“Can I stay home from school?”
Dad said, “As long as you don’t wake Mom. She had a bad sleep.”
“Did she keep hearing a beep?” Jasper asked.
Dad looked at Jasper with raccoony eyes. “As a matter of fact, she did. And so did I. You kept shouting it out. I’ll leave her a note when I head out. You stay in bed until she wakes up.”
Jasper let Dad take his hand away. His head didn’t hurt as much now that Dad had pressed it, now that he could stay home from school.
He hardly ever got to stay home, even though Mom was always there. Mom worked at home. Dad went somewhere else to work. He took the bus, but Mom only took her mug of tea down the stairs to her office in the basement.
Whenever Jasper was allowed to stay home, the first thing he did was work on his lint collection. He’d scrape new lint off the dryer screen, then bring it back upstairs to sort it into the compartments of his lint box. He’d stick his nose right in the box and breathe that special flowery lint smell, the fabric-softener-clean-clothes-start-of-a-new-day smell that he loved. He could do this any day, but working on his lint collection in his pajamas when everybody else was at school doing math was the best.
Because he was supposed to stay in bed today until Mom got up, Jasper didn’t scrape new lint off the dryer screen right away. He took his box off the shelf and carried it back to bed. He sniffed and poked at what he’d already collected. As he was sniffing and poking, he remembered the chip and candy machine and how all the treats were arranged inside it. The lint box was similar, with the different gray lint that he scraped off the dryer screen in their compartments, and the other kinds of lint in theirs.
And Jasper remembered the impatient Beep! the machine had made. He remembered how he kept hearing it in his sleep and how, every time, it woke him up. Because of the beep, he felt so so so tired and his fingers so so so clumsy. So clumsy that, as he was working, the box of lint almost spilled all over the bed.
If Jasper stayed home from school today and worked on his lint collection, something Bad might happen. He might mix the colors of the lint he had worked so hard to sort. He might even do it on purpose! He might stand on the back porch and —
He shut his eyes tight, afraid to see the lint spilling over the railing and blowing away.
Now his head hurt even more from thinking Bad thoughts. He got out of bed and returned his lint box to the shelf.
In the kitchen, Dad was talking to the coffee maker. “Nice and strong and hot,” he said.
“I changed my mind,” Jasper said.
Dad turned to him. “Okay. I’ll make you a sandwich. Get yourself an orange to have with your breakfast. And an apple for your lunch.”
Jasper went to the fridge. Instead of opening the fruit drawer, he pushed all the yogurt containers aside. Maybe Mom had found the can of Torpedo High Energy Drink and poured it out.
It was still there. He looked back at Dad, then reached for the can and took a sip. Surprise! No little bombs went off in his mouth. It tasted different, sweeter and thicker, like syrup. He checked the can to see if it was the same drink. And now that he’d taken a sip, he wanted another. Today, he didn’t have to scratch his tongue in between.
After four sips, he hid the can again. He grabbed an orange and an apple from the drawer and ran to the table — fast! He ate his cereal and his orange while bouncing on his chair. After he finished, he fitted the orange peel over his teeth and smiled at Dad across the table. “Look at me! I’d better go to the dentist! My teeth look so so so Bad.”
Dad took a swig of his nice, strong, hot coffee. “Actually, Jasper. I have a headache, too.”
Jasper spat the orange peel onto his plate. “Mine’s gone! Now I have High Energy!”
Dad squeezed between his eyes with his fingers. He asked Jasper to get dressed.
Jasper ran to his room. Fast! He stripped off his pajama top — fast! — and flung it in the corner. He was supposed to put it in the laundry basket, but he didn’t. He pulled on a shirt. Fast! He opened his underwear drawer. Fast!
In the drawer was a whole set of Day-of-the-Week underpants that his Nan had bought him. “What day is it?” Jasper shouted.
“Friday!” Dad shouted back. “Don’t shout! Mom’s sleeping!”
