Feather Brain (10 page)

I stared at him, openmouthed.

He just shrugged and led me down the hall. He stopped in front of a closed door. “Ready?” he asked.

“Uh, is he loose in your room?” I asked, suddenly nervous.

“Of course he is,” he said. “Where else would he be?”

“I kept him in my closet,” I said, puzzled he hadn't figured that out.

Kyle frowned. “So that's why you aren't as scratched! My closet doors are broken. The landlord won't fix anything, and he won't pay for supplies either.”

“Doesn't the beast attack you in the night? He did me, the first night.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Kyle, rubbing the deep scratch down the side of his face. “That's why I've been sleeping on the sofa.”

I remembered the pile of blankets. “Maybe we could put the blankets over our heads,” I said, “for protection. And we should wear leather gloves.”

Kyle looked at me like I was nuts. “Who has leather gloves? Dad has work gloves, but he needs them. I'm not allowed to touch his tools. If he doesn't have what he needs when he needs it, he can't do his job, he doesn't get paid and we don't eat. So I don't touch his tools. But we could use the blankets.”

We draped ourselves in blankets and stood at the door again, looking like Jedi knights who'd just crawled out of bed.

Kyle opened the door, and we stepped into the room.

The beast leapt at us, screeching. I jumped back, but he clawed his way up my blanket. I kicked through the blanket and he flew off, banging against the edge
of Kyle's bed. While he lay on the floor, stunned, Kyle knelt beside him and waved the raw meat near his nose.

“Don't give it to him,” I said. “Put it in the bag, so he'll crawl in on his own.”

“Grab the bag, would you?” he asked. “I tossed it into the closet.”

I rooted around in his closet, through piles of worn-out runners and old jeans. Finally I spotted the bag and grabbed it from a dark corner. It smelled even worse than when I'd had it; I gagged and hoped Mom never saw or smelled it.

The beast was growling over the bowl of meat. I snapped, “I told you not to feed him.”

Kyle looked up at me with scared eyes. “If I hadn't fed him, he'd have attacked again.”

I sighed and knelt beside the beast. “Help me with the bag,” I said.

Kyle and I spread open the bag. Then I slid it right beside the beast. I slipped my hand under the bowl. The beast growled and shook his head at me, bits of raw meat flying from his mouth. Then he turned back to his food.

Slowly, I slid the bag under the bowl and set the bowl down inside. The beast was too focused on
eating to notice; he just followed the food straight into the bag.

Carefully, Kyle and I drew up the bag around the beast. He didn't realize what was happening until we were pulling the top closed. Then, with a shriek, he struggled to get out, clawing at our hands as we tugged the bag shut. By the time we'd tied it, Kyle was bleeding and I had a new gouge across the palm of my hand.

But the beast was in the bag, and we were ready to bury it.

Kyle and I washed quickly. Then I grabbed my backpack and Kyle grabbed the beast's bag, and we walked over to my house.

We didn't talk much. We were too focused on the job to do anything but walk and think.

As soon as we got off Kyle's street, the neighborhood became nicer: not much traffic, lots of trees, well-kept houses instead of run-down duplexes. The houses were small but freshly painted, with raked and mown lawns.

My house looked really nice after Kyle's. It even smelled nicer here, fresh and green.

Mom was working in the front garden. I asked her if we could dig in the vegetable garden in the backyard.

“You want to dig the garden for me?” she said, smiling. “Oh, yeah. Any time! Well, any time before I've planted it. After that it's off-limits.”

I grinned. “No problem. We just want to dig today.”

I grabbed a shovel and we set to work. The soil was dug every year, so it didn't take long to start a hole. But the soil got harder the deeper we dug. Soon we were turning up chunks of pale gray clay, sticky and dense. But we kept digging, taking turns when we got tired, until we had a hole half as deep as the shovel.

Mom brought out a plate of double chocolate cookies and two glasses of milk. “You guys are working so hard, I thought you might need a snack.” We ate the cookies almost as fast as the beast had eaten his meat. Then we got back to work.

I dragged over the garden hose. When the hole was filled with water, we went in search of ash.

Our fireplace has a tiny door on the outside of the chimney for cleaning out the ash. I got the little shovel from beside the fireplace and a plastic bag, and Kyle and I shoveled out a winter's worth of gray ash and black coals. Kyle held the bag while I shoveled. Each time I dropped a shovelful of ash into the bag, it rose
up in a white cloud, coating Kyle's hands and leaving him choking. I finally learned to slide it off the shovel really slowly, and Kyle learned to hold the bag close to the little door and far from his face. Pretty soon we had a bag full of ash and a clean fireplace.

We carried the ash back to the vegetable patch and set it beside our lake. Except it wasn't a lake anymore; the water had drained out, leaving a muddy hole. We liked the idea of a mud pit, so while I filled the hole with water, Kyle stirred the dirt with a broken branch, making a thick, dark soup.

Mom wandered over to take a look, and I realized that was the perfect time to take out the beast. She stood near the hole, holding a bucket filled with dead leaves and gardening tools. I hid the bag behind some raspberry canes so she wouldn't see how gross it had become. The beast clawed at my hands as I untied the bag. Then he became still as I turned toward Mom. Before she could stop me, I took what she thought was my beautiful feathered dinosaur model and dropped him into the mud. Mom gasped.

Kyle grabbed the bag of ash and spoke in a low, rumbly voice. “The beast fell into a pit of mud. On a normal day he might have been able to escape—but on
this day—this fateful day—the great volcano Kylealuke erupted, burying the dinosaur's world in ash.”

Mom started to laugh.

Then Kyle turned the bag of ash upside down and dumped. Wind caught the ash and blew it into our faces. We choked and jumped back and watched as maybe half of it settled on the surface of the mud.

