Dash & Lily's Book of Dares (9 page)

“Call her whatever you want. But she’s probably soon going to be Mrs. Grandpa. When that happens, my guess is he will move down there permanently.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Langston sat up so I could see his face. Even sick, he was pathetically sincere. “Believe me.”

“How come no one told me?”

“They were trying to protect you. Not cause you concern until they knew for sure these things would happen.”

This was how Shrilly was born, from people trying so hard to “protect” me.

“PROTECT THIS!” I shouted, lifting my middle finger to Langston.

“Shrilly!” he admonished. “That’s so unlike you.”

“What
is
like me?” I asked.

I stormed away from the garden rooftop, snarled at poor ol’ Grunt, who was licking his paws after breakfast, and
continued my storming, to downstairs, to
my
apartment, to
my
room, in
my
city, Manhattan. “No one’s moving me to Fiji,” I muttered as I got dressed to go out.

I couldn’t think about this Christmas catastrophe. I just couldn’t. It was too much.

I felt especially grateful now having the red Moleskine to confide in. Just knowing a Snarl was on the other side to read it—to possibly care—inspired my pen to move quickly in answer to his question. As I waited for the subway en route to Snarl’s Midtown destination, I had plenty of free time on the bench at the Astor Place station, since the notoriously slow 6 train seemed to take its usual forever to arrive.

I wrote:

What I want for Christmas is to believe
.

I want to believe that, despite all the evidence to the contrary, there is reason to hope. I write this while a homeless man is sleeping on the ground under a dirty blanket a few feet away from the bench where I’m sitting at the Astor Place subway stop, on the uptown side, where I can see across the tracks to the Kmart entrance on the downtown side. Is this relevant? Not really, except that when I started to write this to you, I noticed him, then stopped writing long enough to dash over to the Kmart to buy the man a bag of “fun size” Snickers bars, which I slipped underneath his blanket, and that made me extra sad because his shoes are all worn out and he’s dirty and smelly and I don’t think that bag of Snickers is going to make much difference to this guy, ultimately. His problems are way bigger than a bag of Snickers can resolve. I don’t understand how to process this stuff sometimes. Like, here in New York, we see so much grandeur and glitz, especially this time of year, and yet we see so much suffering, too. Everyone else on the
platform here is just ignoring this guy, like he doesn’t exist, and I don’t know how that’s possible. I want to believe it’s not crazy of me to hope he will wake up and a social worker will take him to a shelter for a warm shower, meal, and bed, and the social worker will then help him find a job and an apartment and … See? It’s just too much to process. All this hoping for something—or someone—that’s maybe hopeless
.

I’m having a hard time processing what I am supposed to believe, or if I’m even supposed to. There is too much information, and I don’t like a lot of it
.

And yet, for some reason that all scientific evidence really should make impossible, I feel like I really do hope. I hope that global warming will go away. I hope that people won’t be homeless. I hope that suffering will not exist. I want to believe that my hope is not in vain
.

I want to believe that even though I hope for things that are so magnanimous (good OED word, huh?), I am not a bad person because what I really want to believe in is purely selfish
.

I want to believe there is a somebody out there just for me. I want to believe that I exist to be there for that somebody
.

Remember in Franny and Zooey (which I assume you’ve read and loved, considering the location where you found the Moleskine in the Strand) how Franny was this girl from the 1950s who freaked out over what’s the meaning of life because she thought it was embedded in a prayer someone told her about? And even though neither her brother Zooey nor her mom understood what Franny was going through, I think I really did. Because I would like the meaning of life explained to me in a prayer, and I would probably flip out, too, if I thought the possibility of attaining this prayer existed, but was out of my reach of understanding. (Especially if being Franny meant I’d also get to wear lovely vintage clothes, although I’m dubious on
whether I’d want the Yale boyfriend named Lane who’s possibly a bit of a prick but people admire me for going out with him; I think I’d rather be with someone more … er … arcane.) At the end of the book, when Zooey calls Franny pretending to be their brother Buddy, trying to cheer her up, there’s a line where he talks about Franny going to the phone and becoming “younger with each step” as she walked, because she’s making it to the other side. She’s going to be okay. At least that’s what I took it to mean
.

