“What time is it?” mumbled Notmie.
“Er, you’ve only been asleep for about ten minutes.” Captain Alex kept his eyes fixed to the road.
“Then how come when I started going to sleep the clock said one o’clock, and now it says two o’clock?”
“Okay, you got me. I’m just a little bit lost, but I know what to do to get us out of this bind.”
The Captain rolled down the window and stuck his head out.
“Can you really drive while you do that?” Notmie asked. But The Captain didn’t hear him—his ears were preoccupied with intense wind pressure.
They were presently on a long stretch of road surrounded by farmland on either side. Notmie started counting cows and remembered how Captain Alex couldn’t identify a cow. He laughed to himself.
I wonder what he milked…
“ What is that I smell? ” The Captain screamed through the wind as it pulled back the skin on his face.
“Wha—?” Notmie said, being ripped from his thoughts. “Well, I certainly didn’t do it! Don’t even blame that on me!”
“What did you say?” asked BAJ as he pulled his head back into the car.
“I said—” But Notmie couldn’t answer because the sight of a half-bald man with windswept hair sticking straight up was too funny for him to continue.
He eventually wheezed out: “Your… hair…” and Captain Alex quickly ran his hand over his head a few times until the hair rested semi-normally again.
Notmie caught his breath.
“I was just saying that whatever you smelled wasn’t from me.”
“Well, I hope not,” said The Captain, “because what I smelled was quiche, and if you smelled like quiche, I would have to conclude that you were French, and if you were French, I would have to conclude that you couldn’t be trusted and were most likely set on ruining my life like all the other people from Franch, and if you were not to be trusted, I would have to stop the car and kick you out, and if I kicked you out, I would be very lonely and wouldn’t be able to enjoy my meal, and if I couldn’t enjoy my meal, I might get indigestion, and if I got indigestion, I would most likely have to take some medicine for it, but since I have no medicine on me at this current time, I will just have to hope that you don’t smell like quiche.”
Notmie had closed his eyes to try and follow along as Captain Alex spouted out this train of thought about how quiche and medicine were connected to one another. He lost track but decided that was okay. “But what does smelling quiche have to do with anything?”
Captain Alex narrowed his eyes on the road and hunched over the steering wheel. “It means we’re on the right track.”
Once again, Captain Alex stuck his head out the window and was apparently (judging by how he was flaring his nostrils) trying to follow his nose to the French restaurant.
Notmie saw a sign whiz by that read: Paris—16 Miles
Finally, he began to understand.
When you want to find the French, go to Paris.
“Wow, that’s really wise of me to think!” Notmie then said aloud.
“ Yep, it really is starting to stink! ” yelled Captain Alex, mishearing him from outside the window.
“You didn’t understand a word I just said, did you?”
“ Bless you. ”
“What now?”
“ Oh, that’s a cow? ”
“Captain, I would appreciate it if you would get your head back inside the car!”
“ No, we’re not far! ”
“You’re ugly and smelly and don’t know how to drive very well,” Notmie said once he was sure The Captain couldn’t understand him.
“ What!? That’s just uncalled for! ”
Captain Alex pulled his head back into the car.
“Notmie,” he said, looking very offended, “you can go to hell too, for all I care!”
“Ahh! We’re all going to die! ” Notmie screamed. His eyes bulged as he pointed toward the road in front them. “A giant cowboy is coming to eat us!”
As he pointed, they both saw a giant cowboy hat emerge from just over the horizon.
“ I never liked cowboys! ” screamed Notmie as his voice cracked. He clutched the dashboard and started twitching.
“Whoa! Notmie, chill out! That’s not really a giant cowboy.”
And as Captain Alex said this, the cowboy hat rose above the horizon so that they could just see what it was set on, and it wasn’t the head of a cowboy. It was…the Eiffel Tower.
“We’re going into Paris, Texas,” Captain Alex explained. “They have a small version of the Eiffel Tower wearing a cowboy hat. It’s just supposed to be a cute joke, Notmie. I guess you’ve never seen picture of it or anything, or else you wouldn’t have freaked out.”
