The Otherworldlies

by Jennifer Anne Kogler

  The afternoon sun had finally snaked its way into the living room through the large French doors that lined the back of the house. Steam rose off the wet wooden backyard gate. A faint aroma of pot roast filtered in from the kitchen. Following Mrs. McAllister’s announcement, all three younger McAllisters anxiously awaited the chance to put in their two cents.

  “We barely even know the guy!” Sam said, rolling his eyes and crossing his arms. “What about inviting strangers into the house? Isn’t there some rule against that?”

  “He’s not a stranger, Sam. He’s a friend of mine, and if you don’t do your best to make him a friend of yours, there will be severe repercussions.”

  “Why do we have to have dinner with him?” Sam repeated. “You can’t just spring this on us five minutes before he’s supposed to arrive. Shouldn’t you have asked us beforehand?”

  “That’s—”

  “Look,” Eddie said, cutting his mother off while tossing a football to himself in one hand. “Our mother, Mary Lou McAllister, is a foxy lady.” He broke into a huge goofy smile. “Mom doesn’t want to hang out with you jackals all the time—she has needs,” he continued, raising both eyebrows in quick succession.

  “That’s enough,” Mrs. McAllister said fiercely.

  “I’m kidding. All I’m trying to say is that I think Mr. Summers is a cool guy. I’m serious about that.” Eddie turned to his brother and sister. “Give him a chance. Mom likes him.”

  All three children looked at their mother. Her expression had become more rigid. The McAllister children had seen the Commander tighten up like this before and, knowing what might happen if they did not back down, did so immediately.

  “Maybe we just don’t know him very well,” Sam suggested.

  “I’m sure it’s nice for you to talk to someone your own age,” Fern interjected. “Isn’t he a pilot? You’ll probably get free flights or something. We can finally go see the Taj Mahal like we’ve been wanting to.”

  Mrs. McAllister sighed.

  “I know this is strange,” she said, still looking in her lap. “I’ve been spending more and more time with Wallace. But I want you to get along with him. You three are the most important thing to me, you know that.” Her voice was uncharacteristically flat.

  Fern looked at her mother. She was wearing a red turtleneck and a suede skirt; her hair was perfectly coiffed, and her turquoise eyes sparkled. She had dressed up for the occasion, and she looked beautiful.

  “We’ll be on our best behavior, won’t we fellas,” Eddie said, winking at his younger sister and brother.

  Before Fern and Sam had a chance to chime in, the doorbell rang, playing the beginning of Für Elise. Mrs. McAllister got up to answer it.

  “Wallace, it’s so nice to see you,” she said. Eddie, Sam, and Fern stayed on the couch as their mother greeted Mr. Summers. He wore a green wool blazer and neatly pressed chinos. He would have looked handsome to Fern had she not harbored a deep mistrust of him.

  “Eddie, Sam, Fern? You remember Mr. Summers, of course,” Mrs. McAllister said, bringing him into the living room.

  “It’s nice to see you again, Mr. Summers,” Sam said.

  Mr. Summers crouched down as Byron ran toward him.

  “Why, hello there!” Mr. Summers cooed. Byron jumped up and snapped his jaw, just missing Mr. Summers’s nose. Byron was clearly trying to take a hunk out of his face, yipping all the while.

  “Whoa there,” Eddie said, grabbing Byron’s collar and trying to settle him down. “Sorry about that, Mr. Summers. I don’t know what’s gotten into Byron lately,” he said.

  “Byron doesn’t like strangers,” Sam said, casting a disrespectful glance in Mr. Summers’s direction.

  “I’m a neighbor, Sam,” Mr. Summers said, smiling good-naturedly.

  “Most of our neighbors are strangers, Mr. Summers. But then again, most of our neighbors don’t come over uninvited.”

  “I assure you, Sam, I was invited this time,” Mr. Summers replied, trying to laugh Sam’s rudeness off.

  It was beginning to look like Mr. Summers and Sam were going to go the full fifteen rounds.

  Mrs. McAllister, who had gone into the kitchen, returned with two glasses and a bottle of merlot.

