Bully-Be-Gone (5 page)

A
fter Millicent left for the Wunderkind meeting, Uncle Phineas tidied the kitchen, with the help of the Robotic Chef, who'd started scraping the leftovers into Madame Curie's food dish. The Robotic Chef missed the dish completely, dumping the meager leftovers on the floor.

“Dish? Floor? Yes. Makes no difference to you, does it?” Uncle Phineas asked the cat, who'd already gobbled her meal. “You made quick work of that. And I must make quick work of repairing these trousers.”

He turned around to show the cat the deflated chair hanging off his pants. Madame Curie batted at it as if it
were a toy. Uncle Phineas laughed and then went upstairs to his bedroom to change, the cat following him, dodging and attacking his chair pants.

Uncle Phineas changed, shaved, and applied his favorite cologne. He sprayed a cloud of it, walked through the mist, then spritzed some under his armpits and behind his ears. Named Strong Like Bull, the cologne claimed to make one man smell like ten men. He had bought ten cases of Strong Like Bull many years ago when he'd heard the manufacturer would be discontinuing it. His stash of the fragrance had soured over time, yet even now he wore it because it had been his wife's favorite scent. “My big, strong inventor,” she used to say to him, so close her breath fogged his glasses.

“Just for you, my dear,” he said to a photo of Aunt Felicity he kept in the bathroom. “Wherever you are.” He kissed his fingertip and pressed it against her picture on her helmet.

Millicent's aunt Felicity had been a human cannonball for the Sprightly Sisters All-Woman Circus. She called herself an airborne artillery artist. All the photos of her showed her standing next to a cannon, in a polka-dotted leotard and satin cape and coordinating striped helmet.

One ill-fated day, during a matinee performance, she was catapulted through the top of the circus tent. Uncle Phineas was there. Long after the audience had gone, he sat stunned, looking at the hole through which she'd exited. He wished he had the power to rewind the matinee. If he
had the power, he'd once told Millicent, he would make the elephants go backward, make the lady clowns stuff themselves back into their wonky-wheeled car. In his fantasy scenario, Aunt Felicity would return through the tent roof, closing the hole behind her as if it were zippered.

However, Aunt Felicity was never seen again.

“Wherever you are, my dear.” Uncle Phineas sighed. He turned and headed downstairs, the cat trailing him, still fascinated by the deflated chair pants he had tucked under his arm. He entered the lab and laid the pants on a table. The cat leaped onto the table and pawed at the pants. Something beneath them caught her attention. She began toying with that instead.

“Madame Curie,” Uncle Phineas said, “you are being a pest today. I cannot work with you here. Perhaps you'd enjoy a romp outside.” As he picked her up, she took one last swipe at her new plaything. “What is this?” Uncle Phineas asked, examining the aluminum packet with which the cat had been so taken. He set the cat down on the floor. “‘Bully-Be-Gone. Free sample. Repels bullies, thugs, and other unsavory characters. Body heat activated,'” he read from the label. He smiled. “Now, isn't that noble? Yes? Well, one never knows when one might have a run-in with a bully.” He tore the packet open, brought it to his nose, sniffed the contents. “Odd. No smell.” He smeared the packet behind his ears and under his arms.

He lifted the cat off the floor, brought her outside through the lab door, and set her down on the lawn. He
stretched out his arms as if embracing the entire neighborhood.

“What a grand day, Madame Curie,” he said. “The air is filled with magic.”

The air was indeed filled with something he couldn't see.

Unbeknownst to Uncle Phineas, the Bully-Be-Gone intermingled with the Strong Like Bull cologne. The chemicals in each were both attracted to, yet also repelled by, one another. He'd become a sort of living firecracker. The combination of his fermented cologne and Millicent's invention, set off by his body temperature, was phenomenal. Like a Roman fountain, he was literally shooting tiny sparks of Strong Like Bull and Bully-Be-Gone.

Ping! Ping! Ping! The molecules shot hundreds of feet into the air where they were lifted by the breeze.

Over the next few days, they were carried past great stretches of farmland, over forests, and beyond hills to Pinnimuk City. There they were swirled in circular currents by passing cars, propelled by steam rising from vents in the sidewalks, jetted through the air again by the breeze.

They wafted through Pinnimuk City Central Park, between the trees, past the playground, over the lake.

When the invisible droplets finally landed, they came to rest on a homeless lady lying on a grassy knoll, a rock as her pillow, under layers and layers of newspapers. She opened one eye, then the other. She inhaled the wonderful scent that rained on her cheeks and forehead and nose.
What was it? It smelled, to her, like a good many things at once. With her head tilted back, she mentally listed the smells: popcorn, elephants, and gunpowder.

