunt Fox dog's ears.
"Let's do some words," she said. "Or I'm going to get too sad."
"You sure? We don't have to do that."
"Yes, we do. Do you have a list?"
"I want to work on something else. Can you find the part where it talks about the puppy? It's in the second chapter."
Velveeta scanned through the pages.
" 'He was a big, sad- eyed hound'?"
"Yeah, that. I want to learn all the words in that paragraph."
"It's a long paragraph. Look, it goes all the way to the next page."
Travis took the book from her and counted. Twenty-four circled words.
"Can you drill me through them all?"
He took out his notebook and pencil and handed them to her.
"You sure? You won't get mad?"
"As long as you don't tell me to just try."
Velveeta wrote down the words. She fed them to Travis, one at a time. Once they'd gone over the list a few times, he asked her to read the paragraph out loud.
He lay back on the ground as she turned the print on the page into a living dog, same as McQueen had done in his office. Travis had never known puppy-Rosco, and he never would. This was the next best thing.
When Velveeta finished the paragraph, he sat up.
"Show me where it starts?" he said. "And read just that first sentence?"
She pointed at the words as she read. The string of print jumbled and shifted in front of him.
"Wait here," he said. "I'm going to go over there and try it by myself first."
"Is this the part where you run back to the truck and leave me alone in the woods?"
"No. I'm just going over there, by that tree. You can see me from here."
He sat with his back to her and looked at the words in the sentence one at a time, chewing through them slowly.
He stuck with that first sentence, again and again, word by word.
"Travis," called Velveeta, "you okay over there?"
He nodded and drilled through the sentence again.
Then he went back over and held the book up between them.
"Okay, you do it first. Just that sentence."
She read it. He followed with his eyes, imagining the yellow highlight from the Kurzweil moving across each word.
"Now you?"
Travis looked out at the swamp, taking in the hush of it, the breeze on his face, the crunchy smell and the soft carpet.
"See that stand of pines over there?" he said. "All the diff erent greens? Just like your scarf."
"Here." Velveeta unwound the scarf. She put it around Travis's neck, and it settled soft and slidey on his skin.
"It'll give you superpowers. Now read."
Travis gulped a big breath and plowed into the sentence. He kept tripping. He couldn't get through it.
"Wait, let's do the words again," said Velveeta.
They drilled words again, one at a time. Travis broke a sweat.
"Why do you want to do this?" he asked, taking a breather.
Velveeta lay back with her hands behind her head.
"Because it seems like I'm doing something real," she said. "That first time in the library, watching those words stick to your brain? That was so fun."
Travis lay next to her. The maple leaves blazed against the blue.
"Calvin would have liked you."
"Why?"
"He liked what I liked. We liked all the same movies.
Anything he said was good, it was good. Even the black-and- white ones."
"What did he die of?"
"Heart attack. In his sleep. One day, boom, gone. No more Calvin."
Big puffer clouds moved slowly across the expanse of blue sky. The sun shone on Travis's face, warm but not hot.
"If it wasn't for him, I probably wouldn't know how to read, either. He always made me do my homework."
Travis felt like he could lie there all day listening to her talk, but Velveeta grabbed the shoulder of his shirt and pulled him up.
"Come on, try the sentence again."
"You said try," he said. "You're not supposed to say try."
"Sorry. I forgot. Don't try."
Travis sat up, took a breath, and shook himself loose.
Then he took the book from her and read the sentence all the way through. Not one stumble.
"Travis, that was so great!" yelled Velveeta. She held up her fist. "Pound it!"
Travis lifted his hand and tapped it gently against hers, and she caught his eyes and held them tight. Their knuckles stayed together, touching. The light hit her hair like it had that day by the garbage can, the deep brown- red of Rosco lying in the sun.
"What color do you call your eyes?" asked Velveeta.
"Is that what they call hazel? Because they should have a whole different name for that color."
"I better check the time." Travis fumbled in his pocket for Grandpa's watch. "
Uh- oh, we're late. Come on, we've got to run."
He shoved the book in his backpack and they took off . Travis couldn't have read another word, not after that.
Velveeta's feet pounded behind his, along the dirt path and up the gravel drive to the road, where Grandpa was waiting in the truck.
on a Sit- up SATURDAY
So I walked into the home trailer after the best day of my life so far and the madre did not even ask me where I'd been or did I have a good time.
She told me Jimmy called and he's in Texas. Can this be true? I don't believe it.
I think he's still in Russet and lying, but she had another drink.
I've been thinking about the whole sitter- upper thing that McQueen talked about from The Book Thief. The madre is not a sitter- upper. She's a lierdowner. But Travis is a sitter- upper.
If it wasn't for him, I would have turned into a lier- downer after Calvin died. Or for sure after Sylvia took my scarves. I don't want to be a lierdowner.
