There was a long pause while she listened to Mr. Donovan.
Then she said in a calmer voice, “I understand your confusion. Yes, Bruce is mature for his age and his voice did sound like an adult. I haven’t viewed the video yet, but I’m sure it was very well done. Bruce is a fine photographer. Still, as you must understand, we couldn’t possibly allow our underage child to go to Hollywood without a chaperone.”
Another, much shorter pause.
“That’s very kind of you. I’ll discuss it with Bruce’s father and we’ll get back with you…. Yes, I realize the decision must be made immediately. Thank you for honoring Bruce and his accomplishments. He definitely is a special boy. And I think you should know that his younger sister wrote the script.”
She said good-bye very calmly and replaced the receiver on the hook. Then she drew a deep, shaky breath and collapsed into a chair.
“What’s going on here?” Mr. Walker demanded.
They all had been so glued to the phone conversation that they had not heard the front door open and close. Now Bruce and Andi turned to see their father standing at the entrance to the family room. He set down his briefcase and hurried over to his wife.
“Linda, what’s wrong? You look as if you’re in shock.”
“I suppose I am,” Mrs. Walker said in a tremulous voice. “The children’s video has made the finals in a national contest. A producer named Craig Donovan wants Bruce to fly to Hollywood. This is surreal! Things like this don’t happen to normal people!”
“Surreal is right,” Mr. Walker said. “No responsible parents would ship their child off to Hollywood to meet with some stranger. There’s no way to know what kind of man this Donovan is or what his true intentions are.”
“He sounded sincere,” Mrs. Walker said. “He hadn’t been aware of Bruce’s age. When I told him, he immediately offered to cover the expenses of a chaperone.”
“I will be Bruce’s chaperone!” Andi volunteered eagerly. “I will protect him from evil and guard him from temptation! I won’t let Britney Spears get anywhere near him!”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” their father said. “He needs an adult chaperone, and neither your mother nor I can get off work. If this opportunity had come after school let out, your mother might have been able to take Bruce to Hollywood. But she can’t leave her students in the final days of the school year.”
“That’s not fair!” Andi cried. “You could make this happen if you wanted to! One of you could quit your job and we could live on welfare until I become a famous writer! This is the best opportunity Bruce will ever have! The two of you are the meanest parents in the world!”
“And you have just placed yourself in the running for being the rudest child in the world,” Mr. Walker told her sternly. “We don’t allow that sort of talk in our family. Go to your room until you’re ready to come down and apologize.”
Tears of frustration were streaming down Andi’s face as she turned on her heel and stomped angrily out of the room.
“You were very hard on her, John,” Mrs. Walker said. “It’s understandable that she’s upset and disappointed.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” Bruce said. “This was Andi’s dream — second only to getting her book published. Of course she’s mad! It’s not like you didn’t know we were making a video and entering it in a contest. Dad, we even invited you to be in it!”
“We’re happy to have you and Andi work on creative projects together,” Mrs. Walker explained. “It’s just that we didn’t expect an outcome like this. We assumed that, at most, you’d receive a certificate like Andi did with her book project. That sort of recognition is appropriate for children. But this — it’s beyond comprehension! As Dad said, you can’t go alone to Hollywood, and neither of us is free to go with you.”
“Then the answer is no?” Bruce asked, trying once more. “You won’t change your minds? Even if I promise to phone you every half hour to let you know I’m okay?”
“The answer is no,” his father said. “I’m truly sorry, son. But knowing you made it to the finals should make you proud. That, in itself, is a triumph. After dinner, I think we should go out for ice cream.”
“I apologize,” Andi announced loudly. She had reentered the room while they were talking. “I’d like to go out for ice cream. This time I think I’m going to have a hot-fudge sundae.”
“Apology accepted,” her father said, putting his arm around her and giving her a hug. “We all sometimes say things we don’t mean when we’re disappointed. As your mother pointed out, I should have been more sympathetic to what you were feeling.”
“Aunt Alice says she’ll be happy to chaperone us,” Andi said.
Her parents and Bruce stared at her in stunned amazement.
“What?” Mr. Walker exploded. “When did you talk to Aunt Alice?”