  “Wallace and I are going to have a drink in here before dinner. If you kids wouldn’t mind setting the table and heating up the potatoes and green beans, I’d really appreciate it. Oh, I almost forgot—the roast is on a timer. When it dings, take it out, will you?” The Commander’s voice was sweet and delicate.

  “Everything smells just delicious, Mary Lou,” Mr. Summers said, lightly touching Mrs. McAllister’s elbow as the two sat next to each other on the couch. Fern couldn’t believe her eyes and ears. It was like she was watching a cheesy dating show where her mother was the chief contestant. Sam, Fern, and Eddie gathered in the kitchen.

  “This is going to be awful,” Sam whispered as soon as the kitchen door swung closed. He could hear the faint laughter of his mother in the living room. “What if we go in there and they’re making out or something?”

  Fern was still reeling from the way Mr. Summers had touched “Mary Lou’s” arm.

  “Mr. Summers isn’t going to be making out with anybody tonight,” Eddie said, half laughing, half whispering.

  “How can you be so sure?” Sam shot back.

  “Because the Commander would never ever do something like that in front of all of us. Now just calm down, and before you know it, this’ll all be over.” He palmed Fern’s head and moved to the fridge to get out the beans and potatoes. The McAllister kids worked efficiently and silently to set the table and prepare the food—both things they had been accustomed to doing ever since the Commander had taken her high-powered real estate job.

  Twenty minutes later, the McAllisters and Wallace Summers were sitting at the dining room table, shoveling pot roast, green beans, and mashed potatoes into their mouths. The dining room, the Spode, and the sterling silver hadn’t been used since Christmas Eve, and it reminded Fern of drinking eggnog while Bing Crosby sang about chestnuts.

  “So, Fern, I know Eddie here’s a football star, but do you play any sports?”

  “No, not really,” Fern said. “St. Gregory’s doesn’t have a middle school gym, and I haven’t been able to practice outside because of the sun.”

  “The sun?”

  “Fern has sensitive skin, Wallace. But she’s a really great runner,” Mrs. McAllister said, jumping in.

  “The girl may look undersized and scrawny, but she’s got jets!” Eddie said, with every intention of embarrassing Fern. He, Fern, and Sam often raced from one end of the grove to the other, and Fern never lost. Fortunately, Eddie was the kind of older brother who never let a loss like that bother him. In fact, he celebrated it.

  “And you, Sam?” Mr. Summers followed up.

  Sam stabbed a couple of green beans with a fork. Everyone at the table stared at him. He was acting oblivious.

  “Sam? Are you going to answer Mr. Summers’s question?”

  “Huh?” Sam said, looking up. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that was a question.”

  “I forgot that you were a literalist, Sam,” Mr. Summers said, unwilling to engage in hand-to-hand combat. “What sports do you play?”

  “I play basketball and in the spring I do the triple jump and long jump.”

  “Ah, so you’re going to follow in your brother’s footsteps,” Mr. Summers said, smiling at Sam.

  “He wishes,” Eddie said, nudging Sam with a friendly elbow.

  “So, where are you originally from, Mr. Summers?” Fern asked, worried that Sam would be grounded for the rest of the school year if he kept needling Mr. Summers.

  “Well, I’m from Maine originally, but I’ve been living the last few years in Tampa, Florida.”

  “Why’d you move?” Sam said, his voice lifeless.

  “Nobody told me that Florida was an overbuilt swamp!” Mr. Summers said jovially. When he grinned, he looked very young�
��too young for her mother, Fern thought. “They have more bugs and snakes there than people.”

  “We have bugs and snakes here. Rattlers,” Sam said.

  “I also didn’t like sweating as soon as I got out of the shower. The summers are brutal.”

  “Well, Wallace, you’ve come to the right place. Things are so dry here we have brush fires year-round,” Mrs. McAllister said in a voice Sam thought to be much sweeter than she usually used with any of her children.

  “How do you like the pot roast, Mr. Summers?” Sam asked. Fern looked nervously at her brother. It was an odd question for him to ask.

  “I’ve been too busy munching on these delicious green beans—I haven’t tried it yet,” he said. “But here goes nothing.” Mr. Summers picked up the knife to the side of his plate. He stabbed the slab of meat and began cutting off a sizable hunk. He began sawing. And sawing. And sawing some more. He couldn’t get his knife though the piece of meat. Sam picked up a bite he’d already sliced and put it in his mouth. He smacked his lips loudly.

