“Um, a new one,” Michael says. “But it’s definitely not a really bad secret that would get us all in a lot of trouble.”
“And it’s not a secret that would prove I can’t be a responsible pet owner,” Ellie says.
My dad raises his eyebrows. “So what kind of secret is it?”
“An educational one,” Alison replies.
We all look at her in surprise.
“Well, it’s kind of true,” she says, and shrugs. “Everything can be educational if you think about it.”
“Do you need any help with your educational secret?” my dad asks.
“No,” we all reply in unison.
“Carry on then,” he says, and steps aside.
Michael and Alison sprint toward the kitchen. Ellie opens the door to the basement and heads downstairs. Dragon and I rush up the stairs.
Chewy isn’t in the hall bathroom, my parents’ bedroom, or Ellie’s room.
“We only have one more room to check,” I say with a sigh.
“You’re really worried about getting in trouble, huh?” Dragon asks.
I think about Chewy and where he could be. He won’t have any food or water, or his little wheel. I wonder if he’s scared.
“I always get in trouble,” I say. “I’m more worried about Chewy. I thought we’d find him by now. It’ll be all my fault if he’s not okay.”
“I thought it was my fault,” Dragon says.
I look at the floor and shake my head. “No, it’s my fault. I’m the one who was responsible for Chewy. Not you. Not Ellie. Just me.”
Dragon’s stomach growls. “Does that mean I can have a marshmallow?”
“That means we still have to find Chewy first.”
As we head to my room, Ellie, Alison, and Michael come up the stairs empty-handed.
“Alison thought Chewy might return to someplace he’s familiar with,” Ellie tells us. “I told her Chewy was in your room all last night and yesterday after school.”
We all go in my room and start to search. It’s a little embarrassing to see Alison stumble across my goo collection, especially because some of it’s pretty old. But mostly I’m glad I’m not looking for Chewy on my own.
“Hey,” I say. Everyone stops where they’re searching to look at me. “Thanks for helping me look for Chewy. I don’t know if we’re going to find him . . .”
“Warren,” Alison says, pointing at me.
“I’ll have to tell my parents now,” I say.
“No, Warren!” Alison says, now jabbing her finger toward me.
“I know, it’s my fault!” I say. “It’s all my fault. Okay?”
“Uh, Warren?” Ellie says, standing by Alison. “She’s pointing behind you.”
I turn around and see that behind me is my window. The window is open. And beyond the window is the chute-of-doom ramp. And on the chute-of-doom ramp is Chewy, looking like he’s about to fall off of it.
13
Time for Chewy
Lots of things happen at once. Alison covers her mouth, then her eyes, and then tries to cover her whole face.
Ellie says, “There’s nothing about this in the pet owner manuals.”
Michael runs out of the room, shouting, “I gotta catch him when he falls!”
I reach my hands out of the window as far as they’ll go over the ramp.
“Come here, Chewy,” I say, but he’s too far away to grab. “Come here, and you can have as many food pellets as you want.” Chewy moves a little forward, but the chute wobbles from side to side.
“Wait!” I say. “Stay there, Chewy. Don’t move!”
Michael is now underneath the chute with his hands up. Alison comes rushing around the side of the house and I see she’s brought my bed pillow, which she lays on the ground.
“In case we don’t catch him,” she tells Michael. Michael grimaces. “I can’t even see where Chewy is up there. Oh, there he is!” Alison exclaims. “Wait, that’s not Chewy. That’s the dragon doll. What’s that doing up there?”
I look over and see that Dragon is now on the chute in front of Chewy.
“I can’t believe she still calls me a doll,” Dragon bristles. He then turns his attention to Chewy. “Look, Chewy, I hope this has all been fun for you. Your life was super boring and now it’s super interesting. We got some great material for Warren’s report,” Dragon adds, and pats the notepad. “But I need marshmallows, Chewy, which means you have to return to your normal, safe little life in a cage. Maybe you can visit every once in a while and we’ll play ninja warriors. I won’t even try to eat you when you visit.”
Chewy just looks at Dragon.
“This way, Chewy,” Dragon says, and extends a claw. Chewy moves toward Dragon. I can’t believe it. Dragon’s actually getting Chewy to follow him.
“Come on, little fella,” Dragon says as he slowly leads Chewy toward my window. They’re inching closer, closer, and then . . . the chute begins to swing side to side. Dragon clutches onto the chute with his leg claws, but Chewy doesn’t know to hang on anywhere.
“Be careful, Chewy!” Alison screams. Michael runs around underneath, trying to find where Chewy is in case he falls.
“Please don’t fall!” Ellie yells to Chewy. “I don’t know what to do if a pet falls!”
Chewy is about to topple over the side when Dragon drops the notepad and reaches for Chewy with both front claws. Dragon swings Chewy toward the window where I catch the hamster with my outstretched hands.
“Oh my goodness!” Ellie exclaims as I take Chewy inside and put him on my bed. “I can’t believe Chewy pushed off the dragon so he could jump to you! That was the scariest thing ever.”
