It actually says Tom in the book but Jack sounds better. Stealing is when a boy takes what belongs to some boy else, because in books and TV all persons have things that belong just to them, it’s complicated.
It’s 05:39 so we can have dinner, it’s quick noodles. While they’re in the hot water, Ma finds hard words to test me from the milk carton like nutritional that means food, and pasteurized that means laser guns zapped away the germs. I want more cake but Ma says beets chopped all juicy first. Then I have cake that’s pretty crispy now and Ma does too, a little bit.
I get up on Rocker to find Games Box at the end of Shelf, tonight I pick Checkers and I’m going to be red. The pieces are like little chocolates, but I’ve licked them lots of times and they don’t taste like anything. They stick to the board by magnetic magic. Ma likes Chess best but it aches my head.
At TV time she chooses the wildlife planet, there’s turtles burying their eggs in sand. When Alice gets long with eating the mushroom, the pigeon’s mad because she thinks Alice is a nasty serpent trying to eat her pigeon eggs. Here come the turtle babies out of their shells, but the turtle mothers are gone already, that’s weird. I wonder if they meet sometime in the sea, the mothers and the babies, if they know each other or maybe they just swim on by.
The wildlife ends too quick so I switch over to two men only wearing shorts and sneakers and dripping hot. “Uh-oh, hitting’s not allowed,” I tell them. “Baby Jesus is going to be mad.”
The one in yellow shorts bashes the hairy one on the eye.
Ma groans as if she’s hurting. “Do we have to watch this?”
I tell her, “In a minute the police are going to come weee-ahhh weee-ahhh weee-ahhh and lock those bad guys up in jail.”
“Actually, boxing . . . it’s nasty but it’s a game, it’s kind of allowed if they have those special gloves on. Now time’s up.”
“One game of Parrot, that’s good for vocabulary.”
“OK.” She goes over and switches to the red couch planet where the puffy-hair woman that’s the boss asks the other persons questions and hundreds of other persons clap.
I listen extra hard, she’s talking to a man with one leg, I think he lost the other in a war.
“Parrot,” shouts Ma and she mutes them with the button.
“Most poignant aspect, I think for all our viewers that’s what’s most deeply moving about what you endured—” I run out of words.
“Good pronunciation,” says Ma. “Poignant means sad.”
“A gain.”
“The same show?”
“No, a different.”
She finds a news one that’s even harder. “Parrot.” She mutes it again.
“Ah, with the whole labeling debate coming hard on the heels of health-care reform, and bearing in mind of course the midterms—”
“Any more?” Ma waits. “Good, again. But it was labor law, not labeling.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Labeling is stickers on tomatoes, say, and labor law —”
I do a huge yawn.
“Never mind.” Ma grins and switches the TV off.
I hate when the pictures disappear and the screen’s just gray again. I always want to cry but just for a second.
I get on Ma’s lap in Rocker with our legs all jumbled up. She’s the wizard transformed into a giant squid and I’m Prince JackerJack and I escape in the end. We do tickles and Bouncy Bouncy and jaggedy shadows on Bed Wall.
Then I ask for JackerJackRabbit, he’s always doing cunning tricks on that Brer Fox. He lies down in the road pretending to be dead and Brer Fox sniffs him and says, “I better not take him home, he’s too stinky . . .” Ma sniffs me all over and makes hideous faces and I try not to laugh so Brer Fox won’t know I’m actually alive but I always do.
For a song I want a funny, she starts, “ ‘The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out—’ ”
“ ‘They eat your guts like sauerkraut—,’ ” I sing.
“ ‘They eat your eyes, they eat your nose—’ ”
“ ‘They eat the dirt between your toes—’ ”
I have lots on Bed but my mouth is sleepy. Ma carries me into Wardrobe, she tucks Blanket around my neck, I pull her looser again. My fingers go choo-choo along her red line.
Beep beep, that’s Door. Ma jumps up and makes a sound, I think she hit her head. She shuts Wardrobe tight.
