by Jon Scieszka
So Marleenken helped the Blue-Bearded Bird-Man cover himself in honey, and then she cut open one of his great feather mattresses and dumped the feathers all over him. And he did, indeed, look just like an enormous, blue-beaked bird. He thanked Marleenken for being so clever, and he ran out into the forest.
Marleenken watched until he was out of sight. Then she went to the little door at the end of the hall and opened it. “Come quick!” she said. “Now we go home!”
So she and her sisters hurried from the house and into the forest.
But as they made their way home, they heard something in the trees.
“What’s that?” her eldest sister asked.
Marleenken did not know. They went faster.
“I hear something behind us,” said the second sister.
Marleenken made them hurry even more.
And then, through the trees, Marleenken saw him. His eyes were wide and insane. His feathers shone in the darkness like mist. His blue beard glowed like the flame at the center of a fire. And he hefted his great, bloody axe above his head.
“RUN!” Marleenken screamed.
The sisters ran, and the Blue-Bearded Bird-Man ran after them. They ran, but the Bird-Man ran faster. Soon, he was right behind them. He swung his axe.
The forest echoed like a gunshot. Marleenken kept running. At last, she glanced behind her. Her sisters were panting and gasping, but they were right there with her.
They arrived at the house. They burst through their door and slammed it behind them.
They waited.
A few hours later, their brothers came home. The boys were thrilled to see all three of their sisters back again. They laughed and hugged one another and fought back tears.
“We saw the strangest thing in the forest today,” said the oldest brother. “It was the biggest bird we’d ever seen. It was white like the fog, with a giant blue beak.”
“What happened?” asked Marleenken.
Do you know what happened? Do you have a guess?
Her oldest brother smiled. “What do you think happened? We’re hunters. We shot it.”
Marleenken sighed. “Oh,” she said. “That’s good.”
And the three brothers and the three sisters lived happily ever after.
THE END
DON’T EAT THE BABY
BY KELLY BARNHILL
Before I start this story, let me first say that it is never, never, never, never, never okay to push your brother down a creepy, old, possibly bottomless well.
Or, almost never.
Let me tell you something else, too. I am a scout. My best friend, Jamal, is also a scout. We can both start fires without matches, and can find our way with a map and compass, and can communicate with Morse Code and, by last count, are able to tie forty-six different types of knots correctly, while blindfolded. I am telling you this not to brag—even though it is pretty cool—but because it is important for later.
Also, because everyone should know Morse Code. And knots. That’s just common sense.
My whole life, I wanted a brother. And I never had one until last Tuesday. Instead, I had a very annoying baby sister. I also had two rats, four rabbits, seven fish, one canary, three guinea pigs, one salamander, and one very fat, very old, and very mean cat named Owen—but I never really counted him because he is way older than me. Plus, he belongs to my mom.
I’ve always been in charge of my animals. My mom doesn’t do a thing. Except for the cat, of course. I clean the cages and scrub the bowls and check their paws and fill their water and make sure they have the right foods. I make lists every Monday for my mom, telling her what to buy. My dad calls me the Family Caretaker. My mom calls me Zookeeper Arne. My sister doesn’t call me anything. Except Boy. She just sits in her high chair, shoveling OatieBits into her mouth and grinding her teeth like she’s sharpening them. They gleam like blades.
I always wanted a brother. Not a boring baby sister. Sometimes, I’d ask Mom if I could have one, but she was always cleaning OatieBits from the walls or ceiling or mopping up Owen’s most recent furball. Each time she’d just stare at me, as though I had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, or like I was speaking another language. And then she’d shake her head and say, “Don’t you have a cage to clean or something?” And she’d walk away.
And whatever. She was usually right. But that’s not the point.
I really wanted a brother. Not a fish. Not a lizard. Not a rat. A brother. Who would ride bikes with me and play Monopoly and do experiments in the kitchen.