Mom jumped back too. “Oh, you guys—this is gross!” But she was so pleased I was being gross outside with a friend instead of sitting alone in my room that she smiled when she said it. And she didn't say a thing about the ash and clay in her garden.

Then Kyle added, still using his voice of doom, “Now, we wait, to see if the dinosaur can survive this terrible disaster.”

Mom shrugged. “Well, it's not going to crawl out on its own, is it?”

I choked and turned away so she couldn't see my face. Kyle kicked me and turned back to the ash pit. When we just stood there, waiting, Mom got bored and went back to work.

Kyle and I stood frozen, watching, waiting for movement, for some sign of life. We knew he wouldn't be able to move until Mom was gone, so perhaps now he would crawl out. But he didn't. The ash settled
in a gray layer, swirling in little whirlpools when the wind gusted, but nothing rose from below.

I smiled, just a little. “Maybe this'll really work,” I muttered.

“Just wait,” said Kyle, but he smiled too.

“The longer he's down there, the more likely he'll die,” I said. “He can't breathe mud.” I was barely breathing myself, waiting, hoping.

And still nothing moved. We smiled at each other. As the ash pit stayed quiet, we started to grin.

“We've done it,” I whispered. “We've done it!”

Kyle's eyes started to shine. “You really think so?”

“Oh, yeah. He couldn't possibly live that long without air!”

And then the mud burped. Kyle and I jumped back in horror. He hadn't died—he was still alive—how could that be? He really must be some kind of monster. We stared at the pile of ash; my stomach felt like a mud pit.

As we watched, the ash shifted, the mud burbled and one foot emerged.

Just like in a horror movie, one arm reached out, coated in mud and ash, then another foot and then the head. The beast looked all around until he spotted us. He stared, his eyes filled with hate.

Kyle and I looked at each other in horror. The beast was alive!

He crawled up the lip of the mud pit, through the ash, and hung on the side of the pool, coated in black ooze, staring at us. I stared back, unable to move, to speak, to think. Finally Kyle elbowed me.

“What should we do?” he whispered.

I hadn't a clue. I was so tired of the beast, so tired of fighting him. But when he lifted his head and started to roar, I knew I had to do something.

“Mom,” I bellowed. Then I whispered to Kyle, “If Mom's here, he'll be a model, and we can put him in the bag.” Then I yelled again. “Mom!”

She came running. “What is it?” she said, panting slightly. She looked all around, trying to figure out what the panic was.

“Look,” I said. “He's alive!”

She took one look at the beast, frozen at the side of the pond, mud-caked arms and head emerging from the goo, and started to laugh. “You guys are so weird,” she said as she turned away.

I made a face at Kyle to keep her talking. Kyle made a face back; he didn't want to do it.
C'mon
, I mimed.
You have to
. At least that's what I tried to say with waving hands and scrunched-up face.

Kyle sighed and called out, “Mrs. Clarke?”

Mom turned and took a few steps back toward us. “Yes, Kyle?”

I bent down to grab the leather bag.

“Um, could I get the recipe for your double chocolate cookies? They're really good.”

“Your mom likes to bake?”

He shook his head. “I live with my dad.”

Mom nodded. “Sure. I'll photocopy the recipe for you.”

While they were talking, I scooped up the beast and dropped him into the leather bag, struggling
to keep the beast in view of Mom, but the bag out of her sight.

Kyle and I dragged ourselves inside and scrubbed off the mud. We went back outside when Mom called us to clean the ash and clay out of her garden. Then she sent us in to scrub again and have a few more cookies. Finally we headed upstairs to figure out a new plan.

Kyle dropped the bag on the floor and shut my door, while I flipped on the radio to cover the beast's shrieks of rage. Kyle and I flopped on my bed, side by side.

“What are we going to do now?” Kyle grumbled.

I groaned. “No idea.”

We both sighed.

“How did we get into this in the first place?” Kyle asked, shaking his head.

“All from some stupid website,” I moaned.

Kyle sat up suddenly. “Show me.”

“What?”

“Show me the website. Maybe it'll give us some ideas.”

We raced downstairs into the office. Kyle stopped at the doorway to look around, but I ignored Mom's desk and filing cabinets and went straight to the computer table. I sat at the keyboard, and Kyle pulled up another chair. I logged on and got onto the Internet. In just
a few minutes the home page for howweirdcanyouget.com was loading.

Kyle watched in silence. I glanced over as I waited. He had a funny look on his face. “What?” I asked.

“I wish I had a computer at home,” he said softly. “You have no idea how lucky you are.”

I shrugged, not wanting to make a big deal of it.

Once we were on the website, Kyle and I started to skim through the ads.

“There's the kit I ordered,” I said, pointing at the roaring dinosaur over the text. “Make a Dinosaur Come to Life, nineteen ninety-five.”

We kept going, muttering as we read the ads.

“Turn your skateboard into a hoverboard.”

“Talking masks.”

“Hey, how about this one?” I said with an excited squeak. “
Dinosaur Too Lively?
” The picture with this ad was of a dinosaur rising up on its hind legs, claws slashing, mouth open in what looked like a gigantic roar.

Kyle leaned forward to read the small print. “What is alive will be still, but only if sprayed, when alive, by the creator or owner. Only sixty-nine ninety-five.”

“What?” I said, indignant. “Twenty bucks to get into trouble, and seventy to get out? What a rip-off!”

Kyle laughed. “Kind of clever, don't you think? It's not like we won't buy it!” Then he paused. “You can buy it, can't you?”

“I don't have seventy dollars,” I said. “I have some allowance money, but I spent all my birthday money on the last kit and a book. I spend all my money on dinosaur stuff. How much do you have?”

Kyle flushed. I stared. I'd never seen him turn red before. He turned away and mumbled, “I spent all my money too. I don't have a thing.”