Zero Tolerance Meets the Alien Death Ray and Other (Mostly) Inappropriate Stories (3 page)

BOOK: Zero Tolerance Meets the Alien Death Ray and Other (Mostly) Inappropriate Stories
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Chewing. Swallowing. Mindlessly chewing
whatever it was fed.

Warmth flooded my mouth. I opened my eyes.
To my horror, I saw a sausage on my fork. The severed, open end
dripped an amber-colored grease. In my mouth, I could taste the
remains of the hunk I had mindlessly bitten, chewed, and
swallowed.

"Another?" my mother asked.

"Yes, please," I said. I closed my eyes and
took a large bite.

 

Nice Kitty

Seventh grade seems sort of old for Pet Day,
but I have the greatest dog in the world, so I figured I'd bring
him. Roy was fine being around other animals, even after we walked
into my first-period math class and saw the tiger lying next to Mr.
Stockton's desk. At first, I thought it was fake. Mr. Stockton is a
bit of a joker. But then I noticed that the tiger's flanks were
moving slowly with each breath. As I said, Roy was fine — but I
could feel myself tense up a bit.

"She's safe," Mr. Stockton said. "She just
had a big meal. Sheeba won't want to do anything except nap for a
while."

"Okay..." I pulled back on the leash as Roy
tried to get close enough to sniff the tiger.

"You're just a big kitty, aren't you?" Mr.
Stockton said. He knelt down and ruffled the tiger's head. "Who's
my sweet girl? Who's my little biddle kitty-iddle."

I led Roy over to my seat in the second row.
I was the first one there, which meant I got to watch the rest of
the class come in. It was pretty much a three-step process. Step
one: walk in, all proud of your pet — whether it was a cat, a rat,
or a salamander — and all ready to get attention. Step two: freeze,
then stare in disbelief at Sheeba, possibly leaving your mouth open
long enough for a bit of drool to form and dangle. Step three:
chase your fleeing pet down the hall while groaning at the pain of
having claws, teeth, beaks, or pincers break your flesh.

Eventually, we all got seated. Mr. Stockton
started the lesson. Nobody paid much attention. Everyone stared at
Sheeba. But, like he'd said, she seemed happy to nap. And I think
there's some expression about letting sleeping tigers lie. If not,
there should be. We hadn't gone more than ten minutes into the
period when Duncan Imberson, who sat dead center in the front row,
leaned forward and dangled his hamster cage in Sheeba's face.

"Want a snack?" he asked. "Yummmm. It's
hamsterific."

"Stop that, Duncan," Mr. Stockton said.

I didn't think it was very funny. The
hamster was terrified, and had nowhere to hide.

A minute or two later, Duncan dangled the
hamster again. "Mmmmm. Crunchy and chewy," he said.

"Duncan, please stop doing that," Mr.
Stockton said.

Of course, Duncan didn't stop. But after the
fifth or six time he dangled his hamster, Mr. Stockton took away
the cage and put it on his desk. "You can have your pet back at the
end of the period," he said.

Duncan kept quiet for about five minutes.
Then he grabbed Sylvia Baldwin's bird cage and tried to dangle that
in front of Sheeba.

Sylvia snatched the cage away from him and
moved to a different seat.

When the bell rang, Roy, who'd been lying
patiently by the side of my desk, got up, looked at me, and panted.
"Let's get you some water," I said. As I headed out of class, I saw
Duncan walk to Mr. Stockton's desk and reach toward the hamster
cage.

 

Mr. Stockton put his hand on the cage and
said, "I think I changed my mind. Sheeba's probably hungry by now.
Maybe we should give her a snack. Maybe that will teach you a
lesson."

I was sort of interested in seeing how this
turned out. But Roy was tugging at the leash, and I knew he was
thirsty. Besides — Mr. Stockton was just bluffing. He was too much
of a softie to ever sacrifice a hamster. So I headed down the hall
to get Roy's water bowl from my locker.

The rest of the day was a lot of fun.
Everyone had a great time, and Roy got tons of compliments, both
for his behavior and his appearance. I guess seventh grade isn't
too old for Pet Day.