  “Having some trouble with the roast, Mr. Summers?” Sam asked, his mouth full of pot roast. “Mom used to have to cut mine up for me when I was a toddler. I’m sure she’d be perfectly willing to lend you a hand.”

  Wallace increased his effort to saw off a piece. His face had turned as pink as the center of the roast. Small beads of sweat rolled out from underneath his hair on to his forehead.

  “Oh dear!” Mrs. McAllister said, getting up from her chair. “I’m afraid that you’re using the defective knife! I honestly thought we put that in a drawer somewhere or in the trash. That thing wouldn’t cut through a wet noodle—it’s actually worse than a butter knife. I’m so sorry!” Mrs. McAllister got up from her chair and grabbed Mr. Summers’s knife. She was back from the kitchen with a replacement in the span of four seconds.

  Fern tried not to acknowledge Sam. She knew, without a doubt, that Sam had set Mr. Summers’s place at the table. He’d unearthed that dull knife on purpose. She wanted to kick Sam under the table.

  “How do you like it here?” Fern said, trying not to look at her twin brother. Mr. Summers was now visibly flustered, but he carried on valiantly.

  “San Juan’s got so much history with the mission and the swallows and all.” Mr. Summers easily cut through the pot roast with his new knife and devoured large slices. “Orange County is pretty homogenous—tract home after tract home—but I feel like Capistrano’s an actual town.”

  “Have you been to the beach yet?” Eddie asked.

  “No, not yet, but I want to.”

  “What about Disneyland?” Fern said, excited by the mere mention of “the Happiest Place on Earth.” Although Fern had trouble going in the daytime, Mrs. McAllister had bought everyone an annual pass. They spent dozens of warm summer nights running from the teacups to the Indiana Jones Adventure.

  “You know what? That’s something that I’ve been meaning to do. In fact,” Mr. Summers said, his face lighting up, “how would you all like to come to Disneyland with me? Show a novice the ropes?” He finished his question as if he were presenting the McAllister children with one of the finest things a man could offer, almost as if Mr. Summers thought they would go to Disneyland with an older man and forget all the time they had spent without a father-figure. Fern wanted to gag loudly at the table. Sam had other ideas.

  “I’m afraid we can’t do that, Mr. Summers,” he said matter-of-factly.

  “Why is that?”

  “Because a lot of the rides only have room for four, and so someone would be the odd person out all the time. That would be no fun.” Sam said. Fern was astonished. Sam would not relent. Fern had no doubt that the Commander would be very severe with him after dinner.

  “What about Splash Mountain? You can fit five in a log,” Eddie said, trying to take the edge off Sam’s remarks.

  “I’m sure it’s only four.”

  “No, it’s five.”

  “Don’t be an idiot, Eddie,” Sam said, sounding much older than Eddie did.

  “I’m sure of it, there are three seats. I think you can fit six, actually,” Eddie said.

  “It’s four,” Sam said. Eddie recognized the discussion as one wrought with unresolved conflict and went to work trying to smooth things over.

  “Fern, you haven’t weighed in on this important issue,” Eddie said. “What’s your opinion?”

  He turned to his sister—only to find her chair empty.

  “Hey, where did Fern run off to?” Eddie said.

  Mrs. McAllister had noticed immediately. One second she was staring at her daughter and the next moment she was staring at the back of her upholstered dining room chair.

  “Oh dear, has Fern gone up to the bathroom?” Mrs. McAllister asked, her voice jumpy, directing her question at her two sons. Though Wallace Summers could not possibly have noticed, Sam and Eddie picked up on the harried tilt of their mother’s voice. The Commander was panicked.

  “Yes, she was grabbing her stomach,” Sam said, recognizing what had happened and following his mother’s lead.

  “I didn’t even see her leave, the sneaky thing,” Mr. Summers said.

  “Oh, she can be very sneaky. You know what, Wallace? Would you think me terribly rude if I cut our dinner short?” Mrs. McAllister smiled earnestly at Wallace Summers.