Notmie relaxed back into his seat. “Actually, I used to come here every Saturday to visit my grandpa on my dad’s side.”
“What?! Then why the mess did you freak out like that?! You almost gave me a heart attack!”
Notmie grinned. “Did I really?”
Captain Alex couldn’t believe it. What could have gone so terribly wrong in Notmie’s head that he would do a thing like that? And the twitching—the twitching seemed unnecessary.
“Man, you’re a strange one, Notmie,” was all he could think of to say, “but no matter, because here we are.”
While finding the café had its share of challenges, the real difficulty was in parking the limo, partly because Captain Alex had never done anything like this, and partly because Notmie kept going “Ah!” and “Eep!” every time The Captain accelerated backwards, just to annoy him.
“For the love of all things, Notmie, will you stop that?”
“Fine, but I don’t understand how we’re ever going to get this thing into compact-car parking. There’s plenty of space right over there!”
“Hey! Who’s driving this thing? Yeah, that’s right, I am, so just shut up for a second and let me concentrate.”
But Notmie was right. There was plenty of parking just a little bit farther from the building, but Captain Alex had forgotten that the limo was so large and began pulling into a compact-car space without fully considering the difficulty. Of course, once Notmie had mentioned it to him, he was too proud to admit his mistake, and was now attempting this feat, regardless of what was “physically possible.”
Ten minutes later, they were parked.
“I’ll just leave a note on those two cars with my contact information in case they have a problem with the minor scratches,” said Captain Alex casually, as if he did this sort of thing every day.
The Captain began to get out of the driver’s seat, but Notmie stopped him. “Captain, aren’t you going to give me your super camouflaging cape to wear over my face so I don’t get mauled?”
Captain Alex scoffed. “Not a chance. This right here is a fine cape. I’m not going to risk you getting food on it.”
Notmie’s heart began to race. The cape-plan had given him the peace of mind to forget about all the dangers of going into a café, but now that it’d been pulled out from under him, he felt more vulnerable than he had in a long time.
“But you said I could wear it over my face! You were the one who brought it up! What am I going to do now?”
“I only said that to shut you up so we could get going. And I don’t really care what you do now. You could get over it, that might be a good idea. In fact,”—Captain Alex smiled at his own innovation—“step four to staying alive is just that: get over it.”
And with that, Captain Alex stepped out of the limo.
Notmie felt his stomach give another painful kick, and he understood that he didn’t have a choice; it was either go into the café or starve. He preferred not starving, whatever that might take.
“Hey!” Notmie said when he looked up at the quaint building they were walking toward. “I’ve been here before!”
The Captain looked over at Notmie, unsure if this was another one of those weird gags that Notmie seemed to enjoy pulli
ng. “Are you serious?”
“Of course! Granpapaya used to take me here all the time!”
Captain Alex knew there was more significance in the fact that Notmie had been here before than in the fact that he’d come here with some creep named Granpapaya, but The Captain still had to ask: “Who the hell is Granpapaya?”
“My grandfather, of course!”
“Of course…” The Captain repeated, feeling like he somehow should have known that this Notmie guy would have such a stupid name for his grandfather.
As they entered the restaurant, Captain Alex noticed that there sure was an awful lot of horn-honking going on in their wake.
“What’s their deal?” asked The Captain.
“Gee, Cap’n, I don’t know, but it might have something to do with the fact that the limo sticks out of that parking spot so much that other cars are now blocked in.” Notmie was a bit worried about getting beat up for this, despite the fact that one one had ever had the desire to harm him before, but Captain Alex disregarded it completely.
“Sucks for them.”
The smell of quiche was now strong and welcoming, and as they pushed open the front door and took the first few steps inside, berets emerged from behind thick curtains of smoke.
Captain Alex looked around the room. “This is Franch if I ever saw it.”
“ Have you ever seen it?” Notmie asked.
“That’s beside the point. Follow me.”
Oh, Notmie thought, we’re finally getting down to some business! I can’t wait to practice my French on these jen-tuhl-mon.