There was a fourth smell she couldn't place. She squinted, trying to recall what it was. She thought if love had an aroma, it might smell like this; tender and courageous. She thought harder. It wasn't one but two distinct bouquets: a dashing young inventor and a cologne called Strong Like Bull. Five smells in all—the sum of her former life, fragrant as a posy.

She looked at the sky and sat up, gathering the sheets of newspaper around her as if they were the children she'd never had. A single tear rolled down her cheek, paving a streak of fresh skin through the soil on her face. Then she clutched both hands over her heart. She remembered who she was.

M
illicent studied the gathering of Wunderkinder in the secret room. From Pollock's glower to Roderick's sour expression, each face doubted her. Except Tonisha's. She seemed to be waiting for a cue.

“Tonisha,” Millicent said, “this is where you come in.”

She shot out of her chair. “Millicent rescued me from Nina with one of her inventions,” she announced. “I fully endorse her current endeavor.” She sat back down.

“Thank you,” Millicent said, winking at Tonisha. “With that proof statement…” She produced a bottle of the blue substance from her backpack. “I present to you, Bully-Be-
Gone: soon to be available in cologne for men, perfume for women, and also in a handy, pocket-sized deodorant. For you outdoorsy types, I'll have Bully-Be-Gone Cream with UV protection.”

Millicent set her collection of bottles on the table.

Roderick clicked his tongue. “Your inventions don't work. Something always goes wrong,” he said. “No offense, Millicent.”

She didn't believe Roderick. He
did
mean to offend her.

“There may have been a few mishaps along the way,” Millicent said.

“Yeah,” said Pollock, pointing his finger at Millicent. “I'll never forget your Nail Clipper Mittens.”

“But your nails did look spiffy,” Tonisha said, “once you looked past the bandages.”

“There have been more than a few mishaps,” Juanita said, not playing her violin this time.

“But that is why I am offering free samples of Bully-Be-Gone,” Millicent continued. She reached into her backpack, retrieving a handful of foil packets that she dealt to the Wunderkinder as one might playing cards. “Try it for a week. If you're not completely satisfied, you've lost nothing. On the other hand, if you're pleased with the results, you'll receive a twenty percent discount on your first purchase of Bully-Be-Gone.”

Millicent had given this part plenty of thought. Giving freebies was known as promotion. Uncle Phineas had told her freebies, like shampoo samples that came in the mail
or taste tests of chili con carne at the grocery store, were among the best ways to get people to return for more of your product. And, he'd said, people love getting something for nothing—they couldn't possibly reject free samples. He was right. The Wunderkinder took the packets, some cautiously, others eagerly, as if they'd been handed complimentary fries with the purchase of a burger.

Millicent felt pretty pleased with herself.

“Well, hey,” said Leon, examining his sample, “I'll try anything if it's free.”

“Why not?” asked Pollock. “At least it doesn't have moving parts.”

“I'll give it a shot,” said Juanita.

Roderick was the only Wunderkind not wholly convinced. “And just how does this Bully whatever supposedly work?” he asked, leaning back in his chair.

Millicent turned the page on her flip chart and drew a nose on the left side of the page and a brain on the right side. “The olfactory organ,” she said, pointing to the nose, “is the most direct connection to the brain.” She drew a line between the two. “Research shows that scent is the most powerful trigger to memory.”

“Scent memory,” Roderick said. “Smells make you remember things. We know.”

Millicent scowled. “Yes, but the nose isn't very selective, is it? It smells what it smells by chance, and there's no guarantee what the brain will remember because of the smell. Pleasant memories? Unpleasant memories? Who knows?”

“Are you getting around to making a point?” Roderick asked.

“Bully-Be-Gone induces only pleasant scent memories,” Millicent said triumphantly. “Only the loveliest, happiest, dreamiest moments in a person's life.”

“The smell of lavender always reminds me of my granny,” Tonisha said wistfully.

“So what?” Roderick asked in a terse voice, the veins on his neck bulging. “I don't see how that'll keep Pollywog from taking Juanita's violin hostage again or Nina from destroying Pollock's artwork.” He added quietly, “Or all three of them from pushing me into the fountain.”

“Think about it, Roderick,” Millicent said. “It will only affect a person with a bad attitude. For the person who's in good spirits, a pleasant memory would mean nothing. It would simply be absorbed into his or her generally cheery attitude, kind of like a drop of cream in a butter churn. But for the person who is perpetually cranky, well, a pleasant memory would turn him or her into a big pile of sentimental mush.” She circled the table, closing in on Roderick. “Now, whom do you know who's perpetually cranky?”