I hear a loud thud, and Dragon scampers through the window soon after.
“Don’t worry, I’m okay,” he says in between deep breaths. “But the notepad didn’t make it. And the chute definitely didn’t make it.”
“All that matters is that Chewy’s okay,” I say, and gently pat Chewy on the back.
“What is going on here?” I hear my mom say. She’s standing at my bedroom door with my dad, Alison, and Michael right behind her.
My dad brushes past everyone to look out the window.
“What is that . . . thing hanging down from your window ledge?” he says. “Is that cardboard?”
“It’s a secret,” Michael says.
“It’s an educational experiment,” Alison says.
“It’s the reason why I never, ever want a pet,” Ellie says emphatically. “Pets are way too much work. Plus, how am I supposed to know what to do if a pet goes on a chute-of-doom ramp?”
“Chute-of-doom ramp?” my mom asks.
“It’s kind of a funny story,” I say.
“Good. You can tell us after you clean up whatever’s on the side of our house,” my dad says.
“That’s another thing,” Ellie says. “Pets make big messes.”
“All pets always make messes,” Alison says. “It’s no biggie. You just have to clean up.”
“Alison’s right. We’ll clean it all up,” I say.
My parents look at me, surprised.
“We’ll clean up?” Dragon says, also surprised. I guess it’s because it’s the first time I’ve said I’ll clean up without being asked ten times by my parents first.
“If we clean up, we still have the rest of today and tomorrow for fun stuff.”
“And time to take care of Chewy,” Alison adds.
“I will definitely make time for Chewy,” I say, and hold him tightly in my hands.
How about that. Sometimes there’s time for everything.
“And time to write that report,” my mom adds.
Blergh!
14
Hamster Report
Against my will, I have returned to the wasteland. This time I bring
along my tiny ninja sidekick, Chewy the fearless warrior hamster robot. I send Chewy off to forage for marshmallows in the barren lands, but he is quickly trapped in a cage.
I try my best but I cannot save him. The locals, especially the big one who is obviously their leader, insist on keeping Chewy trapped there forever. I tell Chewy I will bring him food pellets and begin to retreat, but their leader captures me as well.
“Warren?” Mrs. Tierney asks. “Are you ready to give your report?”
“Report?”
“Your report on taking care of Chewy over the weekend,” Mrs. Tierney says, looking concerned. “You did write one, didn’t you?”
“Oh, yeah,” I say, and shuffle through my backpack. I pull out the report, stand up, and walk to the front of the classroom.
I look around at the class and clear my throat. “Chewy liked to eat hamster food and apples and even some lettuce. He drank lots of water. Chewy slept a lot in the day and played a lot at night.” I see Mrs. Tierney nod her head. My report is going great. “He did not fall asleep to bedtime stories, even really good ones.”
“You read him bedtime stories?” Nicky says, and snorts. Some other kids giggle.
“For your information, they were the best bedtime stories ever told,” I say. “But you’ll never hear them, because you are not a hamster.”
Nicky looks confused. I continue. “Chewy is one dragon mouth–width wide and half a dragon tail long.”
“What?” Anika says. “Why’s that in your report? How do you even measure a hamster with a dragon?”
“I don’t have room in my report to explain every little thing,” I tell Anika. “Maybe if you spent less time paying attention in school, and more time daydreaming, you’d learn important stuff, too.”
Mrs. Tierney looks like she wants to say something, but she just opens her mouth and then closes it again.
“Anyway,” I say loudly. “When Chewy was awake, he was very brave. He was good at not getting eaten, which was good. Best of all, Chewy was great at escaping the chute-of-doom ramp.”
Now a whole bunch of kids are raising their hands, wanting to ask me stuff. I look at Mrs. Tierney triumphantly. Most of these reports are so boring that I imagine being a time-traveling ninja robot as soon as the kid starts talking. But my report is obviously super interesting, because I have everyone’s attention.
“We’ll save questions for after the report,” I say, and hold up a hand. “My sister, Ellie, does not want to keep Chewy as a pet because now she doesn’t want to have any pets, especially people pets. But others in my house would like to keep Chewy as a pet. I am one of those people.” I look around the room again. “Okay, that’s the end.”
Everyone is waving their hands and shouting out questions, but Mrs. Tierney shushes the room as she walks up to the front. “Uh, thank you, Warren,” she says, “for that very interesting and rather informative report. Maybe too informative.”
“You’re welcome,” I say, and go back to my desk where I sit next to Alison.
“That was surprisingly not terrible,” Alison says.
“Thanks!” I say.
“We’ll have another contest this Friday to see who gets to bring Chewy home next,” Mrs. Tierney tells the class.
“Oh, I hope I win!” Alison says. “I can’t wait to introduce Chewy to all my animals.”
“They won’t try to eat him, will they?” I ask.
“Of course not,” Alison says.
“When it’s your turn to take Chewy, you’ll feed him enough?”
