Alien Superstar

by Henry Winkler

  “Great way to bounce back.”

  “You got a bright future in Hollywood.”

  Out of the shadows, a familiar figure walked toward me.

  “Hey, dude,” Luis said. “You crushed it tonight.”

  “I had a very rocky start.”

  “Doesn’t matter where you start, dude. It only matters where you end up. And the audience gave you a standing ovation.”

  “I don’t think Tyler liked that.”

  “Guys like him, they think about nothing but themselves . . . and their teeth, their shiny white teeth.”

  “Well, he certainly does smile like a star.”

  “You do too, Buddy. Even in that freaky alien costume with the bright red gums.”

  I wondered what Luis would say if I told him it wasn’t a costume, that the real me had red gums and no teeth, and that freaky body was my real one. Speaking of my body, I suddenly realized that it was very, very tired, so tired that I think I actually wobbled a little bit during our conversation.

  “Want me to give you a ride home?” Luis asked. “You’re looking like you could make friends with a pillow.”

  Home. Now, there was a problem. What home?

  “Buddy! There you are!” Jules the stage manager called from the stage door. “Duane’s looking for you. Wants to see you in his office.”

  “Thanks, Jules,” I said. “Is now a good time?”

  “No, ten minutes ago was a good time. Hustle over there. Duane’s got red-hot ants in his pants.”

  “Oh my, that must be so uncomfortable.”

  “Buddy,” Luis said. “This could be good news. Get a move on.”

  Luis and I hurried over to Duane’s office in the trailer. I thought he’d be alone sitting at his beat-up desk, but Cassidy and her intense-looking mom were there with him. Up close, Cassidy’s mother looked even more weighed down with jewelry than she did on the soundstage. Gold bracelets, gold necklaces, gold earrings. I happen to know that the atomic weight of gold is 196.966, so no wonder she looked like she was in a bad mood. Carrying all that weight around would put me in a bad mood too.

  “Buddy, let’s get right to the point,” Duane said as Luis and I jammed into the tiny office. “We’ve all had a long night. You have a lot to learn, but I’m prepared to make you an offer.”

  “To do what?”

  Luis gave me a hard poke in the ribs. “Just listen for once,” he whispered.

  “We want to write your character into the show,” Duane went on. “You’d be a regular and appear every week as the alien student at Oddball Academy. What do you say?”

  “I’ll do the talking for him,” Cassidy’s mom said, wedging her way over to me. “That’s what I do.”

  “Excuse me, ma’am,” I said, holding out my hand. “I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Buddy Cheese Burger.”

  “Hold the cheese,” she said. “It’s empty calories.”

  “I don’t eat it,” I explained. “It’s my name.”

  “Not if I have anything to say about it,” she said. “From now on, the cheese is history. I’m Delores Cambridge. I’m Cassidy’s mother-slash-manager. I manage my daughter’s career, and it would be my pleasure to represent you as well.”

  “Oh, that’s so nice of you,” I said.

  “That niceness is called twenty percent,” Luis whispered. “Managers take twenty percent of everything you earn.”

  “I’d love to be on the show,” I said to Duane. “It sounds like—”

  “I’ll take it from here,” Delores interrupted. She stepped in front of me and sat down on the edge of Duane’s desk. “What my client meant to say is that we’ll consider your offer if you meet our terms. We’ll need certain guarantees, of course—script approval, private dressing room with a mini-fridge stocked with . . .” She turned to me and whispered, “What kind of ice cream do you like?”

  “I’ve never had ice cream.”

  “Fine,” she said to Duane without missing a beat. “Just to make sure, we’ll need three kinds of ice cream in the freezer. Cherry vanilla, chocolate chip, and butter brickle.”

  Delores ripped a page from a notepad on Duane’s desk and wrote down several numbers, folded the paper, and slid it to Duane.

  “Those are our financial terms. Of course, there’ll be a bonus if we make a movie and first-class travel if you send him on a publicity tour.”

  “Wow,” Luis whispered. “She’s tough. This is the kind of manager you want.”