“Principal Pennystacker,” Leon said. “He's a grouch.”

“Other than Principal Pennystacker,” Millicent said.

“Nina, Fletch, and Pollywog,” Tonisha stated.

“That's right,” Millicent said. “And, by using Bully-Be-Gone, you'll soon see those three nasty rats turn into three schmaltzy mice.”

“Indeed,” Roderick said, placing the packet in his chest
pocket, behind his pocket protector. “What harm could come of using this?”

Millicent looked at him quizzically, tilting her head. She wished she could stand on her head at that moment. She was sure Roderick Biggleton the Third would seem less grumpy when viewed upside down.

T
he homeless woman patted and shook the pockets of her overcoat for change. She worked her way up, down, and around to the other pockets in her various articles of clothing: two cardigans, a vest, three pairs of pants, and a skirt. Not a clink or clack. Nothing. She turned her pockets inside out, just to be certain there wasn't a lonely penny or stray nickel. She'd need money in order to make the trip home.

“Home,” she said to herself. She remembered home was in Masonville in an old house with a porch and trees and a lawn and an inventor. “Home. No place like it—can't live
with it, can't live without it; a penny saved is a penny earned for bus fare.” She cawed at her joke.

Her lack of funds didn't bother her. Nothing could destroy her perky mood now that her memory had returned. She'd figure out a way to get some money. She had managed for the twenty years she'd lived on the streets, she'd manage now, too.

She spent the entire day walking around the park and looking for money. She tried shaking a few parking meters for loose quarters and scrounging under park benches for change that might have fallen out of people's pockets. Her efforts turned up a nickel, a paper clip, and a stick of gum still in its wrapper. That night, she went back to her rock and fell asleep, her good cheer intact because she knew, somehow, she'd get enough money for the bus ride home.

She awoke the next morning, chuckling to herself. She'd dreamed the lawn beneath her had turned into dollar bills.

A businessman sitting on a nearby park bench didn't seem to find her laughter amusing and shot her a nervous glare from behind his newspaper.

“That's some how do you do,” she said, loud enough for the man to hear. “It just so happens you are in the presence of the Fabulous Flying Felicity—airborne artillery artist.” She stood and curtsied, the ragged hem of her overcoat skimming the neatly trimmed lawn.

He tried to ignore her, snapping the paper, drawing it closer to his face.

“I came from up there,” Felicity said, pointing to the sky, “but home is where I need to go now. Home to my inventor.” She appraoched the man and peered over the top of his newspaper. “How much are bus trips to Masonville these days?”

The man appeared annoyed. “I don't know,” he finally said. “I drive.”

“Drive what?” she asked. She wasn't really interested in what he drove; she was making friendly conversation.

“A Humdinger Deluxa LX7-CWVi with a moonroof, leather seats, sixteen-speaker music system, two phones, a television, a hot tub, and a compact microwave oven,” he said, crossing his legs assuredly.

This was the most the man had said to her thus far. She thought this odd. He hadn't introduced himself, but he had his transportation. Surely, he drove something grander than a plain old car. Also, it had to be pretty big with all those gizmos. “You drive a motor home every day?” she asked in disbelief, pulling her knit cap over her ears.

“Don't be absurd,” the man scoffed. “If you must know, a Humdinger Deluxa is the luxury car of choice here in Pinnimuk City. Haven't you seen the billboards: ‘That's a Humdinger of a Car'?”

“Well, la-di-dah,” she said, swiveling her hips. She hadn't noticed the billboards. If the man had any sense, which apparently he didn't, he'd be aware that folks who are down on their luck rarely look up. Especially at advertisements for utterly extravagant things they can't afford.

“I fly,” she continued, extending her arms before her as if she were diving. “Or, I would if I had my cannon, but I don't. So how's about some spare change? some excess coinage? some moolah? some dough? some—”

“All right,” said the man impatiently. He tilted to one side, fiddled around in his pocket, handed her a five dollar bill, and frowned. “For heaven's sake, here. Now go away.” He shooed her with his hand, a diamond ring on his finger glinting in the sun.

“Whoa,” she exclaimed, holding the crinkled bill to the sun. Five whole dollars was more money than she'd hoped for and more than she'd seen for a very long time. “Jackpot! Round-trip fare, eh? Bad news—I'm not coming back.”

“If we're both lucky,” the man said under his breath.

“We are,” Felicity said. “And thank you kindly. Gifts may not always be given kindly, but kindly they should be received.” She spun a balletic spin, her coat tenting in a cloud of dust, and sauntered down the cement path toward Pinnimuk City Station, whistling a tune she made up as she went.