Even if I never get out of Russet for my whole life. I'll be a sitter- upper waitress if I have to.
CHAPTER TWENTY?? EIGHT
Travis met Velveeta at the corner of Water Street.
"Travelli," she said. "We are going to a party at Bradley Whistler's, right? Pinch me and tell me I'm not in some wacky nightmare."
"You're not. See? That's his house
at the end of the block. Th at brick one with the white trim."
"Oh, and there's Bradley, just coming out to look for us. Look at him - he's so excited."
Bradley herded them in the front door and introduced Velveeta to his folks.
Everyone said good to meet you, and they sat down to the spinach-pine nuts stuff for lunch. Travis picked around the green and orange and ate the pasta.
There was plenty of fresh bakery bread and homemade applesauce, and cherry crisp for dessert.
Much better than bakery day-olds.
Velveeta started off quiet, but by the time they got to dessert, she loosened up.
"Okay, wait, watch this," she said. "Watch me - I'm Bradley." She knocked on the table. "Hey, open up, what's the password? What's the password, roger roger? I'm the Master Chief - give me the password. That's the password.
What's the password? The password is the password."
"No, no," yelled Bradley, laughing. "It's 'Oh, man, I forgot.' Then it goes - "
She knocked on the table again. "I'm Bradley of the supersonic brain. Open the door. I don't need no frickin' password. Just hook my games back up right now. Come on, hand them over or I'll neutralize your whole squad."
Bradley's parents totally cracked up. They laughed way harder than Travis could see what was funny, and Bradley's mom actually snorted water out her nose.
"Velveeta, you're good," said Bradley's dad, still trying to get his breath. "You kids go on and do your anti- dance thing. We can't take any more."
Travis and Velveeta followed Bradley upstairs. His room was big enough to put three or four of Travis's bedroom in it.
"Why do you have two computers, Bradley?" asked Velveeta. "Do you type on a different one with each hand?"
"No, that's one of my mom's old ones. She lets me take it apart and mess with it. I'm the family IT department."
"No TV in your room? Of course, with a big flat-screen like that one downstairs, who needs it?"
"I used to have one in here, but my dad took it on his anti- electronics binge.
I'm lucky he let me keep the computers and my phone. I told him it'd be good if we could play when you guys came over, but he said I can't contaminate you in this house."
"Bradley Whistler contaminating me," said Velveeta.
"That's a walk into backward land. Look at all these books.
Have you read them all?"
She walked along the full- wall bookshelf, trailing her fingers across the spines.
"Mostly." Bradley sat on the floor.
"You could open your own library," said Velveeta.
Travis sat near Bradley and leaned against the dresser.
"So, Travis," said Velveeta, "why does Cormick call you Moolio, anyway?"
"He says Travis is one coolio moolio," said Bradley.
"That's way better than Chocolate Chip."
"Chocolate Chip was not Chad's best effort. Velveeta, on the other hand, was a stroke of genius."
"Chad named you that?" asked Travis.
"Back in second grade. Chad can't call anyone by just their name. It's a speech impediment. Do you like Moolio?"
"Beats Bluefish."
"Bluefish? What's that?" asked Bradley.
"They called me that at my old school. Because of the reading group I was in, back in third grade."
Bradley bounced up and pulled a book off the shelf.
He pointed at the cover.
"This, right? Your groups were One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish?"
The dumb bluefish stared at Travis with that stupid blank idiot smile.
"But look!" said Velveeta. "That bluefish is the moolio fish. He's all cazh, kicking back on a wave while One and Two and Red are swimming around like a herd of water sheep."
"I want to be a bluefish," said Bradley.
"You can't," said Travis. "You're too smart."
"No, no." Velveeta took the book from Bradley and pointed at the picture. "Look at how the bluefish will not swim when the others swim. The bluefish is at the anti-dance."
She leaned against the shelf in the same pose as the bluefish leaning on the wave, hand on hip, smiling the big close- lipped smile. Only it didn't look stupid on her - it looked like she was up to something.
"See? I'm a bluefish."
"Wait, me too!" Bradley leaned on his desk and popped his eyes wide open and smiled like a maniac. "Am I doing it right?"
"You don't want to." Travis shook his head, laughing.
"Yes, we do," said Velveeta. "We're here, we're anti-dancing, we're bluefish. I think we should have tattoos.
Bradley, do you have a blue pen?"
Bradley tossed her a blue marker from his desk. She drew the fish picture on the back of her hand.
"That looks more like a fat worm than a fish," said Bradley.
"Okay, you're so good, let's see you draw one. Put it on Travis's hand there."
Travis held out his fist, and Bradley drew the fish. It was much better than Velveeta's.