  “I think you need to slow down here, Delores.” Duane held up his hands as if to protect himself from her torrent of words. “Those are pretty steep demands, and the kid is a beginner.”

  “Come on, Duane,” Delores snapped. “You and I both know what we saw. Buddy has magic. That audience ate him up like a chopped salad, hold the egg.”

  “Mom,” Cassidy said. “The hard-boiled egg is the best part.”

  “Cassidy, we’re doing business here. We can discuss your food preferences in the car. Duane, do we have a deal?”

  “I’m going to have to discuss this with the network executives,” Duane said.

  Delores jumped off the desk and snapped her fingers at us.

  “Let’s go, kids,” she said, heading for the door. “Duane obviously isn’t prepared to make a decision, so neither are we. There are a lot of other shows out there for you, Buddy. Tomorrow I’ll start making calls.”

  I was just about to tell Delores how much I really wanted to be on The Oddball Academy. The last thing I wanted was to walk away from that amazing opportunity.

  “Mrs. Cambridge,” I began.

  She held her finger to her lips. “Whatever you’re about to say, don’t.”

  She walked to the door and motioned for all of us to follow. With a deep sigh, Duane got to his feet.

  “Okay, Delores,” he said. “I’ll go out on a limb here. I’ll hire Buddy for the rest of the season and we’ll see how he does. The salary you suggested is okay, but no bonuses or first-class travel. And just to show I’m a reasonable guy, I’ll throw in the butter brickle ice cream.”

  “What about the chocolate chip and cherry vanilla?”

  “Don’t push me, Delores.”

  “Have it your way. Come on, kids. We’re out of here.”

  She started to head out the door again.

  “Okay, okay,” Duane said. “You’ll find all three in the mini-fridge in his dressing room on Monday.”

  Delores burst into a big smile and held out her ring-heavy hand to Duane.

  “You got yourself a deal,” she said. Then, turning to me, she added, “Stick with me, kid. The sky’s the limit. Oh, and don’t overindulge in the ice cream.”

  “Buddy, I’ll have your contracts ready Monday morning,” Duane said. “You can sign them at the table read.”

  “I didn’t know that tables read,” I said. “Do they sound like wood?”

  “Seriously, Buddy,” Duane said with a sigh. “You need to stop with the one-liners. It’s exhausting. Now go home. I could use a break from all you people.”

  We left Duane’s office and gathered in a circle at the bottom of the stairs.

  “Thank you so much, Delores,” I said. “I can’t believe my luck.”

  “I make luck happen,” she said.

  “You sure do,” Luis said. “You want to try some on me?”

  Delores looked at Luis like she was noticing him for the first time.

  “And who exactly are you?”

  “I’m Luis, Buddy’s best friend and guardian.”

  Delores turned to me.

  “And where exactly are your parents?”

  “They’re archaeologists exploring sunken caves in the Sahara Desert.”

  “I don’t know where the Sahara Desert is, but I’m pretty sure it’s not in my zip code. That being the case, I’m going to be making all your business decisions.”

  “What about me?” Luis said. “I’m the one who signed on as his guardian.”

  “Well, you just got demot
ed to best friend,” Delores told him. “I’ll take it from here. Going forward, I’m Buddy’s guardian and I’ll represent him in all business matters.”

  “It’s going to be fun to work with you, Buddy,” Cassidy said, taking my arm. “We’re going to have such a great time hanging out together on the set and in school. We just finished our unit on earthworms, and Janice says that next we’re going to do robotics. Maybe we can build a robot together.”

  “Oh, I love to build robots,” I said. “I built my first one when I was three. It was an autonomous rover craft that explored large-particle sand dunes near my home.”

  “Did you grow up on the beach?” Cassidy asked.

  “Sort of. Just without the water.”

  “Where are you living, Buddy?” Delores asked. “With Luis?”

  “He isn’t, but he can.” Luis shot me a grin. “We live above my grandma’s restaurant. Her guacamole is famous from here to Jupiter.”

  “Really? I’ll have to look for it next time I’m there,” I said.

  “You slay me, Buddy,” Cassidy said, joining Luis and me in a big laugh.

  Delores wasn’t laughing. She was all business.