There was a glass case full of quiches with a cash register next to it and a small French gentleman standing behind it and looking impatiently at Notmie and Captain Alex as they dilly-dallied up to place their order. Notmie hadn’t been there in so long that he’d forgotten how all the employees seemed to ignore the unearthly beauty before them and treat Notmie like everyone else. He’d always found it both a relief and an insult when he was younger, and found that he felt no differently now that he was older.
“We’ll have two of the quiche Lorraine,” The Captain spoke to the man before turning to Notmie and whispering, “We have to try to blend in, so act like you really love quiche.”
“Right,” Notmie whispered back. Then, trying to do right by Captain Alex, he spoke very loudly, and in his best French: “Mmmm! Get me my quiche, waiter! A French person like me sure does love ’is quiche! Mmm-mmm-mmm! Got to ’ave zat quiche wiz all its…quiche-y in-gre-dee-onts!” He turned to The Captain. “Pst, Captain Alex, what’s a quiche made of?”
Captain Alex explained.
“Oh… Wait. Seriously? I always thought that a quiche was made of… Wait, then what’s the yellow thing you peal called, if not a quiche?”
“A banana.”
“Ooh. That explains things.”
“Do I even want to know?”
“Probably not.”
“Okay then, don’t tell me.”
“Okay, I won’t. But one more question.”
“What’s that?”
“What do quiches look like?”
“They’re generally round, have cheese—”
“Ha! Captain, now I think you’re confused because I know for a fact that you’re describing a pizza.”
“Yeah, except not,” The Captain replied, annoyed he was forced to debate the composition of a pizza.
“Brodie Alexander Jones, are you calling me a liar?”
“No, I just think you’re misguided. And if you ever use my full name again, I’ll break your neck. You do know what a neck is, right?”
“Of course I know what a neck is! At least I know what a pizza is!”
Captain Alex rolled his eyes. “Yeah, except not.”
“Yes I do! And I know that it’s not a quiche, or at least that’s what I’ve been led to believe, so I think on this one, Cap-tan Brodie, you’re the one who’s wrong!” Notmie punctuated his sentence by folding his arms across his chest.
“Yeah, except not.”
“Stop saying that!” Notmie cupped his hands over his ears and sung “lalalalala” to himself over and over again.
“Notmie, our food’s ready. Notmie! ” The Captain grabbed Notmie’s hands and yanked them from his ears.
“ Unhand me, you scurvy dog! ” Notmie yelled, flailing around wildly.
The Captain jumped back. “What the hell is the matter with you?” he whispered. “I’m just trying to tell you our quiche is ready.” Captain Alex adjusted his cape then grabbed his quiche off of the counter.
Notmie took his plate, and they found a table.
“So much for being discreet,” said Captain Alex, and Notmie noticed that everyone in the restaurant was staring at them. Captain Alex leaned over his quiche as he ate it, appearing unnecessarily interested in every piece of bell pepper and onion as he tried to avoid the awkward looks.
Notmie also noticed the stares. “Everyone’s staring at you.”
“What do you mean, ‘staring at you?’ They’re staring at both of us.”
“Nope. Sorry, but I think they’re only staring at you.” Notmie scanned the faces of all the on-lookers. “Especially that one guy over there. Don’t worry, I’ll handle it.” He patted Captain Alex reassuringly on the shoulder before “handling the situation.”
“ Hey you! Take a picture, it’ll last longer! ”
“Notmie!” Captain Alex hissed, “What are you doing? Are you mad?”
“No, I’m actually pretty exhilarated right now! I’ve never yelled at a stranger before. You should try it!”
Captain Alex buried his head in his hands, and when he felt a tap on his shoulder he didn’t realize that it wasn’t Notmie.
“Notmie, you’re such an idiot. Stop touching me. Stop it!” And he lifted his head up to see a tall, skinny stranger who spoke in a thick, rich, French accent.
“Are you ze one ’oo zey call Captain?”
“Er… I am called Captain, but I don’t know who ‘they’ are,” Captain Alex said defensively.