Jasper clawed through the drawer searching for Friday. Underpants from Nan reminded him of Nan’s black mark expression. That reminded Jasper of his own smoky mark in the alley. And now that he had drunk the Bad drink again — on purpose! — he would probably get another black mark. People would walk through the alley and see two black marks, then look at Jasper’s house and shiver, wondering who lived there.
He pulled out a pair of underpants. Saturday. Cackling, he stepped out of his pajama bottoms and into the wrong Day-of-the-Week underpants.
He felt so so so so Bad!
Chapter 5
At school, Ms. Tosh took attendance. She called out everybody’s name.
“Ori?”
“Here!”
“Isabel?”
“Here!”
“Jasper?”
“Beep!” Jasper called out.
“Jasper’s here!” Ori called.
While everyone else was doing the Calendar, Jasper hid behind a book and practiced saying “Beep!” in the same impatient way the drink machine had. He squirmed and bounced on his chair. Margo, who sat next to him, leaned over. “Do you have ants in your pants?”
If she only knew about the wrong underpants! Jasper grinned at her, showing all his teeth. Still bouncing, he took out his pencil case and dug through it for an orange marker to color his white teeth.
Ms. Tosh tapped. That was what she always did when Jasper lost focus. She would come over to his desk and tap his worksheet. Jasper looked up and saw the math worksheet in front of him and Ms. Tosh standing over him, waiting with crossed arms for him to start.
The worksheet was hard. It was especially hard because while Ms. Tosh had been explaining what to do, Jasper had been hunched behind his book whispering “Beep!” and bouncing on his chair instead of paying attention.
Tom has 15 rabbits in a pen in his backyard. One day he forgets to close the pen, and 6 rabbits escape. How many are left?
All the other kids were doing the math. Some were counting on their fingers.
“Was Tom Bad?” Jasper asked Ms. Tosh.
“I don’t think so. He didn’t let the rabbits out on purpose.”
Jasper hadn’t bought the Torpedo High Energy Drink on purpose, but he had drunk it on purpose. The first time, Dad had said he could. But this morning Jasper hadn’t asked permission because he knew what Dad would say if he was paying attention.
Dad would say, “No.”
But Jasper had drunk it anyway!
Ms. Tosh explained that Jasper was supposed to use subtraction to figure out how many rabbits were left. “And you can draw pictures if you think that will help.”
Pictures would help. Jasper turned over the worksheet where there was more room for rabbits.
He drew a line. It was so wiggly from Jasper’s bouncing that it could only be the rabbit’s furry back. Jasper drew long, long ears and a short, puffy tail and long, long whiskers. When he sat back and looked at the drawing, he saw a rabbit with High Energy, jumping up and down so so so fast.
Except it hardly looked like a rabbit at all! Jasper scratched it out. Back and forth with the pencil in his fist, he scribbled over the Bad rabbit. Before he knew it, he’d drawn a black mark.
The bell rang for recess.
Uh-oh, Jasper thought. He needed answers — fast! — or he couldn’t go out. In seconds, he filled in all the blanks, torpedoed to the front of the class and dropped his worksheet on Ms. Tosh’s desk. Then he torpedoed outside with his friends, shivering from his Badness.
Every answer he’d written down was wrong!
> For the whole recess, Jasper ran around the school. Ori trotted after him, trying to keep up. “Why are you running, Jasper?”
“I have High Energy,” Jasper said, breathing hard. He told Ori about the Torpedo High Energy Drink. “I still have some. It’s in the fridge at home. Come over after school and try it.”
“I’m not allowed drinks like that,” Ori said.
“Neither am I!” Jasper said, cackling and speeding off.
Chapter 6
Dad made Jasper go to bed early because of his Bad sleep the night before. Also because he had a soccer game in the morning. Jasper was so so so tired that he slept for twelve hours without even taking a break to dream. When he woke on Saturday morning, he felt good.
At breakfast, Dad told Jasper he only needed two things to be a star at soccer: a good sleep and a good breakfast.
“What about a ball?” Jasper asked.