Mom used to do experiments in the kitchen with me. But now she is too busy with my dumb sister.
Dad used to play Monopoly. But now he has this new job and he doesn’t get home until late, and when he does, he’s tired and in a bad mood.
So I decided to take drastic action.
I brought Jamal with me. In addition to being my best friend, he lives next door, and he is in my class. He is ten months older than I am, but I am way taller. He doesn’t have any pets, but he does have a microscope, which would have made us even. But it didn’t. Because Jamal had something else, too.
Brothers. Four of them. It wasn’t fair.
“Why do you want a brother, anyway?” Jamal asked as we climbed through the gap at the bottom of the fence that marked the end of the subdivision and the beginning of the unbuildable land. There was a trail back there that most people can’t see. You can find it only if you know where to look.
Jamal and I have been back there, like, a million times, even though we aren’t supposed to. Mom says the dirt is toxic and my dad says there’s sinkholes and quickmud, and Jamal’s mom says there are criminals living in tents, and Jamal’s dad says there is a bunch of old tools and equipment back there that could possibly cut off our fingers and then Jamal will never be a surgeon. All of those things are true, but we have been okay so far.
“Brothers are not that great,” Jamal continued as we scrambled under the fence, scraping our bellies on the ground. “They steal your stuff and make fun of you and play too rough. Plus? They stink.” This was for sure true for Jamal’s oldest brother, who was a wrestler on the high school squad. He had B.O. even if he had only just gotten out of the shower. Also, it was true of his youngest brother, who was still in diapers and could stop a herd of elephants with one whiff from his butt.
“I just want one. Is that a crime?” I said, brushing the grass and gravel off my knees. I couldn’t explain why I wanted a brother, only that I did.
“Meow,” Owen said in a sniffy voice. Owen always followed us when we went into the unbuildable land. I don’t know how he always knew. We used to try and chase him off, but he always came back, every single time. And even when we tried to throw him off our trail, he always found us again. Now we just tolerate him.
Our subdivision is on something called a Superfund site, which makes it sound like it has superpowers, but it doesn’t. My dad said it means the land used to be polluted, but now it has been cleaned up. And then they built houses. The unbuildable land is a Superfund site too, only it hasn’t been cleaned yet. For some reason, everything goes wrong when they try. The money dries up. Or they find historical artifacts, and they have to stop. Or weird disasters strike. Once, a rain cloud hovered over only the unbuildable land and dumped water for hours, flooding only there and nowhere else. My dad said there had been several different factories going way back to the early days, and each one of them had some sort of major mishap and collapsed, leaking gross stuff all over the place, which meant that the ground was even more polluted than other Superfund sites. The most recent factory had been dismantled and cleared out years ago, leaving only a large tangle of sumac bushes and some dead cottonwood trees. And right by the factory site, there was a well.
A very, very old well.
I don’t think any of the adults in the subdivision knew about it—otherwise, I’m sure there would have been some mom gathering signatures to get it filled in. Parents in our neighborhood are nuts about safety.
/> The well was hidden by a ring of falling-down trees. You had to climb over old, rotting branches just to get to it.
And it was haunted. Or magic. Or both. Everyone said so.
The kids in the neighborhood will swear up and down that if you make a wish, and throw your wish into the well, it gets granted. Somehow. Some way. Every single time. All you have to do is write it on a piece of paper, tie it to a rock, and send it down.
The well is deep. So deep that no one has ever heard the rock hit the bottom. And it smells bad. And there is a weird wind that comes up through the hole all the time, like it is constantly exhaling.
Some kids think it’s dangerous. But they are the ones who haven’t made wishes.
I reach in and grab a rock from my pocket.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Jamal said.
“What does it look like?” I said, wrapping my note around the rock and tying it tight with a timber hitch. (I didn’t even have to look. The knot was perfect. I’m that good.)
I’d never made a wish before. Neither had Jamal. I didn’t want to admit it, but the hairs on my arms were standing straight up. I told myself it was because it was cold. Even though it wasn’t actually cold.