“Just now,” Andi said. “I used the phone in your bedroom. Aunt Alice said she would love to go to Hollywood, as long as she doesn’t have to share a room with a dog. But that’s all right, because Mr. Donovan said he would cover the expenses of a chaperone, so Bruce and Red will have one room, and Aunt Alice and I will have the other.”
“But Mr. Donovan invited only me!” Bruce protested.
“Aunt Alice said that I should go, too,” Andi told him. “She said that’s only fair, since I wrote the story. She’s going to take me as her guest. Isn’t that cool?”
The phone rang.
Mrs. Walker answered it.
“Bruce,” she said, “it’s for you.” She handed him the receiver. “I don’t know who this is, but it’s definitely not Mr. Donovan.”
Bruce said, “Hello?” not bothering to use his deep voice.
“I just got my phone call!” Kristy Fernald said joyfully. “Isn’t it great that we’re both finalists?”
“Your video’s one of the three finalists?” Bruce shouldn’t have been surprised, but in all the excitement he’d forgotten about Kristy. “How did you know that mine was?”
“I asked, of course,” Kristy said. “Didn’t you ask about me? I’m sure you must have. Mr. Donovan seemed blown away by the fact that we’re both from the same small town.”
“So you’re going to Hollywood next week, too?” Bruce asked her.
“If only!” Kristy said. “But my mom can’t get off work to go with me.”
“What about your dad?” Bruce asked.
“My parents are divorced,” Kristy said. “My dad’s out there somewhere, but we haven’t heard from him in years. Who’s chaperoning you?”
“My dad’s Aunt Alice,” Bruce said.
He could sense what was coming, and what he suspected was correct.
“I know this is asking a lot,” Kristy said, “since your father’s aunt doesn’t even know me. But do you think she might be willing to chaperone me, too?”
MY ADVENTURES IN HOLLYWOOD — PART ONE
By Andrea Walker
I will get excused absences for the two days of school that I miss if I write a report about my adventures in Hollywood.
So here it is.
It was terrible having to tell my beautiful, talented, brilliant dog, Bebe, that my brother’s dog, Red, was going to go to Hollywood with us and Bebe wasn’t. It’s not Bebe’s fault that she isn’t able to open gates. If I’d thought about it in time, I could have rewritten the script and made Bobby a dachshund and had him dig a hole and crawl under the gate to get out of his yard. And I could have done something with the toolshed, like make it have a hole in the floor so a dachshund with Bebe’s skills and intelligence could have gotten out that way and led the other dogs to safety.
But there was a deadline, and Bruce had all kinds of reasons why Red should be the star, and all of a sudden Red was Bobby, even before I’d written it into the script.
I tried to explain that to Bebe, but she went into one of her sulks and hid behind the clothes dryer in the laundry room, which is what she always does when her feelings are hurt. I didn’t even get to kiss
her good-bye before we left for the airport.
The plane trip was not as much fun as I’d expected. I wanted to sit with Aunt Alice, but Bruce got there first, so I had to sit with Kristy. Tim told me yesterday that Kristy is Jerry Gordon’s girlfriend. That’s a scary thing to think about. I kept my arm pulled in tight to my side, because I would smash my way through the plane window and hurl myself out into space before I would brush my elbow against the elbow of a girl whose elbow has touched the elbow of Jerry Gordon.
Kristy brought Lamb Chop on board in a carryon cage. She put that under the seat in front of her. Lamb Chop is a Maltipoo. She looks like Snowflake Swanson might look if Snowflake was a midget.
Red had to ride with the luggage.
Right before the plane took off, Kristy’s cell phone rang. There was a picture on the screen. Kristy said, “This is so amazing!” Of course that made me curious, so I asked, “What’s amazing?” Kristy said, “A boy in my math class told me he’s got a cousin in Chicago who looks just like him only older. That cousin just sent me his picture, and it’s true! He looks exactly like Jerry, except he has a mustache. Here — look!”
She shoved the phone screen in front of my face before I could stop her, and there was Connor Gordon with fuzz on his upper lip.
“Isn’t he cute?” Kristy gushed.