The air that comes in is freezing, I think it’s a bit of Outer Space, it smells yum. Door makes his thump that means Old Nick’s in now. I’m not sleepy anymore. I get up on my knees and look through the slats, but all I can see is Dresser and Bath and a curve of Table.
“Looks tasty.” Old Nick’s voice is extra deep.
“Oh, it’s just the last of the birthday cake,” says Ma.
“Should have reminded me, I could have brought him something. What’s he now, four?”
I wait for Ma to say, but she doesn’t. “Five.” I whisper it.
But she must hear me, because she comes close to Wardrobe and says “Jack” in a mad voice.
Old Nick laughs, I didn’t know he could. “It speaks.”
Why does he say it not he?
“Want to come out of there and try on your new jeans?”
It’s not Ma he’s saying that to, it’s me. My chest starts to go dung dung dung.
“He’s nearly asleep,” says Ma.
No I’m not. I wish I didn’t whisper five so he heard me, I wish I didn’t anything.
Something else I can’t quite hear—
“OK, OK,” Old Nick is saying. “Can I’ve a slice?”
“It’s getting stale. If you really want—”
“No, forget it, you’re the boss.”
Ma doesn’t say anything.
“I’m just the grocery boy, take out your trash, trek around the kidswear aisles, up the ladder to deice your skylight, at your service ma’am . . .”
I think he’s doing sarcasm, when he says the really opposite with a voice that’s all twisty.
“Thanks for that.” Ma doesn’t sound like her. “It makes it much brighter.”
“There, that didn’t hurt, did it?”
“Sorry. Thanks a lot.”
“Like pulling teeth sometimes,” says Old Nick.
“And thanks for the groceries, and the jeans.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Here, I’ll get you a plate, maybe the middle’s not too bad.”
There’s some clinks, I think she’s giving him cake. My cake.
After a minute he talks blurry. “Yup, pretty stale.”
His mouth is full of my cake.
Lamp goes offsnap,that makes me jump. I don’t mind dark but I don’t like when it surprises me. I lie down under Blanket and I wait.
When Old Nick creaks Bed, I listen and count fives on my fingers, tonight it’s 217 creaks. I always have to count till he makes that gaspy sound and stops. I don’t know what would happen if I didn’t count, because I always do.
What about the nights I’m asleep?
I don’t know, maybe Ma does the counting.
After the 217 it’s all quiet.
I hear the TV switch on, it’s just the news planet, I see bits with tanks through the slats that’s not very interesting. I put my head under Blanket. Ma and Old Nick are talking a bit but I don’t listen.
• • •
I wake up in Bed and it’s raining, that’s when Skylight’s all blurry. Ma gives me some and she’s doing “Singing in the Rain” very quietly.
Right doesn’t taste yummy. I sit up remembering. “Why you didn’t tell him before that it was my birthday?”
Ma stops smiling. “You’re meant to be asleep when he’s here.”
“But if you told him, he’d brung me something.”
“Bring you something,” she says. “So he says.”
“What kind of something?” I wait. “You should have remembered him.”
Ma stretches her arms over her head. “I don’t wan
t him bringing you things.”
“But Sundaytreat—”
“That’s different, Jack, that’s stuff we need that I ask him for.” She points to Dresser, there’s a blue folded up. “There are your new jeans, by the way.”
She goes over to pee.
“You could ask him for a present for me. I never got a present in my life.”
“Your present was from me, remember? It was the drawing.”
“I don’t want the dumbo drawing.” I’m crying.
Ma dries her hands and comes to hold me. “It’s OK.”
“It might—”
“I can’t hear you. Take a big breath.”
“It might—”
“Tell me what’s the matter.”
“It might be a dog.”
“What might?”
I can’t stop, I have to talk through the crying. “The present. It might be a dog turned to real, and we could call it Lucky.”
Ma wipes my eyes with the flat of her hands. “You know we don’t have room.”
“Yeah we do.”
“Dogs need walks.”
“We walk.”
“But a dog—”
“We run a long long way on Track, Lucky could go beside us. I bet he’d be faster than you.”
“Jack. A dog would drive us nuts.”