“Three things, then. Good sleep? Check. Good breakfast? Check.” Dad set two plates of bacon and eggs on the table. “With your good sleep and your good breakfast behind you, you’ll feel confident and strong for the game, Jasper.”
“My breakfast is in front of me,” Jasper said.
“But after you eat it, it will be behind you.”
“Won’t it be in me?”
“Eat,” Dad said, sitting down at the table.
Jasper ground a lot of pepper onto his egg. He liked so much pepper that his egg looked dirty. “What do you mean, ‘confident’?” he asked.
“Sure of yourself,” Dad said.
Jasper put down the pepper grinder and patted his head and body. He was sure it was him. “I’m confident,” he said.
“Good. If you’re confident, you won’t be afraid of the ball.”
“I’m not,” Jasper said, picking up his dirty toast and egg and taking a bite.
“Good,” Dad said. “That’s what I like to hear.”
Dad started eating his own bacon and egg breakfast. “I forgot your milk,” he said.
“I’ll get it.”
Jasper pulled out a bottom drawer and stood on it so that he could reach the glasses in the cupboard. He poured himself some milk from the fridge.
“See?” Dad said. “You’re getting your own milk now, not expecting me or Mom to get it for you. You must be feeling really confident. So, Jasper? When you’re on the soccer field? When the ball comes to you? Pretend it’s a big jug of milk. Run after it like you’re thirsty.”
Jasper looked at Dad. “Is there milk inside a soccer ball?”
“No,” Dad said. “Of course not.”
Jasper put the milk jug back in the fridge. The Torpedo High Energy Drink was still tucked in the back corner. He took it out and jiggled it. A lot was left — more than half. Jasper thought of the syrupy taste. He remembered how one sip was never enough.
He showed Dad the can. “If I had another drink of this, I’d feel so so so confident. I’d have High Energy.”
“Then drink it,” Dad said.
“All of it?” Jasper asked.
“Drink as much as you want.”
In the bathroom, the hair dryer shut off. Jasper took a quick sip of the Bad drink. And another. He started running on the spot.
“That’s it!” Dad said. “I can see you’re really going to chase that ball today!”
Jasper had two more sips before Mom got to the kitchen. By then he was back at the table, bouncing on his chair.
“Hurry, hurry, you two,” she said. “We’ll get the lates.”
Jasper gobbled his three pieces of bacon. Fast! He glugged his milk. Fast! Then he torpedoed to his bedroom to dress. He dug through his underwear drawer — fast! — until he found a pair of underpants that said Wednesday. Cackling, he put them on.
His soccer uniform was laid out on the bed — the sunny yellow shirt, the black shorts, the shin pads. The long black socks with the yellow stripes on the cuffs.
When Jasper finished dressing, he torpedoed to the tall mirror in the hall. Looking at his whole self in the mirror, at the black and yellow uniform with the yellow stripes under his knees, he said, “Buzz!”
He looked like a bee. But when he turned up the sock cuffs so the stripes didn’t show, he just looked like a boy in a soccer uniform.
In the car on the way to the game, Mom said, “Jasper? Please don’t kick the back of my seat.”
“I’m running,” Jasper told her. “I can’t stop.”
“Because he’s so fired up for the game,” Dad said.
“No,” Jasper said. “It’s because I’m Bad.”
Mom swung around in her seat. “Jasper! You are not bad!”
“Yes, I am,” he said.
“Maybe you’re not the best on the team. But you’re not bad,” she said.
“I am Bad. I’m probably the Worst on the team,” Jasper said.
“You’re not!”
“Who’s the Worst then?” Jasper asked.
Mom faced forward in her seat without answering.
“Mom?” Jasper asked, his legs running in the air, but not kicking Mom’s seat. “Who’s the Worst?”
“I have no idea,” she said. “I only watch you play. I don’t compare you with the other kids.”
“So maybe I am the Worst,” he said.
“It doesn’t matter who’s the best and who’s the worst,” she said. “What matters is that you play as well as you can and have fun.”