“It never goes right,” Jamal said. “Ask anyone.”
“You don’t know anyone who actually made a wish.” Which was true. We knew that kids in the subdivision had done it, but we didn’t know which ones. So we didn’t know how it all turned out.
“My brother says you can’t undo it,” Jamal said. “Even if you want to. There’s no take-backs with wishes.”
“Did he make a wish?”
“No.” Jamal crossed his arms across his chest. “He never would.”
“Well then. Sounds like he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
I walked up to the edge of the well. The wind coming from the dark depths seemed to be picking up speed. I held out the rock.
Jamal grabbed my forearm. “Don’t do it,” he said, his eyes suddenly big. “It’s too scary.”
But I flicked my wrist and let it fly. It hit the far side of the well once with a loud thud, then plunged silently into the darkness. Owen arched his back. His fur became prickly and tall. He began to yowl.
That was Friday.
That night, I had a weird dream. I dreamed I was walking on a long, straight road. It plunged into one side of the sky at one end, and the other side of the sky at the other. My steps crunched on the pavement.
“Hello!” I called.
“I’m right here,” a voice whispered in my year. I whipped around, but no one was there.
“Hello!” I called again. I was starting to panic.
“Still here,” the voice whispered in the other ear.
No one was there. I was alone on the road.
I woke up, panting and sweaty. My room was empty, save for the fish, lizard, guinea pigs, rabbits, and bird. And yet. I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone else was there too.
I could hear Owen hissing in the hallway.
“Crazy cat,” I muttered. Crazy me, I thought. And I went back to sleep.
On Saturday, my mom was annoyed. The salt was gone. All of it. From the shakers, from the canister. Even the big bag of salt she keeps on the porch for the next time the sky decides to throw ice and snow at us.
“Well, what on earth?” Mom said, mystified.
“We must have run out yesterday,” Dad said as he typed an email to his boss on his laptop while simultaneously shoveling eggs and toast and coffee into his mouth. Sometimes it seems like my dad has six hands.
“I didn’t think we did,” Mom said, scratching her head.
“I don’t see any other explanation,” Dad said. “By the way, these eggs would be better with salt on them.”
On Sunday, my dad’s laptop caught fire. Right in the middle of an email. Which he was writing at the dinner table. Which is super not allowed.
“You see?” Mom said calmly, as if spontaneously-combusting laptops were an everyday thing in our house. “This is why it’s not allowed.”
“GET SOMETHING TO SMOTHER IT!” Dad screamed.
Everything on it was lost. Even the keys melted.
“Bad luck,” Mom said, but it didn’t sound like she meant it. Nothing made her madder than my dad using technology at the dinner table.
Later that night, the television shattered. No one was in the room. This time, my mom and my dad seemed mystified.
Meanwhile, Owen the cat howled and hissed and whined. He ran into my parents’ room and jammed himself under their bed, refusing to come out.
On Monday, my rats vanished. Without a trace. I blamed Owen.
“He ate them!” I shouted. “He ate Jeeves and Bertie! I HATE THAT CAT!”
“Owen did no such thing,” my mom soothed. “He’s been under my bed this whole time. You are making a fuss over nothing. Your rats are probably just exploring the house. They’ll be back before you know it, I’m sure of it.”
“You know,” my dad said. “It is almost Halloween. We might have ghosts. If there’s one thing a rat won’t abide, it’s a ghost. They’ll leave as soon as a house is haunted.”
“How do you know?” I demanded.
My dad shrugged. “Everyone knows that. If you want to get rid of rats, get a ghost. Common knowledge.”
“But what if I want my rats to come back?”
Dad frowned. “I guess you have to get rid of the ghost.”
But it wasn’t a ghost at all. It was a brother.