I said, “He has shifty eyes.”
“How can you say that?” Kristy asked me, sounding like I’d insulted her dearest friend, even though she’s never even met Connor. “This isn’t a video, Andi. There’s no way you can tell if his eyes are shifting.”
Then, thank goodness, there was an announcement for everyone to turn off their cell phones, so Kristy clicked hers off and put it in her purse. I didn’t talk to Kristy for the rest of the trip. Instead, I wrote in my notebook. I wrote a poem about how the sky looks from an airplane window and a poem about Bebe in the laundry room. I’ve decided not to include those poems in this report, because I may want to turn them in as part of a different assignment. For instance, for science we might have to write about cloud formations. There’s no sense wasting a poem that I might find a use for later.
When we got to LAX, which is the name of the Los Angeles airport, a man in a uniform was holding up two cardboard signs. One said “WALKER” and the other said “FERNALD.” Those were for Bruce and Kristy. Each of them got their own sign, even though we were all going to ride in the same car.
The man got our luggage and let Red out of his crate and took us outside to a limousine. He explained that Mr. Craig Donovan had sent the limo because taxi drivers in Los Angeles won’t take dogs as big as Red unless they belong to movie stars. Aunt Alice put on her allergy mask so she could ride in the car with Lamb Chop and Red without sneezing.
We were starving, because the only food on the plane was pretzels in little plastic bags that we couldn’t get open. Aunt Alice told us that she used to cut them open with nail scissors, but the man at the airport who put her purse through a metal detector wouldn’t let her take her scissors on the plane. Nobody else could do that either, so there were lots of people trying to open the pretzels with their teeth. One woman broke a tooth and started screaming. The flight attendant brought her an ice pack.
It took us over an hour to get to our hotel, because the roads were clogged with traffic. That made it almost bedtime, New Jersey time, and we still hadn’t eaten.
We are staying at a special hotel that allows pets and has room service for dogs. Dogs have their own menus. Dry dog food costs eight dollars. Braised beef and garden vegetables costs ten dollars. There is also something called a Grilled Chicken-Liver Feast that’s so expensive that Aunt Alice wouldn’t let Bruce and Kristy order it for Red and Lamb Chop even though Star Burst Studios is paying for everything. She said it’s “inappropriate to take advantage of our hosts.”
The limo driver suggested that Aunt Alice take off her mask before she went into the hotel. He was afraid the people at the desk would think it was a holdup. He promised to keep Red and Lamb Chop safe in the car and bring them to Bruce’s room after we were registered.
While Aunt Alice was checking us in, a man came up and asked, “Are you here for the Dogs in Action contest?” Aunt Alice said, “Yes,” and the man said, “I’m Maynard Merlin, and I’m here for that, too.” So we’ve now met our other competition besides Kristy.
I took notes while our enemy talked to Aunt Alice:
Maynard Merlin has shiny black hair that doesn’t match his gray eyebrows.
He was wearing a gray suit and a red tie.
He smiles all the time, even when there’s nothing to smile about.
He guessed who we were when he heard Aunt Alice tell the check-in person that we had two dogs outside in a limo.
His own dog, Gabby, was in their room, resting up for tomorrow’s interview.
He asked Aunt Alice too many questions.
One question was, could we all eat dinner together? Aunt Alice said that was a nice thought but we were too tired from the long plane trip to be good company and she thought we would order up room service. Then he asked her if she would like to meet him later in the lounge so they could have a drink and get to know each other. She told him, “No, thank you.”
Then Kristy asked him what Gabby’s video was about.
Mr. Merlin said he’d taught Gabby to talk.
To Be Continued
CHAPTER TEN
They gathered in the hotel lobby at eight o’clock the next morning to wait for the limousine to take them to Star Burst Studios. Maynard Merlin was waiting for the limousine as well, and Gabby was with him. The only one of their group who was not staring at Gabby was Mr. Merlin, who was staring at Aunt Alice.
Aunt Alice adjusted her mask and said, “Good morning, Mr. Merlin.”
Mr. Merlin asked, “Is that you, Alice? I didn’t recognize you with your facial adornment. I hope you had a good night’s rest.”