“He’s sure going to do that today, aren’t you, Jasper?” Dad said, turning around in his seat to smile at Jasper. “Remember, the ball is a jug of milk. You’re thirsty. Run after it! Run!”
“Fast!” Jasper shouted.
They were only a little bit late for the game. Coach Ben was giving his Hurray Talk to all the players. Jasper ran over and joined the circle.
“Hurray! Jasper’s here!” Coach Ben said.
All the kids called out, “Hurray, Jasper!”
“Let’s play our best today,” Coach Ben said.
He put his big hand in the middle of the circle. All the kids slapped their smaller hands on top of his. When there was a big pile of small hands in the middle, they shouted “Hurray!” one last time.
Except for Jasper. Today Jasper shouted, “Beep!”
Then Coach Ben threw all their hands in the air and everybody ran off, except Jasper. Coach Ben put his arm around him and held him back.
“I said ‘beep’ when everybody else said ‘hurray,’” Jasper admitted to Coach Ben, who was leading him over to the big net bag of soccer balls.
Coach Ben fiddled with his cap brim. He coughed and picked up a ball. “Do you see this, Jasper?”
Jasper wondered if Coach Ben needed glasses. “It’s a soccer ball.”
“Can it hurt you?” Coach Ben asked.
“It could,” Jasper said.
“But it’s much more likely that you’ll hurt the ball. Right, Jasper? Punch it. Go ahead.”
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to touch it with my hands,” Jasper said.
“Go ahead. Punch it. Just this once.”
Jasper punched the ball and laughed. “That’s Bad!”
“It sure is! Now kick it.” Coach Ben dropped the ball on the ground.
Jasper kicked the ball. It torpedoed all the way into the parking lot and bounced off somebody’s car.
“Wow!” Coach Ben said.
“Was that Bad?” Jasper asked.
“That was terrific! Can you do that during the game?”
“Yes!” Jasper said.
“Good boy!” Coach Ben patted Jasper on the shoulder. He called out to the other kids, “Positions, players! Get in position!”
Just as Jasper was about to run onto the field and take his position, Coach Ben noticed Jasper’s socks. The cuffs were still turned up so that the st
ripes didn’t show. “Just a second, Jasper.” Coach Ben turned down Jasper’s cuffs so the stripes showed again, the way he did before every game.
“Buzz!” Jasper said. “I’m a bee!”
“That’s the stuff,” Coach Ben said.
Jasper ran off buzzing.
The whistle blew and the ball came flying down the field toward Jasper. His High Energy made him run. Fast! In a second he was at the edge of the field where all the dandelions grew. It was like a dandelion garden there between the soccer field and the trees.
“Buzz, buzz, buzz!” Jasper sang as he kicked through the dandelions. He could see the yellow powder gathering on his black socks. This was what bees did. They played in the flowers collecting pollen on their legs. Then they took it back to the hive and made honey things with it. He’d learned it in school.
Jasper got an idea. He could be a Bad bee. A bee who beeped instead of buzzed! A bee who beeped and stung people!
Jasper burst back onto the field, beeping and zigzagging. He chased after the boy who had the ball, and when he got close enough he jabbed with his pointer finger stinger. “Beep!”
“Hey!” the boy said, grabbing his waist. “That tickles!”
“Beep! Beep!” Jasper said, stinging.
The boy buckled over, laughing.
Jasper thought the referee would blow his whistle for stinging, but he didn’t. Somebody else got the ball so Jasper went after him.
“Look at him run!” he heard Dad call. “Go, Jasper! Go!”
The boy Jasper was chasing saw Jasper’s stinger pointed right at him. His eyes got wide and he ran the other way. “Don’t!” he cried, already laughing. “No tickling! No!”
“Beep!” Jasper said as somebody from Jasper’s team kicked the ball and scored a goal.
At the break, Dad and Coach Ben rushed at Jasper, smiling because Jasper’s team was winning. They’d never won a game before.
“Good work, Jasper!”
“But I was Bad,” Jasper said. “I was so so so so Bad. Didn’t you see me?”
Jasper John Dooley, You're in Trouble Page 2