  “Buddy, I assume since your parents are roaming the desert somewhere, you’re staying with your best friend here. I’m going to recommend you come live with us until they return.”

  “Thanks, but I’m okay where I am,” I said.

  “Apparently, ‘recommend’ was the wrong word,” Delores said. “Let me revise that sentence. Buddy, as of tonight, you’re staying with us. Period.”

  My brain started to whirl. I had never been in a human house before, although I had seen them in the movies. I knew they had beds instead of pods like we have on our planet. And they have all these devices like toasters and dishwashers and toilets. I didn’t know how to use a single one of those.

  Delores was busy listing all the reasons why I should live with them.

  “You can go over your lines with Cassidy every night,” she said. “And I can keep an eye on you, and make sure they’re treating you right on the show.”

  Cassidy seemed surprised at her mother’s suggestion. “If Buddy comes to live with us, where’s he going to sleep?” she asked.

  “We’ll move Eloise into your room. She can sleep on your trundle bed.”

  “But, Mom, she snores. She sounds like Darth Vader when she sleeps.”

  “I’ve always wanted to meet Darth Vader,” I said. “Star Wars is my favorite movie, although it’s not entirely accurate in its portrayal of deep space.”

  “Eloise is not Darth Vader,” Cassidy said. “She’s just a seven-year-old with a sinus condition.”

  “Cassidy, it won’t kill you to share your room with her until Buddy’s parents get back,” Delores said. “Buddy, I’ll take it from here. Get all your things and we’ll put them in the car.”

  “I’m wearing all my things,” I said.

  “You don’t even have a toothbrush? If you’re going to be a star, dental hygiene is key. Shiny teeth photograph well, remember that. We’ll go shopping tomorrow and get you some fashion-forward clothes. I’ll front you the money until you get your first paycheck.”

  “Cool,” Cassidy said to me. “We can spend the day shopping at the mall. And get a pizza for lunch.”

  “Excuse me, missy,” Delores said. “He’ll get the pizza. You’ll get the chopped salad, hold the egg. It’s my responsibility as your mother-slash-manager to see that you make healthy food choices. You might not like it now, but you will thank me later on.”

  “You just want me to look good in my costumes,” Cassidy said.

  “There is that too,” Delores answered. “It’s a harsh fact, but true—the camera adds ten pounds to you. Trust me, pizza is not your friend.”

  At the sound of the word “pizza,” my whole body twitched. My stomach was still recovering from dinner. Earth food and I were not having a good relationship. The one food I knew my system could digest, the remaining nutritional wafer, was in my spaceship, which was so close and yet so far away.

  I was hungry and thirsty and queasy at the same time. In all the excitement of the day, I had forgotten to drink any water. What I was feeling was more than just regular thirst, though. It was as if some unknown force were sucking all the liquid from my body. Was this terrible feeling my life force starting to dim?

  Luis gave me his phone number and said to call him when I was settled in. Cassidy and I climbed in the back seat of Delores’s station wagon, and we drove through the main gate of the studio.

  “So long, Scotty,” Delores called out to the guard at the main gate.

  As we left the lot and drove onto the freeway, my head began to spin. I put it between my knees to try to get rid of the dizziness.

  “Do you get carsick?” Cassidy asked.

  “Yeah, carsick,” I murmured. “That must be it.”

  “That sucks,” Cassidy said. “I used to get carsick too.”

  There was no way to explain to her that what I was feeling wasn’t carsick. I felt like my insides were drying out and turning to dust. What if I suddenly blurted out, “I’m not carsick. This is just my life force dimming”?

  How weird would that be?

  Pretty darn weird.

  14

  Luckily, Cassidy’s house was close to Universal Studios, up a winding road that led to a cluster of woodsy hillside homes. Her family’s house had so many glass windows you could hardly tell the inside from the outside. Cassidy’s dad, a tall man with a lot of hair on his face but none on his head, was waiting for us on the front porch. Standing next to him was the cutest little girl you’d ever want to see. She had two curly pigtails on her head.