I want that. The getting younger with each step, because of anticipation, in hope and belief
.

Prayer or not, I want to believe that, despite all evidence to the contrary, it is possible for anyone to find that one special person. That person to spend Christmas with or grow old with or just take a nice silly walk in Central Park with. Somebody who wouldn’t judge another for the prepositions they dangle, or their run-on sentences, and who in turn wouldn’t be judged for the snobbery of their language etymology inclinations. (Gotcha with the word choices, right? I know, sometimes I surprise even myself.)

Belief. That’s what I want for Christmas. Look it up. Maybe there’s more meaning there than I understand. Maybe you could explain it to me?

I had continued writing in the notebook when the train came, and finished my entry just as it arrived at Fifty-ninth and Lex. As the zillions of people, along with me, poured out of the train and up into Bloomingdale’s or the street, I concentrated hard on not thinking about what I was determined not to think about.

Moving. Change.

Except I wasn’t thinking about that.

*

I dodged Bloomingdale’s, walking straight toward FAO Schwarz, where I realized what Snarl had meant by “payback.” A line down the street outside the store greeted me—a line just to get
into
the store! I had to wait twenty minutes just to reach the door.

But no matter what, I love Christmas, really really really I do, don’t care if I am sardined in between two million panicky Christmas shoppers, nope, don’t care at all, I loved every moment of the experience once I got inside—the jingle bells playing from the speakers, the heart-racing excitement at seeing all the colorful toys and games in such a larger-than-life setting. Aisle after aisle and floor after floor of dense fun
^fun
experience. I mean, Snarl must know me well already, perhaps on some psychic level, if he’d sent me to FAO Schwarz, only the mecca of everything that was Great and Beautiful about the holidays. Snarl must love Christmas as much as me, I decided.

I went to the information counter. “Where will I find the Make Your Own Muppet Workshop?” I asked.

“Sorry,” the counter person said. “The Muppet Workshop is closed for the holidays. We needed the space for the
Collation
action figure displays.”

“There are action figures for paper and staplers?” I asked. How had I not known to include these on my list to Santa?

“Yup. Just a hint: You might have better luck finding the Fredericos and the Dantes at Office Max on Third Ave. They sold out here the first day they went on sale. But you didn’t hear that from me.”

“But please,” I said. “There has to be a Muppet workshop here today. The Moleskine said so.”

“Excuse me?”

“Never mind,” I sighed.

I worked my way past the Candy Shoppe and Ice Cream Parlor and Barbie Gallery, upstairs past all the boy toys of guns and Lego warlands, through the mazes of people and products, until I finally landed in the
Collation
corner. “Please,” I said to the salesclerk. “Is there a Muppet workshop here?”

“Hardly,” she spat. “That’s in
April
.” She said this with all the contempt of
Well, duh, who
doesn’t
know that?

“Sorry!” I said. I hoped someone’s parents sent
her
to Fiji next Christmas.

I was about to give up and leave the store, my belief in the Moleskine defeated, when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned around and saw a girl who looked college age, dressed like Hermione Potter. I assumed she was a store employee.

“Are you the girl looking for the Muppet workshop?” she asked.

“I am?” I said. Don’t know why I said it like a question, other than I wasn’t sure I wanted Hermione knowing my business. I’ve always resented Hermione, because I wanted to be her so badly and she never seemed to appreciate as much as I thought she should that she got to be her. She got to live at Hogwarts and be friends with Harry and kiss Ron, which was supposed to happen to me.

“Come with me,” Hermione demanded. Since it would be dumb not to do what a smarty like Hermione instructed, I let her guide me to the farthest, darkest corner of the store, where the stuff no one cared about anymore, like Silly Putty and Boggle games, was. She stopped us at a giant rack of stuffed giraffes and tapped on the wall behind the
animals. Suddenly the wall opened, because it was in fact a door camouflaged by the giraffes (
giraffe-o-flaged
?–must
OED
that term).