The next day was pretty much back to normal.
No pets. Well, there was one pet. Duncan's hamster. It was in its
cage on a table at the back of Mr. Stockton's classroom. That was a
relief, because I didn't think it would be fair to use the hamster
for a snack, even if Sheeba was a pretty cool looking tiger.
Speaking of Sheeba, there was no sign of her.

It was a couple days later that I realized
there was no sign of Duncan, either. Not then. Not ever. So maybe
Sheeba had gotten a snack after all.

 

Jeepers,
Creepers, Where'd You Get That Beeper?

To tell the truth, I really didn't know
exactly what a beeper was or how they worked until the day I found
one. I'd seen them in old movies. They're called
pagers
now,
and they do all sorts of fancy stuff. But back then, they were just
called beepers, and most of them didn't do much at all. If someone
had asked me how they worked, I wouldn't really have been able to
give a good answer. It wasn't something I paid much attention
to.

I wouldn't even have found it if it hadn't
beeped when I walked by. At the time, I believed it was a
coincidence. I was on my way home from school. I was late. Mr.
Atkins had made me stay after to work on an essay. I'd already
written it once, but he told me I didn't put enough effort into it
and he wanted me to try again. So I got out later than the rest of
the kids. I'll bet a couple hundred kids walked right past the
beeper before I did. It was lying on the ground next to the
sidewalk, just a block away from the school. But it blended into
the dirt pretty well, so it wasn't surprising that nobody noticed
it. As I said, I would have walked right by if it hadn't
beeped.

But it did beep. I stopped when I heard the
sound. I really didn't know what I was hearing, but it seemed
familiar. I searched around, then finally found the beeper. It was
a small box, about half the size of a deck of cards, and there was
one of those little windows on one side like they have on
calculators.

It stopped beeping as soon as I picked it
up. There wasn't any message in the window.

I stood there for a minute, holding the
beeper and wondering what to do with it. The right thing would be
to try to find the owner. I had no idea how to do that. I thought
about just putting it back where I'd found it. I actually started
to bend down and place it back on the ground.

As I reached toward the spot where it had
been, it beeped again. Just one short beep. I stood up checked the
display window. There was still nothing showing.

I figured I'd bring it with me and ask my
folks what to do after they came home from work. So I put the
beeper in my shirt pocket and walked the rest of the way to our
apartment.

My friend Max was waiting for me on the
front steps. "I thought you'd never get here."

"Look what I found." I showed him the
beeper.

"Cool," Max said.

It beeped again. This time there was a
number in the window. "Let's call it," I said. "Maybe we can find
out who this belongs to."

We went inside and I dialed the number.
After four rings, I heard the click of an answering machine. "I
can't come to the phone right now," the voice said. "Please leave a
message when you hear the tone."

I hesitated, not knowing what to say.
Finally, I hung up without saying anything.

"Well?" Max asked.

I told him about the message. The beeper
beeped again. I dialed the new number. It was another answering
machine. This time, the message said, "Need a new roof? You've
called the right place. Leave your number and we'll get back to
you."

I hung up again. "This is weird," I told
Max. "I think the number is supposed to be someone who's just
called the beeper. Right? But nobody is home at these places."

Max shrugged. The beeper beeped. I looked at
the number.
Why not
, I thought. I dialed again. No surprise
— another recording. "To leave a message for John, press one. To
leave a message for Karen, press two."

I hung up. The beeper beeped. The next call
told us, "Be back soon — leave a message if you want."

"I think it's broken," I said. "It's
probably just putting up any number."

"Yeah," Max said. "Maybe it got wet."

The beeper beeped. I dialed almost before I
realized what I was doing. Sure enough, another message, "Buried
under a ton of work? We can help you with secretaries and other
office personnel. Leave your number and we'll get back to you."

"Man, this doesn't make any sense," I said.
"I've got better things to do than to make all these calls. Maybe I
should just put it back where I found it."

"Yeah," Max said. "Or you can toss it in the
trash."

I looked at the can. And I thought about the
messages. I wrote them down.

I can't come to the phone right now.

Need a new roof?

To leave a message for John, press one.

Be back soon — leave a message if you
want.

Buried under a ton of work?

As I stared at them and saw the pattern, I
felt my blood freeze in my body. My hand fell open and the beeper
clattered to the floor.

