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Authors: Bill Harley

Charlie Bumpers vs. the Perfect Little Turkey (9 page)

BOOK: Charlie Bumpers vs. the Perfect Little Turkey

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16
B-A-R-P-H

I headed out of the room with the doorknob in my hand. Just as I got to the stairs, Uncle Ron came running down. He blew by me and I heard the back door slam as he went outside. I figured he was going to his truck to get his tools.

When I got upstairs, I found Mom, Dad, and Matt standing by the bathroom door. Chip was screaming and sobbing on the other side.

“It’s okay, Chip,” Mom was saying. “We’ll get you out in a jiffy. Uncle Ron can get the door open.”

“I want Mom!” he wailed.

I squeezed between them, shoved the doorknob in the hole in the door, and gave it a twist. The
door opened and there was Chip in the bathroom, standing by the toilet.

In his hands was the Buck Meson Transport Module.

Broken in half.

“You broke my model!” I yelled.

“Not now, Charlie,” Dad said.

Not now! When? Chip had destroyed my perfect transport module!

“I don’t feel good!” Chip moaned. Neither did I.

Mom gave me a cold look, then took Chip by the hand and led him into my room.

“I don’t feel good,” he kept saying. “I want my mom.”

I heard my mother say, “You’re fine now. You just need to calm down.”

“I can’t,” he said hiccupping and sobbing. “I feel bad, I feel—”

And then I heard the unmistakable sound of someone throwing up.

I ran into my room.

I sure didn’t want to sleep in my own bed that night.

Or maybe ever.

Mom helped Chip off the bed and back into the bathroom. I stood there looking at Chip’s Thanksgiving dinner. The rolls and the whipped cream.

And the Swedish Fish. A lot of them, swimming around in everything else.

And my broken model of the Buck Meson Transport Module.

Buck Meson! The special was still on downstairs! I ran out of my bedroom. Right into Dad.

“Charlie, Matt, Mabel, come with me,” he said, in his very serious voice that I never wanted to hear.

“But
Buck Meson
’s on downstairs!” I said.

“I don’t care where he is, we need a talk.”

“I didn’t do anything!” Matt said.

The Squid’s mouth was shut in a tight line.

“Come with me,” Dad said. “All of you.”

“Let me go pause the show,” I pleaded.

“Right
now,
” Dad said.

He was mad.

Never mess with a mad dad.

He led us into his and mom’s bedroom, then closed the door. “Charlie,” he said, “did you lock Chip in the bathroom?”

“No, I just had the doorknob.”

Dad gave me a confused look. “You just had the doorknob?”

“Yes,” I said.

I looked at the Squid. Her bottom lip was trembling.

“How did you get the doorknob?”

I looked at the floor. I didn’t really want to tell all this to Dad. It was going to be a very complicated explanation.

“What about you, Matt?” Dad asked. “Didn’t you hear Chip calling for help? You were the closest.”

“Um … I had my headphones on.”

Dad squinted and gave Matt an icy stare. My brother looked at the floor, too.

“What exactly is going on here?” Dad said.

It got really quiet. We could hear the faucet running in the bathroom and Mom talking softly to Chip. I was about to say something, but the Squid spoke first.

“I did it!” she blurted out.

“Did what?” Dad asked.

“I took the doorknob away so Charlie could watch the show!”

“What are you talking about?” Dad asked.

“Dad,” Matt said, “Chip’s been bugging Charlie ever since he got here.”

“That’s no excuse—” Dad started.

“But it is, Daddy!” the Squid said. “It’s a
real good
excuse. First Chip kicked the soccer ball against the garage and you blamed Charlie and then Chip
wouldn’t sleep on the mattress so he got to sleep on Charlie’s bed and then he shot off the rocket when he wasn’t supposed to and it almost hit Mrs. Walcott then he tried to hog all the rolls and ate the Swedish Fish and then he was jumping all around when Charlie was trying to watch his favorite show and he’s really, really
a-n-o …
” She paused for a minute, trying to figure out how to spell something. Then she tried again. “Annoying:
a-n-o-i-e-e-i-n-g
.”

“Dad,” Matt added, “he doesn’t listen to any of us. Everybody always says what a great kid he is, but he’s a pain.”

“P-a-i-n,”
spelled the Squid. “So I took the doorknob away. I was just trying to help Charlie.”

Dad opened his mouth to say something but no words came out. He sat down on the bed and rubbed his head. A couple of minutes earlier, it had looked like he wanted to strangle all of us, but now I thought maybe I was going to live.

“Charlie?” he said.

“Yeah?”

“It sounds like you’ve had a hard time.”

I nodded.