  “Have I offended you, Mary Lou? Usually, I don’t get kicked out until after dessert has been served and I’ve accidentally gotten whipped cream all over my face.”

  “Oh no, it’s nothing like that. You see, Fern has stomach problems, and she’s so self-conscious about them.”

  “Stomach problems?”

  “Yes. Acid reflux, the purple pill—you know the drill. She’s probably in a mess upstairs, and . . . well, I should go check on her.”

  “Of course, of course. I know how girls can be at that age. I’ll get out of your hair immediately.” Mr. Summers tossed his napkin down on the table, taking his last bite of pot roast before standing up.

  “Kids are under so much more pressure than they used to be,” Mrs. McAllister said, shaking her head when she realized how much of an understatement that was in Fern’s case.

  “Mary Lou, I had a great time. I hope you’ll invite me back often enough that Fern’ll be comfortable around me someday.”

  “Yes,” Mrs. McAllister said absently, completely dismissing Wallace Summers’s romantic declaration. “I’ll send Eddie over with some wrapped-up dessert,” she finished. The Commander’s eyes had glazed over and she rushed Mr. Summers out of the house. Sam and Eddie moved to the living room, exchanging knowing glances as they sat on the couch. When the Commander returned, her face was the color of a picket fence. She sat in the armchair and sighed deeply.

  “Does either of you know where your sister is?” Mary Lou McAllister’s voice was so calm and so collected under the circumstances that Sam began to wonder if his mother wasn’t in on some sort of practical joke. He’d learn, eventually, that panic took many forms.

  “Didn’t you see her?” Sam said, unable to stay calm like his mother. “She was here, and then she got that look and then she was gone!”

  “You’re saying that Fern actually disappeared?” Eddie asked with disbelief.

  “What look are you talking about, Sam?” Mrs. McAllister said in an accusatory tone.

  “I don’t know. Sometimes Fern gets a look on her face, like she’s a robot, and then strange things happen.”

  “How do we know she’s not hiding under the table or something?” Eddie said, beginning to crouch under the table. “Fern’s a rascal—I bet she just wanted Summers out of the house. Hey, Fern—come out, come out wherever you are!” Eddie said. Sam couldn’t help but think that his older brother was painfully naïve.

  “I think I know where she is,” Sam said, almost weakly.

  “Where?” Mrs. McAllister asked anxiously.

  “Disneyland.”

  Fern had drifted off into her own thoughts at the mere mention of Disneyland.
The McAllisters had been there over a hundred times and had watched at least a hundred fireworks shows over Main Street. There was something about its perfection that appealed to Fern. While sitting at the dinner table, she shut out the bickering between Sam and Eddie, closed her eyes for a brief moment, and imagined Critter Country, with its wooden structures culminating in the grassy hills of Splash Mountain. The twisted tree trunk flashed each time a log full of people rolled down the steep drop. The tree trunk itself had always fascinated Fern; its gnarled roots and twisted limbs almost made the top of the mountain look human. Sam’s and Eddie’s voices drifted across the dinner table until Fern finally couldn’t hear them any longer.

  A familiar blackness took hold of her.

  Floating alone in a space that appeared to have no beginning or end, Fern pawed the air, trying to find an edge she could hang on to. Then everything turned a shade lighter, and she could make out her own hands. The sound of rushing water thundered through her skull. She could feel her knees buckle beneath her.

  She was on her back. Above Fern there was nothing but dusky sky. She shifted slightly, sat up, and leaned against something that felt like wet concrete. Fern looked to the right and what she saw was unmistakable: the majestic white peak of the Matterhorn across the way, at eye level. Fern could make out the bobsleds as they carried delighted passengers, rumbling around the wooden tracks of the snowcapped mountain. More immediately in the foreground, the place known as Tom Sawyer Island separated Fern from the red rock of Big Thunder Mountain. As high as she was, Big Thunder looked small and unintimidating. She shifted her weight on her legs, trying to peer over the ledge she was on.

  Although she hadn’t been sure before, all it took was one log passing through the white waters and into the foggy nest of thorns beneath her for Fern to realize that she was sitting on Splash Mountain, atop the hollowed-out tree trunk on the highest point of the mountain.