I followed Hermione inside to a small closet-like room where a worktable with Muppet heads and parts (eyes, noses, glasses, shirts, hair, etc.) was set up. A teenage boy who looked like a human Chihuahua—excitably compact yet larger than life—sat at a card table, apparently waiting for me.

“You’re HER!” he said, pointing to me. “You don’t look at all like I expected even if I didn’t really imagine how you’d look!” His voice even sounded like a Chihuahua’s, quivery and hyperactive at the same time, but somehow endearing.

My mother always taught me it was impolite to point.

Since she was in Fiji on her own covert mission and wouldn’t be here to scold, I pointed back at the boy. “I’m ME!” I said.

Hermione shushed us. “Please lower your voices and be discreet! I can only let you have the room for fifteen minutes.” She inspected me suspiciously. “You don’t smoke, do you?”

“Of course not!” I said.

“Don’t try anything. Think of this closet as an airline lavatory. Go about your business, but know that smoke detectors and other devices are monitoring.”

The boy said, “Terrorist alert! Terrorist alert!”

“Shut up, Boomer,” Hermione said. “Don’t scare her.”

“You don’t know me well enough to call me Boomer,” Boomer (apparently) said. “My name’s John.”

“My instructions said
Boomer
, Boomer,” said Hermione.

“Boomer,” I interrupted. “Why am I here?”

“Do you have a notebook to return to someone?” he asked.

“I might. What’s his name?” I asked.

“Forbidden information!” Boomer said.

“Really?” I sighed.

“Really!” he said.

I looked to Hermione, hoping to invoke some girl power solidarity. She shook her head at me. “Nuh-uh,” she said. “Not getting it out of me.”

“Then what’s the point of all this?” I asked.

“It’s the Make Your Own Muppet point!” Boomer said. “Designed just for you. Your special friend. Arranged this for you.”

My day had been seriously suck so far, and despite the seemingly good intentions, I wasn’t sure I felt like playing. I’ve never desired a cigarette in my life, but suddenly I wanted to light one up, if only to set off the alarm that might get me out of this situation.

There was too much not to think about. I was tired from not thinking about it all. I wanted to go home and ignore my brother and watch
Meet Me in St. Louis
and cry when sweet little Margaret O’Brien bashes the snowman to bits (best part). I wanted to not think about Fiji or Florida or anything—or anyone—else. If “Boomer” wouldn’t reveal Snarl’s name or probably anything else about him, what was the point of my being here?

As if he knew I might need a morale boost, Boomer handed me a box of Sno-Caps. My favorite movie candy. “Your friend,” Boomer said. “He sent this for you. As a deposit on a later gift. Potentially.”

Okay okay okay, I’d play. (
Snarl sent me candy! Oh, how I might love him!
)

I sat down at the worktable. I decided to make a Muppet that looked like how I imagined Snarl looked. I chose a blue head and body, some black fur styled like an early Beatles hairdo, some Buddy Holly black glasses (not unlike my own), and a purple bowling shirt. I glued on a pink Grover nose shaped like a fuzzy golf ball. Then I cut some red felt to shape the lips like a snarl, and placed that onto the mouth position.

I remembered when I was ten—not too long ago, now that I thought about it—and loved going to the American Girl store beauty parlor to get my doll’s hair fixed up, and how one time I asked the store manager if I could possibly design my own American Girl. I’d already figured my girl out—LaShonda Jones, a twelve-year-old roller boogie champion from Skokie, Illinois, circa 1978. I knew her history and what clothes she’d wear and everything. But when I asked the store manager if they would help me create LaShonda right there inside the American Girl palace, the manager looked at me with such an expression of sacrilege you’d have thought I was a junior revolutionary politely asking if I might blow up Mattel, Hasbro, Disney, and Milton Bradley headquarters at the same time.

Even if his name was classified information, I wanted to hug Snarl. He’d inadvertently made one of my secret dreams come true—allowing me to build my own doll while in a toy mecca headquarters.

“Do you play soccer?” Hermione asked me while she folded away the clothes I didn’t use for my Muppet. Her folding was so expert I wondered if she was a store employee on loan from the Gap.