He showed up the next day, after I had been having the weirdest dream. I saw a pair of hands holding a book called Excellent Recipes for the Average Family, and it showed cutout silhouettes of a mom, a dad, a boy, a girl, and a cat all standing in a roasting pan with a question mark on it. The person put the book down and I could see his face. It was my face.
I woke up with a yelp.
“Can it, will ya?” a voice said. “I’m trying to sleep.”
I lay in bed for a full minute, trying to decide if the voice was real or not. I turned on the light.
“It’s the middle of the night,” the voice complained. It was coming from under my bed. “Turn off the light!”
I took a deep breath and peeked. And there he was. My brother. Lying there with my old, mismatched socks and broken toys and other stuff that I never really wanted in the first place. He was examining the springs under my mattress, tap, tap, tapping the old metal with his fingernails. He was obviously my brother. I knew without being told.
“Hey, brother,” he said.
“Hey, brother,” I said. My wish! The well worked. I knew it.
I crawled down onto the floor. I stared at him. He looked just like me. We had the same weird swoop in our hair that won’t stay down no matter how many times you comb it. He was wearing the same striped pj’s. He even had the same smudge of dirt on his cheek that my mom had bugged me about but I hadn’t washed yet.
“How long have you been here?” I asked.
“Dunno.” He yawned and waved his hand toward the bedside table. “Turn off the light, will you? I’m tired.” He rolled onto his side and curled away from me, his back curved like a turtle’s shell. I checked the clock. Three o’clock in the morning. I clicked off the light and went back to sleep. I didn’t dream. I only heard a cat howling over and over and over.
I have a brother, I thought, my heart growing bigger and bigger. I have a brother! I was so happy, I could hardly stand it.
I didn’t see my brother when I woke up the next morning. My mom hollered that I needed to get up, so I grabbed my clothes and stumbled into the bathroom. When I got back, my brother was there, wearing the exact same clothes as I was. He wrinkled his mouth like a prune.
“Are you hungry?” I asked.
“Not yet,” he said. “But my mouth is all salty. Do you have any water?” He looked around the room. “Never mind. I see some.” And before I could stop him, he plunged his face into my fish tank and started sucking the wate
r down. He wasn’t kidding, I thought. My fish dove for cover under the little castle my dad and I had made out of mortar and rocks.
“Stop!” I said, but he didn’t stop. “Stop,” I said again, and grabbed him by the back of the shirt and pulled him up. The tank was only half-full now. His face—my face—was dripping wet.
“Fine!” he said. Maybe I was being unreasonable. He hadn’t been in the house for very long. How was he to know what was allowed and what wasn’t?
“Here,” I said. “Drink from this glass.” I gave him the water glass I was drinking from the night before. I figured, if we were brothers, we had the same germs. He drank it like he was dying of thirst.
I glanced at the clock. I needed to eat my breakfast and get to school. “You coming down?” I asked.
“Nah,” my brother said. “Mom’s not ready yet. She’s delicate.”
“Oh. Okay,” I said. “I could bring something up. You hungry?”
“No,” he said. “I just ate.” He coughed and something yellow flew out of his mouth. Like a piece of paper. Or a feather.
When I got home later that day, I realized that my canary was missing. My brother told me the cat did it. Of course I believed him. He’s my brother. Why would he lie? In a huff, I marched to my parents’ room and fished Owen out from under the bed and carried him, hissing and spitting, outside.
“Bad kitty!” I scolded.
“Meow,” Owen scolded back.
I closed the door and let him yowl until Mom couldn’t stand it anymore and let him back in.
My sister threw OatieBits at nothing in particular.
“Bad Boy,” she said to no one.
The next day, my brother decided to come with me to school. Owen the cat stared at his empty bowl, protesting loudly.
“Oh, WHAT?” Mom said. “I just fed you!” Both the food and water bowl looked as though they were licked clean. “Hush now. You are just fine.”
“Meow,” Owen said with a wounded expression.
“Bad Boy,” my sister said, looking out the window.