“ Voila! So it is you! ’Orrah! All ’ail ze bald Captain Alexander!” the man exclaimed.
“’Ee is goooood…” the rest of the restaurant murmured.
“What’s going on here?” demanded Captain Alex as his head whipped around to get a look at all the people who had just replied in unison.
Notmie erupted with sidesplitting laughter. “I’ll tell you what’s going on here, they just referred to you as ‘The Bald Captain Alexander!’ That’s great!”
Notmie fell out of his chair, holding his sides as he continued laughing.
“But seriously,” began The Bald One, “who the mess are you?”
“Sinclair Pierre Pontier.”
“That’s a really strange name, but that’s not what I meant. What I mean is who are you? Just knowing you name tells me nothing besides that fact that you’re French, which I could already tell by your mustache, beret, and ridiculous accent. What I mean is how do you know who I am?”
Sinclair opened his mouth, but snapped it shut as the sound of three touristy-looking strangers entering the restaurant met their ears.
Sinclair’s tune changed suddenly. “Pardon me for interrupting your meal. Bon appetite! ” He walked casually back to his table and took a seat next to two other Frenchmen with ridiculous mustaches.
When Notmie and Captain Alex looked around the restaurant, those who had been staring just a few seconds prior were now engrossed in other activities and seemed to be completely disinterested in Notmie and Captain Alex. The three strangers who had just entered wandered unsuspectingly to the counter and ordered themselves some quiche. They had no idea what had just happened, or how utterly confused Captain Alex was, or why Notmie was just now getting off the floor, rubbing his sides and wiping tears out of his eyes.
“Notmie,” Captain Alex whispered, “did I just imagine it, or did they just all know my name and then hail me?”
“Well,”—Notmie suppressed another giggle
fit—“if you’re name is The Bald Captain Alexander, then yes, that did just happen.”
“Good, because you wouldn’t know it to look at things right now, so I was just making sure it wasn’t my imagination. I think I’ll go find out what this is all about.” And with that, The Captain stood up, pushed in his chair, and walked clear across the room to where Sinclair was sitting.
“ Excusez-moi, ” he began mockingly, “but what the crap just happened over there? How did you know my name?”
Sinclair looked innocently at Captain Alex and spoke in his smooth, nasally accent, “To what are you referring? I wished you a good meal, zat is all; yes, no?”
But he made two fatal mistakes in all of this. The first was underestimating Captain Alex’s tendency toward paranoia, the second was that he let his eyes jump to the three strangers for a split second; it was a split second too long. Captain Alex caught his stare and was hot on his trail.
“What? Is it those people? Do you know their names as well? What kind of creepy business do you run here? Are you afraid those three people might figure out what is going on and discover whatever the heck your secret is? Huh? Huh? ”
“I–I–I do not know to what it is you are referring, monsieur. Now if you do not mind, I would like to enjoy my meal. You compre’end; yes, no?”
“Oh, I compre’end. I comprehend a lot more than you think I do, you little—” Captain Alex appeared on the verge of saying something unnecessarily rude, which the limited English vocabulary of Sinclair probably wouldn’t have even understood, but a hand grabbing his shoulder from behind stopped him before he could utter another word.
“ Release me, you French fiend! ” Captain Alex screamed.
It was just Notmie.
“Cap’n, I think it’s time we go. Come on. I’m beginning to doubt whether my family has anything to do with the French. We better get a move on or else we’ll never find a way to break the curse.”
Captain Alex noticed Sinclair perk up at the words “break the curse,” and so he pulled Notmie aside, away from the Frenchmen, to have a more private conversation.
The Captain gripped Notmie tightly by the shoulders and looked directly into his eyes, trying to show how serious things had just become. “Notmie, I know this doesn’t seem to be related to you, and I’ll admit, it doesn’t seem like you have any connection to Franch at this point, but don’t you see? They know my name! They know who I am! They all seemed to be waiting for me to come! How can I just walk away knowing that there could possibly be a huge mystery surrounding me that I may never again have the chance to figure out?”
The Fraud Page 7