"What's wrong?" Max asked.

"Look." I pointed to the messages with my
pencil. "Read the first word of each one," I said.

Max took the sheet from me. "I need to be
buried." He stood there for a moment. I guess it took that long for
the meaning to sink in. Then he said, "Whoa," and dropped the
paper.

I stepped back from the beeper.

"Too weird," Max said. "It has to be a
coincidence."

"Has to," I said.

The beeper beeped.

I looked at the beeper. Then I looked at
Max. Max looked at me. "Guess we have to find out," he said.

"We can't stop now." I picked up the beeper.
The plastic felt oddly cold. I dialed, listened to the recording,
and wrote down the first word.

There was no mistake. A message was forming.
When it was done, the beeper stopped. I read the whole message
aloud. "I need to be buried. Look under bridge on river. Thank
you."

"Spooky," Max said.

"Yeah. Too spooky." This wasn't like a scary
movie or a Halloween haunted house that you knew wasn't real. This
was flat out creepy.

"Now what?" Max asked.

"I'm not looking for a body," I said.

"No way," Max agreed.

"We have to tell someone." If I called the
police, they'd want to know how I knew. They'd never believe the
truth. I realized I had to go to the bridge first. Max didn't want
to go, but I talked him into it.

"I don't see anything," he said, when we
reached the bridge.

I searched the rippling surface. There had
to be something in the water. For the second time that day, I felt
my blood freeze. I could barely make out the shape deep below me. I
knew it wasn't a tree branch or anything like that.

"Come on," I told Max. We walked off the
bridge and went to find a policeman.

That evening, the police recovered a
skeleton from the river. I heard them say whoever it was must have
been there for at least seventy years.

"Funny thing," the policeman told me when it
was over. "You'd think the rescue workers would have spotted
something when they pulled that car out last week.

"What car?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Some guy was more
interested in talking on his cell phone than on watching the road.
He went right into the water." He pointed over to the
guardrail.

I could see that a spot looked newer, like
it had just been replaced. "Was he hurt?"

The policeman shook his head. "Nope. Just
wet. But even after we rescued him, all he could do was complain
that he'd lost his phone. It's probably still sitting on the
bottom. If you ask me, that's the best place for it. Those things
will get you killed if you're not careful." He shrugged and walked
back to his patrol car.

Max and I stood for a while and watched the
water running beneath the bridge. When we were ready to leave, I
reached into my pocket and took out the beeper. It beeped once.
Then it was silent. It never beeped again. But I kept it. I'm not
sure, but I think it brings me luck.

 

Growing
Pains

I would have enjoyed the assembly a lot more
if I wasn't sitting next to Augie Blockner. He's the biggest kid in
our school, and he liked to make sure everyone knew it. When I took
my seat, he poked me in the arm and said, "Hey, shrimp."

Okay — I'm short for my age. But I'm not so
short I'd be mistaken for seafood. I looked over at him and said,
"Hi." It was the safest thing to do. If I ignored him, he'd get
mean. If I tried some sort of wise-guy answer, he'd get even
meaner.

Luckily, the assembly started before Augie
could think of some way to make my life miserable. The program was
actually pretty cool. They had a five real football players on
stage. These guys made Augie look like — well, they made him look
like he made me look. That's how big they were.

They talked about stuff like studying hard
and staying in school. It wasn't really a message I needed to hear.
I did okay in school, and I didn't have any plans to drop out of
seventh grade to enter a life of crime.

They also talked about eating good food, and
paying attention to nutrition. The biggest player in the group held
up a sack of oranges in one hand and a head of lettuce in the
other.

"This is what your body needs."

Another guy lifted a two-liter bottle of
cola. "This
isn't
what you need."

The third guy showed us a picture of a cow.
"Balanced meals are important," he said.

I zoned out as they went over all the food
groups. I knew that stuff. They also warned us about steroids and
other dangerous substances.

"Kids," one of the players said, picking up
a small bottle of clear liquid, "this will do all sorts of evil
things to your body. It just isn't worth it."

BOOK: Zero Tolerance Meets the Alien Death Ray and Other (Mostly) Inappropriate Stories
10.02Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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