  “Hi, guys,” the little girl shouted before the car had even come to a full stop. “Wait until you see what Daddy and I built tonight. It’s a recycling center for our city.”

  “That’s my little sister, Eloise,” Cassidy whispered.

  “She seems peppy.”

  “You mean annoying. She is totally Lego obsessed. She wants to be an architect like our dad, and for months now they’ve been building Eloise-ville. Keep your distance because she leaves a trail of Legos everywhere, and those things kill when you step on them.”

  I didn’t understand one word Cassidy said, but I was feeling too dizzy and drained to run Lego through my Earth dictionary. I tried, but it shut down after “leg” and I already knew what that was. When I climbed out of the car, I was unsteady on my feet, and Cassidy’s dad’s powerful handshake didn’t help my balance any. He nearly lifted me off the ground.

  “I’m Brian Cambridge,” he said. “You must be the young man Delores texted me about. She says you’ve got talent and she’s going to mold you into a star. Watch out, kid, she’s a molder of the first order. Look at me, I used to be short and hairy. Now I’m tall and bald.”

  “Did she do a biological alteration on you?” I asked.

  Mr. Cambridge gave me a strange look.

  “Daddy, you just met Buddy the comedian,” Cassidy said. “He loves to joke around.”

  “I know a joke,” Eloise said. “Why was six afraid of seven?”

  “That’s easy,” I said. “Because six is the smallest number that is neither a prime number nor a square number. Everyone thinks that’s funny.”

  “Eeuuww, you’re weird,” Eloise said. “The real answer is because seven eight nine.”

  Eloise laughed so hard that her eyes watered and her nose dripped.

  “Mom, am I seriously going to have to share a room with this person?” Cassidy said, rolling her eyes. “Look at her, she’s like a leaky faucet.”

  “I’ll put a box of Kleenex in your room,” Delores said. “Brian, can you help the girls pull out the trundle bed in Cassidy’s room. I’m giving Buddy Eloise’s room temporarily.”

  Eloise jumped up and down, clapping her hands and twirling around.

  “I’m moving in with you!” she said to Cassidy.

  “You’re weird,” Cass
idy said to her. “Most little kids would hate to leave their room. I wish you did.”

  “I’m not sad,” Eloise said. “This is going to be so much fun. We can tell ghost stories and have unicorn tea parties and play with homemade slime.”

  “Mom, are you hearing this?” Cassidy said. “It is totally unacceptable.”

  “You’ll get used to it,” Delores answered. “End of conversation.”

  I felt like if I didn’t get some water and lie down soon, I was going to pass out. As we walked inside, Cassidy was busy chatting about the house, pointing out the family photographs on the wall. Her words sounded fuzzy and far away.

  “Excuse me, could I get a glass of water?” I asked, interrupting her.

  We went into the kitchen, where Cassidy pulled a glass out of the cabinet and filled it with tap water. I gulped it down in one swallow, and immediately asked for another one. And another one. And another one. And another.

  “Boy, you were really parched,” Cassidy said.

  “I bet if you jump up and down, you can hear the water slosh around in your tummy,” Eloise said.

  As if it had heard its name being called, my stomach let out a long, slow gurgling sound.

  “Eeuuww,” Eloise said. “You’re not going to fart, are you? I hate it when boys fart. Like Anthony de la Rosa. Whenever he brings string cheese for lunch, he farts up a storm.”

  “Mom,” Cassidy said. “Can you please teach her not to say ‘fart’ in public?”

  “Okay, okay,” Eloise said. Then taking my hand, she said, “Come on, Buddy. I’ll show you around if you promise not to expel gas. Is that better, Cassidy?”

  The five glasses of water had revived me enough so I could walk down the hall without passing out. We left Delores in the kitchen, picking up messages from her phone while putting bananas into a food blender and typing on her computer at the same time. Cassidy said her mom called that multitasking.

  The first bedroom we came to was Eloise’s, soon to be mine. There were rainbows painted on the walls, and fluorescent stickers of stars and planets plastered all over the ceiling.

  “All those stickers glow in the dark,” Eloise said. “I say good night to every planet up there. My favorite is Saturn because of the pretty rings.”