Dad took a deep breath. “Okay, look—”

Someone knocked on the door. Uncle Ron opened it and peeked in. “Everybody okay in here?”

“Yeah,” Dad said. “Ron, could you see what you can do about that bathroom doorknob so it never comes off again?”

“Sure thing!” Uncle Ron said and shut the door again.

“Okay,” Dad said. “It sounds like Chip can be a pain in the neck.”

“A turkey butt,” the Squid announced.

“But you don’t get to lock him in the bathroom just because he bugs you. Whatever you think of Chip, he’s got a new baby sister, and that can be hard.”

That was true. I knew what baby sisters were like.

“Charlie, Chip is only here until tomorrow morning,” Dad went on, “so you still have to put up with him and be as nice as you can to him. Even if he is
a-n-n-o-y-i-n-g.
”

“Does that spell ‘annoying’?” the Squid asked.

“Yes, it does, Squirt,” Dad said. He got up from the bed, then reached out and messed up my hair.

“What if he says something dumb?” the Squid asked.

“Then bite your tongue,” Dad said.

She scrunched up her face. “How does biting your tongue help?”

“It’s just a saying,” Dad told her. “It means sometimes it’s better to keep your thoughts to yourself.”

The Squid stuck out her tongue and bit on it. “Ow!” she said.

I was still thinking about all the things Chip had done. “Dad, he broke my Buck Meson Transport Module. And then he threw up in my bed.”

“I know you worked hard on the model. All we can do now is get another one.”

“What about a new bed?” Matt grinned. “Does Charlie have to sleep in barf from now on?”

“B-A-R-F!”
the Squid spelled loudly.

“B-A-R-P-H!”
Matt said.

“That’s not right!” the Squid said.

“I know,” Matt said.

“I’m sure your mom can take care of the bed situation, Charlie,” Dad told me.

When we came out of their bedroom, Uncle Ron had just finished tightening the bathroom doorknob. We all started down the stairs. I was hoping I could see whatever was left of the Buck Meson special.

“Charlie?” a weak voice called from my room. It was Chip.

I went back and looked in. Mom had changed the sheets and Chip was in my bed under the covers.

“Hi, Chip. Are you okay?” I asked.

“I threw up on your bed,” he said.

I nodded.

“Can you stay here?” he asked.

“I’ll sit here with you for a while,” Mom said.

“I want
Charlie
to stay,” Chip said.

He looked pretty miserable. And I’d already missed most of the show anyway. “It’s okay, Mom,”
I said. “I’ll stay for a little while.”

“All right.” Mom got up and gave me a hug. “Call if you need anything,” she said as she left the room.

“Could you sit here on the bed, Charlie?” Chip asked.

I sat down. The broken Buck Meson Transport Module was sitting on my nightstand.

“Was the show good?” Chip asked.

I shrugged. “I didn’t get to see all of it.”

“Just stay here until I go to sleep,” he whispered. His eyelids were getting heavy.

“Okay.” I picked up the broken model, wondering if we could glue it back together.

“I broke it,” he mumbled.

“I know.”

“And I pulled the rocket string too soon.”

“Yeah,” I said, staring at the pieces in my hands.

“And I threw up in your bed.”

“I know.”

“Charlie, I’m …”

It sounded like he wanted to say something that was hard to say. In a flash, I realized he was trying to say he was sorry. I waited a few seconds, then looked over at him. His mouth was open. His eyes were closed. The Perfect Little Turkey started to snore a little.

I heard the phone ring, then Matt called up the stairs. “Charlie, Tommy’s on the phone.”

I stood up and tiptoed out of the room. When I got to the kitchen, Matt handed me the phone.

“Hi, Tommy,” I said.

“Hi. Guess what.”

“What?”

“I didn’t see it.”

“Didn’t see what?” I asked.

“Buck Meson, you bozo! I missed the TV special! We had a flat tire on the way home. We spent the whole time waiting for my uncle to come help us fix it. By the time we got here, it was over!”

“Guess what,” I said. “I didn’t see it either! I
guess we’ll have to hope they show it again.”

After I hung up, I turned around. Matt was leaning against the kitchen counter with a smug grin on his face.

“What’s so funny?” I said.

“So Tommy didn’t get to see it either.”

“What’s funny about that?”

“Did you forget what I said?”

“What?”

“Didn’t I tell you I’d make sure you saw the Buck Meson show?”

“Yeah, but then Chip got locked in the bathroom and threw up. I only saw half of it.”

“No problem. I set it up to record while you were taking Mrs. Walcott’s Maserati to the car.”

“You did?”

“Yeah. Now you and Tommy can watch that dumb show whenever you want.”