“No he wouldn’t.”
“He would so. Cooped up, with the barking, the scratching . . .”
“Lucky wouldn’t be scratching.”
Ma rolls her eyes. She goes over to Cabinet to get out the cereal, she pours it in our bowls not even counting.
I do a roaring lion face. “In the night when you’re asleep, I’m going to be awake, I’ll pull the foil out of the holes so Mouse will come back.”
“Don’t be silly.”
“I’m not silly, you’re the silly numbskull.”
“Listen, I understand—”
“Mouse and Lucky are my friends.” I’m crying again.
“There is no Lucky.” Ma’s talking with her teeth shut.
“Yeah there is and I love him.”
“You just made him up.”
“Also there’s Mouse, he’s my real friend and you made him gone—”
“Yeah,” shouts Ma, “so he won’t run over your face in the night and bite you.”
I’m crying so much my breath’s all whoopy. I never knowed Mouse would bite my face, I thought that was only vampires.
Ma drops down on Duvet and doesn’t move.
After a minute I go beside her and lie down. I lift her T-shirt to have some, I have to keep stopping to wipe my nose. The left is good but there’s not much.
Later I try on my new jeans. They keep falling down.
Ma pulls at a sticking-out thread.
“Don’t.”
“It was loose already. Cheap piece of—” She doesn’t say what.
“Denim,” I tell her, “that’s what jeans are made of.” I put the thread in Cabinet in Crafts Tub.
Ma gets down Kit to sew some stitches in the waist, after that my jeans stay up.
We have a pretty busy morning. First we undo Pirate Ship that we made last week and turn it into Tank. Balloon is the driver, she used to be as big as Ma’s head and pink and fat, now she’s small like my fist only red and wrinkly. We only blow up one when it’s the first of a month, so we can’t make Balloon a sister till it’s April. Ma plays with Tank too but not as long. She gets sick of things fast, it’s from being an adult.
Monday is a laundry day, we get into Bath with socks, under-wears, my gray pants that ketchup squirted on, the sheets and dish towels, and we squish all the dirt out. Ma hots Thermostat way up for the drying, she pulls Clothes Horse out from beside Door and stands him open and I tell him to be strong. I would love to ride him like when I was a baby but I’m so huge now I might break his back. It would be cool to sometimes go smaller again and sometimes bigger like Alice. When we’ve twisted the water out of everything and hanged them up, Ma and me have to rip off our T-shirts and take turns pushing ourselves into Refrigerator to cool down.
Lunch is bean salad, my second worst favorite. After nap we do Scream every day but not Saturdays or Sundays. We clear our throats and climb up on Table to be nearer Skylight, holding hands not to fall. We say “On your mark, get set, go,” then we open wide our teeth and shout holler howl yowl shriek screech scream the loudest possible. Today I’m the most loudest ever because my lungs are stretching from being five.
Then we shush with fingers on lips. I asked Ma once what we’re listening for and she said just in case, you never know.
Then I do rubbings of a fork and Comb and jar lids and the sides of my jeans. Ruled paper is smoothest for rubbings, but toilet paper is good for a drawing that goes on forever, like today I do me with a cat and a parrot and an iguana and a raccoon and Santa and an ant and Lucky and all my TV friends in a procession and I’m King Jack. When I’m all done I roll it again so we can use it for our butts. I take a fresh bit from the next roll for a letter to Dora, I have to sharpen the red pencil with Smooth Knife. I squeeze the pencil hard because it’s so short it’s nearly gone, I write perfectly only sometimes my letters go back to front. I am five the day before yesterday, you can have the last bit of cake but there is no candles, bye love Jack. It only tears a little on the of. “When will she get it?”
“Well,” says Ma, “I’d imagine it’ll take a few hours to reach the sea, then it’ll wash up on a beach . . .”
She sounds funny from sucking an ice cube for Bad Tooth. Beaches and sea are TV but I think when we send a letter it turns them real for a bit. The poos sink and the letters float on the waves. “Who’ll find it? Diego?”
“Probably. And he’ll take it to his cousin Dora—”
“In his safari jeep. Zoom zoom through the jungle.”