“Warren, you know I will.”
“And you’ll make sure he has fun?”
“Yes.”
“And you’ll make sure he doesn’t get lost again?”
Alison looks at me and shakes her head, but she’s still smiling.
“Warren, when it’s my turn to take Chewy, do you want to come over and help me take care of him?”
I smile.
I make a deal with a redheaded local to visit Chewy at her home base at an unspecified date. When it’s time, I will bring along marshmallows and a dragon.
Turn the page to read a chapter of
How to Make Friends
“Ugh. How am I going to pack all this in one week?” I say, looking at my room.
“Don’t pack everything,” Dragon says. “Just the good stuff. Like me.”
I lift up a plastic green tarantula and a blob of gooey fake ghost slime and toss them into a box.
“Everything I have is good.”
“What about this?” Dragon asks, holding up the broken half of a blue crayon.
“I might need half of a blue crayon one day.” I throw the crayon in the box and it splits into two more halves.
“Dragon, I need to make more friends than Ellie when we move.”
“Why do you want to make more friends? You have me,” Dragon says.
“Ellie’s always right about everything,” I say, and Dragon nods his head because he knows what I’m talking about. Ellie was right when she said the tub would flood if I put too many ninja toys near the drain, even though they really needed water training. She was right when she said my stomach would hurt from eating so many marshmallows at once, even though it was Dragon’s idea to challenge me and he won anyway. And Ellie was right when she said if I didn’t put on enough sunblock I’d get red, even though it was more important to help Dragon prepare for his annual fire-breathing exam that day. Dragon and I both ended up getting burned.
“I want to be right just one time,” I say. “So how do I make friends?”
“That’s easy,” Dragon says. “When I want to make a new friend, I tell them they can either be my friend or I’ll burn down their village.”
“Dad says we’re moving to a new town, not a village.”
“Oh, that’s a shame.”
I find a smushed chocolate chip cookie under a pile of books. I break it in two and give half to Dragon.
“Still fresh,” he says.
“I think it’s only from a couple of months ago,” I say.
“You know, people like compliments,” Dragon says after licking the melted chocolate off his claws. “You can make friends fast by giving out compliments. Try it on me.”
“Okay. You’re very . . . dragon-y.”
“That’s not a compliment.”
“You’re slimy?”
“Also not a compliment. Compliments are supposed to make a friend feel good.”
“Um . . . you smell especially smoky today.”
“A little better. And?”
“Your tail is super spiky and a nice shade of green.”
“It’s not just green. It’s emerald green!”
“Oh. Really?”
“Hmm . . . forget the compliments. Let’s think of something else.”
I pick up three monsters glued together. “I don’t play with these anymore.”
“They’re my bodyguards,” Dragon says.
“What do you need bodyguards for?”
“I’m very desirable.”
“Okay,” I say, and put the monsters into the box. “Hey! How did we become such good friends?”
“We have lots in common,” Dragon says. “We both love marshmallows. We enjoy seeing how fast things can go down staircases. We like training worms to be ninja warriors. We’re really good at getting out of bath time. And we both love marshmallows.”
“So all I need is to find a hundred kids who love all the same stuff as me.”
“Yes.”
“I’m never going to make any friends,” I say.
* * *
x x x
That night I dream about living in the new town. I show all the kids at school a magic show where I stuff my books into my backpack and then pull out a flying robot rabbit. Everybody wants to be my friend, but I onl
y agree to be friends with the first hundred of them. Ellie sulks because no one wants to be her friend.
All of my friends want to sit next to me in class. At lunch my friends give me marshmallows so I’ll eat next to them. At recess my friends play whatever I want. When I come home I hang out with Dragon, but Mom calls me to the front door. My one hundred friends are waiting to play with me.
“Leave me alone! I need a break!” I yell. All one hundred friends run away.
“I told you you’d never be able to make friends,” Ellie says with a smirk.
I wake up next to a snoring Dragon.
“I’ll show her,” I say out loud. “I will make friends this time.”
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Ariel grew up outside of Philadelphia (developing a cheesesteak obsession), went to college at Barnard in New York (developing a sushi obsession), and now lives in the suburbs of New Jersey with her family (developing a marshmallow obsession). She doesn't have a pet dragon, but does have the occasional herd of deer show up in the backyard.
Besides writing children's books, she's worked in a movie theatre, at a Baskin Robbins, as a camp counselor, a paralegal, in human resources, and as a stay-at-home mom.
Visit her at arielbernsteinbooks.com
Before his career as a writer-illustrator, Mike was a freelance graphic designer, comic book artist, performer, and teacher with a career spanning two decades. He is the director of ORNG Ink, an after-school studio for young artists, and has received several awards and honors for his work in the community with children and teens.
Mike lives in Orange, NJ, with his wife, two adventurous kids, and a cat named Agnes that hates him. Visit him at mikemalbrough.com.
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Warren & Dragon Weekend With Chewy Page 4