"Look at the long eyelashes on that thing!" said Velveeta. "Bradley, I had no idea you were all artistic. Put one on your own hand."
Bradley took a long time to draw his own. Finally, he held his hand up.
"Look, it hardly shows on me," he said.
"That's because you're a stealth bluefish," said Velveeta.
"Cleverly disguised as a one fish. Look, we can even have a secret bluefish wave."
She rippled her hand through the air, dipping it up and down like it was riding ocean waves.
"Everyone wants to be a bluefish, but we're a very select group. We need a password and a secret hand-shake. We should make up a bluefish code.
Everyone will want to be us."
"Hey, kids." Bradley's dad knocked. "It's going on four. Travis, Velveeta, get your shoes on. I'm taking you home."
"You don't need to drive us home. We can walk," said Velveeta as Bradley's dad opened the door.
"You sure?" he asked. "It's no trouble."
"We'd rather walk, right, Travis?" said Velveeta. Travis nodded. "It's not raining or anything."
They followed Bradley's dad downstairs. Travis and Velveeta thanked Bradley's parents, and everyone said how much fun it was.
"That actually was fun," said Velveeta once they got up the street a ways.
"Yeah, it was. How come you never let anybody drive you home? You even made us drop you off at the library yesterday."
Layers of clouds blanketed the sky, and a chilly wind blew them along. Velveeta wrapped the ends of her scarf around her neck and tucked them inside her hoodie.
"Mr. Noticer Boy, are you sure you're not an undercover cop?"
"Even if Mr. Whistler drove us, you'd make him drop you at the library, right?"
"Right. So listen, I've been thinking about Rosco's rabies tag. Does carrying it withyou make you feel like Rosco is less dead?"
"Not really." Travis found the tag in his pocket. "I mean, if anything, it makes him feel more dead because if he were alive, then he'd be wearing it, not me."
"Right." She unwound her scarf a couple of turns and wrapped one end around her palm. "This is different. I'd be wearing it even if Calvin were still alive."
"But carrying it with me . . ." Travis pressed the tag, flat and warm, into the center of his palm. "It doesn't make him not dead, but it makes him not as much gone, you know? Like sometimes when I rub it, I can sort of smell him."
Velveeta rubbed the scarf across her cheek. They came to Main Street, but instead of turning toward town, Velveeta stepped onto the bridge and leaned over the railing. The water looked cold and choppy in the wind, and leaves swirled down and hit the surface.
"So it's not like you're someone who never had a Rosco, right? So even though Calvin's dead, it's not like I'm someone who never had a Calvin.
Because if there'd been no Calvin, there'd be no scarf."
"Yeah," said Travis. "Not that scarf, anyway. I mean, you could go buy some other scarf, like I could go get another rabies
tag. But you couldn't get that one."
"Even with all the scarves gone but this one, I can't turn into a no- Calvin Velveeta. Like you can never be a no- Rosco Travis, right?"
"Right."
The water rushed beneath them. Travis picked up a stick and threw it in. It drifted toward the bridge, picking up speed as it got close to the dam.
When it went under, they ran across and watched it come out the other side.
The stick hurtled over and crashed into the white water at the bottom.
"So I was wondering," said Velveeta. "Is there a Mrs. Ed?"
"Nope. She died before I was born."
"What about Ed Junior? Or Edwina?"
"My dad died when I was three. So did my mom."
Velveeta opened her mouth, but Travis stopped her. "It's okay. I hardly remember them."
He picked up another stick, crossed the road, and threw it as far as he could.
The wind and the current pushed it swiftly toward the dam. He crossed back over and leaned next to Velveeta.
"So you don't miss them?" she asked.
"No. Not like Rosco."
The stick shot over the falls and disappeared into the foam and rocks at the bottom. Travis leaned farther over the railing, looking for it to pop up again.
Velveeta pointed at the bluefish Bradley had drawn on his hand.
"Did you mind?" she asked. "Us getting all bluefishy with it?"
"No, it's fine," said Travis. "It's different here."
"That's because you've got me and Bradley in your school. Ha. Get it, your school?"
"Ha," said Travis.
The stick finally resurfaced near the steep bank, floated downstream on smooth, fast- running water, and disappeared around the curve.
"Hey, speaking of school, have you been practicing that sentence so you can wow McQueen tomorrow?"
"I've got the first two down now."
"Can I come and watch you wow him?"
"No."
"Please?"
"No."
"Fine, cut me out of the good part. That's just like you." She pushed away from the railing. "I'd better get going. See you tomorrow, Travarelli."
About a block away, she turned around and walked backwards. She rolled her left hand up and down in the bluefish wave. Travis bluefish waved back. She flipped the end of her scarf at him, turned around, and walked on.