“So tomorrow morning, I’d say. Lunchtime at the latest.”
The ice cube is making less bulge in Ma’s face now. “Let’s see?”
She puts it out on her tongue.
“I think I have a bad tooth too.”
Ma wails, “Oh, Jack.”
“Really real for real. Ow, ow, ow.”
Her face changes. “You can suck an ice cube if you want, you don’t have to have a toothache.”
“Cool.”
“Don’t scare me like that.”
I didn’t know I could scare her. “Maybe it’ll hurt when I’m six.”
She puffs her breath when she’s getting the cubes out of Freezer. “Liar, liar, pants on fire.”
But I wasn’t lying, only pretending.
It’s rainy all the afternoon, God doesn’t look in at all. We sing “Stormy Weather” and “It’s Raining Men” and the one about the desert missing the rain.
Dinner is fish sticks and rice, I get to squirt the lemon that’s not an actual but a plastic. We had a real lemon once but it shriveled up too fast. Ma puts a bit of her fish stick under Plant in the soil.
The cartoon planet’s not in evenings, maybe because it’s dark and they don’t have lamps there. I choose a cooking tonight, it’s not like real food, they don’t have any cans. The she and the he smile at each other and do a meat with a pie on top and green things around other green things in bunches. Then I switch over to the fitness planet where persons in underwear with all machines have to keep doing things over and over, I think they’re locked in. That’s over soon and it’s the knockerdowners, they make houses into different shapes and also millions of colors with paint, not just on a picture but all over everything. Houses are like lots of Rooms stuck together, TV persons stay in them mostly but sometimes they go in their outsides and weather happens to them.
“What if we put the bed over there?” says Ma.
I stare at her, then I look where she’s pointing. “That’s TV Wall.”
“That’s just what we call it,” she says, “but the bed could probably fit there, between the toilet and . . . we’d have to shift the wardrobe over a bit. Then the dresser wou
ld be right here instead of the bed, with the TV on top of it.”
I’m shaking my head a lot. “Then we couldn’t see.”
“We could, we’d be sitting right here in the rocker.”
“Bad idea.”
“OK, forget it.” Ma folds her arms tight.
The TV woman is crying because her house is yellow now. “Did she like it brown better?” I ask.
“No,” says Ma, “she’s so happy it’s making her cry.”
That’s weird. “Is she happysad, like you get when there’s lovely music on TV?”
“No, she’s just an idiot. Let’s switch the TV off now.”
“Five more minutes? Please?”
She shakes her head.
“I’ll do Parrot, I’m getting even better.” I listen hard to the TV woman. I say, “Dream come to life, I have to tell you Darren it’s just beyond my very wildest imaginings, the cornices—”
Ma hits the off. I want to ask her what a cornices is but I think she’s still cranky about moving the furniture, that was a crazy plan.
In Wardrobe I should be going to sleep but I’m counting fights. That’s three we had in three days, one about the candles and one about Mouse and one about Lucky. I’d rather be four again if five means fighting all the days.
“Good night, Room,” I say very quiet. “Good night, Lamp and Balloon.”
“Good night, stove,” says Ma, “and good night, table.”
I’m grinning. “Good night, Wordy Ball. Good night, Fort. Good night, Rug.”
“Good night, air,” says Ma.
“Good night, noises everywhere.”
“Good night, Jack.”
“Good night, Ma. And Bugs, don’t forget the Bugs.”
“Night-night,” she says, “sleep tight, don’t let the bugs bite.”
• • •
When I wake up, Skylight’s all blue in her glass, there’s no snow left even in the corners. Ma’s sitting in her chair holding her face, that means hurting. She’s looking at something on Table, two things.
I jump up and grab. “It’s a jeep. A remote-control jeep!” I’m zooming it in the air, it’s red, as big as my hand. The remote is silver and a rectangle, when I wiggle one of the switches with my thumb the jeep’s wheels spin zhhhhung.
“It’s a late birthday present.”
I know who brung it, it’s Old Nick but she won’t say.