“I slept very well, thank you,” Aunt Alice said politely. “Both of our four-legged companions slept in the room with Bruce, so I didn’t sneeze even once. Kristy has informed me that Maltipoos are nonallergenic, but I’m not one for taking chances, especially with a big day ahead of us.”
The children could not take their eyes off Gabby. They had expected something extraordinary, but he looked like a run-of-the-mill hound-type dog with floppy ears and oversized lips.
Kristy said tentatively, “Hello, Gabby.”
Gabby said, “Allo.”
Kristy let out a shriek. “Oh, my gosh, he really does talk! Mr. Merlin, I thought you were kidding! What else can he say?”
“His vocabulary is somewhat limited, because there are particular sounds that dogs can’t make,” Mr. Merlin explained. “Gabby has trouble pronouncing certain letters of the alphabet, such as ‘s’ and ‘b.’ The ‘th’ sound is beyond him, but he does very well with vowel sounds and with easy letters like ‘l,’ ‘w,’ and ‘r.’”
“Hello, Gabby,” Andi said. “I’m Andi Walker. I’m very glad to meet you.”
“Allo, Annie Wawar,” Gabby said.
Then, just as Bruce was preparing to introduce himself, the limousine driver arrived to whisk them off to Star Burst Studios.
Aunt Alice took her seat in the car, and Mr. Merlin immediately plunked down next to her. Bruce sat behind them with Red, and Kristy squeezed in beside him with Lamb Chop on her lap. That left Andi to share a seat with Gabby, which she didn’t mind at all, as she had liked the dog as soon as she’d seen his sweet face.
“Are you excited about being interviewed?” she whispered to him.
Gabby said, “Uh-uh,” and leaned his head against her shoulder.
When they reached the studio, they were ushered into a pleasant waiting room with large plush chairs and a sofa. A secretary phoned Mr. Donovan, who rushed out to greet them. He was wearing a flowered sports shirt and pink pants and had a diamond stud in his right earlobe.
He gave a gasp of startled recognition when he saw Aunt Alice in h
er face mask.
“Mrs. Rinkle!” he exclaimed. “What a delightful surprise! I was under the impression that you’d fallen into a volcano!”
“I’m not the real Mrs. Rinkle,” Aunt Alice told him, extending her hand for him to shake. “I simply played her in the video, which, as you know, is a reenactment, not a documentary. My name is Alice Scudder, and I’m here to act as a chaperone for these three children. These are Bruce Walker, the producer of Bobby Strikes Back, and his sister, Andrea, who wrote the film script. This other young lady is Kristy Fernald, who created the video about her therapy dog.”
“And I’m Maynard Merlin, and this is Gabby,” Mr. Merlin interjected quickly, clearly anxious not to be left out. “Gabby, say hello to Mr. Donovan.”
Gabby said, “Allo, Mrrrr Onowam.” Apparently D and V were other letters that caused him problems.
Mr. Donovan appeared both startled and impressed.
“I owe you an apology, Mr. Merlin,” he said. “I must admit, I was slightly suspicious that you might have morphed your film in order to create the visual effect of a dog talking. Obviously that’s not the case. This is truly astonishing.” He turned his attention to the others. “And these glorious animals must be Bobby and Lamb Chop! What marvelous specimens they are!”
“There were other dogs in our video, too,” Andi said. “Did you notice the dachshund with the big, expressive eyes? Her name is Bebe, and she can shake hands and roll over.”
“I wanna geggit owa wig,” Gabby said.
“What he’s saying is ‘Let’s get the show on the road,’” Mr. Merlin translated. “He can’t wait to get in front of the camera!”
“No, it’s not,” Andi said. “He said, ‘I want to get this over with.’”
“Well, either way, let’s get the ball rolling!” Mr. Donovan said. “The studio in which we’ll be taping is down the hall, and I’d like to conduct separate interviews to avoid distractions. Those of you who aren’t involved in a taping session are free to relax and make yourselves comfortable out here. Mrs. Rinkle — I mean, Scudder — would you like for my secretary to bring you some coffee?”